Someone slid into the room behind Grey and took up a station at the side of the room, leaning negligently against the wall. He was thin and young, black-haired, wearing the clothing of a London dandy. She did not know him until she saw his eyes. Then she knew. It would be years before the rest of him caught up with the age of those eyes. He smiled at her, rueful and a little pitying. Adrian.
Doyle also would be somewhere in this house. She had the most formidable enemies ranged against her. There was no role she could play, no fabrication she could create, that would fool these hard-eyed, patient men. She was the mouse in a houseful of cats. Not a chance for her.
Galba tapped lightly on the desk to draw her attention. “Mademoiselle, I want you to believe we wish you well. I will do you no hurt whatsoever, not under any circumstances. You’re understandably frightened. We will give you time to get used to the situation.”
It would begin now, the questioning. They would be courteous for a while.
“It is not so new to me, this situation.” Her voice did not break, thank the good God. “I have been before in the hands of men who want things from me, Monsieur Galba. I do not fool myself. It will hurt eventually.”
Behind her, she heard Grey mutter, “For God’s sake.”
Galba opened a book on the side of his desk, flipped past a few pages, then closed it with a snap. “I cannot believe your mother let you grow up thinking the British Service tortures people in this house. It is inconceivable to me.”
“I do not think my mother said anything at all about the British Service. She did not work against you directly, ever. Nor have I.”
“Has anyone, anywhere, ever made such an accusation against my service?” There was anger underneath Galba’s voice.
The methods of interrogation of the British Service had become a matter of some urgency at this moment. She prodded and prodded at her brain until it could work a little. The Military Intelligence of the British had a bad reputation. But Galba’s people…? In the field there were deaths and violence—these were not the games of children they played, after all—but nothing in her vast store of memory spoke of torture.
“I have not heard of it,” she admitted.
“Then don’t prate foolishness at me. Even terrified, your mother’s daughter should have more sense.” Then, immediately, he shook his head and made a wiping-away gesture across the desk. “I retract that. You’re exhausted and shocked, and you’ve been dealing with barbarians like Leblanc. It undermines your judgment. And in one way you are correct. I intend that you will cooperate with me in the end.”
Her skin was cold everywhere except where Grey touched. She wondered if she might possibly faint.
“Have you fed her at all today?” Galba was looking at Grey. He continued without waiting for an answer. “I’m stupid to ask. Of course you have, knowing what awaited her.” He made the same impatient gesture. “But you haven’t let her wash or given her decent clothing. Take her away and let her compose herself. She can’t think when she’s in this state, and I can’t concentrate, seeing her like this.” Beneath bushy white eyebrows, piercing blue eyes studied her. “Mademoiselle Villiers, we will not talk seriously until you have recovered your equanimity. Not until tonight, or perhaps tomorrow. You will need time for lengthy reflection.”
She sat, numb and unmoving, till Grey took her under the arm and levered her out of the chair.
“One thing more…” Galba had become grave. He moved the inkwell upon his desk a finger’s breadth to the left and stared at it, his lips compressed and twisted at the corner, as if the inkwell had blighted many hopes. “We heard of your mother’s death, but not how it happened. Will you tell me?”
Pain rang within her like a bell, cold and sharp. After weeks, the hurt was not less, thinking of Maman’s death. “Her carriage fell from the cliffs. Into the sea. And she was lost.” Maman, who had dared so much and escaped so many evil chances, had died because some stone rolled from the crest of a hill. A pointless death. It was an irony of the gods. “Near Marseilles.”
“You are sure she is dead? Beyond doubt?”
She nodded.
“I’m very sorry,” Galba said quietly. “Go now. We will talk later.”
Grey led her away. Her exit was followed by Adrian’s wry gaze, but Galba sat looking down at the book in his hands, his face set and utterly still.
It was Robert who walked beside her down the hall and opened the door to the stairwell that led to the basement. It was Robert, looking as he always did, who smiled reassuringly at her, as if all were correct and excellent with the world. But it was Grey’s grip on her the whole way.
Twenty-three
IF ONE WISHES TO DO SECRET AND UNPLEASANT things to people, Annique thought, cellars are the logical place. It was not altogether surprising Grey should take her to one. It was not damp or sinister, being one of those basements half in, half above, the ground. The corridor was carpeted, the walls papered in a delicate pattern of blue flowers. All was deceptively ordinary. But the arched windows, high in the wall, were barred with iron grills that sank deep into the brick.
No escape. How thorough they are. She and the knowledge she carried were wholly at the disposal of the British Service. Doors, closed and threatening, waited on either side of the hall. He would take her behind one of them.
“They aren’t torture chambers.” Grey was annoyed. “Left side is workshops. Storage rooms on the other side. That one’s full of papers. Not an oubliette in the house. I’m not Leblanc.”
“You are more subtle than he is. Infinitely, evilly more subtle.” She wrapped her arms around her to control the shaking. He opened the last door on the right and went in before her. She did not know what would happen next, but she could not imagine Grey hurting her. Or Robert. Whichever one he was.
“You are not real.” She stood in the empty hallway. There was nowhere to run, after all. “I have been tearing my heart to pieces for a mountebank scarecrow. A puppet. I am the girl in the story who falls in love with a clockwork figure in the tower. I have thought myself very clever from time to time, but I am more stupid than dirt.”
Grey came back to the door. He had Robert’s face, but he was not Robert. “I’m not made of clockwork.”
“You. You do not exist at all. You are a nothing, Monsieur Grey. You are a shadow and a cloth flapping in the wind.”
“I am Robert Greyson Montclaire Fordham. Everything I told you is the truth—my parents, my brothers, the house in Somerset, the trout pond, the pony I taught to do tricks. I was Robert Fordham for twenty-six years before Grey ever existed.”
“You lied to me. You are nothing but lies to your back teeth.”
His grin showed exactly those teeth at her. “Then we’re well matched. Are you still afraid?”
“Of course I am afraid. I would be an imbecile not to be afraid.”
“You’re already over it. I won’t hurt a hair on your head and you know it. Come.” He took her hand and pulled her with him into the room which was, amazingly, a bath. It was shining clean and luxurious and surprised her considerably more than a dungeon would have.
“This is a bath,” she said stupidly.
“So it is. I hope you find that endlessly reassuring.”
“I do not want to be reassured. I want to escape.”
He laughed. He had betrayed her and decoyed her into this house and captured her and now he laughed at her. He was most definitely coldhearted as a clockwork.
She was confronted by a small, paneled room. The two arched windows were barred with iron latticework. She couldn’t see out of the milky glass, but, from the angle of the sun, she could tell the room faced south. A red rug from Turkey slanted across the black and white tile. A fire was just starting in the brick fireplace set in the wall. Beside the fire, a cheval glass reflected everything.