Still, the next day, with clouds dulling the sky and threatening more rain, he picked his roads more carefully.
And ended lost in the woods.
Spotting a flickering campfire in a clearing kept him from having to admit to anyone that he'd had no idea of their direction for most of the day. He followed the light, keeping to a narrow track, and he realized his mistake only when he drew rein.
The firelight revealed a ragged camp with two shaggy ponies that had been unhitched from carts that were even more ramshackle than their own. Three dark eyed, dark skinned children stared at him from beside the campfire, their clothes much mended and faded. An older woman sat tending a pot hung over the flame. She did not look up at them.
"Who are they?" Diana asked, leaning closer to Paxten.
"Gypsies," he answered, guessing and glancing around the clearing again. Something did not seem right. The back of his neck tingled. Too late, he realized what seemed wrong—where were the men?
Picking up the reins, he started to turn the donkey cart in the narrow lane, intending to gallop the beast away if he must. Before he could, two burly, dark-haired men stepped from the woods to grab the donkey's bridle, both older men, one with jagged scar across his face. Paxten glanced behind them to see if they could leave the cart and run. But three more men—boys really, but tall enough and broad in shoulder to mean trouble—stood behind the cart. He could not mistake the cold in their eyes, nor the glint of sliver flashing in their hands.
Knives.
Merde, now what had he dragged his Andria into?
CHAPTER TWELVE
At the appearance of the men, Alexandria felt the sudden tension in Paxten. She glimpsed the thoughts turning behind his eyes; she had her own. Five to one. Paxten would be on the ground and dead before he could do more than take a swing at one of these ruffians. She put her hand on his arm to keep him still. With her foot, she nudged her jewel box toward him and whispered, "Give these to them."
He frowned at her, then answered in soft English. "That's a sure way to end with our throats cut."
"Then what—"
A querulous voice rose from beside the fire, pulling Alexandria's attention to the old woman who had risen and now stared at them. "You are English!"
She spoke the words like an accusation, in heavily accented English. Alexandria glanced from the old woman to the men with their hard faces and narrow-eyed stares. They looked, she thought, like a lean pack of wolves.
Straightening, her heart beating hard and fast, she could see no reason to avoid the truth. "Yes, we are." Beside her, Paxten muttered a curse. She glanced at him. "What choice do we have?"
The old woman's dry cackle filled the night. Calling out something to the men in guttural French, the woman came forward. Her black skirts swirled as she walked. Her silver-gray hair had been pulled up into a knot on her head. With the firelight behind her, she looked a witch, her wide face lined by years and coarsened by weather and a hard life.
"You are wise, little one." She glanced at Paxten, at Diana, and back to Alexandria, her dark eyes glittering in her heavily lined face. "Your family?"
"My niece," Alexandria said. She decided not to attempt an explanation for Paxten.
The old woman glanced at him, smiling now, but with a calculating look in her eyes. "You have not the look of the Anglais."
"I am Anglais. And I am not. I don't fit anywhere, actually."
She grinned now, showing a gold tooth. "Ah, you are like us then! Come. Share our fire. Maurice, bring our guests."
It sounded more an order than a request. The old woman turned and limped back to the fire. But the two older men, Alexandria noted, seemed disappointed. With a flash, the knives disappeared. She let out a soft breath.
Paxten did not look easy with the situation, and she could share his sentiments. But what else could they do other than obey? Only Diana seemed untroubled by the tensions swirling around them. Stepping from the cart, Diana bent to talk to one of the children. The child stared at her, eyes enormous and solemn.
Glancing around him, Paxten eased himself from the cart, and helped Alexandria from it. The man with the scar led their donkey away to tether it next to the shaggy ponies, and two women, both of whom seemed younger than Diana, came out from the shadows of the trees. They stared at Diana, eyes wary. However, Diana chattered away in French to them, introducing herself, admiring the children, and soon the women came forward.
The old woman gestured for them to sit. Paxten did so, but with his back straight and his glance sliding around him often. However, it seemed to Alexandria as if these Gypsies had nothing to offer but hospitality now. Pewter plates were brought out, hot rabbit stew served, wine filled metal mugs that were passed to them. Bread came out from a clay pot where it had baked in the coals.
No one had much conversation. The Gypsies spoke little during the meal, and only to each other, talking in low French with so marked an accent that Alexandria could follow none of it. Alexandria could barely eat, let alone converse. And Paxten, too, remained tense and alert.
After the meal, the women cleaned up and the older man without the scared face brought out a guitar. He began to tune the strings. The other young men ignored Paxten, and only occasionally glanced at Diana or Alexandria from eyes still veiled with suspicion.
Standing, Alexandria moved closer to the old woman, her curiosity unbearable. "Thank you for the meal. But why did it matter to you that we are English?"
The woman glanced at her, then smiled. "We lived once in the Vendée."
The name meant little to Alexandria, other than as a name for a district in the west of France. But Paxten muttered a soft oath, and the old woman glanced at him. "I see you understand," she said. She spoke to one of the younger men in her own language.
With a sharp glint in his eyes, the man moved to one of the carts. He pulled out a leather bag that weighed his arm, and spilled its contents onto the dirt.
Gold buttons glinted in the firelight.
The old woman grinned. "We go where the hunting is good these days." Still smiling, the old woman moved to help the young man gather up the buttons.
Alexandria stepped closer to Paxten. "Were those—"
"Buttons from uniforms. Yes. And these aren't Gypsies as I had thought."
She glanced around them, nervous again now.
Paxten's hand gripped hers. "Don't worry, ma chére. They're brigands right enough. Bonaparte named them such, and aptly. But it's him and his army that they have no love for."
She edged closer to him. "But who are they?"
"In parts of France, including Vendée, the Revolution never took, not with its hatred of both king and Church. The royalists there fought back. Then Bonaparte took power, so they fought him. Or they did until he sent his army against them."
"But why should they care if we are English?"
He smiled. "Because, ma chére, England most generously sent weapons to Vendée. Not that it did these poor devils much good. I heard of families burnt alive in their homes. Bonaparte wanted an example made, in case others in France decided they disliked his being made First Consul for life."
She shivered. And she thought of the soldiers who were following them. Would they prove to be such ruthless men, led by the example of the General who had made the French army victorious? She decided she did not want an opportunity to learn if they were.
Despite her uneasiness, Alexandria soon found little else to do other than to sit close to Paxten. With the guitar strumming softly and the fire warm on her face and hands, her eyelids began to droop. She yawned, and noted that Paxten sat straight as ever, watchful. She realized that she had not seen Diana since their meal, and panic flared.
Sitting up, she gripping Paxten's hand. "Where is Diana?"
An answer came to her from the darkness outside the circle of firelight. "I'm here, Aunt."
A black-haired girl with Diana's blue eyes stepped into the firelight.
Paxten straightened and stared
at the girl.
With her golden hair and pale skin, she had been lovely. But with her curls now dyed black, and her skin turned a dusky hue, she looked an exotic temptress. Her blue eyes startled by their contrast with the dark tresses. And how had she managed that copper tint to her skin?
He grinned at her. "Magnifique! But hardly a disguise that allows you to fade into insignificance. Perhaps, Andria, you should have allowed her the breeches of a boy after all."
Diana gave him a saucy look, but Alexandria was on her feet and touching a hand to her niece's cheek. "What have you done to your skin?”
"It is only dye. Madeleine swears it will wear off in a few weeks."
"Weeks!"
Paxten decided he had best intervene. Alexandria's eyes had darkened and her brows pulled flat, and unless he missed his guess, she was about to give her niece a thundering scold.
He owed the girl no help. However, he had no heart to take the triumphant gleam from her eyes. Besides, she did look quite fetching, and they could use any help they could come by to keep themselves hidden. This made her no less stunning, but heaven help anyone now searching for a beautiful blond girl.
"C'est bien, Andria. Perhaps you should dye your skin as well. I think I would like you dusky as an exotic houri."
She glared at him. "Yes, I expect you would."
"And why not—I should like you in any form, ma chére.”
She glanced at him again, but stepped away, as if she did not trust him. Or did not trust herself with him. He smiled at that.
With a resigned sigh, she looked again at her niece. "Well, I suppose it cannot be too awful if it will wear off."
Diana's new appearance seemed to amuse the Vendéans. As did Alexandria's reaction to her niece's transformation. Paxten did not relax, however. The men might smile, but he did not trust that their mood might not shift. And so he lay with a tree against his back, and his eyes open a slit as the moon rose and the fire died and the others settled to sleep.
The morning dawned with mist, and Paxten watched it rise, swirling thick around the camp. He had been lost before this. In such fog, how would he find the road to Dieppe?
Shaking his head, he turned to wake Diana and Alexandria.
By the time he had them alert, the Vendéans had a fire lit to heat water for tea and coffee, and to make bread. The men moved about quiet, their faces as expressionless as last night. The women chattered, however, in soft voice, talking to each other, waking their children.
He stepped closer to Alexandria, a hand pressed to his side, for the cold of the night had left him stiff and aching. "We should go soon. We have a way yet to the coast."
He spoke softly, and in English, but the old Vendéan woman still overheard him. She looked up from her seat by the fire, a steaming mug of tea in her hands. Her eyes glittered with speculation. "The coast? What—ah, now I see. You must be that half-Englishman the soldiers seek. The dangerous one who raped a Frenchwoman, is that not what they say?"
#
Paulin saw his comfortable retirement disappearing. He would be lucky not to end his days posted to the farthest colony possible for his failure.
He could swear they had caught the trail of that damned Marsett and those Englishwomen. They had been seen in a town during its spring fair. Only now all trace of them had vanished again. Did the man have a pact with the devil? Or had he, after that fair, raped and murdered the women and doubled-back to Paris? Is that not how a desperate criminal ought to act?
Only no one acted as they should in this.
The captain had made this hunt an obsession. And this Marsett danced them around the countryside as if it were a game. Bah, why did they not just find someone who looked enough like Marsett and shoot him? Who would know, after all? And they could go back to Paris and to the real work of a soldier. France was at war, again, was she not?
But that would not do for the captain, it seemed. No, he had to have this half-English cur even if it meant they must search for phantoms. They would become ruined men if this misadventure went any more sour.
The captain turned from the crossroads where he had been standing and strode back to Paulin. Paulin wiped away his thoughts as if they had not existed. Straightening, he kept his stare on the crossroad sign.
"Are they still making for Boulogne?"
Paulin risked a glance at the captain. He looked older than he had two weeks ago—much older. Fatigued lined his face and dulled his eyes. Paulin had no answer for a question that sounded more a guess, so he asked, "Shall I order the men to mount?"
Boulogne, Dieppe, Calais—he did not care where they rode, as long as they reached a port town and the end of this chase. He wanted new orders. Ones that had a chance of success.
The captain turned from him and stared at the road. Glancing at Paulin, he asked, "What would you do?"
Paulin considered offering the suggestion of murdering the women and going back to Paris, but the hard look in the captain's eyes kept him from speaking. He did not want to be thought a fool for making such a guess. So he shifted his weight. "I can't think like Marsett—he's English!"
The captain's mouth edged up. Paulin shifted his weight again, even more uncomfortable now.
"And that makes him different, does it?"
Paulin lifted one shoulder. "Who understands the English. Why does he go this way, then that, as if drunk? How can he disappear as if the devil had his hand over him?" And why do we care? Paulin added to himself.
"No, he's not drunk. And he may be the devil, but it's not black arts that aid him. He's smart this one. He keeps to back roads. He finds ways to disguise himself. But it will not save him. I swear it will not." He stared at Paulin. "Would you feel different about this, Lieutenant, if Marsett had had your sister, or your mother, instead of the general's wife?"
Paulin's mouth hardened.
The captain nodded. "Just so. Madam D'Aeth may be another man's wife, but she has been dishonored. We cannot let that go. Now—Boulogne? Dieppe? Or some fishing village between?"
Paulin frowned. "Not a village. Too hard to buy passage. And too easy to stand out as a stranger. He needs a town where another face is just another face. I'd want Boulogne. Or Calais. And a short crossing."
The captain nodded. "Yes. But they sent the coach to Calais as a ruse, so they would not take that road. Not if they hoped we would be on it. That leaves Boulogne and Diepee—it must be one of them. So we will go to both."
"Sir?"
"Take half the men for Boulogne. Report to the commander and obtain what assistance you can to search the town, then question every captain of every boat. If Marsett is not there, remain until I send you word. I'll take the rest of the men to Dieppe."
Paulin's frown deepened. "But, sir...."
"You have some other thoughts, Lieutenant?"
Paulin did. However, he had his orders now. And at least they put an end in sight.
He straightened and saluted. "No, sir!" Shouting out the names of the men who would ride with him, he turned away and swung up onto the back of his sturdy, bay mare.
He glanced once more at the captain, standing in the road still, holding the reins to his brown gelding, the remaining nine men standing behind him. Gratitude flared in him that he did not have any such thing as honor that nipped at his heels like a hound.
"Good luck, sir!" he called, then he spun his mount and set out at a canter. And he could almost pity this Marsett to have to face the captain now. After all the trouble the man had caused, he would be lucky if the captain allowed him to die quickly.
#
Paxten had braced himself, uncertain what the Vendéans would now think of him. He doubted they had any love for a French general, but many of them were devout Catholic. They viewed themselves as patriots, loyal to the crown, to the Church, and to their true France. Would they think him one, too, or judge him a criminal?
The old woman grinned at him. "That whore of a General's wife got better than she deserved if she had you. But you had
best travel with us if you wish to stay alive. We met two of the soldiers hunting you already."
Paxten thought of the gold buttons spilled into the dirt. Buttons off uniforms. And he tried to think of some reason why they could not travel together—a reason the Vendéans could accept, because he could not very well say, "Sorry, but we do not travel with cutthroats." He could not afford to offend his hosts. But why should they not travel together? The Vendéans knew the countryside better than he. And while they might be murderous when it came to the French army, they had been hospitable enough so far. Ah, but it was not just his life at risk.
He glanced at Alexandra's pale face and Diana's wide blue eyes and decided that perhaps there was a bargain he could strike with the old woman that might help keep them safe. And get them to Dieppe. He would just have to pray that he knew what he was doing. And that the Vendéans did not decide that their English guests would make for better bait that might draw to them more French soldiers who would fall to those very, very sharp knifes they kept hidden.
#
It took three days and two more cold nights on the ground to reach the cliffs over Dieppe. Paxten knew that he had lost his vigilance, but the Vendéans had shown them nothing but an indifferent kindness—as if he and Alexandria were sheep they took to market. Diana was a different matter.
She seemed to have become an adopted daughter. The children clutched her skirts, and when they stopped to camp each night they dragged her into their games. The other young women braided Diana's darkened hair, and the men began to smile at her and flirt with her.
And that meant that Alexandria had not a look or moment to spare for anything but her niece. She hovered next to Diana, as anxious as any mother.
Paxten found his feelings mixed as they gained the cliff tops and could look down at the curve of the port town of Dieppe with its narrow streets and tidy cottages. On the bluffs, windmills perched. A few houses stood on the slopes that led to the water. Across from them a headland jutted into the sea, creating a natural, wide cove.
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