‘Well, that was interesting,’ I said. ‘They’ve a French national wandering about, Coates hadn’t been promoted and there seems to be rivalry between the two teams working for the Under Secretaries. What did you learn?’
‘That everyone was very polite, but cool, about Sir Thomas but actually appeared to like Salmond and be loyal to him. There was some speculation about Coates’s death, but the verdict seems to be that he must have had money troubles. Not that anyone had any idea what he might be spending his money on.’
‘Any hint that they knew he wasn’t attracted to women?’
Luc shook his head. ‘If they knew they are loyal enough not to mention it.’ He grimaced. ‘Difficult to do any digging without revealing that all we’re interested in is Coates.’
I told him I’d encouraged the young clerk to get in touch if he thought of anything. ‘I suggested it might help the friends and family if they understood what had made him do it,’ I explained.
‘Good idea.’ He sounded uncharacteristically downbeat.
‘I feel the need to add to the evidence boards,’ I said. ‘What with coded ledgers, French spies, office politics and unknown lovers I’m beginning to lose the plot.’
‘Too many motives.’ Luc said, rubbing his right hand over his face as though to brush distracting cobwebs away.
‘They do say that motive isn’t the best indication of guilt. You need means and opportunity first – even if someone has the strongest motive in the world, if they couldn’t have committed the crime then they’re out.’
‘I just wish James wasn’t mixed up in this,’ Luc said abruptly.
Ah. So that was what the matter was.
‘You’re worried that it is upsetting him or you are concerned that he might be exposed as a result of this and be in trouble with the law?’
‘Both. And trouble with the law means public humiliation at the very least and then...’
‘Surely he wouldn’t be arrested and tried? An Earl’s brother?’ Arrested, tried, hanged. I thought about Coates’s dangling body and shuddered.
‘I could probably get him out of the country in time,’ Luc said. ‘If they arrest anyone he is associated with who hasn’t those kind of connections, then they would be in deep trouble.’
‘Is he with someone? Someone special, I mean?’ What would that do to James, to have to flee abroad, to leave a lover to be hanged or pilloried?
‘I don’t know,’ Luc said. ‘He doesn’t confide in me about that. I suspect not. And if he is found with someone casually, then they are more likely not to be a gentleman.’ He stopped abruptly. ‘I shouldn’t be discussing this with you.’
‘Nonsense. We’re both worried about him.’
Luc met my gaze for a long moment, then nodded. ‘With the country at war it is damn difficult to get someone out of the country safely these days.’
‘America?’ I suggested. ‘West Indies?’ I thought about tropical diseases. ‘America is healthier.’ Then I looked at his face as the cab turned, allowing sunlight to spill in. ‘It won’t come to that,’ I said firmly. ‘We won’t let it.’
Luc put his arm round my shoulders and hugged me against his side. ‘No. Of course it won’t.’ I wriggled and kissed his ear, the only bit I could reach, and he turned his head and found my lips. When we surfaced again, panting slightly, he said, ‘Even so. I’ll find out more about shipping to the United States. And make sure I’ve got gold coins to hand.’
Could I take James to the twenty-first century? It hadn’t occurred to me before that anyone else might move back and forth with me because Luc certainly couldn’t even consider it, not with an earldom and children and a raft of responsibilities. But James could vanish into an era where he would be accepted for himself…
‘What are you thinking about?’
‘Just an improbable idea. It wouldn’t work.’ I imagined James living off a supply of gold guineas deposited with my local solicitors to wait out the decades… We’d probably fall foul of some money-laundering regulations, knowing my luck with banks.
We set up the evidence boards again and Garrick joined us once he’d brought in what he described as, ‘A light luncheon, my lord.’ For ten, possibly, but it was well into the afternoon now, so I wasn’t complaining. James, who seemed to have an infallible nose for food, wandered in before we could begin either eating or thinking. He looked strained, I thought, but as he had clearly decided to be upbeat and positive I didn’t make the mistake of showing that I’d noticed.
I added sheets headed Home Office and listed everyone whose name we had learned under two headi
ngs, one for each Under Secretary. I gave Gaston de Saint Clément, Comte de Hautmont – and I’d believe that title when I saw some more proof – a sheet of his own.
‘Who the blazes is that?’ James stood and peered at the name, cold mutton chop in one hand, pint tankard in the other.
‘A smooth Frenchman whom I trust as far as I could throw him. Possibly less. I don’t believe his title for a start. I think he’s a spy. What does the Home Office want with a translator anyway?’
Garrick went out and came back carrying a thick book. ‘The Almanach de Gotha.’ He dumped it in a space between the chicken and the cold tongue and began to search. ‘There is a Comte de Hautmont, but Pierre-Philippe, not Gaston. How old is your count, Miss Lawrence?’