Bettina trembled. “Everett?” She stared at his skinny frame and sunken cheeks. “Is-is it you?”
“Take me, lady.” One cellmate with a sloppy grin pushed in front of her.
Bettina shoved her arm through the bars. “Move out of my way!”
The tall man lumbered up and elbowed the other aside. “Bettina? My God?”
Chapter Sixteen
“Grâce à Dieu! Yes!” She thrust her fingers toward him. His hand took hers, bony, and rough, his weary eyes blue with green flecks.
“How did you…how did you find me?” Everett moved close to the bars, his mouth gaping in a scraggly beard. He smelled like sewage, yet she didn’t care.
“I cannot believe it, mon amour.” Tears blurred her vision. She jerked his hand to her chest, over her racing heart.
“We’ll have to see the major now.” The guard pulled at her shoulder. “We can’t release prisoners without authorization. Permission has to be sent from our general in Brest, if this man’s not a criminal with charges against him.”
“I’m no criminal,” Everett protested, yet his gaze remained intense on her. “As I keep telling you people.”
“He is innocent.” Bettina fumbled her other hand into her pocket. The men shifted around, mumbling, pressing against the bars and Everett. She had no choice but to release them all. People would be hurt, perhaps killed, yet any authorization could take months, years. Everett stood before her, a caged man she wanted in her arms.
The key rattled in the lock, difficult to turn, then she clicked it. The guard shouted and grabbed for her arm, but the door swung open. Men whooped and shoved out, knocking the guard and Marcel down.
Everett swept his arms around her and buried his face in her neck. They staggered against the tide of escaping prisoners. She clutched his scrawny body.
He reared back, eyes sharp. “This way! We must escape now.” He dragged Bettina down the corridor in the opposite direction. Several men ran with them. A door at the back was locked. Three men heaved up a solid wooden bench and slammed it into the door. At the third ram, the door splintered with a painful crack. Men jerked it open and trampled through.
They stood on the outside of the fortress.
Everett gulped in breaths of fresh air. “Ah, the sun! Freedom, you.”
“We should run to the north.” Bettina gasped, staring over her shoulder. “Hurry.”
She and Everett rushed past the walls and along the top of the beach.
A bugle blared. Shots echoed from behind.
Their feet swished through the sand. More men ran past them. Bettina’s breath sharp in her lungs, her hand gripped in Everett’s, she felt his pulse reverberate up her arm. Past the limestone cliffs, they left the beach and hurried into the trees. They jumped over bushes and underbrush, winding deeper into the shadows of the waning light. Other voices, footsteps, rustled around them. Twigs crackled. Gunshots sounded far behind them.
She stumbled and Everett caught her and they continued to run.
“Head for Calais, to the north!” one man shouted.
“Let us break away from them.” Everett steered her to the east while the others ran north. He gripped his arm around her and they hurried deeper into the forest. The sweet scent of wild herbs and leaves engulfed them.
Soon the sun’s rays disappeared over the tree tops. The air turned cool on Bettina’s flushed cheeks. They both started to stumble over roots as the light vanished.
An hour must have passed. Half staggering down into a ravine, they stopped and gasped for air then embraced as if they’d melded into a statue of one. He felt like a skeleton in her arms.
Released, Bettina collapsed onto a fallen tree, caught between laughter and sobs. “All this time, they said you were drowned...yet I never accepted...would not consider...” She coughed and patted her chest to calm her heart.
Everett dropped beside her, his arm around her again. He heaved for breath and kissed the top of her head. “My darling, my sweet darling. How did you know where I was?”
“I’ll…tell you in the morning. Are we safe here?” She rubbed her hands over Everett’s bony shoulders under a threadbare shirt, then through his hair, dry as straw. He smelled acrid, greasy, but she probably smelled no better.
An owl gave a mournful cry over their heads. Darkness settled around them.
“We need…I need to rest. Not much energy. Still, we must be careful.” He kissed her fingers. Then he lurched up and dragged tree branches over to form a canopy on the other side of the log. She stood and piled on more.
Everett crawled under the canopy and tugged her with him. The mossy ground dampened her knees. He stretched out with a grunt and she nestled against his chest. His ribs poked into her breasts.
“You are so thin, we must find food.” She swallowed a sob, pushed off her shoes and rubbed her aching feet together.
“Food…in the morning.” He hugged his arms around her. “You’re my feast.”
She gripped her hands around his arms so he couldn’t slip away in the night. “Are you actually here with me? Tell me I’m not dreaming you. Life can’t be that cruel.”
“I’m here, my love. I’ll never leave you again. I can’t believe…you’re here.” He sounded on the verge of tears. His heart thumped against hers. “Hopefully, no one will find us.”
No other footsteps, no voices, sounded in the woods.
She cuddled closer, stroked his sleeve and grew used to his animal smell. His warm body along hers comforted her. “I have spent far too many nights alone.”
“No more…alone.” His chest rose and fell against hers. Soon his breathing slowed and became even.
Bettina tried to calm her rambling pulse. They were together, but what now? He was an escaped prisoner and they had no money. Long after she heard his exhausted snores, she tensed at each crackle in the forest, waiting to hear soldiers’ boots pound through the brush.
* * * *
A bird called from somewhere. More birds chirped in response. Half-asleep, Bettina moved and twigs prodded into her side. She opened her eyes and shivered in the morning chill. Sunlight filtered through the thick trees and the gaps in their makeshift canopy.
She started, but Everett’s warmth from behind mollified her. In her scattered dreams she still searched for him. Bettina caressed the arm he draped over her. His lips kissed the back of her neck, tingling her flesh.
She turned to look at him. His unshaven, gaunt face. “I thought...I’d never awake in anyone’s arms again—but the only arms I wanted were yours.”
Everett sat up and pushed a hand through his tangled brown hair. He stared about for an instant, eyes wary. He touched her cheek, his gaze softening with relief and love. “Bettina, just hearing your voice...saying your name, and it not being a futile longing. I want to…” His gaze roamed over her. He brushed a hand down her bodice then pulled it away. “We must keep moving. We can’t stay here.”
“Of course.” She sat and stuffed her feet back in her shoes, reluctant to leave their nest. His touch revived sensations she’d buried. “Far away from the soldiers.”
He crawled out from under the branches and pulled her to her feet. He scratched at his ragged clothes. “I need to find water to scour that prison from my skin.”
Bettina stretched her stiff muscles and they walked hand in hand deeper into the woods. She had so many questions to ask, but his determined stride and the effort it took left her to savor the companionable silence.
At a tiny stream they drank cool water and picked blackberries from a bush to eat. She licked the sweet taste from her fingers. “Have you been in that prison all this time?”
“Mostly, endless…days and nights.” He clenched his fists, then grabbed her hand. He kissed the berry juice from her fingertips. “Let’s keep walking.”
; She understood his fear of recapture. They hurried upstream where the trickle of water swelled to a pool under shading oaks.
“Here is where I’ll scrub hell from my body.” Everett jerked off the ragged breeches and shirt he wore. He waded into the pool. His thinness shocked her and the whip marks on his back made her stifle a cry. Then she sighed with happiness that he was alive and with her.
Bettina watched him splash water over his tortured frame and slowly undressed herself. The cool air caressed over her flesh and she grew bashful, naked in the woods, the sexual side of her nature suppressed for so long. She picked a handful of wild basil and waded through the mild current. The cold water tickled over her body and goose bumps popped up on her arms.
His eyes darkened as she approached, water swirling around her breasts, nipples puckered. She rubbed the sweet scented plant over both their chests and shoulders. They both chewed the leaves.
“What an eternity it has been.” Everett gathered her against him, slick skin to skin. He kissed her and her heart fluttered. She pressed her body into his and felt him grow hard against her belly. He lifted her up and she wrapped her legs around his sharp hips. Everett entered to her soft moan and took her urgently in the water. She felt brief pain, like a virgin, her body no longer used to such invasion.
Afterwards they languished on the bank above moss-covered stones, kissing in the sweet grass. The sun peeking through the tree branches dried them in their primal nakedness. Bettina never stopped listening for footsteps pursuing them.
“There’s so much to tell, I don’t know where to begin.” With a trailing finger, Bettina explored his hollow cheeks, his pallid face. He had new lines around eyes that looked startled and enormous. Her beloved had aged in prison; his hair was peppered with gray.
“Tell me if our son thrives? Where is he?” He kissed her deeply before she could reply.
“He is safe.” She caught her breath. “I—”
“We’ll walk as we explain.” Everett sat up and pulled on his filthy clothes. “For now, it’s wise if we continue moving. This is your country, which way do you suggest?”
“My father’s sister, my Aunt Melisande, used to live in a town on this coast. Douarnenez, it is to the north, several miles south of Brest.” Bettina dragged her chemise and dress over her head. “We’ll have quite a walk. I don’t even know if she’s still there. I haven’t seen her since my father’s funeral.”
* * * *
A breeze ruffled the leaves around them. The sprouts and buds of spring flowers flanked the path they tread, spreading color and inviting smells. They strolled upstream and leaned into one another, gleaning reassurance from each other’s touch. Bettina began to detail the events of her life he’d missed.
“Saved by my own watch.” He almost laughed, but contained it as if an alien emotion.
By mid-morning Everett groaned and sank down on an outcropping of rock, his eyes moist. “I cursed every day in that prison. Prayed every night you were well, and how I was going to get back to you again. I never knew we had a second child on the way.” He shook his head, shoulders hunched. “All I left for you to manage alone, to suffer.”
“You’re the one who has suffered.” She sat beside him and grasped his hand, aching over his weakened condition. “You have a feisty little girl, without a doubt.” Her own eyes teared as she pictured their daughter.
“Christian, my God, Christian is almost seven, speaking in sentences. Attending school.” Everett sighed. “They won’t know me.”
“They will soon, mon amour.” She nudged his shoulder with hers, hearing her son’s sweet laughter. She missed her babies so much. “I can hardly believe you’re with me now. It was the fantasy I spun each night before sleeping, when I could sleep.”
A butterfly with turquoise splashed wings fluttered in the air. Everett kept turning and looking behind him as if someone might sneak up on them.
“Oh, my sweet, brave darling. I lost any conception of time in that hole.” He kissed her cheek. “All that’s happened...to both of us.” His gaze on her swam with tears.
She slipped her arm around him. “You must tell me about your ordeal.”
“Not yet.” He stretched his back and shoulders. “My mother...my poor, dear mother, thinking she’d lost both her children. I never got the chance to...to tell her I forgave her for hiding after my father died.”
“Your mother understood.” She pictured Rose Camborne, withering away with grief after Everett’s reported drowning. How they’d all lumbered through those dark days. Their struggle to keep the estate solvent without funds. “All was forgiven, I’m certain.”
Everett pulled her head to his chest and stroked her hair. “Bettina, you’re the strongest person to weather what you have. At least the children and Frederick are safe with your mother in America.”
She reveled in the feel of his fingers in her hair. “Your nephew, he is almost a young man now, working for a printer.”
“Little Frederick. I can’t wait to see all of them again.” His voice sounded stronger.
“You don’t mind that I can’t have any more children?” She kept her head on his chest. His heart raced under her cheek. After her rough birthing of Genevre, the doctor told her she couldn’t have any more babies. She hadn’t minded at the time, with Everett presumed dead.
His fingers caressed her scalp, sending shivers down her shoulders. “Darling. Thank God I didn’t lose you in childbirth.” Everett put his lips to the top of her head, his arms pressing her against him.
She looked up and saw tears falling down his cheeks. She kissed each one, the warm, salty taste. Something rustled in the leaves and she cringed, scanning the area. “We have plenty now to concern us. We must find a safe place.”
“So much has been taken away, but given back to me.” He held her face between his hands and kissed her mouth. Then he rose with effort and they walked for a while in silence, his hand massaging the nape of her neck. “I hate to bring it up, because the matter’s so mundane, but I desperately need fresh clothes.” He plucked at his shirt riddled with holes and stains. “These are falling off of me. They also single me out as an escaped convict, or some other ne’er-do-well.”
“I haven’t a penny.” She wished now she had her silk party dress. “Perhaps I can trade my silk chemise. My captors at least left me that.”
When they neared a village of sufficient size, Bettina left Everett in the woods and went in search of a clothing peddler or ‘slops’ shop. Chased away as a beggar there, in a second village she found success. She returned with used but serviceable clothing for them both.
“I traded my silk shift for linen, and your clothing, and my gown for this one.” She flailed out the skirt of the baggy blue dress she’d swapped for Robine’s brown one. The soldiers would search for a woman wearing brown. She scratched. The linen shift didn’t feel as nice against her flesh as the silk. “I slipped behind the peddler’s cart to dress.”
“You look quite fetching in your shapeless attire, my dear.” He accepted the items she handed him. “I smell food.”
“I drove a hard bargain. I squeezed enough money from the peddler to buy bread and goat cheese.” With a crackle of paper, she unwrapped these treasures on a large stone. “I thought my life in Cornwall was difficult. Now I truly understand how the poor struggle.”
“These last few years have taught me well.” Everett took a bite of bread and cheese. “Delicious.” He removed his ragged clothes and tugged on the too-short breeches and baggy shirt.
“We will need a tailor to fix you up proper, Monsieur Camborne.” Bettina smoothed down his shirtfront with anxious fingers. His scarecrow visage brought a lump to her throat. “I even have hats.” She twisted back her thick hair and tied on an outmoded gray bonnet. She handed him a floppy felt hat.
“Any garment you wear is entrancing to
me.” Everett gave her a crooked smile—the first since they’d reunited—then kissed the tip of her nose. “And I’ll make use of my rags.” He tore off strips of cloth to stuff in his battered shoes. “I haven’t had a pair of stockings since the first year of my incarceration. I’m a new man, just to have decent clothes.”
Bettina stuffed cloth in her own shabby slippers, her stockings snagged and stained. “We make a lovely pair.” She hugged and kissed him, longing to imprint his body into hers, this man she’d lived too long without.
* * * *
The sun dipped to the horizon and shadows crept over the woody marsh. Bettina discovered a cave, low on a hillside. Her feet and ankles ached with pain. “We can sleep here. A little shelter will be good.”
Everett hesitated. “I’ll sleep near the entrance.” He ran his hand over the stone, as if remembering his prison.
She smiled in understanding to hide her sadness at his suffering, unwrapped the remainder of their food and gave him the larger portion. After eating, her stomach still growled.
The air grew cooler and crickets chirped in the nearby bushes.
Everett stretched out on the earthen floor and sighed. “You have no idea how good it feels to sleep with a breeze on your face.” He held out his arms. “And more so, with you.”
“Do you wish to talk, about what happened…after you sailed?” Instead of lying beside him, she removed his shoes and massaged his feet with the cloth stuffed inside.
He sighed again. “Ah, my lady, you do know how to please.”
Bettina then stretched out and nestled in the curve of his neck after kissing his cheek. She heard his stomach growl with hunger. “We can sleep, if you want.”
He caressed his fingers through her hair. “I’ve spent endless, empty hours turning the events over in my head. My bleak nights, with every dawn the threat of execution.”
“Oh, mon amour.” She pressed herself into the warmth of him, his sharp ribcage and hip bones. “I’ve imagined so many things when I thought you were lost.”
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