Page 67 of The Spy and the Nightingale
“If you are able to seek refreshments or step out for air, whatever excuse you devise, there are agents working together, not only?—”
“It cannot be Beaumont. They would suspect him.”
“No. I’m certain it would be someone else.” Who, she did not know. She had met only Baudelaire, but it could not be him either.
Lucy withdrew her hands. “I do not have much cause to trust strange men.” Her voice was dry, a trace of biting sarcasm in it.
She swallowed around another great lump at what else might lurk behind Lucy’s words and twisted the ring on her finger, willfully suppressing the thought.
The ring.
She tilted her wrist, palm inwards, so that Lucy would see it glinting on her finger.
“Maman’s ring!” Lucy exclaimed. “But why is she not?—”
Now was most definitely not the time to answer that. “It could be a token of sorts at the theater, in the hands of someone who?—”
Lucy nodded. “Yes. Yes, it will?—”
A soft knock silenced them both, followed by Chrysanthème’s entrance. “I truly wish I did not need to interrupt, but we must do something with your dresses. Time runs thin, and we must not give Dubois cause for additional suspicion.”
Additionalsuspicion. Her heart accelerated.
Chrysanthème looked between them. “I think you must also be very careful not to invite comparison between your faces. Keep your faces turned away from Dubois whenever you can. Compton too.”
It was as she’d feared, then.
Chrysanthème carefully pinned the rip in her borrowed gown in lieu of stitching. The wine stain on Lucy’s skirt was speedily dealt with, although the silk would never be the same.
Lucy remained silent. She did not trust Chrysanthème, and why should she?
“You may speak in front of Chrysanthème,” she told Lucy. “She is a friend of friends.”
Lucy shook her head, but when they hugged once more before they left the room, she whispered, “What I know of Compton will be of value. Dubois and Cuvelier as well. Tell Beaumont this.”
Heart in her throat again, she nodded. “I will.”
Nathaniel would help secure Lucy even had she nothing to tell him; she was sure of it. Whenever he could do so without jeopardizing his work. But if Lucy could provide much-needed insight into their activities, all the better.
Perhaps her sister’s freedom would be Compton’s downfall. She had not truly dared to hope for any of it, but she’d found Lucy now. Maybe—just maybe—both possibilities were within reach.
Nate’s every nerve vibrated. It required conscious effort to maintain a bland expression, something that rarely demanded concentration on his part. He strove to keep his body loose, his posture relaxed, his movements lazy.
He’d learned close knifework with theguerrillerosin the latter part of the war and had come armed tonight accordingly, but it would do him little good if the other men turned on him suddenly in a concerted attack. Compton had a pistol in his coat; the bulge had briefly revealed itself when he sat. Dubois no doubt had multiple weapons at hand. Cuvelier possibly not, but with both Compton and Dubois armed, that little mattered.
Last night he’d been nearly sure, especially after the suggestion of thesalle écarlate, that Dubois didn’t trust him. Tonight he was certain.
Dubois had watched Isobel closely during the introduction to Miss Muir, and he’d watched Dubois. Dubois was the most immediate threat to her tonight, no matter that Compton was his primary objective as far as the Foreign Office was concerned.
Dubois knew. Perhaps not the exact relationship between Isobel and Miss Muir, but the remark last night about Isobel’s eyes was not a surface observation. He couldn’t tell if Comptonand Cuvelier were similarly wise but thought not—and interesting if so, for why would Dubois not have shared those suspicions? But Cuvelier paid no attention to Isobel after his introduction to her, and while Compton had certainly taken note of her, he’d been more calculating than distrustful. The avaricious look as his eyes skimmed Isobel was far from casual but lacked Dubois’s hooded suspicion.
Whatever was transpiring between Isobel and her sister, Dubois believed that Chrysanthème was his creature. There was cold comfort in that because, in that sense, he was not working entirely alone tonight.
“Tell me, what are your political interests, Beaumont?” Dubois asked. “I find myself very much interested in them. My friend was not able to tell me much after your game oftrente-et-un.”
Oberlin again. Had he some role in all this, or had he merely been Dubois’s informer in Frascati’s? “I am rather bored with politics, to be honest.” He reclined casually on one elbow. “Or perhaps I should say disenfranchised by them. Those bloody wars were rather limiting, for one, preventing me from freely enjoying your country for several years.”
Dubois made a noncommittal noise. “We, too, found the wars rather inconvenient, did we not, Compton?”
