Chapter 9

Nine

We were to meet Alex Sinclair at Charing Cross rail station by ten o'clock for the trip to Dover.

Brodie was already there when I arrived, and Alex joined us shortly after.

He handed us our travel papers as well as an envelope with French currency.

"You'll be traveling as Lady Forsythe," he explained as he handed me my papers. "And as newly married, husband and wife." He glanced uncertainly from me to Brodie.

"Sir Avery thought it would be the best arrangement, so not to raise suspicion. And accommodations have been made for you at the Westminster in Paris. A good many who travel to France stay there, and it is in keeping with the reason you are there, a bit of after-wedding travel."

How considerate of Sir Avery, I thought. I did wonder if he had somehow managed to learn about that ceremony before the magistrate in Scotland.

"It is possible to send a telegram direct from the Westminster. Telephone connections can be problematic. You are to use the code-word Excalibur."

He paused with another nervous glance, first at Brodie who had said nothing until now, and then at me.

"And if there is a difficulty of some sort?"

"Do not contact the local authorities. Sir Avery was most insistent regarding that." He looked at me then.

"If you encounter a difficulty, you are to contact a man by the name of Sancier at the Belleville Gallery. If you should be questioned, you're to tell them that Lady Forsythe is looking to expand her collection," he added with a look at me.

Not that I had a collection. I was familiar with the artist community in Paris from past school days, however, my sister was the art afficionado, not myself. I had a basic education in art. It had never fascinated me as it did my sister, who turned out to be quite talented.

"Has the man, Sancier, been notified?"

"He has, as well as been informed where you will be staying. He will be able to assist if there should be a need," Alex responded. "I trust you have both made arrangements regarding your absence for the next few days so as not to raise questions or cause undo alarm?"

Brodie nodded.

I had placed a telephone call to Sussex Square the previous evening after I arrived back at the town house. In speaking with my great-aunt, I simply explained that I would be working on an inquiry case for a few days with unpredictable hours. I said nothing of setting off for Paris. That would raise too many questions.

"Do give Brodie my regards," she added in spite of the fact that I had not mentioned him. "And do be careful, dear. While the French are among our ancestors, they can be a bit peevish from time to time. But then you are familiar with that. Do call when you return. Plans are well underway for Lenore and James's wedding."

Once again, it did seem that she was well informed. I had visions of her having her own network of spies about London. And I did wonder if my sister had been informed of the plans.

Alex was to accompany us as far as Dover. The excuse, if anyone inquired, was that he was my brother and was going as far as the coast to send us off. The real reason was to provide assistance if there should be any last-minute issue before boarding the ferry for the cross-channel trip to Dover.

I suspected it had more to do with the fact that Brodie was not at all pleased with being sent off on a matter he was certain Sir Avery's ‘people' in France could have handled, and had made no attempt to hide the fact.

"Plausible deniability," he explained as Alex went to check if the train was on time. "If anything should go wrong, Sir Avery will be able to use the excuse that we were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. And I don't like the fact that he has no hesitation using your title for this."

"Then we simply need to conclude this as quickly as possible, determine what that address might have to do with anything, make our report, and return to London," I pointed out.

"The train is on time. We can proceed to the platform," Alex announced when he returned. "We have a private compartment. For anyone inquiring, I am your brother. I'm accompanying you to the coast to ‘see you off on holiday.'"

I smiled to myself. Alex was certainly getting into this. He did need to get away from the office below the Tower more often.

Our train arrived and we settled into our compartment. We were familiar with the journey from a previous case. Two-and-a-half hours from Dover to Calais and then six hours by train to Paris.

With Alex as our chaperone, there was little conversation, and we arrived at Dover in plenty of time to make the transfer from train to the ferry.

"You're to keep Sir Avery advised of your progress," Alex reminded us again and then bid us farewell.

Of course, I sarcastically thought. In the midst of a case there was more than enough time to write reports and dash off telegrams. The truth was, however, that none of this was Alex's doing. He was merely following orders.

We left the departure area and entered the main area cabin of the ferry. Brodie tucked our bags onto a shelf along with other baggage.

I walked through to the portside deck with seats along the inside wall that were tucked under a shallow overhang to protect against weather. Brodie followed out onto the deck.

The wind had come up across the water, whitecaps appearing out beyond the landing. The crossing would put us in Calais very near evening. Alex had arranged for us to stay at an inn there before continuing on to Paris on a morning train.

Brodie took out his pipe, then filled the bowl. I cupped my hands around it to block the wind as he lit a match. His fingers wrapped around mine the same as dozens of times before, yet different, and I wanted to hold on. For just a moment that dark gaze met mine as he bent his head and took several puffs, then blew out a stream of smoke once the tobacco glowed.

We stood there as the last of the passengers boarded, then filled the cabin of the ferry. Those more adventuresome souls came out onto the deck to take advantage of the sun and fresh air in spite of the sharp wind that whipped from off the water.

The signal that we were departing went out and we steadied ourselves at the railing as mooring lines were cast off and the ferry slowly edged away from the dock. It then turned out into the channel as clouds of steam billowed overhead from the steam engine.

That fragrant pipe smoke wrapped around me like a memory, then disappeared on the wind as I stared out over the water.

"Ye could have refused to be part of the case," he commented and took another draw from the pipe.

"I wanted to be finished with the agreement I made with him." It was as simple as that. After this, I owed nothing to Sir Avery or the Agency.

"That agreement." He tamped out the contents of the pipe at the deck railing, his mouth thinned in a line surrounded by that dark beard. It was the first we had spoken of it.

"The agreement I made to save your life. I would do it again." I turned and went back inside the cabin.

He remained on the deck for the rest of the trip, returning only when darkness fell across the water and the lights from the port of Calais drew closer.

Calais was an ancient seaport used in medieval times for channel crossings. According to my great-aunt, our ancestor had crossed from there into Britain when he set off to conquer everything he came across.

The old part of Calais with its stone and wood beam residences and inns was just beyond the port, while the more modern part of the city that included the rail station spread to the south of the port. Modern , of course, meant within the last two to three hundred years.

It was very near nine o'clock in the evening when we disembarked and the last train to Paris had departed earlier.

According to the travel itinerary Alex had provided, we had a reservation for the night at an inn rather than at one of the hotels in the city, and nearer the rail station for our departure in the morning.

Weather that had followed us across the channel had finally set in with a drizzling rain. Brodie found a driver and we made the short ride to the inn.

A boy appeared as soon as we arrived and retrieved our travel bags in a rapid flow of French.

"You are English, oui ?" he asked as he followed us into the inn. "We have many English guests traveling to Paris."

The inn was typical of older residences found in Calais and other places in France that had been transformed into inns to accommodate travelers from England and other places.

It was built of brick with timber-framed windows and exposed beams in the Norman Style. Shutters on the windows were painted bright blue, with flower boxes glimpsed overhead in the halo of an electric light from second-story window openings as we entered the inn with another couple.

In heavily accented English, the sightly balding man behind the counter informed them that supper could be provided to their room.

" Oui, monsieur ?" he inquired as Brodie approached the desk and gave the name for our reservation.

"Ah yes, it is here. And supper for you and the lady?'

Neither of us had eaten since leaving London. Brodie nodded and signed the guest register. He was then handed a key.

The same boy who had assisted with our travel bags when we arrived escorted us to our room on the second floor. He deposited the bags near the door, then turned to Brodie with a toothsome grin and was rewarded with a coin. The grin spread even wider.

"I will bring your supper when it is ready," he informed us as he went to the door, undoubtedly in anticipation of another coin.

"He reminds me of Rory," I commented after he left.

They did seem to be of about the same age.

Brodie merely nodded.

He had not spoken of him at length, yet I knew from Adelaide Matthews that he had been a frequent visitor over the past months.

It seemed the boy had become quite attached to him and looked forward to his visits, something that he undoubtedly needed, having never known his father. And then there was that question that still remained.

Was he Rory's father?

It was possible from the brief time he was with Ellie Sutton. I knew that it had weighed heavily on him after her death, that Rory might be orphaned much as he had been at very near the same age.

He lit the fire in the fireplace that had been laid in anticipation of our arrival. I removed my coat and hung it on a hook by the door. The fire quickly caught, and I crossed the room and extended my hands toward the heat.

"It appears the innkeeper is not on the list of establishments that carry her ladyship's whisky," he commented with a gesture to the bottle of wine and two glasses that sat on the table near the hearth.

"You will have to remind Munro," I replied as he went to the table, removed the cork from the bottle, and poured two glasses.

The wine completed what the fire had started, my hands soon warm along with the rest of me.

"Bordeaux," I commented, and at the look from Brodie where he sat across the table added, "The wine."

"Ah, ye know about such things."

"From afternoons when I managed to escape from the school Linnie and I attended in Paris." I took another sip of wine and smiled. "And then there was her determination to visit every gallery in Paris. I was certain that if I had to tour one more museum or art gallery, that I would surely die of boredom."

"Yer misspent youth," he drily commented.

By no means compared to his life on the streets of Edinburgh, but I supposed that was where my adventures first began.

There was a knock on the door. The man at the front desk had arrived with our supper balanced on a tray with a tureen, bowls, and a long twist of bread on a plate.

The boy had accompanied him. He flirted outrageously as he set a second bottle of wine on the table, then expertly opened it.

Everyone in France, it seemed, drank wine, and I had to laugh at that typically French habit and in one so young. Brodie provided father and son each a coin.

The boy thanked Brodie, then turned to me and bowed from the waist.

" Enchantée, madame ."

When I would have translated after they left, Brodie nodded as he poured more wine.

"Ye seem to have that effect on most men and boys ye encounter."

And one particular man? I did wonder. Were there still feelings there? Was there a way around the angry words, and pain?

The supper was a typical French stew with meat and vegetables in a rich wine sauce, fresh-baked bread that Brodie sliced, and that second bottle of wine.

The hot food drove away the last of the chill from the ride from the Port of Calais, while the wine created a faint glow around everything in the room—including the man who sat across from me with that overlong mane of dark hair. My fingers curled into the palm of my hand.

I pushed back memories as I emptied the last of the wine from my glass, then rose from the table and went to the bed that was only slightly larger than the one at the inn in Norfolk.

I unfastened the button at the waist of my skirt then stepped out of it, then unbuttoned my shirtwaist and shivered in the colder air at the edge of the room, dressed now only in my camisole and long slip. I quickly slipped under the covers on the bed.

He placed more wood on the fire, then returned to the table and emptied the bottle into his glass, legs stretched before him, boots crossed at the ankles as he slowly sipped the wine. And that dark gaze met mine from across the room.

"Why didn't you refuse to be part of the case?"

"I could have. But I wanted to be done with the agreement I made with Sir Avery."

"Aye, the agreement."

I knew his feelings toward Sir Avery. After the case that had taken us both to Edinburgh, he didn't trust him.

"You could have refused as well."

"No," he replied, staring into his glass as he swirled the wine as I had seen him do countless times with a dram of whisky. As if he might find answers there.

"That wasna possible," Brodie replied, that thick Scots accent wrapping around the words.

Why wasn't it possible? I wondered as I drifted in a faint wine haze and closed my eyes.

But the wine, the warmth in the room, and the bed... The question was there, then slipped away with the wine and heat from the fire, and that long trip across the channel.

brODIE

He rose from the chair then went to the hearth. The fire had burned low once more and the room had grown cold. He put more wood on it, poked at it until it caught and burned brightly, then turned toward the bed.

She was asleep, lips slightly parted, her head resting on one hand on the pillow, the fingers of her other hand wrapped around the edge of the blanket.

He crouched low beside the bed. If he closed his eyes, she was still there, as she had been the past months—the curve of her cheek, the stubborn angle of her chin. Those eyes that were not quite green but not quite gray the way they had been when she had stared back at him in anger that last time.

But when he opened his eyes, she was still there, asleep now, her breathing slow and even, her lips slightly parted with something she might have said.

There was a faint smile, she would want the last comment. She did like to have the last word. Not in anger but something she wanted him to know. To understand?

It had taken all those months apart, countless times that encounter at Scotland Yard had tortured him, and his worst fear had been that he might lose her. In the end he had caused it himself and she had left.

He touched the ring that he had placed on her hand with those few words so many months ago. She still wore it in spite of everything that had passed between them.

Impossible, he had thought, when he told her of his feelings and wanted her for his wife. Impossible for a woman like her and a man like him.

Yet, she had accepted his proposal, had accepted him. And she trusted him. Hadn't she told him so?

That last time, before she left, when he was beaten and chained, she asked him to trust her .

He did. It was himself that he didn't trust to be able to keep her safe...if she was out there alone. And the rage that had followed—at Abberline, at himself, and at her!

And now? How did he take away the hurt he saw in her eyes that last time? How did he make her understand that he did trust her? That he needed her there at the office, at the blackboard with her scribbles and her notes, across the desk from him at the end of a day as they shared a dram of whisky. Needed her argument over one reason or another when he was wrong about a clue they'd uncovered, all the other ways that he'd come to know her...needed her , when he'd learned not to need anyone.

When he would have returned to the chair before the hearth, her fingers gently closed around his as they had countless times in the past. That simple gesture that had connected them after long days, a frustrating case, and other strong words. It was difficult to know who was holding onto whom.

It didn't matter as he gently eased down onto the bed beside her, then pulled her close.

If she wakened, there were no words, just that quiet way they had found with each other in the past as she stirred and somehow moved closer, then slept once more, trusting him...