The Tide Watchers

by Lisa Chaplin

  He lifted his brows, impressed that she thought so fast in a critical situation. “If there’s one here, it hasn’t been used in years. The carpet’s been laid on top.”

  “I realize it’s a risk. Lock the door, and don’t make any tears in the carpet,” she hissed.

  Bent almost double, he spread his hands wide at each edge of the carpet and tugged. It took repeated pulls and tugs before the dirt of a century began to give. A final tug, and it fell back in his hands.

  Lisbeth peered over his shoulder and made a soft, hissing sound of victory as they saw the square cuts to the floorboards, and a handle resting in its carved-out place in the wood.

  “Don’t get your hopes up,” he warned her. “The tunnel could have collapsed or filled with water a hundred years ago.”

  “You’re objecting because you didn’t think of this plan,” she snipped, and he fought a grin. Bloody impertinent chit was right. “The tunnel will be clear because it’s the only way you can save my son.” She stuck her knife in the cut floorboard in the farthest corner against the wall, sawing at the dirt. “Lay the carpet back over itself without making a crease. We want it to fall back in place when we go. Get one of the knives I’m sure you have hidden in your boots, and help me loosen the dirt.”

  With grim humor he wondered who was the seasoned spy, and who the pupil. “You really are your father’s daughter.”

  Is it surprising? At her age you were in France, gathering information for Britain. Yet though he’d been thoroughly trained, he doubted he’d have been so coolheaded on his first mission. Far more than Leo or Andrew, she’d inherited her father’s phenomenal memory, and natural talent for espionage. Though Eddie would hate it, being a traditionalist when it came to women, right now Duncan would take whatever advantage he could get, and be bloody grateful for it. He took a knife from his boot and began working on the crevice on the other side.

  “Hurry.” He looked up; her face was gray and creased with dust. “Patience isn’t Alain’s strong suit.”

  He finished one side and dug the knife in around the corner.

  A noise came from outside. “Turn down the lantern!”

  “This will be the last place they look,” he whispered, to reassure her. Panic would kill them both.

  Another noise, closer. They were checking windows. The closed curtains in the other rooms would create a delay while they worked out where to break in first. Clever girl, thinking of that. He got the last of the dirt loose. “Move back.” He pulled the knife from the crevice, grabbed the ring of the trapdoor, and put his whole force into yanking upward. Nothing. After twenty seconds, he drew in a harsh breath. “One, two . . .”

  Again, it didn’t give. He watched Lisbeth work the knife, stabbing along the crevices. Then she pushed both knives right in and wiggled them around. “Try again.”

  He set every muscle in his body tense and hard and pulled with everything he had.

  A deep voice yelled, “Gaston Borchonne, open up, in the name of the first consul!”

  Again! she mouthed without sound. She dug the knives in while he pulled.

  With a groaning sound and a crack, the trapdoor at last lifted. “Hold your breath and move back. The air could be a hundred years old.”

  Pounding on the front door. Muffled yells from the back.

  “We can’t wait.” She pulled the edges of the carpet up. “Hold the carpet at the corners of the trapdoor, so they fall back together.” She picked up the lantern, wrapped the edge of her cloak over her nose and mouth and around her head like a Bedouin woman, and stepped into the hole. “Follow me.” She swarmed down.

  A shriek of cracking glass—the front sitting room. A muffled yell. “Gaston Borchonne, open in the name of the first consul!”

  Holding his breath, Duncan turned and found the steps with his feet.

  Thuds came harder, faster. Glass crashed inward. The fifth stair down was cracked partway through, sagging in the middle and he swayed, leaning forward to stop from falling. Seasoned sea legs helped him hold balance.

  Lisbeth was at the base of the old ladder. “Grab the rope to pull the door down. Make sure the carpet falls with it.” She turned the lantern up, and he saw she’d dropped her cloak from her face. “This seems to be a side tunnel leading to a wider one. The walls of both tunnels are bricked, and they’ve been mortared recently as well. There’s fresh air circulating here.”

  He found the rope hanging beneath the trapdoor. “Thank God for that. Lift the lantern higher—yes! Here’s a latch.” He pulled the door down and shoved the rudimentary bolt-and-latch across. It was rusty and groaned in protest, but it moved. “Thank God for that, too. An inch is all we need. Hopefully it will take hours to find another entrance to the tunnel.”

  “Do you attend church, mon—um, Gaston?” she asked softly, a little laughter in it.

  “I do at home.” He joined her at the base of the ladder, grinning. “I’ve learned to be grateful for unexpected miracles in this line of work. And no need to call me Gaston. Delacorte’s ended any chance of my passing as Borchonne. We can’t stay in Abbeville.”

  “My son,” she murmured, in sharp anxiety. “I won’t go without him.”

  “I understand, but we have no choice. Delacorte will kill us both. Best if we disappear and leave my men to it. My orders are already in place to take Edmond.”

  She must have understood there was no choice. Her face hardened, but she nodded. “Which way?” she whispered, standing at the fork of the two tunnels. “There’s no difference between them.”

  “Which way has more air circulating?”

  She turned her face this way and that. Lifting the lantern, she strode to the right.

  A glimmer of a plan lit in his brain as they walked. “Let’s hope we don’t run into whoever made the tunnels their playground.”

  “So long as it’s not Alain and his gendarmes, I’ll shake their hands in thanks.”

  No hesitation in her voice or uncertainty in her walk. Thank God. He couldn’t abide wailing females who expected a man to protect them from every little thing. “Can you see anything ahead?”

  She frowned. “Not yet.” She kept looking right and left as she walked. “Do you think smugglers are using this? Or some religious group?”

  Perhaps she kept asking questions from a need for reassurance. He didn’t care. Whatever kept her going, he’d do. “We’ll know when we see altars and icons, barrels, a fleur-de-lis, or the red caps of the Jacobins.”

  “If Fouché’s his master, Alain’s a Jacobin.”

  Right now she didn’t need to be reminded Fouché owned every spy group in France, and they could be facing any kind of violence or weaponry at the other end of this tunnel. So he grinned. “Then we pray it’s not them, and thank God when it’s someone else.”

  “I think I’m learning the religion of espionage.” Her soft laugh had the Norfolk lilt. It sounded nice. Like home.

  The candle in the lantern sputtered. She turned, her eyes wide. “We need candles.”

  “I have one.” He spoke with deliberate coldness. “Don’t panic.”

  She didn’t reply, but her eyes flashed and her chin lifted, like Eddie when he was angry.

  Opening the lantern door, he grabbed the candle stub and held it out to her. “Take this. It seems you need the reassurance.” He spoke with deliberate coolness.

  The resentment in her eyes grew, but she took it.

  He put his last candle inside the lantern. He’d have to find a way out, and fast. If she was nervous now, God knows how she’d be when they lost the light. “Would you like me to lead?”

  “No.” She spoke through gritted teeth, and he fought laughter. At least she was a fighter.

  They’d gone at least a mile, unless he’d lost his sense of distance. Were they even heading north? He didn’t think the tunnel had turned. The bricks were no longer holding the walls up; the tunnel grew smaller, until they were on their hands and knees.

  “Give me the lantern,” he sa
id when she lost balance. She handed it to him without a word—but within a minute there was nothing but natural soil and rock in front of them.

  “It ended. It just stopped,” Lisbeth cried. “Turn around. I have to get out. I-I think I’m-I’m going to be sick—”

  “Lisbeth,” he said quietly. “Can you still feel fresh air on your face?” She made an odd sound. “We’re still near an exit. Take a few breaths, you’re exhausted.” He maneuvered himself so he sat, then he took the lantern and set it down between them.

  She sat beside him, leaning against the damp wall of the tunnel. “I went past exhausted hours ago,” she said eventually. “You called me Lisbeth.”

  “Yes, I did.” And in doing so, he’d proven his closeness to the family. Leo had told him they’d given her the nickname “Lisbeth” when she was little. She couldn’t pronounce her name properly, but she wouldn’t let anyone else introduce her. At first using it to tease her, they’d soon forgotten she was ever Elizabeth. Few outside the family called her that. Still less did anyone use her intimate nickname of Lizzy.

  Last week, calling her madame had given her back her dignity, and the power of choice. Elise would be her cover name, since it was common in France. But she needed a friend now, and following her wiggling bottom for the past ten minutes mocked his attempts at distance. “I am Duncan, Lisbeth. I’m pleased to meet you.” Unable to bow, he held out a hand.

  Her eyes were quizzical. “Is that your real name?” It was less a question than a demand. Needing something or someone to trust, to believe in.

  “It’s the name I prefer,” he said, giving her what truth he could.

  She relaxed, smiled, and took his hand. “I’m pleased to meet you, Duncan.” Then she chuckled, again with that soft Norfolk lilt.

  He grinned at her. Even pale and covered with dirt, the blind distance had vanished from her eyes; she looked vivid, alive, and strangely contented. “It is rather absurd. We were beyond politeness the moment we met.”

  “But you made me laugh and stopped me from panicking,” she whispered, laying her hand on his. “Thank you for trusting me with your name at least.”

  Odd that she’d seen his greatest flaw, when they’d only known each other a few hours all counted; absurd that a simple touch on his hand felt so intimate. He should have taken up the girl’s offer at Le Boeuf. He’d been without a woman too long, and he couldn’t afford weakness with this one. “It’s past dawn. We have to leave the tunnel. Can you last a little longer?”

  “I could sleep sitting up”—she yawned—“but to have my baby, I’d stay awake a week.”

  He believed it. She’d do whatever it took to have her child safe with her.

  “There was a tunnel branching off a short way back. We’ll have to take the chance.”

  “Yes,” she said, sounding small and frightened again.

  “The boat’s waiting for us. I sent three men to Eaucourt. They’re awaiting their chance to rescue your son,” he said, fumbling to say the right thing to calm her down.

  When she turned back and smiled at him, it was like the sun rising. “Thank you, Duncan.” She touched his face, right where the scars were.

  Slowly he moved his head back, trying not to offend her at this critical moment. Had he said or done something to invite that kind of unwarranted intimacy? He’d thought he was safe from that kind of thing, given Delacorte’s treatment of her, and the attack last week. He’d have to establish the boundaries of commander and team member when they were out of here. If she got silly, romantic notions about him, the mission would fail—and he’d never had a mission as vital as this one. “It must be daylight now. My men won’t wait forever.” He wriggled around in the cramped space, picked up the lantern and took the lead in a two-knees-and-one-hand crawl.

  The tunnel widened again. When it reached the branch, the bricks resumed. “We ought to have followed the side path in the first place, but it was heading away from the river instead of to it. Now we have no choice.”

  Soon they could walk again. A natural light source came from the left, weak as sunrise in cloud. He snuffed the lantern. “The exit’s close.”

  Again, she didn’t answer. She hadn’t spoken since thanking him; he kept filling the strained silence with awkward comments. So she had taken offense over his small rejection. He supposed he’d have to beg her pardon for not wanting her to touch him now. It didn’t matter. His only pride was in his duty. Whatever got the mission done, he’d do.

  He moved forward, noiseless even in his riding boots, until the light source was evident. He turned, whispering in her ear, “Be careful, the stairs are steep and carved from sandy rock. They could crumble.”

  She nodded, her body stiff and taut. Yes, she was offended—but what mattered was that, so new to the game, and just having seen a dead body, she’d taken the time to calm herself. She was quick thinking and mostly slow to panic. She’d been the one to save them in the house. She had all the makings of a fine team member, if only her presence wouldn’t disrupt his men. A pretty girl like this was bound to turn heads, make for fights . . . but it seemed she was easy to direct, at least. A small rejection and she wasn’t touching him, or even talking to him.

  He could deal with his men when the time came. Turning back, he began climbing.

  There were a dozen stairs leading to a trapdoor, similar to the one they’d escaped through. It was roughly made, an imperfect fit, which allowed the weak light of sunrise to come through—but about to push the door up, he heard a hard voice lifted in anger.

  Behind him, Lisbeth stiffened and stilled.

  It wasn’t long before he knew who was on the other side of the trapdoor. Nobody said rivers of blood with such relish. “Jacobins,” he said softly, hoping to God she wouldn’t panic. He checked his fob for the time. “Something big must be going on for them to meet so early in the morning. It isn’t like them to meet at sunrise.”

  “If Jacobins use the tunnel, Alain knows how to get here—and he’ll know where we’ve come,” she returned calmly enough, but her eyes sang a familiar song. She didn’t need to accuse him out loud. He’d failed in his promise to protect her from Delacorte, and they both knew it. From frying pan to bloody conflagration, and he had to think quickly.

  The Jacobins were the most volatile organization in France. The Jacobin Robespierre had led France into the deadly Reign of Terror. Since Robespierre’s execution in 1794, the group had been hiding in pockets. Then, with the rise of their new favorite son Fouché they’d enjoyed a vocal resurgence—one reason the first consul removed Fouché from office.

  But it didn’t matter if he held the title or enjoyed Boney’s favor. Everyone knew he still ran every espionage group worth knowing in France, and it was suspected he was the source of the attempts on Bonaparte’s life since the infamous “infernal machine” in Paris that killed fifty people. It was also obvious who was behind every attempt in return to lessen Fouché’s power base and had the news sheets mock his fearsome reputation. Bonaparte and Fouché were locked in a power struggle that was fiercer for its being unacknowledged, the glorious hero and the brilliant puppet master.

  Throughout these thoughts, Duncan’s mind raced with plans. He bent to her, mouthed Follow my lead, and tried the door. It didn’t move. With slow deliberation he knocked, in the intricate musical pattern he’d been taught when he’d infiltrated the Jacobin Club in Paris in ’93.

  Sudden, utter silence. Then sounds of hasty shuffling, and the trapdoor opened. Several faces peered down. One man was smiling as he greeted, “Welcome, brother, we’ve been—” But then every man blinked as they looked at him, and half a dozen muskets were pointed in his face. “Brothers, we’ve been betrayed. Kill him. Kill them both!”

  CHAPTER 12

  SIMULTANEOUS MUSKET HAMMERS CLICKED into place. “Wait,” Duncan whispered to the men with muskets. “You’ve been waiting for someone to come with news, haven’t you? I have news for you. Delacorte has arrived, but he’s brought a dozen gendarme
s with him.”

  At the worst moment, Duncan felt a tug at his cloak. “They’re coming.”

  The Jacobin leader pointed his musket in Duncan’s face. He’d seen the man before, but where? “He’d never betray us to the gendarmes. He knows Bonaparte would behead us all! And your face proves what you are!”

  Dust wandered up Duncan’s nose. As he fought the urge to sneeze, his mind raced. The Jacobins were a dramatic, paranoid bunch when things were going well, but that they suspected him because of his face . . . then he understood. He was going to kill whichever Stewart brother was interfering in his life this time.

  They were in a disused barn with broken stalls and rotten hay, but the barn doors were new and solid, and the windows had iron shutters. The trapdoor had a heavy iron manger cemented on its upper side to weigh it down.

  If Fouché was feeding money to the local Jacobins, it explained Delacorte’s continued presence in Abbeville. It also meant Boney was up to something important on the Channel Coast, if Fouché was sending his major players here to keep his eyes on it.

  Looking at the leader’s face, a memory clicked. “See who’s with me, and tell me again that you’d trust Delacorte with your lives.” Taking advantage of the momentary confusion, he pushed his way up and into the barn. Lisbeth scrambled up after him.

  The barkeep and son of Tavern Le Boeuf’s owner gasped, “Elise?”

  “They’re coming, Marron,” Duncan said urgently. “Are you so certain of his loyalty over and above his hatred of his wife? Was he not mentored by Fouché?” All the world and his aunt knew spymaster Fouché’s well-deserved nicknames: “The Butcher of Lyons” for the mass murder and destruction of that city, and “The Weather-Cock of Saint-Cloud” for changing loyalties with every passing political wind. How he always emerged unscathed was the mystery.

  Without consultation two of the men slammed the trapdoor down, shoved three massive cannonballs inside the manger, and sat down hard.

  Duncan kept his gaze on Luc Marron’s face and his hand on the primed pistol in his cloak pocket—but Marron was no fool. With a waved hand, his men searched their guests and took Duncan’s weapons.