Page 17 of Who Will Remember (Sebastian St. Cyr Mystery #20)
C harles, Lord Jarvis, was seated at the elegant French desk in his private chambers at Carlton House, writing a letter to Wellington, when he heard an exclamation of alarm from his clerk in the anteroom, followed by the sound of a chair being pushed back as the useless man scrambled to his feet.
“But you can’t—” bleated the clerk. “His lordship left strict instruction he was not to be disturbed!”
Jarvis laid aside his pen and folded his hands together atop his letter as his son-in-law strode into the room, Jarvis’s clerk at his heels.
“Leave us,” Jarvis told the clerk. To Devlin he said, “I take it this isn’t what one might term a friendly familial visit.”
The Viscount came at him, bracing his hands against the far side of the desk and leaning into them. And so intense was the flare of menace in the younger man’s eyes that it took all of Jarvis’s self-control to remain calmly seated. Then Devlin uttered a smothered oath and pushed away to go stand at the windows overlooking Pall Mall. “I just had an interesting conversation with the Bourbons’ new assassin in London,” he said, swinging around again to face Jarvis. “Is this one working for you, too?”
Jarvis drew an enameled snuffbox from his coat pocket and casually flipped it open. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Oh, you know,” said the Viscount, his unnatural, wolflike eyes narrowed down to lethal yellow slits. “I can handle the bastard following me. And if it comes to it, hopefully I can also handle him trying to kill me. But I’ll be damned if I’ll put up with him lurking outside my house like he was last night. Tell him to stay the hell away from my family or I’ll kill him. It’s as simple as that. Give my regards to Lady Jarvis.”
He was halfway across the room, headed toward the door, when Jarvis said, “Do you know where Maréchal McClellan is?”
Devlin paused, his expression unreadable. “What difference is it to you?”
Jarvis raised a delicate pinch of snuff to one nostril and sniffed. “He’s a dangerous man.”
Devlin’s head jerked in denial. “Dangerous to whom? The war is over. The French are our allies now, remember? McClellan took an oath of allegiance to the Bourbons after Napoléon’s first abdication and he stayed faithful to that oath throughout the Hundred Days. Why the hell are the Bourbons trying to kill him?”
“His ideas are dangerous.”
A gleam of understanding showed in those nasty eyes. “By which I take it you mean he’s less than enthusiastic about the Bourbons’ determination to yank France back to the days of eighteenth-century royal absolutism? Interesting.”
“You didn’t know?”
“No. I’ve never met him. But the truth is, men like McClellan should be the least of your worries. This restoration is not going to end well, and if you weren’t so blinded by your own bloody prejudices and smug assumptions, you’d know it.”
Jarvis felt an icy flare of rare, pure rage. He prided himself on being a man who indulged in few vanities. But his one overriding conceit was his unshakable confidence in the superiority of his intellect and the acuity of his analysis and understanding.
Devlin was at the door when Jarvis stopped him again by saying, “I hear you’re looking into the murder of Lord Preston Farnsworth. I wonder, are you familiar with a man named Plimsoll? Lancelot Plimsoll.”
Devlin looked back at him. “He’s a natural scientist. What could he possibly have to do with Farnsworth’s death?”
Jarvis reached for his pen and allowed himself the faintest hint of a smile. “I think you might be surprised.”