“One of our friends?” Inès had asked him about the owner of the inn. She had sailed with Durand from France to England last autumn, and the two were fast friends.
“Absolument.” Durand grinned at Inès now. “Are you both ready to see the capitaine de port?”
He had told them the local harbormaster was in his pay. They would show their passports asMonsieur et Madame La Porte, pay their entry fee, and show their two small valises at customs. They were to claim they were from Toulon on the Mediterranean and here only a short time.
“I will go in first. The proprietor, Monsieur Chantal, and I have been at this so long that he claims such profit from me that he can marry his daughter to the local marchand de sel.”
“Salt is precious,” Inès told Evan, offhand. “The local merchants who sell the good salt from Guérande have suffered because they cannot export as much, what with the blockade.”
Evan nodded. Lack of good salt at a decent price had been, said many, one of the causes of the French revolting against their king. But Evan smiled. One bright spot forthe British in this disastrous blockade was that local French businesses suffered for the cut in markets.
At the moment, all Evan cared about was having a good meal on a table that did not lean to one side or the other with the wind—and getting his wife to a comfortable bed.
#
Their trip down the coast of the Seine toward Paris was one of the most pleasant journeys Inèshad ever taken. The weather was sunny; the traveling coaches they hired were wide and comfortable; the apple fritters and the calvados wine from Normandy’s orchards slid easily over her tongue. No one looked at them oddly, and that, she was sure, was because, true to Durand’s warning, Evan said little. But also, they had burned their English-made garments before leaving Le Havre. They had purchased new clothing in the local street markets, and none of it was of any quality at all, though clean. Beside her was her husband. The greatest boon to her, he was, as ever, kind and understanding. His acceptance of her actions—her lying and deception of her vice admiral and her terror at being blackmailed by Vaillancourt—astonished and thrilled her. What man would still care for someone who had done any of that? She rejoiced that she had the one and only man who could—and he loved her.
With all secrets between them gone, she reveled in his devotion and took him to her each night and day he wished with an ardor filled with the marvel of his love for her. He was an inventive lover, and she his eager pupil and partner. His devotion salved her anxiety about this trip and its purpose. If his soothing care lasted only for a few hours into the night, she awoke knowing he would be hers once again when they sought their bed.
As they spent a night in a convent in sight of Rouen’s huge, old city clock, she realized she might never see that clock again. As they took rooms in an inn overlooking the little town of Vernon, she urged Evan to abandon the route of the Seine. “It is too obvious. If La Mèreknows I am gone from London, if she searches for me and concludes I’m in France to free Luc, she will expect us to take a fast and simple route. We must go east through small villages where the French army tends not to be billeted. Then we can go south to Paris by riverboat.”
He saw her logic and agreed.
March first, they took rooms in an auberge in Passy to the west of the center of Paris. There they told the propriétaire they would stay for two nights to rest. Their identities covered by their claim to sell Toulon porcelain, they found a dealer in household goods in Le Halle exchange. The innkeeper asked no questions. She and Evan took a fiacre the next morning to the left bank of Paris, where they took rooms in a small auberge. The next morning, they went to seek out help in the Rue du Four from a person whom Inès once knew.
Chapter Twenty-Three
March 3, 1806
Rue du Four
Paris, France
“Who lives there?” Her husband shielded his eyes from the brilliance of the morning sun as it silvered the white stone on the townhouses that spread for over a mile toward the River Seine.
“That man who just left that house?” Inès pulled close the brim of her enormous, bell-shaped cloche hat as they stood at the corner of Rue du Four. They had arrived in Paris last night and taken a room in an auberge near Les Invalides, the hospital and home for wounded French soldiers that Louis XIV had built nearly a century ago. Weather on the left bank this morning was blustery off the Seine, and Inès had to hang on to her hat. So did Evan grab at his own. They had taken breakfast at a small café in sight of this particular house, watching the comings and goings.
Now, appearing for all the world to hail a public fiacre, they lingered as Inès focused on the five-story house she remembered well. Built more than a century ago, it was one of those grand Parisian houses aristocrats had had built to stay in the city when they visited. This was one of those delicate beauties the Parisians calledhôtel particuliernear the Saint-Germain-de-Pres Abbey. Lost to the Vicomte de Neufchateau, who originally owned it—the café owner had told them this morning—a banker had repossessed it years ago. That banker was often in and out of Bonaparte’s favor. Inès feared the one she sought to help them might not still live there.
But she narrowed her gaze on the swarthy fellow who had stepped off the front landing and taken to the street. Rafe, with whom they had been reunited this morning in that small café in Saint Germain, had done his work by delivering a note to the majordom. The older, gray-haired man with a long nose and bulging, pale eyes who had answered the door lingered there, watching his recent caller stride away.
“Durham interested him,” she told Evan, her trepidation dissolving with this small success. “And he read the note.”
“Twice. Is the butler the same one you knew years ago?”
“He is. I recognize him. He is still the majordom of the house. I am so relieved.” She had reason to be. Few in Paris were those she could call upon to help Durham, Evan, and herself. “His name is Monsieur Gaspard. He was once a reliable comrade to Lord Ramsey and Amber when she was pursued by Vaillancourt.” She licked her lips and took her husband’s arm, rejoicing at one small triumph. “Let’s go.”
Just as Durham’s note to Gaspard had stated, Gaspard would soon receive old friends in the ruelle. Inès and Evan hurried to the kitchen door of the back service entrance in the small alley. Evan rapped on the door, and it was no time before it fell open to them.
The man inside gazed at Evan with curious yet friendly eyes. But his view of Inès began with wide-eyed shock, then sweet delight and, finally, dark concern. “Come in. Come in. Mademoiselle—?”
“Collette,” Inès supplied before the man could continue. Then she held out her hand and he pulled her into the small hall. Evan followed and shut the door.
Their host, good fellow, had opened his arms wide to Inès. “Collette. Ba! Of course you are.” He laughed, and so did she, as they hugged each other. “Collette, poof! A ruse.”
She pushed back to get a good look at him. “I am so happy to see you looking well, monsieur.”
“Nothing has changed about me,” he said with firmness in his demeanor. “I welcome you…Collette.” But then he eyed Evan once more.
