Clandestine Passion: Part 3 – Chapter 31

James was surprised not to hear back from Catherine immediately. She had been so troubled about the possibility of the painting being displayed. He had hoped when she received his letter that she might summon him or come to him. And yes, he had hoped that she would be grateful. But he had tried hard to have no other expectations. Such as a kiss. Or coming into his bed. Or what he most wanted—a declaration of love.

It should be enough for him that he had relieved some distress for her. And that she had promised to talk to him. Frankly. And he might finally tell her of his double life that had sustained him until he had met her and realized he only wanted to be the man in her bed, at her side, in her heart.

He had been the one she had turned to in her anxiety over the painting being in the Exhibition. That meant something, surely? That she saw him as a man who could solve problems, a man of action, not the foolish drunk he had played for so long. Not a boy. She had trusted him and he had proven worthy of that trust.

After waiting several hours, he went to sleep. He had an early meeting the next day.

He rose in the dark the next morning and checked on the painting. Yes, it was still there, still covered, leaning up against his fencing kit in his dressing room. Enfield heard James get up and he came in the room to stoke the fire for heating water for his shave and for his tea.

“Don’t touch the . . . thing in the dressing room, Enfield.”

“Yes, Your Grace.”

“It will be removed very soon.”

“Yes, Your Grace.”

The ducal carriage, normally housed at the family’s town house, appeared outside James’ rooms just after dawn. James got in and rode to Madame Flora’s.

“So, this is the end, Your Grace.” Mr. Bulverton looked much the same as usual. Ordinary. A tight-lipped bureaucrat. Flour on his clothes. Of course, the bakery was so busy in the morning, James was surprised that Bulverton was not completely coated after coming through the underground passage, like a chalk miner.

“Yes. I’ll be busy in Middlewich a great deal. And I think it would be better for everyone if I . . . grew up. I have to conduct myself responsibly now. Make sure that Ca—that my sisters and my mother know that I will always do my best, do my duty.”

“That makes sense.” Mr. Bulverton rubbed his chin.

“Oh, Jacques!” Isabella threw her arms around his neck and quickly squeezed him. “I will miss you.”

James mumbled something and then looked up and spoke more clearly, “I wondered, Isabella, if you might want to, perhaps, open a shop?”

“A shop? But what kind of shop?”

“Well, maybe for these embroidered robes you make for yourself. I would think ladies would like these a great deal. I could stake you. You could sew them and sell them and—”

“And I wouldn’t have to sell myself anymore, Jacques? It’s all right, you don’t have to rescue the whole world, you know.”

“Well, I wasn’t trying to—”

“Non, non, non. Don’t worry. I have my plans.” She hesitated. “And I hope that you are making your plans, as well.”

Mr. Bulverton stood and stuck out his hand. “Best of luck, Your Grace.”

“Yes,” James said. “Yes. And thank you.”

“Oh, Jacques? Your friend, Lord Drake, he came in last night. He is still here, I think. With Nancy.”

“Thank you, Isabella.” He kissed her on the cheek. “Au revoir.”

Bulverton suddenly gripped James’ forearm. Hard.

“You are grown-up, James. You always were. Don’t forget that. And don’t let anyone treat you like a boy. You’re not one.”

James waited in the parlor of Madame Flora’s for an hour until he saw Thomas cross the room, heading for the stairs down to the street.

“Tom!”

“Jamie!”

They shook hands and went in search of a coffeehouse. Thomas hadn’t heard about James’ father’s death.

“So, you’re a duke now.”

“Yes.”

“I didn’t think you wanted to be a duke.”

“I wasn’t given much choice, was I?”

“I suppose not. But it probably isn’t such a terrible thing, in the end. I’m sure as a duke you won’t have any trouble attracting a wife. Not that you would have had any trouble before. My housekeeper Mrs. Dewey always called you Lord Adonis behind your back, you know, and she still asks when you’re coming to Sommerleigh again.”

James smiled and frowned at the same time. “No, I didn’t know.”

Thomas leaned forward over his cup of coffee. “And last spring, when I was courting Catherine, there were a couple of times we called on her together where I was absolutely sure she was eyeing you like you were some succulent slice of roast beef, while being perfectly polite to me. That’s why I stopped asking you to come with me, you know? But at Christmas, it seemed she had quite settled into thinking of you as a kind of favorite nephew.”

James laughed a little too loudly at that.

“It seems mature women like you, Jamie. You should remember that. Especially when you go to take a wife.”

If only he could talk to his friend about his feelings. But he couldn’t. At Christmas, Thomas had said he didn’t know what love was. With his chaste marriage of convenience and his whores, Thomas would have no understanding of the twinned hope and agony in James’ heart.

Then, surprisingly, Thomas wanted to buy a book for his wife Harry and they went in search of a bookseller. Thomas Drake and James Cavendish, in a bookseller’s shop at nine o’clock in the morning. It beggared belief.

When James got back to his rooms, there was no word from Catherine waiting for him there. But he still hoped she might come for the painting, so he sent Enfield to stay at the Middlewich town house. Of course, sending Enfield away meant that she would definitely not come, he realized that.

He spent the afternoon fencing at Antonio’s, determined to distract himself with exhaustion from exertion. He exhausted himself successfully, but he still held his breath when he came back to his rooms and was sorely disappointed by no letter, no note slipped under his door. He threw his fencing kit on the floor of the drawing room. Tomorrow, he would go to her.

In the middle of the night, James came out of deep sleep. He had heard something.

“Catherine?” he called out into the dark. No reply. He went back to sleep, he thought. Then another sound roused him.

Someone was in his dressing room.

He had slept naked, hoping that she would use the key he had sent her back in February and come into his bed as she had at Sommerleigh.

Now he cursed himself for a fool.

He got out of the bed and looked for a weapon. His fencing kit was still in the drawing room. Here, the poker from by the fire. And would more light help him or help the intruder?

The question was taken out of his hands as a match was struck and light from a lamp filled the room.

It was Siddons, holding the lamp, standing in the door to James’ dressing room, pointing a pistol at James. No wonder he had lit the lamp. He needed to see to shoot.

“I’m here for the painting,” Siddons said.

“That’s theft, Siddons.” James kept the poker in his hand. “And if you fire the pistol, it will be assault.”

“Oh, no, Your Grace. If I fire the pistol, it will be murder. I assure you.”

James said nothing but he could feel his heart thumping.

“You’re the thief, Cavendish. You stole the painting from me.”

“I bought that painting. From the Royal Academy. As you know.”

“Yes. After you forced them to buy it. After you threw around your title and your money and you got your way. Like I am sure you always have.”

James was silent.

“I want you to drop that poker and light that candle on the mantelpiece. I want to see you clearly.”

James let the poker clang to the floor and he found matches and lit the candle.

“You sleep as God made you, I see. Rather difficult to be a white knight when you have no armor, eh?” Siddons laughed. “Come over here, Cavendish, and take this lamp. And then I am going to take this painting and go.”

And, in between those two things, you are going to shoot me dead. Because how could you possibly let me live to speak of your crime?

James walked over and took the lamp. Siddons, still pointing the pistol at him, backed up into the dressing room.

“Come here,” Siddons said. “I want to make sure I have the right thing.” James came into the dressing room and walked to the end and held up the lamp and removed the drape from the painting.

Suddenly, the golden-haired youth flared into life. The fearful eyes. The white skin. The ominous forest and the pool.

Siddons walked forward and flipped the painting, looking at its backside. He seemed confused for a moment and then he shrugged. “Fine,” he said. “Fine. Actually, why don’t you carry the painting for me. Carefully. Carefully. We’re going to the door to the street.”

Siddons backed away, holding the pistol out, and James hoisted the painting up with one hand, still holding the lamp with the other. James walked out of the dressing room, feeling certain that at any second, he would hear a shot and feel a bullet enter his body. Siddons followed him.

When he got to the little hall between his bedchamber and the drawing room, he felt the cold stone on his feet. He remembered the one time that Catherine had come to his rooms and how she had pulled her dress over her head in this hall and dropped it on the stone floor, and he almost wept.

Siddons was going to have the painting and there was nothing he could do.

He stopped walking and stood still. Siddons came up behind him.

“Keep moving, Cavendish.”

James turned around to face Siddons and put the painting down, resting it against his own leg. He raised the lamp in both hands high above his head and threw it as hard as he could onto the stone floor. The lamp smashed, oil splashed out and flame began to lick over the oil puddle on the stone floor.

“What are you doing? You shitsack!” Siddons jumped back.

The oil and the flames spread closer to James’ feet as he took the painting and put it facedown on the fire.

Siddons screamed, a wordless cry. James saw a lick of flame near Siddons’ outstretched hand.

Oh, James said to himself as he crumpled to the floor, that means he fired the pistol. I anticipated that, didn’t I? I just forgot to do anything about it.