Читать книгу Return Of The Runaway - Sarah Mallory - Страница 8

Chapter One

Verdun, France—September 1803

The young lady in the room at the top of the house on the Rue Égalité was looking uncharacteristically sober in her dark-blue linen riding habit. Even the white shirt she wore beneath the close-fitting jacket bore only a modest frill around the neck. She had further added to the sobriety by sewing black ribbons to her straw bonnet and throwing a black lace shawl around her shoulders. Now she sat before the looking glass and regarded her reflection with a critical eye.

‘“Lady Cassandra Witney is headstrong and impetuous,”’ she stated, recalling a recent description of herself. Her critic had also described her as beautiful, but Cassie disregarded that. She propped her chin on her hand and gave a tiny huff of dissatisfaction. ‘The problem with being headstrong and impetuous,’ she told her image, ‘is that it leads one to make mistakes. Marrying Gerald was most definitely a mistake.’

She turned and surveyed the little room. Accompanying Gerald to Verdun had been a mistake, too, but when the Treaty of Amiens had come to an end in May she had not been able to bring herself to abandon him and go home to England. That would have been to admit defeat and her spirit rebelled at that. Eloping with Gerald had been her choice, freely made, and she could almost hear Grandmama, the Dowager Marchioness of Hune, saying, ‘You have made your bed, my girl, now you must lie in it.’

And lie in it she had, for more than a year, even though she had known after a few months of marriage that Gerald was not the kind, loving man she had first thought him.

A knock at the door interrupted her reverie. After a word with the servant she picked up her portmanteau and followed him down the stairs. A light travelling chaise was waiting at the door with Merimon, the courier she had hired, standing beside it. He was a small, sharp-faced individual and now he looked down his long narrow nose at the bag in her hand.

‘C’est tout?’

‘It is all I wish to take.’

Cassandra answered him in his own language, looking him in the eye. As the bag was strapped on to the chaise she reflected sadly that it was little enough to show for more than a year of married life. Merimon opened the door of the chaise and continued to address her in coarse French.

‘Milady will enter, if you please, and I will accompany you on foot. My horse is waiting at the Porte St Paul.’

Cassie looked up. The September sun was already low in the sky.

‘Surely it would have been better to set off at first light,’ she observed.

Merimon looked pained.

‘I explained it all to you, milady. I could not obtain a carriage any sooner. And this road, there is no shelter and the days can be very hot for the horses. This way we shall drive through the night, you will sleep and when you awake, voilà, we shall be in Reims.’

‘I cannot sleep in here.’ Cassie could not help it, she sniffed. How different it had been, travelling to France with Gerald. She had been so in love then, and so hopeful. Everything had been a delicious adventure. She pushed away the memories. There was no point in dwelling on the past. ‘Very well, let us get on, then. The sooner this night is over the better.’

* * *

It was not far to the eastern gate, where Cassie knew her passport would be carefully checked. Verdun still maintained most of its medieval fortifications, along with an imposing citadel. It was one of the reasons the town had been chosen to hold the British tourists trapped in France when war was declared: the defences made it very difficult for enemies to get in, but it also made it impossible for the British to get out.

When they reached the city gate she gave her papers to Merimon, who presented them to the guard. The French officer studied them for a long moment before brushing past the courier and approaching the chaise. Cassie let down the window.

‘You are leaving us, madame?’

‘Yes. I came to Verdun with my husband when he was detained. He died a week since. There is no longer any reason for me to remain.’ She added, with a touch of hauteur, ‘The First Consul Bonaparte decreed that only English men of fighting age should be detained.’

The man inclined his head. ‘As you say. And where do you go?’

‘Rouen,’ said Merimon, stepping up. ‘We travel via Reims and Beauvais and hope to find passage on a ship from Rouen to Le Havre, from whence milady can sail to England.’

Cassie waited, tense and anxious while the gendarme stared at her. After what seemed like hours he cast a searching look inside the chaise, as if to assure himself that no prisoner was hiding on the floor. Finally he was satisfied. He stood back and handed the papers to Merimon before ordering the postilion to drive on. The courier loped ahead to where a small urchin was holding the reins of a long-tailed bay and as the chaise rattled through the gates he scrambled into the saddle and took up his position beside it.

Cassie stripped off her gloves, then removed her bonnet and rubbed her temples. Perhaps now she was leaving Verdun the dull ache in her head would ease. It had been a tense few days since Gerald’s death, his so-called friends circling like vultures waiting to strike at the first sign of weakness. Well, that was behind her now. She was going home. Darkness was falling. Cassie settled back into one corner as the carriage rolled and bumped along the uneven road. She found herself hoping the roads in England were as good as she remembered, that she might not suffer this tooth-rattling buffeting for the whole of the journey.

The chaise began to slow suddenly and Cassie sat up. For some time they had been travelling through woodland with tall trees lining the road and making it as black as pitch inside the carriage. Now, however, pale moonlight illuminated the window and Cassie could see that they were in some sort of clearing. The ground was littered with tree stumps and lopped branches, as if the trees had only recently been felled and carried away. She leaned forward and looked out of the window, expecting to see the lights of an inn, but there was nothing, just the pewter-coloured landscape with the shadow of the woods like a black wall in every direction.

The carriage came to a halt. Merimon dismounted, tied his horse to a wheel and came up to open the door.

‘Step out, milady. We take you no further.’

Cassie protested furiously as he grabbed her wrist and hauled her out of the carriage.

‘How dare you treat me thus,’ she raged at him. ‘Your contract is to take me to Le Havre. You will not get the rest of your money if you do not do so.’

His coarse laugh sent a chill running through her.

‘No? Since you have no friends in Le Havre, and no banker, you must be carrying your money with you. Is that not the truth?’

The chill turned to icy fear.

‘Nonsense,’ she said stoutly. ‘I would not be so foolish as to—’

Another horrid laugh cut through her protests.

‘But certainly you would. Give me your purse now and perhaps we will not hurt you quite so much.’

Cassie glanced behind her to see that the postilion had dismounted and hobbled his horses. He was now walking slowly towards her. If only she had not left her bonnet in the chaise she might have made use of the two very serviceable hatpins that were secured in it. As it was she had only her wits and her own meagre strength to rely on. She took a step away from Merimon who made no move to stop her. Why should he, when the postilion was blocking her retreat?

‘I shall be missed,’ she said. ‘I have told friends I shall write to them from Rouen.’

‘A week at least before they begin to worry, if they ever do.’ Merimon gestured dismissively. ‘No one cares what happens to you, apart from your husband, and he is dead. I cannot believe the English détenus will be in a hurry to tear themselves away from their pleasures.’

No, thought Cassandra, neither could she believe it. Gerald had ensured that all her friends there had been his cronies, selfish, greedy persons who only professed affection if it was to their advantage. She was alone here, she was going to have to fight and it was unlikely that she would win. Cassie tensed as Merimon drew a long knife from his belt. He gave her an evil grin.

‘Well, milady, do we get your money before or after we have taken our pleasure?’

‘Never, I should think.’

The sound of the deep, amused drawl had them all turning towards the carriage.

A stranger was untying the reins of Merimon’s horse. The man was a little over average height, bare-headed, bearded and dressed in ragged homespun, but there was nothing of the peasant about his bearing. He carried himself like a soldier and his voice was that of one used to command.

‘You will move away from the lady now, if you know what’s good for you.’

‘We have no quarrel with you, citizen,’ called Merimon. ‘Be on your way.’

‘Oh, I do not think so.’

The stranger was walking towards them, leading the bay. With his untidy hair and thick beard his face was but little more than a dark shape in the moonlight, but Cassie saw the gleam of white as he grinned. For a long moment there was silence, tense and expectant, then everything exploded into action. With a howl of rage Merimon hurled himself at the stranger and at the same time Cassie saw the postilion bearing down upon her.

That was fortunate, she thought. Merimon was the bigger of the two and he had a knife. With the postilion she had a chance. Cassie tensed as he approached, his arms outstretched. His ugly, triumphant grin told her he thought she was petrified, but just as he launched himself forward she acted. In one smooth, fluid movement she stepped aside, turning, bending and scooping up a branch about the length and thickness of her own arm. Without a pause she gripped the branch with both hands and carried it with all her force against the back of the postilion’s knees. He dropped to the ground with a howl.

‘Nicely done, mademoiselle.’ The stranger trotted up, mounted on the bay. He held out his hand to her. ‘Well?’ he said. ‘Do you want to come with me, or would you prefer to take your chances here with these scélérats?’

Villains indeed, thought Cassie, quickly glancing about her. Merimon was on his knees, groggily shaking his head, and the postilion was already staggering to his feet. Swiftly she ran across to the stranger. She grasped his outstretched hand, placed one foot on his boot and allowed him to pull her up before him. He lifted her easily and settled her across his thighs before urging the horse to a canter.

Cassie had no fear of falling, the stranger’s strong arms held her firmly before him. The choice, since she was sitting sideways, was to turn into the man or away and Cassie opted for the latter, twisting her body to look ahead. The black shawl had snagged on one arm of her riding habit and now it fluttered like a pennant over her shoulder. It must have flown into the rider’s face because without a word he pulled it free, tossing it aside as they pounded away into the darkness of the trees. Cassie turned her head to watch it drift slowly to the ground behind them. Her only symbol of grieving for her husband, for her marriage. It was gone. She faced forward again, looking ahead into the darkness. Into the unknown future.