The Secret of Love (Rakes & Rebels: The Raveneau Family Book 3)

by Cynthia Wright

  “Indeed?” Denon looked surprised. “I am pleased to hear you say so, Madame. We heard rumors that you were not pleased. I will convey to the emperor your true feelings.”

  The sound of footsteps drew St. Briac’s attention to the other end of the gallery. To his amazement, he beheld Jean-Baptiste Wicar walking toward the Rotunde d’Apollon. The painter and unscrupulous “art collector” wore an elaborately tied cravat that scraped his chin, and a frock coat of forest-green velvet with maroon facings. His curly dark hair was partially obscured by a top hat, and he was speaking animatedly to a stoop-shouldered companion.

  A shock ran through St. Briac as he realized that Wicar’s pale, hollow-cheeked companion was none other than Isabella’s brother, George, Marquess of Caverleigh.

  Chapter 30

  As the two men drew closer, Wicar seemed to notice St. Briac in his priest’s disguise, and made a distracted little bow with his head.

  “Bonjour, Monsieur l’Abbé,” he mumbled.

  Gabriel gave a short nod in response and soberly returned his attention to the painting. Meanwhile, he forced himself to remain still, merely watching as the two men passed by—even though he was nearly overcome by an urge to grab Caverleigh and demand that he take him to Isabella.

  However, until he knew more about the circumstances of her abduction, he could not risk her safety. Caverleigh’s appearance today had not been part of the plan he and Madame Le Brun had concocted, but St. Briac made a decision to see it through. Long ago, he had trained himself to be guided by reason rather than emotion—or fear. It was harder than ever to hold back now that his heart was involved, but he reined in his passions.

  From the circular expanse of the Rotunde d’Apollon, St. Briac heard Denon exclaim at the sight of Wicar and Caverleigh.

  “Ah, here are my guests. If you will excuse me, Louise—”

  “Oh, do not apologize,” Madame Le Brun was saying, “Do not hesitate to conduct your business. Pay no attention to me. I would like nothing more than to peruse some of the masterpieces you have brought to our country.”

  St. Briac saw her wander away among the statuary, yet well within earshot.

  “Vivant, you see our friend, the marquess, is here with me,” Wicar said in a low voice. “We met on the stairway.”

  “My lord, I presume that you have the piece we discussed?” Denon said to Caverleigh. “We have…” he lowered his voice, “the funds you requested. But we must complete this transaction in a private location.”

  “I see,” replied the Englishman, swallowing hard, “but I am afraid that the item is not here yet.”

  Around the edge of the wide doorway, St. Briac caught a glimpse of Isabella’s brother. He was licking his lips as if he hadn’t had a drop of water for days.

  “How can this be?” protested Wicar. “Did we not have a clear agreement?”

  “Yes, of course! And that’s why I have come to explain!”

  “I am surprised that you would show your face in Paris, considering the danger you are in from your creditors,” said Denon. “Perhaps you have not been able to acquire the piece after all?”

  “But I have! I did!” Caverleigh was showing signs of panic. “It simply hasn’t arrived in Paris yet. It was delayed, but now is en route, via special courier.”

  Wicar gave a snort of disbelief. “And when, exactly, will that happen?”

  “I am told that it will arrive two days hence. I will bring it to you then, I swear! But first, it is a matter of some urgency that you advance a portion of the sum we agreed upon.”

  “Because you’re terrified of the moneylenders or are itching to return to the tables?” hissed Wicar. “Don’t waste our time.” Then, leaning closer, he said, “You have until midnight tomorrow night. We will make the exchange with you then, under—”

  His last words were muffled, but St. Briac didn’t care. He had much more information now than he had come with—and it came to him that he could follow Caverleigh when he left the Louvre.

  With luck, the desperate marquess would lead him straight to Isabella.

  * * *

  “I beg you to walk more slowly,” exclaimed Madame Le Brun as she hurried to keep pace with St. Briac.

  Emerging from the Louvre, he scanned the courtyard. “My apologies, but I intend to follow Caverleigh. Did you see which way he went?”

  They both spied the stoop-shouldered Englishman at the same time, walking across the cobblestones, toward the Tuileries gardens.

  Madame turned to Gabriel. “I feel certain that our Izzie would wish that I urge you, please, do not do anything rash!”

  Stepping into the shadows, he quickly stripped off the cassock, cape, cross, and biretta. “My sincere apologies for leaving you here, Madame, and for asking you to carry these home for me. I fear they would both slow me down and make me more conspicuous. Adieu!”

  Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun, celebrated portraitist to royalty, stood holding the pile of clothing. A wry smile touched her lovely mouth. “Of course, mon cher. How could I refuse a man like you?”

  Moments later, he was crossing the courtyard, intent on closing the gap with Lord Caverleigh. It was true, he wore a small rapier under his rakish blue cutaway coat, but St. Briac prayed he would not need to use it this day.

  * * *

  Izzie stared at the moldy piece of cheese that George had left for her to eat. Tears threatened as she thought of their parents, of the life they’d been raised to lead, and how far down her brother had descended…into utter dereliction.

  He means to take me with him, she thought, into the pit! A fresh wave of courage washed away the gloom of moments before. It might seem that she hadn’t bathed or worn clean clothes or eaten a proper meal for days, but none of that could change what Izzie was made of.

  Perhaps George didn’t want to remember his true origins, and there were certainly reasons to forget, but she sat up straighter and whispered, “I am Lady Isabella Trevarre, daughter of nobility.”

  With that, she bent to finish the newest layer of glazing on her copy of Leonardo da Vinci’s portrait of King François I. Her eyes burned as she focused on making each brush stroke as light and fine as possible. Madame Le Brun would be proud. Even in the dull light of her garret room, Izzie realized that she had come astonishingly close to replicating the inner light that shone from Leonardo’s own masterpiece. One more day of drying, then a few small details, and she would be ready to put her copy into the original frame George had saved. Gabriel’s treasured portrait of the King would go into her paintbox until it could be safely returned into his hands.

  Sliding the painting under the bed to dry, Izzie took out her sketchbook and opened it. There was her rendering of Gabriel, so real that her heart hurt to look at him.

  In her sketch, he was turning his head just a bit to look into her eyes, his own merry gaze filled with something infinitely warm and inviting…something that appeared to be love. It was exhilarating to realize that the more she accepted her own hopes and feelings, the more she was able to reveal the emotions of her subjects.

  With a bittersweet smile, Izzie opened her art box and took out her pastels. Deftly, she shaded the sculpted planes of his face, the curve of his lower lip, the slight arch of his left brow.

  The more she ached for him, the better her sketch became, until a tear crept onto her cheek and fell toward the paper, where she caught it at the last moment.

  Just then, she heard the tiniest of taps at the window. Izzie’s head came up in surprise. Was it a bird?

  At first, clambering to her feet, she thought that her tired eyes must be deceiving her. Or perhaps she had fallen asleep and this was a dream! For there, on the other side of the sooty pane of glass, was Gabriel…in the flesh.

  * * *

  Climbing the stocky branches of a great chestnut tree that somehow survived in the bare, sunless courtyard outside Caverleigh’s lodgings, St. Briac looked in windows as he ascended. He had one of those feelings Eustache was always going on about
, a feeling that he was about to find his Isabella.

  Caverleigh had entered the front door of the building, but an ill-tempered old man had been waiting to harangue him about the rent, and Gabriel guessed that he wouldn’t arrive in his rooms for at least a few minutes.

  The tree was barely tall enough for him to reach the garret room at the top of the building. As he peered through the grimy window, St. Briac caught a glimpse of golden hair, falling loose around Isabella’s shoulders. His first thought was that she was like a princess, locked in a tower dungeon. She was sitting on the floor next to the bed with her traveling art box and sketchbook, still wearing the same gown as the last night he’d held her and kissed her at Château du Soleil.

  There was no time now for niceties. Reaching out, St. Briac tapped lightly on the glass. The expression on Isabella’s face when she looked up and finally realized who was outside her window, was one he would not forget for the rest of his life.

  In the next moment, she was there, just inches away, yet maddeningly separated from him by the window. Isabella tried to push down on the latch that would release the casement, but it was frozen with rust.

  Gabriel reached out and splayed one hand on the filthy pane of glass, gazing into her shadowed eyes. Isabella flattened her own fingers against his, and the window seemed to evaporate. How much thinner she looked! He could feel her pulse, her cold, trembling body, her fear, and it took every bit of restraint he possessed to keep from breaking the glass and carrying her off with him.

  “I found you,” he murmured, just loudly enough for her to hear. “Everything will be all right.”

  “I am so sorry, Gabriel.” Her voice was muffled behind the window as tears rolled down her pale cheeks. His heart clenched to see her looking so careworn. “This is my fault.”

  He had no idea what she was talking about. Was it the desperate secret she’d wanted to tell him that last night at Château du Soleil? “I love you, Isabella. Nothing else matters.”

  “But—the painting—”

  “Nothing else matters!”

  “You don’t know.” She shook her head as if she were about to break down in sobs, but recovered herself at the last moment. “He means to meet Denon and Wicar tomorrow night—”

  “You don’t need to think about that because I’m taking you away with me.” He tested the leaded glass as he spoke, wondering if it would be possible for him to break through, in spite of the heavy casement that was rusted shut.

  Isabella’s eyes went wide behind her spectacles. “Are you mad?”

  “I would be mad indeed to leave you here for another moment.” He decided to break the glass with the knuckle guard on his rapier. “Stand back.”

  “Gabriel, listen to me!” Her low voice became determined. “This is far too dangerous. My brother carries a pistol and he could enter at any moment. You must wait until we leave to meet Denon and Wicar.”

  “You will accompany him?” He had no idea where the rendezvous would take place, and yet it seemed a trifling detail. Suddenly, the sound of a key rattling in the door’s box lock caused Isabella to turn away in panic.

  “He’s coming,” she said in an undertone. “Go!”

  “Look for me tomorrow night. I shall not fail you.”

  “Gabriel—” Desperately, she reached back to the window that separated them and whispered, “Don’t worry, I’ve made a copy of the painting!”

  What had she said? Something about the painting? St. Briac was surprised to realize that the portrait of the King was the farthest thing from his mind. The door was swinging open as he ducked down below the windowsill, crouching in the chestnut tree.

  “There you are!” Caverleigh exclaimed. “I have news. Tomorrow night at midnight, I will deliver the painting and receive my remuneration.”

  As St. Briac strained to make out what they were saying, he smiled as he realized that Isabella had stayed near the window. She was speaking as loudly as she dared, for his benefit.

  “I will have the painting ready then,” she said. “Even the frame will be in place.”

  “Finally! You shall come with me, so that we can leave Paris after the exchange is made.”

  “And where will we meet them?”

  “Somewhere in the catacombs, under the city. They’ve given me a map.”

  From the other side of the window, Caverleigh’s words were slurred by the time they reached St. Briac’s ears, as if the Englishman had been drinking. What the devil had he said?

  “But George,” Isabella exclaimed a bit too loudly, “you are afraid of dark, enclosed spaces. How can you bear to go under Paris, into the catacombs? Especially at midnight?”

  “Believe me, Izzie, for this sum of money, I would happily go into the very bowels of the earth! You have no idea how desperately I need it.”

  “Please tell me that you intend to pay the moneylenders so that you may finally live your life in the open again.”

  St. Briac recognized the very real note of hope in her voice.

  Caverleigh gave an agitated laugh. “What sort of fool do you take me for? I intend to escape Paris immediately, with every franc of my payment. And I intend to keep you with me until I am safely out of France!”

  Chapter 31

  Paris was shrouded in darkness in the hour before midnight when Izzie and George crossed the River Seine in his rickety calash. Although she had heard him tell the curious landlord that they were merely joining a French uncle for a late supper in Saint-Germaine, Izzie knew that they would not return to the dismal garret room. Everything they’d brought to Paris was leaving with them tonight, including the priceless Leonardo da Vinci portrait, now carefully rolled up and stowed in the secret locked drawer of her art box. Her palms began to perspire whenever she thought of it.

  George, meanwhile, nervously gripped the newly-framed painting Izzie had so painstakingly copied. He’d wrapped it in paper and carried it himself, ordering the young hired coachman to fetch all their belongings from the garret rooms.

  The twisting streets of the Left Bank were narrow, dirty, and dark; clearly Napoleon’s project to revive Paris hadn’t reached these neighborhoods. After George had directed the driver through a series of confusing turns, they came to the edge of the city and he ordered, “Arrêtez!”

  Izzie’s heart was pounding as George climbed down, clutching the painting, and impatiently reached back with one hand for her.

  “Hurry! Just leave those things.”

  “But we are coming back, yes?”

  “Perhaps.” He tried to consult his pocketwatch with his left hand, still holding the copied painting snugly under his right arm. “It’s late. Hurry!”

  “George, I will not leave my art box unless you can promise me that this boy will stay here and wait for us.”

  “You will drive me mad!” But he handed the youth a five-franc Napoleon coin. “Run to find me some light, then guard the carriage and wait for us.”

  “Oui, m’sieur!” The boy ran off to a nearby tavern, returning in moments with a torch, its flame the size of his head.

  As they entered the arched stone tunnel that would take them down under Paris, into the catacombs, Izzie tried to stay calm. This was made more challenging because George was suffering from a terrible fit of anxiety and his discomfort seemed to increase as they descended farther underground.

  George held the torch in front of them with a shaking arm, its flame dancing over the rough-hewn stone walls of the tunnels and steep ramps they were forced to negotiate.

  “Do I recall correctly that this was a limestone quarry, before the catacombs were created?” Izzie asked, hoping to make conversation that would distract him from his fears.

  “Yes. As I understand it, before the king lost his head, he ordered the putrefying cimetière des Innocents to be emptied, and the bones transferred down here, into the old, abandoned quarry. Rumor has it that millions of skeletons are here now, including all the victims of the Reign of Terror…and still they come.”

&
nbsp; “Amazing,” said Izzie with a little shiver. “Madame Le Brun told me that even the remains of those villains Robespierre and Danton ended up here, under Paris.”

  They were going deeper now, and the tunnel narrowed. Drops of water splashed on Izzie’s head, sizzling as they fell into the torchlight.

  “Good God, what a spine-chilling place this is!” cried George.

  As he spoke, he stumbled over an old rusty horseshoe, left behind long ago on the muddy path. The torch he held lurched sideways to illuminate an open chamber on one side of them. There, to Izzie’s utter horror, she beheld masses of human bones piled several feet high.

  “Oh!” She pressed a hand over her own mouth to smother a scream. There were countless gleaming skulls scattered among the long bones. Human skulls! It had been horrifying enough to speak of the remains stored here, but actually seeing these skeletons was almost beyond comprehension. “George, are you certain you know the way?”

  “Why do you ask that? I was given a map!” He whirled on her then, the torchlight leaping over his panic-stricken face, and yelled, “Don’t make me doubt myself!”

  “All right.” She put a hand on his arm, realizing that her own safety depended on keeping him calm. It was folly to imagine that Gabriel could somehow find her in this macabre labyrinth, try though he might. It was up to her to save her own life. “Can I help you? I could carry the painting…”

  “No!” Clutching it against his chest with one arm, he panted for air. “Izzie, I think I may be going mad.”

  “No, no, you’re fine, George. Don’t worry, you aren’t alone, and I’m sure it’s just a short distance farther. Let’s pause here for a while and breathe.”

  In that moment, as he leaned against her, time dropped away. Izzie slipped backward, to a time when she was a young girl and George had been her ally in an unstable world.

  However, this time her older brother was the frightened one, and Izzie was propping him up.