Page 37 of The Avenging Angel and the Spy
Baptiste grinned. At last disengaging himself from Belle, he stepped forward. “Forgive me, monsieur. I forget myself. You must blame it on my excitement at seeing Isabelle again.” He offered Sinclair his hand, his skin as dry and thin as the fan parchment, but his grip surprisingly strong.
“A pleasure to meet you at last, Monsieur Renault.” Sinclair addressed the Frenchman in his native tongue.
Baptiste studied him, and Sinclair had the uncomfortable sensation of being sized up at a glance. He could not tell what the man’s verdict was, but he nodded toward Belle, saying, “He speaks passable French for an Englishman.”
“Merci du compliment, monsieur,” Sinclair said wryly. He returned Baptiste’s stare, attempting to do a little sizing of his own. The genial little Frenchman looked neither ruthless nor daring enough to be any sort of spy, let alone one playing a dangerous game of double dealing. Yet Sinclair would not have dismissed Baptiste as a suspect by his appearance alone. The chief thing that seemed to disqualify Renault was that according to Belle, the fan maker rarely ever strayed far from Paris. If he were passing information about the English coastline to Napoleon, he would have to have an accomplice.
Sinclair’s gaze strayed to Belle, her apparent closeness to Renault giving rise to all manner of unpleasant thoughts. He wasglad to relinquish them for the time being as Baptiste clapped his hands together briskly and said, “Bien,so it appears the three of us will have much to discuss, but not here, not now. You are tired from the journey, yes? I will show you upstairs. Come along, then.”
The steps were narrow, poorly lit, and of such an alpine steepness that Belle and Sinclair moved cautiously for fear of a misstep. They were quickly outstripped by Baptiste, apparently well accustomed to the climb. His stream of chatter floated back down to them.
“I still live in the rooms behind the fan shop. Madame Fontaine’s place, the apartment you will have, takes up the second and third floor. These stairs can be reached through the fan shop or the outer door, which has a porter on duty. He is a good fellow and will run errands for you.”
Baptiste paused before an oak door on the first landing, fumbling through a ring of heavy keys attached to the belt beneath his apron. The steps twisted at a sharp angle, continuing upward to the next floor.
“Is anyone living in the apartments above us?” Belle asked.
“A retired shoemaker and his wife.” Baptiste clucked his tongue in disgust as he tried first one key, then another. “But you need not worry about them. They keep to themselves. They will take no heed of your comings and goings.”
“And the garrets?”
“At the moment empty. When Merchant wrote to say that he was also sending along Lazare—” Baptiste fairly spat the name. “I assumed that you would not wish him sharing your quarters, I thought that the garret would do well enough for the likes of him.”
“I can see that you are a gentleman of great discernment, Monsieur Renault,” Sinclair said.
Baptiste flashed him a grin, then grunted with satisfaction as he found the right key at last. Turning the knob, he shoved the door open, bowing Belle and Sinclair past him with a sweeping gesture.
As soon as Belle stepped across the threshold, she was beset by a cold draft and that musty smell of rooms left too long closed. She wrapped her arms about herself and shivered—not so much from the chill in the air, but a shiver of reminiscence as she studied her surroundings. The actress Mademoiselle Fontaine’s apartment held all the garish glitter of a stage set with its high ceilings and neo-Greek cornices. The crystal chandelier would have appeared too ostentatious for a king’s palace, let alone an apartment. The outer room was a combination antechamber and dining room, the walls hung with Indian cloth, the scattered chairs covered in crimson corded silk of Tours.
As Belle moved farther into the room, her footsteps seemed to strike out a lonely echo upon the black and white tiled floor, and she could almost feel herself dwindling into a child of ten again. The place reminded her depressingly of the sort of chambers and furnishings her actress mother had chosen those fortunate times when Mama had acquired herself a rich benefactor. Jolie Gordon never had known the difference between the lavish outlay of money and real elegance. She would have fancied herself quite the grand lady with such an establishment. But even at such a tender age Belle had known better and so had the tradesmen who had waited upon Mama, outwardly so polite as they vied for her custom. Only Belle had noticed their thinly veiled sneers and blushed with shame.
She had vowed then she would never live in the midst of such tawdry glamour. But like so many of her vows, it was worth about as much as the dust now coating the surface of a heavily ornate mahogany dining table. Belle trailed her gloved finger along it, leaving a glossy streak.
Baptiste bustled forward, apologizing. “Ah, I meant to get up here, have the place cleaned and aired, but I had no notion when you would arrive. I will get a fire going at once.”
He flung open a set of double doors leading into a cream and gilt drawing room furnished with a stiff-backed settee supported by clawed griffin feet and cases of books whose pristine spines suggested that the volumes did little more than adorn the shelves. As Baptiste bent to his task by the hearth, Belle felt Sinclair touch upon her shoulder. She glanced up to meet his eyes and saw a frown creasing his brow.
“You don’t like this place, do you?” he asked.
She started, but she did not know why. She ought to be accustomed by now to how easily Sinclair seemed to discern her thoughts.
“What’s not to like?” she quipped. “It has all the charm and elegance of a high-priced brothel.”
“We don’t have to stay here. I am sure I could find us someplace else.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. We have a job to do and this place will serve our needs as well as any. You seem to keep forgetting that you are not an eager husband striving to please a new bride.”
“So I do. What a fortunate thing that I have you to keep reminding me.”
As Sinclair stalked away to explore another door, taking the stairs that led to the next floor of the apartment, Belle nearly called him back to apologize for her ungracious manner of rejecting his concern. But the next thing she knew, she might find herself explaining her reaction, telling him all about her mother, telling him far too much. If she had annoyed him, it was far better to leave it that way.
She followed Baptiste into the drawing room, stripping off her cloak and gloves, glad to have a moment alone with her old friend. She had seen little of him these past years, since shenever went into Paris and he never traveled far from that city. All that they had shared had been hurried meetings in Rouvray Forest, and those had always been too fraught with the urgency of varied missions to allow much time for idle chat.
Baptiste knelt before the hearth, applying the bellows to a tiny flame he had coaxed amongst the kindling. His ruddy cheeks and leather apron were smudged with ash, the fire’s light dancing in his large brown eyes. He reminded Belle of an illustration she had once seen in a book of legends, the dwarf-king at work upon his forge, conjuring treasures from the dark secret places beneath the earth.
But then Baptiste had always given Belle the impression of not being quite of this world. Some of the smuggling feats they had pulled off together during the Revolution had been nothing short of wizard’s work. She smiled softly at the remembrance, watching as his nimble fingers stacked more wood upon the fire.
“And how have you been, my old friend?” she asked.
