Beauvallet

by Georgette Heyer

  ‘I conceive that to be none of your business, señor. If you must know I am on my way home from Santiago to Spain.’

  ‘Why, an evil chance,’ said Beauvallet sympathetically. ‘What folly possessed that numskull of a commander of yours to open fire on me?’

  ‘Don Juan did his duty, señor,’ said Don Manuel haughtily.

  ‘Alack then, that virtue has not been better rewarded,’ said Sir Nicholas lightly. ‘And what am I to do with you?’ He bit his finger, pondering the question. ‘There is of course the long boat. She puts off as soon as may be for the island of Dominica. It lies some three miles to the north of us. Do you choose to go aboard her?’

  Dona Dominica took a quick step forward. Since her fears were lulled her temper rose. This careless manner was not to be borne. She broke into impassioned speech, shooting her words at Beauvallet. ‘Is that all you can say? Sea-robber! Hateful pirate! Is it nothing to you that we must put back to the Indies and wait perhaps months for another ship? Oh nothing, nothing! You see where my father stands, a sick man, and you care nothing that you expose him to such rough usage. Base, wicked robber! What do you care! Nothing! I could spit on you for a vile English freebooter!’ She ended in a sob of rage, and stamped her foot at him.

  ‘Good lack!’ said Beauvallet, staring down into that exquisite face of fury. A smile of amusement and of admiration crept into his eyes. It caused Dona Dominica to lose the last shreds of her temper. What would you? She was a maid all fire and spirit. She struck at him, and he caught her hand and held it, pulled her closer, and looked down into her face with eyes a-twinkle. ‘I cry pardon, señora. We will amend all.’ He turned his head and sent a shout ringing for his lieutenant.

  ‘Loose me!’ Dominica said, and tried to pull her hand away. ‘Loose me!’

  ‘Why, you would scratch me if I did,’ Beauvallet said, teasing.

  It was not to be borne. The lady's eyes fell, and encountered the hilt of a dagger in Beauvallet's belt. She raised them again, held his in a defiant stare, and stole her hand to the dagger's hilt.

  Sir Nicholas looked quickly down, saw what she would be at, and laughed. ‘Brave lass!’ He let her go, let her draw out his dagger, and flung wide his arms. ‘Come then! Have at me!’

  She stepped back, uncertain and bewildered, wondering what manner of man was this who could mock at death itself. ‘If you touch me I will kill you,’ she said through her teeth.

  Still he came on, twinkling, daring her. She drew back until the bulwarks stayed her.

  ‘Now strike!’ invited Beauvallet. ‘I’ll swear you have the stomach for it!’

  ‘My daughter!’ Don Manuel was aghast. ‘Give back that knife! I command you! Señor, be good enough to stand back.’

  Beauvallet turned away from the lady. It seemed he gave no second thought to the dangerous weapon she held. He waited for Dangerfield to come up, standing with his hands tucked negligently into his belt.

  ‘Sir, you called me?’

  Beauvallet indicated Don Manuel and his daughter with a comprehensive sweep of his hand. ‘Convey Don Manuel de Rada y Sylva and his daughter aboard the Venture,’ he said, in Spanish.

  Don Manuel started; Dominica gave a gasp. ‘Is it a jest, señor?’ Don Manuel demanded.

  ‘In God's Name, why should I jest?’

  ‘You make us prisoners?’

  ‘Nay, I bid you be my guests, señor. I said I would amend all.’

  The lady broke out again. ‘You mock us! You shall not take us aboard your ship. We will not go!’

  Beauvallet set his hands on his hips. The mobile eyebrow went up again. ‘How now? First you will and then you will not. You tell me I am a dog to hinder your return to Spain, and curse me roundly for a rogue. Well, I have said I will amend the fault: I will convey you to Spain with all speed. What ails you then?’

  ‘Take us to Spain!’ said Don Manuel uncomprehendingly.

  ‘You cannot!’ cried Dominica, incredulous. ‘You dare not!’

  ‘Dare not? God's Son, I am Nick Beauvallet!’ said Sir Nicholas, amazed. ‘Dared I sail into Vigo a year back, and lay all waste? What should stop me?’

  She flung up her hands, and the dagger flashed in the sunlight. ‘Oh, now I know that they named you well who named you Mad Beauvallet!’

  ‘You have it wrong,’ Beauvallet said, jesting. ‘Mad Nicholas is the name they call me. I make you free of it, señora.’

  Don Manuel interposed. ‘Señor, I do not understand you. I cannot believe you speak in good faith.’

  ‘The best in the world, señor. Is an Englishman's word good enough?’

  Don Manuel knew not how to answer. It was left for his daughter to say No, very hotly. All she got by that was a quick look and a slight laugh.

  Across the deck came Don Juan de Narvaez, stately even in defeat. He bowed low to Don Manuel, lower still to Dona Dominica, and ignored Beauvallet. ‘Señor, the boat waits. Permit me to escort you.’

  ‘Get you aboard, Señor Punctilio,’ said Sir Nicholas. ‘Don Manuel sails with me.’

  ‘No!’ said Dominica. But it is very certain that she meant yes.

  ‘I have no desire to jest with you, señor,’ Don Juan said coldly. ‘Don Manuel de Rada naturally sails with me.’

  A long finger beckoned to Don Juan's guard. ‘Escort Don Juan to the long boat,’ said Sir Nicholas.

  ‘I do not stir from here without Don Manuel and his daughter,’ said Narvaez, and struck an attitude.

  ‘Take him away,’ said Sir Nicholas, bored. ‘God speed you, señor.’ Narvaez was led away, protesting. ‘Señora, be pleased to go aboard the Venture. Diccon, have their traps conveyed at once.’

  Dominica braved him, to see what might come of it. ‘I will not go!’ She clenched the dagger. ‘Constrain me at your peril!’

  ‘A challenge?’ inquired Beauvallet. ‘Oh, rash! I told you that I never refused a challenge.’ He bore down upon her, and dodged, laughing, the dagger's point. He caught her wrist, and had his other arm firmly clipped about her waist. ‘Cry peace, sweetheart,’ he said, and took the dagger from her, and restored it to its sheath. ‘Come!’ he said, tossed her up in his arms, and strode off with her to the quarter-deck.

  Dominica forebore resistance. It would be useless, she knew, and her dignity would suffer. She permitted herself to be carried off, and liked the manner of it. They did not use such ready methods in Spain. There was great strength in the arm that upheld her, and the very carelessness of the man intrigued one. A strange, mad fellow, with an odd directness. One would know more of him.

  She was carried down the companion into the waist, where the men were busy with the treasure – China silks, and linen-cloths, ingots of gold, bars of silver, and spices from the islands. ‘Robber!’ said Dominica softly.

  He chuckled. It was annoying. To the bulwarks he went, and she wondered how he would manage now. But he did it easily enough, with a hand on the shrouds, and a leap up. He stood poised a moment. ‘Welcome aboard the Venture, sweetheart!’ he said audaciously, and climbed down with her safe tucked in his arm to his own poop-deck below.

  She was set on her feet, ruffled and speechless, and saw her father being helped carefully down the side of the tall galleon. Don Manuel appeared to be both bewildered and amused.

  ‘See them well bestowed, Diccon,’ Beauvallet bade the fair youth, and went back the way he had come.

  ‘Will it please you to come below, señora?’ Dangerfield said shyly, and bowed to them both. ‘Your chests will be here anon.’

  Don Manuel smiled a little wryly. ‘I think the man is either mad – or else – an odd, whimsical fellow, my daughter,’ he remarked. ‘We shall doubtless learn which in time.’

  Two

  Dona Dominica was escorted below decks, and led to a fair cabin which she guessed to be the home of Master Dangerfield, hurriedly evicted. She was left there alone, while Master Dangerfield took her father on to yet another cabin. She took stock of her surroundings, and was pleased to approve. The
re were mellow walls, oak-panelled, a cushioned seat under the porthole, a table with carved legs, a joint-stool, a fine Flanders chest, a cupboard against the bulkhead, and the bunk.

  There was presently a discreet scratching on the door. She bade enter, and a small man with an inquisitive nose and very bravely curling mustachios insinuated his head into the room. Dona Dominica regarded him in silence. A pair of shrewd grey eyes smiled deprecatingly. ‘Permit that I bring your chests, señora,’ said the newcomer in perfect Spanish. ‘Also your ladyship's woman.’

  ‘Maria!’ called out Dominica joyfully.

  The door was opened farther to admit a plump creature who flew to her, and sobbed, and laughed. ‘Señorita! They have not harmed you!’ She fell to patting Dominica's hands, and kissing them.

  ‘But where were you all this time?’ Dominica asked.

  ‘They locked me in the cabin, señorita! Miguel de Vasso it was! Serve him right that he took a grievous knock on the head! But you?’

  ‘I am safe,’ Dominica answered. ‘But what will happen to us I know not. The world's upside down, I believe.’

  The man with the mustachios came into the room and revealed a spare figure garbed in sober brown fustian. ‘Have no fear, señora,’ said this worthy cheerfully. ‘You sail upon the Venture, and we do not harm women. Faith of an Englishman!’

  ‘Who are you?’ Dominica asked.

  ‘I,’ said the thin man, puffing out his chest, ‘am no less a person, señora, than Sir Nicholas Beauvallet's own familiar servant, Joshua Dimmock, at your orders. Ho, there! bring on the baggage!’ This was addressed to someone without. In a moment two younkers appeared laden, and dumped down their burdens upon the floor. They lingered, gaping at the lady, but Joshua waved his hands at them. ‘Hence, get hence, numskulls!’ He hustled them out, and shut the door upon them. ‘Please you, noble lady, I will dispose.’ He looked upon the mountain of baggage, laid a finger to his nose, skipped to the cupboard, and flung it open. The raiment of Master Dangerfield was exposed to Maria's titters. Joshua swooped, came away with an armful of doublets and hose, and cast them into the alleyway outside the cabin. ‘Ho there! Avoid me these trappings!’ he commanded, and the two women heard footsteps coming quickly in obedience to the summons. Joshua returned to the cupboard and swept it bare, flung out the boots and the pantoffles that stood ranged upon its floor, and stepped back to observe with pride the barrenness of his creating. ‘So!’ The chest caught his eye; he went to it in a rush, lifted the lid, and clicked his tongue in impatience. He seemed to dive into it head first.

  Dominica sat down on the cushioned seat to watch the surprising gyrations of Master Dimmock. Maria knelt by her, clasping a hand still in both of hers, and giggled under her breath. An indignant voice was uplifted in the alleyway. ‘Who cast them here? That coystrill! Dimmock, Joshua Dimmock, may the black vomit seize you! Master Dangerfield's fine Venice hosen to lie in the dust! Come out, ye skinny rogue!’

  Joshua emerged from the chest with an armful of shirts and netherstocks. The door was rudely opened; Master Dangerfield's servant sought to make a hasty entrance, but was met on the threshold by Joshua, who thrust the pile of linen into his arms, and drove him out. ‘Avoid them! Avoid, fool! The noble lady hath this cabin. By the General's orders, mark you! Hold your peace, wastrel! The Venice hose! What's that to me? Make order there! Pick up that handruff, that boot, those stocks! There are more shirts to come. Await me!’ He came back, spread his hands, and shrugged expressive shoulders. ‘Heed naught, señora. A hapless fool. Master Dangerfield's man. We shall have all in order presently.’

  ‘I should not wish to turn Master Dangerfield from his cabin,’ Dominica said. ‘Is there none other might house me?’

  ‘Most noble lady! Waste no moment's thought upon it!’ Joshua said, shocked. ‘Master Dangerfield, forsooth! A likely gentleman, I allow, but a mere lad from the nursery. This mountain of raiment! Ho, the young men! all alike! I dare swear a full score of shirts. Sir Nicholas himself owns not so many.’ He threw the rest of Master Dangerfield's wardrobe out of the cabin, and shut the door smartly upon the protests of Master Dangerfield's man.

  Dominica watched the disposal of her baggage about the room. ‘I must suppose you a man of worth,’ she said, gently satirical.

  ‘You may say so, indeed, señora. I am the servant of Sir Nicholas. I have the ear. I am obeyed. Thus it is to be the lackey of a great man, lady,’ Joshua answered complacently.

  ‘Oh, is this Sir Nicholas a great man by your reckoning?’

  ‘None greater, lady,’ said Joshua promptly. ‘I have served him these fifteen years, and seen none to equal him. And I have been about the world, mark you! Ay, we have done some junketting to and fro. I allow you Sir Francis Drake to be a man well enough, but lacking in some small matters wherein we have the advantage of him. His birth, for example, will not rank with ours. By no means! Raleigh? Pshaw! he lacks our ready wit: we laugh in his sour countenance! Howard? A fig for him! I say no more, and leave you to judge. That popinjay, Leicester? Bah! A man of no weight. We, and we alone have never failed in our undertakings. And why, you ask? Very simply, señora: we reck not! The Queen's grace said it with her own august lips. “God's death,” quoth she – her favourite oath, mark you! – “God's death, Sir Nicholas, you should take Reck Not to be your watchword!” With reason, most gracious lady! Certain we reck not. We bite our glove in challenge to whosoever ye will. We take what we will: Beauvallet's way!’

  Maria sniffed, and cocked up her pert nose. Joshua looked severely. ‘Mark it mistress! I speak for both: we reck not.’

  ‘He is a bold man,’ Dominica said, half to herself.

  Joshua beamed upon her. ‘You speak sooth, señora. Bold! Ay, a very panther. We laugh at fear. That's for lesser men. I shall uncord these bundles, gracious lady, so it please you.’

  ‘What is he? What is his birth?’ Dominica asked. ‘Is he base or noble?’

  Joshua bent a frown of some dignity upon her. ‘Would I serve one who was of base birth, señora? No! We are very nobly born. The knighthood was not needed to mark our degree. An honour granted upon our return from Drake's voyage round the world. I allow it to have been due, but we needed it not. Sir Nicholas stands heir to a barony, no less!’

  ‘So!’ said Dominica with interest.

  ‘Ay, and indeed. He is own brother to Lord Beauvallet. A solid man, señora, lacking our wits, maybe, but a comfortable wise lord. He looks askance at all this trafficking upon the high seas.’ Joshua forgot for a moment his rôle of admiring and faithful servant. ‘Well he may! Rolling up and down the world, never at rest – it is not fit! We are no longer boys to delight in harebrained schemes and chancy ventures. But what would you? A madness is in us; we must always be up and about, nosing out danger.’ He rolled up the cords he had untied. ‘I leave you, señora. Ha! we cast off !’ He hopped to the porthole, and peered out. ‘In good time: that hulk is done. I go now to see the noble señor safely housed. By your leave, señora!’

  ‘Where is my father?’ Dominica asked.

  ‘Hard by, señora. You may rap on this bulkhead, and he will hear. Mistress –’ he looked austerely at Maria – ‘see to the noble lady!’

  ‘Impudence!’ Maria cried. But the door had shut behind Joshua Dimmock.

  ‘An oddity,’ said Dominica. ‘Well – like master, like man.’ She went to the port, and stood on tiptoe to look out. The waves were hissing round the sides of the Venture. ‘I cannot see our ship. That man said she was done.’ She came away from the port. ‘And so here we are, upon an English ship, and in an enemy's power. What shall come of it, I wonder?’ She did not seem to be disturbed.

  ‘Let them dare to touch you!’ Maria said, arms akimbo. ‘I am not locked in my cabin twice, señorita!’ She abandoned the fierce attitude, and began to unpack my lady's baggage. She shook out a gown of stiff crimson brocade, and sighed over it. ‘Alas, the broidered taffety that I had in my mind for you to wear this night!’ she lamented.

&n
bsp; Dominica smiled secretly. ‘I will wear it,’ she said.

  Maria stared. ‘Your finest gown to be wasted on a party of English pirates! Now if it were Don Juan –’

  Dominica was impatient suddenly. ‘Don Juan! A fool! A beaten braggart! He strutted, and swore he would sink this ship to the bottom of the sea, and take the great Beauvallet a prisoner to Spain! I hate a man to be beaten! Lay out the gown, girl. I will wear it, and the rubies too.’

  ‘Never say so, señorita!’ cried Maria in genuine horror. ‘I have your jewels safe hid in my bosom. They would tear them from your neck!’

  ‘The rubies!’ Dominica repeated. ‘We are here as the guests of El Beauvallet, and I vow we will play the part right royally!’

  There was a soft scratching on the door, and Don Manuel looked in. ‘Well, my child?’ he said, and looked around him with approval.

  Dona Dominica waved her hand. ‘As you see, señor, I am very well. And you?’

  He nodded, and came to sit beside her. ‘They house us snugly enough. There is a strange creature giving orders to my man at this moment. He says he is El Beauvallet's lackey. I do not under stand these English servants, and the license they have. The creature talks without pause.’ He drew his gown about his knees. ‘We labour with the unexpected,’ he complained, and looked gravely at his daughter. ‘The commander bids us to supper. We shall not forget, Dominica, that we sail as guests upon this ship.’

  ‘No,’ said Dominica doubtfully.

  ‘We shall use Sir Nicholas with courtesy,’ added Don Manuel.

  ‘Yes, señor,’ said Dominica, more doubtfully still.

  An hour later Joshua came once more to her door. Supper awaited her, he said, and bowed her down the alleyway to the stateroom. She went regally, and rubies glowed on her bosom. The dull red of her stiff gown made her skin appear the whiter; she carried a fan of feathers in her hand, and had a wired ruff of lace sewn over with jewels behind her head.

  The stateroom was low pitched, lit by two lamps hung on chains from the thick beams above. On the bulkhead opposite the door arms were emblazoned, arms crossed with the bar sinister, and with a scroll round the base, bearing the legend Sans Peur. A table was spread in the middle of the room, and there were high-backed chairs of Spanish make set round it. Beside one of these was standing Master Dangerfield, point-de-vice in a bombasted doublet of grograine, and the famous Venice hosen. He bowed and blushed when he saw Dominica, and was eager to set a chair for her.