The Secret History of the Pink Carnation

Chapter Thirty-Nine

An air of suppressed excitement emanated from the small group in the Balcourt courtyard. Even the horses harnessed to the plain black carriage that stood in the center of the cobblestones seemed to feel the tension, moving restlessly back and forth, swishing their brown manes. As three disheveled figures stole through the gates, the group let out a ragged cheer.

“You made it! Huzzah! I knew you could do it!” Henrietta flung herself at her mother and brother.

“What took you so long?” demanded Miles, pounding his best friend on the back.

Amy hung back behind Lady Uppington, watching as Richard was overwhelmed with joyful welcome. Henrietta clung to Richard’s arm, chattering and exclaiming, Geoff kept shaking his head and muttering, “Thank God,” Miles bounded by Richard’s side like a faithful hunting dog, and Lord Uppington took Richard’s hand with a solemnity that was enough to make anyone tearful. Even Miss Gwen unbent enough to announce that she was pleased to see him return unharmed, which, for Miss Gwen, represented a great excess of emotion.

The courtyard resounded with good cheer. Except for Amy, who wanted nothing more than to sit down heavily on the cobblestones. It had, after all, been a long and anxious night, after all the excitement of planning the raid on the Swiss gold, and the fight with Richard, and the anxiety of his rescue . . . not to mention running across half of Paris in the dead of night. Anybody’s legs would feel wobbly after all that exertion.

Amy tried to join in the jubilant spirit. After all, they had rescued Richard. Huzzah! Even in Amy’s head, the huzzah lacked conviction. She might have rescued Richard—with a great deal of help from Lady Uppington and her antiquated pistol—but there was the pesky matter of why Richard had needed rescuing in the first place. How he must despise her! He hadn’t said anything on the way back—Lady Uppington had spoken enough for all three of them—but, then, he didn’t have to, did he? She knew what he must be thinking. She had vindicated his mistrust ten thousand times over; she had done what even vile Deirdre had failed to do: She had ended his career as the Purple Gentian.

It was all over. Not only Delaroche, but fifteen—fifteen!—of his men had seen Richard unmasked, by his own hand, as the Purple Gentian. It would be all over Paris by morning, and in the London illustrated papers by noon the next day. Richard could never return to Paris again. He might not be dead, but the Purple Gentian was. Delaroche would be proud, Amy thought bitterly.

She wanted to crawl into the house, bury her head under a pillow, and hide.

“Amy!” Henrietta darted over and dragged Amy into the circle. “You’re such a heroine! What was the torture chamber like?”

“Torture chambers are so trite,” sniffed Miss Gwen.

Henrietta ignored her. “Was it truly ghastly?”

Amy scarcely registered the exchange because Richard’s eyes were on her, casting her another unreadable sidelong look. The entire way back to the Hotel de Balcourt, he hadn’t directed one solitary word her way. Just those looks.

Amy nodded absently. “Ghastly,” she echoed. She wished he would just explode already and have done with it. Tell her he hated her. Tell her she’d ruined his life. Tell her . . .

“Oooh, splendid! You must tell me all about it later. But now”—Henrietta twirled in a circle in an impromptu victory dance—“guess what we have in the carriage!”

“We?” Miles waggled his sandy eyebrows at Henrietta. “Just who went on this mission?”

Under cover of their bickering, Richard edged towards Amy, wishing that they were anywhere but in the middle of the circus he termed his family. All the way home from the Ministry of Police, he had searched for opportunities to speak to her. But his mother had hurried them so rapidly through the streets of Paris that speech had been impossible.

Geoff said something to him, but Richard ignored him, keeping one eye on Amy, who was half hidden behind his mother. Richard had already tried to make his way over to Amy no fewer than three times. The first time, Miles had cornered him, demanding to know the details of the escape. Not to be outdone, Henrietta begged a full description of the torture chamber. And his father, in his own quiet way, had proved very insistent about recounting the saga of the Swiss gold in epic detail. Lord Uppington, after seven years of following his son’s exploits from his favorite armchair in the library at Uppington House, was over the boughs at having finally been out on a mission. Richard listened with half an ear to the mechanics of constructing a barricade to stop the progress of the carriage bearing the gold. He downright ignored his father’s account of calming the horses while Miles fought it out with the coachmen. By the time Lord Uppington got around to the bit where Miss Gwen disarmed one guard and rammed another in the stomach with her trusty parasol, Richard gave up all pretense of paying attention and left his father in the middle of a sentence.

He wanted to ask Amy why she looked so woebegone. He wanted to make sure she knew he’d never meant that about her being a bit of fluff. Or a light-skirt, or a mere dalliance. He wanted . . . Oh hell, he just wanted Amy. Cavemen had had the right idea, Richard thought disgustedly. Just knock the girl on the head and bear her home to your cave. None of this having to express emotions that made a man feel like his still-beating heart was being torn from his ribs and mounted on a spike for all to jeer at.

Right. He dug his hands into his pockets and rocked back onto his heels. He’d just tell her he loved her and get it over with already.

“I’m so sorry,” Amy blurted out wretchedly, cutting Richard off before he could begin. “I know I’ve ruined everything, and I wish there were some way I could make it up to you.”

“Ruined everything?”

“The Purple Gentian.” Amy shifted on her dirty bare feet. “Your mission. Everything.”

“Not quite everything,” broke in Miss Gwen smugly. “We have the gold, and we’ll soon have Lord Richard safely out of Paris.”

“We have a boat waiting for you,” Miles called, loping around Miss Gwen. Any hopes Richard might have had for a private chat with Amy rapidly evaporated.

“The boat formerly belonging to Georges Marston,” Geoff put in smugly, joining the group.

“Don’t worry,” Miles added, “we sent Stiles along to clear it out for you.”

“We’ll pack up your things and follow in a few days,” Lady Uppington contributed. “We have it all taken care of, darling. You needn’t worry about a thing.”

“You seem to have it all planned,” Richard said levelly.

Don’t go, Amy wanted to beg. But she couldn’t. Delaroche knew Richard’s identity; to stay in Paris was to flirt with the gallows, if not something far worse. Miss Gwen was right. He had to go, and quickly.

Amy’s entire body ached with the strain of holding back tears. She tried to console herself with the prospect of carrying on the Pink Carnation—which was, after all, what she had come to Paris to do. But, somehow, the prospect of espionage had lost its luster for her. How could there be a Paris for her without Richard? His presence would haunt her in the corners of Mme Bonaparte’s yellow salon and the corridors of the Tuilleries. And then there was the Seine . . . the boat . . . the carriage . . . even her brother’s house. There wasn’t a place in the city that hadn’t been imprinted with the memory of Richard.

Even the sparkling stars in the night sky above her belonged to Richard.

“May I come with you?”

Henrietta’s mouth snapped shut midsentence; Miss Gwen ceased poking Miles with her parasol; the entire courtyard went still, everyone’s attention riveted on Amy. It was like being in Sleeping Beauty’s castle, surrounded by frozen figures caught in an enchantment.

“I want to come with you,” Amy repeated, her voice unnaturally loud in the lull. “That is,” she added, as Richard made no response, no movement, “if you’ll have me?”

“Will I have you?” Richard repeated incredulously. “Will I have you?”

Uncomfortably aware of the seven pairs of eyes upon her, Amy flushed a deep red. “Well, yes,” she muttered. “That was the question.”

“Will I have you!” Richard whooped. Swooping, he jerked Amy off her feet, and whirled her in a dizzying circle. “Oh, no, no! You have it all wrong. The question,” he pronounced, lowering her very, very slowly to her feet, “is, will you have me? After all, I’m the one who made a muddle of everything by not telling you the truth. . . .”

“But I made you reveal your secret identity,” Amy said breathlessly.

Richard grinned down at her. “I should have revealed it to you days ago.”

Could a person explode from sheer joy? If so, Amy knew her time was limited. Her heart was pounding so hard it was about to burst right out of her chest; the sides of her face were about to split from the smile that was spreading across them; and her head was so light it was about to float right off the rest of her body. “You don’t hate me for exposing you to Delaroche?”

“Not if you don’t hate me for calling you a light-skirt.”

“It was the bit of fluff that hurt,” Amy countered giddily, reveling in the press of Richard’s hands on the small of her back and the way his green eyes crinkled at the corners as he smiled down at her.

“Give me a half century or so, and I’ll make it up to you.”

“I think he’s trying to propose to you,” interjected Henrietta delightedly.

“Don’t you have someplace else you need to be?” scowled Richard.

“You’re going about this all wrong,” interrupted Henrietta again. “You’re supposed to get down on one knee and—argh!” She subsided with a muffled yelp as Lady Uppington clamped a hand over her daughter’s mouth.

“Don’t interrupt them or you’ll spoil it,” Lady Uppington hissed in a stage whisper.

“Can’t you all just go away?” Richard roared.

Amy would have seconded the sentiment had she not been in love with the whole world (even Bonaparte and his Ministry of Police) at that very moment.

“This is all very charming,” announced Miss Gwen, “but I believe you are the one who needs to go away, my lord, before someone from the Ministry of Police alerts the guards at the gates of the city.”

Richard glowered at Miss Gwen before turning back to Amy. Taking her hand, he said softly (the entire assembled crowd strained forward as one) and rapidly, “Amy, I love you. I want to marry you. I’ll get down on as many knees as you require of me—as soon as this lot goes away.” His voice dropped again. “Will you come with me?”

“To the wide world’s end,” replied Amy. “Or to Calais—whichever is closer.”

Richard grinned. “Definitely Calais, then. Does this mean you love me?” he asked in a voice pitched for Amy’s ears only.

“Yes, yes, yes!”

“Ah, my excellent powers of seduction persuaded you . . .”

“Ha!” yelped Miles from the background.

“Oh, do be quiet!” scolded Henrietta, who was quite curious to hear more about seduction techniques, even if they were her brother’s.

Amy bit her lip. “Do you really think we should be talking about seduction in front of your family?”

She looked so adorable in her embarrassment that Richard didn’t much care whether his family was breathing over their shoulders or stranded in the farthest Antipodes. He just knew he had to kiss her. Right that very moment.

“It’s all right,” he murmured, leaning in. “We are going to be married.”

“Oh, in that case . . .”

“Shhh!” Through a fog, Richard heard Henrietta hush Miles on the threshold of a snide comment. “I think he’s going to kiss her!”

Richard’s face froze a hair’s breadth from Amy’s. His jaw clenched. Amy, meanwhile, had gone bright red again, and banged her forehead against Richard’s chest, on the time-honored theory that if she couldn’t see anyone, they couldn’t see her.

“Right,” Richard said through compressed lips. “That’s enough. Let’s go.”

“Wait, we want to see your technique!” Miles jeered. “Ow!” Miss Gwen had applied her parasol to Miles’s arm with immediate effect. “Owww . . .”

“You can’t just take Amy and go!” Lady Uppington protested, looking uncharacteristically perturbed. “I know I’ve been a rather permissive mother”—Henrietta made a noise that quickly turned into a cough—“but I really cannot countenance your going off alone with a young lady of good family. And overnight, no less! No, Richard, you’ll just have to wait until we bring Amy back with us, and then we can arrange everything properly. We’ll have the wedding breakfast at Uppington House, Amy dear, unless you think your aunt and uncle will object? Hmm, I wonder if the dear archbishop . . .”

Amy put her arm firmly through Richard’s. “What if someone were to chaperone us?” She looked appealingly at her cousin. “Jane?”

Jane’s brow furrowed. She clasped her hands together at her waist. “Amy, I’m not going back.”

“What do you mean?” asked Amy.

Little circles of pink burned in Jane’s pale cheeks. “I know it was always your dream, Amy, but, if you don’t mind terribly, I’d like to stay on as the Pink Carnation.”

“Oh. Of course I don’t mind. Just, are you sure that’s what you want, Jane?”

“More than anything,” Jane said simply.

“What is the Pink Carnation?” whispered Richard to Amy.

“I’ll explain later,” Amy whispered back.

“And I”—Miss Gwen thumped her parasol for attention—“am staying with her, so don’t look to me for a chaperone, missy.”

“Not bloody likely,” muttered Richard.

“I’d be your chaperone,” volunteered Henrietta, “only Mama would never let me.”

“Besides,” Miles pointed out, ignoring the increasingly ominous expression on his best friend’s face, “the more people go along, the more difficult it will be to smuggle you all out. Kiss your betrothed good-bye, old chap, and have a pleasant journey home.”

“Enough!” Amy stamped her foot, and the sturdy boot she was wearing made a satisfying reverberation on the cobbles. Whoever had given permission for her future, hers and Richard’s, to be decided by committee? It was time to take action. Grabbing Richard’s hands, she announced, “Richard, I give you my full permission to compromise me.”

“Why aren’t we all that lucky?” sighed Miles into the shocked silence.

“Amy, you don’t mean that,” interjected Lady Uppington.

“I certainly hope you do,” breathed Richard into Amy’s ear.

“Oh, I do,” Amy whispered back wickedly, loving the way his hands started trembling in hers.

“Your reputation . . . ,” continued Lady Uppington.

“If anyone hears that I was alone with Richard, can’t we just bruit it about that we were already secretly married in France? Nobody except all of us here will ever know the difference.” Amy sent an appealing glance around the group in the courtyard. Henrietta looked like she was on the verge of applauding. Miss Gwen eyed her coldly. “Please. I don’t want to be separated again.”

“I second that,” put in Richard, squeezing Amy’s shoulders possessively.

Support came from an entirely unexpected source. From the edge of the group came a rich chuckle. “Who are we to stand in the way of young love, Honoria?” the marquess said good-humoredly. “After all, if you remember . . .”

The marchioness turned bright pink.

The marquess patted his wife’s hand, smiling broadly. “I thought so, my dear.”

Richard looked in horror from one parent to the other. “I don’t want to know. I just don’t want to know,” he muttered.

“You shall use your consequence to protect Miss Balcourt’s reputation, and no one will dare to say anything against her.”

Amy liked Lord Uppington more by the moment. She beamed at the marquess, and nearly dropped Richard’s hand with shock when Richard’s dignified father dipped an eyelid at her in a small but undeniable wink. “Welcome to the family, my dear. Now don’t you think you ought to be going?”