by Carola Dunn
Before Isaac could call for help, a second ladder and a rope with a canvas sling snaked down. Two sailors followed. Isaac and Felix were hauled up and deposited on the deck, shivering and streaming with water.
“Your shoulder, Felix?” Miriam’s voice was steady, but Isaac saw tears glinting on her cheeks and knew that Felix’s flirtation with Suzanne had not altered her feelings for him. “I’ll have to bind it again. But first, both of you go below at once and get out of those wet clothes! You are fortunate that the crew are expert at retrieving barrels from the water.”
Felix grinned wryly. “My good fortune is that Isaac has developed a habit of rescuing me from the results of my folly. I should have known I couldn’t make it up that ladder.”
“So should I,” she whispered.
“I don’t suppose we was any of us thinking too clearly just then,” said Hannah briskly. “But we’ve seen the last of the lieutenant and that nasty prefect. Now off with you and get dried off.”
Isaac was turning to obey when Miriam laid her hand on his arm. For a dreadful moment he was afraid she was going to thank him for saving her beloved’s life.
“You won’t let Nathan Rothschild send you to Bordeaux again, will you?” she beseeched him, her eyes searching his face in the moonlight. “Hébert and Grignol will not forget.”
Warmed by her concern, he nearly revealed then that their journey to Bordeaux and beyond had been a ruse. But he couldn’t ask her not to tell Felix, as Kalmann had insisted. He put his hand over hers. “Nathan is no ogre. He will not expect me to go.”
She nodded and gave him a little push towards the cabin boy, who was waiting to show the way below.
His and Felix’s quarters proved to be not a cabin but a corner of the space between decks, screened off by sailcloth hangings and furnished with a pair of hammocks. The only cabin, the captain’s, was reserved for the ladies. Thither, after binding Felix’s arm, Miriam and Hannah retired. Isaac helped Felix into his hammock and climbed cautiously into his own. He scarcely had time to wonder at how comfortable it was before he fell asleep.
As Lavardac had promised, by morning they were far out in the Gironde, the banks a hazy line on each side. The Alouette darted down the estuary like the bird she was named for, not, as the captain explained, the soaring alouette des champs, the lark, but the sandpiper, the alouette de mer.
The captain, a barrel-shaped, black-bearded man, considered it a huge joke to have been shot at by Monsieur Grignol. He spoke English of a sort, his accent a curious mixture of French and Cornish so thick that Isaac found his French easier to understand. He welcomed his passengers on deck, but sent them below whenever another vessel approached.
Felix, pale after his ordeal and his arm once more in a sling, found the companionway difficult to ascend and descend. Though he made light of it, that afternoon when Miriam ordered him to his hammock, he made no protest.
Isaac helped him into the hammock and went up again to find that Hannah had also retired to her quarters. He and Miriam found a sheltered spot to sit looking out over the ruffled blue estuary, dotted with white sails. Herring gulls screamed overhead, timbers creaked, and every now and then a shouted order was followed by the rattle of pulleys and snap of canvas as the Alouette came around on a new tack.
“Can you conceive of anything more peaceful?” Miriam murmured with a sigh. “It’s impossible to imagine storms and sea battles and shipwrecks.”
“Don’t try to imagine them,” Isaac advised, laughing. “At least, not until we are put ashore.”
She smiled at him, her brown eyes sparkling. The breeze played tantalizingly with wisps of glossy red hair. “`Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,’“ she quoted.
“Who said that?”
“Some poet we read at school. Our teacher was at pains to point out the deficiencies of such a philosophy.”
“It has its attractions, though, on a day like this.” Isaac decided to dismiss the future and enjoy the few uninterrupted hours he had with Miriam.
That night under cover of darkness, the Alouette slipped through the narrow opening of the Gironde, past the Cordouan lighthouse, and out into the Bay of Biscay. She skipped and frolicked across the rolling Atlantic waves. When Isaac helped Felix out of his hammock in the morning, Felix stood quite still for a moment, turned green, and grabbed at the nearest bulkhead for support. Isaac grabbed the nearest container, an empty tankard, and handed it to Felix just in time.
At last Felix looked up, pallid and sweating. “I didn’t think I had drunk so much brandy last night,” he groaned.
“I don’t believe it’s a hangover. You are just seasick.
“Just! I’m dying!”
“You might feel better in your hammock. To some extent it counteracts the roll of the ship.”
So Felix returned to his hammock, and admitted that he now merely wanted to die. Isaac soon found out that Hannah, too, was incapacitated. He and Miriam were unaffected.
In fact, he had never felt better. “Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,” he told himself. Once they were back in London he might never see her again. A banker’s courier was not likely to be a welcome guest in the home of the wealthy furrier, nor, if Felix’s parents blessed his marriage, at the home of the Earl of Westwood. But Isaac had a week of her company ahead of him. Except for her visits to the sufferers, for whom she admitted she could do little, and the jovial captain’s occasional intrusions, he had her to himself.
Ignoring twinges of guilt for profiting from Felix’s illness, he took advantage of every minute. They talked endlessly, strolled around the deck, stood at the rail watching the rocky cliffs of Brittany slide past or the red-gold setting sun quench its fires in the limitless western seas. Together they marvelled at dolphins and flying fish, and fed the squawking gulls on scraps. And then she would worry over Felix’s health, or go down to sit with him for a while, sometimes to coax him into eating dry biscuits to keep up his strength, sometimes just to cheer him, and Isaac would be devoured by jealousy.
That she fussed over Hannah, too, was no consolation. He knew her deep devotion to the faithful servant, so he was prepared to believe her equally devoted to Felix.
The days slipped away. Fair winds carried the Alouette around the tip of Brittany and sped her across the Channel. Then one afternoon the captain announced that as soon as it grew dark they would be blindfolded and transferred, along with his cargo, to an English lugger.
The news threw Miriam into a flutter of apprehension. Whatever happened, the longed-for return to her native land was going to change her life completely. One way or another she was bound to lose the freedom she was accustomed to. Would she also lose Isaac? She was more than ever certain that she loved him, but she still could not decipher his feelings.
How she regretted that night in Pau when she had responded to Felix’s kiss and rejected Isaac’s. If only he would kiss her again!
She threw herself into preparing her patients for the move. The last day or two they had both recovered enough to take a little exercise and food, but they were both sadly pulled. At least Felix’s shoulder had benefited from the prolonged rest.
The transfer from ship to ship as a blind, helpless bundle was terrifying, but for once all went smoothly. The smugglers’ slings and tackle worked as well for people as for barrels. Aboard the lugger they were left blindfolded and warned not to speak. Miriam gained the impression that they put in to shore somewhere to unload the barrels. At last the blindfolds were removed and the small ship sailed openly into Plymouth.
Shortly after daybreak the next morning, the travellers sat down to breakfast in the coffee room at the Drake’s Arms.
“Dry land at last,” Hannah sighed thankfully.
“Everyone speaking English at last,” said Felix, laughing, “and not a whiff of garlic in the food. I’m famished.”
“Home at last,” Miriam murmured, but it did not feel like a homecoming. What did it matter where she was if Isaac didn’t love her?
Chapter 23
Soon after arriving in London, Isaac and Felix walked through the City to St. Swithin’s Lane and turned into New Court. Nathan Rothschild’s clerks recognized Isaac. After a few minutes wait, they were ushered into Mr. Rothschild’s private office.
“Good afternoon, gentlemen.” Despite fourteen years in England, seven as a naturalized citizen, his accent was still that of the Frankfurt ghetto. A stocky man in his mid-thirties, beginning to bald, his full lips had a faintly amused expression belied by the piercing quality of his dark eyes. Isaac had seen him at the Royal Exchange, leaning against his favourite pillar near the Cornhill entrance, his face stony and his eyes blank. There, no one could guess his thoughts or intentions. Those who tried were often mistaken, and Nathan Rothschild had built a fortune on their mistakes.
Isaac gave him two copies of Wellington’s receipt, and a letter from his brother Kalmann, wrapped in the oilcloth that had preserved the papers from the waters of the Garonne. Nathan waved them to chairs, opened the package, and perused the contents.
“Very good,” he grunted, and pushed one copy toward Felix. “Here is a receipt for the Treasury, my lord. Mr. Cohen will go with you to present it to ensure that all is in order, but first I must have a private word with him, if you will be so good as to wait.”
Somewhat surprised at his summary dismissal, Felix stood up and took the receipt.
“We can go to the Treasury tomorrow if you prefer,” Isaac suggested.
“No, I’ll wait. Good day, Mr. Rothschild.”
“Good day, my lord.” As the door closed behind the outsider, Nathan leaned back in his chair and nodded at Isaac. “A good job, Cohen.”
“Did you know we were to be used as decoys, sir?” His anger stirred anew.
“No, that was Jakob’s notion, I gather, as was involving this Miss Jacobson. He is young yet. I am acquainted with Aaron Jacobson and I doubt he’ll be pleased to hear his daughter was used so.”
“Miss Jacobson will tell him of the journey, of course, but neither she nor Felix--Lord Roworth--knows we were escorting a load of lead.”
“Your discretion is admirable.” Nathan stared consideringly at Isaac. “Kalmann says that he and Jakob expected to write off as expenses the gold used to disguise the lead. He suggests that, for your efforts in preserving it, you should receive half its value. I shall have an account opened in your name in the amount of three thousand pounds.”
“Three thousand...!” He stiffened. “You do not need to buy my silence, sir.”
“I am aware of that. Permit me to reward a capable and trusted employee. They are not so easy to find.”
“Thank you, sir. I am not such a fool as to refuse,” he said ruefully. An idea struck him. “Do you think... I don’t suppose you would consider hiring Lord Roworth? I doubt he earns much at the Treasury and I know he dislikes his position. He’s a good fellow.”
Nathan’s eyes narrowed and he tapped his lower lip thoughtfully. “Lord Roworth. Viscount, and heir to an earldom. His title and connections could prove useful to me, I daresay. Do you think he would be willing to work for a Jew?”
“I cannot say, but at least he won’t be horrified at the notion as he would have been two months ago.”
“Ach, so? You have changed his mind about us?”
“I believe so, sir, I and Miss Jacobson. He might even support Jewish emancipation when he takes his seat in the House of Lords.”
“I shall offer him a position,” said Nathan decisively. “Ask him to step back in.”
So Isaac went out and sent Felix in. Tactfully he stayed in the outer office, presided over by Mr. Rothschild’s chief clerk. Pacing about the room, he at once began to wonder what had possessed him to propose Felix as a Rothschild employee.
If he accepted Nathan’s offer, would it make him more or less likely to wed Miriam? Isaac was not even sure whether he wanted Felix to wed Miriam, for the sake of her happiness, or to give in to family pressure and cry off, thus giving Isaac some hope of winning her.
With three thousand pounds in the bank, he no longer felt himself utterly ineligible. But nine years ago he had been wealthy and she had rejected him anyway. He suppressed a groan.
Felix came out a few minutes later, his step jaunty, his face jubilant. He shook Isaac’s hand and slapped him on the shoulder.
“I have you to thank for this, old fellow,” he said.
“You have accepted?”
“At double the salary, how could I refuse? You know my family’s situation. Let’s go to the Treasury right away, get the business over and hand in my resignation.”
They walked to Lombard Street and found a hackney to take them to Whitehall. Isaac lent no more than half an ear to his companion’s wry remarks. As the somewhat smelly vehicle carried them down Cheapside and past St. Paul’s, he came to the conclusion that Felix was not talking like a man about to tie the knot with an heiress.
“Are you going to marry Miriam?” he interrupted.
“What? Me? Given half a chance I’d marry her like a shot, but she won’t have me.”
“Won’t have you?” Isaac’s heart gave a cautious hop.
“I asked her in St.-Jean and she turned me down,” said Felix simply. “I told her I’d be waiting if she changed her mind, but I don’t have much hope.”
The world whirled about his head. “Are you sure?”
“Believe me, when the woman you love turns you down you know it.”
“Yes...yes, of course.” The moment had come when he could no longer hide behind a painful memory. He ached to hold Miriam in his arms, to keep her at his side for ever, and to win all, he must risk all. He reached for the hackney’s door handle. “I have to find the matchmaker, but I can’t remember her name.”
Felix grabbed his arm. “Getting out in the middle of Fleet Street won’t help. Deuced if I can see what you want with a matchmaker, but if that’s the way of it, I daresay it can wait till after we have been to Whitehall.”
“Weiss, that’s it! Mrs. Weiss. Somewhere in Whitechapel. My landlady might know how to get in touch.”
“She’s bound to, old fellow. Stands to reason. Landladies know everything,” said Felix soothingly. “And if she doesn’t, you can always just go and throw yourself at Miriam’s feet.”
Isaac laughed. “To be sure. I’d rather do the thing properly, but if it’s impossible, I’ll just go and throw myself at Miriam’s feet.”
Miriam allowed her parents several hours of unalloyed rejoicing over the return of their long-lost only child. She waited until they met before dinner in the drawing room-- refurbished in the same shades of red--to inform them that she had come to her senses and intended to marry the man they had found for her nine years ago.
“I have come to realize,” she said demurely, “that you knew what was best for me all along, Mama.”
Seated beside her on the crimson-brocaded love seat, her mother patted her hand. “It would have saved a great deal of heartache if you had come to your senses sooner, my dear,” she said. “However, better late than never. Of course, Isaac Cohen is no longer eligible, but your father will find someone equally suitable.”
“Only the best for my dear girl.” Mr. Jacobson, standing by the fireplace with his hands linked behind his back, nodded and beamed. His side-whiskers had greyed during Miriam’s long absence, she noted with a pang, and new lines in his face suggested sadness. She feared she was responsible.
Impulsively she jumped up and ran to embrace him. “Dearest Papa, you need not go to any trouble to find me a husband. Isaac Cohen will suit me very well.”
“Out of the question,” her mother said. “If it was only a matter of his losing his fortune--but he has taken some quite menial employ and abandoned his Talmudic studies. Indeed, I have heard that he is become almost a free thinker! Your Papa wants a man of learning for you, Miriam.”
She turned to face her mother, her arm about her father’s waist. He put his arm around her shoulders and gave her a gentle squee
ze. His love comforted her though she felt no need of his support.
“You mean a religious scholar, Mama, but you are not religious, so why should I be? Isaac is no less learned for having abandoned a strict interpretation of the law. I respect and admire his views and I want to marry him.”
“And how do you know so much about Mr. Cohen’s views, miss?”
Miriam smiled. “As yet I have told you little of how I found my way home. For the past two months I have been travelling with Mr. Cohen, and another gentleman. And Hannah, of course,” she added as Mrs. Jacobson’s face froze in an expression of horror.
“Ah, Hannah, bless her. She has been a faithful servant. Nonetheless, you must be married, and quickly. But not to Isaac Cohen.”
“Then I shall run off with the other gentleman who travelled with us.”
“Since you talk of running off, I assume he is equally ineligible.”
“That is a matter of opinion. He is Felix, Viscount Roworth, heir to the Earl of Westwood.”
Her mother gasped, and she felt her father take a sudden breath. “You have been moving in exalted company, my love,” he said.
“He asked me to marry him, Papa.” She looked up at him and he kissed her forehead.
“No!” said Mrs. Jacobson sharply. “Better a poor, non-observant Jew than a wealthy, titled Goy. If you must have Isaac Cohen, then you shall have him. Has he, too, asked for your hand without consulting your father?”
Miriam turned her face to her father’s shoulder. “No.”
“Well, you need not fear he will spurn the match, penniless as he is.”
She swung round and cried out, “Isaac has too much integrity to marry for money!” Then in a low voice she continued, “And I do not know whether he loves me.”
Mr. Jacobson took charge. Hugging his daughter to him, he spoke over her shoulder to his wife: “My dear, you had best send for the matchmaker at once.”
