The Orchid Affair: A Pink Carnation Novel by Lauren Willig

Author:Lauren Willig [Willig, Lauren]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780451235558
Amazon: 045123555X
Publisher: NAL Trade
Published: 2012-01-03T06:00:00+00:00

He knew he should have paid his governess a higher salary.

André’s eyes caught those of his governess as the door swung closed. She stared back, watchful, wary, giving nothing away. Damn. He wanted to shake her, to demand answers, to rattle her out of that impressive self-possession. Was she an agent of Delaroche? Or someone else? Or nothing more than what she said. A governess. A friend of Daubier.

He might not, thought André, with gallows humor, have to wait long to find out. If she wanted to hang them all, she could. All she had to do was cry out. It would be difficult explaining de Berry’s presence in Daubier’s studio. They might try to pass de Berry off as his cousin, but it was a threadbare deception at best. And even the taint of suspicion would be enough to damn them all.

He had told Cadoudal not to bring de Berry to France. Not yet. There were too many pieces still left to fall into place: key generals to be suborned, potential foes to be neutralized, an appointment at the palace to be procured. He had urged prudence, but hotter heads had prevailed, and now here they were, at the mercy of a governess who might or might not keep silent for the love of an old painter who had once been a friend to her parents.

Put that way, they hadn’t a hope in hell.

The guards were almost upon him. “—hate these late-night assignments,” one was saying companionably to the other. “The night was meant for sleep, not traipsing around the city after phantoms.”

“A phantom? But I thought they said it was an artist,” said the second man disingenuously. “Sir!”

Both men snapped to at the sight of Jaouen, who folded his arms across his chest and fixed them with a stern stare. He had learned more of theatre these past few years than any actor in the Comédie-Française.

He recognized the men as the same who had been sent to Cadoudal’s lodgings. The dim one was . . . Laclos. That was it. Laclos and Maugret. Neither was particularly bright, but dangerous, nonetheless. He would have to trust to the appearance of authority and the late hour to keep their suspicions at bay.

“You certainly took long enough.” André kept his back to the door to the dining room. He knew better than anyone the danger of the betraying glance. “Where were you?”

“We came as fast as we heard,” said Laclos quickly. “There was trouble on the bridge, an overturned cart—”

“Yes, yes,” said André curtly, dismissing the man’s excuses in a way that made clear just how much credence he gave it. André turned his attention to the other man. “What were your orders?”

Maugret’s wandering eyes snapped back to André. He noticed too much, this one. He had been looking about with frank curiosity. “To guard the chambers of the traitor Daubier, sir. To make sure no one else entered.”

“Well done,” said André, with a fine edge of sarcasm. “By now, half of Paris might have been in and out.

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