Read Online Saved by Scandal by Bárbara Metzger - Free Book Online

Mademoiselle Margot’s rosy glow, no one noticed. The boxes were too dark, for one, and their escorts were too busy gazing worshipfully at the stage, for another.
    Then Margot started to sing. She sent a regal nod to her accompanist in the orchestra, then took a deep breath and began with a popular country ballad. The disgruntled females could find nothing outstanding in her voice, surely no cause for their male companions to be hanging on every note as if it were the Heavenly Choir. The women detected the slight French accent, but they could not hear the somewhat throaty, yearning tones, as Margot sang of a lost love gone to war. The men could. They were ready to console her.
    Galen frowned, alone in the back of the family’s box. Why, she might have been inviting those blackguards to her bed, with that sultry voice. He’d said she could keep singing, not keep seducing every poor sod in Town. They applauded madly when she was done.
    Her next piece was an Italian aria. Her voice was not quite of operatic quality, but it carried to the far reaches of the vast hall. Most of the audience could not understand the words, but they knew enough that the heroine of the song was dying, deceived and betrayed by her lover. She always was. Even those who could not pronounce the King’s English, much less a word of Italian, were soon dabbing at their eyes. The grande dames in their diamonds nodded their approval, wishing their own progeny could acquit themselves half so well when called on to entertain at those hideous musicales. They’d be hiring new music instructors in the morning.
    The applause was louder, nearly covering the crash of a fallen backdrop and the curses of the stagehands. Such a distraction might have unnerved a lesser performer, but the thunderous acclamation from the audience seemed to have given Margot confidence and cured her stage fright, at least for this evening. She joked with the bucks and beaux sitting close to the stage about the considerate cabbage-heads, for waiting until she had finished the piece.
    Then, when everything was almost quiet again both on stage and in the audience, Margot said, “My friends, I have an announcement to make.”
    Not even the orange girls shouted their wares into the silence that followed. Galen sat forward, although still in the shadows. He did not like having no idea what the female was going to say; they had not discussed any public statement. She was supposed to look beautiful, making him the envy of every man in the hall, and she was supposed to sing like a nightingale, that was all. She was not supposed to improvise on his script.
    “ À regret ,” she was saying, the French accent that was part of her stage role more pronounced, though Galen knew from their talk this afternoon that she’d been educated in Italy by English governesses. “With regrets, I am announcing my retirement from the stage in two weeks. You have been so kind, and I will miss my friends in the cast, but this will be my last engagement.”
    Boos and catcalls rose from the pit, and feet started stomping in protest. Margot held up her hand for quiet. “No, no,” she insisted, “you must not be angry. You must be happy for me, mon amis , especially on this, my wedding day.”
    Hysteria almost broke out in the theater as reporters rushed forward to catch every word, and a few punters ran out to check their wagers at White’s. One tulip in the pit stood on his neighbor’s shoulders and cried, “Say it is not so, Margot. I love you!”
    Galen, from his box, promised himself a bout at Gentleman Jackson’s with the sprig of fashion. See how pretty he looked then.
    The fop toppled onto a Bird of Paradise, flattening a feather or two. The audience howled. One of the players offstage struck a cymbal, and quiet was restored.
    Margot was smiling. “I am honored by your regard, monsieur , but my heart and my hand belong to another. You see, I have been waiting my whole life for the man of my dreams.