“TheGreen Fairycomes in small doses,” he explained as if she’d never heard of absinthe, which, of course, she hadn’t. He did admire her bravado, though. “Under no circumstances drink it down in one go. It must be sipped very slowly. In fact, it would be best if you only pretend to drink.”
“I left my leading strings behind in London,” she snapped.
“Then you must know”—He paused, considering the best way to phrase his next words—“it produces a state of euphoria.”
“A state of euphoria?” Her head tilted to the side. She was intrigued.Blast. “Have you tried it?”
He nodded once, his eyes darting away from her too intrigued gaze. “And the feeling it produces the next day—”
“One of crapulence?” she interrupted. “After last night, I know something about that feeling.”
“It’s the very opposite of euphoric. Best to stay away. Agreed?”
~ ~ ~
Oh, how he willed her to agree.
“Perhaps,” she replied. That was all the satisfaction she would give him. She inhaled a steadying breath and backed out of the alcove, unable to tamp down an unruly smile.
The front door swung wide, and long, protective fingers curled around her hand. Giddy pinpricks of excitement wended their way across her skin from that small point of contact as he swept her inside the café and guided them past a cluster of haphazardly strewn tables. They ventured to the back of the café side by side, a genuine couple to the crowd around them.
“This café,” he said in a muted voice meant for her ears only, “is populated by indulged and moneyed sons looking to show off their educations and theirlorettes.”
Without another word, they found two open seats at a long table that ran the length of the back wall. Mariana took the corner seat Nick offered and attempted to follow any one of several heated conversations swirling through air dense with cigar smoke and a certain humidity specific to enclosed spaces brimming with animated people.
“This is quite a public place,” she observed.
“Cafés are where individuals of like-minded, usually extreme, political persuasions congregate.”
Mariana’s voice emerged in a secretive hush, “These people are revolutionaries?”
“At one extreme.”
“Villefranche said the French like to live at extremes.”
“He’s not entirely wrong.”
Of a sudden, everyone in the café became suspect. “Won’t the wrong people know you’re alive?”
“They don’t really think I’m dead. The note you received in London was a ruse, I’m convinced.” Although, he hadn’t worked out why. “I’m simply unreachable for the time being.”
Mariana nodded and allowed her gaze to roam the room. She gave up on understanding what was being shouted around her. The French spoken was too informal and too fast. She leaned in close to Nick. “Translate his conversation for me.” She jutted her chin toward a young man with the wildest, reddest head of hair she’d ever seen, surpassed only by his complementing wild, red moustache.
“He is speculating whether the king’s new throne is solid gold or gold plated.”
“Does it matter?”
“To the French? Absolutely.”
Next, she indicated a fervent young man to Nick’s right.
“He is declaiming the merits of oil paints over watercolors. Watercolors speak of an artist’s lack of fortitude, substance, and gravity. They are an insubstantial and moral void.”
A half-smile lurked about Nick’s lips and responsively, nay,instinctively, she matched it. “Good to know,” she responded, but his attention had strayed away from her.
She tamped down a flicker of pique. Her rational mind understood that it was part of their act tonight. Still, it irritated her that Nick played his role so convincingly well.
Left alone to her thoughts, she settled back and soaked in the atmosphere. She couldn’t help feeling a little let down. She’d thought pressing matters of importance were discussed in the cafésof Paris. And, perhaps, they were. But not with her, a mere woman. Judging by the arrangement of the table, it was glaringly obvious that a woman was to be seen and not heard. The men sat flush up to the table—the better to hear one another and insert an opinion when necessary—while the women sat positioned slightly behind their men.
