LITMIR.BIZ

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that made his lips tighten.

      “She’s probably Bonaparte’s latest flirt. Poor Josephine, no wonder she’s wearing a sad look of late. They say he forces her to keep his mistresses about her….”

      What a transformation she had undergone! From gypsy pickpocket to drenched cabin boy, and now, in the space of the few weeks that had elapsed since she had run away without a word of explanation, Bonaparte’s mistress. Was she really the lovely Edmée’s niece?

      Mr. Livingston, United States Ambassador to France, cast a quizzical glance at the scowling face of his fellow American, who lowered himself into his seat without a word. Captain Dominic Challenger was something of a mystery, and in spite of his preoccupation with other affairs, the American minister could not help but wonder, as he had done before, how many of the stories about this particular man were true. Less than a hundred years ago, he would have been labeled a pirate and would probably have been hanged for his crimes. Today he was a privateer—when it suited his inclinations, and when he needed the money. Livingston had heard the tale of how Captain Challenger had sailed into the port of Charleston in a captured English ship—renamed and flying the American flag. He’d stirred up a lot of old scandals since then, besides creating new ones of his own. Was it really true, for instance, that he had arrived uninvited at Monticello when Mr. Jefferson was entertaining certain prominent gentlemen from the state of Tennessee, to ascertain, he’d said quite bluntly, whether one of them happened to be his real father?

      Challenger wasn’t his real name of course. His legal father had been an Englishman, a Tory whose estates had been confiscated after the Revolutionary War. But whoever or whatever he was, Captain Challenger had the advantage of friends and unofficial backers in high places. Hard faced and closemouthed, he had the look and manner of a born adventurer—not the kind of man that Robert Livingston would normally have cultivated, but in this case—

      Livingston sighed to himself, recalling the subtle and not so subtle diplomatic negotiations that were taking place at that very time. They involved the question of the possible purchase from France of the port of New Orleans since it had been confirmed that Spain had indeed ceded the whole territory of Louisiana back to France. After the scandal of the X-Y-Z Affair and the ensuing strained relations between France and the United States of America, it seemed as if at last Bonaparte seemed willing to negotiate. Thank goodness the sole responsibility would no longer be his for he’d learned that the president was sending one of his most trusted advisors, Mr. Monroe, to help finalize matters.

      Dominic Challenger had delivered certain secret dispatches from President Jefferson himself, along with others from Mr. Pinckney in Spain. Obviously, the president trusted him, and he also had contacts in the territory of Louisiana itself, not to mention New Spain, which made him knowledgeable enough to help in the negotiations that were going on. It was for this reason that Captain Challenger stayed on in France.

      He’d managed to find himself certain sweet forms of consolation, however. The American minister let his hooded eyes wander from the stage to the first consul’s box, where the vivacious Countess Landrey sat leaning forward slightly, her full lips curved in an enigmatic smile. Was she the reason for the angry scowl that still darkened his companion’s features?

      The drama that was being enacted on the brightly lighted stage went unremarked by far too many people although at its end there would be the usual storm of enthusiastic applause.

      Marisa, trying to curb her disturbing thoughts, kept her eyes fixed on Philip Sinclair, willing him to look in her direction. She did not notice, as her aunt and godmother belatedly did, that Napoleon, who had returned to them in an angry mood, had begun to glance at her far too often, a thoughtful look on his face.

      Philip Sinclair, for his part, made a conscious attempt to keep his eyes from straying towards a certain other box and its occupants. He realized that he still held his shoulders far too rigidly, but he could do nothing about it. The shock he had received upon recognizing a certain tall figure had made him go white, and even Lady Marlowe had remarked on it. Still stunned, almost disbelieving his own eyes, he had said more than he should, to be bombarded with eager questions from the old gossip.

      God! He should have had more control over himself. But the sight of the last man in the world he had expected or wanted to see again, and here, of all places, had almost numbed his mind. Dominic—who should have been dead, or rotting away in a Spanish prison in Santo Domingo. Did his uncle know he was still alive, and not only that but on apparently good terms with the American ambassador in Paris as well? What was he up to? And—although he told himself grimly that he must not let the thought frighten him—had Dominic seem him? It was all he could do to remain seated, pretending that nothing was wrong and that his whole future and prospects hadn’t begun to crumble around him. A few more years—with his uncle’s legal heir presumed dead, he would have inherited everything. Damn those lazy, lethargic Spaniards anyhow! They had been paid enough, through obscure, secret sources, to make sure he died, working alongside their black slaves under the broiling Caribbean sun. And then, a few years later, when the proof was delivered—what had gone wrong?

      Philip waited impatiently for the performance to be over; he wished he could have been seated in a less conspicuous place. He must see Whitworth, the British minister, and ask him to deliver a message to his father, who would know what to do. Thank God Whitworth was an old family friend! And he must see Marisa. Why hadn’t she mentioned she was coming to Paris? He had not seen her until the intermission and then, soon after, he’d received his second shock of the evening when Dominic had followed Talleyrand into Napoleon Bonaparte’s box. ‘Perhaps Marisa will be able to tell me what he’s doing here, and what name he is using,’ Philip thought feverishly. God, but she looked lovely tonight! If things had been different, he would have thought of nothing else.

      Joseph Fouché, duke of Otranto, had also been watching but for different reasons. It was his duty to watch all that was going on, and make his own deductions—helped, in part, by the efforts of his agents. Tonight had proved exceptionally interesting, and a chilling smile curled his thin lips as in his mind he began painstakingly to fit tiny pieces together that would eventually form a whole picture. All visitors to France during these tense times came under the surveillance of his men, and especially since there were more rumors of royalist plots in the offing.

      Loyal to no one but the first consul himself, he trusted no one, not even Napoleon’s own wife and her friends—especially those out of the past. Now he allowed his eyes to rest again on the young girl in the golden gown who sat just behind her aunt. Such a strange reappearance, that! Her mother had been executed as an enemy of the Republic, and the girl had fled France as a child, only to return unexpectedly and mysteriously as a young woman. But how had she got here? With whom—and why? He had burned to question her from the beginning and had been put off; but now, at last, he had been given his instructions. Napoleon, his master, was inexplicably interested in the chit, and like any one of his prospective mistresses, her background was open to investigation.

      He would enjoy questioning her, Fouché thought slyly. Was she really as innocent as she seemed or merely a pawn in someone else’s game? He would find out.

      12

      Unaware of all the intrigue swirling around her, Marisa tried to force some semblance of gaiety into her manner when at last they left the theater to drive to the magnificent hotel of the Russian ambassador. Far from being ended, the evening was only just beginning!

      Josephine was silent, suffering from one of the migraines that made her husband so impatient with her of late, and Hortense was her usual quiet self. But the Countess Landrey seemed exhilarated as she teased her niece softly, “You seem very quiet, all of a sudden, my love. Surely one night in Paris cannot have left you bored? That dull performance at the theater tonight was only a prelude—I’ve heard that the Russians are lavish entertainers!”

      Edmée’s high-strung mood drove Marisa to ask herself whether perhaps her aunt was expecting to meet her latest lover again here. Marisa drew in her breath sharply, in order to dispel the angry thoughts that flooded her mind. No, she couldn’t tell her aunt, not yet. And having seen her and learned of her true

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