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“That’s not possible,” Marcus replied grimly.
Josette rose to her feet and smiled at Devin. “Forgive me, monsieur, but I should be going.”
Devin stood up, hoping to detain her. “Please stay a little longer. I’m certain this will only take a moment.”
She lowered her lashes and shook her head. “I’ll try to come back later, monsieur, if I can. I need to check with my father and see if there is anything I can do to help him.”
Devin watched her go with regret. With Gaspard sick in his cabin, he’d been free of any competition for Josette’s attention. Tomorrow, she would continue on with the Marie Lisette and he would begin his journey overland across Ombria. He turned in annoyance to LeBeau.
“What is it that you wanted?”
LeBeau cleared his throat. “I’d like to apologize. I drank too much wine before dinner last night. I’m afraid it tends to make me argumentative. I fear I spoiled everyone’s meal. I’m sorry.”
Devin raised his eyebrows. “Surely your political views haven’t changed overnight?”
“Of course, they haven’t,” LeBeau assured him. “But the dinner table was not the place to discuss them.”
Devin inclined his head. “On that we agree.”
“I hope you can forgive me,” LeBeau continued. “I have the utmost respect for both your brother and your father. I regret that you may have found my remarks offensive.”
It was as though Devin could hear his father’s voice in his mind: Never decline an apology that is proffered publicly. If you do, you allow your opponent to become the injured party.
“We all speak without thinking sometimes,” he remarked lightly. “This trip is almost over. Let’s put last night’s discussion behind us.”
“Thank you,” LeBeau said with relief. “My invitation still stands. In spite of everything, I would still like to show you Treves.”
“I’m sorry but our plans are not definite,” Devin answered diplomatically. “I have no idea when we will arrive in Arcadia, so it is impossible to commit to anything.”
LeBeau retrieved an envelope from the inside pocket of his jacket. “I’ve written down my address for you with directions to my summer home, just south of the city. I’d consider it a favor if you’d take the time to stop for a visit.”
When hell freezes over, Devin thought. “Thank you,” he replied, making a production of putting the envelope in his own pocket. “If we cannot take time to visit you, at least I am certain I will see you at the Académie next year.”
LeBeau laid a hand on his arm. “I hope to see you before that.”
Devin resisted the urge to shake off the offending hand, and smiled graciously. “Good night,” he murmured.
LeBeau answered only with a bow. He turned and was gone. Bertrand St. Clair followed discreetly on his heels.
Conversation started again as quickly as it had stopped and Marcus glanced at Devin.
“That was well done,” he said under his breath.
Devin shrugged. “My father would say it is bad form to call a man a liar in public but I was truly tempted.”
The rough night made sleep nearly impossible as the ship tossed uneasily on stormy waters. Both Devin and Marcus were up and dressed before dawn. Up on the forecastle, they discovered a light coating of snow covering the deck. The rigging hung thick with ice. Every movement of the ropes or sails sent glass-like shards smashing onto the deck. Stray flurries still floated down from a leaden sky.
They sailed into a harbor made ghostly with frosted spars and shrouds of mist, docking just as the sun struggled feebly to lighten the skies. They had said their goodbyes to the other passengers last night Devin had received an invitation from Dr. Rousseau to visit his home when he reached Treves. And Gustave Christophe was anxious that he stop in Tarente to meet the boy who swept his shop.
Only Henri LeBeau and Bertrand St. Clair also planned to disembark at Pireé but they had yet to appear on deck when Devin, Gaspard, and Marcus left the ship. Devin’s first steps off the gangplank were awkward and halting. His legs had grown used to the roll of the ship, and solid ground felt surprisingly odd in comparison.
The port of Pireé seemed strange and exotic. The first thing Devin noticed were the large signboards hanging in front of every shop. Instead of words, each bore a painted or carved likeness of the merchandise that was sold inside. The bright and unsophisticated images made him feel as though he had landed in some foreign port where he didn’t speak the language.
Buildings rose three or four stories along narrow streets, the simple architecture adorned by colorful shutters which bracketed windows and doors. Central gardens showed the first leaves of peas and the bright green spikes of garlic poking through dirt still dusted with last night’s snowfall.
“Where are the hotels?” Gaspard asked, looking rumpled and sleepy.
“I would imagine they are toward the central part of the city,” Marcus said, pointing at the businesses around them. “These are only small neighborhood shops: the scissors indicate a seamstress, the cake – a bakery – the horseshoe – a blacksmith.”
“And where would I find a cup of coffee and a croissant?” Gaspard asked hopefully.
Marcus turned him to face a blue shuttered shop with a steaming cup on its sign. “There I would think.”
“Thank God,” he murmured. “Do you mind if we stop?”
Devin laughed. “You could have had breakfast on the ship, if you’d gotten up earlier.”
“You and Marcus are lucky that the storm didn’t make you seasick,” Gaspard protested. “If you’d felt the way I did last night, you wouldn’t have been anxious to get up early for breakfast either.”
“You weren’t alone,” Devin assured him. “Half the ship was sick.”
“Let’s not talk about it anymore,” Gaspard pleaded, one hand held sympathetically to his stomach.
A bell jangled when they opened the door. Four small tables filled the front of the shop. The smell of fresh brewed coffee and cinnamon wafted from behind the counter. Gaspard sighed and crumpled into a chair by the window.
“I’ll have café au lait and two of whatever smells so heavenly.”
Devin threw his knapsack on a chair. He rolled his eyes and made an exaggerated bow. “Yes, monsieur. Right away, monsieur.”
Two of the other tables were occupied and several men had turned to stare at their entrance. Their eyes took in every detail of their luggage and their clothes.
Devin smiled and said, “Good morning.” But only one man echoed his greeting, the rest merely nodded or sat silently watching as he walked to the counter.
He paid for four cinnamon buns and three cups of coffee, ferrying the food back in two trips and setting it on the table. Just before he sat down, he glanced up to see Henri LeBeau talking to Bertrand St. Clair out on the street.
“I see LeBeau has departed the ship,” Marcus commented. “And that he and St. Clair have struck up a friendship.”
“It doesn’t look friendly to me,” Devin observed, as LeBeau gestured rudely at St. Clair. LeBeau’s face was flushed and angry. St. Clair made some final retort and stalked away.
“Apparently, that man can’t get along with anyone,” Gaspard said through a mouthful of cinnamon bun. “These are wonderful, by the way.”
“LeBeau actually apologized to me last night,” Devin said, “and invited me to visit him in Treves.”
Gaspard made a disgusted sound in his throat. “I hope you told him what he could do with his invitation?”
“Devin was actually very polite,” Marcus informed him.
“Then you’re a better man than I am,” Gaspard said.
Devin looked up and grinned. “That has never been in question has it?”
Gaspard threw a piece of bun which hit Devin squarely in the chest – and bounced off – landing in his coffee cup. Coffee sprayed all over the table and the front of Devin’s jacket.
Gaspard leaned back with a satisfied smile. “How clumsy of me! Please accept my apologies.”
“Remind me never to buy you a cinnamon bun again,” Devin said. He fished in his pocket for a handkerchief and pulled out LeBeau’s envelope, as well. He laid it on the table while he mopped at the brown liquid soaking into his jacket.
Marcus tapped the envelope. “Is that LeBeau’s address?” he asked.
Devin crumpled his wet handkerchief on the table. “I assume so.”
He tore open the envelope and extracted the piece of paper inside. It took only a moment to read it and react. With it still in his hand, he stood up and rushed to the door, hoping that somehow LeBeau might still be in sight. Standing on the doorstep, he could see the street had filled with people going to and from the docks. But there was no sign of either LeBeau or St. Clair in either direction.
Marcus had followed him. “What’s the matter?” he asked in alarm, grabbing his shoulder as he came back through the doorway.
“Read it yourself,” Devin snapped, throwing the paper down in front of him on the table.
Marcus unfolded the letter and read out loud: “I know who broke into your cabin. Be careful. Your life is in danger. Please come to see me in Treves.”
“Shit,” Gaspard said, straightening up. “Is there more?’
“Just directions to his house,” Devin replied, slumping down into his chair.
“Why couldn’t he have told you this last night?” Gaspard asked.
Devin shook his head. “I don’t know. He did ask to speak to me alone.”
Marcus was watching him closely. “Was there some reason you didn’t open this until now?”
Devin sighed. “I intended to throw it away without reading it at all. But I forgot it was in my jacket pocket until I pulled it out just now. I wish I’d found it ten minutes ago.”
Had LeBeau been lingering outside to speak to him just now? And what had St. Clair said to him that had made him so angry?
Marcus folded the letter carefully and returned it to the envelope, then shoved it across the table to Devin.
“You won’t be in Treves for another two months. That gives you a long time to decide what you want to do. You can either ignore it or take LeBeau up on his invitation. Besides, there’s some possibility that you may run in to him along the way and you can ask him what he meant. I wouldn’t worry about it now.”
While the others finished their breakfast, Devin sat hunched over his coffee cup, toying with his food. He methodically dismantled his cinnamon bun but didn’t eat any of it.
Gaspard gestured with his coffee cup. “I would have eaten that if I’d known you were going to destroy it.”
“Be my guest,” Devon replied, pushing his plate in front of his friend.
Outside the sky had darkened and snow was falling heavily.
CHAPTER 8 (#ulink_246cbbbc-f757-514e-a42e-9a9eddaac56c)
The Stones of Ombria (#ulink_246cbbbc-f757-514e-a42e-9a9eddaac56c)
Devin’s itinerary called for them to leave the harbor and walk the twenty miles to Briseé to spend the night but Marcus immediately vetoed that because of the weather.
“This isn’t Viénne,” he told Devin, as they left the cafe. “These spring snowstorms can be deadly. I’m not running the chance of being caught far from shelter and having to spend the night out in the open. We’ll stay tonight in Pireé. If the weather has improved by morning, we can go on.”
“But if we stay here tonight,” Devin protested, “we’ll be behind schedule already and we’re only three days into our trip!”
“Then I would say the man who planned our itinerary was a fool not to take bad weather into account.” Marcus responded harshly. “Use your head, Devin!”
Devin had, in fact, taken bad weather into account. He just hadn’t anticipated it being a problem so early in their journey. It was later, as they made their way through the most Northern Provinces, that he had built extra time into their schedule. Apparently, Ombria was having a late spring; he’d had no way of knowing until they’d arrived here this morning. He threw his knapsack over his shoulder and followed Marcus, tight-lipped and furious. Snow blew into his face and melted down the neck of his jacket. A few steps ahead of him, Gaspard’s dark hair was already powdered with white, and snowflakes plastered Marcus’s hat and shoulders.
“This is nasty,” Gaspard said, stopping to let Devin catch up. “You don’t want to walk all day in a snowstorm. We’ll rent a room at one of the hotels and get a hot bath and a good meal. Besides, it’s a shame not to see the capital of Ombria while we’re here.”
Devin stalked straight ahead without commenting while Gaspard kept pace beside him.
“We could walk around the city this afternoon and then go to the theater tonight. The plays are all unscripted, did you know? Most of the dialogue is improvisation. The director gives the actors a specific plot and they act it out. They claim it’s never the same twice.”
Receiving no response, Gaspard stopped in front of Devin, placing a hand on each of his shoulders. “You can’t control the weather, Dev. You’ve waited two years for this trip. Lighten up and enjoy it!”
Devin shook off his hold. “It’s just that one thing after another has gone wrong. I feel as though the entire project is unraveling and there isn’t a blessed thing I can do to stop it!”
“But surely losing one day won’t make that much difference,” Gaspard insisted.
“It’s not the delay,” Devin answered. “I’m beginning to have second thoughts about the whole thing.”
Marcus turned to face them, sheltering his eyes from the snow with one hand. “Are you two coming or not? I don’t intend to stand out here and freeze, while you whine about a change in plans!”
Gaspard grimaced. “God! What’s gotten into him?”
“I don’t know,” Devin answered. “Come on. We can talk later.”
They found a large hotel that fronted onto the square. The staff was solicitous and efficient, and except for the strange pictorial signs, they could have been in Coreé. After they took their bags to their room, Devin considered canvassing the other hotels in the area to see if he could find Henri LeBeau. But the heavy snowfall kept them inside the rest of the day. When they went down to dinner, Devin glanced around the large dining room, but he saw no familiar faces.
The theater faced the hotel on the other side of the square. They walked quickly on slush-filled sidewalks, their collars turned up against the huge snowflakes which had begun to mix with rain. Ice coated the street lamps and glittered on the cobblestones and the ironwork that ornamented the front of the theater.
The play was well done and expertly costumed. Devin was fascinated by how the same oral tradition that had produced the Chronicles had also spawned this alternative form of drama. The director proved to be a local storyteller who had turned to theater production. And best of all, the evening’s play was based on one of the lesser known tales from Ombria’s Chronicle.
“There,” Marcus pointed out later as they sipped brandy in the hotel dining room before going up to bed. “You see, the day wasn’t a total waste, after all. And I can guarantee that you will sleep better here under an eiderdown quilt than in some snowy hollow along the road to Briseé.”
Devin allowed his brandy to slip slowly down his throat, enjoying the fiery sensation that drove away the chill of clammy boots and damp clothes.
“I actually wouldn’t mind seeing another production sometime,” he admitted. “I didn’t realize that the theater would be so closely tied to the Chronicle here.”
“I heard the man behind us say that some directors are actually bards,” Gaspard said. “Apparently, it’s important that the plot always remain accurate even though the actors have the flexibility to modify the individual scenes.”
The stringed quartet that had played for the evening in the hotel dining room began to pack up their instruments. Across the room, a waiter extinguished candles on the empty tables. Only one other table remained occupied, where a young couple sat talking quietly. Devin stood up.
“We’d better go and let them close for the night.”
Marcus pushed in his chair. “Remember, you need to leave the letters to be sent to your father at the Hall of Records in the morning. Is there anyone else you need to write to? I assume your fiancée knows about your trip?”
