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I snorted my contempt. “I rejoice to hear that protecting the Countess is now become your aim.”

“It is the dearest consideration of my heart,” she rejoined stonily, and took up again the doorknob.

I drew my needle swiftly through my canvas. “It was on her behalf, then, that you visited Lord Harold at Wilborough House but a few days ago?”

Her fingers dropped from the doorknob as though suddenly made nerveless. “I did no such thing. What use have I for such a man?”

“I wondered at it myself. You have always professed yourself his enemy. And so when my sister Eliza remarked upon your having met with him—she is, as you know, an intimate of the Duchess's—I could not satisfy my curiosity. But as you say you did not visit, she must have been mistaken. I dare say it was the card of some other Madame Delahoussaye she saw.”

Madame did not honour me with a reply, but drew a shuddering breath, and for an instant I thought she might cross to where I sat and seize my throat in her two hands. But her self-mastery was admirable; she merely nodded frigidly, and swept from the room.

I liked her too little to care for her good opinion; I wished only to frighten her into some exposure, and was very well pleased with the effect of my questions.

I HAD NOT HAD A MOMENT'S REST ALL DAY—had not even sought my room to change before dinner, the interval between Mr. Cranley's departure and the bell having been too short. So I mounted the steps now in Madame Delahoussaye's wake with a sense of crushing weariness, fearful of the morrow and my own place in it—and found that, to my glad joy, a letter from my brother Frank awaited my eager eyes.

8 January 1803

Ramsgate

My dearest Jane—

Your letter arrived by this morning's post, and I was made so happy by its receipt, I little cared that it proved brief and barely legible upon first reading. When I divined, however, that your sole concern was the nature of deep-water ports in the colonies—no word of your gaieties or writing, and not a question spared as to the health and happiness of your brother—I felt certain you must be taken ill. I had nearly resolved to apply for leave, and hasten to London and your deathbed, when I read the letter again. Whatever the cause of your request, it has a certain urgency that will not be denied; and so I shall leave off raillery and offer a straight reply.

You believe that Lord Harold Trowbridge wishes to purchase the port for some nefarious purpose, and that the woman in whose power it remains desires only to discharge the estate's debt, without questioning the reason for his interest in its acquisition. That Trowbridge has journeyed to France is of singular interest, for it has come to my knowledge—and this must remain our secret, Jane—that a naval engagement may shortly arise in the very waters of which you write, should Buonaparte's forces sail from Martinique, and our own fleet from ports in the Barbadoes. If Trowbridge is aware of this, as well—and with his access to the higher circles, it is entirely possible—he may be plotting some effort on behalf of His Majesty's government, in which event the woman's port should prove essential. More than this, I cannot say; but you know, dear Jane, that the truce between Buonaparte and our King was nothing more than a pause to draw breath. The blow shall come, and on several fronts, I fear; the Corsican would test our Navy's right to rule the seas, and we must not fail.

Write to me again when you have something else in your head besides military strategy; but know that you have, as always, the love of your dearest brother—

Frank

9 January 1803, cont.

˜

I HAVE A MIND AMAZED AT ITS OWN DISCOMPOSURE—FOR I know, now, why Lord Scargirave had to be killed—why Isobel and Fitzroy must be sacrificed; and it is so that high treason might be done. It is impossible that Lord Harold should act on behalf of His Majesty; he is too much of a charlatan, too readily the property of the highest bidder. No, Trowbridge must be in the employ of Buonaparte himself, and means to betray