Probably. But it certainly didn’t hurt to check. After a long nap, followed by a shower, a snack, and a Grande Toffee Nut Latte, I hastily specified to myself.
And there were also Jane, Geoff, and the marquise to follow up on. If only it weren’t a Sunday! The British Library would be closed, as would the Institute of Historical Research. Somehow, I doubted that much would appear if I plugged any of their names into the British Library database, but it was certainly worth a try. I wondered if Colin knew where the Pinchingdale family papers were kept – if there were any Pinchingdale family papers. Even if there weren’t, it would make a good pretence for calling Colin…
Or would have, if I had had his number.
With that lowering thought came another, even more distressing one. I shot up in my seat so precipitately that my forehead grazed the seat in front of me.
Forget having his number; I had never given him mine. Any of my numbers. He didn’t even have my e-mail address. Which meant that his confident ‘I’ll call you’ was worth just about as much as the currency of a small former Soviet republic.
It could have been just an oversight on his part.
It could have been. And I heard there were some shares in the Brooklyn Bridge going cheap.
I should have remembered that We should do drinks sometime is bloke-speak for Have a nice life. I couldn’t believe what an idiot I had been.
Or, rather, I could believe it; I just didn’t like it.
Whoa. I yanked my rampaging imagination to a halt before I could plunge into full-blown woman-scorned mode, like a team of spooked horses careening towards a cliff. Just because the last man I’d dated had been a cheating slime didn’t mean the whole lot of them were accomplished deceivers who would as soon lie to a girl as have a drink with her. After all, Colin had clearly been distracted by something. Whatever that something might be.
Feigning distress, whispered my inner demon (who was clearly a friend of Colin’s hobgoblins), could be a good way of getting rid of an unwanted houseguest who has begun evincing signs of a crush. But he had seemed genuinely miserable, my better self argued back. Those circles under his eyes hadn’t been makeup. And why suggest drinks if he didn’t mean it?
That latter, I was forced to concede to myself, lacked force as an argument. If I had a dime for every time one of my friends complained a guy had promised to call and didn’t…well, I could finance that research trip to Ireland. I was guilty of it myself, casually tossing off, ‘We should do coffee,’ to acquaintances at the Institute of Historical Research, well knowing that I was no more likely to follow up on it than they were to contact me.
The lack of my phone number wasn’t fatal. If he were serious about meeting up for drinks, there were half a dozen ways he could acquire my number. Well, maybe not half a dozen, but I could think of at least two. His aunt Arabella, who had foisted me off on him this weekend in the first place, or his sister, Serena, who could, in a pinch, wrest the information from Pammy. If I could think of it, so could he.
If he did manage to acquire my number, it would at least prove that he had been serious about that drink. In old fairy tales, the heroes were frequently put to some sort of test: toting the head of a dragon home to the princess; pinching the feathers off the tail of a mythical bird; defeating an ogre with a halitosis problem in hand-to-hand combat. I didn’t delude myself that I was the stuff of which heroines were made. I didn’t even have half a kingdom to offer as reward, unless half a kingdom meant half a very small rented flat in a basement in Bayswater. But if the prize was less, so was the task. Braving the dread telephone in exchange for a drink with yours truly. Compared with hacking down a thicket of thorns, acquiring a phone number seemed negligible.
I would give him until…was Wednesday too soon? If there was a real crisis, I didn’t want to rush out and buy a voodoo doll for no good reason. Thursday, I decided generously. If he hadn’t called me by Thursday, I would know that I’ll call you had simply been shorthand for not interested.
In the meantime, I had a spy to track down.
I couldn’t follow the Black Tulip and the Pink Carnation to Ireland, but I could seek them out in the manuscript room of the British Library. If that failed… Well, Mrs Selwick-Alderly had told me to keep her abreast of developments in the dissertation. It would only be polite to give her a call.
Leaning one cheek against the windowpane, I wondered who would resurface first. Colin? Or the Black Tulip?
Acknowledgments
I had hoped that a year’s passage would render me the blasé sort of second-time author who could pass by the acknowledgments page with a mere flick of a pen. Instead, I’ve accumulated yet more people to whom thanks are due.
First, to the marvellous people at Dutton, who have entered into the spirit of the Pink Carnation with a zeal that would alarm Napoleon; to my miracle-working agent, whose resourcefulness and patience are equalled only by his ability to leap tall buildings in a single bound; and to the wonderful women of Romance Writers of America (with special love to the New England Chapter), who generously received me into their ranks.
To my parents, who now own the largest collection of pink books in the Western hemisphere and who continue to welcome me home and feed me despite my technically having an apartment of my own; to my brother, Spencer, without whose timely care package of truffles and cheese, Henrietta and Miles would still be stuck in the middle of Westminster Bridge; and to my little sister, Brooke, who more than earned the dedication of this book – even if she did filch all my Julia Quinns.
To the usual suspects, aka Nancy, Abby, and Claudia, pillars of my existence; to Liz, who puzzled over plots till our coffee went cold; to Jenny, who was never too busy to listen to the Crisis of the Day (and to Jenny’s mother, whose Pink Carnation purchases rival those of my parents); to Lila, who throws the best party this side of the Atlantic; to Kimberly, who hasn’t yet learnt that ‘How is the new book going?’ is a very dangerous question to ask; to Chris and Aaron, who were each man enough to read a book with a pink cover – in public; to Weatherly and Elina, who make even medieval jurisprudence fun; and to the 2005 Cravath summers, who livened up legal practice (you know who you are – and if you don’t, you were drinking way too much at the Zoo Party).
And, last but not least, to the caffeine-creating wizards at the Broadway Market Starbucks, who not only allowed me to occupy the little table in the back for whole days at a time, but supplied me with gingerbread lattes while I did so.
Thank you all!
Historical Note
Once again, the time has come to separate fact from fiction, and make my apologies to the altar of historical accuracy. The flower-themed spies do, in fact, have their place in the historical record. Although the Scarlet Pimpernel, the Purple Gentian, and the Pink Carnation are all fictitious, there were flower-named spies romping across the Channel. La Rose was the more prominent, but one agent did go under the pseudonym Le Mouron (the Pimpernel) – and they identified themselves by means of small cards marked with a scarlet flower. Nor is the notion of a female flower figure, like the Pink Carnation, pure invention. Mlle. Nymphe Roussel de Preville confounded the revolutionary government under the code name Prime-rose. Reputed to be stunningly beautiful, like Jane, La Prime-rose was a mistress of disguise, equally comfortable gracing a drawing room or masquerading as a man. The ring of spies posing as cravat merchants dispersed by Miles early in the book also have their historical counterparts in the French agents scattered through London posing as tailors, servants, merchants, and milliners.
Back at headquarters in London, there was some shuffling of places and personnel for the purposes of the novel. During the Napoleonic Wars, espionage was largely conducted through a sub-department of the Home Office called the Alien Office. To avoid confusion, and distressing images of extraterrestrials wandering around London, I followed the fictional tradition that ascribes stealthy deeds of daring to the War Office. As a sop to the shades of those men who laboured in the Alien Off
ice, I borrowed their building and staff for the use of my fictitious War Office. Number 20 Crown Street, where Miles receives his instructions from William Wickham, had been the headquarters of the Alien Office since its inception in 1793.
As for William Wickham…I have very poor luck with spymasters, who seem to have a habit of resigning just before I need them. In 1802, Wickham left the Alien Office and sailed for Dublin in his new capacity as Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. However, Wickham is to the English secret service what Fouché was to the French. Using the Alien Office as a base, he built a network of spies – or, as Wickham himself euphemistically termed it, a ‘preventive police’ – that spanned the Continent and terrified the enemies of England. Wickham’s new title changed little; he continued to hold sway over England’s efforts at espionage, first from the Irish Office and later from the Treasury. Despite his Irish appointment, Wickham was, in fact, physically present in London in early summer of 1803, and would have been on hand to give Miles his marching orders.
My final mea culpa is for those avid students of the Regency era who will have noticed some importations from slightly later in the century. Almack’s, ‘the Marriage Mart,’ where Miles hid from matchmaking mothers behind convenient outcroppings of masonry, had been in operation since 1765. The tepid lemonade, knee breeches for the gentlemen (the Duke of Wellington was once refused admittance for committing the unpardonable gaffe of appearing in trousers), and the firm closing of the door upon any unfortunates who desired entry after the magical hour of eleven would all have been familiar to Henrietta and Miles. They would have blinked in confusion, however, at the mention of the quadrille, which was not introduced into England until 1808, although it had already attained popularity across the Channel. Likewise, Sarah, Lady Jersey, was only seventeen in 1803, and would not marry the future Earl of Jersey for another year, nor become Lady Jersey until 1805 (not to be confused with the other Lady Jersey, her mother-in-law, chiefly famed for extraconjugal cavorting with Prinny). Nonetheless, both the quadrille and Lady Jersey are such commonplaces of the period that the ballroom felt incomplete without them.
As always, for the bulk of the details relating to espionage during the Napoleonic Wars, I am deeply indebted to Elizabeth Sparrow’s minutely researched work on the subject, Secret Service: British Agents in France, 1792 – 1815. For pretty much everything else, heartfelt thanks go to Dee Hendrickson and her brilliant Regency Reference Book (aka Everything You Wanted to Know About the Regency but Were Afraid to Ask), and the ever-resourceful ladies of the Beau Monde and Writing Regency, whose encyclopaedic knowledge of the early nineteenth century saved Henrietta – and her author – from any number of shocking gaffes.
Tempted to unmask more flowery spies?
Read on for further details of the
Pink Carnation series …
To order visit our website at
www.allisonandbusby.com
or call us on
020 7580 1080
The Secret History of the Pink Carnation
BY LAUREN WILLIG
Nothing goes right for Eloise. The one day she wears her new suede boots, it rains cats and dogs. When the tube stops short, she’s always the one thrown into some stranger’s lap. Plus, she’s had more than her share of misfortune in the way of love. In fact, after she realises romantic heroes are a thing of the past, she decides it’s time for a fresh start.
Eloise is also determined to finish her dissertation on that dashing pair of spies, the Scarlet Pimpernel and the Purple Gentian. But what she discovers is something the finest historians have missed: the secret history of the Pink Carnation – the most elusive spy of all time. As she works to unmask this obscure spy, Eloise stumbles across answers to all kinds of questions. How did the Pink Carnation save England from Napoleon? What became of the Scarlet Pimpernel and the Purple Gentian? And will Eloise Kelly escape her bad luck and find a living, breathing hero of her own?
The Masque of the Black Tulip
BY LAUREN WILLIG
‘If modern manhood had let me down, at least the past boasted brighter specimens. To wit, the Scarlet Pimpernel, the Purple Gentian and the Pink Carnation, that dashing trio of spies who kept Napoleon in a froth of rage and the feminine population of England in another sort of froth entirely.’
Modern-day student Eloise Kelly has achieved a great academic coup by unmasking the elusive spy the Pink Carnation, who saved England from Napoleon. But now she has a million questions about the Carnation’s deadly nemesis, the Black Tulip. And she’s pretty sure that her handsome on-again, off-again crush Colin Selwick has the answers somewhere in his family’s archives. While searching through Lady Henrietta’s old letters and diaries from 1803, Eloise stumbles across an old codebook and discovers something more exciting than she ever imagined: Henrietta and her old friend Miles Dorrington were on the trail of the Black Tulip and had every intention of stopping him in his endeavour to kill the Pink Carnation. But what they didn’t know was that while they were trying to find the Tulip – and trying not to fall in love in the process – the Black Tulip was watching them …
The Deception of the Emerald Ring
BY LAUREN WILLIG
‘All in readiness. An unmarked carriage will be waiting for you behind the house at midnight …’
History student Eloise Kelly is in London looking for more information on the activities of the infamous 19th century spy, the Pink Carnation, while at the same time trying to keep her mind off the fact that her mobile phone is not ringing and her would-be romantic hero Colin Selwick is not calling.
Eloise is finally distracted from checking for messages every five minutes by the discovery of a brief note, sandwiched amongst the papers she’s poring over in the British Library. Signed by Lord Pinchingdale, it is all Eloise needs to delve back in time and unearth the story of Letty Alsworthy and the Pink Carnation’s espionage activities on the Emerald Isle …
The Seduction of the Crimson Rose
BY LAUREN WILLIG
Hoping to track down the true identity of the elusive French spy the Black Tulip, graduate student Eloise Kelly delves ever deeper into the archives at the British Library and the family papers of her boyfriend Colin Selwick, the modern-day descent of her Napoleonic spy subjects. As she becomes ever more entwined with Colin, her research brings her closer to uncovering the Black Tulip’s true identity.
Determined to secure another London season without assistance from her new brother-in-law, Mary Alsworthy accepts a secret assignment from Lord Vaughn on behalf of the Pink Carnation: to infiltrate the ranks of the dreaded French spy, the Black Tulip, before he and his master can stage their planned invasion of England. Every spy has a weakness, and for the Black Tulip that weakness is black-haired women – his ‘petals’ of the Tulip. A natural at the art of seduction, Mary easily catches the attention of the French spy, but Lord Vaughn never anticipates that his own heart will be caught as well. Fighting their growing attraction, impediments from their past, and, of course, the French, Mary and Vaughn find themselves lost in the shadows of a treacherous garden of lies.
The Temptation of the Night Jasmine
BY LAUREN WILLIG
After 12 years in India, Robert, Duke of Dovedale, returns to his estates in England with a mission in mind - to infiltrate the infamous Hellfire Club to unmask the man who murdered his mentor at the Battle of Assaye. Intent on revenge, Robert never anticipates that an even more difficult challenge awaits him, in the person of one Lady Charlotte Lansdowne.
Throughout her secluded youth, Robert was Lady Charlotte’s favourite knight in shining armour, the focus of all her adolescent daydreams. The intervening years have only served to render him more dashing. But, unbeknownst to Charlotte, Robert has an ulterior motive of his own for returning to England, a motive that has nothing to do with taking up the ducal mantle. As Charlotte returns to London to take up her post as Maid of Honour to Queen Charlotte, echoes from Robert’s past endanger not only their rela
tionship but the throne itself.
About the Author
A native of New York City, LAUREN WILLIG has been writing romances ever since she got her hands on her first romance novel at the age of six. Like Eloise Kelly, Lauren is the proud possessor of an unfinished Harvard History department dissertation, and spent a year poring over old documents at the British Library before abandoning the academic life for the more lucrative world of law. Once Lauren received her JD magna cum laude from Harvard Law School, she practised as a litigation associate at a large New York firm but decided that book deadlines and doc review didn’t mix and departed the law for a new adventure in full-time writerdom.
www.ThePinkCarnation.com
By the Same Author
By Lauren Willig
The Secret History of the Pink Carnation
The Masque of the Black Tulip
The Deception of the Emerald Ring
The Seduction of the Crimson Rose
The Temptation of the Night Jasmine
Copyright
Allison & Busby Limited