The Spy's Kiss (9 page)

 

 

Sir Charles Barrett was leafing idly through a small stack of letters at the breakfast table, setting half aside unopened, glancing quickly at most of the rest, and reading through the few items which seemed urgent. His wife, long inured to silence at breakfast, was placidly sipping her chocolate and perusing the latest communication from Masters Edward and James Barrett, penned in haste from school and pleading for an immediate advance on their quarterly allowance. Sir Charles had handed it to her with the recommendation to let the rascals stew in their own juices.

“What do you think it is now?” she asked.

“Same as last time, they've placed some absurd wager and lost all their money.”

“Last time they were here in London, consorting with that limb of Satan, Simon Viscount Ogbourne. I didn't realize this sort of thing went on at school as well.”

He lifted his head from his own correspondence. “My dear,” he said mildly, “much as I would like to blame Simon for the failings of my sons, I am afraid it is not quite so one-sided. Who took Simon down into the crypt under St. Paul's, for example? And who showed him how to pick locks?”

“Ned and James would not have been able to teach Simon lock-picking if
you
had not allowed your friend Colonel White to instruct the two of them first,” she pointed out acerbically. “For an entire afternoon, using our own house as a testing ground. What were you thinking?”

“God knows.” In fact, he had been thinking that when he was a schoolboy he had always longed to acquire a few practical skills, like lock-picking, in addition to Latin and geometry. He went back to his letters and separated one sheet out of a thick packet. “Here, this is for you. It's from Clara Bassington; she enclosed it with Bassington's to me.”

“They're coming up to town later this month,” she said, peering at the spidery handwriting.

“Yes, so Bassington says. And a good thing, too, with this Russian business unresolved.” He continued skimming the earl's letter. Negotiations with the Tsar's minister continued; Royce had finally located the misplaced file; had Barrett heard anything more of the Austrian position; there had been a curious incident.... Barrett frowned, sat up, read more carefully. In his last letter, Bassington had mentioned that their mysterious visitor was leaving the next day, and Barrett had breathed a sigh of relief and suspended his inquiries into Clermont's background. Now it appeared the man was still there—and was actually staying in the house, after a very suspicious accident.

He got up, swearing under his breath, and rang the bell.

“Yes, sir?” A footman materialized instantly. Sara Barrett ran a very well-ordered house.

“Is Crosswell here yet?” This was his secretary.

“I believe so, sir. Shall I ask him to step over this way?”

“If you please.” The man vanished, and Barrett gave his wife an apologetic look. “Do you mind, my dear? I would like to finish my breakfast, but this may involve rather tedious matters.”

“Oh, I was done eating ages ago,” said his wife. “I was simply keeping you company. I'll leave you to Crosswell's tender mercies.”

The secretary, a pleasant-faced young man of twenty-two, appeared almost as quickly as the footman had and held the door for Lady Barrett on her way out.

Dispensing with the courtesies, Barrett held up the letter. “This is from Bassington,” he said. “Remember his visitor? Mr. Clermont? I had asked you to look into him, and then I told you to drop it? I need you to pick it up again. There's been some sort of riding accident, and Clermont is now ensconced in Boulton Park being waited on hand and foot by Miss Allen and Lady Bassington. The whole thing smells to high heaven.”

“Er,” said Crosswell, blushing slightly. He was very shy, too shy, Barrett thought regretfully, to realize his ambition to serve in parliament. But he would make some minister an excellent secretary.

“Yes?” Barrett said encouragingly.

“Er, didn't quite drop it.” The thin face turned even redder. “Got curious. Knew someone who had been at Derring's school. Younger, of course, my age. But thought I would ask. Bastard from noble line, odd name. Schoolboys fond of that sort of gossip. Thought my, er, acquaintance might remember something. And he did.”

“What?” Barrett was accustomed to his secretary's condensed style of speaking.

“Clermont not English. French.”

“You believe Clermont is
French
?”

“My friend will swear to it, sir. Many émigré students at Old Hall after the Revolution. Catholic schools in France closed for years during the Terror, you know.”

“You are telling me there is a Frenchman at Boulton Park right now, a Frenchman who speaks perfect English and has told no one of his origins?”

“Er,” said Crosswell, “yes. Very likely.”

“Hell,” said Barrett with feeling. He rang again and ordered the footman to institute an immediate search for one Philip Derring, a young man from Oxfordshire lodging somewhere near Mount Street. “It's urgent,” he called, as the footman withdrew. “And if you do find him, bring him here at once.”

“What if you can't locate Derring?” Crosswell asked after the footman had disappeared once more.

“Then we call in the dragoons.” Barrett picked up his coffee cup. “And in this case, that is not a figure of speech.”

Clermont's brief respite from Vernon's supervision came to an end at half past ten in the morning of his fourth day at Boulton Park. There was a familiar knock on the door and an equally familiar failure to wait for permission to enter. The valet marched in, followed by two cowed underlings with an enormous trunk which they deposited, under his supervision, next to the armoire. They returned a few moments later with a crate of books, Julien's equipment case, and a cloth-covered basket. On their final trip they brought in two armchairs and a Persian wool coverlet. Only after dismissing them did the valet finally deign to greet his master, who had been watching the proceedings in horrified fascination.

“I trust, sir,” said Vernon in arctic tones, “that you will see fit to inform me next time before you nearly kill yourself.”

Clermont started to protest that it had been an accident but thought better of it. It had not, in fact, been an accident, and in any case, the best strategy with Vernon was to remind him who was master. “What is
that
?” he demanded, pointing at the trunk.

“Your new trunk.” Vernon opened it. It was full. “I took the liberty of purchasing a larger one.”

Julien hadn't imagined he owned enough clothing to take up that much space, even if Vernon had brought everything in his wardrobe. He was wrong; Vernon had brought everything in his wardrobe, and it did fill the trunk. Spare riding gear. Evening clothes. Two dressing gowns. A variety of jackets and pantaloons for day wear. Dozens of neckcloths. Stockings. Pumps. Slippers. His evening cloak and silk hat, for heaven's sake, as though an opera house might suddenly materialize in the middle of the earl's garden. Sixteen shirts. As they emerged, neatly folded, his jaw dropped. “Did you bring
all
of my shirts?” he asked, incredulous.

“Yes, sir. Not being certain of the competence of the earl's laundress. Nor of how long you might be planning to stay.” This last came with a very pointed look, which Julien pretended not to see.

“And are those books? Why on earth would I need books at Boulton Park? The library here is one of the best in England!”

Vernon sniffed. “I have it on good authority that invalids often prefer familiar volumes, as less taxing to their faculties during convalescence.”

“I am
not
an invalid,” said Clermont between his teeth. “I am nearly recovered, in fact.”

“Miss Allen tells me otherwise.” He added, significantly, “I have already spoken with her and assured her that I will do my utmost to carry out her instructions for your care.”

He should have known the two of them would form an alliance. His hopes of solid food, centered on the mysterious basket, withered and died. He lay back and watched Vernon finish unpacking, eyes half-closed. Clothing was stowed in the armoire; the books set out; furniture rearranged; curtains twitched open to admit more light. The basket proved to contain four jars of pale brown jelly, which Clermont recognized immediately as belonging to the class of foodstuffs consumed only by those who could not leave their beds and find something more appetizing. He let it all pass without comment until Vernon removed two silver and ivory brushes from the bottom of the trunk and laid them on the table by the armoire.

“Put those away,” he said sharply. They were the only items with his crest he owned besides the ring. He couldn't take a chance, especially after Lady Bassington's reaction to one glimpse of the signet.

“But, mi—” The valet cut himself off before the forbidden title could emerge.

“Exactly.” He gave Vernon a quelling stare.

“But,
sir
, we have no other brushes. And your hair, if I may say so, requires more than a comb to maintain its proper appearance.”

“Be sure to put them away every time after they are used, then.”

“Yes, sir.” There was a long pause. “I take it, then, you have not had an opportunity to, er, discuss your concerns with Lord Bassington?”

“Not a conversation I would choose to have while lying flat on my back with a dent in my head,” he pointed out dryly. “I thought I might wait a bit.”

Vernon coughed. “If I might venture to suggest—”

Another quelling stare, and the valet subsided. Julien had heard it all before. A proper gentleman would write a letter. A slightly less proper (and less patient) gentleman would call upon the earl in private and pose the question straight out. A gentleman would
not
snoop through family diaries under the pretext of conducting scientific researches. Nor would he accept the hospitality of a man he considered an enemy.

For years he had been a proper gentleman. He had followed his aunt's rules, which covered everything from how much to eat at formal dinners (less than your host, especially if he outranks you) to when it was appropriate to attempt to kill an opponent in a duel (if he has called you a coward; otherwise, you must only wound him). When he was young, she delivered her injunctions in person, daily, beginning on the day his grandfather formally acknowledged Julien and conferred one of the family titles on him. Once Julien had gone away to school she turned to moral epistles, each with its own subject heading (“On the class of females permitted as mistresses to young men of questionable birth”). Vernon was her master-stroke. Handpicked for his knowledge of the aristocratic code of conduct, he was her means of making a vicarious return to the daily lectures—lectures which, she constantly reminded Julien, he could not afford to ignore.

“Mistakes which in others would go unnoticed will be seen as evidence that your birth has tainted you,” she had told him on the occasion of the first lecture (“Gentlemen conceal pain, even when they are being caned for misbehavior,” delivered during the caning, which she administered herself when the new marquis defiantly refused to thank his grandfather for his generosity). “You must prove yourself fitted for the position your grandfather has given you. At any moment, no matter how well you have done up until then, you may ruin yourself with one careless word or gesture.” He had been five years old.

Now, twenty-four years later, he had finally decided it was time to act like a bastard.

 

 

Serena poked her head cautiously into the sickroom after several gentle taps on the door went unanswered. She expected to see her patient in bed, dozing. Instead, for one disoriented moment she thought she had opened the door of the wrong room. Fresh flowers were on the mantelpiece and the nightstand, two new armchairs had been arranged to form a small circle near the bed, and the fire was burning brightly (without smoking, as it usually did). Tucked partially behind one side of the massive armoire at the other end of the room she glimpsed a very large trunk. On the other side stood a clotheshorse, with a jacket and inexpressibles hanging neatly over the rods. A paisley rug had been tossed over the bedclothes and extra pillows in starched cases were plumped against the headboard.

Her patient had been transformed as well. His bandages had been adjusted and partially covered with a black silk bandeau. The bright hair had been trimmed, he had been shaved, and instead of Pritchett's faded dressing gown, he now sported one of claret-colored silk. He was seated at a small table with Simon, both of them peering intently at a metal and wooden contraption which Clermont was adjusting with some brass screws along one side.

“Goodness,” she said faintly, more to herself than to either of the occupants of the room. Her eyes moved around the room, finding more additions—a candelabra, a small oval mirror, a stack of leather-bound books on the lower shelf of the nightstand. A volume lay open on the bed; she recognized it as one of the late earl's journals and, curious, stepped over and looked at the passage Clermont had been reading.

 

 

 

There followed a list, with crude drawings, of some half-dozen specimens collected that day, none of which were moths or butterflies. She turned to the front of the volume. It was dated 1783. George must be her uncle, then, and Charles his cousin. They would have both been in their early twenties. Perhaps the late earl ended by regretting his decision to introduce his son to the joys of travel. Her uncle had spent more time abroad than at home after that first expedition to the Caribbean, and several times he had been given up for dead, only to resurface just when his hopeful cousin had borrowed large sums of money on the expectation that he would now be the heir to the title. Then, fifteen years ago, George Piers had married the daughter of a family friend, produced Simon, and settled down to exploit his now-numerous and very valuable foreign connections as an unofficial consultant to the government.

A harsh, grating sound from the other side of the room called her attention back to Clermont. He was hunched over the table, rotating a handle set into the frame. Simon was staring, fascinated, at a round metal plate which flashed and whirled and sent off tiny sparks. The noise made her wince. After what seemed like a small eternity, it stopped. Clermont straightened and said to Simon, “You can see now—look along this edge—it's already distinctly rounded—”

But Simon had caught sight of her, and, warned by his change of expression, Clermont turned. His dark eyes were glittering with excitement, and in his crimson robe and black headband he bore a disconcerting resemblance to the swashbuckling villain of some lurid novel.

“May I ask what you are doing?” she said.

Her tone was mild, and she had in fact meant her question for Clermont, but Simon's uneasy conscience translated her query into an accusation. “Mr. Clermont invited me,” he said defensively. “He sent Hubert to find me, and I came in properly, through the anteroom.”

“Did you truly invite him?” she demanded, looking at the alleged host.

“Yes.” Clermont frowned, twisted one of the screws slightly, then looked up again. “It wasn't precisely my idea. Hubert—if that is his name—helped my servant to unpack this and mentioned that it might interest the viscount.”

“How very—odd,” she said. “I am surprised Hubert would forget himself so far as to hint that one of our guests should share a valuable piece of machinery with an eleven-year-old boy.”

Clermont grinned. “His exact words, if you must know, were: ‘Take care Master Simon don't catch sight of this, sir, or you'll never see it in working order again.' ”

Laughing, she said, “Now,
that
sounds more plausible! But you chose to ignore his warning, I take it? Perhaps I should tell you about my clock, which has not chimed since Simon ‘repaired' it. Or about the waterless fortnight in the kitchen while the pump was being replaced. Or about my aunt's jewels, which had to be entirely remounted after Simon took the stones out of three different pieces and switched them.”

“No need,” he assured her. “Hubert enlightened me. I believe he also mentioned a model ship, a distilling apparatus, and a music box.”

“The music box works now,” Simon muttered. “And Serena's clock never really chimed properly in the first place.” Then his face brightened. “Look at this, Serena! It's a lens grinder, and he's going to let me help make the lens for a telescope! See, you cut the glass into blanks, only Mr. Clermont has already done that, and then you set them here in the holder, and use the screws to turn the gears to adjust the angle of the grinding plate, and when the angle is right, you lock it with this lever—”

He was pointing to five different places on the machine, and she was already thoroughly confused. She could see a disk of glass in a sort of vise at one end of the machine, and a series of plates and rods converging on it. Simon was turning the handle slowly, still talking, and she could barely even tell which way each section was rotating; she had never been good with machines. The one thing she did grasp was that this was a precise and complicated piece of equipment. Not the sort of thing idle young gentlemen carried around in their portmanteaux. Who exactly was Julien Clermont? Were his parents in trade, after all? But then why had Mrs. Childe and her aunt treated him like a duke?

She gestured towards the machine, hoping she looked as if she had followed Simon's explanation. “How do you come to be an expert at lens grinding, Mr. Clermont?” she asked.

“Hardly an expert,” he said. His face had grown guarded again, as though he somehow sensed her suspicion. “But I am good enough to make lenses for myself; the one I use for the specimens, for example. My grandfather insisted that I learn.”

“Was he a craftsman himself?”

For a moment he looked startled, then he shook his head and smiled wryly. “No. Call it a peculiar form of snobbery, if you will. The Hapsburg emperors required their children to learn a craft. Therefore, my grandfather required us to do so. My aunt learned weaving, my cousin studied engraving, and I took up optics.” He was not looking at Simon, who was still grinding slowly, but now he said over his shoulder, “Best stop and rotate the blank, Simon, or you may go too far on that side.”

“But I shall have to go off to lessons again in a few minutes, and I wanted to finish this bit,” the boy protested.