"Shh," Gabrielle said, putting a finger on her lips, smiling at him in the darkness.
"What the hell do you mean, jumping out on me like that?" Nathaniel demanded in an outraged whisper. "I expected you in the crypt at dusk."
"It took me a while to arrange everything," she whispered, seemingly unperturbed by his anger. "I have a laissez passer for you." Her crooked smile gleamed white in the gloom. "With it, you can go anywhere in the city… stay at an inn, travel wherever you wish."
She reached into the pocket of her cloak and pulled out the precious document. "See. It's in the name of Gilbert Delors, a servant in the household of Monsieur le Prince de Talleyrand, who's instructed to journey to his master's estates in Perigord and is to be allowed to pass without let or hindrance."
"How on earth did you get hold of this?" He stared at the paper.
"I stole it," she said. "You see, it's signed by Talleyrand's steward." She pointed to the signature. "The real Gilbert Delors has been turning the house upside down looking for it all day. When he came out of the steward's office, I had a most urgent errand for him to run, an armful of parcels that needed to be taken immediately to my chamber. He put the paper on the table when I filled his arms with packages… et voila."
Nathaniel turned the document over in his hands. It was Jake's passport to safety. He could leave Paris, travel anywhere in the country without question. He could arrange passage on a regular paquet at Calais rather than wait in danger for the eventual return of the fishing boat.
Gabrielle certainly didn't do things by halves, he thought. He had a sudden absurd urge to laugh, to fling his arms around her and dance a jig as relief coursed through his veins, and he felt his muscles relax as he stepped back from the brink of the precipice for the first time since they'd reached Paris.
"Let's go and find some supper," he said. "And a decent bed."
"Ah, well, I have that all planned too," Gabrielle said with a mysterious smile. "There are certain establishments where a man can take a woman, no questions asked." She let her cloak fall open, and Nathaniel's eyes glazed.
Gabrielle was wearing a gown of crimson velvet edged with tawdry lace. The decolletage was so low, it barely covered her nipples, and the skirt was caught up to reveal a petticoat hiked well above her ankles, ankles that were clad in what looked to his astonished gaze to be cotton stockings. On her feet she wore a pair of down-at-heel black shoes with paste buckles.
"Sweet Jesus," he whispered. "What game are you playing?"
"A brigand's game," she said with a roguish gleam in her eye. She too seemed infected with an almost manic edge of delight. "Who's to question a servant and his whore in Pigalle?"
Nathaniel shook his head as if trying to clear the cobwebs from his brain. "Jake… T
"He'll be quite safe with us. He's too young to understand anything about the place, and it'll be a lot safer and more comfortable than hiding from secret police in crypts."
"And what do you know of such places?" Nathaniel demanded.
"Well, if you must know, I had a lover," Gabrielle said nonchalantly. "We used to have our assignations there. Come on, we'll find a carriage at Notre Dame."
"What? Come back here!" Nathaniel grabbed her arm as she was about to prance off down the street.
Gabrielle grinned at him. "You're not going to be a prude, are you?" Wisping river mist from the Seine clung to the dark red hair tumbling loose over her shoulders, and the charcoal eyes were alight with the challenge and mischief that he hadn't seen for an eternity, it seemed.
Jake suddenly tugged at his father's hand. He didn't understand what Gabby and Papa were talking about, but the chocolate had melted in his mouth and now he was cold and hungry and tired again.
"Papa." The single word was a small, undifferentiated plea that caught their attention as nothing else could have at that moment.
Nathaniel bent and picked him up. "I don't know what the hell you're up to, Gabrielle," he said. "But let's get going."
She seemed to have wings on her feet, he thought, following her exuberant progress to Notre Dame. There were several hackney carriages in the square before the cathedral. Gabrielle gestured to one with a vulgar flick of her fingers and, in accents of the streets, engaged the driver in a ribald exchange that had Nathaniel torn between laughter and total bemusement.
She jumped into the carriage, took a bewildered but compliant Jake from him, settling him on the seat beside her as his father climbed in and closed the door.
"Where in the devil's name did you learn to speak like that?" Nathaniel demanded as the carriage lurched forward.
Her eyes glinted in the darkness. "I always wanted to be an actress."
Nathaniel leaned back against the squabs, closing his eyes in defeat. "Brigand," he murmured to himself. "A veritable brigand."
Gabrielle only chuckled, cuddling Jake, who sucked his thumb, rocking with the motion of the carriage, sensing the different atmosphere surrounding him. The fear and the tension were gone; and there was no sign of the anger that often sparked between his father and Gabby. They were behaving in the wav that made him feel warm and happy, and Papa had that funny little smile that he only ever wore when he was with Gabby.
The carriage came to a halt in Pigalle. Gabrielle jumped down and informed the driver with a cheeky wave that her escort was paying and he could well afford a good pourboire.
Nathaniel handed over the fare and the required tip without demur. The square was busy and well lit, women plying their trade on every corner, potential customers idling by, examining the wares. He glanced down at Jake, who seemed indifferent to the scene, holding Gabrielle's hand, his eyes half closed with tiredness.
"This way." Gabrielle linked her arm in Nathaniel's, allowing her cloak to fall open, revealing her trollop's costume. Her tumbling hair was a startling mismatch with the crimson gown.
The garment was obviously as carefully selected as the rest of her wardrobe, Nathaniel thought with another quiver of amusement as she led them across the square and into a narrow side street where the houses had lanterns outside the doors and in the windows. Women lolled against doorjambs or sat in the windows, displaying their charms.
Gabrielle stopped outside a much more discreet establishment, where a lantern hung over a closed door and the windows were shuttered.
"What is this place?" Nathaniel demanded as Gabrielle knocked smartly.
"The madame here used to be Julien's nurse, until she changed professions. He'd kept in touch with her, and he and his army friends used this house for their assignations. Madame is very accommodating and very discreet. It's a profitable sideline for her, I imagine."
Julien was presumably the lover, Nathaniel decided as a grating slid back in the door and an eye filled the gap. But where did the Comte de Beaucaire figure in all this?
He watched, fascinated, as Gabrielle raised her hand to the grating and made a circle with her thumb and forefinger, an identifying sign of some kind.
The door was opened by a very fat woman in a gown of striped bombazine and a lace cap perched on graying hair. She greeted Gabrielle with a businesslike pleasure that indicated they were old acquaintances but not intimates, then she subjected Nathaniel to an unnervingly close inspection before swooping on Jake with cries of entrancement.
"Oh,le pauvre petit!" She enveloped the startled child against her massive bosom, all the while listening with sharp calculation to Gabrielle's request for two adjoining rooms.
She nodded and promptly named a sum that sounded extortionate to Nathaniel. Gabrielle, however, raised her skirt in the manner of her ac opted profession and extracted a wad of notes from her garter, counted out the requisite number, replaced the remainder, thanked their hostess warmly, and turned to Nathaniel with a smile.