The Spy's Kiss (12 page)

 

 

Clermont winced slightly as the door crashed shut. “Why does your cousin dislike Frenchmen?” he asked.

Simon shook his head. “I daren't tell you. Not now.”

He thought for a moment. “Suppose,” he suggested tentatively, “I wished to have a conversation with someone. Not your mother, but someone else who knew Miss Allen, knew her family. Who might that someone be?”

“Mrs. Childe,” said Simon promptly. “Or my nurse. Mrs. Childe can be a bit starchy, though. Especially about anything involving what she calls ‘lapses.'”

Clermont was reminded uncomfortably of his aunt, who would have approved and encouraged the revolting obeisance Mrs. Childe had inflicted on him at the dinner party.

“Perhaps Nurse is safer,” Simon decided. “And she does love to gossip. But she is likely on her way to my bedchamber now, after that racket Serena just made. I must go.” He headed for the door.

“Simon?”

The boy turned.

“Thank you for the—apology.”

Simon nodded stiffly. “You're wrong, by the way. Serena
is
fond of you,” was his parting shot.

“As the hawk is fond of the rabbit,” muttered Clermont. He picked up Fabricius, extracted the diary he had tucked down inside it, and settled back to consider the very interesting entry he had discovered for March of 1793. After a long list of scientific books, with prices, there was a short note:
n. b. funds returned from Lausanne.
It would have meant nothing to anyone else. Julien had been searching for it since his first day at Boulton Park.

Serena returned from her postbreakfast walk in a foul mood. This excursion was usually the highlight of her day—a chance to be alone, to walk as briskly as she pleased, to think without interruption, to escape the well-meant but irksome restrictions her aunt and uncle placed on her. She knew every path on the grounds and loved them all, even on wet mornings like this one, when her shoes and skirt hem quickly caked over with mud. But today the misty landscape spread out beneath the hill had not even registered. She had stepped mechanically over stiles without seeing them. Her feet had carried her, inexorably, towards the fateful iron gate where Clermont had entered the park—illicitly, she now suspected.

Someone else evidently suspected the same thing. When she reached the spot on the path where the gate came into view, she saw Meyer, his gig abandoned in the middle of the road, examining the lock with great attention. Hastily she retreated, hoping he had not seen her and furious with Meyer for doing exactly what she had intended to do herself.

“Nasty, officious, meddler,” she said under her breath as she crested the hill again. The sight of the greenhouse by the garden gate irritated her further. She had been planning to take Clermont there once he was on his feet again. She was much more knowledgeable about plants than about insects; in the greenhouse, she had decided, she could form a clearer picture of Clermont's scientific credentials. But over the past two days she had become more and more certain he was a fraud. He had revealed himself when he had shown Simon the lens grinder. His rapt expression and unselfconscious delight were unmistakable; she had seen them many times on the faces of the Aurelians who came to venerate the butterflies. In the cabinet-room Clermont had been courteous, interested, well-informed—but not absorbed, as he had been with his machine. He could recite entire catalogues of tropical plant names and it would not change her mind. Whatever he sought at Boulton Park, it was not butterflies.

Then there was the problem of Simon. Royce had evidently gone off to London first thing this morning with dispatches; her uncle had decided that even the government couriers were insufficient protection for this particular batch of papers. That left her mischief-minded cousin free for the day. He had visited her to announce this fact at half past seven, an hour which normally would not even see him awake, let alone dressed.

“I'm to spend the morning in the library with Mr. Clermont,” he said, looking so smug that she wanted to throttle him. “So you needn't miss your visit with Fanny Orset after all. I can help him find anything he needs.” She pictured Clermont and Meyer in the library, circling each other like wolves. Worse, she pictured Simon confronting Meyer and informing him that his investigation was “not sporting.” She had written a hasty note to Fanny putting off their engagement until another day, and ordered the lens grinder moved up to the library in the hope that its noise would make conversation impossible.

By the time she had changed into dry clothing, Meyer's gig was standing in the stable yard, and she was not surprised to receive a summons from her uncle: his apologies, but Royce was away; would it be too much trouble to go up to the library and show a new visitor the cabinet-room?

“What of Mr. Clermont? Where is he at the moment?” she asked the servant who had come to fetch her.

“Also in the library, miss. As is Master Simon, who evidently has permission to use the optical equipment.” It was Coughlin, who knew Simon well, and he added pregnantly, “Mrs. Fletcher reports that a paring knife went missing from the pantry shortly after Master Simon visited the kitchen.”

She hurried up the stairs, wondering what she would find when she opened the double doors. Meyer and Clermont hurling butterfly species' names at ten paces? Simon holding Meyer at knifepoint? Clermont being led off in manacles?

What she did find was the last thing she expected: four males, ranging in age from eleven to fifty-five, amicably huddled over the lens grinder. Clermont and Simon, with great enthusiasm, were explaining to Bassington and his guest the different possible adjustments and demonstrating the action of the polishing disks.

“May I?” asked Meyer, indicating the handle.

“It is Simon's lens, for a telescope,” Clermont said. “Nearly finished, I believe. What do you say, Simon? Shall we let Mr. Meyer and your father take a quick turn at your lens, or would you prefer to put in a new blank?”

Torn between courtesy and a natural reluctance to risk his precious handiwork, Simon hesitated. Bassington suddenly recalled his responsibilities as host and cleared his throat. But Meyer spoke first.

“If it is not too much trouble,” he said timidly, “I would be most interested in seeing the process from the very beginning.”

Simon brightened, and the other two men looked relieved. Simon's lens was removed and duly admired; a new blank was inserted and the various brackets adjusted, with eager questions from her uncle and Meyer, who both insisted on taking several turns once the apparatus was ready. Serena retreated unobtrusively to a chair and watched—not the machine, which held little interest for her, but its operators. Meyer, whose performance as the reclusive scholar was so convincing she began to doubt Simon's report. Her uncle, looking more relaxed and cheerful than she had seen him in weeks. And above all, Clermont and Simon, who seemed like the older and younger halves of a single person. They hovered, watching and correcting, with the same expression of possessive enjoyment when the disks were turning, the same narrowed, intent gaze when some adjustment was required. Two left eyebrows flew up when her uncle asked a question which apparently revealed his ignorance of gear mechanisms. Two simultaneous nods answered another query by Meyer.

Absorbed in the pantomime (when the grinder was operating she could not hear any of their conversation), she did not realize her aunt had come in until she saw her go up to Bassington and literally shake him.

“George!” shouted her aunt.

He was bent over, turning the handle, but now straightened up and looked at her in surprise. He took in her folded arms and compressed lips. “Is something the matter, my dear?”

She pointed to the lens grinder. “Who put this machine here?”

Belatedly, Serena realized that the apparatus had been moved from the marble-topped bureau she had designated as its new home earlier that morning and was now resting on a large pier table. A large rosewood pier table, to be more precise, featuring an elaborate marquetry panel depicting the triumph of Neptune. It was a family heirloom; her own mother had spoken of it, envying her sister its possession.

“This,” said the countess, indicating the table, “is an original Adam design
.
In rosewood, gilt, ebony, and ivory. It is worth thousands of pounds. It is also of great sentimental value to me, having been given to my mother by the Duke of Somerset on the occasion of her betrothal.”

“The apparatus has felt on the bottom, Mama,” Simon assured her. “We looked before we moved it.”

“The apparatus,” she said with exaggerated patience, “grinds glass. Which means that small, sharp pieces of glass are rubbed away from this round thing”—she gestured at the blank, sitting forlornly in its brass clamps—“and are deposited
on my table.
” Her finger stabbed towards the layer of translucent grit which now covered one side of the surface.

“I gave Simon permission to move it, my dear,” Bassington confessed. “Four of us could not fit around the bureau where it had been set up by the servants. I'm afraid I did not think about the inevitable consequences of the grinding. Perhaps Mrs. Fletcher can contrive some means of removing the fragments without damaging your table.”

“I will clean it myself,” said the countess in a thin voice. “I would not put Mrs. Fletcher, or any of my staff, in such a difficult position.”

All three men were looking sheepish.

“Ah, Serena!” Her uncle had finally noticed her. He coughed nervously. “I had promised Mr. Meyer a tour of the house. Perhaps now would be a good time?”

Simon and Clermont were looking as though they, too, would have liked an excuse to escape the library. Serena half expected them to volunteer to accompany her, but Clermont was, quite properly, apologizing to her aunt and offering to move his equipment back to the bureau immediately.

 

 

She found Meyer courteous, attentive, and far more convincing as a scholar than Clermont. He ignored notable treasures of the house, such as the Lely portraits and the astronomical clock, and lingered instead over obscure engravings of rare plants. A small cabinet of fossils fascinated him. He made no attempt to impress her with his knowledge, but asked questions, very humbly, and accepted her replies with gratifying interest. She found herself dreading the inevitable confrontation of the two pseudoscientists.

It was not long in coming. Towards the end of their circuit through the main rooms, her sixth sense, which sometimes warned her Simon was on the prowl, came to full alert. They were in a small salon behind the main entrance hall, and Meyer was over by the window admiring a set of framed watercolors depicting English butterflies. Sure enough, there was the faint but unmistakable sound of footsteps on the other side of the paneling.

“Serena? Are you in here? Are you alone?” It was Simon's voice.

Sighing, she stepped over to the concealed door and pushed it open. “Must you always use the servants' corridor? It is very disconcerting to hear voices coming from behind the wall.” And as he started to say something else, she stepped aside to let him see that Meyer was within earshot, adding pointedly, “I am still engaged with Mr. Meyer; we are just finishing our visit of the public rooms.”

Meyer, startled, had turned around and was blinking in surprise at the sight of his host's son emerging from the middle of a wall.

Her cousin made an instant recovery. His blue eyes widened ingenuously. “That's not a corridor; it's my secret passage,” he said, in hurt tones. “I was showing it to Mr. Clermont.” Sure enough, a tall figure was ducking through the low narrow door in Simon's wake. The dark eyes met hers, amused.

Simon had marched up to Meyer. “Our house has dozens of secret passages,” he said in the confiding voice of a much younger child. “Would you like me to show you some of them?”

It was a masterful strategy, Serena decided. Meyer would now dismiss any rumors he heard of hidden recesses and tunnels—and there were indeed dozens, although most could barely accommodate Simon. More importantly, he would dismiss Simon as an over-imaginative child.

“There is a hidden treasure,” he was assuring Meyer. “I'm the only one who knows where it is.”

“Simon, you know better than to plague your father's guests.” Her voice carried a warning, whose real message was:
don't overplay your hand.

Clermont had wandered over to one of the watercolors. “You didn't bring me to this room,” he said accusingly. “These are by Harris, are they not?”

She decided not to remind him that his own tour had been abbreviated because he was still convalescing. That might in turn remind the inquisitive Mr. Meyer of the suspicious accident on Clark's Hill. “Yes. They are the originals of some of the plates in his book.”

“To the Right Honourable the Earl of Bassington, This Plate is most humbly Dedicated,” Clermont read off. He sighed. “Beautiful work. Pleasing to the eye and remarkably accurate. Seems hardly fair that a single individual should have both talents.”

Meyer had joined him. “Do you by chance have the honor of the artist's acquaintance?” he asked, in reverent tones.

Clermont coughed. “Is there a younger Mr. Harris? The author of
The Aurelian
died when I was a small boy, I believe.”

First service returned by Mr. Clermont for fifteen,
thought Serena.

Meyer peered shortsightedly at the signature. “Ah, yes, my mistake,” he said. He fished for his spectacles and put them on. “Vanity.” He gave a self-deprecatory smile and shook his head. “I did not wish Miss Allen to think me an old man.”

Miss Allen was in fact thinking that she did not like liars. That even the polite fictions necessary to maintain life in a well-bred household irked her (“Miss Allen is not at home,” when she was standing right behind the drawing-room door as Pritchett sent the caller away). And yet here she was in a small room with three people who were all lying through their teeth. She wondered what would happen if she were to step between Clermont and Meyer and shout “Stop playacting!” at the top of her lungs.

Clermont counterattacked. “What I like best about Harris,” he said, “is the way he creates an elegant composition while still depicting males, females, and larvae of each species. As with the Painted Ladies in this example.”

“Yes, and note the broken china cup on the ground,” Meyer riposted. “Delicately suggesting the traditional habitat of the Painted Lady, to whit, rubbish heaps.”

“And the thistle—is that not the preferred food of the Marmoress, here?” Clermont was overdoing it, she thought.

“Is that so? The Marmoress? Ah,
Melanargia galathea
. I do not know all your English names for the insects. It is not as familiar to me as the Painted Lady.” Meyer gave his embarrassed smile again. “I am the veriest amateur,” he confessed. “I hope to profit from the coincidence of our visits, Mr. Clermont.”

Game to Mr. Meyer,
she decided gloomily.