Read Online Kings and Emperors by Dewey Lambdin - Free Book Online

warmer, and the wind-whipped rain did not spray into the outdoor covered patio.
    â€œToo bad that Spencer and Moore could not combine their armies, and do something in Portugal,” Mountjoy began, after ordering them a bottle of claret.
    â€œWe’ll see in the Spring,” Lewrie said with a shrug. “Better weather, better plans?”
    â€œI’ve heard from Romney Marsh in Madrid,” Mountjoy imparted in a mutter, hinting that there were some new developments, but this time he did so without his usual twinkle of knowing something that Lewrie did not. He sounded tired. “Crown Prince Ferdinand is plotting to usurp King Carlos and arrest Godoy, for real. It ain’t a rumour anymore. That painter, Goya? He’s doing portraits of the royal court, heard whispers, and passed it on to Marsh. The Spanish people would be all for it … anyone’s better on the throne than Carlos, and they think that Ferdinand will tear up any treaties with France if he does win out, and get them out of this miserable war.”
    â€œNapoleon’d never abide that,” Lewrie said with a sneer. “He’d be over the Spanish border in force, like he did with Portugal, to put a puppet in charge.”
    â€œPerhaps he’s planned to do that all along,” Mountjoy said with a hint of his former slyness. “He’s gobbled up enough of Europe for an empire, already, and if he holds the Spanish throne, perhaps he thinks that gives him all of Spain’s overseas possessions, too?”
    â€œHah!” Lewrie scoffed. “No one in any Spanish colony pays the slightest bit of attention to Madrid, anymore. If France gobbles up Spain, most of ’em would declare independence and say to Hell with European doings. Bonaparte would take an empty purse with not one penny in it, even if the Spanish roll over and beg, which they would not. Sure t’be riots and revolution. Then you get your fondest wish … Spain comes over to our side. Are you sure you’re getting true accounts from Marsh, not just idle rumours? Don’t see how he does it.”
    Romney Marsh could be considered insane, but a perfect spy; he could assume a myriad of identities and carry them off with panache. The only question was how he could juggle all his multiple personas and keep straight which one he played at any given time.
    â€œI gather he plays an artistic priest, he draws extremely well, and can play the guitar so he can pose as an itinerant musician in taverns,” Mountjoy related. “What else he is in his spare time, I’d not hazard a guess. Napoleon is plotting to take all of Spain and her possessions. London’s sent me a letter condensing what they’ve heard from Paris.”
    â€œ That bitch!” Lewrie snarled, meaning Charité Angelette de Guilleri, the worst-named murderess ever, once a Louisiana Creole who had gone pirate to raise money for a French rebellion to take the colony and her beloved New Orleans back from Spain, then a salon celebrity in Paris, and part of the force that had hunted Lewrie and his wife to the Channel coast during the Peace of Amiens, where his Caroline was shot in the back and killed. The woman had turned British spy when Napoleon Bonaparte sold New Orleans, and Louisiana, to the United States.
    â€œOne of ‘Boney’s’ Marshals, Joachim Murat, is gathering another army cross the Pyrenees, over one hundred thousand men, with orders to pretend sweetness and light, and lie like the Devil so the Spanish don’t suspect anything ’til it’s too late. He’ll march on Cádiz, to free up the French ships blockaded there since Trafalgar, and he’ll come to Gibraltar. The treaty that Godoy signed with France proposes an alliance to take Gibraltar.”
    â€œAny mention of Ceuta?” Lewrie asked, suddenly concerned.
    â€œNot to do with Murat, no,” Mountjoy told him. “When Sir Hew Dalrymple wrote to