“He didn’t really say that, did he? It’s insulting. You’re not a damsel in a ballad.”
Oh, hell, Solomon thought. He shrugged. “Who knows where the old man gets his ideas?” But he’d never been able to lie to Elijah.
There was a long silence. “Oh God,” Elijah said in a changed voice. “You—you didn’t—”
“No,” Solomon said firmly. “I didn’t. I don’t think I would have. I thought about it desultorily, is all. Don’t—don’t mention it to anyone, all right? I’m not actually sure Uncle Hathaway knew—I may have extrapolated a trifle.”
“I should never have taken this damn job,” Elijah said bitterly. “They told me it was my patriotic duty, and I was so bloody proud of my French, and—”
To Solomon’s complete astonishment, he began to cry—not all-out sobbing, but a sort of sniffling trickle that was somehow worse. “Oh God, Sol,” he said again, messily. “I’m sorry, this is embarrassing, but—if you had—because of me—”
Solomon gave him a handkerchief and a crooked smile. “Now you begin to faintly imagine how I felt, sapskull.”
Elijah blew his nose loudly. “And now—with René—I feel like such a Judas—”
Solomon sighed. “Serena does, too. Sometimes when she thinks no one’s looking I catch her watching him with this unreadable expression—”
Elijah half-laughed, half-snorted. “Does she have any other kind?”
Chapter 18
They arrived two hours before the masquerade to take over the Pursleigh kitchens. There was to be a buffet table in the ballroom and a very light, very elegant supper served at half-past midnight. That was Lord Pursleigh’s plan, at any rate. Presumably, news of his arrest would persuade Lady Pursleigh to call off the proceedings. Solomon felt sorry for the diminutive blonde. She had gone on with her party in defiance of the rumors flying about London that Wellington was defeated and that the French army was already looting Brussels. An expectant pall hung over the entire city, but Jenny Pursleigh had filled her townhouse with a blaze of light and celebration.
The viscountess was young—he had gathered at the Elbourn ball that she had been at school with Serena—and very flirtatious and very charming in her costume: winged Victory. A laurel wreath nestled in her curls and tiny wings of gold foil sprouted from her shoulders. Her yellow gown had barely any sleeves and fastened at the shoulders with vaguely Roman clasps. Gold sandals peeped from beneath the hem.
He wondered what Lord Pursleigh thought of his wife’s patriotism. To drive the message home, she had amassed a small pile of papier-mâché broken Napoleonic eagles and a ripped and stained tricolor to stand in front of to receive her guests. It was all rather ridiculous and bound to be embarrassing when her husband was arrested for treason.
A sporting gentleman in his middle thirties, Lord Pursleigh was planning to dress as Richelieu in a combination of armor and red robes. Unfortunately, the possibilities for hiding a deck of cards in such an ensemble were nearly infinite, which boded ill for their plan to arrest Pursleigh quickly and quietly before the masquerade even started, so that the marquis wouldn’t be sure enough of the connection to change his methods before Brendan could be taken the following morning.
But young Ravi Bhattacharya, whom Serena had hired the day after Elijah’s return, proved to have nearly as many useful acquaintances as Serena. His particular friend Harry Spratt worked for the Pursleighs, and for the sum of five pounds had somehow contrived not only to sprain the ankle of Lord Pursleigh’s trusted valet, but also to be appointed to dress Pursleigh in his place.
As soon as young Mr. Spratt identified the location of the infamous pack of cards, he was to alert Ravi, who would come straight to Elijah, who would ask Lord Pursleigh to step into the kitchens to confer about a problem. And when Lord Pursleigh stepped into the kitchen, he would be quietly arrested where only Serena’s people could see it. She had assigned to the masquerade the staff she was most sure of, either as patriots or as personally loyal to her, and told a few of them what to expect.
That, at any rate, was the plan. In the meantime Solomon and Elijah, along with a few kitchen maids and kitchen boys and an undercook, were working in the kitchen under Sacreval’s direction. Like Sacreval and the rest of the staff, the Hathaways were wearing the livery of the Arms—unrelieved white and black except for a pocket handkerchief lavishly embroidered with the Ravenshaw coat of arms in scarlet, black, and