Around midnight the house fell silent. House-parties kept early hours, particularly with a hunt on the morrow. Nathaniel yawned and put aside the report from the agent at the court of Czar Alexander. The czar had appointed a new commander in chief of his army. It remained to be seen whether Bennigsen would do better than the enfeebled Kamensky when it came to engaging Napoleon's troops in Eastern Prussia. Ostensibly the czar was fulfilling his promise to support Prussia against Napoleon, but Nathaniel's agent reported the vigorous opposition of the czar's mother to a policy that could sacrifice Russia for Prussia. It remained to be seen which way the czar would jump in the end. It was hard to second-guess a man who, according to this latest report, was described by his closest associate as "a combination of weakness, uncertainty, terror, injustice, and incoherence that drives one to grief and despair."
Nathaniel swung out of bed and went to open the window. Whatever the temperature, he was unable to sleep with the window closed. Several narrow escapes had given him a constitutional dislike of enclosed spaces.
It was a bright, clear night, the air crisp, the stars sharp in the limitless black sky. He flung open the window, leaning his elbows on the sill, looking out over the expanse of smooth lawn where frost glittered under the starlight. It would be a beautiful morning for the hunt.
He climbed back into bed and blew out his candle.
He heard the rustling of the Virginia creeper almost immediately. His hand slipped beneath his pillow to his constant companion, the small silver-mounted pistol. He lay very still, every muscle held in waiting, his ears straining into the darkness. The small scratching rustling sounds continued, drawing closer to the open window. Someone was climbing the thick ancient creeper clinging to the mellow brick walls of the Jacobean manor house.
His hand closed more firmly over the pistol and he hitched himself up on one elbow, his eyes on the square of the window, waiting.
Hands competently gripped the edge of the windowsill, followed by a dark head. The nocturnal visitor swung a leg over the sill and hitched himself upright, straddling the sill.
"Since you've only just snuffed your candle, I'm sure you're still awake," Gabrielle de Beaucaire said into the dark, still room. "And I'm sure you have a pistol, so please don't shoot, it's only me."
Nathaniel was rarely taken by surprise, and when he was, he was a master at concealing it. On this occasion, however, his training deserted him.
"Only!" he exclaimed. "What the hell are you doing?"
"Guess," his visitor challenged cheerfully from her perch.
"You'll have to forgive me, but I don't find guessing games amusing," he declared in clipped accents. He sat up, his pistol still in his hand, and stared at the dark shape outlined against the moonlight. That aura of trouble surrounding Gabrielle de Beaucaire had not been a figment of his imagination.
"Perhaps I should be flattered," he said icily. "Am I to assume unbridled lust lies behind the honor of this visit, madame?" His eyes narrowed.
Disconcertingly, the woman appeared to be impervious to irony. She laughed. A warm, merry sound that Nathaniel found as incongruous in the circumstances as it was disturbingly attractive.
"Not at this point, Lord Praed; but there's no saying what the future might hold." It was a mischievous and outrageous statement that rendered him temporarily speechless.
She took something out of the pocket of her britches and held it on the palm of her hand. "I'm here to present my credentials."
She swung off the windowsill and approached the bed, a sinuous figure in her black britches and glimmering white shirt.
He leaned sideways, struck flint on tinder, and relit the bedside candle. The dark red hair glowed in the light as she extended her hand, palm upward, toward him, and he saw what she held.
It was a small scrap of black velvet cut with a ragged edge.
"Well, well." The evening's puzzles were finally solved. Lord Praed opened a drawer in the bedside table and took out a piece of tissue paper. Unfolding it, he revealed the twin of the scrap of material.
"I should have guessed," he said pensively. "Only a woman would have come up with such a fanciful idea." He took the velvet from her extended palm and fitted the ragged edge to the other piece, making a whole square. "So you're Simon's surprise. No wonder he was so secretive."
He sat back against the pillows, an expression of boredom now on the lean features. "This is a tedious waste of time, madame. I don't employ women in my business, and Simon knows it."
"How very definite you sound," Gabrielle said, seemingly unperturbed. "Women make good spies. They have different assets and techniques from men, I would imagine."
"Oh, they're tricky enough, I grant you," he declared as indifferently as before. "But they're more vulnerable… they hurt more easily."
Gabrielle shrugged. "If a woman decides to take the risk and accept the consequences, it's hardly your responsibility, Lord Praed."
"On the contrary. Each agent is part of an interlocking network… dependent upon one another. In my experience, women are not good team members. And they don't stand up well to pressure." His lips thinned. "You understand me, I'm sure."
Gabrielle nodded. "Women are more likely to talk under torture."
"Not more likely," he said with a shrug. "Just more quickly. In the end, everyone talks. But the lives of an entire cell can depend on the extra hour a man can hold out."
"I believe I have as much fortitude as most men," Gabrielle declared. And certainly as much experience in your business, Sir Spymaster-but that was a private reflection. "I can move freely between England and France," she continued. "I speak both languages without accent." She sat on the edge of his bed with an air of calm assurance that Nathaniel found supremely irritating. It seemed calculated to increase the disadvantages of his position, huddled in bed in his nightshirt like some invalid.
"You'll have to forgive me," he said sardonically, "but I don't trust women." He began to count off on his fingers. "As I said, they don't make good team members; they lack concentration; they can't focus on one task; and in general they fail to grasp the significance of information. I do not employ women."
Clearly a man of blind and stupid prejudice. It was amazing he was as successful and highly regarded as he was.
"I also know Talleyrand very well." She continued to enumerate her credentials as if she hadn't heard him. "He was a close friend of my father's and his house is always open to me. I move in political circles in Paris and have entrees at court. I even know Fouche quite well. I could be very useful to you, Lord Praed. I don't think a spymaster can afford to indulge his prejudices about women in general when faced with such advantages in a potential agent."
Nathaniel hung on to his temper by a thread. "I am not prejudiced toward women in general," he said in frigid accents. "As it happens-"
"Oh, good," she interrupted cheerfully. "I'm glad we've established that. Working together could be tricky if you really dislike women. Simon seemed to think that I could be put to good use discovering the identities of the French agents in London."
"Simon is not responsible for selecting agents, madame." Why did he have this almost desperate feeling of facing an immovable object?
"No," she agreed. "You are. But I'm sure you take advice. And Simon is a very senior minister in Lord Portland's government." She examined her fingernails with an air of great interest.
Her hands were long and narrow, he noticed, the nails short, the fingers white and slender. He pulled himself up sharply. She had just made the outrageous suggestion that he was bound to submit to the instructions of Simon Vanbrugh. Only the prime minister had the power of veto over the affairs of the secret service… and even that was open to question.