“Au contraire. I am ecstatic.”
“Jasper . . .” She looked at her hands, clasped at her waist, as she gathered her words. “You seem obsessed with this hunt. With what happened at Spinner’s Falls. I worry that the hunt is harming you. Would it not be better to . . . to leave it be?”
He sipped the brandy, watching her. “Why would I do that? You know what happened at Spinner’s Falls. You know what this means to me.”
“I know that you seem caught by what happened, unable to move beyond it.”
“I watched my best friend die.”
She nodded. “I know. And perhaps now you should let your best friend go.”
“If it were me, if I’d been the one to die there, Reynaud would never rest until he found the traitor.”
She watched him silently, her tilted cat eyes mysterious, unfathomable.
His lip curled as he drank the rest of the brandy. “Reynaud wouldn’t give up.”
“Reynaud is dead.”
His entire body stilled, and he slowly raised his eyes.
Her chin was tilted up, her mouth firm and almost stern. She“mosowl looked as if she could face down an entire hoard of screaming Indians.
“Reynaud is dead,” she repeated. “And besides, you are not him.”
MELISANDE BRUSHED OUT her hair that night and thought about her husband. Vale had left his study without another word this afternoon after they’d argued. She stood up from her dressing table and roamed the room. The pallet was ready for their bed, and the decanter of wine on the side table had been newly filled. All was in readiness for her husband. Yet he wasn’t here.
It was past ten o’clock, and he wasn’t here.
He’d shared supper with her. Surely he hadn’t gone out again afterward without telling her? That had been his habit in the first days of their marriage, but things had changed since then. Hadn’t they?
Melisande drew her wrap about herself and made up her mind. If he wouldn’t come to her, then she’d go to him. She crossed with determined steps to the door leading into his rooms and twisted the handle.
Nothing happened.
Melisande stared at the door handle dumbly for a moment, not quite believing what she’d felt. The door was locked. She blinked, but then pulled herself together. Perhaps it had been mistakenly locked. After all, she didn’t usually go from her rooms to his. Normally it was the other way around. Melisande went out into the hall and walked to Vale’s door. She tried the handle and found that it, too, was locked. Well, this was silly. She rapped on the door and waited. And waited. Then rapped again.
It was perhaps five minutes before the truth dawned on her: he wasn’t going to let her in.
Chapter Eighteen
It was late by the time Jack hurried back to the castle. He barely had time to put away his suit and armor before rushing to the kitchens and bribing the little kitchen boy once again. Then he ran to the royal banquet room where the court had already sat down to eat their supper.
“Why, Jack,” said the princess when she saw him, “wherever have you been, and what is that burn upon your leg?”
Jack looked down and saw that the dragon had wounded him with its fire. He danced about and performed a silly twirl.
“I am a will-o’-the-wisp,” he cried, “and I have floated on the wind to see the king of salamanders!” . . .
—from LAUGHING JACK
Jasper wasn’t around when Melisande rose in the morning. She pursed her lips when she saw the empty breakfast room. Was he avoiding her? She’d been blunt the day before—perhaps too blunt. He’d loved Reynaud, she knew, and it took time to recover from such a grievous loss. But it had been seven years. Couldn’t he see that his hunt for the Spinner’s Falls traitor had enveloped his life? A–timnd didn’t she as his wife have the right to point this out to him? Surely she was supposed to help him find happiness—or at least contentment—in life. After all the years she’d loved him, after they’d come so far in their marriage, it wasn’t fair for him to pull away from her now. Didn’t he owe her at least the politeness of listening to her?
After a simple breakfast of buns and hot chocolate, Melisande decided she couldn’t bear rattling about the big town house by herself. She patted her hip for Mouse and went with him to the front hall.
“I am taking Mouse for a walk,” she informed Oaks.
“Very well, my lady.” The butler snapped his fingers for a footman to accompany her.
Melisande pressed her lips together. She’d much rather take her walk alone, but that simply wasn’t an option. She nodded to Oaks as he held the big door for her. Outside, the sun had hidden behind a bank of clouds, making the morning so dark it was like evening. But that wasn’t what made her halt in her tracks. At the bottom of her front steps stood Mrs. Fitzwilliam and her two children, and Mrs. Fitzwilliam was carrying two soft bags.
“Good morning,” Melisande said.
Mouse ran down the steps to greet the children.
“Oh, goodness,” Mrs. Fitzwilliam said. She sounded distracted, and her eyes glittered as if from tears hardly held in check. “I . . . I shouldn’t bother you. I am so sorry. Please forgive me.”
She turned to go, but Melisande ran down the steps. “Please stay. Won’t you come in and have a dish of tea?”
“Oh.” A tear escaped and ran down the lady’s cheek. She swiped at it with the back of her hand like a little girl. “Oh. You must think me a wigeon.”
“Not at all.” Melisande linked her arm with the other woman’s. “I believe my cook is baking scones today. Please come in.”
The children looked eager at the mention of scones, and that seemed to decide Mrs. Fitzwilliam. She nodded and let Melisande lead her inside. Melisande chose a small room at the back of the house that had French doors leading into the garden.
“Thank you,” Mrs. Fitzwilliam said when they’d sat. “I don’t know what you must think of me.”
“It’s a pleasure to have company,” Melisande said.
A maid came in with a tray of scones and tea. Melisande thanked and dismissed her.
Then she looked at Jamie and Abigail. “Would you like to take your scones into the garden with Mouse?”
The children jumped up with alacrity. They contained themselves until they were outside, and then Jamie gave a whoop and ran down the path.
Melisande smiled. “They’re lovely children.”
She poured a dish of tea and handed it to Mrs. Fitzwilliam.