From Governess to Countess (Matches Made in Scandal #1)(28)
‘How could I possibly be? Aside from the good you are doing, the suffering you are alleviating, and the gap which I was not even aware needed filling, you obviously—simply listening to you talk, it’s very clear to me that you relish what you are doing.’
Her eyes lit up. ‘I love it.’
‘I can see that you do.’ He could not resist kissing her, but forced himself to do so swiftly. ‘I will not keep you, you must be anxious to attend to them. I will see you later.’ Recalling the stack of post which had accumulated in his absence, and the latest list of questions from the over-zealous man of business, Aleksei rolled his eyes. ‘Much later. Meet me here, after dinner.’
Another kiss would be a temptation too far. He opened the door, startling the waiting patients. ‘Now, who is first in line?’
Chapter Six
‘Where are we going?’
‘I am taking you sightseeing.’
Aleksei led her out into the garden. The night sky was clear, the air chilly as he led her along a path to the perimeter wall, producing a key which opened a wooden door set into it. To Allison’s surprise, they emerged on to the banks of the Moyka River. A large boathouse jutted out into the water. Aleksei produced a second key and, as she stepped warily into the gloomy interior, she could hear the gentle lapping of the waters against the wooden supports. She had no sense of the scale of the building itself until he lit a lamp, at which point she found her jaw dropping at this latest demonstration of the Derevenko’s vast wealth. ‘Good grief!’
‘My father’s idea,’ Aleksei said of the huge barge which took up most of the mooring, dwarfing the smaller, everyday boat moored alongside it. ‘He took to heart the idea that St Petersburg was the Venice of the north, and had this built, modelled on a craft in one of the Italian painter Canaletto’s waterscapes. It’s monstrous, isn’t it?’
‘Magnificently so,’ Allison agreed, reaching out to touch the high gold-painted stern on which was perched a carved image of the same bird which was carved over the entrance to the palace.
The barge sat low in the water, surrounded on three sides by wooden decking. Though the hull was painted white, it seemed to her that everything else, including the rudder, was covered in gold. A huge throne-like chair was built into the shelter of the stern, covered in crimson velvet. A cabin—if such a thing could be called a cabin—was constructed in the centre of the barge, the roof supported by wooden pilasters painted to look like marble. She made her way along the decking, counting the places for the oarsmen, Aleksei holding the lantern aloft for her. ‘Eighteen. It must be tremendously hard work.’
‘Impossibly hard,’ Aleksei said. ‘I took one of the places once. It’s far too heavy, utterly impractical. Unless you run with the tide, you need horses to help tow it. It’s only used on state occasions, and then, obviously, only in the summer months. In the winter, every river and canal in St Petersburg freezes over. You ought to see the sleigh my father had built for those occasions,’ he added, with one of his mocking smiles. ‘Imagine something similar to this, only with runners. Come on, let me show you inside.’
It was a short step from the decking on to the barge, where Aleksei was already holding open the door to the covered area. Allison stepped through into a surprisingly small space, made sumptuous with velvet and furs, and glinting with more gold leaf.
Aleksei set the lantern down on the highly polished table, then threw himself on to the sofa. ‘My head aches with questions. I was so sure that I would find that woman. I don’t know what to do next.’
Allison sat down beside him, taking his hand between hers. ‘It will come to you. What you need to do is stop fretting about it for a while.’
‘You’re right.’ He rolled his shoulders, visibly relaxing, pulling her closer to him. ‘Tell me, have any of the servants come to you seeking a love potion? Does such a thing exist?’
‘Oh, they exist, all right, but they do not work. No elixir can compel someone to fall in love, though there are any number of quacks who will sell you something they swear will do just that. I never would. To have to ask for such a thing in the first place must surely mean that it’s a lost cause. It is cruel to offer hope when there is none.’
‘You think so, under any circumstances?’ Aleksei asked seriously. ‘I have had men—boys—mortally wounded, dying on the battlefield and begging to be told that they will live to see their loved ones again, while their lifeblood ebbs from them. I always lied, without compunction. Is that truly so wrong?’
The shadow of that last death, the mother’s desperate pleas came back to her. Had she lied? She could not recall. ‘No, I don’t think that is wrong at all. I reckon I would do the same,’ Allison replied. ‘I cannot imagine the horrors and the suffering you have had to witness.’
‘And inflicted, in the name of my country. It is ironic, is it not, that here we sit, you who have a vocation for healing, and I who have made a career out of killing.’
‘You are a soldier, not a murderer.’
He shook his head, looking grim. ‘There are times when there is a very fine line between the two. I’m not sure I have the stomach for the kind of wars our Emperor will wage now. More territory seized. More people put into servitude. More unnecessary deaths.’