"Barbara Hambly - Benjamin January 1 - A Free Man of Color" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hambly Barbara)

business by the buffet or in the lobby, their eyes always straying to the girls as the girls' eyes strayed
toward them. January saw the American Granger stroll over to the lobby doors to talk to the gilt Roman,
controlled annoyance in the set of his back. Something about the way they spoke, though January could
hear no words, told him that the Roman was American as well—when the Roman spat tobacco at the
sandbox in the corner he was sure of it. Uneasiness prickled him at the sight of them. He neither liked nor
trusted Americans.

The young man in the gray coat likewise made his way to the lobby doors, looked out uneasily, then
gravitated back to the small group of sword masters and their pupils. Mayerling and Maitre Andreas
Verret were conversing in amity unusual for professional fencers, who generally quarreled at sight; their
students glared and fluffed like tomcats. Gray Coat orbited between the group and the doors half a dozen
times, fidgeting with his cravat or adjusting his white silk domino mask. Waiting for someone, thought
January. Watching.

"Drat that Angelique!" Dominique rustled up to the dais with a cup of negus in hand. "I swear she's late
deliberately! Agnes tells me two of her girls need final adjustments in their costumes for the tableau
vivant— they're Modi and Mustardseed to Angelique's Tita-nia—and of course Angelique's the only one
who can do it. It would be just like her."

"Would it?" January looked up from his music, surprised. "I'd think she'd want her group to be perfect, to
show her off better."

Minou narrowed her cat-goddess eyes. "She wants herself to be perfect," she said. "But she'd always
rather the girls around her were just a little flawed. Look at her friendship with Clemence Drouet—who
might stand some chance of marrying a nice man if she'd quit trying to catch a wealthy protector. She
designs Clemence's dresses .... Well, look at her."

She nodded toward the narrow-shouldered girl who stood in deep conversation with the fair young man
in gray, and January had to admit that her dress, though beautiful and elaborately frilled with lace,
accentuated rather than concealed the width of her hips and the flatness of her bosom.

"She designed the gowns for all the girls in her tableau," went on Dominique in an undertone. "I haven't
seen them finished, but I'll bet you my second-best lace they make Marie-Anne and Marie-Rose look as
terrible as Clemence's does her."

"She's that spiteful?" It was a trick January had heard of before.

Dominique shrugged. "She has to be the best in the group, p'tit. And the two Maries are younger than she
is." She nodded toward Agnes Pellicot, a regal woman in egg yolk silk and an elaborately wrapped
tignon threaded with ropes of pearls, now engaged in what looked like negotiations with a stout man
clothed in yet another bad version of Ivanhoe. Marie-Anne and Marie-Rose stood behind and beside
her, slim girls with abashed doe eyes.

They must be sixteen and fifteen, thought January— he recalled Agnes had just borne and lost her first
child when he had departed for France—the same age, probably, at which Madeleine Dubonnet had
been married to Arnaud Trepagier.

And in fact, he reflected, there wasn't that much difference between that match and the one Agnes was
clearly trying to line up with Ivanhoe. They were technically free, as Madeleine Dubonnet had been
technically free, marrying—or entering into a contract of placage— of their own free choice. But that