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The Secret
25 ]une 1807
Edward Drinkwater found the water rose no more than four inches about him once the pontoon had been launched. He found his situation uncomfortable but was less anxious once he felt the raft moored. He had suffered a brief, heart-thumping fear as the water rose about him, but his brother had been right, though to what properties of hydrostatics it was due, Edward was quite ignorant. The clumsy vessel found a sort of equilibrium, presumably supported by the other chambers, or perhaps due to its attitude to the stream of the river, once it had been moored. At all events the inrush of water soon ceased and he lay awash, awake and alert.
He heard the cannon and the cheers and the bumps of the boats. A few indistinct words of French, a rapid series of footsteps overhead, and then a voice asked: 'Why are we at war?'
It was quite distinct and clear, even above the rush and chuckle of the water to which his ears had become attuned, a question posed with some asperity and emotion. The reply was equally charged and candid: 'I hate the English as much as you do!' Edward recognised the Tsar's voice.
There was the small sharp slap of clapped hands and a brief barked laugh. 'In that case, my dear friend, peace is made!'
Lord Walmsley was denied much of a view of this historic event by Drinkwater and Mackenzie. The delights of the morning, despite the embarrassment of their conclusion, had not satisfied his desire. Mackenzie's gold still lay on the bed where it had been taken from the butt of one of his pistols. The girl might be a whore, as Captain Drinkwater and the mysterious Mr. Mackenzie had alleged, but the captain was prone to a certain puritan narrowness. Walmsley had lain with whores before and he had been far too long without a woman. It was true he owed Captain Drinkwater a great deal, but not his moral welfare; that was his own business. Besides the girl had been good. Walmsley sat on the bed and supposed it had been hers before Mackenzie had seduced her Jewish master with his limitless gold. Desire pricked him again and he knew he would not be missed for a while. As the bellowing of the Guards again broke out, Walmsley slipped from the attic unnoticed. On the raft, the two Emperors had reappeared, smiling publicly. Renewed cheering greeted this concord and echoed through the streets of Tilsit.
General Santhonax dismounted from his horse and threw the reins to an orderly. It was already evening and the volleys from the two armies which signalled a general rejoicing had at last died away. He was tired, having been up since just after dawn, when the report of the missing sentry had been brought to him. It was the fourth such desertion of the night and with the armistice declared he was not surprised. He greeted a fellow officer with a tired smile.
'Ah, Lariboissiere, His Imperial Majesty requires you to start immediately to throw a pontoon bridge across the river. He is desirous of impressing our late enemies with the superiority of our engineering. You may withdraw the rafts when you have finished.'
'Merde!' Lariboissiere and his men were tired out, but an order was an order. 'Was His Imperial Majesty satisfied with today's arrangements, General Santhonax?'
Santhonax remounted and settled himself in the saddle. 'Perfectly, my friend,' he said urbanely, tugging his charger's head round. 'It went better than I anticipated.'
Edward had had enough. His head still buzzed with the news he had gleaned and he was eager to escape confinement. He had heard the town clock strike six and could wait no longer. Twisting round he got his shoulders against the plank-ends that Drinkwater had nailed down and pushed hard. He felt something give, and kicked. The plank-end sprang and light entered the chamber. He forced the other end free. The plank dropped into the water and he repeated the performance with the next. More water began to lap into the chamber. He took a deep breath and forced his body through the gap, rolled into the water and submerged. When he came up he was clear of the raft. Over his head arched the blue of the evening sky. He felt a supreme elation fill him and kicked luxuriously downstream.
General Santhonax pulled up his horse at the end of the Westkai and stared down at the slip where the pont volant had spent the previous night. The trampled gravel was covered with sawdust, wood offcuts and a few pieces of cloth where the drapery had been trimmed. One of the men had left a tool behind. The polished steel gleamed dully in the muck where it lay half-buried by a careless foot. It looked like a cavalry farrier's axe.
The professional curiosity of a former secret agent made Santhonax dismount and jump down onto the hard. He pulled the axe out of the mire and looked at its head. A feeling of disquieting curiosity filled him. He returned to his horse, tapping the grubby object thoughtfully with one gloved hand. Lithuanian workmen had been employed in raising the pavilion, but they had been civilians. What then was a Russian farrier's axe doing there? He looked down again. The thing had stained his white gloves with mud. But there was something else too: the spike on the vicious weapon was sticky with blood and hair.
A sudden alarm gripped General Santhonax. He recalled the post of one of the missing sentries and his eyes flew to the gaudy and deserted raft in midstream. A sudden flash came from just below the raft, a plank upflung and yellow with new wood reflected the low evening sunlight that had replaced the day's rain. And was that a head that bobbed and was gone behind the barge? He kicked his horse into motion, leaving the quay and riding along the raised bank that was topped by a narrow path. He fished in one holster for his glass.
Then he was sure. Downstream on the far bank he saw a man crawl out of the river. His blood ran cold. That man had to die, die secretly without the Emperor ever knowing that Santhonax had failed in his duty.
Tilsit was en fete, celebrating the peace. Candles lit every window again, the streets were thronged and cheers greeted every person of consequence who appeared. The Tsar was wildly applauded as he prepared to cross the river and dine with Napoleon. Edward made his way through the crowd to the rear of the Jew's house unnoticed, for it was abandoned by Bennigsen and his suite, and the orderlies had taken themselves off to celebrate in their own manner, leaving only the sentries at the main entrance. Edward reached the attic and was helped out of his stinking rags while both Mackenzie and Drinkwater waited eagerly for his report. In the excitement no one was concerned by Walmsley's absence.
'Well,' said Mackenzie as Edward devoured a sausage and a quantity of vodka, 'our luck cannot last for ever, we are in hostile territory now by all accounts.'
'You are indeed,' said Edward swallowing the vodka, standing naked in a tin bath. 'But another thousand ...'
'Damn you, Ned!'
'Five hundred,' said Mackenzie coolly, picking up the pistol from the bed, 'and not a penny more.' Mackenzie brought the pistol barrel up and pointed it at Edward's groin.
Edward realised he had chosen a bad moment to bargain; a man rarely impresses when naked. 'Very well, gentlemen,' he said grinning sheepishly and attempting to pass off the matter lightly.
'The truth, mind,' warned Mackenzie, the pistol unwavering.
'Yes, yes, of course,' agreed Edward testily, reaching for his breeches as if insulted that he was suspected of real perfidy.
'Well?'
'There are to be long negotiations, but Napoleon is a master of deceit; he played Alexander like a woman. I have never heard flattery like it. He sold his ally Turkey to the Tsar, promised him a free hand against the Porte, guaranteed him the same in Swedish Finland, told him that he was a true child of the liberating ideals of the French Revolution and that the two of them would release the new renaissance of a resuscitated Europe! I could scarcely believe my ears. Why such a tirade of flattery and promises should be made in such secrecy is for you to judge.'
'One always seduces in private,' observed Mackenzie, ironically, "but go on. What of Great Britain?'
'That came last, though I distinctly heard Alexander declare his hatred of the English at the start, but he was much less easy to hear...'
'Go on, we have little time...'
'Britain is to be excluded from all trade with Europe or Ru
ssia. The Tsar agrees to chastise anyone who trades with a nation so perfidious as yours.' Edward paused, his choice of words significant. 'Your navy is to be destroyed by sheer weight of numbers. Napoleon said your navy is exhausted, your sources of manpower drying up, and that you cannot maintain a blockade for ever. He told the Tsar, who made some remark at this point, that your victory at Trafalgar was a narrow one and that this is proved by the death of Lord Nelson. He claimed the tide would have gone the other way but for the Spaniards deserting the French. Had the French had the Russian fleet with them that day the trident of Neptune would have been wrested from Britannia and with it the sceptre of the world!'
'What eloquence,' remarked Mackenzie.
'So the Russian fleet is to break out of the Baltic, eh?' asked Drinkwater.
'Yes. The Baltic is to be a mare clausum to Britain, supine under Russian domination, and to outnumber you the Portuguese fleet is to be seized at Lisbon and the Danish to be commandeered at Copenhagen.'
'God's bones!' exclaimed Drinkwater, his mind whirling with the news. With France and Russia allies, Napoleon's power in Europe would be absolute. The Russians would be free to expand into Turkey, the French to mass their great armies on the Channel shore once more for a final descent upon England. Napoleon would be able to summon the combined navies of every European power to add to his own. There were ships of the line building at Toulon, at Brest, at Antwerp; the Portuguese navy and the Danish navy would add a powerful reinforcement to the Russian squadrons already at sea, cruising as allies of Great Britain. Against such a force even the battle-hardened Royal Navy would find itself outgunned by sheer weight of metal! And, as Drinkwater well knew, the Royal Navy, that reassuring bulwark of the realm, was wearing out. Its seamen were sick of endless blockade, its officers dispirited by stalemate, its admirals worn with cares and its ships with sea-keeping. Such an outcome negated Drinkwater's whole life and he was filled with a sudden urgency to be off, to leave this stifling attic and regain the fresh air of his quarterdeck and a quick passage home with this vital intelligence.
'You have done well,' Mackenzie was saying, spilling into his palm a shower of gold. He held it out to Edward who was now fully dressed. 'Here, this is on account, the rest within the month in the usual way.'
Edward pocketed the cash. He was again the Russian officer, Ostroff. He held out his hand to Drinkwater. 'The parting of the ways, then, Nat?'
Drinkwater nodded. 'Yes ... it would seem so.'
'I have discharged all my obligations today.'
'With interest,' said Mackenzie drily as the two brothers shook hands.
'Where's Walmsley?' Drinkwater asked suddenly as their minds turned towards departure. The three men exchanged glances.
'He can't be far away,' said Mackenzie. 'It isn't the first time he's wandered off.'
'No, but it will be the last,' snapped Drinkwater anxiously.
'He's gone a-whoring,' said Edward as he bent to pick up his gear. Mackenzie slung his saddle-bags over his shoulder and Drinkwater put a pistol in his waistband.
'We cannot wait,' said Mackenzie, looking at Drinkwater. 'Perhaps he's down below.' Mackenzie unbarred the door and led them out down the steep and narrow stairs.
The only person they met in their descent through the eerie silence of the house was the Jew, who was on an upper landing. Mackenzie passed more money to him and the three men walked into the courtyard, shadowed by the late afternoon sunlight.
'I have a horse quartered here,' said Edward, turning aside.
'Where do you go now?' asked Drinkwater.
'To Vorontzoff,' Edward replied, entering the stable. Drinkwater followed to see if Walmsley was repeating his performance of that morning: a brief look showed the hayloft empty.
'Come on ...' said Mackenzie.
Drinkwater hesitated. ‘I must have a look for Walmsley.' Mackenzie swore and, for the first time since they had met, Drinkwater saw irresolution in his face. 'Damn it then, a quick look, but hurry!'
General Santhonax had searched the warehouses of the lower town as unobtrusively as possible. The thought that a soaking man could not vanish without accomplices beat in his brain. He reached the Ostkai with its tall houses where the previous evening he had selected the barge. Lariboissiere's men, with whose help he had crossed the river, were already stretching the first cable of the bridge Napoleon had ordered thrown over the Nieman. Angrily he turned away. Perhaps the inns round the town square might have offered concealment.
Lord Walmsley smiled down at the girl. The bed of the Russian prince was rumpled by the wanton violence of their combined lust, but Walmsley knew he had to leave, to see if the strange, English-speaking Russian officer, Ostroff, had returned to the attic. He emerged onto the landing, hearing a noise on the stairs. Below him someone went out into the courtyard. From a window he could just see down into the deepening shadows of the yard. Captain Drinkwater was there and he was joined by Ostroff, leading a grey horse out of the stable. At the same time Mackenzie appeared, shaking his head. It was obvious that departure was imminent. Behind Walmsley the girl appeared and wound her arms around him.
Below in the courtyard the three men were holding a hurried conference.
'Nothing. It means we'll have to search the place thoroughly.'
'He may have wandered off anywhere,' said Mackenzie. 'I let him go for a while yesterday ...'
'You'd best forget him,' said Edward, putting one foot in the stirrup. 'I will keep an eye out for him and spirit him away if I can.'
'And if you can't?' asked Drinkwater, at once furious with the midshipman for his desertion and in a quandary as to what to do.
'Come, this is no time to delay, we must make the best of our separate ways now,' Mackenzie said, taking Drinkwater's elbow. 'Come on, it is only a short walk to Gower's chaise and we have little to fear. It will not be very surprising if a Scottish merchant and an English shipmaster evacuate Tilsit in the wake of the day's events.'
Edward looked down from his horse. 'Goodbye, Nat, and good luck. Forget your young friend, I'll do what I can.'
'Very well, and thank you. Good fortune.'
The two men smiled and Edward dug his heels into the flanks of the grey and clattered out of the yard. At the arched entrance his horse shied, skittering sideways as a tall military officer almost collided with them. Edward kicked his mount forward.
As the big grey horse trotted away Santhonax looked under the arch. He saw two men walking towards him carrying bags over their shoulders; they had the appearance of travellers on the point of departure, yet he could see no reason for men to leave a town that was so full of wild celebration. With sudden caution he drew his pistol as they entered the covered passage and moved towards him.
Drinkwater saw the man under the arch and caught the movement of the drawn pistol.
'Look,' he hissed, sensing danger at the same moment as Mackenzie.
Drinkwater's hand went to his own pistol, Mackenzie strode forward.
'Bonsoir, M’sieur,' he said. In the gloom the man turned and Drinkwater recognised Santhonax. Without a moment's thought he swung his heavy pistol butt: the steel heel of the weapon caught Santhonax on the jaw and he crashed against the wall. Drinkwater hit him a second time. Santhonax sprawled full length, unconscious.
'It's Santhonax,' hissed Drinkwater as both men stared down at the French general, their thoughts racing. 'Do you think he was looking for us?'
'God knows!'
'Do we kill him?'
'No, that might raise a hue and cry. Take his watch, make it look like a theft.' Mackenzie bent over the inert body and wrenched at Santhonax's waist. He straightened up and handed a heavy gold watch to Drinkwater. 'Here ...' Mackenzie rifled Santhonax's pockets and then turned back the way they had come. 'Leave him. To hell with the chaise. I smell trouble. For all I know he's already discovered Walmsley... there is not a moment to lose.'
Drinkwater ran back, following Mackenzie into the stable. In a lather of inexpert haste Drin
kwater tried to get a horse saddled in imitation of Mackenzie. The other came over and finished the job for him. They drew the horses out of the stable and mounted them. Drinkwater hoisted himself gingerly into the saddle.
'Are you all right?' hissed Mackenzie.
'I think so ...' Drinkwater replied uncertainly as the horse moved beneath him, sensing his nervousness.
'Listen! If we are pursued, get to Memel and your ship! Go direct to London. Ostroff and I will take care of Walmsley ... Come, let's go!'
They rode across the yard and through the archway. Behind them General Santhonax stirred and groaned. Santhonax got slowly to his feet, clawing himself upright by the wall. His head throbbed painfully and his jaw was severely contused. He staggered forward and the courtyard swam into his vision. He looked dazedly about him. A young man was staring at him and then seemed to vanish. Santhonax frowned: the young man had been wearing something very like a seaman's coat.
His head cleared and then it came back to him. The two men, the sudden guilty hesitation and the deceptive confrontation by one of them while the other struck him with a clubbed pistol. The apparition of the youth and the smell of a stable full of horses spurred him to sudden activity. He crossed the yard and met Walmsley at the stable door.
'What's happening?' asked Walmsley in English, mistaking his man in the gloom. Santhonax smiled savagely.
'Nothing,' he replied reassuringly, his own command of English accent-free.
'Is that you, Ostroff?'
'Yes,' lied Santhonax, silhouetted against the last of the daylight.
'Have they gone then?' Santhonax heard alarm awaken in the question. 'Are they getting the chaise?' Guilt had robbed Walmsley of his wits.
'Yes ...' Santhonax pushed Walmsley backwards and followed him into the stable.
'Why, you're not Ostroff! That's a French uniform!'
'Oui, M’sieur, and who are you?' Walmsley felt the cold touch of a pistol muzzle at his chin. 'Come, quickly, or I'll kill you!'
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