He couldn’t believe she was in his arms again; the kiss reassured him, so long was its duration. He had to break it. ‘Come,’ he said, making to drag her down the hill.
‘No, Jack.’ She was breathing heavily, from her running, from their reunion. A bench was close and she sank upon it.
‘A friend has horses nearby,’ he noticed her dress as he spoke, the beauty of the taffeta, the voluminous folds, ‘and we will exchange them for a carriage. But we must go now, if we are to leave Rome before the gates are locked tonight.’
Still she did not move. ‘Sit, please, but for a moment. There are things we must discuss.’
Discuss? A strange word, he thought, full of warnings. ‘This is dangerous,’ he said, taking her outstretched hand, ‘I remember the last time you pulled me onto a bench.’
‘I pulled you?’ She struck his hand as he sat. ‘A gentleman would remember it differently.’
‘Perhaps I am none such.’ A thought creased his brow. ‘For I also remember that you pulled me down to distract me.’
‘I didn’t succeed.’
‘Just as well. For if you had …’ Jack shuddered. If he’d arrived a minute later, the King of England would have been dead and the Absolute name ruined for ever. But he had pondered long on this, recalling every detail; and each had told him that there had been no artifice in her loving. The fact that she was there now confirmed it.
He spoke on the thought. ‘You love me.’ Her nod was hesitant, but it was there. ‘When did you know?’
‘When?’ A smile came, banishing the sadness in her eyes. ‘I guessed at it when I first saw you, with your stick and your swagger, rescuing me.’
‘But you knew it …?’
She closed her eyes. ‘In the library. Duelling with titles.’
‘What? When you vanquished me?’
‘Perhaps that’s why. The hurt on your face!’ She laughed.
For a moment, there was nothing else, just that memory and her hand in his, a drowsy afternoon that could have been Bath, or Rome or anywhere where time did not rule. And then she pulled free, leaned back. ‘Jack, I do love you. But …’
He pressed a finger to her lips. ‘That is not a word for us. “I do” will suffice, and we shall hear it again and soon. Yet only if we leave now.’
He rose. She did not. ‘No, Jack, you must hear me. I do love you—’
‘But?’ He said it, the word he now hated.
‘I cannot go with you. There was a moment when I could have. But that chance passed us by. Because of a torn sleeve.’ The laugh that came now was mirthless.
‘So you would have come with me, then? Despite all the lies?’
‘Which we both told. Playing roles given to us by another.’
Jack knelt, just as he had in Bath, though there was no falsity now in the kneeling. ‘I promise you, Letty, I was going to tell you the truth. Then, there, in that garden, I would have given you a choice.’ He regarded her silence. ‘You don’t believe me?’
She leaned forward. ‘I do. And you have to believe this. Yes, I would have come with you. Yes, I would have married you, lived with you, loved you.’
It was there, what he most wanted to hear. Except the sentence was in the past tense. To return them to the present, he seized her hand. ‘Then nothing else matters. Come.’
Still she resisted him. ‘I cannot. For … for, Jack!’ She dragged her hand clear again. ‘I am no longer free. I am betrothed.’
It had to be the heat. This word did not make sense. ‘To whom?’
She sighed. ‘I am betrothed to the Count di Cavalieri.’
In his mind he saw a small man in a black coat, handing her into an opera box, through a door, out of a carriage. ‘He is ancient,’ he said.
‘He is fifty.’
‘And a dwarf.’
‘He is … very kind.’
‘Kind?’ It was another word that did not make sense.
She pressed on. ‘And he is rich. Very rich. This is what poor girls do, Jack, if they have something to offer. They make a good match.’
He shook his head. It didn’t clear it. ‘Not in your novels.’
‘I never read any novels,’ she said firmly. ‘I always knew what my life would be, where my duty lay.’
‘Is that what you were serving on that other bench?’
She winced at his sudden anger. ‘No,’ she whispered. ‘Then I truly believed it was a beginning, not an end. Then I thought that somehow duty and love had met and it seemed to me a sort of miracle. A story indeed for a novel.’ She laughed again, a sad laugh, then stretched out a hand to him. ‘But believe this, Jack, and know that I will always bless you for it: at least I tasted love once, before duty claimed me back.’
He did not take her hand. Instead he wiped his sleeve across his face. Insects hovered, their buzz in his ears. Shapes seemed to move in the trees off the path, shadows he could not focus on because he was searching for something in the cloudless sky. He found it, a word, the one she’d just spoken. ‘Betrothed.’
‘Pardon?’
There was her answer. ‘You tasted more than love on that bench. That moment of … of joining, betrothed you – to me.’ He took her hands now, tried to lift her up again from the bench. ‘Don’t you see? You cannot marry the Count. For his honour. For mine. Because you are prior contracted. You are betrothed to me.’
The drone of insects, the cracking of a stick between the trees, his heartbeat pulsing in his head. He studied her face, the bunched eyebrows, waited for her to deny the argument. She wouldn’t be able to. She’d have to agree. Have to come away with him.
Her gaze had gone past him, into the tree-line. When it came back, he saw that her eyes had filled with tears. ‘Oh, Jack,’ she said softly, ‘if that is what is binding you, then …’
‘It is. It must.’
‘… then let me relieve you on that point of honour.’ A tear spilled out, ran down the cheek. ‘For, you see, you were not the first.’
He almost laughed, such was the nonsense she spoke. The girl was barely seventeen. ‘Then who was?’
Her gaze moved beyond him again. ‘He was.’
Jack turned. Standing five paces away was Red Hugh McClune. Strangely, the first thought that came was not of the terrible betrayal, by his friend, by his lover. Instead, he remembered what Fanny Harper had said in the theatre that very first time he’d seen Letty. How she had a dark secret. He’d thought then that he would give anything to know it. He hadn’t realized it would have to be his heart.
Jack looked up into the sky again, then around into the trees. He’d never have let these men creep up on him in the forests of Quebec. But he’d been distracted by what he’d thought was love. He’d not let that happen again.
He realized he knew them all. MacBrave from the Angelo. The young Roman lover who’d preceded him down the path the very first day he’d gone to the hollowed-out tree. Even the landlord of his lodgings, not that ancient or sexless it seemed, and the swathes of cloth he still wore were now parted to reveal a toothless smile, two pistols and a club.
And then there was the Irishman. He’d only seen him by moonlight, of course, hadn’t realized just how cropped his hair was, how black he’d dyed it, the fullness of the beard. For just one moment, Jack regretted the passing of that red hair, those peacock clothes. Only one small moment though, that one before he drew his sword.
‘Now don’t be foolish …’
There were five paces between them. Jack covered them fast, so fast that Red Hugh made his first parry with his sword still half in its scabbard, twisting as he did, using the force of Jack’s run to guide him past his right side. Halting, Jack slashed back, spinning around, knowing that the side of the small sword could not kill but could hurt the man badly, catch an eye perhaps, weaken him anyway, prepare him for Jack’s point. But Red Hugh ducked swiftly, spun away, a gap created between them, his arms wide in an attitude of supplication. ‘I pray you, Jack. You cannot win here. Put up.’
Jack couldn’t, didn’t. Again he came, flicking off his cloak, the gold coins in its hem bunching it into a length of heavy cloth that he flung at the Irishman, engulfing him in black. Red Hugh, briefly blinded, must nevertheless have felt the point driven at his belly; he cut down, deflected Jack’s lunge just enough, though he sacrificed a button of his waistcoat.
‘No!’ the Irishman yelled, but not at Jack; at the men who had circled, whom Jack, with side vision, saw were brandishing cudgels. He didn’t care, though. For now, the man he hated was still struggling to free himself from heavy black cloth.
‘Yah!’ yelled Jack, lunging again, straight at the exposed belly that was there and then was not because he’d forgotten again that the Irishman was a left-hander and hardly had to move to flick the blade in an outward circular parry, using Jack’s momentum to bring him tight, so his right hand could drop and fasten on Jack’s, his forefinger find that point under the thumb pad. With a yelp, Jack released his grip, his sword plunging to the dusty earth.
For a moment, Red Hugh held him there. Then the Irishman’s eyes went beyond him and Jack waited for the blow that would tumble him into a familiar darkness, from which, perhaps, he would never emerge. Darkness came but no blow fell. Instead his own cloak was swirled around his head, pulled tight; men fell on him. His hands were swiftly bound and then he was half pushed, half dragged in a stumbling run down the hill. Sightless, all he had were the sounds. The worst of them, beyond Italian cursing and Irish cautions, were those that faded first – a woman’s terrible sobs.
They left him bound and blind for several hours. Only when it was night did they remove the ropes, unwind the cloak, releasing him from one darkness to another. Light eventually came, showing him a long, high-ceilinged room. A gaol again, despite the bed, armoire, table and chairs; but in Bath he’d been held in a cellar while here muffled shouting from below indicated he was being restrained higher up. Bars prevented him reaching the shutters on the outside of the tall, deep-set windows, but he saw a catch, presumed they opened with the correct pole. The growing light also showed him a lantern, his strike light, flint and bowl beside it. Once lit, its glow also revealed the rest of his possessions that he’d abandoned in the attic. There was a basin and jug, both full of water. He drank the one, used the other to wash his face clear of the black dust of the path. A mirror in a large gilt frame hung on one wall above a fireplace, and Jack went close to behold a sorry version of himself.
His hair, hard to tame at the best of times, hung in knotted black shanks down his pale face, and there were purple bruises beneath his eyes. Sighing, he turned again to the water he had not yet drunk, washed again, found his comb and did what he could with his hair, tying it back. Then he sought out his best clothes, the ensemble he’d worn at the opera. There was no need to don the wig. But he would look as well as he could when he faced his inquisitors.
They came within the hour. Two remained outside the door.
‘Good morrow to you, me boy,’ Red Hugh said as he strode in. Jack saw that, like himself, the Irishman had been about his toilet. Gone was the beard, the black garb. Though his hair was not the red cascade it had been and he sported a wig, his clothes were once more the beautifully pressed display Jack had so envied aboard the Sweet Eliza. ‘Are ye well there?’
‘Well enough. And ready.’
‘For what.’
‘For whatever it is you intend to do to me.’
Red Hugh sat on one of the two chairs that faced each other, the table between. He produced a flask from one pocket, two small glasses from another. Extracting the cork with his teeth, he began to pour, speaking around the obstacle. ‘And what is it you think I intend, dear heart? Come over, have a drink and tell me.’
Jack did not move. ‘I am your enemy. I presume you want information from me.’
The cork was laid down. ‘You are my friend, Jack, one who spared my life. Our differences in politics, well …’ He shrugged. ‘And there is nothing you have that I do not already know.’
‘Nothing?’
‘Well, let me see.’ Red Hugh leaned back on the chair legs, still holding out one of the glasses. ‘Come and sit; let us consider the matter.’
Jack came. He did not want to drink with this man. He wanted to kill him. But since that was plainly impossible for the moment and since, despite the reassurance, Jack was convinced that torture was but a few moments away, he might as well take a drink. It might help dull the pain that was coming.
He sat. ‘Slainte,’ said Red Hugh, knocking back the glass, immediately pouring another. ‘I hate to tell you this – and I hope you won’t feel too bad about it – but I already know it all.’ He held up a fist, counted out the fingers. ‘Your scoutmaster in England is Colonel Turnville. You do not know the one here, they would not have trusted you with that information. Am I not right?’
Jack shrugged.
‘Ah, lad.’ Eyes sparkled at him, a finger went up. ‘He communicates via the tree on Monte Pinchio. We read the messages first, as we do your replies. Which reminds me …’ He fished again into the seemingly bottomless pockets, extracted the copy of Herodotus and placed it on the table. ‘It’s always Herodotus or bloody Virgil. All you classical-inclined Englishmen! You should tell ’em to show a little more imagination. Sure, there are some fine Irish writers they could use. Still,’ he patted the volume, ‘they’ll be bound to change their crib since your capture so you may have this. Should distract you in the time you have ahead.’
‘My final hours?’
Red Hugh laughed. ‘I know you have a low opinion of me, lad. But do you really think, after all we’ve been through, that I’d be so unfriendly as to torture and then kill you?’
Jack bit back the retort that came on a surge of anger. Anger was not what he needed here. ‘So what is to become of me?’ he said.
‘I wish, me boy, that I could say you were free to go. We both know that is not going to happen. Nor can I tell you how long you must remain here. But I can tell you that your stay will not be too onerous, howsoever long. I could not, in all conscience, spend Jacobite gold on your hospitality. But it seems only right that what was extracted from the cloak you tried to snare me with should provide you with a little comfort to start you off. And for the rest of the time, if you would just sign this paper …’ From within his jacket, a piece of parchment was pulled out, unfolded and set down alongside a quill and ink pot.
‘What’s this? My confession? I wouldn’t sign one for Turnville and I’ll be damned if I sign one for you!’
Red Hugh shook his head. ‘Read.’
Jack read to himself.
I, Jack Absolute, do hereby relinquish all my shares and disbursements in the Robuste, captured in the late action against the Sweet Eliza and give them, without let or hindrance, to Hugh Patrick Fergal McClune of Broad Street, Bristol. I state that there has been no coercion in this assignment and is in return only for services rendered by the aforementioned Hugh McClune, Esq.
He looked up. ‘No coercion?’
The Irishman shrugged. ‘None. You must stay a prisoner, Jack. It’s your choice if you do it at my expense, for which you will reimburse me, or … well, there are other places that are far less comfortable, I can assure you.’
‘I’m sure you’d know,’ muttered Jack, reaching for the quill, dipping it into the well, signing. He had no choice. He had been in an English cell and it was a hole. He suspected that an Italian one would be far worse.
Red Hugh leaned forward with an approving grin. ‘Now date it, there’s the thing. Marvellous! You won’t regret it.’ He blew on the ink, waved the parchment in the air. ‘Not sure when I’ll make it to Bristol but …’
Jack swirled the contents of his glass, then drained it. ‘And you cannot tell me how long I am to be imprisoned?’
‘Alas, I cannot. Who knows where the Cause will take me now?’
‘Back to England to kill the King?’
‘I think not. That was merely a piece of opportunism when
I heard of his forthcoming visit to Bath. Besides, kill one Hanoverian, there’s always another nearby to place his fat Teutonic arse on the throne.’ His eyes focused above Jack. ‘You know, I’ve always dreamed of doing something that would not just shake the throne but pull it down entirely. Something … spectacular.’ His gaze returned. ‘I’ve got a few thoughts on it, and must be about them now.’ He smiled. ‘But don’t you fear, I’m always back in Rome every two or three years.’
Jack could not help the gasp that came. ‘You would hold me for three years?’
‘It’s not so long, for a youth like yourself. Wasn’t I prisoner to the Turks for as long? And in conditions far removed from these, I’ll be telling you.’ His hand came to rest on Jack’s arm. ‘For your gold will buy you wine and good food, and the guards have instructions to bring you whatever you like.’ He winked. ‘I’ve warned them of your appetites, my boy. Good clean girls will be provided and changed as often as your linen.’
Jack stared back, revolted. Coldly, he said, ‘I think I have had enough dealings with whores, don’t you?’
It was the first blow he’d landed on the Irishman and he saw him wince. ‘Now, Jack, you wrong her. You—’
Jack shook his head. His anger, so banked down but always present, came out now. ‘Your own cousin,’ he spat. ‘How could you? Did you give no thought at all to the honour of a man you said was your friend but that you could lead to a trough where you had guzzled?’
Red Hugh stared back. Jack could see he had hurt him again. Anger and sorrow duelled on the man’s face. Both were mastered – slowly, painfully – before he spoke. ‘I’ll tell you something of my cousin, Absolute. She does what she does for greater reasons than you could ever comprehend.’
‘For the Cause?’ Jack’s voice was sharp with mockery. ‘What cause is it that can turn a girl into a whore and you into her pander?’
Absolute Honour Page 22