King, Ship, and Sword l-16

by Dewey Lambdin

  "Denis is right," Charitй sleepily mourned. "And if so many search parties are sent out, how will any of them be able to recognise the Lewries? There are only four of us who know what Lewrie and his wife look like! Are we to dash from one patrol to the next? Is half of France to be arrested 'til we can arrive and sort through them?"

  "If that is what it takes, yes!" Guillaume Choundas demanded.

  "Even given your coach, m'sieur, you could not dash after a lame snail," Fourchette angrily scoffed, "or a batch of escargot in garlic sauce!" He'd had more than enough of this bitter old cripple, his continual bloodthirsty eagerness, and more to the point, Choundas's snide and cutting comments, which galled sore.

  Fourchette shut his eyes for a long moment, half nodding as he contemplated what Fouchй would do when he reported back to Paris; the guillotine was no longer out in the public square, but it still was in operation.

  "It very well may be your head, as you say, Fourchette," the old ogre shot back in a soft coo. "I will be delighted to see that. If I cannot have Lewrie, perhaps I will have you, for letting him escape!

  "Yet…," Choundas continued after a moment, "consider that he is a sailor, hein? We know he flees to the coast, but… perhaps not to a seaport. There is no point in galloping down every narrow country road, when we should be concentrating on the beaches, the inlets, and the lonely coves. Is France not on guard against threats coming from the sea?

  "We let them run," Major Clary understood quickly, "imagining that they elude us. Perhaps they become careless, or too confident, but… all the time, we double the patrols at the coast, and they will eventually have to take passage, hire a fishing smack or steal a boat from somewhere. The locals could arrest them, 'til we do arrive and… sort them out, as you say, Mademoiselle Charitй."

  "Does that mean I can go to bed?" Capitaine Aulard whispered.

  "From Le Havre to Calais, the entire coast," Choundas insisted. "Like frightened gnats, they will fly… buzz-buzz-buzz… unsuspecting into our sticky web! Where the spider will bind them tightly and suck them dry!" Choundas happily conjured, looking like a beast having a blissful orgasm, so much did he like his fantasy.

  Even the jaded Fourchette felt a shiver up his spine.

  "Oui, I dare say we can all go to bed and get a decent rest at last," Major Clary told Aulard. "At dawn, we tell the good colonel to send out more riders to alert the coastal garrisons and police. It may still be necessary to scour the immediate area round Beauvais, but if they travel all night without pausing, they may be too far away for an exhaustive search hereabouts to matter very much. The only question is, where do we place ourselves along the coast to organise the search? Rouen? Amiens?"

  "They landed at Calais," Charitй suggested, perking up no matter how weary she was. "How much of France do they know how to travel?"

  "The soup," a surly waiter growled as he set his tray down atop the rough table, bowls slopping onto the tray. He dealt them out with a glower on his face. "Bon appйtit" he said off-handedly, making that sound more like a curse.

  "Hot potato soup, aha!" Fourchette cheered, quickly spooning up a taste. "Rouen… Amiens… we can decide in the morning. Hй, garзon! Can we get some good wine?"

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  They got beyond Montdidier by farm roads as the unhappy Fleury family, then the Plumbs altered their disguises to those of a pair of old crones, Sir Pulteney doing a remarkable imitation of a woman for a whole day, whilst Alan and Caroline hid in the waggon bed under an even larger pile of pilfered straw. In that guise they crossed the river Somme, then let the Lewries emerge for another set of costumes and aliases. The way Sir Pulteney and Lady Imogene preened, giggled, and congratulated each other really began to cut raw with Lewrie.

  Sir Pulteney became M'sieur Andrй Guyot, a garrulous, somewhat simple and grey-haired "Merry Andrew" with but a muted version of his inane donkey-bray laugh, no longer in need of a cane.

  Himself t'the bone, and he don't have t'act, Lewrie thought of that persona. Might we mention that Lewrie by this time was becoming a touch surly?

  Lady Imogene became Madame Hortense Guyot, streaking her raven hair with touches of grey to play an elegant beauty, wed to an older, well-to-do man, and a silly goose herself, with fond toleration of her husband's foibles.

  "Oh, such a clever ploy, m'dear!" Lady Imogene gushed as they studied themselves in a hand mirror. "And so distinguished-looking!" Be pullin' rabbits out o' his hat next, Lewrie told himself.

  Now they were in Artois and Picardy, so close to the border of the former Austrian Netherlands and the dead Holy Roman Empire (which after 1815 would become Belgium) Sir Pulteney thought it made sense for the Lewries to portray the Guyots' manservant and maid, Flemings or Walloons, half-German really, hired from cross the border years before. Lewrie became a flaxen blond in neat but worn brown woolen ditto; Caroline became a coppery redhead with her face subtley re-done to pinky-raw cheeks and chin. Again, their poor French could be explained by their supposed origins, and in Flanders, Ricardy, and in Artois, no one gave a tinker's dam or the slightest bit of notice to crude Flemish or Walloon folk-as bad as so many Germans to them!

  Sir Pulteney allowed his goose-brained self to be cheated most sinfully at Albert, a small town on the road to Arras and Lille, on a solo trip, then returned to join them in a wood lot short of the town at the reins of a shabby canvas-topped cabriolet with a younger and fresher two-horse team, wishing to make a grand entrance in Lille, he told them as they re-loaded the remaining trunks and valises, which by then had been reduced to but one valise each, and one trunk that held the last disguises Sir Pulteney decided would be apt when they got to the coast.

  Albert to Arras, the famed woolen industry town. But instead of going through it and proceeding on to Lille, as Sir Pulteney had told the cabriolets owner, they turned off the main road once more and resorted to back-roads and farm lanes 'til striking a major highway near Bйthune. There, they bought oats for the horses, bread and wine, cheese, a baked ham, and pair of broiled whole chickens, with all the necessities for a mid-day pique-nique, along with all the utensils and plates, the napkins, cork puller, and large basket necessary. By the looks on the faces of the various vendors by the time they were done, Sir Pulteney and Lady Imogene had made a distinct impression of a pair of cackling twits; so much so, Sir Pulteney whispered once back into the cabriolet, that no one would remember their silent servants! Then they rattled out of Bethunй on the St. Omer road.

  "We will find a place to lay up somewhere off the road," Sir Pulteney informed them. "It will mean sleeping rough tonight. Then I fear poor M'sieur Guyot will be cheated most horribly when he sells the cabriolet in Saint Omer, haw haw! One last change of disguises, then we're off for the coast! Begad, m'dear, ain't it grand to be in harness again? Livin' by our wits! What marvellous sport!"

  They dawdled along the road for the better part of the day, 'til the sun began to decline and traffic began to thin. A mid-day meal was taken en route, without stopping; sliced ham and cheese sandwiches with a mild mustard and pickles, and but one bottle of wine shared by all. Sir Pulteney had forgotten to purchase glasses, and made quite a dither for their lack, japing over how they had to pass that bottle back and forth.

  Finally, as it drew on toward sunset, Sir Pulteney began peering ahead and to larboard for a place to leave the road, muttering over and over, "… sure to be here, just about here, I remember it well, unless they've gone and cut the woods down. Now where is it?"

  This part of France was looking less promising to Lewrie, when it came to a place to go to ground. It was mostly flat and not very interesting, with long gentle slopes that rose only slightly for what seemed miles, then fell away for what looked like even more miles, and the plowed fields they passed, the road bed, looked paler as they passed through a land of chalky soil. There were drainage ditches to either hand and enough windmills to put Lewrie in mind of the Dutch coast.

  "Aha, there it is, Begad!" Sir Pulteney crowed at last
. "Knew we'd stumble cross it sooner or later! See it, m'dear Imogene?"

  "Hortense, cher Andrй… mon coeur," Lady Imogene prompted.

  There was a long, slow rise to the left, what passed for a hill hereabouts, thickly covered with forest, with the faintest trace of a path where waggons or carts had cut a sketch of a road in white, chalky earth. It looked so long un-used that new grass was growing in the ruts, not just the crest of the track, and a few seedlings from the forest had even taken root, some as high as the belly of the cabriolet. Sir Pulteney drew the coach to a stop, stood on the seat to peer up and down the main road, then, satisfied that there was no one visible for miles, sat down and clucked the team up into the woods.

  By the time they had un-hitched the horse team and hobbled them it was sunset, a rather spectacular one of yellow, amber, and crimson, which made Lewrie feel a tad better; the day's dawn had been a clear one, no "red in the morning, sailor take warning." Given the febrile, goose-brained airs that the Plumbs displayed, he was about ready to hunt up a rabbit's foot or spit and dance about three times counter-clockwise for luck!

  There was a spring at the foot of the rise on the western side, and they fetched canvas feed bags of water for the horses 'til they were sated, then gave them their oats.

  From the summit of their low rise, looking down to the northwest and dry!" Choundas happily conjured, looking like a beast having a blissful orgasm, so much did he like his fantasy.

  Even the jaded Fourchette felt a shiver up his spine.

  "Oui, I dare say we can all go to bed and get a decent rest at last," Major Clary told Aulard. "At dawn, we tell the good colonel to send out more riders to alert the coastal garrisons and police. It may still be necessary to scour the immediate area round Beauvais, but if they travel all night without pausing, they may be too far away for an exhaustive search hereabouts to matter very much. The only question is, where do we place ourselves along the coast to organise the search? Rouen? Amiens?"

  "They landed at Calais," Charitй suggested, perking up no matter how weary she was. "How much of France do they know how to travel?"

  "The soup," a surly waiter growled as he set his tray down atop the rough table, bowls slopping onto the tray. He dealt them out with a glower on his face. "Bon appйtit," he said off-handedly, making that sound more like a curse.

  "Hot potato soup, aha!" Fourchette cheered, quickly spooning up a taste. "Rouen… Amiens… we can decide in the morning. Hй, garзon! Can we get some good wine?"

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  They got beyond Montdidier by farm roads as the unhappy Fleury family, then the Plumbs altered their disguises to those of a pair of old crones, Sir Pulteney doing a remarkable imitation of a woman for a whole day, whilst Alan and Caroline hid in the waggon bed under an even larger pile of pilfered straw. In that guise they crossed the river Somme, then let the Lewries emerge for another set of costumes and aliases. The way Sir Pulteney and Lady Imogene preened, giggled, and congratulated each other really began to cut raw with Lewrie.

  Sir Pulteney became M'sieur Andrй Guyot, a garrulous, somewhat simple and grey-haired "Merry Andrew" with but a muted version of his inane donkey-bray laugh, no longer in need of a cane.

  Himself t'the bone, and he don't have tact, Lewrie thought of that persona. Might we mention that Lewrie by this time was becoming a touch surly?

  Lady Imogene became Madame Hortense Guyot, streaking her raven hair with touches of grey to play an elegant beauty, wed to an older, well-to-do man, and a silly goose herself, with fond toleration of her husband's foibles.

  "Oh, such a clever ploy, m'dear!" Lady Imogene gushed as they studied themselves in a hand mirror. "And so distinguished-looking!" Be pullin' rabbits out o' his hat next, Lewrie told himself.

  Now they were in Artois and Picardy, so close to the border of the former Austrian Netherlands and the dead Holy Roman Empire (which after 1815 would become Belgium) Sir Pulteney thought it made sense for the Lewries to portray the Guyots' manservant and maid, Flemings or Walloons, half-German really, hired from cross the border years before. Lewrie became a flaxen blond in neat but worn brown woolen ditto; Caroline became a coppery redhead with her face subtley re-done to pinky-raw cheeks and chin. Again, their poor French could be explained by their supposed origins, and in Flanders, Ricardy, and in Artois, no one gave a tinker's dam or the slightest bit of notice to crude Flemish or Walloon folk-as bad as so many Germans to them!

  Sir Pulteney allowed his goose-brained self to be cheated most sinfully at Albert, a small town on the road to Arras and Lille, on a solo trip, then returned to join them in a wood lot short of the town at the reins of a shabby canvas-topped cabriolet with a younger and fresher two-horse team, wishing to make a grand entrance in Lille, he told them as they re-loaded the remaining trunks and valises, which by then had been reduced to but one valise each, and one trunk that held the last disguises Sir Pulteney decided would be apt when they got to the coast.

  Albert to Arras, the famed woolen industry town. But instead of going through it and proceeding on to Lille, as Sir Pulteney had told the cabriolet's owner, they turned off the main road once more and resorted to back-roads and farm lanes 'til striking a major highway near Bethunй. There, they bought oats for the horses, bread and wine, cheese, a baked ham, and pair of broiled whole chickens, with all the necessities for a mid-day pique-nique, along with all the utensils and plates, the napkins, cork puller, and large basket necessary. By the looks on the faces of the various vendors by the time they were done, Sir Pulteney and Lady Imogene had made a distinct impression of a pair of cackling twits; so much so, Sir Pulteney whispered once back into the cabriolet, that no one would remember their silent servants! Then they rattled out of Bethunй on the St. Omer road.

  "We will find a place to lay up somewhere off the road," Sir Pulteney informed them. "It will mean sleeping rough tonight. Then I fear poor M'sieur Guyot will be cheated most horribly when he sells the cabriolet in Saint Omer, haw haw! One last change of disguises, then we're off for the coast! Begad, m'dear, ain't it grand to be in harness again? Livin' by our wits! What marvellous sport!"

  They dawdled along the road for the better part of the day, 'til the sun began to decline and traffic began to thin. A mid-day meal was taken en route, without stopping; sliced ham and cheese sandwiches with a mild mustard and pickles, and but one bottle of wine shared by all. Sir Pulteney had forgotten to purchase glasses, and made quite a dither for their lack, japing over how they had to pass that bottle back and forth.

  Finally, as it drew on toward sunset, Sir Pulteney began peering ahead and to larboard for a place to leave the road, muttering over and over, "… sure to be here, just about here, I remember it well, unless they've gone and cut the woods down. Now where is it?"

  This part of France was looking less promising to Lewrie, when it came to a place to go to ground. It was mostly flat and not very interesting, with long gentle slopes that rose only slightly for what seemed miles, then fell away for what looked like even more miles, and the plowed fields they passed, the road bed, looked paler as they passed through a land of chalky soil. There were drainage ditches to either hand and enough windmills to put Lewrie in mind of the Dutch coast.

  "Aha, there it is, Begad!" Sir Pulteney crowed at last. "Knew we'd stumble cross it sooner or later! See it, m'dear Imogene?"

  "Hortense, cher Andrй… mon coeur," Lady Imogene prompted.

  There was a long, slow rise to the left, what passed for a hill hereabouts, thickly covered with forest, with the faintest trace of a path where waggons or carts had cut a sketch of a road in white, chalky earth. It looked so long un-used that new grass was growing in the ruts, not just the crest of the track, and a few seedlings from the forest had even taken root, some as high as the belly of the cabriolet. Sir Pulteney drew the coach to a stop, stood on the seat to peer up and down the main road, then, satisfied that there was no one visible for miles, sat down and clucked the team up into the woods.

  By the time
they had un-hitched the horse team and hobbled them it was sunset, a rather spectacular one of yellow, amber, and crimson, which made Lewrie feel a tad better; the day's dawn had been a clear one, no "red in the morning, sailor take warning." Given the febrile, goose-brained airs that the Plumbs displayed, he was about ready to hunt up a rabbit's foot or spit and dance about three times counter-clockwise for luck!

  There was a spring at the foot of the rise on the western side, and they fetched canvas feed bags of water for the horses 'til they were sated, then gave them their oats.

  From the summit of their low rise, looking down to the northwest and west, Lewrie could see quite a long way into the sunset, and the land round them seemed but thinly populated. There was a village, far off, and a manor house a mile or two away. But in the immediate vicinity, there was nothing but empty fields, with not even the yelp of a stray dog to disturb the bucolic quiet.

  "We'll put up the bonnet and let the ladies sleep in the cabriolet" Sir Pulteney suggested. "Blanket rolls beneath for us… hard ground, dews, and wee crawling things. Odd's Blood, what I would give for a straw pallet tonight! Haven't slept rough in ages. It's a feather mattress for me, I tell you!"

  They dug a pit and risked a small fire, hopefully deep enough in those old-growth woods that it would not be seen. In companionable fashion, they spread blankets to sit on and delved into their basket once more for a cold supper. The new bottle of wine that they passed back and forth even proved to be a fairly good cabernet.