The Mask of Night (44 page)

"There've been rumors for years that Barras replaced the Dauphin with a double and that Josephine was involved in the plot. I've always suspected that if there was such a plot St. Juste was involved. He vehemently denied it of course."

Carfax began to pace the carpet. "When Talleyrand wrote to me about St. Juste's liaison with Bel, my deepest fear was that whatever St. Juste was up to in England somehow involved the Dauphin, though I couldn't work out how. When St. Juste was murdered, I was even more convinced. Quite frankly, Charles, due to your connections to O'Roarke and my connections to St. Juste, I'd have preferred to keep you out of the investigation, but Castlereagh wanted you involved."

"I imagine you had me followed," Charles said in a pleasant voice.

"It seemed a sensible precaution."

A rap fell on the door. "Ah, good," Carfax said. "Come in.“ And then, as the door opened, "I believe you are acquainted with Charles Fraser and his wife?"

"Of course," said a smooth, lightly accented voice. "Fraser. Mrs. Fraser.“ The Comte de Flahaut stepped into the room and pulled the door to behind him.

Chapter 30

You will always have my gratitude, Mlle. Lescaut. A poor thing, but I hope you realize how heartfelt it is.

Comte de Flahaut to Mélanie Lescaut

3 November, 1811

Flahaut inclined his head with just the right degree of formality. Charles had to admit that for a man not trained as an agent, the comte did a very creditable job of concealing that the Frasers were anything more than casual acquaintances to him.

"Charles has been investigating St. Juste's death," Carfax said. "I've told him of my suspicions regarding the Wanderer. In the circumstances, I think you'd best tell the Frasers what you told me earlier this evening."

Flahaut's gaze flickered to Charles and Mélanie then back to Carfax. "Are you sure—"

"Given what they already know, we don't have a choice."

The comte advanced into the room, hands clasped behind his back. "As you no doubt know my friendship with Hortense Bonaparte is of some years standing. Though we have not been in communication much since I came to England. Since I married." He paused and looked from Charles, leaning against the table, to Mélanie, now seated in the chair Carfax had abandoned.

"But you still have ties," Mélanie said. "Naturally."

"Just so. I received a communication from Queen Hortense earlier today. It was brief to the point of curtness, but it was undeniably Hortense's hand. She asked me to go to Lord Carfax and tell him she had information about the Wanderer which it was vital he hear. I asked Lord Carfax to meet me here this evening. I didn't know what the Wanderer referred to until he told me."

Charles looked at Carfax. "If Queen Hortense was involved in a plot with O'Roarke and St. Juste concerning the Dauphin, why would she want you to know about it?"

"Because I suspect Queen Hortense was an unwilling participant in the plot," Carfax said. "I think St. Juste and O'Roarke used some means to compel her to help them. They must have needed assistance only she could provide. Perhaps ultimately they wanted to use her to give Bonapartist legitimacy to a restored Dauphin."

"Hortense hates intrigue," Flahaut said. "Even when Bonaparte was Emperor, she'd have been happier if she could have retired to the country. She's had Bonapartists plots swirling round her since her stepfather was exiled, but she just wants to keep her children safe."

"And so after St. Juste died, her qualms got the better of her, and she decided to contact me," Carfax said.

Charles continued to stare at his former spymaster. "You think O'Roarke—"

"O'Roarke hates the current French monarchy."

"O'Roarke hates all monarchies. He's never made a secret of that."

"But he was willing to work with Bonaparte, even after he made himself Emperor. If the Dauphin is alive, if O'Roarke could find him and be the power behind putting him on the throne of France— Far easier than getting Bonaparte off St. Helena. And far easier to control the Dauphin than a former Emperor."

"Where's Queen Hortense now?" Mélanie asked Flahaut, for all the world as if she hadn't seen Hortense Bonaparte for years.

"She didn't say. But she wrote that after I'd spoken with Lord Carfax, she'd contact me to arrange a meeting. So she must be in England."

"You'll tell us when you hear from her?" Charles said.

"We'll pass on information that seems relevant," Carfax replied in the crisp tone he used to indicate a briefing was at an end. "Now I suggest we get back to the theatre before our combined absence is commented upon. You go first, Flahaut."

Flahaut moved to the door. "It goes without saying that all of this is in confidence."

"Naturally," Charles said.

When the door had closed behind the comte, Carfax fixed Charles with a hard stare. "I know you're second guessing everything I've told you. You wouldn't be doing your job if you didn't. I only ask that you don't discount my theory out of hand.

"You should know me well enough to know I never discount a likely scenario."

"I'm relieved to hear you’ve still got your wits about you.“ Carfax nodded to Mélanie and moved to the door. "Enjoy the rest of the opera."

Mélanie stayed stock still until thirty seconds after the door closed behind Carfax. "What in God's name—"

"Not here. I don't trust Carfax not to be listening."

"Do you believe him?"

"I'm not sure."

The corridor was empty save for the footmen, but when they were halfway down it, Flahaut emerged from an alcove and fell in step beside them. "What the devil was that about?“ His voice was fierce but pitched to their ears alone, and he spoke in French.

"You know as much as we do," Charles said in the same language.

"Somehow I doubt that. I'm not going to stand by if Hortense is in trouble."

Mélanie shot a look at him.

"Surely I don't have to tell you what she still means to me. Political realities don't change that."

"I'm supposed to see her tomorrow morning," Mélanie said. "No don't ask me where. But I'll tell you what I learn. If she contacts you, come to us before you go to Carfax."

Flahaut flicked a glance at Charles. "You don't trust Carfax?"

"These days I don't trust anyone," Charles said.

Laura Dudley smoothed the covers over the sleeping Jessica, then touched her fingers Berowne’s head. Berowne rolled on his back to have his stomach scratched, blinked up at her, stretched, and then burrowed more deeply into the covers.

Laura went through the connecting door to Colin’s room and froze on the threshold. A tall figure stood beside the bed, staring down at Colin’s still form.

Raoul O’Roarke turned his head and met her gaze across the shadowy room. His eyes were dark and unreadable but his mouth lifted in a smile. Laura pulled the door to, and glanced at Colin, then moved to the door to the passage. O’Roarke followed her out of the room.

“I just wanted to make sure he was all right,” O’Roarke said. “He’s had a difficult time of it.”

Laura looked up into his deep-set eyes, myriad suspicions and surmises and fragments of information tumbling in her head. “You’re very fond of him.”

“He’s a remarkable little boy. He reminds me of his father at the same age.”

“I forget,” she said. “You knew Mr. Fraser when he was young.”

Veiled memories shot through O’Roarke’s gaze. “He had Colin’s inquisitiveness and sensitivity. Though he wasn’t as fortunate in his parents.” O’Roarke hesitated, as though perhaps about to say more, but instead he turned down the passage toward his own bedchamber. “Good evening, Miss Dudley.”

Laura watched him, throat tight with something that was absurdly like sympathy. “Good evening, Mr. O’Roarke.”

Simon dropped into a fragile, gilded chair beside Pendarves while on stage Don Ramiro, disguised as his own valet, stumbled across the unsuspecting Angelina. Pendarves was staring at the stage with a rapt expression Simon remembered from choir at Winchester. It was a moment or two before he turned and took in that it was Simon sitting beside him.

“No one else seemed interested in the opera,” Simon murmured.

Pendarves’s expression relaxed a trifle. An empty champagne glass stood beside his chair. Simon was aware of the unworthy thought that drink had always loosened Pendarves’s tongue.

Pendarves turned his gaze back to the stage. So did Simon. A short while later, the curtains stirred at their back, and the ladies stepped into the box, drawing a ripple of attention from the boxes about them. Simon and Pendarves moved to the back row, giving the women the three seats at the rail. Lady St. Ives spared a brief, dazzling smile for the crowd. Lady Pendarves nodded and smiled at several acquaintances and fixed her gaze on the stage. Isobel sat with her hands locked tightly together. Simon wondered if she was hearing a note of the music.

When the curtain came down, Lady Pendarves turned round to look at her husband. She must be more than a decade Mélanie’s senior, Simon realized, yet she retained a wide-eyed ingénue quality he doubted Mélanie had possessed since childhood. Her careful pink-and-white prettiness always put him in mind of one of Jessica Fraser’s china dolls, but now her eyes were alight, lending her face an unusual animation. “It is quite splendid, isn’t it? Far better than the piano score.”

Pendarves’s face softened. “Yes, quite. Do you want a lemonade, Caroline?”

“Oh, no. But thank you, my love.”

The box swiftly filled with guests. Simon and Pendarves got to their feet to make way for the throng, most of whom had come to see Lady St. Ives.

“A lot of humanity in the music," Simon said as they moved into the anteroom. "And a surprising amount in the story. One can’t help but feel for Don Ramiro, obliged to take a bride without love.”

“But in the end he does find love.”

“Where he doesn’t expect it.”

Pendarves drew a breath. "I love Caroline. I always have. I just— What did you want to talk to me about?”

“Did I say I wanted to talk to you?”

“God, Simon, I can still read you that well. Did Mrs. Fraser send you with more questions? I fear I was less than polite to her last night.”

“You’re always faultlessly polite. And I sought you out because I was worried about you.”

Lord Tilbury came through the door with his widowed sister whose name Simon could never remember. Simon exchanged greetings, then touched Pendarves on the shoulder when Tilbury and his sister had gone through the curtains into the box. “Let’s go somewhere we can have a conversation.”

He half expected Pendarves to object, but he merely nodded and followed Simon from the box. He was a man who desperately needed to talk. What he didn’t need was his friend and former lover trying to pry information out of him.

An alcove round a bend at the end of the corridor was comfortingly empty yet not so secluded that they would raise eyebrows. Simon leaned against the alcove wall. “Have you seen Will Gordon since last night?”

Pendarves cast a swift glance about, but the nearest people were a lady and gentleman several feet off, busily engaged in their own conversation. “Briefly. He dressed me down for interfering. Said he could take care of himself. But so help me, Simon, at your age you should know better than to lead him into trouble.”

“At the moment, I’m trying to keep everyone out of trouble. But perhaps Gordon hadn’t explained matters to you thoroughly.”

“There are things best not put into words.”

“That can lead to misunderstandings. You and I used to be able to talk more freely.“ Simon hesitated, then decided to risk it. “I remember the night you told me how it had felt to lose your brother—“

“Why the devil bring that up now?”

“Perhaps because it’s one of the few times we spoke freely,” Simon said. It was perfectly true. He could see Pendarves, head sunk on his folded arms, shoulders shaking with suppressed sobs. Simon would have said he loved him then.

For a moment he thought he had pushed it too far. Then Pendarves’s shoulders relaxed a fraction against the gilded plaster wall. “You were a good friend to me, Simon. You're the only one I was ever able to talk to about losing Christopher.”