The Paris Affair Part 39

"We have to see what's in that painting," Malcolm said. "I can't tell Wellington and Castlereagh about Tatiana's child. I can't make it a p.a.w.n."

"No, of course not," Cordelia said.

Malcolm turned his gla.s.s in his hand. "And given the climate about the treasures in the Louvre, I can't see anyone giving us permission to take one of the paintings in any event."

"Including the French," Harry said. "They're angry enough about losing the foreign treasures. They'd never stand for an Englishman taking a French painting. We'll need to get it out and hopefully return it without anyone knowing it's been gone."

" 'We'?" Malcolm asked.

Harry stretched his legs out and crossed them at the ankles. "Didn't think we'd let you have all the fun, did you?"

Malcolm regarded him for a moment. "Thank you, Davenport."

Harry returned his gaze. "Still getting the hang of being a friend, Rannoch, but I think this is what friends are for."

"And there's a child's safety at stake." Cordelia moved to the arm of Harry's chair. "The men who tried to kill Mademoiselle Leroux-was that because someone thought she might lead you to Princess Tatiana's child?"

Malcolm flicked a glance at Suzanne. "I fear so."

"Which rather seems to justify Tatiana's efforts to conceal the child's birth and parentage," Suzanne said. "For reasons we have yet to discover."

"It's obviously more than the scandal," Cordelia said. "Whoever was behind the attack today wouldn't have been worried about Princess Tatiana's reputation."

"Unless the father's concerned for his," Harry murmured. "Or is trying to find the child and wants to make sure no one else finds it first."

"I thought of that," Malcolm said. "Though I'm more afraid someone wants to eliminate the child before we find it."

There was nothing like the prospect of illicit activity later in the evening to add spice to a diplomatic reception. Suzanne took a sip of champagne. Gabrielle and Rupert Caruthers had just come into the salon in the Austrian emba.s.sy. Suzanne watched them for a moment. The way Gabrielle's hand rested on Rupert's arm, the smile they exchanged before they moved in separate directions. They seemed both easier together and further apart.

"Having the whole Laclos affair brought up again can't be easy on either of them," Simon said at her elbow.

"Simon." Suzanne turned to look at him, recalling the way he'd spoken-or not spoken-about the Carutherses' marriage at the British emba.s.sy ball. The questions about Rupert's and Gabrielle's involvements in the Laclos affair had been answered. As an agent and an investigator, Suzanne no longer needed to focus her attention on them. But she found it harder and harder to ignore the human element. She'd learned that from her husband. "When we spoke about the Carutherses before, you seemed to understand that their marriage was-"

"Perhaps not all one could wish?"

"Yes."

Simon's gaze drifted back to Rupert, now talking to Fitzroy Somerset. "Well, given that Rupert and Bertrand Laclos were obviously madly in love with each other, it's a fair guess Rupert's marriage to Bertrand's cousin is less than idyllic." He turned his gaze back to Suzanne and scanned her face. "You knew."

"Found out. Recently. Was their relationship so obvious?"

"Only to one who knew where to look. I'm not sure even David realized."

"You never talked about it?"

"Not for me to pry into other people's lives."

"No, that's left to investigators."

He touched her arm. "That's different. You had cause."

"Gabrielle knows now. Rupert told her."

"I'm glad. G.o.d knows marriage has its challenges. People enter into it for all reasons, and it seems to succeed or fail for all reasons. But I've always thought a marriage built on lies must have the hardest chance of flourishing."

Suzanne's fingers curled round the ebony sticks of her fan. "Quite."

Aline came up to claim Simon for a dance, and Dorothee moved to Suzanne's side. "I never thought to be so grateful for society's short attention span," Doro murmured. "The whispered comments and shocked looks have been quite cut in half since last night." Her gaze turned stricken. "I'm horrid to laugh about it."

"I don't see what you can do but laugh, dearest. How's Karl?"

"Bearing up well. It's my uncle who keeps looking at me as though he's afraid I'll break."

"He had quite a scare. Especially given the way you looked when Malcolm carried you in."

Dorothee fingered the clasp on her diamond bracelet. "He told me this afternoon that he'll understand whatever I choose to do. It was almost as though-Almost as though he was giving me permission to run off with Karl."

"Does that make it easier?"

"It should, shouldn't it? But the look in his eyes when he said it . . ."

"You're afraid of hurting him?"

"No. That is, that's part of it. But I'm more afraid of what I'd be giving up myself." Dorothee stared at the sparkling flower links of the bracelet, then lifted her gaze to Suzanne's face. "When that man struck me and I was falling to the ground-in the moment before my head hit the cobblestones. It wasn't Karl I wanted. It was Talleyrand."

Suzanne watched her friend move off on Clam-Martinitz's arm. Talleyrand was a dangerous man. For many reasons, she should want Doro to find happiness with Clam-Martinitz. And yet- "Madame Rannoch."

Fouche had materialized at her side. Suzanne forced herself not to stiffen.

"You aren't availing yourself of your influence over your husband," Fouche murmured, voice pitched below the strains of Mozart that filled the room.

Suzanne turned to the minister of police with a bright smile. "Perhaps I prefer to let my husband make his own choices."

"I thought we understood each other three nights ago." His gaze skimmed over her face. "I do hope you haven't been so unwise as to listen to your friend O'Roarke."

"Why on earth should I discuss this with Monsieur O'Roarke?"

"Don't play the innocent, Madame Rannoch. You can't imagine I knew about you and not about your links to O'Roarke. I imagine O'Roarke told you he had me checkmated. And I imagine he didn't add that if he moves against me, I will destroy him."

She couldn't quite control her intake of breath.

Fouche regarded her as though she were a type of unknown insect beneath the microscope. "I always knew O'Roarke was foolishly inclined to idealize causes. I didn't realize that extended to his women as well."

"I think perhaps you're misinterpreting simple loyalty."

"I think not." He tilted his head as though breaking her into parts and toting up her monetary value. "I hadn't realized quite how much you meant to O'Roarke. Even then, I doubt he'd actually be mad enough to move against me. But of course I can't be sure. It's an interesting conundrum. I'm inclined to ignore O'Roarke and do just as I've told you I will if you don't oblige me. Of course, I could be wrong, and O'Roarke could move against me. In which case, make no mistake, I will destroy him. So much risk. And you can prevent it all simply by doing as I asked."

She forced herself not to look away from that incisive gaze. "I've no guarantee you wouldn't expose me in any case."

"My dear Madame Rannoch. Why waste such a valuable bargaining chip? You needn't ever fear I'll use it. So long as you continue to do as I ask."

CHAPTER 28.

"It would almost be worth it to see the look on Wellington's face when he learned we'd been hauled in for breaking into the Louvre," Harry murmured.

"Fascinating as the possibilities are, I think that's a scene I can forego," Malcolm said, scanning the street.

Harry cast a glance over the lamplit cobblestones. A seemingly casual glance that held the appraisal of a professional. "Quite like old times. Seems an age since we've had an excuse for breaking and entering. Hope we haven't grown rusty."

"Speak for yourself," Malcolm said, reaching in his pocket for his picklocks.

Harry took them from him. "I'll do it. You two create a diversion to cover me."

He knelt down in front of the door at this side entrance. Suzanne stepped towards Malcolm and into his arms. "Easiest way to create a diversion," she said, raising her lips to his.

Malcolm gave a laugh against her face and met her kiss. He was less prudish about such matters than he'd been when they married. Harry knelt behind them. She could hear the faint sc.r.a.pe of metal, but only because she knew to listen for it.

A carriage rattled by in the nearby street, bringing a flash of torchlight. Suzanne turned in Malcolm's arms so her skirt created a wider shield. She was wearing a dark mulberry spencer and a jaunty plumed black velvet hat over a black sarcenet gown. Dark for camouflage, but also slightly raffish, the ensemble of an actress out for an evening with her lover.

"We're in," Harry said in a lower whisper. "Coast clear?"

Another carriage rattled past, some soldiers strolled by, their voices carried on the evening breeze, and then Harry pushed the door open, and they stepped into the cool, dark quiet of the palace that housed the art treasures Napoleon Bonaparte had gathered up from his conquests across the Continent.

Harry pushed the door to behind them, and Malcolm struck flint to steel and lit a lamp.

Suzanne was too keenly aware of what was being done to France not to sympathize with those from other countries who wanted their treasures returned to them. Yet it was impossible not to feel a thrill at the richness and beauty that surrounded them. Gilt frames; rich, vibrant oils depicting cla.s.sical scenes, portraits, and still lifes; marble statues; and bronze sculptures flashed past them, taking her back to childhood visits she had made with her father to this very museum. She remembered staring up, listening to her father's stories, asking him to pick her up so she could see better. And later carrying her baby sister. She pushed aside the last memory as it tore at her throat.

Thanks to careful reconnaissance early in the day, they could almost have traversed the corridors to the gallery where The Daughters of Zeus hung without illumination. It was a square room near the Grand Salon Carre, featuring works by contemporary painters, mostly French and Italian. Harry stood by the door holding guard. Suzanne held the lamp while Malcolm lifted the painting down and leaned it against a marble bench. They crouched down and studied it in the light of the lamp. Young women in cla.s.sical garb in a garden. The faces were vivid and arresting, the light luminous as it fell across faces and nestled in the folds of white draperies. But none of the models looked like Tatiana.

"Anything that makes you think of Tatiana?" Suzanne asked.

He shook his head. "Nor anything that seems like a clue to a child." He turned the painting round. Suzanne held it so the paint wouldn't sc.r.a.pe against the bench. Malcolm ran his fingers over the back of the canvas. "The name of the painting and St. Gilles's signature again. No way anything could be hidden."

"A secret compartment in the frame?" Suzanne suggested, looking down over the painting to study it.

Malcolm ran his fingers over the frame, tapped against it, shook his head. Then he touched the inner edge of the frame and frowned when he reached the upper left-hand corner. "The frame's been glued to the canvas." He pulled a knife from inside his coat and carefully pushed the knifepoint between the frame and the canvas. His eyes lit. "Tweezers?"

Holding the painting with one hand, Suzanne opened the steel clasp on her crimson silk reticule and gave them to him. Malcolm reached inside with the care he'd use for picking a lock, tugged, and pulled out a sealed, folded paper. Suzanne drew in her breath. Malcolm lifted the lamp.

Footsteps thudded in the corridor.

Suzanne flung her silk scarf over the lamp and went still. She could feel Malcolm's taut stillness beside her.

"There'll be h.e.l.l to pay if we're caught." The voice, English and with a north country accent (she was still learning to recognize accents from different parts of Britain), sounded from the corridor.

"That's why we're doing this at night." The second voice was also British and sounded like a Londoner, with undertones of Cornwall.

"We didn't fight at Waterloo so we could skulk about frog palaces in the middle of the night."

"Hookey wouldn't thank you for calling them frogs. And you said it-If they knew-"

"Better to do it by daylight and face them down."

"Speak for yourself. I've had enough of fighting frogs. I've had enough of fighting everyone. Where the devil are we supposed to start?"

"East gallery. Something Italian."

Suzanne drew a breath. Wellington must have decided to preemptively remove some of the disputed art treasures. And the soldiers were heading right towards them.

Malcolm looked from her to Harry in the shadows. "Follow my lead."

It was all he could say before the footsteps thudded closer and a tall, broad-shouldered man in the uniform of a British army sergeant appeared in the doorway, lamp raised in one hand.

"What the devil-What the devil are you doing here?"

"I might ask you the same." Malcolm got to his feet. "I doubt Wellington would be best pleased to find you breaking into the Louvre after hours, Sergeant."

"Breaking in-" The sergeant drew a breath. "Wellington sent us."

"Oh, good G.o.d." Malcolm exchanged a look with Harry. "You'd think he'd have had the sense not to send us at the same time."

"Probably didn't realize it," Harry said. "You know how orders can get muddled."

"Are you saying Wellington sent you, too?" the sergeant demanded.

"Of course he sent us," Malcolm said, in a tone that would have withered the roses at Malmaison. "You don't imagine we'd have broken into the Louvre in the middle of the night on our own authority, do you?"

The sergeant opened his mouth, then closed it. More footsteps thudded on the floor. A taller, thinner man in an ensign's uniform appeared in the doorway behind the sergeant. "What-"

"They say they're here on Wellington's orders, too," the sergeant said.

The ensign looked from Malcolm to Harry and back at Malcolm. "You're Malcolm Rannoch."

"I'm-"

"And that's Mrs. Rannoch." The ensign's gaze settled on Suzanne with the look of one spotting a favorite actress. He glanced at Harry. "And you must be Colonel Davenport."

Harry rolled his eyes. "So much for anonymity. And you are-"

"Tompkins. This is Sergeant Grey." The ensign moved into the room. The lamplight illumined his round, well-scrubbed face. "I suppose you're here on"-he coughed-"secret business."

"No, we came here in the middle of the night to do something perfectly commonplace," Harry said.