by Mary Nichols
Adam’s grim expression softened at the sight of her. Her hair was spread about her face and her cheeks were streaked with weeping. She held the pillow in her arms as if, like a child, she derived comfort from it. He stooped and brushed her lips with his, tasting their sweetness. ‘My love, I never wanted this for you,’ he whispered. ‘I am sorry, more sorry than you will ever know.’
Half in sleep, she became aware of his breath on her cheek as he stooped over her and felt the back of his hand stroking her forehead very gently. ‘Time to wake up,’ he said, turning to light a candle. ‘It wants only an hour to dawn.’ There was nothing for it; she opened her eyes.
He had bathed and changed into brown kerseymere pantaloons topped by a fawn-coloured frockcoat, over an embroidered waistcoat buttoned high to a yellow silk cravat flamboyantly tied and held by a diamond pin. A thigh-length pelisse was fastened across one shoulder, military fashion. He smiled at her expression of surprise. ‘Behold Sir Peter Adams!’
‘Another name?’ She wished she did not have to wake up and face the day. ‘Do you change your name as frequently as your clothes?’
‘Very nearly,’ he said cheerfully, determined that their last few hours together would not be miserable. He wanted to remember her with a smile on her face and laughter in her eyes.
She looked at her own crumpled dress; why had she not had the sense to take it off before falling asleep? Beside him, she looked a dish-clout. ‘What about me? Have you decided to leave me behind after all?’
‘No. Nothing has changed. We are going for another little coach ride.’
‘Why won’t you give yourself up? If you are innocent...’
‘If?’ He turned to face her and the aggrieved look in his dark eyes turned her heart over; she felt it thumping so hard that she was almost breathless.
‘Are you innocent?’ she asked him.
‘Don’t you know?’
‘Of course I don’t know. How could I? You were in the library with James when I left the house.’
‘I thought a woman always trusted her intuition; what does your intuition tell you?’
‘You are deliberately trying to confuse me.’
‘Because I ask you to come to terms with your own feelings, to be honest with yourself? If you trusted me, it would not matter what I had been accused of, nor what the evidence was.’
‘Couldn’t we stay here for a day or two just to see what happens?’ She was grasping at straws.
‘That would make Robert an accessory,’ Adam said. ‘He is too good a friend to implicate in that way.’
‘You can’t go on running away the rest of your life.’
‘I don’t intend to.’ His tone was grim. ‘I will be back.’
‘Where are we going?
He laughed. ‘Wait and see.’
‘You don’t trust me, do you?’
‘I trust you with my life,’ he said seriously, ‘every day we are together.’
‘Oh,’ she said in a small voice.
He picked up her hand to put the palm to his lips, making her shiver. ‘Now I want you to dress as quickly as you can. Make yourself into Lady Adams.’
‘Lady Adams?’ Had he really meant it when he said he would marry her? But he would not try to force her into making marriage vows, would he? What could he possibly gain by that? The answer came to her with sudden clarity; as his wife she could not give evidence against him. Did he feel that unsure of her?
He stood up, smiling. ‘It would be best, don’t you think? A husband and wife will attract less attention than a man-about-town with a woman who, beautiful as she is, looks like a wanton.’
‘I look like a wanton?’
‘Look like one and are one,’ he said.
‘That’s not true!’
‘No? Is it the normal behaviour of a well-brought-up young lady to throw herself into the arms of a strange man and then jump into a carriage in order to be carried off by him?’
‘No, but nothing is normal in this affair, is it?’
‘Affair? My dear Maryanne, who said anything about an affair? Nothing is further from my thoughts.’
‘No, I suppose not, when it is your intention to force me into marriage so that I cannot give evidence against you.’
‘Good God, woman, what do you take me for?’ His bantering tone changed abruptly to one of anger. He flung a heap of clothes on to the bed. ‘Put those on and come downstairs. I’ll give you five minutes; if you are not down by then I’ll come and dress you myself.’
The clothes consisted of a flannel petticoat, a fine lawn underskirt and a high-waisted blue taffeta gown with a frilled neck and tight sleeves. Afraid that he would carry out his threat, Maryanne dressed hurriedly and, inside the allotted five minutes, had joined him in the hall, where he threw a full-length burnous around her shoulders and hurried her out to a waiting coach.
Beside it stood Jeannie, dressed for travelling. ‘Is Madame Clavier coming too?’ Maryanne asked.
‘You cannot travel without a chaperon.’ He spoke flatly as he lifted her bodily and put her on to the seat, then turned to help Jeannie in beside her. ‘Watch her,’ he told her. ‘She has a habit of running away.’ Then he shut the door and climbed up on the driving seat beside the driver. As the wheels began to turn, a cock in a nearby yard crowed in the dawn.
By the time it was fully light, they were out in open countryside, but instead of whipping the horses up Adam allowed them to go at little more than walking pace.
‘Why are we going so slowly?’ Maryanne asked.
Jeannie smiled. ‘Getting anxious, are you?’
‘No. ‘
They fell into silence again, until Maryanne could stand it no more. ‘How long have you known the captain?’
‘Five years or thereabouts.’
‘Before you met your husband?’
‘No, later. I met Michel after the Battle of Busaco.’ She paused to look at Maryanne, as if wondering whether to tell her any more. ‘I’d been married before. It wasn’t much of a marriage; we were both too young. We were poor and my parents’ farm wasn’t big enough to support us all, so when the war started. Joe enlisted.’ She smiled ruefully. ‘Did it without telling me and then put my name in the ballot to go overseas. I was lucky.’ She laughed. ‘Or unlucky, depending on how you looked at it.’
‘You became a camp follower?’
‘Yes. We went to the Peninsula. The women stayed in the camp when the troops went off to fight, and we got on with our work and prayed; there was nothing else we could do. After the battles the men came back on their own two feet, if they could, or in carts if they’d been lucky enough to be picked up.’
‘And he didn’t come back?’ Maryanne could easily feel for the other woman.
‘Not after Busaco. I did what all the others in the same plight did, I went out to the battleground to look for him. It was terrible, dead and dying everywhere, French and Spanish and British all mixed up together.’ She shivered. ‘The smell and the cries of the wounded made me feel sick, but I was determined to find him.’
‘And did you?’
‘In the end, all of a heap with three dead Frenchmen. I knelt beside his body, not knowing what to do, just sat there wishing that I would wake up from that terrible nightmare and find myself at home. It was growing dark and I had just roused myself to make my way back to our own lines when I was captured by half a dozen French soldiers. They decided to have some sport with me.
‘Oh, no!’
‘Michel came along and stopped them. He was a sergeant. He took me to the French women’s camp.’ She smiled. ‘It was no different from the English, except I couldn’t understand the lingo.’
‘He married you?’
‘Not straight away, but he gave me money and came every day to see how I fared, and later he brought the captain to translate for him.’
‘You spent the rest of the war with them?’ Maryanne asked.
‘With Michel. Captain Choucas was not always there; he had other dut
ies. Next to Michel, he is the finest man who ever breathed, and what he wants he shall have, if I have anything to do with it.’
‘Even to giving him up?’
‘To the law? No, I’ll never do that.’
‘No, I didn’t mean that. If you love him.’
‘If you mean why haven’t I married him, then why not say so? Because he hasn’t asked me, for one thing, but even if he had it wouldn’t do. He’s a gentleman and, besides, he does not love me.’
‘Does that signify?’
‘Certainly it does. It’s only you aristocrats who marry with such calculated coldness. ‘Twouldn’t do for me.’
‘Then why are you so against me? I thought...’
Jeannie looked sideways at her and laughed aloud. ‘You thought I was jealous. No, it is what you are doing to him I’m against. The risks he is taking...’
‘I know,’ Maryanne said miserably. ‘But he won’t give himself up.’
‘I should think not! But what he’s doing now will put a rope round his neck just as surely.’ She reached across and seized Maryanne’s arm. ‘Tell me this, and tell me true. Do you love him?’
Maryanne did not answer immediately and the girl shook her roughly. ‘Don’t you know?’
‘Yes.’ The word was a whisper. ‘I love him, but...’
‘There can be no buts. I’m going to tell you something now, though he’ll half kill me for it.’ She paused, then lowered her voice. ‘You don’t think he means to drag you across the Channel whether you will it or not, do you? He’s let that devil know he’s got you. He’s going to stage a little play for the benefit of Society, to stop the gossip and save your reputation.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘He’ll make it look as though he is forcing you to go with him and then he’s going to allow Mark Danbury to free you.’ She laughed suddenly, but it was an empty sound. ‘After a suitable struggle, of course. And then he’s going to rely on his friends to get him away safely.’
‘Without me?’ Maryanne whispered.
‘Yes. That way honour is satisfied. The new Duke - the devil rot him - will be able to marry you and your fortune, and, if God is on our side, the Captain will get clean away.’
Maryanne could picture the scene quite clearly. It was Adam’s answer to her refusal to perjure herself. Did he care that much about her? Or was it his way of ridding himself of the encumbrance she had become? Did the foolish man not realise that she would not go back to Mark whatever happened? She was so deep in thought that she did not hear Jeannie speak to her until she shook her again.
‘I said, is that what you want?’
‘No, but how will Mark know where to find us?’
‘I told him.’
‘You?’ She didn’t try to hide her astonishment.
‘Yes, the captain sent me to inform on him while you were resting.’ Jeannie gave a cracked laugh. ‘The bugger paid me well too. I gave it to a beggar on my way home.’ She paused. ‘Well, are you going to let the Captain put his head in the noose for you?’
‘No,’ said Maryanne.
‘What, then?’
‘I’ll leave on my own when we stop for a change of horses. You’ll help me, won’t you?’
‘He’ll come looking for you and put himself in even more danger.’
‘What else can I do?’
Jeannie laughed. ‘You are a muttonhead, aren’t you? You admit you love him. Don’t you want to go with him, of your own free will I mean?’
Maryanne smiled wryly. ‘Would he have me, after all this? I practically accused him of the murder myself and...’ she paused ‘... of wanting to marry me to stop me giving evidence against him.’
‘You said that? No wonder he prefers to ride on the box with the driver.’
‘I was confused, I still am. Oh, I don’t know what to think!’
‘Stop thinking and obey your heart.’ Jeannie gave her another little shake. ‘You must make him abandon that lunatic plan before Mark Danbury kills him, for he surely will. What you do with your life after that is your affair.’
Maryanne attempted a smile; it was as if she were just seeing the light at the end of a long, dark tunnel. ‘I’ll think of something.’ She saw the expression of doubt on Jeannie’s face, and smiled. ‘Don’t worry, I will do it somehow.’
They stopped twice to change the horses and take some refreshment, but Maryanne found every attempt to speak to Adam alone was balked. Either he had to see to the horses, or pay the innkeeper, or see to the luggage, which was no more than a half-empty trunk put there for appearances’ sake, and had slipped loose and he must tighten the straps which held it to the roof. It was almost as if he knew what she wanted and was avoiding talking to her.
They arrived in Dover the following morning just as dawn lightened the sky and lit the cliffs with a pink glow, and Maryanne had still not spoken to Adam. She sat with her hands clenched and her heart in her mouth as they made their way down the hill towards the harbour. If Jeannie was right and Adam had planned a confrontation with Mark, it would come soon, and her nerves were as tight as drum skins, the hairs on her neck tingling with apprehension. She found herself fervently praying that Jeannie had been wrong, that Adam had no plan, that he really did intend to take her to France. But the more she thought about it, the more she knew he did not intend that, and the nearer the time came, the more she realised she did not want to be left behind.
Workers were coming out of their doors as they turned along the coast road, and women began hanging bedding out of upper windows to air. Children and dogs and the smell of cooking breakfasts brought the town to life. On the water, fishing boats were bringing in their catches and, nearer at hand, swinging on its moorings at the end of the jetty, was a cross-Channel packet. They stopped just short of it and Adam jumped down and opened the door for Maryanne, holding out his hand to help her down. She pressed herself further back into the cushions and dug her feet into the floor, ready to resist.
‘Come, madam, there isn’t much time.’
‘I refuse to budge until we have settled something between us.’ Maryanne was aware that Jeannie had slipped out of the coach on the other side, but she did not think she had gone far away.
‘I haven’t time for any more of your foolishness,’ he said. ‘Do you want me to pick you up bodily and carry you on board?’
She tried to laugh but the sound that came out was more like sob. ‘That would suit you, wouldn’t it? It would make your little charade more convincing.’
He looked swiftly up and down the street and climbed in beside her. ‘Maryanne, what are you plotting now?’
‘I am not the one who plots, I leave that to you. You have no intention of taking me with you, have you?’
He sighed. ‘Sometimes Jeannie exceeds her duty.’
‘Don’t blame her. She loves you. She is afraid for you.’ Maryanne paused, watching his face. ‘As I am.’
He opened his mouth to make some cutting retort but decided against it when he realised she was serious. Her face was deadly pale, but there was a sparkle in the depths of her violet eyes which made him catch his breath. If only he could trust her! ‘It’s too late.’ The words were wrung from him.
‘You would return me to a man I cannot love?’ Her lovely eyes brimmed with tears. ‘You want that for me? Can you imagine what my life will be like?’ She lifted her face to his, searching it for reassurance, for a sign that what she was doing was right.
He groaned and lowered his face to hers, finding her mouth in a kiss whose sweetness filled her with unbearable yearning. As the pressure of his lips deepened, she was swamped by an emotion so powerful that it swept away all notion of time and place, all fear, all guilt, and because, at that moment, time stood still, there were no yesterdays, no hate, no intrigue, no murder, and because there were no tomorrows there could be no revenge, no retribution, no decisions to be made. While his arms were about her, his mouth on hers, there was only the present, and she felt secure, untouched by
evil.
He released her at last. ‘Maryanne, in God’s name, what would you have me do?’
She did not answer, remembering Jeannie’s words - that if she truly loved him she would have no doubts - and just now, when he had kissed her, there had been none, only the longing to stay with him forever, for without him she was incomplete. She did not hear him repeat his question, she heard only a small voice inside her telling her that her living and dying were inexorably linked with his. ‘Take me with you,’ she said.
‘Where?’
‘Wherever you go. I don’t care.’
He laughed and shook his head. ‘I’m blessed if I understand you, Maryanne. Why, when you tried so hard to persuade me to trust in the law, are you swinging to the opposite view?’
‘I don’t know. Maybe Mr Rudge was right and Mark is not interested in justice.’
‘I know he is not,’ he said grimly.
‘Then we have no time to lose, have we?’
‘No, by God!’ He called to Jeannie, who returned to the carriage. ‘Change cloaks with Maryanne.’ While the girls did as he asked, he took off his pelisse and threw it up to the coachman. ‘A guinea if you wear this for the next half-hour. And you can keep it afterwards.’ The man took it eagerly and Adam turned back to Jeannie. ‘Take the coach right up to the loading-point and go on board as quickly as you can. Get the driver to carry the trunk; it might fool Danbury long enough for us to escape attention. Come off just before she sails.’
Jeannie smiled. ‘That I will, and God be with you, Captain.’ She turned to Maryanne. ‘If you do anything to make him unhappy, I’ll haunt you forever, do you hear? You will never know a moment’s peace.’
Adam smiled and bent to kiss her cheek. ‘Michel would be proud of you.’ He turned to Maryanne. ‘I had other plans for my own departure. Come.’ He held out his hand and she put hers into it and stepped down beside him. The die had been cast; whatever happened from now on, they were in it together, puppets of fortune, and he prayed that fortune would favour them.