“You take care of the cousin,” Augustus said brusquely. “I’ll keep an eye on your Emma.”
Chapter 11
With fair wind and fiery star
I’ve cleaved the waves to where you are,
Bringing in my foam-tossed wake,
A whole land’s bounties for thy sake.
“You want me to do what?” asked Kort.
“Take part in a theatrical production,” Emma repeated. This wasn’t going exactly as she had intended.
“A theatrical production? As in a stage? And tights?” The last word was uttered in tones of masculine disgust.
“There don’t need to be tights,” said Emma soothingly. “You always seemed to enjoy our amateur theatricals at Belvedere. Remember the time you got in such trouble for stealing the rooster’s tail feathers to make a Cavalier’s hat?”
“Yes, but that was conducted in English,” protested Kort. “Not French.”
“No, it was really more of a squawk,” said Emma. “Followed by loud pecking noises.”
“I meant the play.”
“If you do take the role, you’ll be playing an American. Everyone will expect you to have an accent. It will lend verisimilitude.” She didn’t tell him she had borrowed the phrase from Mr. Whittlesby. Somehow, she didn’t think that would help her argument. Kort hadn’t seemed overly impressed by Mr. Whittlesby. It might have had something to do with all the mincing and wafting and entirely unnecessary alliteration.
Kort wasn’t convinced. “It’s one thing to embarrass myself in front of family, quite another to do so on the international stage.”
“It’s not the international stage, just a little stage at Malmaison.” Emma gave him her best smile, the one she had perfected way back when, in the days of the rooster-tail hat. “And Madame Bonaparte has been all but family to me, which means that, by extension, she’s family to you.”
“That makes no sense at all.”
“Why not?”
Kort gave her an incredulous look. “You can’t just declare a family by fiat.”
“Don’t be silly. The law courts do it all the time. It’s called adoption.”
Kort wisely decided not to pursue that line of argument. Instead, he narrowed his blue eyes at Emma, asking shrewdly, “Why do you want me there so badly?”
Emma rolled her eyes. “
“In that case,” said Kort, “why not find another leading man for your theatricals? I’m sure there are any number of them lining up in the wings.”
“Yes, but none who can affect an American accent quite so convincingly.” Emma linked her arm through his. “Do I have to have a reason for wanting to prolong the visit of my favorite cousin?”
“I can just see the headlines now,” Kort grumbled, and Emma knew she had won. ‘American Merchant Makes Fool of Self in French Farce.’ And that will just be the offstage part.”
“Just think of all the adoring maidens flinging themselves at your feet. No one can resist an actor.” Emma cunningly played her ace. She pointed down the gallery, past a strapping Apollo garbed in the latest in fig-leaf fashion. “Speaking of which, there’s your leading lady, should you choose to take the part.”
Kort squinted. “The purple horror?”
Emma thumped him in the side with her reticule. “No, silliness. The other one. The pretty one.”
Almost as though on cue, Jane emerged from behind the outstretched arm of the statue, a symphony in lilac linen. There was a man with her, a man garbed in tight, knit pantaloons and a shirt that billowed out at the waist and sleeves. His eyes met Emma’s over Jane’s shoulder, and Emma felt an absurd flutter of excitement, as though he were a lover rather than a collaborator, as though their assignations had involved something more than ink.
All nonsense, of course. Nonsense and tight breeches. Emma forced herself to attend to her cousin, turning her head deliberately away from the poet.
“I met her, didn’t I?”
“Yes, at the rout at the Hotel de Balcourt last week.”
Kort looked blank.
“The house with all the Egyptian bits in it,” Emma translated. She fluttered her lashes at Kort. “See? Aren’t you glad you’ve decided to take the part?”
“I hadn’t said I would,” Kort corrected. With studied casualness, he added, “As it happens, I’m going to be at Malmaison anyway. Uncle Robert secured an invitation for me.”
“Oh.” That took the wind out of her sails. So much for impressing her cousin with her French connections when he was able to obtain the same coveted invitation by other means. “Well, then! You have even less excuse not to play my leading man. I’ll expect you in rehearsals next week. Once we’ve written it,” she added, as an afterthought.
“Unless you decide not to,” said Kort hopefully.
Emma struck him playfully on the arm. “Don’t even think it. Resistance is futile. I will have you in those tights.” Something else struck her. “Wasn’t your business meant to be concluded by then?”
Kort flexed his hands in his tan gloves, manipulating the muscles to make his knuckles crack. “There have been unexpected complications,” he said shortly.
“Ah,” said Emma knowingly. Not that she actually knew anything about conducting business, but it was always best to assume the pretense. “You’ll have to book a later passage, won’t you?”
Kort looked down at her, shifting slightly from foot to foot. “Emma…”
“Yes?” Was that an apology she heard coming?
Kort stepped abruptly back, his boot heel connecting with a sharp sound against the marble floor. “Never mind. It doesn’t matter. Come along. Don’t you want to reintroduce me to your friends?”
Before Emma could argue that it did matter, that whatever he had to say, she wanted to hear it, he had started forward, tugging her along behind him, like…like a poodle on a leash, she thought indignantly. Just like back at Belvedere. Her flat-heeled slippers skidded against the marble floor as she scrambled to keep up.
“Emma,” said Jane, her voice rich with amusement. “What a surprise to see you here. And your charming cousin as well.”
Kort executed an old-fashioned bow. “Ladies.”
Jane stepped forward and extended a hand to Kort. “I hear you are to be my hero.”
“On the stage, at least,” Kort said. His eyes slid towards Miss Gwen. Miss Gwen nodded regally, giving Kort permission to take Jane’s hand.
“Hero?” managed Whittlesby, in a mangled voice.
“In our masque!” Emma’s voice came out too loud and too high, waking the echoes in the corners of the room. “Isn’t it above all things wonderful? Kort has agreed to take the role.”
“But…” Mr. Whittlesby was still looking at Jane, not at her. “Miss Wooliston?”
Jane gently retrieved her hand from Kort’s. She gestured to Emma, her smile never wavering. “Our ever persuasive Madame Delagardie has induced me to tread the boards. Provided, that is,” she added, with mock reproach, “that you write us something fit to act in.” She turned back to Kort. “What do you say, Mr. Livingston? Shall we leave them to their artistic musings? I fear we are sadly in the way.”
Kort offered his arm with flattering alacrity. “I wouldn’t want to be the man to stand in the way of genius.”
“Lovely.” It was very neatly done. Within a space of a moment, Jane was leading Kort away. Emma could
