“Good heavens!” Frederick exclaimed. “Do you think someone should run out and tell him Dublin is in the opposite direction before the poor chap goes too far?”
Jane sighed, and Alice recognized on her face the Married/Long-Suffering expression, albeit without any Adoration. “Luncheon is being served, should you—”
Staggering back, she only just saved herself from being trampled byEssie, Lysander, and Bess as they rushed to the dining room. She hurried after them, muttering about having barely any spoons left for stealing. Frederick scampered behind.
“Wait for me, sweetest nectar of my vine!”
Alice and Daniel found themselves alone in the entrance hall. They inhaled—
“Tsk.”A voice echoed through the wide marble space. The breath went out of them wearily.
Charlotte marched down the stairs. “Where did he go?” she demanded.
Alice and Daniel pointed out the front door and she strode toward it, bootheels sparking, voice muttering as she went. “ ‘Hide in the secret rooms and passageways,’he said.‘Steal the weapon, easily done,’he said. Did he mention dust and cobwebs? No!” (A flower vase trembled on a sideboard.) “Did he mention not being able to get a decent cup of tea?” (The vase rose three feet in the air.) “Just as well the man is lovable, or else—”
Crash. Carnations scattered all over the floor.
“Will you leave now, Miss Pettifer,” Daniel asked her sternly, “since the pirates know you are here?”
“Of course!” Charlotte answered so readily, even Alice could tell she was lying. “Oh, and a word of advice,” she added as she passed them. “Married pirates tend not to cling to each other quite so much.”
Glancing down, the agents realized they were holding hands, and hastily snatched them apart. With a laugh so dry it made the Sahara seem like a beach, Charlotte departed. They watched her go, then turned to each other.
“These people are enough to try the patience of an oyster,” Alice said grimly.
“They’re all mad here,” Daniel agreed, making her smile. He lifted his hand as if he would touch the rare curve of her mouth, but loweredit again without doing so. “We should retrace Jane’s steps to see if we can find where she left the weapon,” he said.
“We should join the company for luncheon,” Alice said at the same time.
Their mutual gaze grew heavy.
“We should...” Alice murmured.
“We should,” Daniel agreed vaguely.
They swayed toward each other.
Boom!
Smoke billowed out from the dining room. “Ahoy!” someone shouted.
The agents sighed and went to do their duty.
17
non compos piraticus—a shakespearean conversation— the ladies debate gaming tactics— explosions—troubling news— daniel and alice cannot be moved—plot twist!
There are few hours in life more terrifying than the hour dedicated to the ceremony known as afternoon tea, when partaken in piratic company. After two cups of Earl Grey, a slice of coconut cake, and “amusing conversation” with the matrons of the Wisteria Society, Alice feared she had become insane, without any intervals of sanity, horrible or otherwise. Not only was she unable to focus on the book in her hands, but she felt actually tempted to slouch on the sofa upon which she sat! Only her corset, and the much-ruffled posterior of her yellow and purple afternoon dress, saved her from such a derangement of good manners.
And only the imperatives of the mission saved her from removing said dress and stuffing as much of it as possible down Frederick Bassingthwaite’s throat so he would stop reciting Keats’s “Ode to a Nightingale” in a voice that turned the exquisite poem into something alike to Wordsworth’s “Ode to Duty.”
Once, a few years ago, she had infiltrated a gang of lady smugglerswho were terrorizing the law-abiding gentlemen of the west coast with their guns, their secret basements full of explosives, and the interesting sway of their hips as they strolled Cornwall’s cliffs. After her cover was blown, Alice had hidden behind a barrel of stolen rum while the gang drank masala chai (for what self-respecting smuggler drinks ordinary English tea?) and discussed exactly what they would do to her when they caught her. (After hearing their decidedly inventive plans, Alice had never been able to look at a Cornish pasty the same way again.) That was an interesting tea party, to say the least.
The one today had been worse.
Alice would never have believed it possible for a teapot to endure the uses to which Mrs. Ogden put it, had she not seen it with her own eyes.
And she’d always thought a lady did not expose her ankles in mixed company, let alone her knees, thighs, and knickers, by performing a handstand on a table cluttered with cups and plates, such as Eureka Selassie (hernom de pirata: Eek!) had done.
