To Kiss A Spy (22 page)

Pen glanced at the clock. It was close to seven. In half an hour she would go. It would take her fifteen minutes to reach the water steps and she wanted to leave plenty of time.

“I’m very tired, Robin,” she said, leaning her head against the chair back with a wan smile. “Can we talk in the morning?”

“This won’t take very long.” With a resolute air he came fully into the chamber and closed the door at his back.

Pen felt a surge of desperation. She had to get rid of him. “Robin, please, can’t this wait?”

“No,” he said. “You have to believe me, Pen, I don’t want to tell you this.” He pulled off his gloves and blew on his hands, cupping them over his mouth as he frowned into the fire. “But I can’t stand aside. I love you too much to keep silent.”

“This is about Owen d’Arcy, I assume.” Her voice was cold. She could think of no other way to drive him away. “I have told you before, Robin, that that is my business.”

“Where did you go with him?”

“That is also my business. If this is all you’ve come to talk about, I tell you straight I will not hear you.” Her eyes flickered again to the clock. “I don’t wish to quarrel with you but I will
not
talk of Owen with you.”

“You don’t need to talk. I’m going to talk and you must listen to me.” Robin gave her no time for a response. “The chevalier is a French agent, Pen. He’s working for the French ambassador.”

“I know that,” Pen said scornfully. “He told me so himself . . . presumably to forestall any tale-telling,” she added sardonically. She had to keep up the offensive.

Robin flushed and his discomfort was translated into aggression. “And did he tell you about his wife, also? And his children?”

Pen found it hard to breathe for a minute. “He told me he wasn’t married,” she said softly.

“He’s not . . . not now.” Robin saw that at last he had her attention. He began to pace the chamber, slapping one fist into the palm of the other hand. “I’m sorry, but you have to hear me out, Pen.”

“I’m listening,” she said, her voice flat. She stood up abruptly as if better to withstand a blow, her arms unconsciously crossed over her breast. Robin paced as he told her the tale Simon Renard had told him. He didn’t embellish, and he left out nothing.

“He declared his children to be bastards?” Pen said when he had fallen silent. It was said more to herself than in expectation of a response.

“So I understand.”

“And he hasn’t seen them since?” She shivered, and tightened her arms across her chest.

“So I understand. My informant is . . . is reliable,” he said.

“Another spy?”

“In a manner of speaking.”

“And that world is yours too,” Pen stated. She required no confirmation but this was the first time it had been openly acknowledged between them.

“I ask that you keep that knowledge to yourself,” he said.

Pen merely shook her head with a touch of impatience. Robin knew she would never betray him.

By the same token, she knew he would not lie to her. She had to believe what he’d told her. Not only would Robin never make up such a tale, but it answered so many questions, solved so much of the mystery that surrounded Owen. But was he capable of such cruelty? She had accused him of using her unhappiness for his own ends. It was true that he had. But he hadn’t pretended any other motive.

He had not wanted to talk of children, said he had no place for them in his life. He had been so distressed over the little girl in the lane. . . .

Guilt . . . remorse . . . regret. Was that what dogged him at those moments when he looked so hurt and lost? Was he helping her find
her
child because of guilt over his own?

Her eyes flicked again involuntarily to the clock. It chimed the half hour as she looked at it.
His reasons didn’t matter.

“Pen?” Robin moved towards her and she shook her head.

“No . . . Go. Go now.
Please.
”

“Pen . . . Pen . . . I’m so sorry. I hate to hurt you.”

“I know. But leave me
now
!” She held up a hand as if to push him away. “I need to be alone.”

Robin hesitated, uncertain, unwilling to leave her alone when she looked so white and desperate. He wanted to comfort her, stay with her until she was herself again.

Pen stared at the long hand of the clock creeping to the seven.
“Get out!”

Robin knew he could not stay, whatever his own needs. He turned and left without another word.

Feverishly now Pen swathed herself in her cloak, pulled on her gloves. Whatever Owen d’Arcy had done, she needed him. Until she had her child in her arms she would not see him as a man capable of disowning his own tiny children. She would not think of him as capable of such savagery towards a woman whom the world considered blameless. She would not think of him at all except as a means to an end.

Why, in God’s good grace, did Robin have to choose tonight of all nights to spill his tale?

No!
There was no room in her head for anything but what this night would bring. She drew the hood of her cloak well over her head and opened the chamber door, peering down the corridor half afraid that Robin would be mounting guard in the passage. But there was no sign of him.

She left the palace as she had done before by back corridors used mostly by servants. A light cold rain had begun to fall when she stepped outside. She glanced up at the moonless sky and wondered distantly if this weather would suit Owen’s plan. Whatever plan the spy had concocted.

She hurried along the redbricked path beneath the dripping archway of yews, her way lit by the pitch torches planted along the path that led to the river. Lights flickered from the cressets of barges drawn up at the dock, and the wherries and sculls waiting in midstream in the hopes of a passenger. The river was as busy by night as by day.

She emerged from the shadows and saw Owen immediately. He was standing at the edge of the dock, looking towards the path from the palace. He raised a hand when he saw her, an almost infinitesimal gesture of both greeting and warning—as if she needed the latter, Pen reflected.

She scanned the various groups of people on the dock awaiting transport into London, but to her relief she saw no one she knew. She retreated farther into her hood and walked casually to the edge of the dock where Owen stood.

Without waiting for her to reach him he stepped aboard a substantial barge that she saw had the luxury of cabin housing. It must be a private barge. But whose?

She stepped aboard as nonchalantly as he had. The oarsmen glanced at her, and the man at the tiller yelled an order as soon as her foot touched the deck. Men rushed to untie the barge. Pen ducked into the cabin, feeling the boat move beneath her as it swung away from the dock.

“Good, you’re early,” Owen said as Pen stepped into the cabin that was lit only by a swaying oil lamp hanging from the low ceiling. His voice was rather clipped, his expression detached, and Pen welcomed the distance. She could not have endured kisses and soft words.

She was struck immediately by something different about him. She peered up at him in the shadowy light of the flickering lamp. He was shrouded in a long, thick, black cloak edged with some unidentifiable dark fur. She realized that the jewel on the turned-back brim of his black cap was paste. And then she saw the faint scar running down the side of his face and the odd twist of his mouth; even the shape of his chin had changed.

He looked disreputable, she realized with a shock. The elegant Frenchman had been replaced by a disreputable, slightly seedy man in cheap and unremarkable clothing. And it wasn’t just the clothing, it was the way he was holding himself, everything about his posture. His shifty gaze added to the impression of a man who dabbled in unsavory business.

It was easy to imagine that this was a man who could betray women and children.

She closed off the thought as if she were plugging a leak, and looked around the small cabin that was furnished with rich hangings at the small windows and heavily cushioned benches set into the hull. It was as luxurious as one of the royal craft.

“Whose barge is this?”

“The ambassador’s,” he answered. “There are some advantages in the connections I have.”

Pen merely nodded. She was as tense as a coiled spring, her thoughts and emotions a turmoil of wretched bewilderment, agitation, determination, conviction. She wouldn’t have cared if the ambassador himself with an entire army of French spies was on board so long as they didn’t hinder her.

It was stuffily warm in the brazier-warmed cabin and she loosened her cloak. Owen suddenly smiled and for the first time looked like his familiar self. “You’re dressed for a convent, sweetheart. Not at all suitable for the role I would have you play tonight.”

“What role is that?” Her hands were now clenched, the nails biting into her palms. He mustn’t touch her. She couldn’t bear it.

He made no move to do so, however, answering simply, “A whore. Fortunately I’ve brought the costume for you.”

“And what role are you playing?” she asked, her body as taut as a bowstring.

“A pimp,” he replied as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

Pen inhaled slowly. It certainly explained his altered appearance. She’d never knowingly encountered a pimp, but this seedy, slightly menacing figure that the elegant Owen had become would surely fit the bill. It still seemed extraordinary, however.

“Are you serious?”

“Deadly so. If one is to frequent whorehouses ’tis wise to look the part.”

Pen stared at him as the implication sunk in. “My son is in a
whorehouse
?”

“If I’m right,” he responded. Quietly he told her how he’d seen Miles Bryanston emerging from the back alleys of the South Bank stews. Owen had dreaded making this revelation but saw to his surprise that Pen didn’t seem particularly shocked.

She listened in silence. Owen’s suspicions didn’t have the power to horrify her. For two years she had lived with such terrible depths of uncertainty that knowledge itself, however grim, was a relief.

“These places board unwanted children,” she said almost to herself when he’d finished. Her eyes darted to his face, watching for some reaction to such a description. There was no change on his countenance or in his eyes.

“I think, in general, they tend to be the unfortunate consequences of their mothers’ profession,” he replied aridly. “One child more or less isn’t going to cause much trouble, and I’m sure the Bryanstons are paying heavily for both the privilege and the silence.”

Pen stood clasping her elbows. “So what is your plan?”

“I am going to sell you to the highest bidder.”

She stared, uncomprehending. “What do you mean?”

“We’ll visit each establishment, and at each one I’ll be offering you for sale. I won’t like the price so we’ll move on to the next until we find what we’re looking for.”

“Children?”

“Or evidence of such. Once we’ve narrowed the field, we’ll decide how best to proceed.”

“If I find my child tonight, I’m taking him,” she declared with a fierce light in her hazel eyes.

“Will you recognize him?” Owen asked, watching her closely.

Pen shook her head. “I don’t know,” she said, and the fierce light died under a wash of despair. “How could I possibly know? I’ve never laid eyes on him.”

“Well, we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” Owen said briskly. “Now, to make our preparations.” He heaved a leather bag onto the table, which was bolted to the floor in the center of the cabin.

Pen watched as he took out a ragged gown of blue linen and a grimy petticoat. “Those are for me?” She couldn’t help wrinkling her nose at the stale smell coming from the garments.

“You need to look the part. Let me unlace you.”

Pen submitted, although her muscles tensed as she waited for his touch on her skin. His fingers were deft, accomplishing the task swiftly and without straying. Pen understood that the spy on business had no time for loverlike caresses.

She relaxed slightly but couldn’t help a shudder as she donned the petticoat and the gown. “Where have they been? They could be diseased.”

“No, I assure you they look worse than they are,” Owen responded. He laced the blue dress, which was so low cut it barely covered her nipples.

Pen stared down at the white mounds rising from the décolletage. “I didn’t know I was so well endowed,” she muttered.

“ ’Tis the gown as much as anything,” he replied.

In other circumstances Pen would have offered a humorously ironic response to this unflattering albeit true statement. But she had no laughter in her tonight.

He turned back to the bag and took out a small tin. “Come under the light.”

Pen did so. He opened the tin and took out a brush, some blackish powder, and a chalky gray paste. He turned her face up and went to work.

“What are you doing exactly?” Pen asked as his fingertips smoothed the powder under one of her eyes.

“Making you look like an abused whore,” he told her.

Pen grimaced but asked no more questions.

Finally he stepped back and examined his handiwork. “I think that’ll pass muster.”

“I wish I had a mirror.”

“You won’t like what you see, but if you must, this’ll give you some idea.” He took a small circle of beaten copper from his bag of tricks and held the swaying oil lamp steady for her.

Pen saw a complexion gray with grime and ill health. One eye had a dreadful purplish bruise that spread down her cheekbone. Her lips had the appearance of being slightly swollen. “This is horrible,” she whispered.

“It’s meant to be.” He sounded suddenly detached. “The women in these places are not there through choice. They’re in the gutter with nowhere else to go. If you went there looking fresh and untouched it would instantly arouse suspicion. You’ll have no need to say anything, just keep behind me, look afraid, cower . . . whatever strikes you as appropriate. And just follow my lead.”

Pen nodded and turned away from the dreadful image in the copper. The reality of where they were going had now become hard-edged and she was filled with dread. If her child
was
alive, how would she find him? Neglected, hurt . . .