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“All of them have lost a friend or relative to the guillotine,” a voice said from behind them. The man spoke in English and with an upper-class accent.
Ramsey spun and took in the well-dressed man standing calmly behind them. He wore a triple-caped coat and held his hat under his arm. The man was thin and of medium height with tousled blond hair and light eyes. Ramsey thought they might be green.
He was the kind of man women would find charming and attractive. As though to prove Ramsey’s point, the man smiled genially at Gabrielle, and she beamed right back at him.
He bowed to her. “Sir Andrew Ffoulkes. You must be Lady McCullough,” he said, lowering his voice.
She curtsied, and Ramsey barely refrained from rolling his eyes. Such formality for a meeting in a graveyard. Good God, they were surrounded by dancers flopping about in the most haphazard fashion, and Gabrielle curtsied as though she were standing in the ballroom at Carlton House.
“You may call me Citoyenne Leboeuf,” Gabrielle told him.
“Lud, that’s awful!” Ffoulkes commented. He nodded at Ramsey. “And who is this?”
“This,” Gabrielle said with a sigh, “is Lord Sedgwick. You may call him Citoyen Delpierre.”
“Sedgwick.” Sir Andrew bowed. “I don’t think we’ve met before.”
“We haven’t,” Ramsey said. “And I know you weren’t expecting me. The lady and I found ourselves on the same packet. She had a spot of trouble at the West Gate, and I assisted her entry.”
“Oh.” Sir Andrew’s face hardened. “I heard a rumor of trouble at the West Gate. The marquis’s head was paraded about the streets this evening and brought to Madame Grosholtz. She makes wax casts, you know.”
“How utterly gruesome.” Gabrielle shuddered.
The orchestra finished the piece they’d been playing and launched into the Carmagnole. Sir Andrew wrinkled his nose. “I find this song most distasteful. Citoyenne, would you walk with me a moment?” He held out his arm, and Gabrielle took it. Ramsey, understanding Ffoulkes wanted the opportunity to speak to Gabrielle alone, stepped out of the way and pretended to study the dancers. They had formed a circle and joined hands. Slowly, they went around and around, picking up speed as they reached the song’s refrain.
Dansons la carmagnole
Vive le son, vive le son,
Dansons la carmagnole
Vive le son du canon.
Ramsey translated the lyrics.Dance the Carmagnole. Long live the sound. Long live the sound of the cannons.It was a song the revolutionaries sung, and these people obviously sang and danced it to mock them.
Despite the scene before him, he kept Ffoulkes and Gabrielle in sight. They’d walked to the far edge of the ball and stood in the shadow of a large mausoleum. Ffoulkes seemed to be speaking earnestly, and Gabrielle nodded, also looking serious. Were they discussing le Saphir Blanc? Did Ffoulkes work for the Scarlet Pimpernel? He was just the kind of man Ramsey would have chosen, had he been the Pimpernel. Ffoulkes had that innate loyalty and nobility that heroes always seemed to possess. He seemed the kind of man to rush into the fire without a thought for his own safety or welfare.
Ramsey, in contrast, always thought of himself. As far as he knew, he hadn’t an ounce of loyalty or nobility running in his blood and hadn’t suddenly acquired either trait. Even as he watched Ffoulkes, he thought about following the man, hoping he would lead him to the Scarlet Pimpernel.
Ffoulkes himself wasn’t the Pimpernel. He was too open, too visible. But Ffoulkes might know the man, know how to reach him…
“You watch them quite closely,” a woman’s voice said.
Ramsey turned to see Mademoiselle Manon standing beside him. She drew a finger across her throat. “Forgive my forward behavior, but no one observes the old rules anymore anyway. Would you like to dance?”
Ramsey shook his head. “I never dance.”
She laughed. “Strange that you would come to a ball then. We all risk our lives to come here and dance.”
“Danger seems to follow me like a hungry dog.”
“Just make sure she doesn’t nip at your—“She grasped his arm. “Voices! Light! We are discovered!”
Ramsey darted his glance to the direction in which she stared. The light from torches bounced and weaved toward them. It might have been more revelers joining the group, but apparently he was the only one who thought so. The other attendees threw capes over their clothes and heads and scrambled into the darkness. Pandemonium erupted as the orchestra ran with their instruments, women tripped over their skirts, and desperate men pushed those slower than themselves out of the way.
Ramsey was knocked aside and almost fell to the ground. He caught himself, only to be battered as several men and women fleeing the ball rushed past him. One woman tripped over her skirts and sprawled on the dirt of a newly dug grave. Ramsey reached down to help her as soldiers poured through the grave markers.
“Arrêtez!” they called. “Arrêtez, au nom de la République française!”
