"Very well, if you insist," said the stranger, throwing back his cloak and drawing his own rapier.
"Milord, please!" cried Constance.
D'Artagnan frowned. "Milord?"
"Yes, you fool," said Constance. "Milord, the Duke of Buckingham! And now you'll ruin us all!"
Suddenly, it all became quite clear. For the prime minister of England to be the lover of a lowly lady's maid in Paris was laughable. If he desired a lady's maid, there would be no scarcity of them in London. But if he desired that maid's mistress…
"A thousand pardons, Milord," D'Artagnan said, lowering his sword. "I fear I've made a dreadful error. But I love her, you see, and I was jealous, and I… Please pardon me, Your Grace, and say how I may serve you."
"You are a brave young man," said Buckingham. "You offer me your services and with the same frankness, I accept them. Follow us at a distance of twenty paces to the Louvre and if you see anyone watching us, be a good fellow and slay him."
Buckingham took Constance by the arm once again, having sheathed his sword, and they hurried off toward the Louvre. D'Artagnan kept his sword out, counted out twenty of their paces, and then followed, looking all about him to see if anyone was watching. He did not see anyone. But that was only because he was not very observant.
7
Finn and Lucas followed the carriage to a house on the Rue St. Honore. It took some effort on their part, because although the carriage could not travel very fast through the crowded streets of Paris, it nevertheless proceeded at a fairly brisk pace. Twice, they almost lost it. As it pulled up in front of the elegant home on the Rue St. Honore, Finn and Lucas watched from an alley across the street, trying to regain their wind.
"I just hope this doesn't turn out to be a wild goose chase,
" Lucas said, breathing heavily. "I'll feel like an awful sap if it turns out to have been nothing more than my memory playing tricks on me."
"I don't think there's anything wrong with your memory," said Finn. "Take a look at what that old man's carrying in his hand."
As the couple got out of the carriage, the old man glanced nervously up and down the street. It was getting late, but there was still enough light for them to see the slim metallic tube that the old man was holding in his hand.
"A laser," Lucas said. "And he's not even trying to hide it. He's holding it out in plain sight."
"Sure, why not?" said Finn. "Who'd know what it was?"
"That's just the point," said Lucas. "Anyone who would know what it was would be in the wrong place at the wrong time. The way he's waving it around, it's as if he wants someone to see it. Why would anyone be so obvious with a weapon unless he wanted whoever was watching to know that he was armed? You think maybe he knows we followed him?"
"It's possible," said Finn. "But why wave a laser around to scare off some would-be 17th-century muggers? I just had a rather nasty thought, old buddy."
"You think Mongoose blew our cover already?"
"I'm open to any other explanations."
They watched the chests being carried into the house. "All right," said Lucas, "let's try and think this through. The woman's the one who rang a bell with me, but the old man's got a laser. So that means that both of them aren't what they seem to be. They could be Timekeepers, but then I've never run across any of the Timekeepers before, at least not to my knowledge. I recall that face from a mission, I'm certain of it."
"A renegade soldier?" Finn said. "Right, Darrow said the terrorists made contact with someone in the underground."
"The only person in the underground we know is Hunter," Lucas said.
"That we know," said Finn. "We could've run across someone in the underground and not known it. Or the woman could be someone we've worked with before who's joined the underground since then. Or who's joined the Timekeepers. Come on, think, where did you see her face?"
"I just can't place it," Lucas said, exasperated. "It's driving me crazy, but there's something wrong about her and I can't figure out just what it is."
"Okay, leave it for now. It'll come to you. Let's get back to Mongoose. If he didn't blow our cover, then why's the old man waving a laser around?"
"Well, he wasn't waving it at us," said Lucas. "I don't think he knows we're watching him. But he thinks someone's watching him, someone from the future. Suppose Mongoose didn't blow our cover? What other explanation can there be?"
"That he blew his cover," Finn said. "Or that one of his people got careless and the Timekeepers know that someone's onto them."
"We're going to have to have a serious talk with him," said Lucas.
"Assuming that he's still alive," said Finn. "Damn spooks. They're going to make a mess of it, I just know it. They've got agents all over the place back here and the only one we know is Mongoose. And not only don't we know how to get in touch with him, we don't even know what he really looks like, with those damn disguises. All we can do is go back to the Luxembourg and wait to see if he or one of his people gets in touch with us."