companion “—Emma and Gerard. The people who winter with us.”
“What about the grooms?”
“Jean and Cesar don’t winter with us. They report to the circus when we are ready to set out.”
“So, five people. And everyone else will think that we are married?”
“Yes,” she said. “I suppose it is good that you are so handsome. That will make it more believable that I should marry a noncircus man.”
“Thank you,” he said sarcastically.
She shrugged. “I speak the truth. You are going to be difficult to explain. You will have to work, though. You can’t just stand around and do nothing. Everyone who knows me knows I would never marry a man like that.”
Leo just looked at her.
“What do you think you could do?” she asked.
“I have no idea,” he replied shortly. “Just don’t expect me to perform. I’ll help out with the labor end of things, but I’m not getting up in front of people and making an ass of myself.”
Her eyes glittered. “Our performers are all trained artistes, Leo,” she said. “I wouldn’t dream of putting an amateur in our ring.”
“Good,” he said. “Then we understand each other. I’m here to get the gold to Wellington. If I have to work, I will. But not in public.”
She folded her lips in a stern line. “Very well.”
The first course was served. What the hell can we talk about? he thought. What do I have in common with circus people?
Gabrielle said conversationally, “It looks as if we are seeing the last days of Napoléon. His grande armée was destroyed in Russia and soon your General Wellington will defeat his army in Spain.”
The war was something Leo could always talk about and he responded appropriately. The war and international affairs carried them through dinner, and when he got up to escort the ladies out of the dining room, Leo was feeling slightly better. If he was going to have to spend the next month shackled to a female circus player, it was a help that she seemed to be intelligent.
Three
The following morning, Leo met his traveling companions in the hotel lobby, where they were waiting for their coach to be brought up. He was dressed in a rust-colored riding coat, breeches and high boots—an appropriate outfit for a circus, he thought.
Gabrielle frowned when she saw him. “Those clothes are all right for dress-up,” she said, “but you can’t dress like that around the circus.”
He was dumbfounded. He had thought he was dressed down. “What do you suggest I wear?” he asked a trifle acerbically.
“Trousers, low boots, a shirt—without the tie—and I suppose you can wear that jacket to keep warm. We’ll stop in a town along the way and do some shopping. I have a feeling that nothing you have with you is appropriate.”
Leo looked at his portmanteau and said sarcastically, “Can I at least keep my underwear?”
He would never in a million years have mentioned underwear to an English lady.
But Gabrielle didn’t blink. “Yes, you can keep your underwear. But I will pick your outerwear. It’s important that you don’t raise any suspicions. We can’t do anything that may call attention to ourselves.”
She was right, and he was annoyed that she was right. He was also annoyed that she looked so pretty, standing there with the chandelier light shining off her beautiful silky brown hair.
“Where’s your bonnet?” he asked abruptly.
“In the hatbox,” she replied. “I hate wearing bonnets. They are so confining.”
Emma, who was wearing a bonnet, said, “Nevertheless you should wear it, chérie.”
“I made my impression coming into the hotel. Now that I am leaving I can do as I like.”
Emma rolled her eyes. Gabrielle patted the circle of braids that crowned her head. “Besides, I can’t fit a bonnet over these braids.”
Leo said, “I was under the impression that short hair was in vogue for women.”
“It’s not in vogue for circus performers,” Gabrielle informed him haughtily.
Leo was conscious of a fleeting feeling of approval. It would be a shame to cut off all that lovely hair. He found himself looking forward to seeing it down.
Good God, he thought in horror as he realized what he was thinking. I can’t become attracted to this circus girl. That would be disastrous.
“Here is the carriage,” he said crisply, grateful for the distraction. “Are you ready, ladies?”
Gerard stopped the carriage in front of the hotel door and the three of them went out to meet it.
Gabrielle’s attempt to buy clothing for Leo was not very successful; he was too tall for any of the trousers they looked at, although they did manage to buy some plain white cotton shirts that were more appropriate than his own custom-tailored ones.
“I can make him some trousers,” Emma finally said to Gabrielle, and so they bought material instead.
Leo found himself alternating between indignation and amusement at the way the two women treated him. You would think I was five years old, he thought, as Gabrielle held a shirt up in front of him and nodded that it would be all right. They made their purchases and returned to the carriage for the final leg of the journey into Lille.
The circus was gathered on the outskirts of the city, on the farm that Gabrielle’s family had rented for the winter months. As they drove in, Leo saw a collection of a dozen or so wagons parked in a big field. Gerard drove past the wagons, however, and went directly to the farmhouse, where his passengers alighted.
A slender young man, who looked like a masculine copy of Gabrielle, came out to meet the carriage.
“Leo, this is my brother, Mathieu,” Gabrielle said. “Mathieu, this is my new husband, Leo Standish.”
“How do you do, Mathieu,” Leo said.
Mathieu looked from Leo to Gabrielle. “He’s going to be very hard to hide. He’s so big—and he certainly doesn’t look French.”
“I know, but there’s nothing we can do about it,” Gabrielle said. “He’s what Monsieur Rothschild sent us.”
“What if we said he was Swedish?” Mathieu asked. “Would people know that his accent was English and not Swedish?”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Leo said flatly. He did not at all appreciate being talked about as if he wasn’t there. “If someone does recognize my English accent they will wonder why you are attempting to disguise me.”
Mathieu
