had been an early supporter of the Revolutionary movement—before it turned violent and cruel and began devouring its own.
He said, “That’s when you fled France?”
“As soon as I was able, yes.”
Her voice quavered ever so faintly, and she turned her head, showing him only her flawless profile as she studied the flow of elegant carriages in the street, the endless parade of gentlemen on the strut. He found himself wondering about the life she’d once lived—and lost—in Paris, about the horrors she must have witnessed before she finally escaped it all and fled to Venice, and about all the lonely years she’d lived since then, bereft, with her memories.
They sat in silence for a moment, watching as a plumpcheeked dandy with exaggerated shirt points and a painfully nipped-in waist approached the adjoining door that led to the apartments above and disappeared inside. A moment later, the shuffle of his footsteps on the stairs could be faintly heard above the murmurs in the coffee shop.
Sebastian said, “These ‘dangerous men’ you say Ross associated with ... Do you know who they were?”
“No.”
“Then how do you know they were dangerous?”
Again, that faintly amused curving of the lips. “In my experience, men who turn up the collars of their coats and pull their hats low enough to hide their faces are generally to be avoided.”
“Did such men visit Ross often?”
“Often enough.”
“And the night he died?”
“You mean, last Saturday?”
“Yes.”
“What makes you think I would remember such a thing now, a week later?”
“Because on Sunday morning, when you heard Ross had died, you were suspicious. I think you gave some thought as to what you might have observed the night before.”
She raised her cup to her lips and took a sip. “You are very astute, are you not?”
Sebastian said, “Who visited Alexander Ross that night?”
She set her cup down with careful attention. “Well ... Let’s see. First there was a young woman. Or at least, I assume she was young, although it is difficult to be certain since she wore a cloak and had the hood pulled up.”
“A well-dressed young woman?”
“Her cloak was plain, but well cut. I couldn’t see more than that, since she also wore a veil. She was no woman of the streets, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Did Ross entertain women of the street?”
“Not in his rooms. I’ve no notion how he conducted himself elsewhere.”
“How long did this woman stay?”
“Twenty minutes? Perhaps half an hour. No more. She left very quickly.”
“She came by carriage?”
Madame Champagne shook her head. “Hackney, of course.”
Sebastian nodded. St. James’s Street was the gentlemen’s preserve. For a gentlewoman simply to walk down St. James’s Street was considered a social solecism. But for a woman of quality to be seen entering a gentleman’s lodgings, alone, would mean swift and certain ruin. No wonder the woman—whoever she was—had taken care to hide her face. “And then?”
“An hour or two after the woman’s departure, a gentleman in evening clothes went up.”
“And he arrived—how?”
“Walking. But there’s no use asking me anything more about him because I really couldn’t tell you. He wore a hat pulled low and an opera cape with the collar turned up, and he took care to keep his head down.”
Sebastian smiled. “One of Ross’s ‘dangerous men’?”
“Exactly.”
“He stayed how long?”
“Longer than the woman. An hour. Perhaps longer. I’d say it was close to nine or ten when he left.”
“There’s nothing you can tell me about him?”
“Not really. He was neither remarkably tall nor short, corpulent nor excessively thin. His clothes were very much those of a gentleman—silk stockings and knee breeches. Oh—and he carried a walking stick.”
Sebastian himself possessed an elegant ebony walking stick. The silver handle was artfully contrived to conceal a stiletto. He said, “Mr. Ross himself never stepped out that evening?”
“If he did, I didn’t see him.”
“Is there another way out?”
“There is a door to the court, but it doesn’t lead anywhere.” Madame Champagne sipped her coffee for a moment, then said, “Ross had one more visitor that night.”
“Oh?”
She nodded. “Shortly before I retired for the evening, another gentleman went up. But he came back down almost immediately.”
“You mean, as if he had found Mr. Ross not at home?”
“Yes. Or as if Mr. Ross were already dead.”
“Much the same as the first. Evening cape and knee breeches.”
“Could they have been the same man?”
She frowned, as if considering this. Then she shook her head. “I do not believe so. They moved differently. Or at least, it must have seemed so to me at the time, for it never occurred to me that they might be the same man.”
Sebastian said, “Had you seen these men visit Mr. Ross before?”
“Them, or men like them.”
“But you’ve no idea who they might be?”
She started to say something, then hesitated.
“What?” he prompted.
She leaned forward. “Men may hide their faces but forget that their accents can tell their own story ... to those who know how to listen.”
“What kind of accents are we talking about?”
“Mainly Russian. But also Swedish and Turkish. And the occasional Frenchman, of course.” She kept her gaze on his face. “You’re wondering how I could know, yes?”
He gave a wry smile. “I doubt I would be able to identify a Swedish or a Russian accent. Or distinguish a Turk from, say, a Greek.”
“My father was an official at Versailles when I was a child. I grew up surrounded by accents from all over Europe—and beyond. It was a game my brother and I played, imitating them.”
Sebastian watched her nostrils flare on a quickly indrawn breath and he knew without being told that her brother, like her husband, was dead. He said, “You knew none of these men?”
“I recognized one of the Russians—a colonel attached to the embassy, by the name of Colonel Dimitri Chernishav. I understand he and Ross were friends from Ross’s time in Russia.”
The name meant nothing to Sebastian. “Anyone else?”
She made a face. “Well, there’s Antoine de La Rocque.”
“Who is he?”
“Once, he was a priest. He fled France in the first wave, more than twenty years ago now. He has something
