[Previously: Lavinia and Cedric are enjoying a little quiet interlude together, out in the rose garden. Lavinia has asked Cedric why the Masked Avenger had robbed Lucius.] From the end of part 32:
For the first time since she'd known him, he avoided her eye, and she was fearful--would her shining knight have a chink in his armour after all?
"I know," he said, finally, "that I probably shouldn't have taken it, but ...." He paused, as if trying to decide how to express what he needed to say. When he did speak again she could plainly hear the suppressed emotion behind his words.
"That ring has been in my family for six generations. I'd seen it on my grandfather's hand everyday while he lived, and I knew it was Lucius' birthright to wear it, but h-he didn't deserve it!" He turned to her now; an urgency in his posture and his voice. "If only I could have seen that he cared about Kentham, about our family and our heritage, but no! He was dishonouring everything that my grandfather had stood for ... everything that he'd tried to accomplish during his lifetime. When I realized that Lucius was encouraging those criminals ..!"
He stopped, his eyes searching her face, to see how she was taking this. "It was wrong, and I knew that. In a way, it even made me little better than my uncle, but ... I want you to know, Lavinia, that I never stole anything else. I swear this to you, on my honour ... that is, if you still think I have any!"
Her hands reached for him. "I believe you, Cedric. C'est bon."
It seemed he hadn't heard her. "I've never even worn it, chérie. It's hidden in my room. All I wanted to do was to make sure he didn't have it."
She put up a hand to press her fingers against his lips, silencing him. "I understand, my love, and I believe you."
His relief was palpable. He pulled her into his arms again and held her close. "Merci, mon coeur," he whispered against her hair. "I haven't liked all that I've had to do as the Avenger, but--"
"It was necessary, Cedric," she replied, firmly. "You did what you had to do."
He was so grateful to her for understanding; so happy that she knew his secrets because that meant he wouldn't be forced to lie to her again. "Most of all, I didn't like having to deceive you."
His growing fatigue was evident in his voice, and she knew it was time to call a halt to this outing. She pulled back from the embrace just enough to be able to kiss his cheek. "You didn't deceive me for long, monsieur," she told him smugly, "because I found you out!"
"Touché!" He conceded defeat with a grin.
"And now, it is time for you to rest, Cedric. Also, it grows chilly, I think."
Instantly, he was contrite. "I'm sorry, Lavinia! Are you cold? Of course we should go in and get you warm."
As they strolled towards the house, Lavinia asked about how Jacques came to be in Cedric's service.
"He told me that he promised your mama to look after you. Was he a servant of your grand-père?"
"He was a play mate of hers, and her brother's actually. Jacques grew up on the estate, you see, the son of my grand-père's bailiff. Several of the estate's children would play together when they were younger, and Jacques has told me about those happier times, when my grand-mère was still alive. She died before I was born, so I never knew her, but Jacques tells me she was the kindest of women; a trait that she passed on her daughter."
His smile was sad, and Lavinia moved closer to him, leaning her head lightly on his shoulder for a moment as they walked. Cedric looked down at her and patted her hand where it lay in the crook of his arm.
"Anyway, Jacques had ambitions to be a valet instead of a bailiff and so took a position of footman in the château, to begin learning what he could about being a gentleman's gentleman. When my parents went to France for that ill-fated visit, my mother was delighted to see her old playmate again. Jacques was told to valet my father. My father liked him, too, and they talked about Jacques returning with them to England. Because of those discussions my mother made a request of Jacques before she and my father went for that last journey together. It angered my nurse apparently, but ma mère wanted Jacques to help look after me. She trusted him, you see. It turned out to be her dying wish and so, after her death, Jacques was reassigned to have charge of me. He must have been grieving himself, but he still had so much love and patience for me. He has been with me ever since. I don't know what I would have done without him."
They were silent for a short while then Lavinia said, "My Jeanne has been with me since my mother's death, also. I don't know what I would do without her, either."
*
Peter, another footman, opened the door from the terrace for them. Cedric greeted him in his usual kind way. Peter bowed, "May I say how glad I am to see you looking better, Master Cedric."
"Thank you, Peter. I'm feeling stronger every day."
With the butler's arrival at the other door to the drawing-room, Peter instantly became a most correct and stiff footman. Not by so much as a flicker of an eyelid did Cedric betray that he and Peter had been speaking. Rather, he guided Lavinia forward without a backward glance. Nodding slightly to Portman as they reached him, Cedric asked if there were any letters yet from his uncle. Portman responded in the negative. Thanking the man, Cedric turned in the direction of the Library, Lavinia still on his arm. Once out of earshot, Lavinia whispered to him, "Your uncle is very strict with his servants. This I have seen before."
"Yes. Peter has been here a long time ... before my uncle came. It is hard not to acknowledge someone I have known for a decade but, for Peter's sake and the others like him who are still here, I have to pretend to ignore them. I've sometimes wondered if Portman spies for my uncle. He is one of the servants hired by him; Lucius fired my grandfather's old butler within a week of assuming his inheritance." Cedric lowered his voice even further. "That has always been one of our chief problems--not knowing whom to trust. We are certain that Simms is a criminal. The others we cannot be sure of. Knowing my uncle as I do it's entirely possible that he fired my grandfather's senior servants merely out of spite."
As they approached the Library they heard footsteps and turned to see Jacques walking towards them. He had been on the watch and had come to take Cedric back upstairs.
Cedric smiled at his friend. "As you see Jacques," he said, his voice once again at a more normal level, "I have taken no hurt. Mademoiselle has watched over me like a hen with one chick." Cedric winked at Lavinia as he reached to open the door for her.
Lavinia's smile was abstracted. She had promised her father that she would return to help him after her stroll but there was one more question she needed to ask Cedric first.
"Cedric," she ventured, giving voice to a fear that had been growing within her.
"Yes, my love?"
"I have been thinking," she asked quietly, glancing around to see if any of the servants were nearby, "is it possible that your uncle planned the attack on the Masked Avenger?"
Cedric and Jacques exchanged very speaking glances for a moment, and then Cedric replied just as quietly, "I'm almost certain he did-- the Avenger had been interfering with him for months. I'm also afraid," he added, anger and revulsion colouring his tone, "that if he hadn't been called away to London so suddenly it might well have been him inside that coach, waiting to murder the Avenger ... waiting to murder me."
[Author's note: Help with French phrases--
C'est bon = it's fine]
