by Don Jacobson
Yet, as Miss Bennet would argue, there have been more misunderstandings caused by society’s rules than happy outcomes arising from those same strictures.
I cannot be concerned about what others may think. Either Henry or I or both of us could be meeting our Maker in a few moments. What do I have to lose? What could I lose if the man I love does not know my feelings?
Annie modeled her next statements after Miss Bennet’s assault on the General’s romantic defenses as she thought, L’audace, audace. Toujours l’audace.[xliii]
“Mr. Wilson…Henry…my father despaired that I was too impertinent to ever find a man who could accept me. He always argued that I was dangerously ready to speak my mind.
“However, you must have recognized…’’ Henry made an effort to interrupt, But Annie stopped him, “…no…do not speak…you must have recognized by now that something has changed between us.
“After our first meeting, I feared that I may have offended you with my forward behavior. I knew that it was not a woman’s place to broach her tender feelings without encouragement from the gentleman. You always seemed to hold me in the same strict regard as the other young ladies in the house. But you are like a lodestone pulling me to you. No matter which way I turn, I eventually come back to you.
“Yet for all your martial prowess, you are a shy man. You are unwilling to show your true nature unless you feel comfortable in the company. When you are at your ease, you are friendly and funny, warm and engaging. Add to that your honesty and unmistakable sense of loyalty, and you are as close to perfection as any man.
“At first I feared you did not care for me. Then I began to know your nature and discovered that your silences were not criticisms of a young girl’s excitement, but rather a wall behind which you would hide.”
She paused, her chest heaving behind the bag clutched in her arms.
“Persons in our circle grow up quickly. Even though I am just seven and ten, I have dreamt the dreams of maidens who have been swept off their feet by a well-formed leg or a shy smile. For young girls, gentle or common, romance is the stuff of fanciful novels written by ladies whose greatest concern is to have to send a servant to the stationers for more paper and ink.”
Tears began to prick at her eyes as she looked up at him and focused on the light stubble that had begun to soften the edge of his jaw.
“Those of us in service know that our lot is made more difficult by our poverty—that of pocket, not of spirit. We love, but we can never afford to act on it. As the saying goes, ‘Love does not put food on the table.’
“I do not care. If that is to be my destiny: if I am to spend my life working for others’ happiness, I will not let my chance pass by without at least remarking on it.
“I will not deny my one opportunity. And that is you. I will have you know that no man has ever touched my soul the way you do.
“If we pass through that door, and one of us falls…well, I could not countenance the regret that would be the burden of the survivor if the words of my heart were left unspoken.
“I would not have you walking into the dark valley unaware of my deepest love. How we will act on it after we are through, I know not…but you, Sergeant Henry Wilson, are the dearest man to me.”
Wilson was rocked by Anne’s admission. While he had felt the stirrings for months, he had believed his weaknesses and failings were too profound. How could someone as perfect, as wonderful, as Miss Reynolds find space in her heart for someone who had allowed a sweet woman like Miss Bennet to suffer as she had?
He had never blinked once throughout her remarkable speech. Anne’s radiant face was illuminated by the surges of emotion lifting her soul. Even the tears that brightened her eyes also shimmered on her lashes, suspended like the smallest diamonds, captivating him and pulling him inextricably into her orbit.
I knew it when I saw her in the nursery on that very first day. The flash of that pair of fine eyes disarmed me the moment they were turned my way.
Henry’s eyes filled with dampness that threatened to cascade down his ruddy cheeks. Then he chuckled as he reached out and placed his hands on her shoulders, giving them a gentle squeeze.
“You have me at a complete disadvantage, Miss Reynolds. I am utterly confused. Part of me wants to cry from relief. Another wants to shout for joy. And then there is that rational being that is piqued at you.
“You have a talent for finding the perfect moment to upend my world. You have been doing that for months. At this moment, just before we are to engage in an operation that could affect the entire nation, you decide to assure me of your love for me.
“Now that I know my greatest wish has been realized, how am I supposed to walk behind you as you stride toward a man willing to kill to further his ends?
“You are completely infuriating and thoroughly lovable.”
He gazed at those tawny pools and fell deeply into her soul. His voice softened and his manner became very serious.
“Annie Reynolds, I must confess that since I met you this summer, I thought of nothing except how to win your heart. Yet I also realized that when my faults were laid against the virtues of other men, I must be found wanting.
“The idea that you, a bright and sparkling jewel of a woman, would find a veteran scarred in body and wounded in soul worthy of your regard beggared my imagination.
“You stand before me and speak the words I have dreamt of hearing. But for the harsh reality of what we are to attempt next, I would be convinced I was sound asleep under the eaves, dreaming the same vision I have had for months.
“I am not one for fancy words or lengthy speeches. I do not find your declaration forward or improper. On the contrary, you have eased my fears and have made me the happiest of men.
“For I, too, have found the love of my life here at Cecil House. May I, though, ask your forbearance to defer this conversation as we must hurry?”
A light smile lifted the corners of her lips, but rather than reply, she nodded and turned away to face the door.
Henry adjusted the quilt that cloaked the bag so that it draped over Annie’s left shoulder and passed under her right arm. This gave the impression that she was cradling a middling-sized child across her body. Her bloodstained collar was clearly visible.
Then he pulled open the kitchen door flooding the mews with the lantern’s light.
Chapter XXIV
The alley that ran in front of the stables leading to the mews behind Cecil House was made all the darker by the blackness of the buildings rising on either side. Lanterns and candles had long since been extinguished so nary a sliver of light showed at any crack in the infrequent shuttered window openings. Driblets of late autumn rain trickled down the mortar-filled channels crisscrossing the walls to end in puddles slimed with the residue of millions of coal fires. A lowering cloud-filled sky reflected the meager city glow back down onto the black brougham coach that waited in front of the stables about ten feet past the laundry shed.
Lord Joachim Winterlich rested back onto the ink-colored squabs. He pulled his stygian cloak tighter around his lanky frame. Thanks to its red silk lining, the garment slid easily over his evening clothes made of the best superfine. His white silk shirt and intricately tied cravat bespoke of his activities earlier this evening when he had sat around a raucous table of Carlton House hangers-on. He had slipped away from the three-bottle-a-night men when they had pushed back from the table to head out to one of the more elegant gambling hells off St. James Place.
Waiting was cold work. The cloak with its many capes kept him warm enough yet allowed him easy access to his saber.
If Jonas performed his part according to plan, I doubt if my blade will get much exercise. I will employ it to have my way. Swords are always more impressive when beheld by those not bearing one.
Winterlich was one of the thousands of minor German nobles set adrift by Napoleon’s forcible dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire, that amorphous Central European blob of 300 principalities, duchies,
bishoprics and free cities that was not holy, Roman nor an Empire. Although English was the official language of the British monarchy, German had been familiarly muttered in the corridors of power since George I, formerly the Elector of Hanover, had crossed the North Sea in 1717. Winterlich was one of dozens who had turned their German aristocratic heritage into a career of suckling at the Prince Regent’s teat.
Of course, Winterlich had to keep the appearance of idle wealth. To accomplish that not inconsiderable feat, he leaned on another German connection—this time to the south of his Swabian ancestral home—domiciled in Vienna. A distant cousin had risen high, very high indeed, in the service of the Habsburg Emperor. Winterlich had availed himself of this lucrative connection since his arrival in London over five years ago. In exchange for performing certain “favors,” many of which no gentleman would have ever considered, Winterlich was able to draw on a rather substantial account held in his name at Rothchild’s firm.
Recently, though, his paymasters in Vienna had become increasingly insistent on his delivery of more high-grade information in exchange for his stipends. They simply could not care less about the bedroom habits of Britain’s shadow monarch. While the Schwartzwalder[xliv] had established a network of indolent Anglo-Saxon aristocrats easily swayed by their debts and his connections, the end of Napoleon’s reign had shifted the Empire’s interest to London’s intentions concerning Greater European affairs. That had by necessity placed the burden back onto his shoulders to bore directly into the heart of Westminster, to hunt more exclusive game.
And that posed a major problem. Men like Salisbury, Wellington, Castlereagh and Liverpool absolutely despised the Regent and his coterie of dissolute sots. Winterlich could no more reach into their government dispatch boxes using his confederates than he could become Czar of all the Russians.
Hence his effort to organize the kidnapping of Salisbury’s granddaughter to force her father to compromise his position as the Marquess’ private secretary. He abused himself for allowing Winters to hire his thug friend Wadkins. The plan in the park should have worked except for that verdammt meddler, Fitzwilliam! Of course, who would have expected that mousy governess to act like a Valkyrie in defense of her charge? No, the scheme failed not from audacity, but rather from a failure to consider all of the variables.
He would avoid those foibles tonight. Only two persons were involved in the actual snatching—he himself and his bastard Winters. The only other soul of import to the execution of the kidnapping was his longtime bodyguard who sat atop the box waiting to whip matched blacks into a headlong escape across Mayfair.
He had sat in silence long enough, in fact long enough for him to have fully gained his night vision.
Hah! I remember how Papa would slam his hand on the dining table and rant about the excitement and challenges of a boar hunt at midnight. We would go to the hunting lodge and spend the afternoon blindfolded. Then, after sundown, the servants would guide us out of the circle of lanterns to our hunting stands. Only then would the shields be pulled off. Mein Gott! How amazing! You could pick out individual twigs in the blackness…and the beasts when they ran toward you looked as if torches illuminated them.
He flipped back the crystal of his pocket watch, and checked the time by touch using experienced fingers—just past the eleventh hour. He opened the door and stepped down into the alley. He spoke a few words to his servant who gave a monosyllabic reply. Then Winterlich softly walked down to the corner by the laundry shed and turned to the right to stare at the back of the darkened house.
Suddenly the back door opened, flooding the mews with light…and blinding Winterlich. In the several moments it took his night-sensitized eyes to adjust, two indistinct bodies slowly resolved out of the glare, shimmering down the steps. The smaller, front figure—the maid?—appeared to be carrying something, in all probability his prey. A larger, bulkier shape, slouching somewhat, herded her along toward Winterlich, who now reached beneath his cloak and pulled his saber free of its scabbard.
He raised the tip to point it at the young girl who was obviously carrying the drugged child, wrapped loosely in a quilt against the cold night air. Winterlich’s heart thrilled when he realized that he was moments away from accomplishing his goal. He called out to the footman.
“Ach, mein lieber Sohn. You have performed admirably. Now we must be away. Take the child and carry her to the carriage in the alley.”
Rather than release the girl, the woman tightened her grip on her burden and raised her chin. She cut short any response from the footman and addressed the agent in defiance, never stopping in her traverse of the mews, coming closer to Winterlich’s sword with each step.
“Margaret goes nowhere without me. You may take her, but I insist that I be allowed to come to care for her needs while you pursue your nefarious ends. Either that or kill me now. However, you may risk harming your prize.”
Winterlich lifted his eyebrows at the temerity of yet another Cecil hireling. What was it about that family that inspired such devotion? His retainers in Swabia, with few exceptions, would be just as likely to cut his throat as to profess undying fealty.
He raised the tip of his saber so that it glinted in the lamplight, momentarily unsure of his next step.
Now only a few feet away from that deadly point, the maid saw that slight indecision and the wavering of the blade. In a flash of indescribable heroism, she pulled away from her companion, shrieking like a banshee—which further confused the spy—and then charged straight at Winterlich. She threw herself on the point of the weapon, her falling weight driving it from Winterlich’s grasp and bearing it to the ground.
Several things happened all at once.
Her cry alerted the watchers.
A crossbow-equipped sniper atop the stable roof silently put a foot-long steel bolt through the carriage driver’s breastbone, pinning his body against the coachwork. The ribbons dropped as his nerveless hands released them.
Wilson screamed, “Annie” and raced forward, dropping to his knees to lift her prone figure from the damp and cradle her in his arms, burying her face in the folds of his livery coat.
A crimson clad figure appeared out of the laundry shed and swiftly lifted Winterlich’s chin with the tip of his working sword, its legendary grey blade worn from constant sharpening.[xlv]
A squad of infantrymen came running down the alley, their footfalls muted by flannel wrapped boots, sliding to a halt with muskets pointed at their captive now standing on his toes to escape the prick of three feet of steel.
The dozen players stood stock still, frozen as in a tableau offered during an after-dinner entertainment at one of the great country houses. Death moved slowly away from the group deferring his need to lay his icy grip upon any more still-beating hearts.
Chapter XXV
Wilson was out of his mind with grief. Only moments before he had professed his love for the little maid. Now she was gone, sacrificing herself to capture the spy.
I could not hold her…could not stop her. She moved before I could think.
Great cris de coeur shook the big man. He could feel the slickness that had spread through her gown. He knew that if it were daylight his hands would be stained, covered as they were with the seep that had enveloped her body.
Then she moved. A sob locked in his throat.
Not dead? How? That blade should have gone straight through her heart.
Her hands pushed against his chest as her muffled voice rose up from under the lapel of his coat.
“Henry…I am all right. Would you please let me breathe? Please relax, dear man, naught is amiss,” she said as she lay back in his now relaxed arms.
Wilson saw her smile gleam in the light passing through the kitchen door.
He spoke his bewilderment, “But, I saw you struck down by his sword. You ran…fell…”
“Oh, my love, what you must have thought. But you forgot that I was holding a bushel of barley in front of me. I gambled th
at he would be so astonished by my attack that he would not thrust at me but rather would instinctively give way as I hit the point.
“I hoped that the grain would protect me as I twisted and dropped away. I also wagered that the burlap would entangle his sword. I seem to have been correct in both estimations.
“I would ask that you would help me stand, as I landed right in a puddle and am soaked through.”
Overhearing this, Fitzwilliam chuckled, “She has you there, Sergeant. While I would not recommend this for disarming a determined foe on a regular basis, Annie took advantage of the element of surprise and this fiend’s laziness.
“Recall that I hoped that he would ignore learning the ground on which the battle was to be fought. Sergeant, your intuition to extinguish the torch by the door coupled with placing the kitchen lamp so that you and Annie would be silhouetted as you exited the house led to his downfall.
“He lost his night vision and became unsure of himself. Annie caught scent of that and acted with the valor of St. Joan!”
Transferring his attention to his motionless prisoner, he swiftly moved his sword and flipped the man’s hat off his head. He raised his bushy eyebrows in recognition.
“Oh, here we have a rare and truly poisonous serpent poised to strike the heart of the nation. Lord Joachim Winterlich, a popular denizen of the Carlton House coterie. How many secrets did you pick up as they lay amongst cigar ash and empty bottles, I wonder?” Fitzwilliam marveled.