Page 97 of Who Cries for the Lost

“What the devil are you doing here?” snapped Jarvis as the Viscount came up to him.

Devlin stopped beside him, his hard eyes narrowing as he watched the Prince Regent reach out to fondle the posterior of a young woman who made the mistake of stopping too close to his chair. “I have something for you.”

“Not now, for God’s sake. You look like hell.”

“Now,” said Devlin, his nostrils flaring.

Swallowing an oath, Jarvis turned on his heel and led the way to a small chamber near the top of the steps. “Very well,” he said, shutting the door behind them with a snap, then going to stand so that the table in the center of the room lay between them. “What is it?”

Devlin reached one hand, its glove torn and bloodstained, into his pocket. Drawing forth a braided cord knotted at each end with a dowel, he flicked his wrist to send the cord skittering across the table between them. “Your assassin Gabriel is dead.”

Jarvis stared down at the professional garrote, then raised his gaze to the Viscount’s flinty face. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Of course not,” said Devlin, and turned to go.

He had his hand on the doorknob when Jarvis stopped him. “And Fouché’s list? Do you have it?”

Devlin looked back at him, those feral yellow eyes glittering. From somewhere in the distance came a strange commotion, shouts and laughter mixed with huzzahs. “I burned it.”

Jarvis knew a powerful surge of annoyance, but he was careful to keep it off his face. “No matter. I’ve no doubt most of the names it contained are known to us anyway.”

A gleam of what might have been amusement flickered in the younger man’s eyes. “No doubt.”

The disturbance outside the house in the square was growing, cheers and excited voices mingling with the sound of running feet. “What the devil is that?” said Jarvis as Devlin jerked open the door to the hall.

A cavalcade of men was just reaching the top of the stairs, led by a tall, dark-haired officer wearing a mud- and bloodstained red and gold tunic, his dust-covered face creased with lines of extreme exhaustion and yet glowing with pride. In his hands he carried two captured French flags, their gold-fringed tricolors as stained with mud and blood as the dress uniform he must have donned some six days before to attend the Duchess of Richmond’s ball. The light from the beeswax candles in the chandeliers overhead gleamed on the gilt of two famous Imperial Eagles.

Behind the major came various members of the cabinet—Liverpool and Bathurst and Hendon amongst them. The music stopped abruptly, the dancers breaking apart to clear a path as Wellington’s triumphant aide-de-camp strode across the glittering ballroom to drop to one knee before his drunken Prince.

“Victory, sir!” the major shouted as a cheer went up around the room, echoing the cheering in the street outside. “Victory!”

The babble of voices became a roar.

The Prince Regent burst into tears; the members of Mrs. Boehm’s band looked at one another and began to play “God Save the King.”

One voice after another took up the song, joined by those in the street outside. “God save our gracious King, Long live our noble King...”

“So,” said Jarvis quietly. “It’s over.”

Devlin met his gaze as the voices swelled around them.

“Send him victorious, Happy and glorious, Long to reign over us, God save our King.”

“Yes,” said Devlin. “This time I believe it truly is over.”

Chapter 56

Thursday, 22 June

Early the next morning, Kat walked through the crowds of revelers thronging the streets of the city. The day had dawned clear and warm, the sun dazzling in its brightness. She was surrounded by noise and people, their faces shiny with joy and laughter. But it had been a long time since she had felt this alone.

The events of the last week had shaken her, taught her things she hadn’t known about herself and forced her to reevaluate both the life she was living and the life she wanted to live. She had faced death before. And yet those experiences had been different in ways she couldn’t quite articulate, although she suspected it had something to do with the hopes and dreams that had once driven her but were hers no longer.

And she knew now, as she paused beside the worn stone battlements of Blackfriars Bridge to watch a flotilla of gaily decked barges drifting down the sun-dazzled Thames far below, that there would be no going back to the woman she had been before. To the life that had been hers before.

She was still standing there some minutes later when a handsome young Irishman with laughing green eyes and two deceptive dimples came up beside her. “I heard what happened,” said Aiden O’Connell, his gaze hard on her face. “Are you all right?”

She looked over at him and smiled. “Probably not. But I will be, eventually.”

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