Chapter 13

The taproom of the Blue Boar had changed little from the days when devout pilgrims made the dangerous trek through the wilds of the Welsh Marches to pray at the feet of the priory’s miraculous Virgin. Heavy beams darkened by centuries of smoke supported a low ceiling; oak wainscoting covered time-bowed walls, and patrons jostled one another on crowded benches pulled up to ancient trestle-and-board tables. The air was blue with tobacco smoke and heavy with the malty-sweet scent of ale. Men’s voices and laughter rang loud.

But at Sebastian’s entry, the room hushed and faces went slack as men turned to stare at him. The conversations started up again almost at once, but voices were noticeably quieter, more circumspect than before.

After some twenty-four hours in the village, Sebastian recognized many of the Blue Boar’s patrons—burly Constable Nash and sharp-faced Alan the Ratcatcher and some of the other men who’d volunteered for that afternoon’s search along the river. But even without Emma Chance’s sketch, Hannibal Pierce would have been easy enough to identify.

He stood alone at the counter, a tall, broad-shouldered man in polished Hessians and a well-cut coat that could only have come from the hands of a London tailor. He was half turned away, seemingly focused on his own thoughts and the drink he nursed. But Sebastian knew he was alive to every conversation and interaction, every subtle nuance in the room. It was, after all, the reason Pierce was here.

Several dozen men’s gazes followed Sebastian’s progress as he crossed the room to Pierce’s side and ordered a brandy. Pierce stiffened but said nothing. Anyone who worked for Jarvis would know who Sebastian was.

Sebastian rested his forearms on the scarred old countertop. “Tell me about Emma Chance.”

Pierce paused with his glass halfway to his lips. “What makes you think I know anything about her?”

“Your portrait is in her sketchbook.”

Pierce took a slow swallow of his drink, his lips pressing into a tight wet line as he shrugged. “I’m not surprised; she was drawing everything and everyone around here.”

“Why?”

“What do you mean, why?”

Sebastian turned his glass in his hand, the tawny liquid glowing gold in the flickering light. “I would think you’d know. After all, you do observe people for a living.”

Pierce cast a quick glance at the crowded room behind them and drained his drink. “Let’s go for a walk.”

Outside, the night was white with swirling mist, the air throbbing with the strange, almost metallic whine of mating frogs. The cool, moist air smelled of manure and warm horseflesh from the nearby stables and peat smoke from the chimneys of the surrounding cottages. An unnatural hush lay over the village, as if those not in the Blue Boar’s taproom were huddled behind closed doors, quiet and afraid.

“I take it Lady Devlin recognized me this afternoon?” said Pierce as they turned their steps toward the dark bulk of the old Norman church up the lane.

“You weren’t exactly making an effort to stay out of sight.”

Pierce twitched one shoulder. “In London—or even someplace like Ludlow—one can be discreet. Not in a village the size of Ayleswick. The Bonapartes know exactly why I’m here. So why play games and attempt to pretend otherwise?”

“I would think a servant placed within the Bonaparte household would be in a better position to watch them.”

Pierce hesitated an instant too long before answering, a delay that told Sebastian he was right—that Jarvis had at least one more agent in place, someone posing as a servant. “In some ways, yes,” said Pierce. “But servants’ movements are constrained by the requirements of their duties, are they not?”

“True.”

The vicarage loomed beside them out of the fog, its slate roof slick with moisture, its windows dark. Beyond it stretched the churchyard, the aged tombstones ghostly in the mist. Sebastian said, “So what about Emma Chance? Was she sent here from London? Or Paris?”

Pierce stared straight ahead. Neither his face nor his voice gave anything away. “She wasn’t working with us, I can tell you that. But could she have been sent by Paris? I honestly don’t know.”

“Yet surely Napoléon has someone here watching his brother.”

“Undoubtedly. I even have a few suspicions as to whom. But am I certain? No.”

“And Emma Chance? Did you suspect her?”

A slow smile curled the other man’s lips. “I suspect everyone.”

“Tell me about her.”

“What’s there to tell? She was a pretty little thing. Claimed she was here to sketch, although she was asking a lot of questions.”

“About the Bonapartes?”

Pierce gave a low laugh. “I wouldn’t know. She didn’t ask me anything.”

“Yet she drew your portrait.”

“I didn’t know that.” Pierce drew up abruptly and turned to face him. “Why are you doing this? Why interfere? The villagers were content to believe she killed herself. So why stir them up?”

Sebastian felt a breeze kick up, swirling the damp mist against his cheeks. “Because she didn’t kill herself.”

“So? What the hell is she to you?”

“Nothing. And everything.” Sebastian studied the other man’s big-boned face, the hard light in his eyes. Sebastian knew the kind of men Jarvis employed. He had no doubt that Hannibal Pierce was more than capable of holding down a young woman for five minutes and watching her die a slow, agonizing death. “Did you kill her?”

Pierce stared back at him, his nostrils flaring with the violence of his breathing.

In the tense silence, the shifting of the branches of the ancient yews in the churchyard sounded unnaturally loud. Sebastian could hear a trickle of unseen moisture and the rustle of some night creature—

And the metallic snick of a flintlock’s hammer being carefully thumbed back.