Agent Provocateur
Page 20
“When do we leave for Réunion?” He asked eager to complete their mission to root out and destroy the pirates that used the French held island in the Indian Ocean.
“Not until after that damned ball.” Marty relied. “We should have the intelligence from the Belle by then.”
The Belle was a brig that had been captured the year before. It had made the mistake of attacking the East Indiaman that had carried Marty and Caroline to India. Since then she had been repaired and brought into the Marine.
Marty had been asked to come up with a plan to pacify the pirates working out of Réunion and had tasked the brig to reconnoitre the island. He hoped the Marine captain had the guile to use the fact that the brig was an ex pirate ship to get in close.
Meanwhile he had to be Lord Candor, not Lieutenant Stockley Royal Navy, and attend the Governor’s ball.
As soon as Cooper left, Caroline had a servant fetch Marty for a fitting of a new suit she was having made for him. He stood impatiently as the little Indian tailor fussed over the fit of the suit which was cunningly made of lightweight material but looked like the current fashion in London. It had taken Caroline quite a while and a lot of patience to get the tailor to understand what she wanted. But they had got there in the end.
There was a childish shriek from the door and one year old Beth toddled in pursued by her nurse. Since she had learned to walk she was a terror for exploring and would make her escape whenever they took their eyes off her. Mary, her nurse, was in hot pursuit and scooped her up before she managed to get into the tailors box of scissors and pins.
“Is this really necessary?” Marty grumbled for the umpteenth time. “I thought the last fitting would do it.”
“Be patient my love, you must look your absolute best. They will be looking at us and wondering how two commoners managed to end up as Baron and Baroness Candor. We will not give them an inch to work with.”
The fact was that they didn’t have an ounce of noble blood between then. Caroline had the title through an arranged marriage to the elderly and now late Lord Candor who had died just two years after marrying her when she was just sixteen years old. She had scandalised society with a string of lovers after that until Marty fought a duel for her. They had become lovers and, when she fell pregnant with Beth, they had married.
The big surprise was that the monarch, George the Third, had not only blessed the marriage but confirmed Marty in the Barony and made him a Knight of the Bath as well. They were admired by some but condemned by others as ‘new blood’. Marty’s reputation as a dualist kept the comments to the background but Caroline was sensitive to them.
Marty had been tasked by Admiral Lord Hood and William Wickham to go to India and help the East India Company counter the threat posed by French sponsored rebellions and piracy. Caroline had insisted on going with him as it was likely to be at least a three year posting. So now he was stood there like some kind of tailor’s dummy.