“You gave me such a fright! First you disappeared, then when I went after you I saw all these armed men rush intothe room asking everyone to leave. I got into an argument with one of them because I refused to leave without you. Then I heard the shot and I vow, I’ve never been so frightened in my life.” She pressed her hand to her heart.
“Really. Clara, nothing happened.”
She was about to recount the whole of it, when a guard stepped up to her. “If you will allow me to guide you safely outside, miss, for we need to evacuate the premises.”
“I will follow anon,” Evie told her.
Clara nodded and left.
Turning to Schneider, Evie said, “I am furious that I missed that woman. I never miss, you see.”
“You did hit her, Lady Evangeline.” There was a note of admiration in Schneider’s voice. “She is definitely wounded.”
“Still. If I had aimed a little more to the left?—”
“I told you to stay in the room, wait for her arrival, hand her the blasted list and to do nothing more,” Hartenberg snapped. “Why is it that you are so utterly incapable of following instructions? You nearly got yourself shot. When someone points a weapon at you, you freeze. What if she had not missed her shot?”
“But she did not,” Evie said reasonably. “It is precisely that she never expected me to move in that moment that gave me the advantage. It is the surprise of the moment, which surely, as a field marshal, is a battle tactic you, of all people, ought to understand.”
“Throwing yourself headlong at your enemy who points a loaded gun at you is not a battle tactic, but folly of the first order! It is the single most reckless thing I have witnessed in twenty years of war,” he roared. “There truly are no words for this lunacy of yours. You could have died!”
“But I did not!” Evie shouted back. “I am alive and well,without a single scratch on my body. Nothing happened except that she got away. And if I am to be blamed for anything at all, it is for that.”
Schneider cleared his throat behind them. “If I may be so bold as to interrupt…”
Hartenberg finally let her go.
“We have discovered that there was a coach waiting in the back, with which she must have escaped, and there are further traces of blood. She must have been more badly injured than we thought. We have alerted all the gates to be closed. There is yet a chance to find and arrest her.”
Hartenberg gave a curt nod. “Well done, Schneider. As for Lady Evangeline, take her home and make sure she is guarded at all times.”
“I do not believe Lady Evangeline would be a target, sir,” Schneider countered.
“They are to guard her from herself.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
They foundno trace of the Baroness or her organisation, despite a thorough search of the city. It was as if she had dissolved into thin air, returning to the shadows from which she’d come. Not even the Secret Police had been able to find anything substantial regarding her whereabouts.
“It is a mystery, Your Excellency,” von Hager, the head of the Secret Police, reported to him personally about his findings, or lack thereof. “There is no paper trail regarding the woman. The Baroness does not exist. She is a phantom. There is not a single trace; in fact, everything we know about it has been nothing but rumour and hearsay. It could very well be a one-woman operation.”
Georg did not think so. “While that is possible, it is more likely that they have simply gone underground until it has blown over. We shall have to put more agents on the case.”
Von Hager shook his head. “Impossible. We have run out of agents. All our manpower is concentrated on maintaining security around the palace and the congressgrounds.” He threw up his hands. “Secret societies and forbidden organisations are springing up like mushrooms, and I consider this one to be one of them. They come and go. We have only recently uprooted the Society of the Torch. For every Jacobin society we root out, three spring up in its place.” He heaved a heavy sigh. “Yet these are only women. How much harm can they do?”
“Don’t underestimate women,” Georg snapped. “That is precisely why they will succeed in the end.”
Von Hager rose. “Still, unless we gather more evidence, I will consider this a one-woman affair. Inconvenient, yes. But no real danger as yet. If you wish, we will keep an eye on it and report should we note anything of consequence.”
Georg nodded curtly. At last, he had to do the thing that weighed most heavily on him. He had to summon Julius, who had been his friend these twenty years, to the Imperial War Council for a formal interview.
* * *
“My,”Julius murmured as he entered the interrogation room, dangling his quizzing glass from his fingers as he eyed the heavily armed soldiers who guarded the door. “I vow I am terrified. I would have you know that I was in the middle of a most agreeable nuncheon with Catherine and the children when the soldiers arrived with your, err, how shall we put it? Summons? Arrest? Are you about to pull out the thumbscrews and the rack?”
“Sit.” Georg gestured at the chair in front of the plain table. The room was bare save for a small writing table by the window, where Schneider sat with his notes.
Georg arranged his papers, waited until Julius had settled himself, and only then spoke.
