Joanna Bourne - Rogue Spy

Smith lifted his head suddenly, poised as a hound when a bird flutters in the bush. “You ask for proof? Wait. Wait one minute. I will give it to you.” He’d been counting the minutes, watching for something on the street. Now he saw it. “You wish to see Camille? Turn and look at her.”

It was impossible to travel at speed on Fleet Street, but the carriage that approached was skillfully maneuvered between wagons and horses and made good time. A young woman, one hand on the lowered glass, leaned out the window. She had a fine-boned, pretty face and long, black hair elaborately arranged. Her bonnet was decked with ribbons and cherries. Her pouting, discontented mouth was red as those cherries.

That was the Leyland family face. The Leyland hair. The Leyland cast of features. A true match for the painting in the parlor of the Leylands’ cottage. If that were an impostor, she was an extraordinarily well-chosen one.

The driver on the box had pulled a hat low over his face, letting her see only his mouth and nose and the shape of his jaw. Two men rode inside the coach with the woman. There was an impression of their size and dark coloring, but no glimpse of their faces.

The coach rolled past and turned at the corner at Fetter Lane. Smith said, “Camille Besançon.”

“Perhaps. Perhaps not.” But certainty fell like cold lead into her stomach. The woman in the carriage was the Fluffy Aunts’ niece. Their blood kin. That woman must, somehow, be rescued and restored to them. She felt traps close around her. From some obligations there is no escape.

Smith spoke softly, persuasively. “When she is dealt with, you will return to the comfort of your accustomed life. Why should you not? Who else will challenge you after so many years? On one hand, imprisonment, questioning, and almost certain death. On the other, your placid village and the life you have earned for yourself. The life you deserve.” Smith let that sink in for a moment. “One code. I will never approach you again.”

She let time pass, as if she were thinking the matter over. “I need to talk to her.”

“That’s understood. You will have your chance to trade girlish confidences with the amiable Camille. When you are satisfied, we’ll make the exchange. The woman for the code. But I choose the time and place.”

“You give me no choice.” She put on a sullen expression, held it for several seconds, then let her shoulders slump. “Where?”

“Semple Street, outside Number Fifty-six. Eleven o’clock in the morning, three days from now.”

Three days. That left almost no time to prepare. “I need—”

“Your needs do not interest me. You will come to Semple Street, as ordered. You will bring the key to the Mandarin Code. You do not want to face the consequences for disobedience.”

She made a muscle in her cheek twitch. She’d practiced. “You’ll have your code.”

“Do not disappoint me, Miss Leyland,” he said quietly.

She gave a sharp nod. She didn’t touch him as she walked around and past, her hand under her cloak, on her gun. The shop door jangled as she pushed it open and stalked out into Fleet Street, away from him.

Little glances behind told her that Smith had stayed where he was, studying the selection of books in Franklin’s Bookshop. But his henchman abandoned his lackadaisical perusal of the passing scene and followed her.

Pax pushed breath past the strangling knot in his throat. Breathe in. Breathe out. Air clawed its way into his clenched chest. Don’t cough. Control the need. Fire tore at his mouth and lips. Raked his throat all the way down to his heart. But especially, fire burned his eyes.

The blur of a woman held the bucket while he sluiced water again and again over his face. He sucked it into his mouth and nose. Spat down onto the street.

He cupped water and held it against his eyes. Everything else was just pain. He could live through pain. But his eyes . . .

The jabbering, shuffling crowd let a voice through. “. . . no more sense than a gaggle of molting pigeons. Out of my damned bloody way. You there—yes, you—hop it!”

Hawk wavered into his line of vision, back too soon to have done a job of murder. Even Hawk needed a few minutes.

He’s lost the bastard. God damn it. He’s lost him. Pax steadied himself on the edge of the horse trough and pushed himself up to his feet. His voice came out in a croak. “Did you kill the son of a bitch?”

“Couldn’t find him.”

The monster had slithered away to his hole. He could be anywhere in London. “Go back. Try again.”

“I can’t catch smoke. I never got a look at him.” Hawk waved somebody forward. “Give me those.” And there were white towels. “Take this.”

A wet towel and a dry one. Breathing through the wet cloth helped. “Get back and track the woman. She’ll lead you to him, sooner or later. She’s pretty. Somebody’ll remember which way she went.”

“Later. I’ll find her again. I saw her face.”

“Follow her. Don’t hurt her.” Hawk’s planning to forget that part. “Won’t tell you anything . . . anyway. Police Secrète.”

“And will remain silent under all but the more melodramatic tortures. So I kill the man and leave that pustulant excrescence of a woman alive. You made yourself clear. How bad is it?” Hawker’s hand, shadowed and huge, came toward him and lifted an eyelid. Exquisite, precise pain stabbed.

“Damn it. Let be.”

“Your eyes are swimming in blood. Can you even see?”

“I see fine.”

“You’re not lying well. That’s worrisome. I’ll get you to Luke. No—Maggie’s in town. I’ll get you to Maggie. She’ll know what to do. And these upstanding citizens have found us a hackney.” Hawker dropped coins into an outstretched hand. “My tips are making Fetter Lane rich today. Let’s get out of here before somebody puts a bullet in you.”

He sopped water out of his hair with the dry towel. Tossed it aside. “Need my coat. Gun’s on the ground someplace.”

“Not even stolen. I have collected your various belongings. We will now depart. This way.” Hawker got under his arm and steadied him.

“I can walk.” He stumbled, saying it.

“You can dance an Irish jig as far as I’m concerned. Never known such a bloody-minded, damn-your-eyes bugger. And will you cod-sucking idiots get out of my way!” Hawker shed his upper-class accent and let himself drop into deep Cockney when he wanted to make a point.

Pale faces, the solid brown of a horse, bright dresses. When he blinked, the street was lines of color that shattered and broke. He’d paint this with mad, slapdash color. Lay down thick, writhing rivers of paint, like the man El Greco. He’d seen three El Greco canvases. Two in Paris. One in Venice. It needed searing color to capture this mad derangement of vision, this street. He’d paint it with—

If I can paint again . . .

Don’t think about that. Do the job. Everything else comes later. Tell Galba about the Merchant. Start the hunt.

He had a single clear view of the square block of the hackney coach, till he blinked and blurred it. His sight was coming back.

He needed enough sight to kill a man.

The monster walked under the sun. The French called him Le Marchand, the Merchant, but he was every dram and inch of him a monster. Even the Police Secrète were glad when he died.

I got roaring drunk the night they brought news the Merchant was dead. I was in Paris with Carruthers and Althea and the others in the house on the Right Bank. The kitchen filled up with agents and friends and we celebrated till dawn. I thought I was free.

He’s alive. He’s been alive all this time.

Rage set him shaking. Or maybe he shook with cold. And maybe I’m afraid. “I’m wet clean through. That woman kept slopping buckets over me.”

“Workmanlike job of drowning you,” Hawk agreed. “Let’s get to Meeks Street before you catch pneumonia.”

A half dozen paces to the coach. Colors jostled madly, detached from meaning. Faces floated against the gray-brown buildings. Shirts, dresses, and coats flowed and rippled white, umber, cinnabar, indigo. And, in the confusion, one streak of dull sienna brown stood still.

That exact and particular burnt sienna.

Vérité. She’d made a mistake and they had her. You know better than this, girl. Never look back. Weren’t you paying attention when they taught us that?

No reason for her to be here, except that she was worried about him. Damn Vérité.

He lowered his head so she wouldn’t see his lips move. “She’s twenty feet away. To my left at ten o’clock.”

He didn’t have to say, “Don’t turn and look at her.” He didn’t have to say who “she” was. Hawker knew.

There was too much anticipation in Hawk’s voice when he said, “I’ll follow her. We get in the coach. I’ll spill out of the coach after we start.”

“I’m coming with you.”

“You can’t see.”

“If I don’t keep up, leave me behind.” He pulled himself up, through the door, into the coach while Hawk gave instructions to the driver.

Hawk climbed in behind him, already sloughing off his own coat and reversing it. “He’ll slow down past the corner.”

“You take the lead. She knows me.”

“That goes without saying. It takes somebody who knows you well to want to kill you.”

“She wasn’t trying to kill me.” It wasn’t easy, dragging his coat on over the wet shirt.