Tucker's Inn

by Tucker's Inn (retail) (epub)

  ‘Because your wife took your son with her, you mean,’ I said. ‘She chose him.’

  ‘No, something far worse.’ Louis bowed his head, hesitating as if he was considering explaining what it was that would have caused Antoinette such distress, and deciding against it. ‘The boy was born after I returned her to France,’ he went on at last. ‘When she left, neither of us knew she was with child, and I learned only recently of his existence.’

  ‘You mean she gave birth to your son and never told you of it?’ I asked.

  ‘That is so,’ Louis agreed. ‘It was, perhaps, her act of revenge because I had banished her, I don’t know. Lisette is a law unto herself, and I do not think even she always understands why she does the things she does.’

  He was silent for a moment, and I knew he was thinking of the turbulent past he had shared with his wife, and of things that I, for all that I loved him so, would never know. Then he sighed deeply, and continued.

  ‘Lisette’s family were aristocrats, living in their fine chateaux in the lap of luxury, and with connections to the court of King Louis. When the Terror began I knew, without doubt, that they would be taken by the mob and sentenced to death on the guillotine – and I made up my mind I must do what I could to save her. It was my doing, after all, that she was in France and in danger of her life. Together with some trusted friends I set up the first escape route and crossed the channel to try and find her. She and her close family had gone into hiding. But those from her circle that I was able to speak to told me of the boy. Pierre. My son. I knew then that I could never rest until I found him and brought him safe to England.’

  ‘But…’ I hesitated, then burst out: ‘How can you be so sure that he is your son? If he was born after you sent her away, and if she was…’

  ‘Unfaithful to me?’ His lip curled into the parody of a smile. ‘Yes, that is true enough. But Lisette made no secret of his parentage to her confidantes. The date of his birth fits exactly with… events before she went away. And everyone I spoke to who knows Pierre remarks upon the fact that he is, in appearance, growing to be very like me. There is no doubt whatever in my mind. I sired this child, at least. He is my son.’

  I frowned, puzzled by his choice of words, and I wondered, too, if Louis’ certainty might be misplaced, for does not every man wish for a son to carry on his heritage? But I did not dwell upon it. There were too many other questions to be answered.

  ‘If your chief objective is to bring out Lisette and your son, why do you waste time rescuing others who mean nothing whatever to you?’ I asked.

  It sounded harsh, I knew that the moment the words had left my lips, and the quirk of Louis’ eyebrow told me that he thought so too. But he answered me anyway.

  ‘My network is in place and may as well be used. The poor souls I rescue value their lives too. And every one I am able to speak to is a link in the chain.’ He smiled wryly. ‘Besides, I could not help feeling that if I could do some good, God might look more favourably upon my prayers and lead me to Lisette and my son. And so it has proved.’

  ‘You now know where they are?’ I asked.

  ‘I have the best information yet, from one who is the most likely to know Lisette’s hiding place and tell me the truth.’ His lips tightened. ‘A person I would have preferred to have no truck with, and whose neck I would gladly wring myself. But enough of that. This information is the reason I must return to France tomorrow. It is imperative I find them before they move on again – or are taken by the Revolutionaries. There’s no time to lose.’

  ‘Oh Louis!’ Dread filled me, ice-cold fingers clutching at my heart. ‘I am so afraid for you.’

  He reached out and touched my cheek. ‘Don’t be. I shall do my utmost to ensure I stay out of the clutches of those who would like to see me in the tumbril on my way to the guillotine along with the aristocracy they hate so much. And if I cannot… well, it is destiny. That is something, chérie, which it is impossible to cheat.’

  I caught my lip between my teeth, biting on it hard to contain my emotion. There was nothing I could say, I knew, to dissuade him. Louis’ course was set, and had been long before I had ever met him. He would not have been the man I loved if it had been any different. But oh, the fear for him! And oh, the pain of knowing that if he succeeded in this mission he had set himself, then when he returned once more to England he would bring with him his wife and child.

  Whatever the outcome, whichever way the dice fell, I had lost him. The Revolution so far away across the sea had already cost me my own dear father. Now it would rob me of the only man I had ever loved in that special way that a woman can love a man.

  ‘Louis…’ I whispered. ‘Do you love her?’

  His eyes were far away. ‘I did, once,’ he answered. ‘More than life itself.’

  ‘And now?’

  His eyes met mine. ‘I think you know the answer to that, Flora.’

  My heart was beating like a trapped bird. ‘You love me. As I love you.’

  ‘You know I do. But it cannot be.’

  I reached out and took his hand. My love swept away all modesty, all propriety. It made me bold.

  ‘I know that too, Louis. But can we not have just this one night?’

  I felt him stiffen, withdraw.

  ‘Please!’ I whispered urgently. ‘Tomorrow you sail for France. I pray that you will return safe, but it may not be. And if you do, and you bring Lisette and your son with you, then that too is an end for us. I know that. You are an honourable man, and I would not wish to impose upon you more guilt than you already bear. But if you love me, give me just this one night to remember. I swear that I will never ask for more.’

  His eyes, dark and tortured, held mine, and in them I could see the inner battle that was tearing him apart. He wanted me, just as I wanted him, yet his chivalry and his fierce code of morality held him back as securely as if he had been manacled and chained.

  ‘I cannot dishonour you, Flora,’ he said, his voice low and gruff with emotion. ‘You have already suffered enough because of me. If I should ruin you, what other man would want you?’

  ‘That is of no importance to me,’ I said urgently. ‘I don’t want any man but you, and I never shall. You would not dishonour me, quite the opposite. I shall think myself honoured that I have loved, and been loved, by the bravest and most gallant man in the whole of England.’

  He laughed shortly. ‘That is, I fear, far from the truth!’

  ‘No, it is not,’ I insisted. I caught his hand; he did not tear it away, though his eyes narrowed a fraction more. We were close, so close, and yet so far apart, and the few inches of air between us as charged as the air before a summer storm. I could feel every sinew of his body calling to mine, my nerve endings tingled, my skin shivered, my lips trembled.

  I looked at him and knew that his self-control was such that unless the first move came from me it would not come at all. I reached up and kissed him, one hand still holding his, and in that kiss was all my longing and all my love. For a moment longer he stood like a statue. I whispered against his lips: ‘Louis, oh Louis…’ and I pressed the hand I held to my breast.

  He groaned then, deep in his throat, and suddenly I was no longer the instigator, but the willing slave, and Louis the master. He swept me up into his arms as easily as if I were a child and carried me to the summer house. There he set me down while he took off his redingote and laid it on the bare board floor. He pulled me close once more and for a lovely timeless moment we clung together, kissing deeply, whilst anticipation sharpened all our senses to an unbearable height of ecstasy. Then, still clinging to one another, we sank to the floor.

  I experienced just one fleeting moment’s fear for what I was doing, then he was bunching up my skirts and petticoats; his hands and his hard body against the soft skin of my thighs sent new waves of desire rippling through me, and once again I cared for nothing but being with Louis, close as a man and a woman can be.

  I had never heard that the first time is s
upposed to be painful for a young lady – I had no mother or close female relative to tell me such things, however delicately, so perhaps my lack of apprehension made it easy for me. There was just that one sharp knife-edge of pain that made me catch my breath, and then Louis was in me, moving easily and rhythmically in my wetness, and I was once again borne up on that rushing bore tide, higher and higher, faster and faster, until there was nothing in the world but our urgent need and our bodies moving in unison.

  Quite suddenly Louis was still in me and I knew a brief stab of panic that even now, at the last moment, his resolve had returned, his control was greater than his desire for me. Then his hand slid between our bellies and his fingers found my mound, moving with the same compelling rhythm. I moaned as the undreamed-of sensations within me grew deeper and stronger yet, pressing myself into him, being swept ever upward until I thought I would die of the paroxysm of pleasure so intense it was almost pain. And then he was moving in me again, and united we reached the pinnacle of ecstasy, calling out each other’s names.

  It was over, but I could not let it go. I moved still against him as the aftershocks surprised me, one after the other, then weaker and more widely spaced until my satiated body relaxed, warm, luxuriously warm, luxuriously replete.

  ‘Oh Flora,’ he said, simply.

  I tangled my fingers in his hair, I felt his cheek against mine, and the wetness between my legs. Gradually I became aware of the coldness of the bare boards surrounding the redingote island on which we lay, and could not care.

  For this little hiatus in time, Louis had been mine. The joy warmed me, and gave the illusion of a heaven that could last beyond this day, this moment.

  ‘Oh Flora,’ he said again, and I pressed my fingers to his lips. I did not want him to say anything that might mar the magic of this moment.

  Tomorrow he would sail for France. The likelihood was that never again would we be together this way. But I would have my memories, and I needed them to be untarnished by doubts or regrets.

  They could sustain me then through all the long years that lay ahead.

  * * *

  The glow remained with me for the rest of that unreal day, for I refused to think for even a moment about the morrow, even though it hung like a dark shadow just beyond my conscious mind. These were moments to cherish; the touch of Louis’ hand upon my wrist, light and lingering, as he filled my glass at dinner, the tone of his voice when he spoke my name, the tender looks we shared.

  I felt sure it must be quite clear to everyone that I was different, that Louis and I were lovers, and I felt like a queen, but no one appeared to notice, not Antoinette, and not Gavin, who had joined us for our evening meal.

  Antoinette was still a little preoccupied, and I guessed Louis had spoken to her some time during the afternoon, enlightening her as to the secrets he had kept from her for so long. But he had also asked Gavin to take her to see about buying the foal for her whilst he was away, and when she spoke it was of nothing but that. Horses, and her love for them, seemed to be Antoinette’s way of coping with everything that she found upsetting or unsettling; when she turned her mind to them, the rest of the world faded to shadows. As for Gavin, he seemed a little tense, a little distant, rather than his usual breezy self, and I wondered if it might be that he was anxious because his brother was returning to France once again tomorrow. He must surely be aware of the real purpose behind the trips and be concerned for the dangers Louis faced. Though there was no love lost between them, they were still brothers and that must, in the last resort, mean more than any differences that had arisen as a result of his long-ago dalliance with Louis’ wife.

  Was he also involved in the Brotherhood of the Lynx? I wondered. When he visited France on business did he too risk his life to extricate nobles from their perilous predicament? Since I had seen him poring over the papers that were locked in the bureau it seemed likely that he did, and I resolved to ask Louis about it if the opportunity arose, for I thought that if there was someone with whom I could discuss my fears and anxieties for him whilst he was away it would make the waiting more bearable.

  As the evening wore on, that shadow at the edges of my mind began to close in, deepening with the shadows in the corners of the room beyond the lamplight. I felt it growing closer and darker, prodding at me with fingers of dread, and the poignancy only made my love the sharper and stronger. I was on the edge of a precipice above a yawning chasm, clinging by my fingertips and savouring every sweet breath with heightened awareness.

  Soon after dinner, visitors came, but I did not see them. Louis was closeted with them in his study for some long while, and I resented every moment he spent with them, though I knew they must be discussing important details which might, for all I knew, save his life.

  Gavin did not join them; he remained in the parlour with Antoinette and me, though I sensed he was listening when they emerged into the hallway and stood there for a few moments, talking. I listened too, but I could hear nothing of what they said, nothing but the rise and fall of voices, two cultured, the tones of gentlemen, one rougher, with a broad Devon burr.

  Perhaps he was the captain of Louis’ ship, I thought – or perhaps he was just another local man like my father who had been enlisted to provide a safe house. But that seemed unlikely. For one thing, Louis had told me he had never had direct contact with my father at Tucker’s Grave in order to preserve the security of the line; for another no safe house would be needed, surely, for Lisette and Louis’ son. They would come directly here, to Belvedere.

  Sharp pain twisted in me and for a moment I wondered what I would do when they arrived. Louis had made it plain that I was not safe at Tucker’s Grave, and would not be as long as the operations of the Brotherhood of the Lynx continued. But I did not think I could bear to remain here, in the same house as Lisette. It would be torture to see them together and know that she was his wife, sharing his name and his bed. And though he said he loved me now, was it not possible that when he was with her again the love for her he had once admitted to would be resurrected? I loved her more than life… How could feelings that strong ever die? Hurt and anger had made him send her away, but he must still care for her, or he would never have begun searching for her in the first place.

  Perhaps, I thought, when Lisette and the boy were safe in England, Louis would disband the Brotherhood of the Lynx, for its chief purpose would have been served. Then, surely, there would be no reason for him to fear for my safety at Tucker’s Grave. He might allow me to return there, and run it as my father had before the Terror, serving the ordinary folk who travelled on the stagecoaches and the handful of people from the village who used it as their local alehouse.

  But I did not allow these thoughts to dominate me. I put them out of my mind, determined to make the most of the little time that was left to Louis and me. And hoping, all the while, that when Antoinette had gone to bed and Gavin left for the Lodge, we could once more be together as we had been in the summer house.

  * * *

  I was not disappointed.

  When we were at last alone, Louis came to sit beside me on the chaise and took me in his arms, kissing me hungrily.

  ‘Oh Flora, do you know how I have been longing to do that?’ he asked softly, his breath warm against my cheek. ‘You are a breath of fresh spring air in this harsh cold world, a sweet memory indeed for a man to take with him into danger. I should not want you, but by God, I do. I wanted you, I think, from the first moment I saw you, all forlorn in your mourning bonnet beside your father’s grave.’

  ‘You had a strange way of showing it,’ I said mischievously, for my elation in discovering that Louis felt as I did and my satisfaction in my new-found womanhood gave me the confidence to tease. ‘I thought you most arrogant and unfeeling. Though very handsome,’ I added.

  ‘I expect I am arrogant,’ Louis said. ‘Yes, I am sure I am. But not unfeeling. And certainly not handsome.’

  I smiled at him. ‘Well, let’s not quarrel about that. Time
is too short.’

  The shadow fell over us once more, the awful, pervasive knowledge that tonight was all that was left to us, all we could ever have.

  ‘I wish with all my heart that things could be different,’ Louis said.

  ‘But they cannot.’ Though I longed to beg him not to go, not to place his life in danger, and certainly not to bring his wife here to Belvedere, I knew I must not. Louis was an honourable man. He could not live with the guilt of knowing he had condemned Lisette to death on the guillotine. Not I nor anyone else could persuade him against the course on which he had set himself, and if I tried and was successful it would be a blot on any life we might share, corroding and eventually destroying our happiness and our love.

  Even more important to him was the rescue of the son he had never seen, but who was, none the less, his own flesh and blood.

  ‘I can scarcely believe Lisette kept the existence of your child from you all these years,’ I said. ‘How can you ever forgive her for that?’

  Louis’ eyes were very far away. ‘It is not a question of forgiveness, though it is hard to think of all that I have missed in watching him grow up.’

  ‘And all that he has missed in having you for a father.’

  Louis grimaced. ‘I cannot imagine what he has been told about me! That I am heartless, just as you said, I expect. If he is even aware that I am his father.’

  ‘If Lisette told others, then she must surely have told him,’ I reasoned.

  ‘With Lisette, one can never be sure. There are many things about which she kept her own counsel.’ The deep lines were there again in his face, dark shadows in the lamplight, and I knew he was thinking of things he would not speak of, not now, perhaps not ever. Then he shifted. ‘Anyway, I know now, and if we are both spared and come home safe to Belvedere, then I shall do my best to make it up to them.’