Who Speaks for the Damned (Sebastian St. Cyr #15) - C. S. Harris Page 0,81
in a high-backed chair by the cold hearth. “What the devil is the meaning of this?” demanded Jarvis, closing the door behind him with a snap.
Devlin had been reading a book—one of Jarvis’s own books, he realized, recognizing the distinctive burgundy leather binding that characterized the volumes of his extensive private library. But at Jarvis’s entrance, the Viscount set the book aside and rose to his feet.
“You didn’t tell me LaRivière was passing false information to revolutionary Paris for you. I assume he continued to do so well into the Napoleonic era?”
Jarvis walked to the table that held a selection of carafes and poured himself a glass of burgundy. “I’d offer you some,” he said without looking up, “but I know you well enough to assume you’d have helped yourself if you’d been thirsty.”
“I’m not thirsty. Thank you.”
Jarvis carefully replaced the carafe’s stopper and turned, glass in hand. “It’s a peculiar fantasy you nourish, this idea that I should impart all sorts of privileged information to you simply because you have taken it upon yourself to right all the perceived wrongs of the world.”
“Not all of them. Mainly murders.”
Jarvis gave a noncommittal grunt and took a sip of his brandy.
Devlin said, “Was the information he was feeding to Paris false before or only after the death of his wife?”
“Only afterward. Before the lovely Chantal’s demise, the information he was sending was quite genuine—although not, fortunately, of a particularly sensitive nature.”
“So you didn’t know of his activities until after Hamish McHenry had his little conversation with Lord Grenville? How . . . remiss of you.”
Jarvis’s eyes narrowed. He took another drink.
Devlin said, “Did LaRivière kill Crispin Hayes?”
“I honestly don’t know.”
“Nor do you care?”
“Of course not. Why would I? The man was a fool.”
“I’m surprised you allowed Hamish McHenry to live.”
“He can thank Lord Grenville and the Foreign Secretary’s friendship with his father for that. I assumed the wretch would die soon enough in India, but he seems to have the devil’s own luck.” Jarvis sipped his brandy. “So, are you here for a reason or simply to blow off steam over what you imagine to be my reticence?”
The younger man’s nostrils flared. “Did you have Nicholas Hayes killed?”
“Why would I?”
“To keep him from killing you. And to keep LaRivière’s secret, obviously.”
Jarvis huffed a soft laugh. “Do you realize how long ago that was? Virtually every Frenchman of title or property has switched sides and danced a duet with either the revolutionary government or Napoléon at some point in the last twenty years. The Bourbons understand these things.”
“And yet you warned me away from inquiring too closely into LaRivière’s affairs just a few days ago. Why was that? I wonder.”
“Surely it’s not such a puzzle that I have no desire to see the French King’s representative accused of murder in the midst of the Regent’s grand fete.”
“So you have reason to think LaRivière did kill Nicholas Hayes?”
“I see it as a vague possibility—presumably for the same reasons as you.”
“Because he feared Hayes’s revenge? Or because LaRivière has reason to fear the Bourbons might not be so understanding after all?”
“He may fear it. That’s not to say such fears are reasonable. But then, fears often are not.”
Devlin’s jaw hardened. “Eighteen years ago, you allowed an innocent young man to be convicted and transported to hell for a murder you knew he didn’t commit.”
“I don’t know what happened to Chantal de LaRivière eighteen years ago, any more than you do. Nicholas Hayes went to Dover Street that night with murder in his heart. But whether or not he actually killed that woman pales to insignificance when seen in the larger context of affairs of state. In case you’ve forgotten, we were at war—in the first years of what would be a long, brutal, bloody war we were by no means guaranteed to win. The benefits to be derived from turning someone like LaRivière to our purposes far outweighed the paltry considerations of whatever injustice some hotheaded young man may have suffered.”
“Paltry considerations.”
“That’s right.”
Something blazed in his son-in-law’s eyes, something so hot and dangerous that Jarvis instinctively took a step back.
“You and your ilk sicken me,” said Devlin.
Then he turned and left.
For a moment Jarvis stayed where he was. Thoughtfully, he drained his glass and, setting it aside, walked over to lift the book Devlin had been reading and left open on the table beside the chair.
It was a selection of Montaigne’s essays, and Jarvis found his gaze caught by a familiar line. A straight