The Spy's Kiss (30 page)

“Dauncy!” It took him a minute to remember that that was his name and turn towards the speaker. One of the senior troopers had come in. “Colonel wants you,” the man said, jerking his head towards the door to the hallway.

That was his cue. His mouth felt dry suddenly and he took a last gulp of ale. It didn't help. He climbed the narrow wooden staircase wishing that it could be a month ago, that he could be returning to Vernon to announce that he would not, after all, be calling on the Earl of Bassington. Or better, that he would be calling at Boulton Park, but for the purpose of courting the earl's niece, having discovered that he was not as ineligible a suitor as he had always supposed.

Instead he was on his way to a meeting which would likely result in someone else being shot. With real bullets. He concluded gloomily that there might be worse things than being executed for a crime you had not committed. Condemning someone else to be shot, for example, without being certain they were guilty.

He heard voices behind the door of his former room, but when he knocked they fell silent.

“Come in.” It was Barrett.

They were all there—both Meyers, Barrett, LeSueur, and the colonel. He closed the door and leaned against it. “Surely you do not really wish to involve me,” he said, making one last attempt to escape. “I am a duplicitous bastard who became involved by accident, remember? The son of the man who would be the most likely suspect were he not dead?”

“We must force the thief's hand,” said White. “Our evidence at the moment is very thin. We have searched all the private rooms in the residence as thoroughly as we could without revealing our suspicions. The missing letter is not there. Our best hope is to trick the thief into incriminating himself—or herself. That is where you come in, Mr. Clermont.”

“I may have been a bit underhanded in my dealings with Lord Bassington,” said Julien angrily, “but I do not believe that episode entitles you to consider me an expert in deception. Use Mr. Meyer here, if you need a play-actor. Or that false priest, that Major Drayton fellow.”

White growled something under his breath, but Barrett, ever the peacemaker, held up his hand. “Mr. Clermont, just a moment. We seem to be misunderstanding each other. We will not ask you to take part in any deception. You will not be there to conceal the truth, but to reveal it.”

“What do you want of me, then? What am I to say? What am I to do?”

“All you need do is be present. The spy believes you to be dead. Even the most self-possessed criminal may falter momentarily when confronted by a man who has been executed in his place.”

“And who is the criminal?”

Barrett sighed. “We are not certain. The plan is to assemble several individuals who seem likely suspects and then bring you out and observe their reactions.”

“Haven't you attempted something of this sort before?” Julien folded his arms. “I thought that was the point of my mock execution.”

“It was.” White's tone was peremptory. “Our list of likely suspects derives in part from what we saw that day at the Tower. Our chief suspect fainted when you were shot. Our second candidate seemed extraordinarily pleased by the sight of your blood-stained corpse.”

Julien had not known that. It made him feel slightly—very slightly—less dubious about the proposal to entrap the thief.

“Another purpose was to persuade the thief to take no action for a time, to tempt him to shelter himself under your alleged guilt. There, too, we have been successful. So far as we can tell, there have been no further attempts to tamper with the diplomatic correspondence. In effect, shooting you bought us some time to continue our investigation.”

There was a knock at the door, and one of the dragoons came in and held a brief, low-voiced conference with LeSueur. He glanced sideways at Julien as he left.

“Come along,” said the captain, rising from his chair. He led Julien back downstairs. “The rest of the dragoons are going off to relieve the troops from the garrison at Boulton Park. Keep out of sight for a few hours, until we can find a room to hide you in. Colonel White is taking no chances. Should the thief spot you, he might take alarm and flee.” And then, after a look at Julien's face, he added in an almost sympathetic tone, “Try to get some sleep.”

Enlisted men did not rate bedchambers. Julien went off to the stable and found an empty stall with reasonably clean straw. First he thought he would not lie down at all; he had too much to think about. Then he decided a short rest would do no harm and might even make the solution to his problems clearer. The next thing he knew, a rough hand was shaking him awake.

“You're wanted upstairs again,” the man said, sounding suspicious.

“Damn,” muttered Julien. He ran his fingers through his hair and got most of the straw out; then he stumbled across the yard to the pump. The water was like ice. Where was that corporal with the hot water and the razor when he needed him? He felt groggy and filthy, and the thought of what would happen the next day was making him sick to his stomach.

Barrett was still in the upper parlor, looking harried and anxious. The others were gone. “Mr. Clermont? This way, if you please.” He led Julien down the hall and up half a flight of stairs to a small, steep-roofed room full of linen presses and drying racks. “I must ask you to remain here, with the door locked, and to open only to those who give my name. Now that the other soldiers are leaving, you should not be seen downstairs or in the inn yard. It is of the utmost importance that no one at Boulton Park hear of your presence.”

Julien nodded, too tired to argue or ask questions.

“In the meantime,” Barrett said, “you might wish to have this.” He held out two sheets of note paper.

A letter, Julien saw as he took them. He did not recognize the writing. Only when he reached the signature and saw the name “Charles” did he understand what it was.

“This is your father's last letter,” said the older man. “I am sure that you find the thought of our proceedings tomorrow afternoon extremely distasteful. I certainly do. I thought it might help to see that your father was willing to risk his life to maintain the confidentiality of the negotiations your kinsman and I are conducting.”

Julien still found it odd to hear Barrett refer to the earl as his kinsman. Knowing he was half English had not meant much to him until an actual family had suddenly taken the place of the mythical, absent father. He acknowledged to himself that his relationship to Bassington was probably the principal reason he had agreed to assist his former persecutors in their quest.

Sir Charles now produced a familiar red-bound book. “I understand that you are also interested in seeing your father's diaries. This is the volume which describes his meeting with your mother. You may read it if you choose; some of it is very unpleasant. He did not take it well when your mother left him.”

Startled, Julien drew his hand back from the book. “She left him? I thought it was the other way around.”

“He did intend to marry her, at least according to his own record of events. He met her at an inn; she had run away from school. They were living together, and he was arranging for a Protestant minister to travel across from England to wed them—and to bring funds which he had begged from his uncle—when she went to mass one day at the village church and never returned. She sent him a message that she had sinned and would not demean her blood further by living with a seducer and a heretic.”

That certainly sounded like a Condé, Julien thought bitterly.

“I am not sure how trustworthy his account is,” cautioned Barrett. “Although I will say that in the rest of these diaries—and I have read several years' worth at this point—he has no compunction about painting himself in the ugliest colors. Indeed, this volume is mild compared to some of the later ones. He made his living trading in gossip, you know, and if none was to hand he would do his best to create it.”

Julien took the book, but did not open it.

“Remember,” said his host as he left, “stay concealed.”

Abstractedly, Julien turned the key and locked the door. He was already absorbed in the letter. It was actually two different documents. The first page was a brief note in French, apparently written by one of Piers's servants, informing the earl that his cousin had been killed in a duel that morning and that, per his instructions, two boxes of his effects were being shipped immediately to England. It was unsigned, but there was a postscript, which initially made no sense to Julien: “I believe my master would have wished you to know that M. Ivanov was also killed in the engagement.”

The letter itself was in English.

Julien sat down and read it again. Then a third time. The postscript made sense now. His father had silenced the threatening Ivanov—but not without taking a mortal wound in his turn. Barrett was wrong, though. The letter did not make him feel better about cornering the thief. The thief was beginning to look a lot like Julien's father: an opportunistic man who made money selling other people's secrets.

He turned to the diary. It was just as Barrett had described it, and not so different from his aunt's account: the vision of a frightened girl at an inn. The self-interested rescue, intended at first as nothing more than a pleasant diversion with a timid but very pretty village maid. The gradual realization that she was of gentle birth. The decision to wed her—all the more plausible to Julien because his father also described Aline's unthinking revelations of her as-yet-unnamed family's wealth. And then the frantic search when she did not return after mass. She had asked him to let the priest marry them, and with an Englishman's typical horror of popery he had refused, had told her their marriage would not be lawful in England if it were not performed by a proper clergyman.

Julien closed the book. It was all there: the pleas to the fourth earl for help, the eventual discovery of a Mademoiselle DeLis at a convent in Lausanne. His father had tried to see her and had been refused. He had never known of Julien's existence. No one had; the Condés had concealed him well. The payments were for his mother's place at the convent, not, as he had supposed, for his own upkeep.

The seduction of his mother made painful reading; the absence of any reference to himself was almost as painful. But what haunted him most, long after he had set the book down on the table, were the pages of self-recrimination his father had written in the days after Aline DeLis had disappeared. Why had he been so self-righteous? Why had he failed to see what would happen when she went to mass, and spoke to the priest? Why hadn't he married her when he had the chance?

Why, indeed? Julien got up, unlocked the door, and peered out into the dark upper hall. He had his own ghosts to confront tonight. He hadn't exactly promised Sir Charles to stay in this stuffy little room. Or even in the inn. Or even in the village, for that matter.

Boulton Park was being guarded by the dragoons, which would have made it difficult for Julien to get into the house had he not been one of the aforementioned dragoons. As it was, he simply rode past the man on duty at the lodge, stabled his horse with the other mounts, and walked in a purposeful, military fashion over to the man who was stationed on the terrace.

“What now?” said the man in a peevish tone. Julien had supposed he would say something like “Who goes there?” but Julien was in uniform, after all, and had ridden next to the man for several hours on the way down from London.

“It's Dauncy. You're to go round the gardens now.” He paced, sentry-like, until his fellow soldier had vanished into the mist beyond the inner hedges, and then he took off his hat and boots and began climbing up the wall of the house.

He knew where Serena's room was. They had sat down with him and shown him a floor plan of Boulton Park, the fools, and asked him where Simon's secret passages were, and who he had seen in which rooms at which times. He knew he could get up the wall, as well. It was exactly the same rusticated stone as the new pavilion at Chantilly, which he had climbed when he was six in one of his many attempts to escape his aunt. His feet didn't fit into the grooves as easily, but he was stronger now and his reach was longer. Her window took less than a minute to open. He was feeling very pleased with himself until he eased himself into the room and discovered that the bed was empty.

Panicking, he lit a candle and looked around. This was her room; this had to be her room. Her shawl hung over the back of a chair, and the fan she had carried at the ball was lying on the table next to the fireplace. He crossed to the door. It was locked from the inside. She was Simon's cousin, however, so that didn't necessarily mean anything. He set the candle down on the floor, turned the key, and was about to ease the door open when he heard a slight noise.

Instinct, more than anything else, saved him. Before he could really think he had whirled around just in time to catch the poker aimed at his head. She had swung hard; his palm was stinging. Grabbing the poker with both hands, she tried to tug it free. He jerked it away and clapped his hand over her mouth to prevent the scream she was about to give.

“Will you marry me?” he said into her ear once he had gotten his breath back.

She kicked him. “I'll report you to your captain,” she said, her voice muffled behind his hand. “My uncle will kill you.”

For the first time it occurred to him what she must have thought, seeing a soldier climbing into her room. The poker hadn't been aimed at him, but at someone she believed to be a stranger. At least, he hoped that was the explanation.

The candle had gone out. He staggered over to the window, half carrying, half dragging her, until they reached a faint pool of light. “Serena, look at me,” he said.

She looked. He wasn't sure what he was expecting her reaction to be—relief, astonishment, joy? He got astonishment. Briefly. Then her eyes narrowed.

“You are dead.” It sounded like an accusation.

He didn't have much time. “Will you marry me?” he said again. “I swore that when I saw you, those would be the first words out of my mouth.” He hefted the poker. “I almost didn't get it said before you brained me.”

“They shot you.” She wasn't listening. When she spoke, it was as though she was talking to herself, as though he was not really there. “I saw them. I saw the blood. You are supposed to be dead.”

That was what she had said the last time he had come to her room at night. He looked down at the poker and wondered briefly why he was determined to marry a woman who kept threatening to kill him. “I'm alive. The firing squad was a ruse. But until tomorrow afternoon, I am still officially deceased. You cannot let anyone know you have seen me.” He set the poker down and glanced nervously out the window before turning back to her. “You haven't answered my question.”

“What question?” she said. She sounded more like herself. Suspicious, edgy.

He said it again, slightly louder. He was starting to feel that this whole expedition had been very ill-advised. Only an idiot would go galloping off in the middle of the night because of a passage in a dead man's diary. Still, an oath was an oath. “Will you marry me?”

“Will I marry you?” She stepped back, so that her face was in shadow. He saw the white nightgown billow as she sketched a sardonic curtsey. “I am most sensible of the honor you do me, Mr. Clermont, but I must decline your flattering offer.”

He amended ill-advised to disastrous. By now he had expected to be wrenching himself away from a poignant embrace. Another glance out the window. There was still no sign of the real sentry. “Is it my birth?” he said, feeling the old wound tear open, raw as ever.

She laughed bitterly. “Your birth? Say rather your death. Am I to marry a man who is such a fraud that even his execution is a sham? A man who let me watch that—that horror show? Who never attempted in any way to warn me, or to let me know, afterwards, that he was still alive?”

Out of the corner of his eye he saw movement in the garden. “Damn,” he muttered. “I must go. There's a patrol outside, preventing secret meetings like this one. Serena, I will explain, but not now. I haven't time. All I can say is that I am sorry.” He grimaced. “I seem to spend a great deal of time apologizing to you, don't I? Perhaps I was a fool to think that a proposal of marriage would be a welcome change in my conversational repertoire.”

She was silent.

He stepped closer to her, and she did not move away. Heartened, he risked taking her hand. It was shaking. When he drew her back into the moonlight she did not resist. Against his cheek her eyelashes were damp, and when he kissed her he felt her tremble in a way which had nothing to do with fear or anger. Perhaps his cause was not so hopeless after all.

“I cannot stay,” he said, after another, harried glance out the window. “Or I'll be seen climbing down. Si—someone asked me to remain concealed tonight. I broke out of a locked room to come and speak with you.”

“You did?” He detected a distinct thaw in her tone. She hadn't moved out of his arms, either.

He thought about proposing again, now that she seemed a bit happier about his reappearance. But he didn't quite have the nerve. He compromised on another kiss. It was meant to be quick, but the thaw turned out to be more like a heat wave. It occurred to him, dimly, that if he were found here she would be forced to marry him. What would be so terrible about that?

It occurred to him that he was thinking like his father.

He unlaced her arms—reluctantly—and when he saw the tears in her eyes he almost changed his mind. Almost, but not quite. “Remember, you haven't seen me,” he warned as he climbed out the window.

She nodded.

 

 

He barely made it back down to the ground and into his boots and hat before the other sentry loomed up out of the darkness. “Morrow says he's been posted to the garden, not me,” he said. “And that you're not on duty at all tonight.”

“My mistake,” mumbled Julien. “Must have misheard the orders.”

“Well, get back to the village,” the other man said sourly. “And straighten your hat. It's on nearly backwards. Captain sees you, he'll fine you a week's pay.”

He rode back to the inn, wondering what would happen tomorrow. Would the thief confess? Would Serena hate him all over again for his part in the ugly scene Barrett was engineering? Would he hate himself? He suspected that the answer to all three questions was yes.

He kept his face shadowed as he turned his horse over to an exhausted-looking Jem back at the Burford Arms, but he didn't even try to get back to his garret unobserved. Instead he went and knocked on the door of the little parlor. He didn't think any of the conspirators would be asleep yet, and sure enough, he heard movement in response to his knock, and then quick footsteps.

“Who is it?” The colonel's voice.

“Clermont.”

The door swung open.

“What do you want?” White sounded just as irritable as the sentry from the terrace.

Behind the colonel Julien could see Barrett and Meyer. Neither of them looked surprised or angry. They had not noticed his absence, then. He could pretend he had a question, or wanted permission to check on his horse.

“I went to Boulton Park,” he said, addressing Barrett. “I thought I should let you know. No one saw me, save for Miss Allen.”

“As you predicted,” Barrett said to Meyer, rising. He escorted Julien back down the hall. “Did you tell Miss Allen anything about our plans? Or give her any hints she might pass on to others?”

“Any hints beyond the obvious alarm a guilty party might feel seeing the house surrounded by dragoons? No.”

“We have provided an explanation for the patrols. Death threats against Lord Bassington.”

Julien snorted. “Who is going to believe that?”

“It happens to be true.” Barrett opened the attic door and waved Julien in. “Some members of the French émigré community took the news of your assassination—as they term it—very hard. You cannot imagine how eager I am to resurrect you.”

“I myself find being dead increasingly tiresome,” Julien said.

“Will you give me your word to remain in this room until you are needed?”

“Yes.” He could not help adding, “I would have been in a very difficult position had you asked for my promise earlier.”

Barrett sighed. “I was reproaching myself for that omission when we found you gone, but Mr. Meyer was certain you had gone only to see Miss Allen, and luckily he proved to be right.”

Julien was growing very tired of the knowledgeable Mr. Meyer.

“We have sent for your servant,” Barrett added. “He should be arriving in a few hours to help you restore your normal appearance.”

Julien ran one hand over his chin. “I am usually a bit cleaner,” he admitted.

Barrett paused, one hand on the door. “Was Miss Allen happy to see you? Or is that too personal a question?”

“Will she radiate joy, do you mean, and so advertise my presence to your quarry? You may rest easy on that score. She tried to crack my skull open with a poker. Then she accused me of failing to die properly and laughed at me when I proposed.”

If Barrett had smiled, Julien would have throttled him. But all he said was, “I see.”

 

 

Serena woke up in stages the following morning. First, there was the sense that a wonderful gift was waiting for her somewhere. The precise nature of this gift eluded her at first; she lay there for a while simply enjoying the absence of guilt and misery. Then she remembered what the gift was: Clermont was alive.

That got her out of bed. Terrified that it had all been a dream, she searched her room for some evidence that he had actually been there. It took her twenty minutes to find it: a smear of dirt on the not-quite-closed window. She drifted along in a daze for several hours, savoring her private happiness, trying not to reveal her change of mood when Emily came in to dress her or when her aunt stopped by for her now-routine visit of consolation.

The second awakening came later in the morning, and was more metaphorical in nature. In the middle of another daydream-cum-reminiscence centered on last night's visit, she became aware that her silver lining was surrounded by a very ugly cloud. Why had Clermont's execution been staged? And why, at this particular moment, had he been allowed to reappear? An obvious and very unpleasant answer suggested itself, and she went at once to find Simon and warn him. Now her concern was not so much that she might seem too happy, but that her agitation would be too obvious. She retreated to her room again. But at two o'clock she could not bear the waiting any longer. She decided to go in search of her uncle.

Her excuse was to be the rumors Emily had passed on to her earlier. The servants were all terrified, convinced a horde of rabid Frenchmen were planning to storm Boulton Park and kill every living soul in the place. She would ask him whether the wild rumors circulating in the kitchen had any foundation.

Pritchett did not know where his master was—unusual in itself. She tried her uncle's study and the library, and the sitting room attached to the earl's bedchamber, and the drawing room (this last a forlorn hope; he never set foot in the place if he could help it), and at last returned to the study. The first time she had obtained no response to her knock. Now she rapped more loudly, and called out, “Uncle, it's me.”

“Serena?” It was her aunt, behind her.

Feeling guilty for some reason, she blushed as she turned around. “I was looking for Uncle George,” she said.

“Oh, dear.” Her aunt looked flustered. “I was hoping you might know where he is. The servants—”

“—are about to resign
en masse
,” Serena finished for her. “Did he say anything to you about this business of the royalists?”

“He told me not to fret, and patted my hand in that absentminded way he does when he wants to get to work. I was sure he would be here.”

A door in the paneling opened and Simon stepped out. “Papa is in the records room,” he said.

His mother jumped slightly. “Simon! I do wish you would
not
appear and disappear in that disconcerting manner.”

Serena merely gave him a warning frown. She had told Simon not to use the servants' corridors while the soldiers were here.