"You were grazed by a piece of flying masonry," said Vaughn brusquely. "Now who am I?"
Mary scrubbed her fingers together to get rid of the stain. "You're Vaughn, and as autocratic as ever," she rasped, pleased to see that her voice had returned to her, even if she did sound like an old crone. "What happened?"
Pressing her closer, so that she could smell the acrid whiff of ash and the sickly sweet scent of blood on his waistcoat, Vaughn laughed roughly, a wild laugh of relief. "What hasn't?" he asked. "Your infernal machine went off — "
"Not mine," Mary croaked hastily, and Vaughn pulled her closer in a movement that from anyone else would have been called a hug.
"The infernal machine, then." His voice was hoarse, too, but not as bad as hers. Just a little rough around the edges, like an Irish whiskey. "It exploded and brought the whole dome down with it."
Dimly, memory returned. Taking Vaughn's hand and pulling him off the stage, trying to get as far away from the explosives as possible. And then Vaughn, stopping, trying to go back —
Mary drew in a painful breath. "Did she…?" she asked, not sure she wanted to know the answer.
"No," said Vaughn bluntly.
His eyes strayed towards the remains of the pavilion, belching smoke and flame. Tiny dollhouse figures darted forward, tossing their little droplets of water on the flames. The burning, writhing thing that had once been Lady Euphemia's theatre responded with little hisses and puffs of scorn, before blazing right back up again. "At least, I don't see how. She was directly beneath the dome when it fell."
The rectangular hall that had housed the audience was still largely intact, although the roof was already beginning to come down on one end. The bulbous dome that had covered the stage was entirely gone, collapsed in upon itself like an interrupted soufflé. Red flames, darker than Mary had ever imagined flames could be, flared out of the crumpled edifice, and the whole was cloaked in a writhing black cloud of smoke, like a medieval painter's vision of the torments of the damned.
A woman, unconscious beneath it, wouldn't have stood a chance. Even if the falling stones didn't kill her, the smoke or flame would.
"I am sorry," said Mary hoarsely.
Vaughn looked down at her with a curious expression of his face. "No, you're not." His lips twisted in brutal self-mockery. "And the most damnable part of it is that I'm not, either."
Mary would have protested, but Vaughn wasn't looking at her anyway. His gaze was fixed far away from her, on the burning rubble of Lady Euphemia's theatre.
"What a tombstone that is," he said softly. "What an epitaph. Fifteen years married and not even missed. Crushed out like the inconvenience she was. Poor Anne. I can't even hate her anymore. Hate might have been closer to love."
Streaked with soot, lit by the lurid glow, his features stark with self-loathing, he looked more than ever like Milton's Satan, doomed forever to be his own hell. Mary's heart ached for him, for the bleakness that shrouded his expression like the thick black smoke upon the pavilion.
"My wife's life snuffed out, and I haven't even the will to mourn her. The most I can muster is pity, the poor cousin to emotion. Anyone deserves better than that. Everyone deserves at least one person to mourn."
Thinking nasty thoughts about women who ran off with their music masters, returned to blackmail, and got themselves smothered under several tons of smoldering rubble, Mary struggled up on her elbows, managing to drive several holes into Vaughn's stomach in the process.
"She was dead already," she said staunchly. "Fourteen years ago. You can't be expected to mourn her twice."
Something in her voice brought Vaughn back from the hazy realms in which he was wandering. His eyes refocused on her face. His lips twisted in a cynical smile, but his hand was gentle as he smoothed the tangled hair back from her brow.
"My hard-hearted Mary," he said tenderly. "Always quick to seize on whatever is most convenient."
Mary winced and pulled back as the great diamond on his finger tangled in the knots and snaggles in her unbound hair. "Just because it's convenient doesn't mean it's not true."
Vaughn rested his forehead against hers, gritty with dirt and ash. "True," he agreed. "But even so."
It was very hard to argue with someone whose head was right up against yours, but Mary tried.
"I won't have you tormenting yourself," she said tartly, somewhere in the vicinity of his left ear.
Vaughn lifted his head and smiled at her, a genuine smile through the grime and fatigue. "No, that's your job, isn't it?"
There was such a wealth of meaning in his voice that Mary felt, suddenly, more than a little bit wobbly and oddly unsure of herself. She looked at him uncertainly. "Is it?"
Whatever Vaughn might have said was lost, as a sound like a convulsion of the earth erupted above them. Shifting her gaze hastily up, Mary saw that it wasn't an earthquake or a reenactment of Pompeii — Lady Euphemia devoted her energies purely to English scenes — but her sister's husband, clearing his throat loudly enough to do that organ permanent damage. Similarly smeared with soot, Geoffrey looked tired, and harried, and distinctly put out at Mary's using Vaughn's lap as her own private chaise longue.
"Is Letty all right?" Mary asked hoarsely, heading off any comments about her undeniably compromising position.
"Yes." Geoffrey's harried expression briefly lightened. "She is organizing the bucket brigade."
The stiff muscles of Mary's face involuntarily quirked into an answering smile. "I should have known it wasn't Lady Euphemia."
"Letty has matters well in hand," said Geoffrey proudly, turning to look back at the small figure of his wife, who was bustling up and down the line, making sure everyone had buckets, and understood they were to pour the water on the fire and not on one another.
Unwisely drawing attention to himself, Vaughn broke in, "Has there been any sign of — "
"St. George?" said Geoffrey, blessedly misinterpreting Vaughn's concern. "I don't see how anyone else might have got out. He was the Black Tulip, I take it?"
Vaughn nodded in assent.
Geoffrey allowed himself a grim smile. "Lady Euphemia is convinced the bomb was set by French agents determined to stymie her patriotic pageant. She's quite chuffed about it, despite the loss of her theatre."
"The more reasonable assumption," countered Vaughn, "would be an enraged poet determined to stop such an execration taking place ever again."
Geoffrey shrugged. "She's planning to publish the verse in a memorial volume and present it to his Majesty as a gift."
"Good God," shuddered Vaughn. "With allies like these, who needs the French?"
Geoffrey turned a jaundiced eye on Lord Vaughn's seating arrangement.
"You seem to have adopted certain French manners," he said pointedly. With the air of a man making a great concession, he added, "Given the events of the afternoon, no more need be said. But you might want to rectify the situation before anyone else notices."
"I don't see anything the least bit improper about it," said Vaughn blandly, as if it were entirely normal to be having a conversation sitting cross-legged on the ground with a woman on one's lap. He smiled down at Mary. "Do you, my dear?"
Mary narrowed her eyes impartially at both men in a universal condemnation of masculine folly. Neither of them paid the least bit of attention to her.
Geoffrey folded his arms across his chest in the classic pose of offended guardian. "You may not see anything wrong with it, Vaughn," he began darkly, "but as for the rest of civilized society — "
"Since," Vaughn smoothly overrode him, "Miss Alsworthy has done me the honor to agree to be my wife."