by Amy Lake
This was too much for Lord Winthrop.
“Miss Perrin informs you? Miss Perrin? Why did she not inform me? I am Elizabeth’s fiancé!”
The words were said before he could stop himself, and he sank down suddenly into the sofa beside Miss Cavendish, feeling a perfect fool.
“Are you, really?”
Geoffrey looked up. “Am I what?”
“Her fiancé.”
He stared at the woman, but could not summon the requisite indignation. Aunt Philippa’s question seemed all too pertinent.
“Yes,” he told her. “At the moment, yes.”
At that, conversation faltered. Miss Cavendish seemed to have a great store of patience, and nothing she wished to add.
“Very well,” Lord Winthrop told her finally, after the tea had grown cold. “I will go fetch Elizabeth.”
“Ah,” said the woman. “But she is waiting for Marguerite. And they will be able to return without your assistance, I am sure.”
“She should not be in Dover by herself.”
“I believe Miss Perrin mentioned a relation of some sort, with whom Elizabeth will be staying.”
“Nevertheless.”
Miss Cavendish shrugged. “As you will.”
As he left, Lord Winthrop informed Pivens of his intention to travel to the coast to find Miss Asherwood, which was welcome news to the butler. Geoffrey forbore to mention that he would not be leaving until the following morning, since by now it was quite late in the day and he had no desire to risk Shooter’s Hill in the dark. That was only reasonable.
In the meantime he would visit Miss Penelope Perrin, and find out exactly where Miss Asherwood would be staying in Dover.
* * *
Chapter 51
Old Baston
Armand was in and out of Beauvoir, gathering supplies for the trip to Calais. Extra food was obtainable, but only in small amounts, here and there, or it would be missed. Marguerite scoured the chateau for money; she found a packet of sous and deniers in the kitchen, tucked inside an old sugar canister, and two livres in the desk of the comte’s old study. There might have been more in her mother’s bedroom, but Marguerite refused to go in, and Armand declared that the total—almost four livres—should be more than enough.
They were nearly ready to go, having decided that they would begin after dark, and were in the library fashioning two rucksacks from an old sheet, when they heard the slow heavy tread of a man’s footsteps on the staircase.
“Merde,” muttered Armand. He and Marguerite flew to the door, intending to run.
“Marguerite, eh?” they heard, and both children recognized the voice of old Baston. “Don’t be a fool, girl, come out. I’ve news of your maman.”
Marguerite was crying, but they were tears of joy. Armand sat with his arm wrapped around her shoulders.
“Who?” he asked the old man.
“Pierre-Louis Lefèvre,” spat Baston. “Lives in Loucheux.”
The girl nodded. She recognized that name, and knew the man it belonged to.
“He . . . he asked maman . . . he wanted to . . . ”
“Wanted to marry her,” finished Baston. “And take over the chateau, I’d be guessing. That fils de salope. He’s been sniffing after the comtesse for years.”
Armand winced. Old Baston’s language was the same, no matter who the audience.
“Where is she?” asked Marguerite.
“Gravois says he’s got ’er at his house.”
Armand sent a worried glance at the man, who shrugged. The boy stood up. “We must go rescue her,” said Armand. “At once.”
“Eh, boy, you stay away from that connard, and keep the young missy away from him as well.”
“But— ”
“Did you think nobody cared?” Old Baston looked at Marguerite, and his eyes were kind. “They drove off the servants, child, but your people came back that night, searching for you and your maman. The both of you were gone.”
“I . . . hid.”
“That weren’t a bad notion. But the cook and Mrs. Bonnet have been worried for you. Didn’t know what to do, but they’ve been pestering their menfolk no end, and we been looking.”
Marguerite felt guilty.
“And now the men of the village will take care of this. Besides,” added Baston, with a grim smile, “from what I hear Lefèvre might be bringing the comtesse back himself.”
“Why?” asked Armand.
“Gravois says half of Picardy heard her yelling at him, and I tell you, he says she sounded fair to not stopping. I think Pierre-Louis Lefèvre’s found out he’s bitten off more than he can chew.”
* * *
Chapter 52
Miss Perrin Explains
Lord Winthrop cannot truly be this dense, thought Penelope. She had explained the situation at least twice over, and he was still looking at her as if she’d lost her mind.
“Dover? Why does Miss Asherwood need to go to Dover?”
It would have been funny if he wasn’t so annoying. Miss Perrin began to realize that Elizabeth’s actions were outside of Geoffrey’s frame of reference. He simply could not believe his ears.
“She’s not going to Dover,” said Penny, in exasperation. “Well, I mean she is going to Dover, but she’s not staying there. She’s going to Calais, to meet Monsieur Rabaillat.”
“Who?”
“He is a person . . . well, Lord Blakeley suggested him. He lives in Calais, and Lizzie will find him there, and he can take her to Marguerite.”
“Why would he do that, pray tell?” snapped Lord Winthrop, who—if Penny had only known it—was growing heartily sick of the name Blakeley.
“I don’t know! Maybe he won’t, but he’s worked with the British government before—”
Geoffrey frowned at that piece of information.
“—and at least he can assist her in hiring transport to Beauvoir.”
Lord Winthrop’s eyes narrowed. “Beauvoir?”
“The comtesse’s chateau.” Miss Perrin sighed. She knew Elizabeth had explained all of this previously to Lord Winthrop, but he seemed to have retained none of the particulars. He had, in fact, barely remembered that Alice du Merveille and her daughter lived in Picardy.
Why would he bother remembering? thought Penny. Marguerite doesn’t matter to him.
“And do you have the direction of this Mr. Rabaillat?”
“Direction?”
Lord Winthrop appeared more irritated by the moment. “Yes. An address. I have promised Elizabeth’s aunt that I will go after her. I didn’t realize it would be all the way to France, of course, but it must be done.”
Penelope hesitated. She did have the address, of course, from Lizzie’s note. But as Lord Blakeley was on his way as well, which was something she had not yet divulged to Geoffrey, she foresaw considerable awkwardness in this plan. On the other hand, how could she refuse? It would seem most strange to be so little concerned for her friend’s safety.
“I do,” she admitted. “But Geoffrey, I must tell you that Lord Blakeley has already gone after her.”
“Blakeley!” Lord Winthrop stared at her, his color now an alarming shade of red. “Blakeley! How did he know she’d gone?”
Oh, dear.
“I told him,” said Penny.
* * *
Chapter 53
The Hostellerie Berard
Lord Blakeley arrived in Calais shortly before dawn. He hired a horse and set out immediately for seventeen rue du Havre, with some hope of finding Miss Asherwood still there. He knew the location well, as it happened; it was the address of the Hostellerie Berard, a small, unpretentious hotel near the center of the town, not the fanciest of places, but clean and unlikely to attract attention to any of its residents. He’d used it often in recent years.
He had added the address of ‘Monsieur Rabaillat’ to the envelope out of habit, one of the small details of espionage that might have been important under different circumstances. It was not a detail he had expected M
iss Asherwood to notice, or to use. But, as Peregrine had reminded himself over and over since he’d left London, the situation could have been worse. The innkeep and his wife at the Hostellerie Berard were decent folk, and as Elizabeth must have arrived late in the previous day, he had every hope that she was only this morning preparing for the trip into Picardy. Finding a carriage to hire would take some time, if she could manage it at all, in a town which was wholly unfamiliar to her.
In fact, he would have doubted the ability of a young London miss to do any such thing, ever, except that the last twenty-four hours had left Lord Blakeley with a substantially increased opinion of Miss Asherwood’s ingenuity and resolution of character. Here she was, in France—as he knew, having made a quick inquiry at the offices of the royal mail—when he’d hardly expected her to make it halfway to Dover.
* * * *
Miss Asherwood took a deep breath, and prepared to tackle the problem most immediately in front of her, which was to find a means of travel. Monsieur Berard and his wife were the nicest people, but as their English was exactly at a par with her French, communication had been slow.
If she had thought to bring Mr. Cotgrave’s dictionary with her—
But no, thought Elizabeth. That would hardly have helped.
She had arrived in Calais late in the previous afternoon, and a few shillings had sufficed to bring her comfortably to the address she sought. The people in France seemed to welcome British currency, and so that was one problem solved. But when she had enquired of Monsieur Rabaillat—pointing at the address on the envelope and offering the owner of the house at 17 rue du Havre her most encouraging smile—he merely shrugged.
“Mon . . . monsieur Rabaillat . . . ici?”
“Non, non mademoiselle, malheureusement je ne connais pas cet homme.”
More pointing and smiling, accompanied by a bit of mangled French and a few words of English attempted by the innkeeper—because that was surely what she had found at seventeen rue du Havre, an inn—had led to Elizabeth concluding that, first of all, there was no Monsieur Rabaillat at this address, and secondly, Monsieur Berard had never heard of such a man anywhere on the rue du Havre.
Perhaps he was only staying for a night when he wrote the letter, but in that case, why did Monsieur Berard not remember his name? At this point Miss Asherwood, who was exhausted and very hungry, felt close to tears. Fortunately the innkeeper’s wife arrived at that moment, took one look at Elizabeth, and bustled the girl off to a small morning room, with a lovely little table and windows framed with cheerful, blue and white checked curtains. She made it clear that Lizzie was to sit down at the table, and remain there, and soon brought in a cup of tea and a plate of the most delicious pastries—brioches, said Madame Berard, pointing—that Miss Asherwood had ever tasted.
And after the brioches and tea, Elizabeth had the excellent idea of showing the couple the actual letter from Monsieur Rabaillat. They read it with some quizzical glancing back and forth, but the salient point—Marguerite, a fifteen year-old girl—was not lost on the Berards, who patted Lizzie on the shoulder with real concern.
“Ah, ta petite soeur?”
Miss Asherwood recognized the word for sister, and nodded.
This resulted in a long conversation between the innkeeper and his wife, who turned back to her to say—with Madame Berard putting her hands against one cheek, miming sleep—
“Tu devrais dormir.”
Elizabeth nodded. It was probably the best idea.
But now, the next morning, she was feeling refreshed and ready to tackle the most important leg of her journey. She would need to hire a carriage, of course, but how difficult could that be? Especially as before finally retiring for the evening, in another moment of inspiration, she had sketched a simple map for the Berards, with the towns of Calais, Doullens and Amiens clearly shown, and a line drawn between the first two.
“Oui, oui,” they both said, nodding, so they understood her.
The sense of freedom she had experienced in the last two days, the idea of making her own way in the world, was exhilarating. And yet Lizzie recognized the worry at the back of her mind. She would need to find Marguerite, whom she had never met. Her French was impossible. And what if her path crossed with that of her sister’s on the road to the chateau? That would be most unfortunate.
She made her way down from her room—which had been simple and spotlessly clean—to the small morning salon, hoping for more brioches. She was not feeling at her absolute best, but the hotel’s maid had been able to clean her dress, getting nearly all of the Shooter’s Hill mud from its hem, and she had enjoyed a small bath.
Although her coiffure, such as it was, was still a minor catastrophe.
“Ah, Miss Asherwood,” came a familiar voice. Will you join me?”
* * *
Chapter 54
Pierre-Louis Has a Headache
Lefèvre’s head ached, and he wanted nothing more, on this fine summer morning, than to return the comtesse to Beauvoir and never set eyes on the woman again.
Pierre-Louis was a braggart and a bully, but he was no murderer nor—despite the worried look that Armand had given old Baston—was he a rapist. The comtesse had been safe enough, speaking very generally, with him. And Lefèvre even had a few moments of peace when Dumont and his men had left, after he’d calmed down and decided that she had not been badly hurt. A few moments to imagine that perhaps his scheme would work after all, that Alice du Merveille would believe he was her rescuer and be grateful.
The next day the comtesse began to stir, but she was weak and confused and did not seem to recognize Lefèvre. Then she would sleep again, and Pierre-Louis became concerned enough at one point to fetch the village doctor.
“What’s going on here?” asked the doctor. “Who is this woman?”
Lefèvre tried his story of kidnapping and rescue.
“Hmm,” said the man, disbelieving, but he examined the comtesse, and said that she would recover, although it might take another day.
The next morning Alice du Merveille woke up for good.
She did not believe his story, not a word, not for a second, and if Lefèvre did not return her to Marguerite this instant—
He had offered to go get the girl. That had been a mistake.
Only the fact that Arnaud Dumont’s blow had left her still shaky kept the comtesse from walking out his front door. But she would walk out soon, and back to the chateau, no matter how long it took, and Lefèvre could imagine the humiliation he was in for when word got around.
It had been a stupid scheme.
The comtesse began cursing him roundly, and loudly, and anyone passing by the house must have heard her descriptions of Pierre-Louis’s background, his intellectual capabilities, and his general cleanliness.
The woman’s vocabulary, Lefèvre had to admit, was impressive.
“Look,” he finally said, as the headache worsened. “You can walk to Beauvoir, but it will take a long time. If you want to see Marguerite more quickly, stop yelling and I will get the horse and cart.”
She stared at him.
“D’ accord,” said Alice du Merveille. “Let us go.”
* * *
Chapter 55
A Spy? For France?
Peregrine almost laughed at the girl’s reaction; she stood frozen, with her mouth opened in a soundless ‘oh!’. The picture of astonishment.
“Lord . . . Lord Blakeley,” she said. “But where—?”
Then she seemed to regain her composure, and her chin notched up.
“Lord Blakeley,” said Miss Asherwood, evenly. “What a pleasant surprise.”
She did look a bit worse for wear, he noticed. Not quite the fashionable London miss anymore; her day dress was sporting a few wrinkles, its hem slightly soiled, and her hair still showed the effects of a channel crossing.
She was the loveliest and most desirable woman he had ever seen.
“Have some coffee,” he said, motioning to the chair across
from him. “And the brioches are excellent.”
How was this possible?
What was the man doing here?
But Elizabeth felt some embarrassment at her next thought, which was one of relief. Thank heavens. Someone who can speak French.
You are a strong, independent female, she reminded herself.
Still—
“It is fortunate you are here,” she told Lord Blakeley, as if the situation was perfectly common. “I am looking for Monsieur Rabaillat, but no-one at the hotel seems to know that gentleman. Have you seen him?”
“Ah,” said his lordship. “Well, I suppose I should explain.”
“What!”
Miss Asherwood’s feelings could not have been more clear. Her eyes blazed with indignation, and if Madame Berard had not at that moment returned with a fresh pot of coffee, Peregrine was sure she would have stood up and stomped from the room.
“You . . . you—”
“Cad?” suggested Lord Blakeley.
“Why would you do such a thing?”
“I had to consider the possibility that you were . . . an agent.”
Miss Asherwood frowned. “An agent?”
“Ah, yes. A French spy.”
She was speechless. Then, to Peregrine’s surprise, Elizabeth Asherwood broke into peals of laughter.
“A spy? For France? But you’ve heard me speak French!”
“Yes, but—” Lord Blakeley hesitated.
Miss Asherwood waited, eyebrows raised. “But what?”
“I thought perhaps it was an act.”
“An act.”
“I didn’t think . . . it didn’t seem possible anyone could really speak the language that badly.”
More laughter. Peregrine, who realized the entire thing sounded ridiculous to Elizabeth, was experiencing an unaccustomed sentiment, to whit, chagrin. Why was it that he had such difficulty being a cool and sophisticated gentleman around this girl?
Miss Asherwood’s face was streaming with tears of mirth. He waited until she had recovered sufficiently, and then silently handed her his handkerchief. She thanked him and dabbed at her cheeks.
