The Heroic Baron

by Nikki Poppen

  “You’re under arrest, for the time being, Monsieur Capitaine. You’ll need to come with us until this can all be sorted out.”

  “I am afraid I cannot go with you” She heard Alain revert to his fluent French and saw him draw his hidden firearm. There was no more benefit in pretending otherwise.

  The fool! He could not shoot them all. He needed a diversion, anything that would distract enough of the soldiers so that Alain had a chance of fighting off the remainder. She made a small sign behind her back, motioning the boat to begin to sail out slowly. Any small distance would be an advantage for Alain when the time came. It was going to be a messy getaway. All hopes of subterfuge were gone now. Everything was in the open.

  She whispered a prayer that Alain would understand her choice. If either of them could survive this growing debacle of an escape by being left behind, it was her with her connections and citizenship. The alternative was unthinkable. If the soldiers took Alain, he would die by execution. There was no ruse he could fall back on now.

  Timing her ploy carefully, Cecile sauntered towards the knot of soldiers. No one stopped her. Most onlookers were fairly distanced from the commotion, hoping to keep themselves from the military’s notice. She removed her concealing mob cap and let her curls fall free. Now, instead of hoping the soldiers would not recognize her, she hoped one of them would. She stepped close and screamed, drawing their attention.

  She was recognized immediately. “It’s the violinist!” a voice cried. It was her cue to run. Cecile picked up her skirts and ran into the twisting streets of town. She didn’t run to escape. She had no hope of outrunning the soldiers, but she sought to run long enough to help Alain escape. She knew she wouldn’t draw off all the troops, but she’d draw off enough to increase Alain’s hopes.

  “Cecile!” Alain turned at the sound of her scream. He lunged to break through the circle of his would-be captors once he recognized her plan and saw several of the soldiers set out after her. His lunge brought him up against a brick wall of soldier.

  “You’re going nowhere” The soldier swung a meaty fist. Alain ducked and retaliated with a swift punch to his gut. The man groaned and fell. Alain kicked him hard, drawing a knife from inside his sack jacket. There were others and Alain fought the remaining men, keeping his back to the wharf and his blade up. He jabbed with his fist and stabbed with his blade, feeling the knife thrust into soft skin on several occasions. He took no glory in it but he could show no quarter. He was fighting for Cecile, for the safety of those on the boat, and for his own life. He could not fall although a knife sliced at his arm, and the sheer number of five to one threatened to overwhelm him.

  Desperately, he wanted to search the town for Cecile but he could hazard a single glance into the streets. Cranston and Etienne shouted to him from the boat. His booted feet were on the planks of the wharf. He sensed the change in surfaces. He discharged his pistol at the closest attacker, taking the man in the shoulder. The soldier fell, slowing down the advance of his remaining comrades. It was enough time to turn and run.

  Alain sprinted hard down the remainder of the wharf. The boat had already left its moorings and sailed a safe hundred yards from the pier. Without thought, Alain dove into the cold Channel, going as deep as he dared. The soldiers were not fools. They knew he was not what he claimed. They would shoot into the water in an attempt to catch him. There was no need any longer to take him alive.

  The water was cold against the steam of his heated body. His powerful strokes propelled him forward aided by the fight-induced adrenaline coursing through him. Above him, bullets plopped in the water, useless. He judged himself to be halfway to the boat and likely out of range of the military-issued firearms. He surfaced and gasped for air.

  Etienne called to him, giving him direction by sound as to where the boat lay. He saw it not far from him. Soldiers on the dock pointed at his head but could do no more. A couple of them were struggling to launch a small craft. Alain struck out for The Pride with swift strokes.

  At last, he felt Etienne and Cranston haul him onboard. He lay gasping, shivering on the deck. “Cecile, we have to go back for her.” He choked through chattering teeth. Cranston threw a gray sailor blanket over him and tried to soothe him. But he would have none of it. “Turn the boat back. We have to go back. We can’t leave her there.” He protested, tossing his gaze to the stricken Etienne. “Etienne, make them see reason”

  Etienne slowly shook his head. “Monsieur Alain, we cannot go back without accepting our deaths and that her sacrifice was useless.”

  With all his heart, Alain wanted to go after Cecile, but such an action would make her sacrifice worthless. He knew what she wanted. She wanted him safe. She wanted Etienne safe. Etienne could only be safe if Alain lived. Hythe would not be a new life for Etienne without him.

  When he could stand, Alain made his way to the railing. He had one more duty to discharge before he could give in to his own grief. Etienne stood at the railing, stoically facing north to England.

  “Etienne, I am sorry. I could not save her.” Alain began, feeling wholly inadequate at explaining what had happened.

  Etienne nodded slowly. “I understand how you feel, but it’s what she wanted” With a wisdom beyond his years, he continued. “I think she knew she was the only one who could save you and us. If any of us had been caught, we’d not stand a chance at escaping execution for treason. But she stands a chance, if she can access her connection.”

  “All the more reason to go back for her, to help her.” Alain said through gritted teeth. The thought of his Cecile alone made his stomach clench and his anger rise.

  They both knew Cecile would be caught. There was no use pretending she would get away. It was only a matter of what they’d do to her once they caught her. In spite of his grave words, the boy was trying hard not to cry. Alain put his arm around Etienne and pulled him close. “If there’s any hope, I’ll come back for her. I promise you that I’ll risk anything for her.”

  “Yes, sir. I know you will.”

  There was no other consolation Alain could offer Etienne. The boy was too old for false hope and Alain’s own grief was too great. For all the things he could do, he couldn’t save the ones he loved. It was the second time he’d failed them.

  Spring 1817, Hythe

  Spring had come again, and with it, all the familiar longings associated with a world reborn from the old. The spring of 1817 was especially joyful. The long wars with France were over. After spending 1816 worrying about another escape attempt by Napoleon, people were traveling the world again, seeing the wonders the blockades had denied them. Families were reunited. Friends arrived home after long absences. Alain rejoiced over the safe return of his dearest friend, Tristan Moreland, although he found Tristan much changed, or perhaps it was himself who had been altered in Tristan’s absence.

  It was good to be happy again. In the three years since his own return to Hythe, there had been much sorrow. Isabella’s husband died, leaving her a young widow in her mid-twenties, and always there was the pain of losing Cecile.

  Occasionally, bursts of happiness could dull the ache of her absence. Tristan’s return had sparked a rare visit to London for Alain. He had spent the early season joining his friend in the revels of the capital. He’d rejoiced in seeing Tristan and Isabella marry last spring when her mourning for Westbrooke was complete. Another burst had come from holding his nephew in his arms recently at his christening. But they were bursts of happiness and they were temporary. They could not permanently camouflage the hurt in his heart or fully distract him from second thoughts.

  These days Alain’s main distraction was provided by his bustling seaside town. His vision for a resort had come to fruition in time to take advantage of the postwar glut of tourists. The hotel was full, the shops on High Street crowded and the collection box at St. Leonard’s was brimming with donations left by tourists eager to see the stone church. Arnaud Panchette opened a tea house and bakery that kept his wife and childre
n busy. The others Alain had brought over had found their niches too. One had a tailoring business that rivaled London fashion, and another was an aspiring milliner. Everyone seemed to have landed on their feet. Even Etienne thrived in Hythe.

  Now eighteen, Etienne was robust with good health. He swam in the coves and hiked the rocky paths leading from the beach. Alain had hired tutors, and Etienne had learned English with astonishing speed. When he’d completed his course of study, he’d gone to work clerking at the hotel to learn the trade, although Alain had offered to send him to college.

  Yes, everyone was thriving in Hythe except for him. It was spring and with all the vigor of his twenty-nineyear-old heart, Alain wanted a family of his own. It was no longer enough to surround himself with the families of others, as much as he loved them. It simply wasn’t the same. But a family meant a wife and Alain could not fathom bringing a wife who was not Cecile to The Refuge.

  If he’d hoped a young lady would catch his eye during his last sojourn to London, he was disappointed on that account too. No one could rival Cecile. The young girls were too featherbrained, too self-centered, and too lifeless when compared to Cecile’s vibrant defiance and generous nature. Alain doubted any of the girls he danced with had ever thought to give up part of what they had in order to make another’s life more comfortable. He’d returned to Hythe and devoted himself to the town and the distraction it offered.

  Distraction was something he sorely needed. Without it, he knew he’d spend his days wallowing in “what ifs.” What if Cecile was alive? That was the biggest “what if” of all. While there had been no word from Cecile to assure him she was alive, there had been no word that she was dead. At first, he’d succumbed to the wisdom of friends like Daniel who said to wait. If Cecile could come to him, she would. After a month and she had not come, the military situation made it impossible to get inside Paris. The great generals had all been defeated and the French were panicking. Napoleon hoped to retreat to Paris and rebuild, which resulted in Waterloo. Europe was a fractured continent of half kingdoms. In the ensuing madness, he would never make it to Paris. He certainly wouldn’t make it back out. Nonetheless, it took all his willpower not to sail across the Channel once Etienne was safe on English soil and tear the city apart looking for her.

  Perhaps the only reason he hadn’t done so anyway was that news had reached him a month after his return that an accomplice of L’Un had been apprehended and executed for treason. The traveler who had brought the tale to Hythe had no more information, although Alain asked numerous questions about the accomplice. Had the accomplice been male or female? What had the accomplice looked like? The traveler knew nothing more.

  The news had rent his heart. Most likely it was Cecile whom the traveler spoke of. Alain could think of no other who would fit the description of an accomplice. Only a fool would risk his life after the fact, and he had Etienne to think of now too. He could not risk leaving Etienne alone in the world after he’d already cost the young man his sister.

  Occasionally, he’d take down Cecile’s violin from where he’d mounted it over the mantel of the fireplace in the music room. He’d caress the hard resin-coated varnish of the instrument and conjure up the countless images he stored of Cecile playing the violin at the general’s house. Those days in Paris seemed a lifetime ago.

  So Alain stayed in Hythe, tucked away from the rest of the world, working feverishly on the resort and dedicating his life to the benefit of others. He had his daily routine to serve as a buffer between himself and feeling too much pain, just as he had done when his parents had died.

  He’d rise early and ride. He’d breakfast and read the five day old newspapers from London. He’d spend the morning in his study attending to business and the afternoon walking the streets of Hythe, overseeing his many projects and visiting with the citizens. Evenings were more difficult since Hythe offered a limited social life, but he managed to fill them with card games, social evenings at the homes of prominent citizens, or with more work in his study.

  That April day started the same as any other. Alain dressed in riding clothes and took his early ride amid the sunstreaked morning. The air was crisp with a hint of warmth beneath it. He breakfasted on coffee and an assortment of kippers, eggs, and ham. He reached for the stack of newspapers at his plate, methodically going through each one and circling articles of interest. It was his habit to look for news about investments, political developments, and the goings-on in town. Choosing to be absent from London was no excuse to be ignorant. Alain knew a good businessman needed to keep abreast of all the news. He forced himself to read the society columns to keep up with fashion trends to relay to the tailor on High Street. Occasionally, it humored him to see a friend’s name mentioned in the latest on dit.

  At the bottom of a page in large typeset was an advertisement for a performance at the opera house. Alain’s hand stilled. The performance was a violin concert. He concentrated on the headlines of the ad touting the musician as THE PREMIER VIOLINIST IN ALL OF FRANCE. “Trained by Nicholas Lupot.. “Alain felt his pulse race. He read on, “once a private musician to one of Napoleon’s great generals, she is making her first debut in London, April 16…… She. The violinist was a woman. A woman trained by Nicholas Lupot? It was too great a coincidence to be overlooked.

  His heart hammering, Alain sprinted through the hall, newspaper clutched in his hand, calling for his horse and then deciding he didn’t want to wait for it to be saddled. He ran the entire way to town, not caring about the looks he received from people as he sprinted into the hotel and ran straight up to the desk in the lobby where Etienne sat doing correspondence.

  “She’s alive!” Alain cried, his loud voice drawing the stares of clients.

  Etienne gasped, understanding his meaning at once. “Mon dieu! How do you know?”

  Alain shoved the crumpled newspaper onto the desk, breathless with his explanation. “It’s her, I know it is. How many people could this refer to? There can’t be that many violinists trained by Lupot and it’s not likely the others are women”

  “I can’t imagine who it would be if it’s not her,” Etienne said, his voice tinged with caution. “But it’s difficult to hope again after so long. It will hurt all the worse if it’s not her. Why hasn’t she come before this?”

  Alain lowered himself into the chair next to Etienne’s desk and ran his hands through his already disheveled hair while Etienne gave voice to the doubts in his mind. The initial euphoria of his discovery faded. If she had been alive all this time, why hadn’t she come to them before now? Three years was a long time to wait without sending any word of her survival. Surely she knew they would assume she was dead?

  Alain’s mind went in dire directions. What if Cecile had wanted him to assume she was dead? What if she had changed her mind and hadn’t come to them because she didn’t want to marry him? What if she didn’t love him?

  “There’s only one way to find out,” Etienne was saying. “You have to go to London for the concert. If it is Cecile, you will bring her home and we’ll all be together again.”

  Alain knew Etienne was right, and despite his flare of hope that it was Cecile, he couldn’t help but wish there was an easier way. Suddenly living with the ambiguous unknowns seemed somehow better than facing a concrete reality. She either loved him or she didn’t. If she didn’t, his life would go on as it had for the past three years. Except it would be even worse knowing she was out there and had chosen not to come to him. The only bolster to his courage was that for the first time he had a chance to find out the answer to “what if.”

  The concert was in five days. It didn’t leave much time for second-guessing. Alain would set Cranston to packing only the basics. He wanted to depart immediately. By carriage, the trip would take three days to London. He would ride. He had sets of evening clothes stored at the townhouse after his last dismal visit. He could purchase whatever else he needed.

  Two hours later, Alain swung up onto the back of his sturdy bay hun
ter. The hunter was all stamina, and Alain was counting on every last bit of it. His valise was strapped to the back of his saddle, and the sun was high. Alain thanked his stars it was late spring. The roads would be dry and fast. The road between Hythe and London was long, but Cecile waited for him at the end of it. As he spurred the big horse down the drive leading away from The Refuge, Alain believed for the first time in years that hope did indeed spring eternal.

  London, the Royal Opera House

  Cecile drew her bow across the violin in a fluid flourish, letting the last note hang in the air, quivering and drawn out with poignancy. Silence permeated the auditorium until the last sound of the note faded away completely, no one willing to break the spell she had woven during the past two hours. Finally, certain there was no more to come, the audience exploded with applause, expelling the collective breath of amazement it had been holding since the moment she’d taken the stage that evening.

  A light sheen of sweat glossed her brow as she took her well-deserved bows. She had labored greatly this evening with her varied and extensive repertoire. She had played pieces ranging from the simple but emotive songs of the French countryside, to tear-invoking ballads to classical masterpieces that reminded the audi ence of her skill, showing off her prowess with a bow and nimble fingers. Tonight, she’d been part gypsy dervish with her country fiddling, and part classical performer. Whatever her music demanded of her, she had given fully with her body. Her shoulders and neck ached from the exertions. She had earned every rose thrown to the stage.

  Cecile gracefully bent and scooped up the roses into a makeshift bouquet, knowing how perfectly the flowers complimented the blood red gown she wore. She stood tall, blowing the audience a kiss with her free hand, cradling the roses with the other. Most nights, it did not matter who was in the audience. She couldn’t see faces anyway, thanks to the stage lighting. But tonight, she strained her eyes to see. She hoped and dreaded that Alain Hartsfield would be in the audience.