"The bullet went through. And I have to finish writing this list of informers before I forget."

"Before you die?"

"That, too." He seemed remarkably unconcerned with that prospect, or with her discovery of his true identity. Probably he figured she was going to find out eventually. Probably he figured she'd do what she always did and take it with a proper British stiff upper lip. Probably he figured she wouldn't kill him.

Not yet, anyway.

Opening her bag, she found her towels, her tweezers, her small container of sulfur water drawn from a spring in France. She soaked a linen strip, laid it on his wound, and smiled as he flinched and said, "By God, woman. That hurts!"

Served. Him. Right.

"And it stinks," he added, but he wasn't really paying attention.

"The sulfur will help stop an infection." She took the strip away and examined the wound. "You're going to need all the help you can get. The bullet blasted the costume and the shreds have adhered to the muscle."

With a sigh, he put down the pen and looked at her, really looked at her, for the first time since she'd walked through the door. "Emma, this is important."

If he told her he loved her, she was going to say she didn't care.

"That paper contains the list of informants, either willing or unwilling, to Prince Sandre. You must promise me you'll make sure Rubio gets this list to Raul Lawrence."

Hadn't she already realized she was a fool? And now she knew she was a hopeful fool, clinging to the expectation that he was going to declare his devotion to her. She wanted to slap herself.

No, she wanted to slap him.

"Emma, will you promise?"

"Of course. I've given my all to the cause. I'm hardly likely to fail you now."

His voice deepened, and he crooned, "Emma . . ."

Oh, now he realized she was upset. And he was turning, if possible, even whiter.

She didn't care. That bastard. If he dies, I'll kill him. "Lie down on the bed."

"I dream of you saying that to me, but under different circumstances."

Did he imagine he could charm her now?

He stood up. He swayed.

She leaped forward and wrapped her arm around him.

He leaned against her heavily, then straightened.

The stupid, bullheaded, strutting, pulling-the-wool-over-her-eyes rotten bastard.

"What did you say?" he asked.

She was a vicar's daughter. She hadn't really thought any of that. She certainly hadn't said it out loud. "I said, lie down."

"I thought so." How dared he sound amused here? Now.

She helped him to the neatly turned-down and waiting bed.

Earlier tonight. Earlier tonight he had kissed her beneath her skirt; then, not half an hour later, he had conversed with her in the ballroom, pretending that none of that had happened, that he hadn't been in her bedroom the night before and every night before that. And the night before that, and the night before that, and that he hadn't convinced her to seduce him into making love to her, and hadn't made her stay awake nights worrying about him.

She was so angry. She was shaking with rage. It sure wasn't worry that he would die of this measly little wound that had blasted out a chunk of muscle, leaving his arm limp and him with an infection she could see coming a mile away.

"How did you pull this off?"

"Tonight or . . . ?"

"All of this. Your costume, your horse, the freedom to ride at night when you're supposed to be locked away or under supervision?"

"Rubio is a miracle with clothing and costumes. When I went into the dungeon, my Moricadian friends saved Old Nelson for me."

"Old Nelson is . . ."

"My horse. There's a stable in the cave below the dowager house." His voice grew weaker, the rasp more distinct.

"So you have all the ingredients to be the Reaper except freedom, and-let me guess. Fanchere's guards are Moricadian, and none-too-vigilant when it comes to caging the Reaper." She wasn't really guessing. Brimley had warned her there was more to the Moricadians than met the eye, and allowing Michael to roam the roads was neatly undermining the de Guignards' fortune and prestige. Of course the servants wanted him to ride. "Fanchere is Moricadian. Is he also a party to this deception?"

"Perhaps." But Michael nodded thoughtfully. "We've never spoken of it, and if he is, it's more of a blind eye than active assistance."

Emma inclined her head.

"Don't be angry with me," Michael whispered. "I know what you think I've done to you, but it's not true."

"You don't know what I think." She went to work with her tweezers, pulling threads of his black cape and his white shroud out of the mangled, bleeding muscle.

He didn't answer. He had passed out.

Good. He couldn't feel the pain, although why she cared, she didn't know.

She ran her hands along his arm. It felt cool and lifeless. The bullet had done something dreadful: ripped his nerves, destroyed an artery-she didn't know, and for all her furious ill humor, she didn't want to amputate his arm.

She glanced up as Rubio finally made it through the doorway.

If Durant were conscious, she would get Rubio over here to tell him about living with an amputation. Just to scare him. Just to let him know how close he was to death and dismemberment.

Rubio limped to the bed. "How is he?"

"He's fine." She continued working the shreds of his costume out of his shoulder.

"Then why are you crying?"

"I'm not crying." She wiped the tears first with one shoulder, then the other. "There's a list on the table. It's important. You're to deliver it to Raul Lawrence."

He limped over and looked, folded it, and put it in his pocket.

"What did he think he was doing?" she burst forth.

"Riding, you mean? As the Reaper?" Rubio grinned and showed two chipped teeth. "He had to. When he was in the dungeon, he planned a way to undermine the de Guignards' reign. And God bless him, it worked."

When she thought about the danger into which Durant had put himself, and the way he had used his disguise to seduce her . . . "What did he think he could accomplish?"

"He intends to destroy Sandre."

"By dressing up as a ghost?" She poured her scorn into her voice.

"To transport information to the new king. To send the tourists running and Sandre's income to perdition. To spread the rumors of the true king's return. To fight if he has to, and kill for vengeance."

She looked at Rubio, then went back to work on Durant. "Get him out of his wet trousers," she ordered. When Rubio hesitated, she cast him a look of burning scorn. "I've seen it all before, and he's chilled to the point of hypothermia. Get him out of these trousers and wrap him in warm blankets." Without looking at him, she started unwrapping the scarf at his throat.

Rubio peeled Durant out of his trousers and covered him. He looked at her and saw the way she was staring at Durant's throat. "When he got out of the dungeon, he couldn't speak at all," Rubio said.

He couldn't speak? She couldn't speak.

The marks on Durant's neck looked as if someone had hooked a chain around him and dragged him behind a horse. The skin was red, scarred, broken across his Adam's apple. The disfigurement covered him from his jaw to his collarbone. . . . It was barely healed. It would never heal. "What caused it?"

"The de Guignards love hanging."

"I've heard that before." Earlier tonight, in fact. From the prince.

"Because it's true. They love to put rope around a man's throat, pull him up, and let him dangle, kicking and choking, grabbing for his throat while death creeps up on him so slowly he can count the beats of his heart."

"They hanged Michael? So what saved him?" Rubio laughed roughly. "Their desire to hang him again. If you leave a man up there for fifteen minutes, you can cut him down and let him recover, then hang him again and enjoy his struggles all the more. It's a rough thing, knowing you're going to die with their laughter ringing in your ears."

She looked at his throat and saw similar marks rising above his stiff collar.

"I was no one. They didn't care whether they mutilated me. So they hanged me and they cut me up and put me to the rack. Him"-Rubio jerked his head toward Durant-"they cared about. Because his family has money and influence. Because he wouldn't break. Because he gave them a lot of entertainment. Because they believe he knows more than he will admit."

"Does he?"

"I don't know. But if he does, he's fought off the fear and the pain to keep his secrets." He sounded as if he admired Michael.

Of course, he was a man, simple and direct.

And she was a woman betrayed.

She went back to work on Michael's wound. "Get me warmed sandbags. We need to pack his arm to keep his blood moving."

"I'll do it." She heard the heels of Rubio's boots on the stone floor as he limped away. Step. Step. Step. Step. The boots stopped. "Someone needs to don the Reaper's costume and ride while he's wounded."

"Then find somebody."

"It can't be a Moricadian. Moricadians used to be the best riders in the world, but now none of them can afford a horse, and if one of them is caught, they'll be hanged seven times before they die."

"Then the Reaper's role will go unfilled." She concentrated on the task at hand.

"The Reaper has ruined the prince's income by frightening away the gamblers. The Reaper has created hope in the common people-they believe his appearance is the harbinger of the true king's return. Best of all, the Reaper has made the prince look like an incompetent fool." Rubio laughed hoarsely. "He's made Sandre a laughingstock. The Reaper's done a lot of good here. You can't let his efforts go for naught."

She shot him an annoyed glance. "I'm not listening."

But she heard him.

Inside his study, the prince sat at his desk, working in his leather-bound book of accounting. Flames flickered in the fireplace, dispelling the chill of the sudden, icy storm. Quico's wife, Bethania, moved with quiet grace around the room, dusting the furniture. It was a cozy, peaceful scene . . . probably the last Jean- Pierre would ever gaze upon.

He stood in the doorway, dripping on the floor, shivering with cold . . . and fear.

"Yes?" Sandre didn't look up.

"I shot the Reaper, my prince."

The prince placed his pen on the blotter, looked up from his desk, folded his hands, and smiled. "Not fatally, I hope."

"Not fatally, no." Jean-Pierre regulated his breathing to keep his voice even. "He got away."

Sandre's smile faded. "He got away?"

"My liege, I was careful not to kill him-too careful, I fear." Jean-Pierre hurried on to the next bit, the good part. "But I saw the bullet hit, saw the impact take out the shoulder of his costume. I saw him sway in the saddle, and the blood spray in the air. He is hurt. He can be found."

Sandre stared at Jean- Pierre. Just stared at him. Stood. Opened his drawer. Reached in. And pulled out a pistol.

Jean-Pierre was going to die.

Sandre lifted the pistol, aimed it at Jean-Pierre-then swung it around and shot Bethania.

She screamed and fell to the ground, writhing on the carpet, holding her thigh.

Calmly, as if he did this every day, Sandre put the pistol back in the drawer and shut it. Raising his voice to be heard above Bethania's shrieks, he said, "Since the Reaper started making his appearances, there has been a decided drop in income from the gambling halls and the hotels. And do you hear that sound?"

Jean-Pierre glanced at Bethania. "Yes, Your Highness." How could he not?

"I don't mean her. That other sound. Listen!" Sandre cupped his ear.

Jean-Pierre strained, but he could hear nothing above the woman's pain-fed sobs.

"It's the sound of Moricadia laughing. Do you know whom they're laughing at?"

Jean-Pierre shook his head.

"They're laughing at me. They're laughing because the Reaper still rides." Sandre dropped his hand to his desk and leaned forward. "No one laughs at Prince Sandre de Guignard."

"No, Your Highness."

"Tell my guards to go and find the Reaper. Every three days that they don't find him, another wife or child will be shot."