Smoke & Lies

by Andrea Penrose

  Grentham acknowledged the warning with an exaggerated bow. But before they could exchange further words, a wave from one of the matrons clustered by the punch table caught Constantina’s attention.

  “Margaret Mallington wishes to get my advice on colors for her granddaughter’s first ball dress,” she observed. “So if you will excuse me . . .” As she shifted her stance, her cane struck a none-too-gentle hit to Grentham’s shin. “Remember what I said, Percival.”

  Sophia stifled a chortle as the dowager walked off to meet her cronies. The minister speared her with a quelling frown. She ignored it.

  “There are several matters to which I must attend,” he announced brusquely. “So I, too, will excuse myself—”

  “Do you never stop working?” said Sophia sharply.

  “Alas, there is no rest for the wicked,” he replied.

  To Arianna’s surprise, Sophia moved to block his path. “Surely nothing is so pressing that you can’t spare a few moments of your time to ask a lady to dance.”

  Grentham stared at her mutely. Arianna had never seen him at a loss for words.

  Sophia didn’t blink. “Well?” A note of challenge edged her voice.

  He hesitated, then slowly held out his arm.

  Yet another strange twist to the evening, mused Arianna as they moved off to take up a position on the polished parquet. She had no idea what her friend was choreographing. The dance floor was full—the waltz, which had only lately arrived in England, was proving very popular tonight. No doubt because many of the high sticklers of Society still considered it rather scandalous.

  Mellowed by the fine champagne, most couples were aglow with good cheer as the first notes set everyone in motion. Like graceful butterflies riding a summer breeze, silks fluttered in the warm, scented air.

  Sophia, however, looked more like a hornet on the attack. Arianna could see her friend was subjecting the minister to a rapidfire lecture—whatever she was saying had him back on his heels.

  For a few moments, she lost them in the vortex of spinning colors. When they reappeared, Grentham had regained his footing and was moving smoothly in time with the music. For a man who very rarely deigned to dance, observed Arianna, he was doing it quite well.

  Sophia, on the other hand, was making no attempt at grace. The minister was going to limp away with a few quashed toes.

  The melody quickened, and suddenly everything seemed to take on a feverish brightness—the blazing candles, the crystalline laughter, the glittering gems. Mayfair’s opulence was on dazzling display. And yet Arianna found her thoughts slipping into the dark shadows of her past.

  Were it anyone else but Grentham, she might have accepted that Wolff's presence in this mission was a coincidence. But the minister seemed to possess unholy powers of squeezing secrets out of thin air. Not that she could think of any reason why her former employer might represent a threat. Saybrook might not be aware of him by name, but he knew of her youthful stint as an actress. If Grentham tried to use it as a means of manipulation, she could laugh in his face.

  Still, Wolff’s appearance had set off inner alarms bells. And having been forced to fend for herself in a cutthroat world, Arianna had quickly learned that the key to survival lay in heeding one’s instincts.

  She couldn’t shake the feeling that this mission was going to be fraught with difficult challenges . . .

  “Thank you, Miss Kirtland.” Grentham’s voice suddenly interrupted her brooding.

  Arianna hadn’t realized that the waltz had ended. Lifting her gaze, she saw Sophia looking daggers at the minister as he bowed over her hand. “Dancing with you is an experience I won’t soon forget,” he murmured softly, though through there was no mistaking the deliberate irony.

  He straightened and inclined a brusque nod at Arianna. “I shall leave you ladies to enjoy the rest of the evening.”

  With her own thoughts in a tangle, she found it hard to judge whether the fleeting glitter in his gaze was malice or some other emotion.

  “Arse,” muttered Sophia under her breath, once the minister had moved away.

  Her own worries gave way to concern for Sophia, who was standing in rigid fury, hands fisted in her skirts. She stepped back into the shadows of the alcove, drawing her friend with her.

  “Arse,” repeated Sophia. “He may mock me, but I trust I made my message clear.”

  “I thought you were inclined to see him in a favorable light,” responded Arianna. “By the by, why did you drag him out on the dance floor?” A smile tugged at her lips. “I’m assuming it was not to discuss the latest fashions or the unusually cold weather.”

  The flush ridging her friend's cheekbones darkened. “I was simply warning him that he had better not be sending you and Saybrook into the devil's cauldron without knowing whether a fire was about to erupt underneath it.”

  Arianna raised her brows. “You expected him to care whether a few random operatives get boiled in intrigue?”

  “No, I expected him to understand that I intend to make his life hell if he sends the two of you off on a mission without knowing the full extent of the dangers you’re facing.”

  “I daresay he doesn’t know the full extent of the dangers,” she pointed out. “He might have conjectures, but I doubt that even he, with all his far-flung networks of informants, ever knows the all the variables.”

  “That doesn’t make it right,” countered Sophia.

  “In all fairness to Grentham,” she replied dryly, “his job requires that he doesn’t have a conscience.”

  “In this case, your aunt and I will demand that he have one.”

  “Ah, no wonder he was looking a little green around the gills. The threat of Aunt Constantina and her cane is likely the only thing that would strike terror in his cold-as-steel heart.”

  “Don’t you, too, make sport of me.” Sophia’s chin took on a defiant tilt. “I may not be as experienced as you are in intrigue and adventure, but I won’t sit by meekly when I think my friends are in danger of being fed to the wolves.”

  Arianna gave an inward wince at the references to ‘wolves.’

  “Are we on the supper menu?” Saybrook, moving with unnerving cat-like stealth, slipped out of the side salon and crossed the narrow passageway to join them. “Whatever predators are on the prowl here tonight, I imagine they would find the lobster patties and quail pate far more appetizing.”

  “Ye God, do the two of you always make a jest of mortal danger?”

  “Only on an empty stomach,” quipped Saybrook. Seeing Sophia’s scowl, he quickly added, “I appreciate your concern. Be assured, Arianna and I don’t deliberately seek out danger.”

  Not anymore, added Arianna to herself as she recalled the reason she had first come to London. Revenge for her father’s murder hadn’t tasted as sweet as she had imagined . . .

  But thoughts of the past quickly gave way to the present situation.

  “And yet someone tried to kill me this morning,” she said softly. “So we must be a threat to someone.”

  Chapter 6

  Dawn hovered on the horizon, the chill light leaching all color save for shades of pewter grey from the surrounding spires and rooftops. Arianna had risen early after a fitful sleep and slipped down to the kitchens to make herself some hot chocolate.

  After frothing up a creamy foam with a molinillo, she carried her cup and the pot to the breakfast room. But rather than taking a seat at the table, she went to stand by the bank of mullioned windows. Tiny flecks of ice traced a crystalline web across the nearest pane. Leaning in close, she exhaled a breath to the glass and watched a part of the gossamer-thin pattern dissolve.

  Questions, questions. And damnably few answers.

  “You look pensive.” Saybrook, his hair still tousled from sleep, stood in the doorway, steam wafted up from the mug of coffee cradled in his palms.

  “There is much on which to think,” she replied, turning away from the stark silhouettes of the garden trees.

  “Indee
d.” He came to join her by the window, and for a moment they stood in companionable silence. His aura of quiet strength had been the first thing she had noticed about him. That, and his dark, smoldering eyes, which seemed to possess the power to see straight through to her soul.

  At times, it was still an unsettling sensation.

  “Are you concerned about Wolff—or von Wolfram, as we must remember to call him?” he asked.

  How to answer?

  “I have no reason to be, and yet I know him well enough not to underestimate the dark side of his nature.” Arianna had, of course, told Saybrook all about her former employer on the carriage ride home from the ball. “At heart, he's a scoundrel—granted, a charming one, but a scoundrel nonetheless. If it serves his purpose, he won't hesitate for a heartbeat to betray us.”

  “So Grentham has warned us,” replied the earl.

  “Yes.” Somehow that was only more troubling.

  “And?” he pressed.

  “And . . .” She sighed. “And while neither of us is a stranger to the unholy games within games of espionage, there is something about this particular combination of players on the chessboard that unsettles me.” She pressed her palm to one of the windowpanes and felt the cold cut like a knife through her flesh. “Though I can't put a finger on why.”

  “Then we must pay attention to your intuition and be even more on guard than usual.”

  That he didn’t try to counter her fears with reasonable arguments helped settle her jumpy nerves.

  “Thank you for not pointing out that this mission is no more daunting than our previous ones,” she murmured.

  Saybrook smiled. “It seemed a waste of breath to state the obvious.” He took hold of her icy hand and pressed it to his chest. The thud-thud of his heartbeat pulsed a welcome warmth through her. “I prefer to concentrate my efforts on something useful.”

  He led her to the table and refilled her cup from the still-steaming chocolate pot. “We’ve yet to address your question of last night. Parsing through who had a motive to shoot at you yesterday may us help clarify what sort of hidden danger within dangers we’re facing.”

  “I've been pondering that for half the night.” Arianna seated herself. “I'm certain Grentham had no hand in the deed. It would go against all his interests. Unless, of course, he's a traitor. And that I can't bring myself to believe.”

  Saybrook nodded in agreement.

  Arianna didn’t add her one niggling concern regarding the minister. She intended to deal with that by herself.

  “However,” she responded, “given that he talked to both the baroness and Wolff about us before yesterday, they seem the likeliest suspects.”

  “One of them is doublecrossing Grentham?” mused the earl. “A reasonable assumption. As is the conclusion that if one of them is a traitor is, then he or she is aligned with whoever wishes to prevent us from undertaking the voyage.”

  “That’s the obvious answer.”

  His lips twitched. “Which doesn’t make it wrong.”

  “True.” Arianna took a sip of chocolate. “Then again, it could be completely unrelated to our upcoming travels. Sophia suggested that perhaps some past enemy is seeking vengeance.”

  She refrained from adding any mention of the Russian envoy who had recently arrived in London. They had an unpleasant history with him. And given her most recent run-in with him concerning Constantina’s stolen letters, he had ample reason to wish her dead.

  Her husband, however, seemed to sense what she was thinking. “At last week's diplomatic reception, you mentioned that you had a nasty encounter with Count Orlov before I arrived. Would you care to elaborate?”

  Arianna thought for a moment. “It would serve no useful purpose.”

  Saybrook fixed her with an unblinking stare. She willed herself not to look away.

  “Very well,” he murmured. “I trust you know best, so let us not distract ourselves with it.”

  Trust. A clench of guilt tightened her chest. She shifted in her chair. “Shall I fix us some toast and jam? You know I think better on a full stomach.”

  A rough-edged voice sounded from out in the corridor. “So do I.”

  A moment later, their good friend Basil Henning appeared in the doorway, his face unshaven, his hair uncombed, his less-than-pristine clothing in its usual state of disarray. “But I’ll need more than toast and jam to fill my breadbox.”

  “Baz—how lovely to see you,” she said. No matter that he looked as though he had walked backward through a thicket of gorse.

  The surgeon chuckled. “I’m well aware that the sight of my phiz first thing in the morning is more likely to rob you of your appetite.”

  “No chance of that,” quipped the earl. “Arianna is far too fond of breakfast.”

  She raised a brow. “Are you implying that I’m losing my girlish figure?”

  “Your figure,” he murmured, “is quite perfect, my dear.”

  His smile stirred a flutter in her chest.

  “Speaking of breakfast, the scullery maid who admitted me is already alerting your cook that ample sustenance is needed without delay,” said Henning as he crossed the carpet—leaving an unholy trail of mud on the ornate Oriental design—and made himself at home in one of the chairs. He and the earl were longtime friends, a camaraderie forged during the brutal battles of the Peninsula War.

  Arianna’s bond with him was more recent, yet no less heartfelt. They had been through some hellish experiences together . . .

  “How is your sister holding up?” asked Saybrook, once the surgeon had settled into his seat. Caught up in a deadly intrigue involving Scottish radicals and a network of French spies, Henning's nephew had recently been killed during an attempted escape from a British military prison. His body had never been recovered, as the shots from his pursuers had knocked him from the cliffside path into the churning sea below.

  Somehow that made the young man’s death seem even harder to bear—one didn’t even have a coffin over which to mourn.

  The surgeon responded with a wordless grunt.

  “Grentham tried to save him from Stoughton’s scheming,” murmured Arianna. A weak platitude—which deserved Henning’s response of a scornful snort.

  Thankfully, a footman entered with coffee and a basket of sultana muffins, still warm from the oven. The sweet-scented aromas and muted clatter of cups dispelled the awkward moment, though she saw that the surgeon still wore a troubled look.

  Their friend took a noisy slurp before leaning back and scratching at his stubbled chin. “So, laddie, I received your note about this habble-gabble trip to Elba—”

  “And you’ve come to wish us good luck and Godspeed?” interjected Saybrook with a dry smile.

  “Auch, you would know that without me having to haul my aging carcass across half of London,” shot back Henning. “Granted, the prospect of a bountiful breakfast, complete with Lady A’s lovely pastries —” He paused to pluck a muffin from the basket. “—was an enticement. But my main purpose is purely altruistic. I’ve come to knock some sense into your cockloft.”

  He took a bite of the muffin and let out a blissful sigh before launching into his lecture. “You’re a bloody damn idiot if you let Grentham push you and Lady A into yet another devil-cursed cauldron of lies and intrigue. No good can come of it.”

  Arianna feared he was right. It was likely that Saybrook’s cousin was already dead . . .

  “So you think I should forget about Eduardo because the odds are stacked against his still being alive?” asked the earl.

  Henning expelled an uncomfortable breath.

  “I don’t care to play games of chance with the lives of my friends as the stakes,” said the earl softly. “Idiotic though that may be.”

  “It was worth a try,” muttered Henning. “Not that I expected you to listen to reason.”

  “Since when have any of us listened to reason when love and loyalty are involved?” murmured Arianna.

  That drew a gruff laugh from
the surgeon. He raised his cup. “A toast to us idiots. May we somehow survive our incurable penchant for spitting in Satan’s eye.”

  On that note, the footman reappeared with platters of shirred eggs, kippered herring and fried gammon.

  As Henning dug into the food with gusto, the fellow discreetly passed a folded sheet of paper to Saybrook.

  Seeing the blood-red sealing wax, Arianna felt a shiver slide down her spine.

  “What does the minister have to say?” she asked once the sound of cracking paper died away. “Given the ungodly hour, I imagine it must be important.”

  Saybrook offered her the note. “Read it for yourself—he’s simply informing us of another person with whom it may be useful to make contact once we reach Elba.”

  “For what reason?”

  “As you’ll see, he doesn’t explain himself.”

  She reluctantly took the paper and skimmed over the contents. “I take it the name means nothing to you?”

  “Correct.” A cynical smile played on the corners of the earl’s mouth. “But as we’ve already seen, names don’t necessarily mean much.”

  Henning stopped chewing. “How so?”

  Arianna explained about Count Wolfram. “And God only knows who the baroness really is,” she added, after making a terse mention of the mysterious Lady Plessy-Moritz.

  “It doesn’t matter who she is,” observed Saybrook. “We only need to discover what her—and Wolff’s—intentions are.”

  “Aye.” Henning speared a strip of gammon with his knife. “Given all the intrigue, I trust you’re taking the Tsar’s pretty pistols with you, Lady A.”

  “They’re far too lovely to risk exposing to the seawater and salt air,” she replied. “Sandro is taking a selection of very serviceable weapons—”

  Saybrook pushed back his plate and got to his feet. “Speaking of which, I ought to check that the bullets and powder are properly prepared for an ocean voyage.” He looked to Arianna. “Are there any last-minute items that need to be ordered?”

  “None that I can think of. Bianca has been terrifyingly efficient in creating her lists.” Arianna finished the last swallow of chocolate. “But there is still much to do before we must leave for the docks.”