“You are so earthy and forthright, you army chaps,” Adrian coolly cut in.
“I want to know why this French whore trots in here like she—”
“But this isn’t some manly, thigh-slapping dinner in your barracks.”
Grey made an inconspicuous hand motion, and Adrian subsided. “You’re a guest here, Colonel, and there are ladies present. Adrian, serve Mademoiselle Villiers some wine.”
Grey was making a point, so she let Adrian fill her glass for her.
The colonel snarled and swiveled to confront Galba. “You tell me why there’s a bloody slut of a French spy sitting at the dinner table.”
Galba allowed an eloquent silence to punctuate, then said, mildly enough, “We will not discuss this now, Colonel. Or in those terms.” He turned back to Adrian. “I’m wary of intervention in Lazarus’s own household. It is provocation on our part.”
“Not our part. My part. I’m acting on my own. Annique, you will not grow up to be big and strong if you don’t eat your vegetables.”
She rearranged what Adrian had put upon her plate with her fork and listened to him wax eloquent in favor of some scheme, doubtless dangerous and complex. She did not eat. She could not have eaten anyway while the Colonel Reams seethed at her in that fashion. The wine smelled like an excellent Bordeaux.
“Your decision?” Galba glanced at Grey.
“It has to be attempted. We’ll deal with Lazarus afterwards. Will goes along to do the heavy lifting.”
Adrian exhaled impatiently. “It’s a second-floor window. She…” His eyes slid across Reams. “The package I’m collecting weighs four stone. I could fetch it out under one arm.”
“And that’s all you have,” Grey said. “Your shoulder isn’t healed. Do this, if you have to. But Will goes with you.” Thus Grey made judgments of important matters, sending these deadly men out to steal, taking care they should be safe.
It would be easy to fall in love with such a man. He felt her eye upon him and grinned, just in a flash, like a man at his sweetheart, and also like a tomcat who has been much satisfied by a tabby. It was a compliment, but an embarrassing one, though of course no one at the table knew what he had been up to with her.
Then he was speaking to Doyle, all business. “…pull in two extra guards. Galba’s in the guest room, but Pax leaves before dawn.”
The quiet Paxton stretched across the table to fetch back the wine bottle. “I’ll take the usual route. If you have messages, give them to me tonight.”
“You already have mine.” Galba took up his wineglass. “Good journey.” It was unobtrusive, but Grey and Doyle and Adrian lifted their glasses as well, and they drank as one.
How it brought back memories, this meal. As a child in Lyon she had carried bread and wine to tables like this and sat as the quiet mouse while men and women made such preparations and left, one by one, to walk alone into danger. Later, she had been one of Vauban’s people, his very inner circle. That silent toast…Her friends had made those for her. It was lonely to look upon this as an outsider.
“Upon that note…” Galba’s chair creaked. “Mademoiselle Villiers, we must clarify this situation for all concerned. I regret giving you so little time to compose yourself.”
She set the fork down and ceased annoying the vegetables. “I am all attention.”
“Do you wish to accompany Colonel Reams and place yourself under the protection of Military Intelligence? I did not think so. No, Colonel, you may speak later. Your choice, mademoiselle.”
She shook her head.
“Then you shall not. You will remain with us. However, I would prefer that you were not distracted by illusionary alternatives. You are planning to escape, I believe.”
“One explores many possibilities.” She did not try to look young and naive, as that would be wasted here. Instead, she composed her face as if she were at the opera, attentive but uncomprehending.
Grey appreciated it. The flicker in his eye was all amusement.
Galba was less easy to read. “Let us make your situation plain. You are not without intelligence, but you underestimate your worth on the playing field. That is not uncommon in someone your age. Robert, you may take Mademoiselle Annique to the front door and open it for her.”
Colonel Reams hopped to his feet like a red and angry bantam. “She’s a French national. You have no right. The girl’s mine, damn it.” He should have been absurd with his jiggling paunch and a napkin clutched in his hand. He was not ridiculous to someone who might soon be in his cellars for questioning.
Then Grey was at her elbow, shepherding her from the room, his body between her and that spewing of rage, his path direct and unswerving toward the colonel. It was Reams who backed away. He swung round to snarl into the bland face of Galba, whose dangerousness was of an order the colonel did not recognize.
The clamor of his outrage trailed them down the hall to the dim, stiff parlor where Grey unlocked the front door. The cool evening wind enveloped them.
They stopped just inside the doorway, and Grey looked alertly at the houses opposite. He was considering the question of snipers, she thought.
“The colonel fears you will let me walk out of here. He is a stupid man, is he not?” she said.
“He’s a self-serving son of a bitch.”
“That also.” She looked upon the quiet street in the dusk. “You have opened this door for me as Galba told you to. You wish to show me something. I have an idea what it may be.”
“Of course you do.” He gestured toward the large black carriage waiting directly in front of the house. “That’s Reams’s carriage. The healthy young men inside who are taking such an interest in you are from his private detachment of marines. He’s brought three.”
“Three? It is an honor of sorts, I suppose.”
“You have a reputation among spies. We can ignore them, however, because Reams can’t touch you. Remember that. Now, look to your right, farther up the street.” Grey’s arm around her was not to keep her from running. It was for comfort. “Number Sixteen, with the window at the front where the lamp is. That’s Soulier’s agent keeping an amiable eye upon us. She grows herbs in her back garden and presents us with sachets of lavender every year at Christmas. She has visitors tonight. Large Frenchmen. They’re at the window now, watching us.”
He let her absorb it for a while, then said, “When Soulier gets orders from Fouché, he won’t have any choice.”
The sky was opalescent with sunset. The linden trees planted in the little strip of garden in the middle of the street rustled very slightly in the wind. They both knew that a death order from Fouché might already have reached London. “It is a difficult time for Soulier.”
“So it is. We have no word on Leblanc yet. He’s probably already in London. Let’s finish this. Look left.” A cart and horse waited in the street. Pickaxes and shovels and piles of bricks disordered the pavement. Two men, long after any reasonable hour, repaired a brick wall in front of one of the houses. “Our local Czarist agents.”
“I am learning Russian. It is a country France has not invaded yet, but I wish to be prepared.”
“I suppose that memory of yours helps you learn languages. Who else have we got? The French Royalists are up on Braddy Street, two or three lots of them, mostly keeping an eye on each other. It’s hard to tell the Royalists apart. Sometimes they’re not even sure.”
“Is that all of them?” She felt profoundly tired. It was inconceivable so many men should interest themselves in her. It was sheer perversity. They could not possibly know what she carried in her head.
“One more. At the corner. See the crossing sweeper? He belongs to Lazarus.”
“Lazarus? Ah…the Lazarus of Adrian. The one he goes to steal from tonight. I do not know the name.”
“He’s not political. Lazarus rules the criminals of this town. He deals in precious objects. He’d sell the knowledge in your head, and you, to the highest bidder.” His grip tightened on her arm. “You woul
d give him that knowledge within a short time. He is…skilled.”
“This is an interesting neighborhood.” She didn’t try to keep the fear out of her voice. Grey had brought her here to frighten her and deserved to know how well he had succeeded. “They will all speculate upon why I am in your headquarters, beautifully dressed and not held by any duress. That is what you want, no? To show them you have done me no harm?”
“Soulier will be relieved.”
“Do not be slighting. Soulier used to buy me meringues in the Boulevard St. Michel when I was small enough to ride on his shoulders. He took me to the opera when I was eight. I wore a white dress with a blue sash. He taught me how to pick locks. It will give him no pleasure to kill me.”
Within an hour Soulier would know she was here. He would wonder if she had become a traitor. Grey did this on purpose. So clever of him. “Let us go inside. I feel cold.”
Reams was still shouting and pounding the table when they returned, using English words she had not yet learned. Without glancing at him, she took her place at the table beside Galba and picked up her napkin to put in her lap.
“Oh good. You’re back. Your food was getting cold.” Adrian lounged in his chair, his expression benign. “And the colonel is repeating himself.”
Reams swung his head like an enraged bull, glaring up and down the table. “She goes with me. Now.”
She was certain Reams could not give orders to Galba. Almost certain. Why, oh why, had she never learned more about the British?
Galba didn’t raise his voice. “The jurisdiction is moot. Come, Colonel, sit down. Let us not fall out over one French operative whose usefulness is still questionable.”
She concentrated on looking like someone whose usefulness was questionable.
“Military Intelligence has priority. Damn it, she’s mine till I’m through with her.” Reams’s gaze crawled across her. His fingers curled hungrily. This was a man who had expended much imagination planning exactly how he would interrogate her.
Galba folded the wineglass between his hands. “Your organization will have access to all documents we obtain. But she remains with us.”
“I say—”
“This is England, Colonel.” Grey was rock and adamant steel. He took a step toward Reams. “This time, you don’t have a troop of armed men at your back.” He took another step.
Reams retreated. Only one step. But everyone had seen him flinch, as a dog before the wolf. They all knew he feared Grey.
“Damn you.” Panting and red-faced, he whirled and slammed his fist onto the table in front of Galba. Silverware rattled. Glasses danced. “You’d better get yourself another pretty slut to play with. You’re going to find out I do have the authority to take her.” He marched out, not glancing back, and young Giles jumped up to run nimbly to get the doors unlocked in his path.
“That’s got his truss in a twist, don’t it?” Doyle remarked amiably. “I hope you weren’t listening to none of that, Maggie, ’cause it weren’t polite.”
“Poisonous little beast.” Lady Markham, who was Maggie, took a sip of wine.
Annique let her breath out slowly. She felt as if she were made of ancient paper, ready to crumble at a touch and blow away in the wind.
Adrian talked in her ear. “Reams gets so few chances to harass beautiful female spies. He’s very disappointed.” He took one of her hands and began chafing it between his. “For us it’s routine. We abuse women most days of the week. And why am I the one holding your hand, when what you want is Grey, who…Yes, he will eventually show up.” Then Grey was beside her, and she turned toward him and buried her face into his waistcoat.
“He can’t touch you. It’s all bluster.” Grey stroked her hair. “Weren’t you listening to me when I said you were safe?”
“Robert, take her out of here,” Galba said.
“She’ll be fine. Give her a minute.”
“We can grant her few amenities, but privacy is not beyond our means.” Galba looked away. “Marguerite, I apologize for exposing you to this. You are aware of the exigencies that force me to tolerate Colonel Reams.”
Doyle chuckled. “Hell, Maggie don’t understand half them words the colonel says, do you, luv?”
“I most certainly do. I have learned many vulgar words from you.”
They were all so carefully not watching her. She could not collapse in fear and self-pity under the eyes of so many English agents, and an aristo. She ceased clutching Grey. “Do not concern yourself. I am most perfectly fine.”
He did not release her, however, for which she was inexpressibly grateful. “I’m sorry to put you through that. We had to show him you’re under my protection. Under Galba’s.”
“I am all complaisance to be displayed like a performing monkey.” She looked very hard at her plate. “Though I do not like loud, angry men arguing over who shall take me to his basement and torture me.”
“He can’t get to you,” Doyle said quietly. “He can’t get past us.”
“Mademoiselle,” Galba said, “I’m sorry we distressed you. We shall postpone the rest of this discussion.”
How polite he was. The noisy colonel with his many threats was the least deadly of the men in this room. Now she must face the others. “There is no purpose in waiting.”
“Perhaps not. Do you wish to retire elsewhere to eat in peace?”
“It is not necessary.”
“Will you try to drink the rest of your wine?”
She shook her head.
“I’m not trying to cloud your judgment. One glass of Bordeaux is unlikely to do that. No? And none of the rest of this will tempt you either, will it? Bring the wine, then, and let us go into the other room.”
Adrian pushed back pocket doors that separated the dining room from the study. This was the room where she had slept on a sofa earlier. Evidently she was to sit on the same sofa now. Grey had brought her glass of wine along. She did not drink any, but it gave her something to occupy her hands. Behind them, in the dining room, Giles cleared the table, stacking the dishes in a dumbwaiter in the wall.
No one spoke to her. They settled into the comfortable chairs with the ease of long familiarity. Paxton pulled back the edge of a curtain and looked out past the bars to where the last light was fading. His eyes were on the sky, assessing, like someone who would take ship soon. Adrian began a low-voiced discussion with Doyle, being technical about ropes and roofs. Galba settled into the broad red chair a few feet from her and watched the fire. After a few minutes, Giles brought in a tray with cups and a silver pot. It was coffee, even though this was England and she had expected to be assaulted with the Englishman’s idea of tea. She wondered whether this was the usual custom for these men or whether it was a part of the evening planned for her. Grey stood behind her, so close his jacket brushed her back.
“Shall we talk together, mademoiselle, or do you need more time?” Galba asked.
“I congratulate you on the economy of your threats. I do not suppose you have said twenty words to me all evening, and I am entirely quivering with terror of you.”
The old man made a sound of annoyance. “It is useless to attempt to reason with you. Robert, take her upstairs. We will return to this when you are calmer. Tomorrow—”
She dared to interrupt him. “Monsieur, for this discussion I will never be calmer.”
“Then, in the name of sanity, drink some coffee—Giles, get her a cup—or stand up and scream, or punch Grey in the stomach, or do whatever is necessary to compose yourself. The thought of dealing with a woman of your caliber, terrified, appalls me.”
She knew, almost certainly, the path she must take in the next hour. “I will not drink coffee. Nothing at all. Let us talk instead.” She set the wineglass firmly on the table, away from her.
Grey’s hand moved lightly to the nape of her neck, beneath her hair, warm against her skin. He did this to strengthen and reassure her. She had the thought that it does not take much to convince a woman she is in love if
one is even a little kind to her when she is alone and frightened.
“I would like to call you Annique, if I may,” Galba said.
He would wish to be informal when he threatened her.
“Pull yourself together and answer Galba,” Grey said softly.
“Of course you may call me Annique.”
Galba’s lips twisted. “I will not presume upon it. Annique, have you considered your options carefully? Let me recapitulate your dilemma. At the front door are jackals from several nations. Somewhere, not far from here, Jacques Leblanc is making plans to kill you. That is what you face, if you escape. Waiting for you also are your French masters. Robert tells me you no longer wish to serve Fouché. Is that correct?”
“I would rather not.” Her voice was a dry rustle of sound, not much louder than the fire.
“Is this ideological? Or is it because Fouché is so lacking in imagination he will require you to work as a courtesan?”
She did not answer. One does not explain one’s motives to one’s captors.
Galba shifted his weight in the chair as if he had become uncomfortable. The boy brought him coffee in a demitasse so small it disappeared in his hand. They waited while Galba drank. He took his time, as if he delayed to seek words. “I do not fault your mother’s choice. She was a great patriot. But that path is not for everyone. It is not for you.”
“No.”
“Besides your French masters and what awaits you beyond the front door of this house, you have a final alternative. The British Service.”
“We’re not as final as all that.” Adrian slipped onto the couch beside her. “Cub, I owe you my life four or five times. I pay that kind of debt. I won’t let Galba do anything horrible to you.”
“I saved you only twice, I think. And yes, you will let him do things entirely horrible to me, mon frère.” It warmed her to be defended by Adrian, as they knew it would. As he knew it would. “You have done many things you did not want to do. Hurting me will be harder for Grey, who has some conscience, which you do not. But both of you will do it.”
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