The man whirled and ran.
“Bloody hell,” swore Sebastian, scrambling to his feet, his bleeding arm held crimped to his chest. A whip cracked, the air filling with harsh shouts and the jingle of harness as a wide-eyed pair of grays reared suddenly in the gloom. Sebastian ducked out of the way of the horses’ slashing hooves, then swerved to dodge a lumbering dowager’s carriage.
By the time he reached the opposite footpath, the greatcoated man in the heavy scarf had disappeared.
? ? ?
“Your questions are obviously making someone uncomfortable,” said Gibson, laying a neat row of stitches along the gash in Sebastian’s arm.
Sebastian grunted. “The question is: Who?” He was seated on the table in Gibson’s surgery, stripped to his waist, a glass of brandy cradled in his good, right hand.
Gibson tied off his thread. “Any chance Monsieur Harmond Vaundreuil could have had his own physician killed?”
“You mean because he discovered someone—probably Kilmartin—was trying to bribe Pelletan?” Sebastian took a slow swallow of his brandy. “It’s certainly possible. It wouldn’t matter whether or not Pelletan actually accepted Kilmartin’s bribe, if Vaundreuil somehow came to hear of it. And there’s no doubt in my mind that Vaundreuil is afraid of something. I just don’t know what.”
“The other members of his delegation, perhaps?”
“Perhaps.” He remembered the horror Vaundreuil had shown when told the killer had removed Pelletan’s heart. He still believed that horror was real. But it was always possible the Frenchman had simply been ignorant of his own henchman’s viciousness.
Sebastian watched Gibson smear a foul-smelling salve over the wound. “What I find difficult to understand is why Vaundreuil or one of his associates would want to plant a charge of gunpowder in Golden Square in an effort to kill Damion Pelletan’s sister. But then, that could be because Madame Sauvage is being considerably less honest with us than she could be. About a lot of things.”
He was aware of Gibson stiffening. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I’ve discovered that Damion Pelletan was trying to convince Lord Peter Radcliff’s pretty young wife to run away with him. In fact, Pelletan and his sister were actually arguing about it just moments before he was murdered. Now, why do you suppose she neglected to tell us that?”
A woman’s voice sounded from the doorway behind him. “I’ve told you there is much I still don’t recall from that night.”
Sebastian turned to look at her. She wore the same old-fashioned gown from that morning, the smudges of black at her knees still visible from where she’d knelt beside the body of her dead servant woman. And it occurred to him that everything she owned had probably been lost in the explosion and fire.
He glanced at Gibson, who was preparing to wrap a bandage around the injured arm. A faint but clearly discernable flush of color rode high on the surgeon’s gaunt cheekbones. And Sebastian knew without being told that Gibson had offered the now homeless Frenchwoman a place to stay—and she had accepted.
He looked back at Madame Sauvage. “How long had you known?”
“That Damion wanted Julia to return with him to France? He only told me that night, as we were walking up Cat’s Hole to see Cécile.”
“Did he tell you why?”
“You mean that he had discovered Radcliff was beating her? Yes.”
“And it never occurred to you that a man violent enough to use his fists on his helpless young wife might also be violent enough to kill the man proposing to steal that wife away from him?”
“I told you, I only learned what Damion intended the night of the attack. I simply did not recall it.”
Sebastian let his gaze drift over the pale, fine-boned features of her face. Not only was she a habitual liar, but she wasn’t particularly good at it. How the hell Gibson couldn’t see that was beyond him. But all he said was, “Tell me about your father’s autopsy of the Dauphin in the Temple Prison.”
The sudden shift in topic seemed to confuse her. She stared at him, her eyes wide. “What?”
“Your father was one of the doctors who performed an autopsy on Marie-Thérèse’s ten-year-old brother, the Dauphin of France, after his death in prison. You were—how old? Twelve? Thirteen?”
“I was fourteen.”
“So you must recall something about it. I take it you were already interested in medicine at the time. Surely he discussed it with you.”
“He did.”
“Did he believe the dead boy he saw in the Temple was in fact the son of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette?”
She moved to stand before the room’s fireplace, her back to them, her gaze on the small blaze on the hearth. “My father saw the boy alive only once or twice, when he was called to the Temple just days before the child’s death. He never had any doubt that the boy who died in prison was that same child.”