“Thank you. That was well done,” he said. “I’ll get to the point. Have you been under the city?”
“Under, monsieur? Do you mean the catacombs?”
“Yes, but specifically, the ossuary, not the miles of abandoned mine tunnels.” At least, Malcolm certainly hoped he wouldn’t have to explore miles of catacombs to figure out what was going on underneath Paris.
Visibly, she shuddered. “No. Some people like that sort of amusement, but I have no wish to see a million bones. Besides, they closed it to the public last year.”
“Last year, naturally,” he agreed. “It’s difficult to police a city if people are wandering around under it, and the new king didn’t want any lingering Bonapartists hiding down there. But I thought all Parisians went down for a lark at one time or another.” And she seemed like the adventurous sort who would’ve done exactly that.
However, she shrugged and said nothing more.
“In any case, simply because it is closed, mademoiselle, that doesn’t mean it’s not being used. With all visitors being prevented from entering, what better place to hide people who are your political enemies?”
She frowned, obviously considering. “Why not imprison people in the regular jail?”
Serena looked adorable, and he wanted to reach out and smooth the furrows on her brow. He resisted. She might take offense and snap at his hand like one of the stray dogs he’d seen around the city’s street.
After all, she’d still been angry with him when last they’d parted.
“Napoleon said he isn’t going after his political enemies, isn’t that correct?” he asked.
“So he told me,” she said.
“No one in power, especially with as precarious a hold as the emperor currently has, allows his enemies to mill about undeterred,” Malcolm pointed out. “He may not do anything about them publicly, but that leaves him two options. Take them outside of Paris and kill them, or hide them below the city, and maybe kill them down there, I suppose.”
She scrunched up her mouth in disgust. “I dislike the way you speak of killing as if it is nothing.”
“No, mademoiselle, I don’t think it is nothing. I value human life and wish we hadn’t experienced two decades of war already. It has gained all of us, British and French, very little. I’m simply being realistic. I’ve lost contact with a friend whom I fear has been taken down into the catacombs, hopefully to be detained and nothing more. But that is bad enough, don’t you think?”
She nodded.
Should he ask her?There was something capable and calm about this woman, at least on the exterior. If the situations she found herself in frightened her, such as the incident with Christoff, she didn’t show it.
“You helped me so well at the Tuileries Palace. I wonder if you would help me again.”
“Do I have to go underground? It is supposedly sixty-five feet down, and the limestone mining tunnels spread out for miles.”
It seemed he had stumbled upon a small crack in her tough exterior.
“The section that used to be open to the public, with a marked trail, is only a mile, I believe,” he said.
“Only?” she repeated. “It would feel to me like being buried alive.”
Malcolm hoped it wouldn’t come to that. He didn’t relish poking around down there either, but he had to. She, however, did not.
“No, you don’t have to go below,” he promised. “Remember when I said I wouldn’t have played the part of a baker at the palace if a friend hadn’t disappeared?”
“Yes, I remember. And this friend may be in the catacombs?” she asked.
He appreciated her astute grasp. “I believe so. I wouldn’t ask you to do anything dangerous. Nothing more than chat with the guard who stands by the entrance gate. You could ask him questions and distract him while I slip through the gate and search.”
“I suppose I could,” she said, sounding less than enthusiastic.
“I have no right to ask you, but I could certainly use a diversion such as you can provide.”
To his surprise, she barely hesitated.
“Very well. I’ll do it.”
