‘So what would you have me do?’
‘You tell me. I have reason to think that an Englishwoman has been abducted, and is about to become the victim of a forced marriage. What redress do we have? Can we count on the authorities to investigate honestly?’ Darcy threw up his hands. ‘Who are the relevant authorities in any case?’
‘Well may you ask.’ Hoppner opened a box of cigars and pushed it across the desk. ‘Smoke?’
Darcy shook his head. Hoppner clipped a cigar, lit it, and leaned back. ‘It is like musical chairs. For centuries, this region was administered by the Republic of Venice. This ended with the French invasion at the end of the last century, and Napoleon later included the Veneto in his Kingdom of Italy, and appointed French officers to look after the police. Last year, just a few months ago, this was changed again when the Congress of Vienna re-assigned control to the Austrian Empire. Now Bonaparte is back in France, and who knows what will happen. The prefect is trustworthy, but he remains a French appointee, now answerable to an Austrian commander. In such times, the abduction of an Englishwoman will command little attention—even assuming that we can provide proof.’
‘So how is law and order maintained?’
‘Poorly. Much depends on the local captains, who are Venetians, not foreigners, and likely to favour their own kind. They are also susceptible to bribery.’
‘They would stoop so low as to support abduction and forced marriage?’
The consul blew a smoke ring. ‘It would depend on the official. The trouble is that we have two rival interpretations of the facts. Miss Bennet has resided in Venice for months as a friend of the family. An attachment with Carandini is not implausible. His lawyer is willing to attest to an engagement. She is plainly sick, and under the care of his doctor. Against this weight of evidence, I fear you have no case.’
Darcy clenched his fists in frustration. ‘I’m convinced, Hoppner, that Miss Bennet is being held under duress, probably through the use of drugs.’ He recalled the smell of the empty wine glass at her bedside. ‘If I am not mistaken, they are dosing her with laudanum.’
Hoppner rested his cigar on an ashtray and leaned forward. ‘I’m sorry, but it will not do. We have no proof. Laudanum is often prescribed as a medicine. I see no way to proceed by official channels.’
Darcy lowered his voice. ‘And what of unofficial channels?’
The consul studied him. ‘You care for this woman? You would risk your life for her?’
‘Certainly.’
‘You have resources,’ the consul mused. ‘Money. Skill with a rapier, I would wager. Did you bring a pistol?’
‘Two, to defend against brigands.’
Hoppner continued in a whisper, ‘I speak now as a friend, not as an official. Yes, in your place I would seek reinforcements and attempt a rescue. The administrative chaos of recent months will work in your favour. But remember, Carandini has resources too. If you have drawn his character correctly, he will not take this lying down. He will employ agents of his own and come after you.’
Darcy recalled Mario Carandini’s warning. ‘I will be ready.’
‘One thing I can do.’ Hoppner took a key from his pocket and unlocked a drawer. ‘Again in confidence.’ He withdrew a wad of documents. ‘As a precaution I keep false letters of safe conduct for use by my wife and myself in an emergency. They may prove useful if officials have been ordered to detain anyone named Darcy or Bennet.’
Darcy glanced at the letters, which related to a certain Mr Giles Ashley from Cambridge, and his wife Rebecca. ‘Do you not need these yourself?’
‘I can make two more sets.’
‘This is a kindness I will not forget.’
Hoppner rose and offered his hand.
13
The night was clear, the moon almost full. Their vessel, a caorlina, resembled a rudimentary gondola, but had a longer interior with space for six rowers. Darcy had taken an oar, leaning back against a small trunk holding their possessions. In front were two sailors, Angus and Dougal, whom he had found hanging around the port in hope of earning their passage to Scotland. Having enjoyed no success that day, the sailors were glad of the opportunity to earn a ducat apiece. They had co-opted two drinking companions, Italian fishermen mostly drawn by adventure, but with an eye to the flagon of wine that Darcy had brought along as an incentive.
It was an hour past midnight, Darcy estimated, yet traffic still moved over the lagoon, the dark shapes pin-pointed by oil lamps. As well as manpower, Angus and Dougal provided equipment: ropes, a grappling hook, an iron lever, a hammock. For weaponry they carried knives; Darcy had sword and pistols—a necessary precaution, but he knew in his heart that if it came to a battle, their chances of escape were slight.
They found the dock near the villa, and Darcy checked the coast was clear before passing through to the scrubland.
‘Burgess?’ he hissed.
‘Over here, sir.’ The servant was seated on a tree trunk shielded from the villa by oleander bushes. He pointed to the gate.
‘Is the family still here?’ Darcy asked.
Burgess nodded. ‘They’ve posted two guards.’
Darcy peered through the bushes. ‘I see no-one.’
Burgess pointed to a hut that adjoined the villa. ‘One is inside. The other is round the back, patrolling.’
They waited until a man walked stiffly into view, carrying a musket. Darcy sighed. Some kind of defence he had expected, but to neutralise two armed men without a fracas would take time, if it could be done at all. He thought for a while, before leaving Burgess on watch and returning to the dock.
‘Nae a problem,’ Dougal said. ‘Creep aside them, one two wi’ the hilt of ma wee knife, and it’s gudnicht to baith of them.’
‘Or goodnight to both of you if they hear you coming,’ Darcy said. ‘I have a better idea.’ He took a small bottle from his pocket, and whispered to the fishermen to bring the stoneware flagon of wine from the boat.
‘I’m hoping that our friends outside the villa will be bored, and not amiss to a little refreshment.’ He uncorked the phial and held it to Angus’s nose. ‘Recognise this?’
‘Boggin ’ell, tha’s bitter.’
Darcy up-ended the phial into the flagon. It was laudanum, the mixture of opium and alcohol he had smelled in Elizabeth’s wine glass. He had brought it in case she craved the drug; now it had found a better use.
‘Waste of gud buckie,’ Angus complained.
Darcy shook the flagon and tested the wine with a finger. Yes, it was bitter, but still drinkable. He gestured to the fishermen to join them, and in broken Italian issued his instructions.
An hour or so later, Burgess joined them at the boat.
‘It’s working,’ he whispered. ‘One of the guards managed a wobbly patrol ten minutes ago, but his mate hasn’t come out. They’re both in the shed now.’
‘Excellent. Tell us if anything changes.’
Darcy gave the thumbs up to the fishermen, who had hoodwinked the guards by pretending to be local revellers willing to share a flagon of vino rosso. The guards were ex-militiamen who offered their skills to anyone willing to pay. Weary and bored, they were easily tempted to try one swig, then another, until eventually they traded a pinch of tobacco for the whole flagon.
‘They winna be out cold,’ Angus warned. ‘Nae on laudanum.’
Darcy nodded. ‘But we have them drinking in the shed now, and their reactions will be sluggish.’
They sent the fishermen back to the shed. One guard was now snoring; the other, recalling his job, staggered around the villa until he reached a tree, where Angus and Dougal jumped him and stuffed a rag in his mouth to keep him quiet.
Able to move freely at last, with both guards bound and gagged, Darcy unlatched the gate and led the sailors to a cypress that he had spotted from Elizabeth’s window. He looked up at the small stone balcony and rickety wooden shutters. Had they moved her? But why go to such trouble with two guards outside?
The tr
ee was too far from the balcony to provide access. Angus and Dougal conferred by gesture; then Angus leaned against the wall while Dougal climbed on his back. Dougal’s fingers reached for the balustrade, but it was too high. Angus pointed to a rope, which Darcy passed up; Dougal managed to lob the end over the balustrade and thread it back. Looking down with a grin, he fashioned a noose to grip the top of the wall, and jumped down.
Darcy pulled on the rope. It held firm.
Lower down the rope, the sailors had tied thick knots to serve as footrests. Angus shimmied up, the iron lever in his teeth, and was probing the shutters as Darcy joined him. He pointed to a gap, where a fastener on the inside was visible, wiggled the blade of his knife through, and lifted it. With a creak the shutter opened to reveal a sash window slightly ajar.
Carefully, Darcy raised the window and climbed inside. He recalled the clammy air and the faint odour of opium. A woman stirred, then rolled on to her side, asleep. Darcy leaned over the bed and saw the familiar dark curls, now unpinned, and the pale skin shiny with sweat.
It was Elizabeth. She was here.
14
Someone was whispering her name. A man’s voice, familiar, like a dream of home.
‘Miss Bennet. Elizabeth. Wake up.’
She twitched, and nearly cried out, but the reassuring voice hushed her. ‘Don’t be alarmed. You are safe, but we must speak softly.’
She saw the outline of his face, just a few inches away. ‘Mr Darcy! But how …’
‘Shh.’ He held a finger to his lips. ‘We must go now, and take care not to alert the household. Do you understand?’
‘Go? But it is impossible …’ Frantic images came into her mind, of Regina urging her to take her medicine, and Gabriele waving a document that she had to sign—or had she already signed it?
Darcy rested a hand on the blanket, near her shoulder. ‘I am going to take you back to your family in England, if that is what you want.’
Her heart jumped. ‘They say I am too sick to travel.’
His voice was quiet, but firm. ‘You are not sick, Miss Elizabeth. You feel tired and confused because you have been drugged, with an opiate.’
‘It is a medicine …’ A wave of drowsiness overcame her, and she bit her lip, struggling to focus.
‘The physician is in the pay of Signor Carandini, who seeks to lock you away until you consent to marry him.’
‘They say I have signed a document.’ She recalled her father’s advice. ‘Although I should not have.’
‘Do you wish to marry him?’
‘Marry?’ She shivered. ‘No. But they say I have given my word …’
‘Miss Bennet, listen carefully. I have seen the document. The signature is illegible. Either it has been falsified, or you wrote it when you were half asleep and had no idea what you were agreeing to. The document does not matter. All that matters is whether you prefer to stay here, or return to England.’
She felt a familiar annoyance at the way he assumed command. But she was too weak to retaliate now; it was a relief to submit and give herself into his care.
‘I will come with you.’
‘Then let us make haste. Can you walk?’
She tried to lever herself up, but her limbs were so heavy that she trembled with the effort.
‘Never mind, I will carry you. Now your clothes …’
She pointed at a wardrobe. ‘How can I dress?’
‘No time for that.’ He quickly made up a bundle and handed it to someone on the balcony.
She managed to sit up, and pointed to her nightgown. ‘I cannot travel in this.’
‘We’ll use the bedclothes. Permit me.’ She gasped as he pulled back the blankets, and he raised a hand. ‘This is no time for delicacy. Relax, and try not to make a sound.’
His arms came around her and he lifted her on top of the bedclothes, then wrapped her like a parcel. The sensation of his hands through the thin cotton nightdress took her breath away, but with his warning fresh in her mind she remained compliant. A wave of fresh air hit her as he handed her through the window to another pair of hands; a moment later she found herself on the balcony floor. She probed under the blankets and felt rough canvas.
A hand touched her arm, and Darcy whispered, ‘Keep still. We’re lowering you in a hammock.’
The canvas enfolded her and she was swinging back and forth. There was a muffled oath from above as the hammock bumped against the outside of the balcony, but she was unhurt, and did not cry out. Another pair of hands guided her to the ground. Light footsteps sounded behind her as Darcy and another man descended, then the hammock rose again, twisting her into a bow shape as her head and feet were pulled up.
She heard a rattle from the villa followed by the bang of a shutter, and a shriek of ‘Intrusi!’
‘Confound it!’ Darcy growled, no longer keeping his voice down. The hammock swayed as the men rushed her through the gate. In the corner of her eye she saw Darcy alongside, shouting at the men to stop.
‘Too slow! I will take her. Run ahead and alert the others.’
She felt his arms enfold her body, still wrapped in the bedclothes, and they set off again, now at running pace. The cries from the villa receded, then they were alone, in a woodland, with Darcy breathing heavily as he picked his way between the trees.
A cold breeze woke her. She was in a boat, leaning against the hard edge of a platform at the rear. In front of her she recognised Darcy, silhouetted against the moonlight as he pulled on an oar; beyond him she counted five other men. As she sat up a headwind caught her hair, which streamed behind. The men grunted with exertion. She reached back and tried to fold her hair into the blankets, but it flew out again as soon as she released it.
Darcy stopped rowing, and pointed. ‘There! Another boat, from the same dock.’
‘A gud half-mile ahint,’ a man replied.
Darcy applied himself again to his oar, and smiled as he realised she was awake. ‘Comfortable?’
Not very, she thought, but at least the blankets were keeping her warm. ‘Who is following us?’
‘I fear Carandini has found reinforcements.’ He pointed over his shoulder. ‘Do you see an opening inland from the lagoon?’
She leaned over, and squinted into the distance. ‘I see two openings. No, three.’
They passed between a pair of tiny islands, and a man at the front shouted, ‘Fusina.’
Elizabeth looked back at Darcy. ‘Is that our target?’
He nodded.
‘And after that?’
He frowned. ‘We shall see.’
Unaccountably she felt a lightening of spirits, and met his eye with a smile. ‘Mr Darcy, am I to understand that you have no idea what to do next?’
He smiled back. ‘My plans are flexible.’
‘In other words, non-existent.’
‘Miss Bennet, we have a two-mile row ahead of us into a stiff wind. Lie back and try to sleep. Perhaps when you wake, my plans will have evolved to your satisfaction.’
She laughed—when had she last done that?—and tried to find a comfortable angle to rest her head.
15
When they reached Fusina it was still dark, but the wharf was already busy as goods from Venice were loaded on to barges, to be drawn by horse power along the river towards the Brenta canal. Looking back across the lagoon Darcy could no longer discern which of the boats had been pursuing them from Lido. He had wondered whether to dock first elsewhere, as a decoy, but decided that the priority was speed: they had only half an hour on Carandini and his men, and must put it to good use.
Facing him at the back of the boat, Elizabeth had slept through the latter part of the journey, and he felt a twinge of guilt at the pleasure of having her so close, curled up in the warm blankets with her hair spilling in all directions.
Angus and Dougal moored the boat, and helped Burgess unload Darcy’s trunk, which now held some of Elizabeth’s clothes as well as his own. He puzzled what to do with Elizabeth herself, still dresse
d in her nightgown and probably too drowsy to walk. Eventually he awoke her, then simply carried her up the steps to the wharf and sat her on the trunk, where she drew the blankets across her shoulders and awaited events in silence.
It was time for a parting of the ways. Darcy extracted two gold ducats from his belt for Angus and Dougal, and gave the Italian fishermen a silver lira each to compensate them for the missing wine, sacrificed in order to drug the guards. The men set off in excellent spirits. Without them Darcy felt a knot of anxiety: if Carandini and company caught up, it would no longer be possible to resist. He hoped that his pursuers would see the caorlina boat depart, and divide their forces in case Darcy and Elizabeth were still on it.
Burgess returned with the welcome news that a barge was about to leave, and could take them along the Brenta to Padua. Even better, when tempted by another coin, the bargee sent two men to carry their luggage.
It was a low thin vessel with the decks at both ends laden with barrels, and a covered sitting area recessed in the middle. As Darcy boarded, the bargee left to talk with a boy who was harnessing two horses to the side of the boat. On deck there were open boxes of fresh fish, which Darcy had to side-step as he carried Elizabeth inside. Two other passengers, dressed like farm workers, watched with interest as he set her down on one of two wooden benches which ran along the sides. Their presence obviously disturbed Elizabeth, who had woken up sufficiently to worry about her hair, but she managed to coil it beneath a blanket, after which she again closed her eyes.
As the barge moved slowly off, Burgess joined them.
‘Any sign of Carandini?’ Darcy asked.
Burgess shook his head. ‘Won’t be long though, sir. An hour at most, probably less.’
‘What would you do in his place?’
‘Ask at the wharf. Then hire a horse and gallop after the barge.’
‘Just so.’ Darcy thought for a moment. ‘Which means we have a problem. We cannot hope to reach Padua by barge, because in an hour’s time we will be overtaken. We must disembark earlier, at a place they won’t expect.’
Darcy's Journey Page 6