A Spark Unseen (25 page)

“And if this emperor is a man one would not wish to offend, Mr. Aldridge,” I hissed, voice dripping venom, “then tell me why I should not inform him that you are a liar and a murderer, and that you are holding me against my will at this very moment?”

We stopped, and those hard blue eyes locked on to my own. “Because, dear Katharine, we have a bargain to discuss. One that I think you will wish to hear.” He smiled at me. “And because he will not believe you.”

“And why in the world not?” If I did not know what was behind Ben’s beautiful smile, I might have been charmed.

“Because, Miss Tulman, he is my father.”

And before I could think or react, I was jerked forward eleven more steps, and found myself wrapped in the enigmatic gaze of Charles-Louis Napoléon Bonaparte, emperor of France.

Ben bowed, pulling me down into a curtsy beside him.
“Vos Majestés Impériales,”
he said,
“je vous présente Mademoiselle Katharine Tulman?”

My head was down, but I was stealing looks at the emperor, trying to understand how what Ben had just told me could be true.

“Does the young lady speak French, Charles?”

I lifted myself up to see the ivory-skinned empress smiling sweetly at us. Whatever Ben’s relationship might be to Napoléon, it was clear that the Empress Eugénie was not his mother. She could not have been much older than Ben. Her glance slid once over my tightly gripped wrist, and Ben instantly let go of me, smiling stiffly. “I believe she does not, Your Majesty.”

“Then where are your manners, Charles? Let us speak English for the new acquaintance.”

He bowed formally and said, “This is Miss Katharine Tulman, Your Majesty, lately of England.”

I curtsied again, and the empress inclined her head before she said, “So you must have known Charles in England, Miss Tulman. He talks so little of his time there.”

I stared at the empress, a large diamond winking from the center of her tiara. I had no idea what any of them knew about Ben’s past. For that matter, neither did I. “He is a …” I began.
Liar? Poisoner? Murderer? Thief?
“He is a remarkable man,” I finished lamely.

“And so thoughtful,” said the empress, beaming. “Only last week, Charles brought me a gift of my favorite claret, just because I happened to mention my fondness for it.”

“You are too kind, Your Majesty.” Ben gave her his smile, all charm, while I prayed that the empress would drink nothing from the hand of Ben Aldridge.

“Is this your woman?”

The voice had been high and distinctly German. We all turned to look at the Emperor Napoléon, whose gaze now rested fondly on Ben. The question had been directed at him, but it was me that he had been speaking of, as if inquiring after a pet.

“No, Your Majesty,” I said clearly, and a little too loud. “I most certainly am not.”

There was a pause in the surrounding conversation. Napoléon’s gray eyes bore back into mine, like a tunnel where no one else could intrude or interrupt, and again I was struck by the sound of distant bells. Then his waxed mustache twitched.

“You must dance with her some more, Charles, I think, if you wish to make her so.”

Everyone laughed politely, including Ben at my side, as if the emperor had just concocted a very witty joke. Ben said, “Then with Miss Tulman’s permission, we shall take our —”

“Is the woman a Pisces?”

Again there was a lull in the conversations surrounding us. Ben hesitated, turning to me, and the empress said quickly, “The emperor is so very interested in his horoscope.” She caught my eye and gave me one tiny shake of the head.

I had no idea what any of this meant, or what sort of superstition I was playing into, but I said, “No, Your Majesty, I am not a … Pisces.”

“Then I am safe to dance with the lady, wouldn’t you agree, Your Majesty?” Ben said. The emperor waved a hand, while the empress smiled, seeming relieved.

Ben bowed yet again and, remembering late, I curtsied before he took my arm, steering me — without my permission — away from the royal couple. When we were swallowed by the crowd, I pulled my arm loose, but he grabbed it again, jerking me sideways through one of the arched doorways. I heard a few male chuckles. There was another grand room here, smaller, with upholstered chairs, fine cabinets, and one or two trysting couples, and then we were through another door, in the dark, and I was pushed up against a wall. The room was large, I could feel that, and empty, but it wasn’t until my eyes adjusted to the moon shining down through the window that I saw the dais containing two thrones. I made a move toward the doors but Ben had me in a grip of iron, bruising my upper arms. He pushed me back into the wall.

“You forget that we have a bargain to discuss,” he said. “Something I want for something you want.”

“You have nothing I want,” I spat.

He came close to my face, crushing the hoopskirt. I leaned back as far as I could, hands splayed against the wall. “Are you certain of that?” he whispered. “And what if I offered you Lane Moreau?”

I went still.

Ben smiled. “Well, that got your attention, I’d say. Poor Mr. Marchand.”

“Where is he?”

“This is a bargain, Miss Tulman.”

“Is he alive?”

“At the moment. But I cannot guarantee that he will remain so.”

I turned my head away. The velvet was so hot I could hardly breathe.
Alive.
I had been so sure, and yet it was my relief, not my corset, that was going to suffocate me.

“Give me the location of Frederick Tulman,” Ben said gently, his grip on my arms still painful, “and I will give you the location of Lane Moreau. That is our bargain.”

I took three shallow breaths that did me no good before I said, “I told you that my uncle is dead.”

“Oh, dear,” said Ben. “I do hope for Mr. Moreau’s sake that you are a liar, Miss Tulman. If you have nothing to trade, then I simply have no use for my guest.” My face was turned as far away as it could be, but he was so close now that his breath tickled my cheek. “And what do you think I do with things I have no use for?”

I remembered Davy’s small body making a curving arc through the air as he was thrown from Ben’s boat.

“Do you think I will hesitate?” he said. “Did I hesitate with that annoying little lawyer of yours?”

I turned to face him then, letting the truth of this settle into me. Whether Mr. Babcock’s death had been with or without the emperor’s knowledge I couldn’t be sure, but some of my earlier hatred twisted about, finding its proper place. I stared back into Ben’s eyes, a clear blue void of nothingness. No, he would not hesitate. But the mention of Mr. Babcock had let loose a rivulet of my pent-up rage.

“I take it you don’t know how to make the gyroscope work, then?”

His smile disappeared. “All I need is for Mr. Tully to show me,” he said. “It’s a very simple request.”

“And your father will be … most grateful, I suppose. So grateful he’ll hand over a palace and a kingdom? I had rather thought your father was a sailor, Mr. Aldridge, or that’s what you told me at Stranwyne. But I believe the emperor has already named his heir, hasn’t he? If the empress doesn’t give him one first. She would be quite the forbearing wife if —”

“Shut up!” he yelled, pulling me forward to slam me once against the wall, the words reverberating several more times in the empty room. “That … woman,” he said, his eyes close to mine, “is a bloody, royal fool. She has no idea who I am, and when my father is done being besotted with her, he will set her aside. But do not dare …” He paused, choosing his next words slowly. “Do not dare question his love for me. I will hand him a weapon that will give the Bonapartes more power than they ever dreamed of, and when I do, my father will give me anything I ask. Anything!”

There was a mania in this that frightened me more than anything else that evening. Ben relaxed, but not his grip on my arms.

“Our bargain, Miss Tulman?”

“I told you that my uncle is dead,” I whispered.

“I will come to Rue Trudon tomorrow night at midnight to collect him. If you give him to me without a fuss, then I will give you Lane Moreau. Without a fuss. And if Mr. Tulman is not there, dear Katharine …” He finally let go of one of my arms, reaching out to twine a finger around one of the curls on my bare shoulder. “… then I have a bullet eager to rid me of an unwanted guest. A fair and simple trade. Other than that, Miss Tulman, I don’t care what you do.” He chuckled at my shiver. “Choose well.”

And he left me.

I
jumped when, less than a minute later, Henri Marchand threw open the door to the dark and empty throne room, bouncing it against the wall, laying a bar of bright gaslight across the floor. I caught a glimpse of a ball going on through the open doors of the room behind him, a table with fluted glasses and stacked confections, servants and milling guests, a world I’d nearly forgotten was there. He closed the door, shutting us away again.

“I lost sight in the crowd,” he said. “I could not find you, until I saw that man leaving. Who is he?”

Ben Aldridge. Charles Arceneaux. Not dead, but alive, and the emperor’s secret son. How could any of that be? I thought of John George’s bloodstains on the floor of Stranwyne’s chapel, and of dear Mr. Babcock, dewy-eyed at the memory of my grandmother. On whose orders had they died? Ben’s, or the emperor’s? Or were those orders one and the same? And then there was Lane, dead if I did not hand over my uncle, and Uncle Tully, innocent as a child in all of this. How dare he make me choose between them?

“Miss Tulman?” Henri said.

Bitter cold slid down my spine, not freezing or numbing this time, but bracing, tingling, every corner of my mind awake and alive to it.

“Miss Tulman!”

I pushed away from my leaning stance against the wall and straightened my dress. Henri stepped back. I was angry now, deeply so, the kind that made me cool and calm, the kind that would not let me rest until I’d had my way. Ben always had the upper hand, always left me no recourse but to react to whatever plan he had set in motion. I’d been doing so for more than two years, in some ways. Now it was time for him to react to mine.

We waited outside the Tuileries in the night air, bathed in lights. I was surrounded by history and magnificence, but the plans now filling my head left no room for their appreciation. My neck ached from where I had hit the wall, and I was regretting my lack of cloak or wrap. Henri tugged off his jacket and silently offered it. I hesitated before I took it, but it was warm. I heard the horse hooves, and our carriage rattled up. A lavishly dressed servant opened the door and I was handed in, taking a moment to squeeze the enormous skirt through the narrow doorway.

As Henri began to step in after me I said, “Be so good as to tell the driver we wish to go to Rue Tisserand. Quietly, if you can.”

He leaned back out, and I distinctly heard him say “Rue Trudon.” I frowned. He climbed in and sat down opposite me, my skirt leaving no room for his feet. “I said the Rue Tisserand, Mr. —”

I saw his hand shoot up in the semidarkness, stopping my speech. “No more, Miss Tulman. No more.”

Gravel crunched under the carriage wheels. When we left the gates and began rolling smoothly on a paved street, I said, “Is something the —”

“I mean that you tell me nothing. Nothing!” he shouted. “And yet I am to go with you to Rue Tisserand in the middle of the night. Madness! You will go home as you ought.”

He was absolutely seething. Oddly, I liked it much better than when he was flattering. “I am sorry. It isn’t fair to you, I know. I will go home first …” I saw his shoulders relax slightly. “… so I can take Mary with me. She is —”

I was interrupted by what I could only assume was a long and bountiful example of French cursing. “What is wrong with you?” he said finally. “What is wrong with you? I do not know your troubles. You will not say. But the emperor’s men, they watch your house, and other men, they disappear around you, poof!” His English was suffering with his anger. “And you say go here, and go there, and you wish to visit slums in the night in a dress that would buy a month of bread, and bring the imperial court right to the poor monsieur’s door! Idiocy!”

I was taken aback, mostly because he was correct. I had been letting my own fury get the better of my sense. Of course I was being watched, whether I could see the eyes or not. I could not simply drive up to Joseph’s door. I would get the man killed. Henri leaned forward, elbows on knees, rubbing his forehead with one hand. I could smell his jacket all over me.

“I am sorry,” I told him again. “The man in the ballroom is … He is known as Charles Arceneaux, he is a … a favorite of the emperor. He thinks I have something he wants. If I do not produce this thing by tomorrow night, then he says another man will die. I cannot let this man die, but I also cannot produce this thing that he wants. I must speak with Joseph and I have no time to wait until a more proper hour.”