“Oh, I will go. Believe me, I have no desire to stay longer than I need. But you will know this.” Viv stood. “Vaillancourt had me followed from the time I arrived on French soil near Rouen. He wanted to learn why you were in France. Fortunately for me, he questioned if the woman he saw was Charmaine…or someone almost exactly like her. When my own desire to learn what happened to Diane brought me to Monsieur Vaillancourt’s salon, he told me himself of the payment he demanded you give him for taking our sister from us.”
“He lies!”
“No, Charmaine. He has no reason to do that. He believes he paid you well for your services as his spy in London. Indeed, he gloats over his success. He counts the information you sent him about British men in politics as worth every penny he gave you.”
“How did he find out who you were? Did you tell him?” Charmaine was screeching.
“Oh, never fear. He was going to arrest me, but as we talked about your…career in espionage, he realized who I was. Your twin, but not. Your duplicate, but not.”
“You were supposed to go to Paris, pretend to be me, and kill the maid and him!”
“Yes. I failed. Poor fool you that you thought I had that in me. Poor fool me that I went with such sorrow in my heart for what happened to Diane that I sought revenge. And then I realized I could not. It was not in me. What I did do was my own bidding. I learned what happened to Diane, and why and how.”
“She died!” Charmaine said with such venom that Viv recoiled.
“She did.” Viv swallowed hard on the information she would now impart. “Vaillancourt had his gendarmes take her to Carmes. She lived there for years. I know not precisely how long, but she was still there when a few of my acquaintances were also imprisoned. They tell the tale of a young woman who aided the abused, the sick, the dying. A lady who fought the guards for good food and water and decent treatment. The men marked her as one who harassed them, and they punished her for it, brutally, often. Then came one other young woman into the prison whom they intended to starve. Diane gave the girl her own porridge. For that, she was taken away and never seen again.”
Viv wove, unsteady on her feet, yet drained of her anger at Charmaine. She was void of her despair at Diane’s loss. She could accept, finally, that her sister was gone, that she had lived true to herself, and now it was Viv’s purpose in life to give back to others love and support, just as Diane had done.
“You blamed yourself,” Charmaine had the audacity to say. “You were a child, yet you always talked about how you should have run to help catch her. Like Cantrell. Like your dog. I laughed at your foolishness.”
If Viv had not already come to terms with Diane’s loss, she would have slapped her sister.
“You have such a sense of honor,” Charmaine spat. “What does that get you, little bastard?”
“A life filled with the joy of love.” Viv turned and strode to the door.
“Wait!”
Viv paused but did not turn to face her.
“Wait. I—I need food. That maid you pay. And money.”
Viv opened the door wide to let in the sun—and to admire the view of the dashing man she loved standing in front of his carriage.
“You—you will return, won’t you?” Charmaine cried. No thanks, no apology—only her own self-interest graced her lips.
“Never,” was Viv’s last word.
*
Tate helped herinto their carriage, then sat beside her. Louis had decided after Viv went into the cottage that wherever Tate and she went in that coach, he would go too. That was fine with Tate.
She sat silent, still and very pale. He took her into his arms and spoke near her ear. He’d predicated she would be undone by her confrontation with her sister. She had not told him the details of her encounters with Countess Nugent or René Vaillancourt. Viv’s long hours of contemplation of those visits were fair notice that he could wait until eternity for her to reveal the details. If perchance she did not, that too was her choice. He would accept it.
In the meantime, he could do a few things to alleviate any further suffering she had.
They were well on their way back to London when he removed her hat and said, “I am burning this thing tomorrow. I hate it.”
She rolled her eyes at him and gave him an actress’s outraged look. “My perfect little chapeau? How dreadful!”
“Truly.” He rolled his own eyes. “Black and yellow. Who wears those colors?”
“Canaries.”
“Yes, well.” He opened a window and threw the thing to the wind. “Not you.”
“Now I am not properly dressed.” She tsked.
