The Price of Glory

by Seth Hunter

  “He is in England.” Nathan finally managed to get a word in. “He is at my home in England. At my father’s home in Sussex.”

  She stared at him and her face lost some of its colour. She shook her head slowly. “No. How can that be?”

  “Sara, would I lie to you about such a thing? He is with my father in England. Mary told me to take him there—so he would be safe.”

  “Alex is safe? In England?” She still seemed doubtful. She clutched at his shirt as if she would shake the truth out of him and he took her hands and held them in both of his.

  “Yes. So now will you come?”

  “Where in England? Is he with Mary ?”

  “He is with my father in Sussex,” Nathan repeated. “At my father’s home in the Cuckmere Valley, where I lived when I was a boy. I was playing with him on the shore last summer. Netting for prawns in the rock pools at Cuckmere. He is there, Sara,” he insisted. “Waiting for you.”

  “You took him to England?”

  “What else could I do? I thought you were dead. I could not leave him in Paris.”

  “No.” She shook her head but no longer in disbelief. “I am not blaming you. How could I blame you? You have kept him safe for me.” She rewarded him with a dazzling smile and there was laughter in her voice. “I cannot believe it. Alex safe in England. And you are here.” But then the smile faded and a shadow crossed her face. “But if only I had known. I would have found some way of getting there. I would have come to him. To both of you.”

  “But I have come for you instead,” he said.

  “And you still want me?” she repeated wonderingly.

  “Of course I want you.” He almost laughed, though he was close to tears. “I have always wanted you.”

  “But I am not the same.”

  “You are the same to me.”

  “I cannot believe you have come back for me.”

  “You said I would find you here, waiting for me. At the little café in the square. Drinking lemonade and eating cakes made of oranges.”

  “Did I say that?”

  “You did. But it was closed. And I have not had my lemonade, or my cakes.”

  “They did not make the cakes in springtime. They did not make them until the summer, when the oranges were ripe. Otherwise, they would be too bitter. And now nobody makes them.”

  Then the tears came. He bent forward to kiss them away but she pushed him back.

  “I am sorry, Nathan, but so much has happened. So many people have died. And … And I have tasted so much that is bitter to me.”

  He nodded. “It is all right,” he said tenderly. “I will make it all right. We will leave together and I will take you to my ship and we will sail for England—to be reunited with your son.”

  “Leave here?” She looked about her helplessly.

  “Yes. If you can bear it.”

  “When?” She wiped the tears away almost fiercely with the back of her hand.

  He looked towards the setting sun. Impossible to walk through the hills at night. “Tomorrow at first light. We have to be at the coast by sunset, or the ship will leave without us.”

  She looked back at him and he saw that she had decided. “I will make up a bed for you,” she said. “In my father’s room.”

  It was not quite how he would have planned it, but at least she was coming back with him, if only because of Alex.

  And so he slept in her father’s bed and halfway through the night she came to him. She climbed in next to him and he put his arms around her at last. Her cheeks were wet with tears.

  “I never thought I would see you again,” she said. “When I was in the death-cart I thought of you and it was too painful for me. I could not bear it.”

  “I am here now,” he said, and this time she let him kiss away her tears.

  He lay awake until dawn, afraid to sleep in case he missed it, and when he saw the first pale light in the sky he gently shook her awake.

  “We must go now,” he said, “or we will miss the ship.”

  They went by way of the abbey. It was somewhat of a diversion but he had to make sure Whiteley was not still there, waiting for him, in spite of his orders. He could not contemplate turning up with Sara on the beach and telling Duncan he had left his shipmates behind.

  She wore men’s clothes and an old straw hat but no-one would have taken her for a man, save at a great distance. She had bundled a few things into a pack and he saw her put a small pistol in with them. And she took a wicked little knife which she strapped to her left arm under her sleeve. Nathan wondered at this but said nothing.

  It was easier on the return journey for it was mostly downhill and Sara walked almost as fast as he could have walked if he were alone.

  “I am used to walking,” she said. “We went mostly by foot in the Vendée. In the marais and in the forest. It was not often that we rode.”

  It was the only time she had mentioned the Chouans and he did not press her.

  “And then I walked all the way from Brittany.” She smiled at him then and it was like the sun coming out, like the Sara he had known in Paris. “So you would find me here.”

  They made good time but it was still almost noon before they reached the abbey. It appeared deserted. Nathan looked up at the belltower but could see no sentry there.

  “They must have left,” he said. He was a little disappointed even though he had given a direct order. “But we will catch up with them sooner or later.”

  He spoke confidently but he knew they had little time to spare. He wondered if the old man had died during the night or whether Whiteley had been forced to take him with them in a litter. He had to find out for sure before they moved on.

  “I need to look for something,” he said. “In the crypt. You can wait for me here.”

  But she would not let him leave her. “I will come with you,” she said. “I do not like this place.”

  He hesitated. Perhaps he should not tarry. They were obviously not here. But he needed to know if Grimaldi was alive or dead.

  “Very well,” he said, taking her hand. “It will not take a moment.”

  They were crossing the floor of the chapel when he heard the sound of a horse stamping in the yard. Nathan turned to run but there was a man standing in the doorway they had just come through: a man he knew—and it was this that stopped him in his tracks as much as the pistol in his hand, for it was Commissaire Gillet.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  the Sacred Chalice

  SARA BACKED AWAY from the man in the door, her eyes searching the small chapel for a line of retreat. Finding none, she let out a sob and sank to the floor with her face in her hands, but Nathan saw her fingers feel for the hidden knife in her sleeve.

  “No!” he commanded her urgently, though he had acknowledged a long time ago she was not his to command.

  “I confess I am as surprised to see you here, Mr. Turner, as you must be to see me.” Gillet arched his brows in affectation. “Delighted, of course, but amazed. And the countess, too, though I would hardly have recognised her, had we not been so well acquainted in the past.” He favoured her with a bow. “But doubtless all will become clear, in the course of time.”

  He advanced towards them and Nathan saw the empty sleeve pinned to his breast. “You remember the night of the coup,” Gillet prompted him. “In the rain at the Hôtel de Ville? But I have learned to shoot as well with my left arm. Better, perhaps. For I recall that I missed that night, whereas you did not.”

  He was not alone. Three soldiers had entered the chapel behind him—and another: a civilian in a black suit, slouch hat and Hessian boots, less immaculately polished than was usually the case.

  “Another surprise for you,” said Gillet. “I believe Mr. Imlay is an old acquaintance.”

  Nathan swore an oath, but in truth it was not as great a surprise as meeting Gillet. Imlay had a way of turning up when he was least expected, and the possibility had been in Nathan’s mind ever since he had heard of the foreigne
r sent from Paris to find the Grimaldis, though he had told himself it was impossible.

  In fact Imlay looked more shocked than Nathan. “What in God’s name are you doing here?” he demanded with an exasperation that in other circumstances might have been amusing.

  “There will be plenty of time for us to find out about Mr. Turner,” Gillet assured him crisply. “The priority at present is to find Signor Grimaldi.” He looked enquiringly into Nathan’s face. “A name that is familiar to you, perhaps.” Nathan made a play of looking puzzled. “Oh come now. You know how persuasive I can be when there is something I need to know.”

  Nathan knew. He had hung in chains before him, naked, in the House of Arrest while Gillet strode up and down and round and around with a long, thin cane, picking his spot. He could hear the swish before it struck. He could see the look on his face as he watched the pain he caused; not unlike the look that was there now.

  Imlay spoke sharply to him. “Citizen, a word, if you please?”

  Gillet looked into Nathan’s eyes for a moment longer before he responded, his voice ironic. “Of course, Citizen, I am at your disposal.”

  The two men went into a huddle in a corner of the chapel. Nathan watched them carefully. They seemed to be arguing, though their voices were too low for him to hear. He doubted if Imlay commanded here, but you could never be sure with such a man. He noted the position of the three guards: two at the door of the chapel, the other standing to one side under a window with the sunlight behind him. Dragoons—booted and spurred and armed with carbines. But not Gillet’s own thugs. And Imlay’s loyalties were still a matter of conjecture.

  The two men had finished talking. Gillet turned away. He did not look amused. Imlay walked to the door, catching Nathan’s eye and indicating that he was to follow him.

  “Go with them,” Gillet instructed the corporal of dragoons. “And remember,” he said to Nathan, indicating Sara with a jerk of his head, “what you have left here.”

  Nathan walked deliberately up to him, ignoring the pistol levelled at his chest.

  “Touch her, go anywhere near her and I will kill you,” he said. “I have the authority of General Buonaparte and I will do it.”

  He saw the astonishment in Gillet’s eyes and then he turned and followed Imlay to the door.

  “What was that all about?” Imlay said to him in English when they were outside the chapel.

  “What?”

  “About General Buonaparte?”

  “He is a friend of mine. He will do anything for me.”

  “So I heard in Paris. But what is this about having his authority ? Authority for what?”

  “That is not for me to say.”

  Imlay eyed him warily. “Please do not trifle with me, Nathan. The only authority you have is from the British Admiralty. And they sent you to Genoa—with George Grimaldi.”

  So he knew that much. And how much more?

  “So why are you here?” Nathan demanded. “And whose authority do you have?”

  Imlay lowered his voice, though it could be assumed the dragoon did not speak English. “I imagine you were informed about the deal that George Grimaldi was sent to broker in Genoa?”

  Nathan kept his expression blank.

  “The reserves of the Casa di San Giorgio?” Imlay pressed him. “Come now, what else would bring you here?”

  “I’ve no idea what you’re talking about” Nathan told him. He was surprised how relaxed his voice sounded. “I came here for Sara. I found her in Tourettes where she said she would wait for me, and we stopped here on our way to the coast, for refreshment.”

  Imlay stared at him as if he was mad. “For refreshment?” he repeated faintly. He gazed around the ruined abbey in bemusement and then back at Nathan. “Do you take me for a fool?”

  Nathan shrugged. “Believe what you like,” he said. “But it is the truth.”

  Imlay took off his hat and stood for a moment as if in prayer. Then, very deliberately, he said: “Look, I cannot be entirely frank with you but I will tell you this: I need to know what has happened to the gold of the Casa di San Giorgio. That is why I came here from Paris. A great deal depends upon it and …”

  “Your investments in America, I suppose?”

  “That is a part of it, yes. But the gold of the Casa di San Giorgio will purchase a great deal more than that. It will buy the future of my country. And I will stop at nothing, do you understand me, to secure that.”

  “So now you are working for the Americans?”

  Imlay did not reply.

  “Do the British know that? Does Bicknell Coney or Spencer? Do the French? Does that man in there?”

  “If you do not tell me what I need to know, that man in there will tear it out of you with whatever means occur to his sadistic mind. Do you understand that much, at least?”

  “I told you. I came here for Sara.”

  “And I do not believe you. Look, I know what your mission was. I know that the gold was removed from the vaults of the bank and I know that shortly afterwards, Frederico Grimaldi fled with his family and was shipwrecked on the coast not far from here. I know he was probably here at the abbey—until quite recently. And so does Gillet. All we need to know is where he is now. Then, as far as I am concerned, you can go back to your ship with Sara.”

  “What about Gillet? You think he will let us go, just like that?”

  “You may leave Gillet to me.”

  “Oh yes? Well, I am sorry. That is all I have to say to you.”

  “Then I must leave you to him.” Imlay turned away.

  “Wait.” Nathan tried another tack. “What if I were to tell you there is no gold?”

  Imlay turned back and laughed in his face.

  “It is true,” Nathan insisted. “Frederico Grimaldi told me. Before he died.”

  The laughter died in Imlay’s throat. “What do you mean, ‘before he died’?”

  “We found him here, close to death, and we took him back to the Unicorn but we could do nothing for him. He had pneumonia. Then I came back for Sara.”

  Imlay regarded him carefully for a long moment. When he spoke it was with heavy patience, as to a child. “Either you are lying or Frederico Grimaldi was. The Casa di San Giorgio is one of the richest banks in the world. Almost as rich as the Bank of England.”

  “Then pity the Bank of England. There are no reserves. No gold. There has not been for many years. It was all a sham. When the French invaded, the Grimaldis knew they would be found out, so they pretended they had hidden it.”

  “And what of the Sacred Chalice?”

  “Ah. So you know about that?”

  “Yes, I know about that. And now I want to know where it is.”

  Nathan repeated what he had been told by Nicolas Grimaldi. “Someone dropped it. And it shattered in a thousand pieces.”

  “Someone dropped it,” Imlay repeated flatly. He thrust his face closer to Nathan’s. “Do you find this amusing?” He was close to losing his temper. He waved a hand back towards the chapel. “Do you know what that man is ready to do to you—and to Sara?”

  “It was made of glass,” Nathan assured him. “Or you could say sand, like all the treasure of the Casa di San Giorgio.”

  There was still doubt in Imlay’s eyes but then they heard Gillet calling him urgently from within. The chapel was empty but the door to the crypt stood open and Nathan followed Imlay down the steps, the corporal at his heels. Gillet had lit a lamp and was peering at one of the stones in the floor. Nathan looked for Sara and saw her sitting with her back to the wall, head down with her knees drawn up to her chest and her hands clasped round them.

  “They were here,” Gillet said to Imlay. “There is bedding in the corner and someone made a fire: the ashes are still warm. And this stone has been moved.” He pointed. “See the marks on the side. Someone has levered it up.”

  He strode over to the far side of the crypt and stooped down over something on the floor. When he came back Nathan saw that he was holding a
crowbar.

  “They must have used this.” He thrust it at the corporal who inserted it into the crack and levered the stone up a fraction until the other two dragoons could grip it with their hands and pull it back. Nathan eased the dirk out of his boot and held it behind his thigh.

  Gillet peered down into the vault. “It’s a body,” he said.

  “Well, this is a crypt,” Imlay informed him dryly.

  “But he has just been buried. Look. No more than a few hours ago, I would think.”

  Nathan took a step forward and by the light of Gillet’s lantern he saw the waxen face of Frederico Grimaldi.

  “Is this who I think it is?” Imlay asked him.

  Nathan said nothing. He stepped back into the shadows, with the knife in his hand. Gillet crossed over to where Sara was sitting and levelled his pistol at her head, cocking the hammer.

  “It is Grimaldi,” Nathan told him. He looked back at Imlay. “He died just after we got here—and we buried him.”

  “And the gold?”

  “I keep telling you, there was no gold. There is no gold.”

  Gillet gestured with his pistol at Sara. “Strip her,” he ordered the corporal.

  The corporal looked astonished. “Strip her? Me?”

  “You heard me. Now do it!”

  “Gillet!” growled Imlay warningly.

  “Shut up! I command here.”

  The corporal looked to Imlay uncertainly. Gillet reached out and grabbed a handful of Sara’s hair. Then he reeled back with a cry, his hand to his neck and Nathan saw the knife in her hand and the blood. Nathan was already moving, but he could never have moved fast enough. Gillet had the pistol cocked and aimed. The gunshot was thunderous in the confined space.

  But it was Imlay who had fired and Gillet who fell.

  Nathan changed direction and ran at the corporal, stabbing him in the stomach and wrenching the carbine from his hands. Another loud report, almost in his ear, and he saw that Imlay had shot one of the other dragoons. Then through the smoke he saw the third trooper running to pick up his carbine from where he had left it at the foot of the stairs. Nathan fired from the hip and saw him go down.