Page 17 of A Ruse of Shadows
They have an air of mercenaries about them—the sort to do evil mechanically, rather than with personal relish. But they let Mrs. Watson, Miss Redmayne, and myself into the house without raising a fuss: My lord Bancroft, it would seem, understands that I will do nothing for him unless first assured of the well-being of everyone in the household.
The mercenaries have not mistreated anyone but hand down strict orders that they expect to be meekly and swiftly obeyed. Mr. Mears, the only man in the household, has been locked in his own room. Madame Gascoigne has to cook for everyone, Polly and Rosie Banning waiting on the mercenaries hand and foot.
Thankfully they let Mademoiselle Robineau remain with Bernadine in her room at all times.
When I saw her, Bernadine was not too badly off. Fortunately, at this point, Mademoiselle Robineau has been a part of the household for months. And she has an innate calm and a cheerful presence. So even though Bernadine must feel, to some extent, the fear and tension of the situation, within her own room, with the invaders out of sight, she seemed to be carrying on more or less normally except for a reduced appetite.
We were not allowed to remain long. After a quick visit with everyone and a few words spoken across Mr. Mears’s door, we were booted out. Miss Redmayne kindly put us up in her place, where I may compose letters and telegrams. She and Mrs. Watson are out now, purchasing enough ready-to-eat foods to supply a platoon. We will deliver all that, plus a large hamper of foodstuff from Lord Ingram, to the house this evening. It should make life easier for the staff. And, we hope, allow us another chance to see Bernadine.
By the time you receive this letter, on the morrow, I should be getting ready for the railway trip to Boulogne, there to cross the Channel back to England again.
To confront Lord Bancroft.
At this point the letter switched to a jumble of letters, which Livia recognized as the Cdaq Khuha code that she and Charlotte had devised to use with each other when they were children.
Deciphered, it read,
No doubt you feel anxious and likely wish that you could either journey to Paris to keep an eye on the situation or join me in England. But I must ask you to remain in Aix. Since I cannot be there, you must be my eyes and ears. I am counting on you.
Love,
Charlotte
?For most of her life, Livia had felt insufficiently heated. At the height of the English summer, she often needed a shawl. And even then, she would have preferred a fire laid in her room morning and evening, to dispel the chill brought in by a damp draught.
During the past few months, however, she had been gloriously, sensationally warm. Malta. Egypt. The Aegean Sea. Everywhere she’d broiled luxuriously, wallowing in the sensation of fingers and toes that didn’t feel the least bit cold. Why, Provence itself was prodigiously sultry.
She’d thought that somehow, with all the heat she’d soaked up, she would be like a sunbaked stone and remain warm for a while, even after day turned into night. How naïve she had been. In a single moment, she felt herself transported back to that drafty bedroom at home, cold all over and dead certain she’d never again be warm enough.
Carefully she read the letter again, especially the part originally in cipher. Then she went down to the reception and said to the clerk, “Alas, I have some unwelcome news. My friends will not be able to join me as scheduled.”
“We are sorry to hear that, mademoiselle.”
“Thank you. I will let you know if anything changes.”
She began to walk away, then turned around, as if in afterthought. “In Paris I knew a Swiss manufacturer named Herr Albrecht. I’ve heard that he has a house in Aix. Would you happen to know anything about it?”
“Herr Albrecht?Mais oui, mademoiselle.He bought anhôtel particulierseven or eight doors further east on the Cours Mirabeau, on this side of course—this is the superior side. But I don’t believe he visits much.”
So Charlotte’s information was correct.
Livia walked out of the hotel onto the Cours Mirabeau. Charlotte had never said that Mr. Marbleton was here, only that Miss Moriarty had become convinced that das Phantomschloss, the rumored castle where Moriarty kept his treasures, secrets, and prisoners, did not exist. That instead he made use of a loose network of locations, the house in Aix-en-Provence under the name of Albrecht—one of his aliases—among them.
Livia crossed the boulevard to the less superior side of the Cours Mirabeau, which faced north and would be in the shadows for much of the day as the sun rounded toward the south.
She passed a bank, an elegant patisserie, and an office for some sort of agricultural cooperative. Another bank. A school that was empty of students at the height of summer.
Her heart pounding, she cast a quick glance across the street.
That house. Yes, that particular house. She risked another peek from underneath the tassel fringes of her parasol. Four floors up, did a curtain flutter?
Her beloved Mr. Marbleton—her Stephen—looking down at her?
Yesterday, when she’d walked the same route, that thought and that thought alone had consumed her. Now the chaos inside her head was a sustained wail, a cry for help in the middle of an infinite wasteland.
Would Bernadine be all right? Would Charlotte be all right? Would any of them, in the end, be all right?
?The unmarked carriage was parked two streets away from the headquarters of Credit Lyonnais, where a cache of secrets that Charlotte had stolen from Moriarty the previous December sat undisturbed in an underground safe-deposit box. The inside of the carriage, with its curtains drawn, was dim—and a bit warm. Charlotte studied her slightly hazy reflection in the mirror.
