To dance with the Signora was a delight: she was small and her feet in their crimson silk slippers moved like thistledown. Briefly, like a man feeling a sore tooth with his tongue, Carey wished he could dance with Elizabeth Widdrington instead, but that was utterly impossible with her jealous bastard of a husband standing guard over her. He had never before known the obsession with a woman that he felt for Elizabeth and he disliked it thoroughly. He felt perpetually confused and at war with himself, wanting to take the simplest route, march over to where she sat, pale, composed and frankly dowdy in her high-necked velvet gown, punch her loathsome consort in the nose and sweep her away with him. What he would do with her then made the material of all the sleeping and waking dreams that pestered him and frayed his temper. But none of it was possible. Elizabeth herself, with her stern sense of propriety, could and would prevent him. He could hardly see her without creating elaborate internal flights of fancy in which he tore off her clothes and took her gasping against a wall, and yet he also knew that he could not bear to hurt her and would stop if she so much as frowned. It was all too complicated for him.
If I press my suit to the Italian lady, thought the calculating courtier within him, it may ease Sir Henry’s suspicions. It might even convince the King I am not what he thinks me and perhaps…perhaps, who knows? — Signora Bonnetti might not be quite so staunch in defence of her honour?
The music of the pavane stopped and he realised he had gone through all its figures without even registering them. Signora Bonnetti curtseyed low to him and he bowed and they waited for the next dance.
Another volta, and Carey found himself grinning impudently at her. There were ways and ways to find out. He pranced and spun through the opening jig, and held her hand lightly while she responded with the women’s footwork. With his index finger he gently stroked the hollow of her palm as she danced. She laughed and spun, her skirts billowing, came neatly into his arms and in the beat and a half when he was placing his hands to lift, he made his move. In the volta the man was supposed to grip the bottom edges of the woman’s stays, front and back, to lift and spin her as she leaped. His hands disguised by crimson satin, Carey put them in two quite different places, causing the Signora to gasp and flush. He lifted her anyway as she jumped, and she spun neatly and came back to him again. He was braced for her to slap him, or stand on his toe or even accidentally on purpose dig her fan handle into his privates-all of them counter-moves he had known court-ladies make before. She didn’t, only leaned against him as he caught her, and whispered, “Gently, my dear, I am not made of marble.”
“Nor am I,” he whispered back, as he placed his hands exactly where they had been before. “See what you do to me.”
She jumped as he lifted, spun, jumped again and laughed when he steadied her in an equally scandalous manner.
The dance separated them into their own figures and Carey concentrated on lifting the solidly built lady who came into his arms as the partners changed without rupturing himself or hurting his back. His whole body was alive with the dance and the music, he felt like thistledown himself and his feet flung themselves through the complicated steps without any need for his conscious direction. He could look across the expanse of whirling courtiers and find Signora Bonnetti watching him. Perhaps? Please God, he prayed profanely, thinking about Catholic countries where the possibilities were so pleasingly endless and forgiveable.
At last the dance brought her back, whirling breathlessly into his arms and once again he held her delectably tight arse instead of her stays and flipped her up. Although he believed he had done it properly, he thought he must have mistaken the balance. She came down heavily and seemed to twist her ankle. Immediately contrite he held her up and as the measure finished, he supported her to the bench at the side of the hall.
“Signora, I am sorry,” he said. “How embarrassing for you to have such a clumsy partner…”
“Yes,” she said, not looking at all annoyed with him. “My ankle is sore and I am very hot indeed. Please take me into the garden to cool myself.”
He held his arm out to her and she wove her hand into the crook of the elbow and squeezed eloquently. “Monsieur le Depute, you are very gallant.”
“Signora Bonnetti, you are very beautiful, but too formal. Will you not call me Robin, as the Queen of England does?”
Another squeeze and the brush of her hip against his told him she was pleased.
“Why then, Robin, you may call me Emilia as my husband does-though he is no longer so gallant, alas.”
Carey bowed his head. “How can I help paying court to Emilia, the fairest jewel in Scotland?” Hackneyed, he knew; whatever had happened to his tongue?
She tossed her head and limped assiduously as he led her out towards the bowling alley, past the crowd of lords and ladies predating on the delicacies of the banquet, and through the door into the garden, where their feet crunched on gravel paths between herb beds and her ankle seemed much better already. She led him through hedges into a rose garden, from the scent, and sat them both down on a stone bench.
“For the crime of hurting my ankle with your wickedness,” said Emilia Bonnetti in a whisper, “you must now forfeit a kiss.” She proffered her cheek and shut her eyes.
Just for a moment, uncharacteristically, Carey hesitated. Somewhere inside him came a plaintive cry, protesting that this was the wrong woman, that what he needed to do was go back into the hall, kill Sir Henry Widdrington and bring Elizabeth out to the rose garden instead…And then the unregenerate old Adam arose and pointed out that wrong or not, this was a woman and an extremely juicy one at that and…God knew, he needed a woman.
She was still holding up her cheek to be kissed. He bent towards her, touched her very gently with his lips below the feather fringe of her mask, then took her shoulders and turned her so that her mouth came under his. Then he kissed her properly.
After that there was another, more ancient dance than the volta, only marginally complicated by her farthingale and his padded hose, which ended inevitably with her sitting astride his lap giggling as he bucked and gasped into the white-hot little death and bit her quite carefully on her creamy shoulder, just below the line of her gown.
She squeaked, nibbled his ear and lifted the hand that was under his doublet and shirt to tweak his nipple. They stayed like that for a while.
“We should go back,” she whispered, and sighed.
“Just a minute, Emilia my heart,” he temporised, happier than he had been in months, sliding his hands under her thighs again. God, they were beautiful to feel; why did women hide their beautiful plump smooth arses under acres of silk and linen, it was a miraculous treasure that they kept there and he wanted more…
She squeaked again, differently, and laughed. “Mon Dieu,” she said flatteringly. “I had heard Englishmen were cold-hearted.”
“Not me,” he managed to pant, his heart building up to a gallop once more, Jesus God, it had been so long…“Kiss me.”
“Tut tut. At least it’s true that Englishmen are greedy…” She was thoughtful, or her top half was, while her rump rocked gently to and fro and made him feel he was going to burst again.
“I admit it,” he muttered. “I admit it, I’m greedy, only kiss me again.”
She slid her arms out of the front of his doublet and held him round the neck so he could do it more thoroughly. She twisted her fingers in his hair and grasped in a way that would normally have hurt him while he directed her honeypot and let himself quite slowly drown in it. This time both of them cried out dangerously in the empty rose garden, and Carey crushed her against his chest as her faced relaxed like a baby’s.