Miss Gwen looked pleased. "It is attention to detail that makes all the difference."
"No pink petals this time," said Geoff, from somewhere just above Letty's head. "Our best chance is to make it look like an accident. Otherwise they might go to ground, rather than bringing the rebellion forward."
"May I help?" asked Letty, tilting her head back and getting an excellent view of the underside of his chin. For a dark-haired man, he was quite well shaved; she couldn't find any spot he had missed.
Jane and Geoff exchanged a long look.
"I'll need you with me," said Jane. "You can entertain Lord Vaughn while I have a little chat with the marquise."
"I don't think Lord Vaughn finds me terribly entertaining."
"Well, do your best," said Miss Gwen dismissively. She looked pointedly at Geoff. "Wear a low bodice. Men are so easily diverted."
"Well," said Geoff, looking as innocent as a man who has just been caught staring down his wife's bodice can contrive to look. "That covers about everything, doesn't it? Given the lateness of the hour, I suggest we all seek our beds." He raised an eyebrow at Miss Gwen. "As the good Lord intended."
The clock on the mantel obligingly confirmed his observation by striking two.
Jane rose, her curls, which she had neglected to remove, bobbing coyly around her face. "You'll see Letty home, of course."
"Of course," replied Geoff, at his most bland.
"I'll call for the carriage," said Jane.
"And I," said Miss Gwen, sweeping out in Jane's wake, "shall seek my perch."
Alone once again in the little green parlor, Letty and Geoff exchanged a slightly sheepish look.
"She heard the bat comment, didn't she?" said Letty guiltily, rising to stand next to Geoff.
"She hears everything." Geoff's mind did not appear to be on Miss Gwen. "There is one thing we failed to address."
"Aside from Miss Gwen's sleeping habits?" said Letty, trying to keep her tone light and failing miserably.
Geoff frowned. "I didn't want to alarm you in front of the others, but it might be unwise for you to return to your own lodgings tonight."
"Emily's murderer," said Letty heavily, returning to earth with a thump. With all the talk of mimes and bats, it had been all too easy to forget how deadly the game they played actually was. "We don't know that he recognized me."
Geoff crossed his arms, looking about as malleable as a chunk of granite. "That is not a chance I want to take."
Feeling absurdly gratified, Letty suggested, "I could ask Jane and Miss Gwen if I could stay here, with them."
"With Miss Gwen stalking about in her nightcap? You might be scarred for life."
"Even Miss Gwen's nightcap must be preferable to the Black Tulip."
"I wouldn't wager on it." Clasping his hands behind his back, Geoff strolled to the dresser, examining a scene of Dublin Castle inexpertly painted on a lumpy piece of stoneware. "I have a better suggestion."
"What might that be?" Letty stayed where she was, rooted to the center of the room.
Geoff slowly turned from his contemplation of the domestic arts to face Letty.
"Come home," he said simply. "With me."
Chapter Twenty-three
Thursday night, wine bottle clutched in the crook of my arm, I trudged right back down Brompton Road.
I hadn't deliberately decided to revisit the site of Tuesday night's humiliation. It was pure ill luck in the form of geography. Pammy's mother lived in the Boltons. Directionally challenged as I am, the only way I knew to get there was via the South Kensington tube station, straight down Brompton Road. I suppose I could have taken a cab, but that smacked of cowardice—not to mention extravagance. A student budget doesn't run to much in the way of extras.
Passing the ill-fated Indian restaurant, I couldn't resist taking a tiny peek through the glass door. The bar area was crowded—it was just about that time of the evening—but there was no familiar tall blond braced against the bar. Not that I had expected there to be. Or that I cared. I had put that all behind me. All the flutters, all the euphoria, all the despair, all the ridiculous overanalyzing had been nothing more than a silly crush, undoubtedly brought on by boredom. As Pammy liked to keep pointing out to me, I'd been long overdue for a romantic peccadillo. Was it any surprise that my restless imagination had seized upon the first reasonably attractive man to come along?
Oh, well, I told myself soothingly. So I had behaved like an idiot. It was all over, and there was no harm done—except to my pride, and no one would ever see that but me, anyway.
Upon my return home from the Indian restaurant Tuesday night, I had plopped down at my little kitchen table in my little basement flat, and painstakingly dissected the entire course of my acquaintance with Colin. Not the bits that happened in my head, not the agonized phone staring or the gooey-eyed naming of our children, but all of the actual interactions, from our first meeting in his aunt's living room just about two weeks ago.
Had it really only been two weeks? It had. I counted, and then I counted again to make sure. Going through those two weeks, I came to the relieved conclusion that while I might know that I'd made an absolute idiot of myself over him, there was no reason for Colin to know. Aside from that slight puckering incident in the old medieval cloister, I had never said or done anything to indicate more than a friendly interest. And it had been very dark out there. He might not even have noticed. I was safe.
And I never, ever had to see him again.
I did intend to call Mrs. Selwick-Alderly. Eventually. But just because I was in contact with his aunt didn't necessarily mean bumping into Colin.
In the meantime, I was rather proud of everything I had accomplished over the past week without any Selwick intercession. True, it was their collection that had pointed me in the right direction, but the Alsworthy/Alsdale line of research was entirely my own, and it was paying off in spades.
It was nice to know something that Colin Selwick didn't.
The death of Emily Gilchrist opened all sorts of interesting possibilities. I wondered how many other raven-haired spies were roaming France and London, unremembered by commentators. And why would they? Who would read anything into—what had Geoff called it?—a chance quirk of physiognomy. That wasn't exactly the phrase (I had it in my notes, back in my little flat, backed up on three disks, just in case), but it was the same idea. I know historians aren't supposed to fall in love with their own theories, but I was head over heels about the notion of an entire band of female French agents, like a nineteenth-century Charlie's Angels. Only better.
It made the Pink Carnation's organization look positively humdrum.
Who, then, was the Black Tulip? Mr. Throtwottle was the obvious choice, but given all the women running about dressed as men, I wouldn't put it past Throtwottle to be yet another black-haired woman playing a trouser role. Noses like that didn't just grow naturally.
As for Lord Vaughn…Even bearing in mind the precedent of Monsieur d'Eon, there was little chance of his being a woman. But I didn't buy his complicity with Jane, any more than Geoff did. Whatever Lord Vaughn did, he did for himself, not for king or country or even the rare combination of a keen mind and pretty face.
Vaughn as spymaster? The idea had some potential. He had known the marquise for a long time…and there was that matter of a missing wife. The marquise? Or another black-haired agent? I had no proof, only hunches. Of all the actors concerned, Vaughn lacked motive. Related to three-quarters of the peerage of the British Isles, he had the most to lose in prestige and cold, hard cash if the French succeeded. There had been French noblemen, including Josephine Bonaparte's first husband, who had espoused the revolutionary cause, weighting ideology above their own self-interest—but that had been before the advent of the guillotine. And it just didn't seem like Vaughn.