Prologue
11 August 1816
My dear Isobel,
By the time you read these words, I will have left you. These nine weeks past have been the longest I have been parted from your mother in close to thirty years, and while I rejoice in the knowledge that soon I will again embrace my beloved Isolde, I regret more than I can say that in rejoining her, I leave you alone.
I know you will do all that is possible for Lucy. My solicitor has record of the provisions I have made for you, both for that endeavor and all the years ahead of you. I must believe in my heart that you will succeed in bringing Lucy home, whether to England or Scotland. However, should you not find your sister and she is lost to you as well, I beg you,a nighean, do not remain all your life in the darkness of grief. Walk towards the light and find happiness.
Remember that night always ends and nightingales sing mostsweetly as dawn is breaking.Thig crìoch air an t-saoghal, ach mairidh gaol is ceòl.Embrace joy,aspideag, for you have always been meant to sing.
I love you, daughter.
D’athair gràdhach/ Your loving father,
Robert Muir
PART ONE
Île-de-France
OCTOBER 1816
Chapter 1
October 1816
Île-de-France
For the past half hour, Nate’s attention had been split between the brothel and the veiled woman two doors down.
“I do not know why I bother to play with you, Beaumont,” Étienne Baudelaire said glumly as Nate captured his bishop.
“You enjoy the challenge.” It was checkmate in five moves, which Baudelaire had just realized.
For several hours they’d played chess in the front window of the café opposite Les Moineaux, covertly watching for anyone who showed an interest in the brothel. Les Moineaux was not open to customers on this Sunday afternoon, and general foot traffic had been light owing to the persistent drizzle.
“I do not enjoy this torture, truly.” Baudelaire studied the board. “We must consider some different manner in which you may torment me. Already I know better than to try you at cards.”
The woman pushed aside her veil as the grey afternoonsteadily dimmed. He was increasingly certain she watched for something—or someone.
He’d recognized at once the combination of masculine greatcoat and dark bonnet. With a small satchel in hand—the same one from the Dover packet, it appeared—she’d exited the bookstore two doors down from the café and stood now beneath the eaves of an adjacent business. She might be invisible to most passersby.
Anyone from England might now cross to Calais without suspicion with peace declared. Many travellers had done so this past year, eager to once again travel freely around the Continent, but there was no overlooking that this particular woman had come into his sphere in Paris twice in as many days—and that after travelling from Dover to Calais on the same packet boat. In his line of work, there were no chance encounters, sometimes with deadly consequences.
Yesterday he had seen her on Pont Neuf as he waited, surreptitiously, for Jeremiah Compton to meet Guillaume Dubois’s man. Now outside Les Moineaux. There were a handful of plausible explanations: She was involved in Jeremiah Compton’s operations, she was an independent agent collecting information about Compton or Dubois, or she was trailing Nate himself. If it was the latter, she had done a poor job of concealing herself, but one couldn’t afford to make assumptions unless one was courting death, which he was not.
Discreetly he pointed her out. “Do you recognize her?”
Baudelaire squinted at her and shrugged. “The mademoiselle who has this past half hour been lingering somewhat conspicuously? I do not think so, although I cannot be sure. Her face is too much in the shadows.”
“I’ve seen her before. The crossing from Dover and twice now in Paris.”
“You suspect she is involved?”
“You know as well as I how rare genuine coincidences are.” In his and Baudelaire’s world anyway.
“Oui.So I will follow our man Corbin in Les Moineaux when he emerges, if he does so and does not amuse himself into the night, and you will follow the woman. But look, she is already now leaving. And I have lost this game anyway.” Baudelaire tipped over his king. Disgustedly, loud for the benefit of other patrons, he exclaimed, “You have beaten me once more, Monsieur.Perhaps I will find more congenial play with another.”
