“I can.” Miss Townsend nodded. “His Paris sojourn was a few years ago. He told me, when he was awkwardly explaining that we were together for the purposes of catching the villains and nothing more, that he was loyal to a woman in London. One, he said, with beautiful eyes. When I pressed him for details, he laughed and told me you were a cook. Though that was too small a word for you, he said. You were an amazing woman who cooked like an angel, too good to be stuffed into a hot, tiny kitchen.”

“Oh.” This must have been soon after he’d met me, when I’d worked for Mrs. Pauling. That kitchen had been cramped, and Daniel had seen me for the first time in the miniscule cubby, and smiled at me.

“Did he put you up to telling me this?” I asked. “He knows I am unhappy with him.”

“Indeed, no. I saw your misgivings, and I wanted to assuage them. As I say, McAdam was officially sworn to secrecy—dire things heaped upon his head if he breaks that faith, and so forth. But I was not.”

“Poor Daniel,” I said. “I must sometimes be a trial to him.”

“I doubt that very much.” Miss Townsend had a pleasant laugh. “He feels it keenly, I think, that he must keep things from you. He hadn’t met you yet when he started working for the men he does, and I think he regrets it now.”

“Who does he work for?” I thought of the spectacled man with cold eyes. “The police, I know, but what part of the police?”

Alas, Miss Townsend shook her head. “I have no idea. He asked for my help in Paris because I am an Englishwoman, I knew the people whose soirees he needed to attend, and he found me trustworthy. Easy for me to pretend I’d married a handsome nobody, to the despair of my family and friends.”

“What did your family and friends say to that?” I asked in true curiosity. “I imagine someone told them.”

“They don’t pay much attention to what I get up to. By the time they got word, it was over, and they decided me pretending to be married was just one more madcap thing I would do. An artist is expected to be eccentric.” She spoke lightly, but I saw a flash of anger in her eyes, which she quickly hid.

“Thank you for explaining,” I said. “It was kind of you.”

“Not at all. I noticed your discomfort, and I saw that you are not the sort to pry—at least, not about something concerning your own life.”

I suppose that was true.

She’d given me much to think about. I thanked her again, and we returned to the kitchen and to our respective tasks.

*   *   *