The Sultan's Daughter Read Free Page B

against such chance recognition as you suggest I long ago invented two mythical cousins, both of whom strongly resemble me. One is myself, the English Admiral’s son, Roger Brook; the other, on my mother’s side, is a bearded fellow named Robert MacElfic. Should any Frenchman think that he has seen me where Ishould not have been I’d vow it was one or other of these cousins they saw and mistook him for myself.’
    â€˜Lud! One must admire you for a cunning devil.’ Georgina laughed. ‘Can there then be no single man in all France who knows you for an Englishman and can give chapter and verse to prove it?’
    Roger’s face became a little grave. ‘There are two. Joseph Fouché, the terrorist who was responsible for mowing down with cannon the Liberal bourgeoisie of Lyons, is one. But when we last came into conflict he was without money or influence and on the point of quitting Paris as a result of an Order of Banishment forbidding him to reside within twenty leagues of the capital. Fortunately he is not among those terrorists who succeeded in whitewashing themselves; so from fear of the reactionaries seeking to be avenged on him he is most probably still living quietly in some remote country village.’
    â€˜Then your chances of coming face to face with him are, thank God, slender. Who is the other?’
    â€˜Monsieur de Talleyrand-Périgord. His name was struck from the list of
émigrés
in ’95, but he did not return from America until the autumn of ’96; so he had not yet arrived in Paris when I was last there. He has since been made Foreign Minister, as I learned in Italy while assisting Fauvelet de Bourrienne with General Bonaparte’s correspondence.’
    â€˜It is a certainty, then, that before you have been for long back in Paris you will run into him at some reception.’
    â€˜True, but I have little apprehension on that score.’ Roger shrugged. ‘He and I have long been firm friends. Moreover, he is greatly in my debt. It was I who saved him from the guillotine by providing him with forged papers that got him safely out of Paris. He is not the man to forget that; and, although he knows me to have been born an Englishman, it should not be difficult to persuade him that I have served France well and have for long been French at heart.’
    Georgina slowly shook her head. ‘You are the best judge of that. Yet I shall still fear that, through some accident, the fact that you are a secret agent sent from England will come to light.’
    He frowned. “Knowing so well your psychic gifts, it troubles me somewhat to hear you say so. I only pray that your foreboding may not be due to the capacity that you have oft displayed for seeing into the future. Yet I do assure you that such a risk gives me small concern compared with a far greater one that always plagues me when I set out upon my missions.’
    â€˜What greater risk could there be than of a discovery which would be almost certain to lead to your death?’
    â€˜It is that, having acquired considerable influence with Barras, the most powerful man in the Directory, I may use it wrongly. On more than one occasion I have formed my own judgment and have acted in direct opposition to what I knew to be the official British policy.
    â€˜In three separate matters upon which great issues hung I have done this, and all three times fortune has favoured me. But it is in the taking of such decisions that lies the real anxiety of my work. Each time I am faced with some crisis, in which a word from me may serve to sway the balance, I am beset with a desperate fear that I will adopt the wrong course. So far my judgment has proved right, but there can be no guarantee that it will continue so; and sooner or later, should I again take it upon myself to act contrary to Mr. Pitt’s instructions, I may find that I have committed an error that will cost our country dear.’
    â€˜I