2.
Downstairs, a small party was in progress.
"There is a very special method to this, ladies," Marguerite instructed. "You take the chocolate between thumb and forefinger, like so, and you twist the wrist back and forth, ever so slightly. Now, repeat after me: shake your bon-bon, shake your bon-bon, shake your bon-bon, shake your bon-b...."
Marguerite spied Sir Andrew out of the corner of her eye. "Excuse me, ladies," she said, and tiptoed over. "So, Andrew," she said with a smile, "you have news about my husband?"
"Madame, you assume that just because I chose to call on you at home, you immediately assume I'm here about your husband. There could have been a thousand other things I wanted to say."
Marguerite waited.
Andrew sighed. "It's about your husband."
Sir Percy had returned from France, and was on his way back home. Marguerite's fan club was on their way out. "Did you hear that?" Marguerite whispered to Sir Andrew as she bid her fan club goodbye. "It sounded like footsteps...from Percy's rooms. Noone should be there at this time of day."
"Wait here," Andrew instructed. "I'll go see if there's any danger."
Marguerite promptly crept up the stairs after him.
When they reached the study, the door was wide open. Andrew slipped in first, and after a moment, said, "There's nobody here -- but it appears some of the papers on his desk may have been moved."
"Anything in this room could be damning..."
"He didn't have time to find anything," said the woman's voice frolm the portrait. Then it cleared its throat. "I suppose I can stop using this ridiculous falsetto now," the voice said in a much manlier tone.
"Percy," Marguerite said, "thank goodness."
"Madame," the voice said politely, "I'm afraid I'm not your husband."
"Step out from behind that picture then," Andrew said. "We have you cornered." Marguerite moved to protest. Good god, Andrew, what if he was armed? But the voice merely said:
"I come in peace, sir. I suggest you don't shoot me. It would be a shame, the upholstery in here is lovely, and bullets don't quite take to me. I would step out from behind this painting, but for fear my appearance would alarm Madame."
Well, then, Marguerite said to herself, I'll be prepared for horns and a tail. "Don't worry," she said lightly, "I won't scream, or cry, or faint. I promise."
"I've seen it happen," the voice replied. "But if you promise..." Andrew gripped her arm, silently encouraging her to be brave.
Marguerite uttered a slight gasp; she couldn't help herself. The gentleman was dressed as an Elizabethan, complete with a ruff around his neck. But that was not the most remarkable thing about him. His entire body was a translucent white color; the few stray beams of sunlight coming through the window shone through him.
"Your appearance," Marguerite said, slightly awed, "is most remarkable."
"Sir Nicholas de Mimsy Porpington, at your service." He bent to kiss her hand, but he brushed right through her, leaving only a slight chill. Marguerite curtsied and looked to Andrew.
Andrew was unconcious.
A moment later, Sir Percy arrived downstairs. "Percy, I'm not sure I can explain, I got your message but now Andrew's lying on the floor, the study's been broken into, and, oh yes, there's a pearly white see-through man who sounds like you but isn't."
"Delighted to see you too, m'dear," he said on his way upstairs. "Up, nincompoop!" he said to Andrew. "What! Did they hit you over the head?"
"I suppose Nicholas rather shocked him," Marguerite replied. Porpington looked a bit embarasssed.
"Nicholas?" Sir Percy said.
"Over here. Sir Percy, I presume," Porpington said.
Sir Percy had to look twice; then, of course, introduced himself properly. "Are you yet living?" Percy asked, as politely as he could.
"I am exactly two hundred and eighty-five years dead," Sir Nicholas said proudly.
"May I call you a spectre, then?"
"Indeed," said Porpington. "Just not a 'haunt' or a 'ghoul'. And 'ghost' is pleasantly straightforward. There was a man in here, short, round fellow in a terrible wig, sawed off the doorknob -- and then your friend came in and decided to take a nap on the floor --"
"I'm fine," Andrew mumbled, opening one eye. "And you're still here," he said to Porpington. "Percy, don't trust him, he broke in --
Porpington looked absolutely flabbergasted. "Sir, I am completely incapable of holding solid objects!" To demonstrate, he lept through the couch several times, and attempted to pull Andrew's hair, but only passed his white hands through Andrew's head. "Really, I try to help and --"
Porpington hadn't noticed that his ruff had come loose. His head flopped off, attached to his neck by a small piece of ghostly skin and muscle. "Whoops!" He quickly secured it back on.
Andrew looked quite uneasy, but a plan was already forming in Sir Percy's mind. "Tell me," Percy said, "that fellow in the bad wig -- was he dressed in green, and did he have a sort of squased-up nose?"
"Yes," Porpington said, "with a little scrape on it."
"It's just as I thought," Percy said, "the Duc de Calmet. That nice old man you rescued from the guillotine, Andrew, most likely wasn't a Duc at all, but a spy who was falsely arrested as a way to secure a route across the channel. He even lodged here, and argued with the butler upon learning these rooms were forbidden. I met him a few streets away, as I was coming back -- there's no telling where he is by now."
"I was late," Percy said, "because I had met Madame Daggauseau, a recent emigre, who had known when she escaped that her sister's family had been placed under suspicion, and just recieved word that the cousin, Leon, was missing."
"I know nothing but the name of the town where the family may be hiding. Leon was one of my contacts. He renounced his aristocratic standing and appeared to support the revolution, while secretly handing out money to the Royalists and the poor."
"I'm sorry," Porpington interrupted, "but there's a note on the floor which I can't pick up, with a name on it that I can't pronounce."
Percy studied the scrap of paper with subtle amusement. "It appears our sloppy housetheif Duc," he said, "had orders from Citizen Chauvelin." Percy realized Popington didn't have the slightest idea what was going on. "I'll explain on the boat."