The three of them exchanged wordless looks.
It was Henning who glanced away first. “You think Talleyrand is not the mastermind of all this but the target?” he asked with some skepticism.
“Yes, actually I do,” answered the earl slowly. “Indeed, when one looks at it from that angle, the pieces of the puzzle begin to fit together.”
“Nay, I dunna see it, laddie,” said Henning stubbornly. “The Prince is perhaps the most crafty, cunning mind in all of Europe. It’s hard to imagine him as a victim.”
“Oh come, as I pointed out earlier, you have studied history, Baz,” countered the earl. “How often have the mighty, however brilliant they be, fallen to an assassin’s blade or bullet? Only God is omniscient—assuming He exists.”
The surgeon scowled but had no retort. Instead he muttered, “Go ahead then—convince me.”
“Very well, let’s start from the beginning,” said Saybrook. “Davilenko had the misfortune to meet Arianna in the bookshop, where his regular exchange of secrets was so rudely interrupted. However, he recognized Arianna at Lord Milford’s shooting party and saw a way to salvage the situation. I suspect that the Grognard was brought in to create a diversion. Whether he killed me or simply wounded me didn’t matter—in the confusion, someone could steal into our quarters and retrieve the hidden codes.”
“And we know that someone did try to enter our rooms,” Arianna pointed out. “The man posing as a servant with the starched cravats.”
“Yes, but you say Grentham’s operatives confirmed that Davilenko hadn’t told his superiors about the book’s loss,” argued Henning. “How did he arrange for the Grognard to take a shot at you? And more to the point, why would he risk shooting at Rochemont?”
Saybrook mulled over the question for a bit. “From my experience, I know that the leader of a clandestine network keeps his identity a secret from his minions. My guess is Davilenko had a way of communicating with the network if he needed assistance, but had no idea that Rochemont was part of the group—”
Henning snorted.
Ignoring the interruption, Saybrook continued, “I’m assuming Davilenko was clever in his own way, so it wouldn’t have been too hard to think of a lie to cover the need to shoot at me.”
“Then why was the Grognard murdered?” demanded the surgeon.
“That’s the one point that puzzles me,” admitted the earl. “But wait a moment before you assume that smug smile.”
Henning thinned his lips.
“Do you deny that Kydd was recruited through the Scottish secret society? Which, by your own admission, was run by Rochemont.”
Henning gave a grudging grunt.
“You’ve also been told by your sources that the funding for these revolutionary groups came from Napoleon.”
“Aye,” admitted the surgeon. “My old friend told me that he had made several secret trips to France for the cause, and had met with the Emperor personally.”
“So we know the link between Rochemont and Napoleon to be fact, not conjecture.” Saybrook leaned back and steepled his fingers. “Which, as Arianna pointed out so sagely last night, raises the key question—what possible reason could Rochemont have for continuing his efforts to undermine England?”
“The Royalists aren’t aware of his betrayal,” suggested Henning. “Now that his former master is out of power, Rochemont offers them a way to foment trouble in Scotland, and as a weak England is always in the best interest of France, the new King agrees to fund it. Voila!” A snap of his fingers punctuated the exclamation. “The comte keeps his bread buttered on both sides and ends up looking like a hero.”
“I think that the French King is far too worried about consolidating his power at home to be funding unrest abroad,” said the earl. “No, I’d be willing to wager my entire fortune that the money is still coming from Napoleon.”
There was a moment of utter silence, save for the drip, drip, drip of the spilled coffee, before Arianna whispered, “So you think that the Emperor is planning to seize back his crown?”
“Yes,” said Saybrook. “That’s precisely what I think.”
Henning shifted uncomfortably in his chair.
“The French King is weak—the real political power in France right now is Talleyrand,” insisted the earl. “And while we’ve assumed that Talleyrand is the force behind this plot, it would mean that he’s gone back to working for Napoleon, the leader he betrayed in ’08.”
“A not unreasonable assumption, given that the Prince has switched sides more often than a lady changes her . . . hair ribbons,” said the surgeon. His voice, however, lacked conviction.
“I know, I know,” said Saybrook impatiently. “But when I analyze the plot, nothing quite fits together with Talleyrand as part of Napoleon’s inner circle. It’s only when we see him as Napoleon’s enemy that it starts to make sense. If the most able diplomat in all of Europe is a loyal servant of the new King, he presents a formidable opponent to any plan to take back the throne.”
Arianna watched tiny beads of condensation form on the spout of the abandoned kettle. “You make a convincing argument, Sandro. What do you think, Mr. Henning?”
The surgeon’s chin took on a mulish jut.
“One last point,” offered Saybrook. “The second part of the message we just decoded—‘And when the Well runs dry, the Castle will be ours and the Bee will once again rule the board’—appears to hold the key to everything, correct ?”
“Aye, I’ll grant you that,” replied Henning guardedly.
“You’ve been cajoling me to sharpen my old skills at cutting through conundrums, so how about this? The castle is, of course, a chess piece, and I think we can all agree that it symbolizes the bailiwick—or, if you will, the country—of the King and Queen. As for the Bee, it’s well known that Napoleon adopted it as his symbol when he became emperor. With that in mind, the meaning of the phrase seems obvious.”
“Hmm.” Henning made a rueful face. “I concede that the Castle and Bee reference seems to indicate that Napoleon is planning to escape from Elba and reseize the throne of France. But you still haven’t completely convinced me that Talleyrand isn’t part of the plot.” His jaw took on a pugnacious tilt. “Can you explain to me what the devil ‘Well’ means?”
The earl’s mouth quirked up. “As a matter of fact, I think I can.”
But before he could go on, Arianna suddenly straightened. “Well—Water! The serving maid mentioned that a secret guest is coming for the Carrousel. A general.”
“A general,” repeated Henning. All of a sudden, his eyes widened.
“Yes, and I ask you, who is the only general whose military genius rivals that of the former Emperor?” said Saybrook. “Who is the only man Napoleon might fear on the field of battle?”
“Wellington,” whispered Arianna.
“Wellington,” repeated the earl, a note of grim satisfaction shading his voice. “Napoleon has beaten every Allied commander he’s faced—only the Russian winter put his army in retreat. But Wellington has bested the crème de la crème of the French generals. He, too, is undefeated on the battlefield.” His fingers began to drum a martial tattoo on the tabletop. “It would be a clash of Titans. And if I were Napoleon, it would not be an opponent I would want to face.”
The surgeon’s low whistle took on a tinny tone as it echoed off the hanging pots.
It had not yet died away when Saybrook delivered his coup de grace. “At the moment, the duke is serving as our government’s ambassador in Paris. But according to a comment I overheard Castlereagh make this afternoon, he is coming to Vienna for a private meeting with Talleyrand and Metternich to discuss France and the future balance of power in Europe.”