Hardly daring to move, he turned his head to look at the shop directly opposite the row of neat houses.
On that horrific day when he had run from his home, heedless of the blood on his hands, he had paused only to stare at this same shop. Then it had been titled, Tom Ozzard, Scrivener. Now he had enlarged the premises and had added & Son to his name.
He thought of the time when the surgeon Sir Piers Blachford had spoken out about this same scrivener, and had remarked that it was the only time he had heard the name Ozzard. He had nearly collapsed. Why did I come?
“You lookin’ fer somethin’, matey?”
Ozzard shook his head. “No. Thank you.” He turned away to conceal his face.
“Suit yerself.” The unknown man lurched away towards a tavern which Ozzard knew lay behind the shops. Knew, because he had paused there for a glass of ginger beer on his way home. The lawyer who had employed him as his senior clerk had sent him off early to show his appreciation for all the extra work he had done. If only he had not stopped for a drink. Even as the hazy idea formed in his mind he knew he was deluding himself. She must have been laughing at him for months. Waiting for him to go to his office near Billingsgate, then for her lover to come to her. Surely others in the street must have known or guessed what was happening? Why hadn’t someone told him?
He leaned against a wall and felt the vomit rising in his throat.
So young and beautiful. She had been lying in her lover’s arms when he had walked in unsuspectingly from the street. It had been a sunny day, full of promise, just as today had started out.
The screams began again, rising to a piercing screech as the axe had smashed down on their nakedness. Again, again, and again, until the room had been like some of the sights he had seen since he had met with Richard Bolitho.
He did not hear the heavy tramp of feet and the clink of weapons until a voice shouted, “You there! Stand and be examined!”
He could barely stop himself shaking as he turned and saw the press gang poised on the corner he had just come around. Not like the ones you saw in fishing villages or naval seaports. These men were armed to the teeth as they hunted for likely recruits in an area which was crammed with sailors, nearly all of whom would have the right papers, the “Protection” to keep them free of the navy.
A massive gunner’s mate, a cudgel hanging from his wrist, a cutlass thrust carelessly through his belt, said, “Wot’s this then?” He peered at Ozzard’s blue coat with the bright gilt buttons, the buckled shoes beloved by sailors whenever they had funds enough to buy them. “You’re no sailor, I’ll be damn sure o’ that!” He put a hand on Ozzard’s shoulder and swung him round to face his grinning party of seamen. “What say you, lads?”
Ozzard said shakily, “I—I do serve—”
“Stand aside!” A lieutenant pushed through his men and regarded Ozzard curiously. “Speak up, fellow! The Fleet needs more hands.” He ran his eye over Ozzard’s frail person. “What ship, if serve you do?”
“I—I am servant to Sir Richard Bolitho.” He found he was able to look up at the lieutenant without flinching. “Vice-Admiral of the Red. He is presently in London.”
The lieutenant asked, “Hyperion —was she your last ship?” All his impatience had gone. As Ozzard nodded he said, “Be off with you, man. This is no place for honest people after dark.”
The gunner’s mate glanced at his lieutenant as if for consent, then pressed some coins into Ozzard’s fist.
“’Ere, go an’ get a good wet. Reckon you’ve bloody earned it after wot you must ’er seen an’ done!”
Ozzard blinked and nearly broke down. A wet. What Allday would have said. His whole being wanted to scream at them. Didn’t they see the name on the shop front? What would they have said had he told them how he had run most of the way to Tower Hill to seek out a recruiting party? In those days there was always one hanging around near the taverns and the theatre. Ready to ply some drunken fool with rum before they signed him on in a daze of patriotic fervour. How would they have behaved if he’d described what he had left behind in that quiet little house? He made himself look at it. The window was no longer in the sun.
When he turned the press gang had vanished, and for a second longer he imagined it was another part of the torment, the stab of guilt which left him no peace. Then he looked down at his hand and opened the fingers while his body began to shake uncontrollably. There were the coins the gunner’s mate had given him. “I don’t want your pity.” The coins jangled across the cobbles as he flung them into the lengthening shadows. “Leave me alone!”
He heard someone call out, saw a curtain move in the house next to the one which had once been his. But nobody came.
He sighed and turned his back on the place, and the shop with his stolen name on the front.
Somewhere in the warren of alleys he heard a sudden scuffle, someone bellow with pain, then silence. The press gang had found at least one victim who would awake with a bloody head aboard the Thames guardship.
Ozzard thrust his hands into his coat pockets and began the long walk back to that other part of London.
His small figure was soon lost in the shadows, while behind him, the house was as before. Waiting.
Just a few miles upstream from Wapping where Ozzard had made his despairing pilgrimage, Bolitho bent over to offer his hand to Catherine, and assist her from the wherry in which they had crossed the Thames. It was early darkness, the cloudless sky pinpointed with countless stars: a perfect evening to begin what Catherine had promised to be “a night of enchantment.”
Bolitho put some money into the wherryman’s hand, with a little extra so that he would be here to carry them back across the swirling black river. The man had a cheeky grin, and had not taken his eyes off Catherine while he had pulled his smart little craft lustily over the choppy water.
Bolitho did not blame him. She had been standing in Lord Browne’s hallway beneath a glittering chandelier when he had come down the staircase. In a gown of shot silk, very like the one she had worn that night in Antigua when he had met her again for the first time after so long. Catherine loved green, and her gown seemed to change from it to black as she had turned towards him. It was low-cut to reveal her throat and the full promise of her breasts. Her hair was piled high, and he had seen that she was wearing the same filigree earrings which had been his first-ever gift to her. The ones she had somehow managed to sew into her clothing when she had been forced into the Waites prison.
The wherryman flashed him a broad grin. “I’ll be ’ere, Admiral—nah you go off an’ enjoy yerselves!”
Bolitho watched the little boat speed back across the river to seek out another fare.
“I don’t understand.” He looked down at his plain blue coat, bought in Falmouth from old Joshua Miller. He and his father had been making uniforms for the Bolitho family and other Falmouth sea-officers longer than anyone could recall. “How did he know?”
She flicked open her new fan and watched him above it, her eyes shining in the glow of many lanterns. “More people know about us than I thought!” She tossed her head. “What do you think, Richard? My little surprise—to take your mind off weight-ier matters?”
Bolitho had heard of the London pleasure gardens but had never visited any. This one at Vauxhall was the most famous of all. It certainly looked enchanted. Lantern-lit groves, wild rose hedges, and the sound of birds who enjoyed the merriment and music as much as the visitors.
Bolitho paid the entrance fee of half a crown each and allowed Catherine to guide him into the Grand Walk, a place for promenade, lined with exactly matching elms, and past little gravel walks with secret grottoes and quiet cascades and fountains.
She tightened her grip on his arm and said, “I knew you’d like it. My London.” She gestured with the fan towards the many supper booths where splendidly dressed women and their escorts listened to the various orchestras, sipping champagne, cider or claret as the fancy took them.
She said, “Man
y of the musicians are from the finest orchestras. They work here to keep their pockets filled, their bellies too, until the season returns.”
Bolitho removed his hat and carried it. The place was packed with people, the air heavy with perfume to mingle with the flowers and the distant smell of the river.
Catherine had been wearing a broad Spanish-style shawl, for it was known to be cold along the river at night. Now she let it drop to her arms, her throat and breasts shining in lanternlight or changing into provocative depths and shadows as they walked along a path.
It was like an endless panorama, where comic songs and bawdy ballads shared the same status as the work of great composers and lively dancing. There were plenty of uniforms too. Mostly red with the blue facings of the Royal regiments, and some sea-captains from the many ships moored below London Bridge, and the twisting route which would carry them back to the sea once more.
They paused where two paths crossed, so that it was possible to hear the music of Handel from one angle, while from the opposite direction they could listen to someone singing “Lass of Richmond Hill.” And neither seemed to detract from the other, Bolitho thought. Or perhaps it really was enchanted . . .
On the extreme of the brightly lit gardens was “The Dark Walk.” Catherine led him into the deep shadows where other couples stood and embraced, or merely held one another in silence.
Then she turned and lifted her face to him, pale in the darkness. “And no, dearest of men, I never walked here with another.”
“I would not have blamed you, Kate. Or the man who would lose his heart to you as I did.”
She said, “Kiss me. Hold me.”
Bolitho felt her arch towards him; sensed the power of their love which hurled all caution and reserve aside.
He heard her gasp as he kissed her neck and then her shoulder, and pulled her closer without even a glance as a pair of strolling lovers passed by.
He said into her skin, “I want you, Kate.”
She pretended to push him away, but he knew her excitement matched his own.
She touched his mouth with the fan as he released her and said, “But first we eat. I have arranged for a booth. It will be a private place.” She gave her infectious laugh, something which at times in the past Bolitho had thought never to hear again. “As private as anything can be in Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens!”
The time passed with an impossible speed while they sat in their little flower-bedecked booth, toying with their salads and roasted chicken, enjoying the wine and the music, but most of all each other.
She said, “You are staring at me.” She dropped her eyes and took his hand in hers across the table. “You make me feel so wanton—I should be ashamed.”
“You’ve a beautiful neck. It seems wrong to hide it, and yet . . .”
She watched him wondering.
“I will buy something for it. Just to adorn what is already so lovely.”
She smiled. “Only in your eyes.” Then she squeezed his hand until it hurt. “I am so in love with you, Richard. You just don’t know.” She touched her eyes with a handkerchief. “There, see what you’ve done!” When she looked at him again they were very bright. “Let us go and find our lecherous wherryman. I have such need of you I can scarcely wait!”
They walked back along the path towards the gates. Catherine pulled her long shawl over her bare shoulders and shivered. “I never want the summer to end.”
Bolitho smiled, passion and excitement making him light-headed, as if he had had too much wine.
“Wait here in the shelter. I will make certain that the waterman you described so well is alongside.”
She called after him as he turned by the gates. “Richard. I do like your hair like that. You look so . . . dashing.”
She watched him pass into the shadows and drew the shawl more tightly around her; then she turned as a voice said, “All alone, my dear? That’s very remiss of somebody!”
She observed him calmly. An army captain; not very old, with a lopsided grin which told of some heavy drinking.
She said, “Be off with you. I am not alone, and even if I were—”
“Now let’s not be hasty, m’dear.” He stepped closer and she saw him stagger. Then he reached out and seized the shawl. “Such beauty should never be hidden!”
“Take your hand off my lady.” Bolitho had not even raised his voice.
Catherine said shortly, “He is full to the gills!”
The captain stared at Bolitho and gave a mock bow. “I did not realise; and in any case she looked like the sort of woman who might favour a poor soldier.”
Bolitho was still very calm. “I would call you out, sir—”
The captain grinned stupidly. “And then I would willingly accept your seconds!”
Bolitho opened his plain blue coat. “You did not let me finish. I would call you out if you were a gentleman and not a drunken lout. So we will settle it here.” The old sword simply seemed to materialise in his hand. “And now!”
Another soldier lurched through some bushes and gaped at the small, tense scene. He was tipsy, but not too drunk to recognise the danger.
“Come away, you damned fool!” To Bolitho he exclaimed, “On his behalf, Sir Richard, I crave your pardon. He is not normally like this.”
Bolitho looked at the captain, his eyes hard. “So I would hope, if only for the sake of England’s safety!”
He slid the sword into its scabbard and deliberately turned his back on the pair. “The boat is ready and waiting, my lady.”
She took his proffered arm and felt it shaking.
“I have never seen you like that before.”
“I am sorry to behave like some hot-headed midshipman.”
She protested, “You were wonderful.” She held up the small reticule which hung from her wrist, and added, “But if he had tried to hurt you he would have got a ball in the buttocks to quieten him down. My little carriage pistol is quite big enough for that.”
Bolitho shook his head. “You are full of surprises!”
By the time the wherry was halfway across the river, weaving expertly through packs of similar craft, he was calm again.
Then he said, “It really was a night of enchantment, Kate. I shall never forget it.”
Catherine glanced at the staring waterman and then allowed the shawl to drop from her shoulders as she leaned against Bolitho and whispered, “It is not yet over, as you will soon discover.”
The waterman left his wherry to assist them out on to the pier. In his trade he carried them all. Men with other men’s wives, sailors and their doxies, young bucks on the hunt for excitement or a brawl which would end blade to blade. But his two fares this evening were like none he had ever carried, and for some strange reason he knew he would always remember them. He thought of the way she had teased him with her shawl and gave a rueful grin. It had been well worth it.
He called after them, “Any time, Sir Richard! Just ask for Bobby—they all knows me on the London River.”
The carriage which had been put at their disposal was standing in line with many others, the coachmen nodding while they waited for their masters who were still over at Vauxhall.
Bolitho saw Ozzard’s gilt buttons glinting in the carriage lamps. It was like a silent warning, and he felt Catherine’s grip tighten on his wrist.
“Is something wrong, Ozzard? There was no need for you to wait with the carriage.”
Ozzard said, “There was a messenger from the Admiralty, Sir Richard. I told him I didn’t know where you were.” His tone suggested he would not have told him anyway. “He left word for you to present yourself to Lord Godschale at your earliest convenience tomorrow.”
Somewhere in another world a church clock began to chime.
Catherine said in a small voice, “Today.”
As they reached the house in Arlington Street, Bolitho said, “It cannot be so urgent. I have no flagship yet, and in any case—”
She turned on the stairway and tossed
her shawl impetuously over the curving banister rail.
“And in any case, my gallant admiral, there is still the night!”
He found her waiting for him beside one of the windows from which, in daylight, you could see the park. She looked at him, her face almost impassive as she said, “Take me, use me any way you will, but always love me.”
Down in the deserted kitchen Allday sat at the scrubbed table and carefully filled a new clay pipe. It had cost him a fortune in London but he doubted if it would last any longer.
He had heard the carriage return and had seen Ozzard going quietly to his bed. Something was troubling him sorely; pulling him apart. He would try and find out what it was.
He lit the pipe and watched the smoke rising in the still air. Then he pulled a tankard of rum towards him and tried not to think of them upstairs.
All the same, he thought, it would make everything just perfect. To feel her defences giving way.
Allday snatched the tankard and took a great swallow.
Aloud he said thickly, “Just watch out for squalls, that’s all I asks of ’em!”
But as he thought of them up there together, he knew that nothing would make any difference.
11 THE MISSION
BOLITHO pushed open the tall doors of the drawing room and stood for a few moments in silence.
Catherine was by one of the windows, looking down at the street, waiting as he was for the inevitable departure.
Then he crossed the room and put his hands on her shoulders, and touched her hair with his mouth. “It is nearly time.”
She nodded and seemed to lean back against him. “I will not let you down, Richard. We have been free to love these past weeks, free from everything. For that I can only be grateful.” She twisted round in his arms and searched his face despairingly. “But perhaps I am greedy, and want so much more.”
Bolitho heard someone bumping his chest down the stairs and stared past her at the empty street. The shadows were lengthening already, each evening drawing in—an early autumn then.
He said, “At least there is no danger. I am to go on a mission—” He hesitated, hating the secrecy. “Should anything go amiss, I have taken care of—”
The Only Victor Page 19
