Free India Black in the City of Light by Carol K. Carr Page A

hotel that prompted such a generous gesture. In either case I got my perfume, and that, after all, is why I came to Paris in the first place.

Keep reading for a special excerpt from Carol K. Carr’s next Madam of Espionage Mystery . . .
    INDIA BLACK AND THE GENTLEMAN THIEF
    Coming in paperback February 2014 from Berkley Prime Crime!

At that moment, I’d have given anything to have a rapier in my hand. I’d have used it to fillet French. I believe the poncy bastard knew it, too, for he was casting about the room for a means of escape.
    Now I ask you, after scattering a nest of anarchist vipers and nabbing one of Tsar Alexander’s best agents and finally settling down to a glass of champagne with a chap you’ve had your eye on for donkey’s years and that same fellow has finally discovered that indeed you are a woman and a deuced fine one at that, I ask you, is it fair that all this bliss should disappear like so much fairy dust? Damned right, it’s not fair. One moment I was admiring the dark, lithe figure of French and calculating how many glasses of champagne it would take before I could carry the bloke off to bed, and the next I was contemplating a missive from that maddening old trout, the Dowager Marchioness of Tullibardine, informing me that the object of my affection (French, in the event you had forgotten) was well informed about the murky past of yours truly.
    Dedicated readers of these memoirs will recall that ever since the marchioness had informed me that she had known my mother, screeching out this information at a train station in Perth as her carriage pulled away, I had been attempting to find out just what the wretched woman knew. Her correspondence had been evasive until this letter.
    I quote her message here, so you’ll appreciate just how much kindling the marchioness had dumped on this particular fire.
    Dear Miss Black,
    If you want to know about your mother, ask French.
    Sincerely yours,

Lady Margaret Aberkill

Dowager Marchioness of Tullibardine
    I do not think I need to emphasize just how irritated I was to find that French knew more about my family history than I did. Hence my desire for a rapier. Lacking that weapon, I brandished the marchioness’s letter at him.
    “I suggest you find a means of defending yourself, as I intend to tear you limb from limb. After you’ve told me what you know, of course.”
    I do believe the fellow actually considered for a moment whether I would make good on the threat. I could see the wheels turning as he reckoned his chances. In the end, he made the right choice. He believed me. He’s no coward, though. He drew himself up and put on his usual mask of polite indifference.
    “I assume that note is from the marchioness and that she has informed you that I can shed some light upon your past.”
    “Brilliant deduction. Now, if you and the marchioness are through playing your little game, please be so good as to explain what you know about my family and how you’ve come by the information.”
    Despite what the gospel grinders would have us believe, I am convinced that the Whiskery Old Gent Upstairs plays favorites from time to time. Clearly he took pity on French, for just as the treacherous knave opened his mouth, someone hammered on the front door with such conviction that the champagne glasses trembled on the mantle.
    I was disposed to ignore the caller at the door, for though I like custom as much as the next madam, I was preoccupied with other matters just then.
    French leapt to his feet. “I’ll answer that.”
    “Let it go,” I snarled.
    “It might be a messenger from the prime minister.”
    “I don’t care if it is. Dizzy can find some other agent to take care of his problem. We’re in the middle of a discussion and I won’t brook any interference.”
    Really, Benjamin Disraeli was becoming a bloody nuisance. You’d think that after I (with a little help from French and that odiferous street Arab Vincent) had exposed that anarchist cell