London Gambit

by Tracy Grant

  Now she looked much like the girl of two-and-twenty she in fact was, but when she drew back after giving him an exuberant hug, she looked at him with the keen gaze of one of his best agents. She scanned his face, seeking clues, but merely said, "It's so good to see you. Come into the sitting room."

  "You look well," he said, as she poured coffee.

  "It's good to be with my mother and sister again. In some ways it's been easier than I thought. In others—" She glanced out the window, as though the heavy gray of the sky in and of itself told the story of what was difficult about living in London.

  "It's an insular country," O'Roarke said. "Not easy for outsiders. But the British can be surprisingly kind when one gets to know them. They've embraced outsiders more through history than many of them would care to admit. I'll own to having grown more comfortable in England than I'd ever have thought possible."

  "In truth, many people have been kind. And Maman and Ninette seem more at home than I'd have thought possible. I daresay I shall as well. In truth, I think the hardest part is not having a mission. A huge part of my mind feels empty."

  He touched her hand. "I know the feeling. Though I confess at times I've longed for it."

  She handed him a cup of coffee. "Something serious must have happened to bring you back to London so quickly. Unless—" A question she couldn't quite put into words flickered in her gaze.

  Raoul froze, the coffee cup halfway to his lips. "Damnation. I should have realized. You're much too acute."

  Lisette colored, reminding him of how young she was. And in some ways quite inexperienced. "I don't know anything for a certainty—But I'm not blind. I saw you looking at her."

  He took a sip of coffee. "Which says a great deal for your skills and that mine must be slipping."

  "Or that you felt safe in front of those you were with. Besides, you said you trusted her. And that you'd tell her what happened in any case. From you, that's better than a declaration."

  He thought back to that night, the myriad tensions, the sheer, intoxicating relief of seeing Laura again. Was he slipping?

  "I'm glad," she said. "You deserve some happiness."

  "I don't deserve anything of the sort, but I've found more of it than I ever expected." He blew on his coffee, dispelling the steam. "In truth, I came back for two reasons. I was on my way for reasons that are far more personal than I would admit to any but my closest friends"—he gave a faint smile—"I do have a reputation to maintain. But when I got to Dover I found a message from Suzanne."

  Lisette's gaze flickered over his face, wide and questioning. Raoul took another sip of coffee, relief warring with dread. Relief because Lisette betrayed no knowledge of the Phoenix plot. And dread because he didn't want to tell her.

  "Has anyone from the old life been to see you recently?" he asked.

  "Suzanne," she said without hesitation. "She brought her children, they're charming. Bertrand. Manon Caret. Suzanne brought her and she engaged my mother to repair her costumes. She brought another actress, Jennifer Mansfield, who I think also may once have been an agent—"

  "Long ago. No one who's come to England more recently has sought you out?"

  "Should someone have?" Lisette sat back and regarded him. "Raoul, why did Suzanne send for you?"

  "My dear—Have you ever heard the words 'Phoenix plot'?"

  "It was a code name for plans to get Bonaparte off St. Helena. Highly theoretical plans, but—Mon Dieu."

  "We don't know anything for a certainty," Raoul said. "But someone's been visiting former agents, trying to get them involved in the plot. And the man who warned Suzanne about it slipped away in the night with a raging fever before he could explain more, and then turned up again trying to recruit agents to assist with the plot. I don't suppose you ever met a Louis Germont?"

  Lisette clunked her cup back in its saucer. "Germont? He's the man who talked to Suzanne? I saw him."

  "In Paris, before you left?"

  "No, in London, yesterday. In Les Trois Amis. It's—"

  "A coffeehouse frequented by émigrés. I know it well."

  "I go there when I'm homesick. I was with Ninette. I looked over and saw a fair-haired man who looked familiar. At first all I could see was his hair and a bit of his profile. I didn't think much of it, because one is always seeing familiar-looking people at Les Trois Amis, but I was trying to place him while Ninette and I sipped our coffee. He was with another man, a bit older, brown haired, nondescript. Then Germont turned to the side and I recognized him."

  "Did you speak to him?"

  "No. I grabbed my sister's hand and got her out of the coffeehouse as quickly as possible."

  Raoul watched her. Lisette wasn't given to fancies. "Bertrand helped Germont flee Paris. The story was that Germont was a clerk in the foreign ministry. Was that not the case?"

  "No, he was. And he'd passed information to the Bonapartists. That's true as well. I could see why Bertrand would have helped him. Why perhaps he'd really needed to flee France."

  "But?"

  "Germont tried to steal letters I was carrying for Queen Hortense. That was when I learned about his other master." She looked into Raoul's gaze. "He's an agent for Fouché."

  "We seem to have identified the bracelet's owner." Malcolm dropped into a chair across from Jeremy Roth in the Brown Bear Tavern.

  Roth pushed aside the notebook in which he'd been writing and signaled to a waiter to bring Malcolm a pint. The Brown Bear, which adjoined the Bow Street Public Office, was frequently used by runners to conduct business. Laura had been detained in one of the rooms upstairs when she was first taken into custody after the Duke of Trenchard's murder.

  Malcolm told Roth about Maria Monreal. He omitted the full details of Harry's past association with her, but he suspected Roth read between the lines.

  "A fortunate break that we found her. And God knows we could use a break in this case." Roth leaned back in his chair. "Does she know Worsley or anyone connected to him? I've been interviewing the Brook Street staff to see if anyone was approached about the household's arrangements for the evening, but none of them reports talking to anyone. So, unless they're lying—and I could detect no evidence of that—we don't know how this Maria Monreal knew Worsley would be back late and had told the staff not to wait up."

  "I haven't seen David since I learned her name, but I doubt he knows her. But Carfax does." Malcolm took a sip from the pint the waiter had brought him. Last night, after their search of the Brook Street house, he and Suzanne had updated Roth on Carfax's use of Whateley & Company as his private system to transport goods and information. Now he told Roth about his interview with Carfax that morning.

  Roth turned his tankard in his hand. "Would Carfax have known Worsley's plans for evening?"

  "He'd certainly have known David would be at the performance at the Tavistock and very likely that he was going to the supper party afterwards. He might have known from the past, or been able to guess, that David would tell the servants not to wait up." He might even have been able to guess that David would bring Simon home with him, though that was too great a confidence to share, even with Roth.

  "You think we're caught in a private battle between Carfax and Wellington?" Roth asked.

  "I did," Malcolm said. "But Fitzroy is convincing when he denies it. I think it would be particularly difficult for Fitzroy to lie when it comes to the duke."

  "He always struck me as one who'd have a difficult time lying in general." Roth gave a twisted smile. "Speaking from an enlisted man's perspective."

  "A good perspective."

  "But distant when it comes to officers. As distant as a Bow Street runner is from the denizens of Mayfair, though I seem to get caught up in their affairs surprisingly often." Roth took a sip from his tankard. "I remember hearing Somerset had lost his arm. Hard to believe it's three years since Waterloo tomorrow. In some ways it seems like yesterday. In others as though it were another world."

  Malcolm nodded. Another world in which
his wife had still been actively spying for the French. How different might their lives be now if Bonaparte's forces had been victorious that day? Would it have been easier for her to stop spying? Or harder?

  "Whom besides the duke would Fitzroy Somerset do such a favor for without question?" Roth asked.

  Malcolm had been asking himself the same question since his interview with Fitzroy the previous day. "I don't know. But I'd hazard a guess it's another soldier."

  Suzanne leaned back on one of the black metal benches in the Berkeley Square garden. Colin, Emily, and Livia were playing tag, while Jessica and Drusilla attempted to join in, and Berowne alternately chased the children and rolled over on his back. Cordelia and Laura sat beside her. Cordy, she knew, was loath to go home while Harry was out interviewing Maria Monreal, and Laura, she suspected, had her own anxieties about what Raoul was doing. Malcolm could be back at any moment, or not until dinner. And Suzanne was less anxious about what he was doing than about what she was going to say to him when he returned. It was one thing to make up her mind that she had to tell him about the Phoenix plot, and another to actually tell him and face his response.

  "I'm glad Raoul's back," Cordelia said. "You must be relieved, Laura."

  Laura gave a dry smile. "I suppose now I have to stop pretending with you as well."

  "Not if you don't wish to," Cordelia said. "I'm quite adept at feigning blindness."

  Laura's smile deepened. "In truth, it's rather a relief not to have to pretend with friends."

  "I'm fortunate that Harry was mostly done living a life of danger when we reconciled," Cordelia said. "Not that it stops me from worrying." She spread her fingers over the cherry-spotted muslin of her skirt. "Given that, it seems petty of me to be concerned that he's presently interviewing his former mistress."

  In an odd way, the comment was an offer of friendship, and Laura's gaze said she took it that way. "On the contrary. That sounds beastly. Though knowing Harry, I wouldn't say you have any cause to worry."

  "No, of course not." Cordelia pleated a fold of the sheer fabric between her fingers. "But it's hard to—"

  "Let go of the past?" Laura glanced at her daughter, hiding behind one of the plane trees. Tag seemed to have given way to hide and seek. "Don't I know it. But I think that's just what one has to do if one wants to move forwards."

  Suzanne wondered if Laura was thinking of her own past or of Raoul's. Which included Suzanne herself. She put up a hand to tighten the ribbons on her Leghorn hat, just as a familiar lean figure appeared approaching the square. Suzanne lifted a hand to wave. The warmth she always felt at the sight of her husband washed through her; at the same time she tensed at what she had to tell him.

  Colin, Emily, and Livia ran to the square railing to wave to Malcolm. He stopped to talk to them, ruffled Jessica's and Drusilla's hair, picked up Berowne, and walked over to the three women with the cat draped over his shoulder. "Your afternoon looks much more agreeable than mine. I've been to see Fitzroy and Carfax. Fitzroy claims to have engaged Ennis at the request of a friend for whom he was acting in confidence."

  "Do you believe him?" Suzanne asked.

  "I'm inclined to do so." He perched on the arm of the bench. "He also emphatically denies hiring the person who broke into Brook Street. In which case, there are definitely two different people looking for whatever Craven had."

  "And Maria Monreal was working for the person who had Coventry killed," Cordelia said.

  "It looks that way. Though it doesn't mean she killed Coventry. Someone else working for the same person could have broken into Whateley & Company. In any case, Harry's well able to take care of himself."

  "Of course," Cordelia said.

  Malcolm touched her arm. "Carfax admits Maria Monreal worked for him during the war, but he denies any knowledge of the break-in. Which is just what he'd do if he was behind it."

  "Do you think he was?" Laura asked.

  "No, but I don't discount it as a possibility." Malcolm pulled Berowne from his shoulder into his lap.

  "Perhaps Harry will learn something from Maria Monreal," Cordelia said.

  Malcolm met her gaze for a moment. "I hope so."

  The children fell on their parents demanding refreshment, which necessitated a return to the house. Once they were all settled in the day nursery with lemonade and biscuits, it was a simple enough matter for Suzanne to say she needed to speak with Malcolm. After a few sips of lemonade, they went a few doors down to their bedchamber.

  "Cordy's a bit concerned," she said. "And aware she has no right to be."

  Malcolm shook his head. "She has to know Harry has eyes for no one but her."

  "Sometimes it's difficult to see that oneself. But I think it's more that she's realized Harry could have had a life without her."

  Malcolm dug a shoulder into one of the bedposts and regarded her. "I'm quite sure Harry couldn't imagine life without Cordy. Because that's precisely how I feel about you."

  Suzanne's chest constricted. "You always know just what to say."

  "Hardly, but after five and a half years of marriage I have learned a bit." He watched her for a moment. "What's wrong, sweetheart?"

  Suzanne drew a breath. Always best to say these things straight out. She dropped down on her dressing table bench. "The night of the Whateley & Company break-in. I told you I left the Grandisons' because Bertrand summoned me to Marthe's to tend an injured émigré."

  Malcolm regarded her with a steady gaze. "You said he'd been wounded. With everything that's happened, I forgot to ask you how he got on."

  "As it happens, we don't know. He ran from Marthe's in the night."

  "Odd." Malcolm's brows drew together, but he was silent, waiting for her to go on.

  "It makes a sort of sense when one knows the whole story. He babbled to me while I was tending him. After Bertrand and Marthe left the room." She locked her hands together. "Have you heard of the Phoenix plot?"

  His gaze narrowed but held no flash of recognition. "No, but it sounds like a code name. For resurrecting something? Or someone?"

  She managed a faint smile. "What it is to have an agent husband with a good classical education. Yes." Her fingers tightened. When crossing a precipice, ultimately one had to leap. "It's a code name for a plot to free Napoleon."

  She saw the realization settle in his eyes but he held himself perfectly still. "You wanted to talk to O'Roarke before you told me," he said.

  She swallowed, her throat raw. This was another of the moments that could push their relationship forwards or send it crashing to bits. But there was nothing to be gained from avoiding the truth. "Yes."

  Malcolm nodded, his gaze steady as still water. "You sent for him?"

  "Yes, though apparently he was already on the way home to see Laura."

  He gave a faint smile, though his gaze remained serious. "I understand."

  "Do you?"

  "In this instance, you couldn't think like my wife."

  "I am your wife, Malcolm."

  "But you're not just my wife, as I constantly try to remind myself. You have other loyalties. In this case, you had to think as an agent first. If I suspected Carfax was trying to break up a Bonapartist plot, I wouldn't tell you. At least not before I'd investigated and knew what we were really facing."

  She released her breath. "Darling—you never cease to amaze me."

  "I could say the same for you. Also, I assume you wanted to make sure O'Roarke wasn't involved."

  She drew another parched breath. "He says he isn't. I believe him. Which may mean I'm going soft."

  Malcolm gave a twisted smile. "I'd never expect you to turn on him, sweetheart. And I appreciate your not putting me in a situation where I had to betray him or decide to let the plot go undiscovered."

  This time the breath she drew had a touch of wonder.

  "I can't claim to fathom my feelings when it comes to O'Roarke," Malcolm continued. "But you and Laura aren't the only ones who worry about his safety in Spain. It was a distin
ct relief to see him walk into our breakfast parlor this morning. The thought of him embroiled in a plot—"

  "I know." She gripped her elbows.

  "Does he have any idea who's behind it?"

  "He says not. He's out making inquiries now. I think he'll tell us what he learns. At least, as much as he can."

  Malcolm gave a twisted smile, then stepped forwards and drew her to her feet and into his arms. "It usually comes down to that, doesn't it?" he said into her hair.

  Chapter 22

  Harry climbed the steps of the Berkeley Square house. He knew instinctively that Cordelia would have stayed there after Livia's lessons. He told himself that what he had to report could only reassure her. But he knew from personal experience that it wasn't the facts that would worry her. It was the unvoiced thoughts and feelings that underlay those facts. What actors filled in in a script. What a composer added to a libretto.

  Impossible to define. More powerful sometimes than words, and certainly more elusive. How often had he looked at Cordy, seeking clues about some man she had danced with, spoken with, shared a glass of champagne with? Far more often than he would admit to anyone, even Malcolm. It was a reflexive reaction. Even now. Even with everything they had built.

  "They're in the library, Mr. Davenport," Valentin said, accepting Harry's hat as he admitted him to the house.

  "They" turned out to be everyone. Colin's wooden castle gleamed white and silver in a patch of sunlight. Malcolm was on his knees, helping Colin, Livia, and Emily sort through the knights and ladies. Drusilla and Jessica were galloping wooden horses round the outer battlements. Berowne dozed by the window. Cordy, Suzanne, and Laura sat on the sofa with a tea tray and a plate of almond cakes before them.

  "Uncle Harry." Colin looked round over his shoulder. "We're picking the knights of the Round Table."