Next day, as he again went off to the Hibernia, he happened to recall one of his Portuguese acquaintances mentioning that when Lord St. Vincent’s fleet had been in Lisbon, the Admiral had kept open house in his flagship, and that hundreds of Portuguese gentry had been entertained in her and other vessels. He wondered for a moment if he could get Sir Sidney to give a party and include the de Pombals in his invitations. But he dismissed the thought as impossible almost as soon as it entered his head. Theoretically, at least, Portugal was now at war with Britain.
On reaching Hibernia, he learned that the Admiral was not aboard and might not be back for some hours, as he had only just left to carry out an inspection of one of his other ships. Strangford was in the stateroom, lazily scanning a book of Portuguese verse. After a short conversation, Roger realised that no new plan to get the better of the French was in the making, and it was obvious that His Lordship had given up. Again obsessed with his own problem, Roger had himself rowed back to the city.
That afternoon a possible way of solving it at last came to him. When in Isfahan, a Catholic chaplain had celebrated Mass every morning in the Embassy. No doubt here in Lisbon the de Pombals attended Mass daily at home in a private chapel; but on Sunday, all the odds were that they would go to church. If so, that could provide him with the sort of situation he was so eager to bring about. As it was a Friday, he would have to wait for two days before he could put his plan into execution, but at least he now had something to hope for.
He had been greatly tempted to loiter in the neighbourhood of the de Pombal mansion, on the chance of catching another glimpse of Lisala; but had resisted it because the last thing he wanted was to be recognised hanging about near the gate. On the Saturday, to keep his mind off this temptation, he again went out to the Hibernia. Neither Sir Sidney nor Strangford had any news for him, but the former invited him to remain on board for dinner.
It proved a somewhat gloomy meal, as Strangford was much more adept at showing his handsome person off in a mixed society, composed mainly of women, than participating in doing his share of hard drinking with men; and Roger found it difficult to keep his mind on the conversation. But he more than did justice to the Admiral’s port and, when rowed ashore, was distinctly mellow.
Nevertheless, he was up by five the following morning, as there was the possibility that the de Pombals might attend early Mass. When the closed carriage which he had ordered pulled up not far from the gates of the de Pombal mansion, there were still only a few people about, and he settled down to wait with as much patience as he could. From time to time he took out his big turnip watch and the minute hand seemed positively to crawl. But at last his patience was rewarded. A large, gilded coach appeared; the Marquis and two ladies were in it. He could not see their faces, but had little doubt that Lisala was one of them. His driver already had his instructions, and they followed the coach to the Church of San Miguel.
As the de Pombal party alighted, Roger’s heart gave a happy bound. One of the ladies was Lisala, the other her elderly duenna. The two footmen who had been perched on the stand at the back of the coach took prie-dieus for their master and the ladies from the boot, and the whole party went up the steps of the church. As soon as they had disappeared inside it, Roger paid off his coachman and entered after them.
As was usual in those days, the church had no pews, so the majority of the congregation was standing. Roger took up a strategic position in accordance with his plan, beside the holy-water stoup, which was just inside the main door. Now he was filled with impatience and could hardly wait until the service was over.
At last the genuflecting and intoning ceased and, after final bobs in the direction of the high altar, the worshippers turned about, to leave by the door. For an agonising two minutes Roger waited as the crowd flowed past, then he saw the de Pombals coming towards him. Lisala’s hand was resting on her father’s arm and her eyes were demurely cast down. The Marquis was exchanging politenesses with an acquaintance, so he did not notice Roger dip his fingers in the holy-water stoup and extend his hand so that Lisala could not fail to see it.
The practice of a stranger offering Holy Water to a lady after she had attended Mass was very common and nobody thought anything of it. Many years before, Roger had made use of the custom to pass notes to the beautiful Athenais de Rochambeau; but now he had no billet-doux palmed in his hand.
To his consternation Lisala touched his fingers, but did not look up. For a moment his heart dropped like lead. She was about to move on without even a glance at him. His ruse had failed. Then the Marquis, reacting to Lisala’s brief pause, turned and looked straight into Roger’s face. Halting, he exclaimed:
‘It can’t be! Yes, it must be, le Chevalier de Breuc.’
Roger bowed, shook his head, then smiled. ‘No, Senhor. You are mistaken. But I understand the reason for your error. It has happened to me many times before. You have taken me for my French cousin. My name is Roger Brook; and I am an Englishman.’
Lisala and the Senhora Christina were now also staring at Roger. With a little gasp, Lisala exclaimed, ‘But this is incredible! The likeness! We are recently arrived from Isfahan and … and came to know Colonel Breuc well there. You might be his twin.’
‘True, Senhorita, people have often said that.’ Roger laughed. ‘Our fathers were twins, and my cousin and I were born within a month of each other; he at Strasbourg and myself in England. Our fathers were so devoted that they even decided to have us christened by the same first name. But may I know whom I have the honour of addressing?’
‘I am the Marquis de Pombal, and this is my daughter,’ said Lisala’s father.
‘De Pombal,’ repeated Roger with a bow. ‘A famous name. I am honoured indeed. My only regret is that I should have come to Lisbon in such unhappy times. Since you are acquainted with my cousin, it may be that you will consider that sufficient introduction and permit me to call upon you. I am attached to the staff of Admiral Sir Sidney Smith, and find life with the Fleet exceeding dull.’
‘Why, yes.’ The Marquis smiled. ‘By all means do so. I shall be happy to receive you.’
Turning, they left the church together, followed by Lisala’s old duenna. Roger escorted the party to their coach and, with many bows, watched them drive off.
When they had disappeared, he drew a long breath and took stock of the situation. His ruse had worked. He felt confident that his plausible story, backed by his slightly tinted hair and now flowing side-whiskers, had fooled the Marquis and Senhora de Jahlo. But he was not so certain about Lisala. The great thing was that contact had been established. It was now up to him to consolidate his position.
On the following afternoon he paid his call. The Marquis was out but, after waiting some while in a pillared, marble hall, he was shown through into a spacious drawing room, with wide windows leading out on to a stone terrace, beyond which there was a lovely garden.
At one end of the room, Lisala and her aunt were seated on a sofa. Roger very nearly made the blunder of bowing first to the Senhora de Arahna; but realised in time that he was not supposed to know her. Lisala curtsied in response to the graceful ‘leg’ he made, then presented him to her aunt, who had been told of the meeting in church. She received him pleasantly and invited him to sit down.
To begin with they talked of Roger’s remarkable resemblance to his French cousin. He then enquired about their journey from Isfahan. They had suffered severely from the intense heat while sailing round Arabia and up the Red Sea and, on one occasion, after passing the Straits of Gibraltar, had been terrified that their ship would go down in a violent storm. In other respects, the voyage had been monotonous, but uneventful.
Roger’s first objective was to convey to Lisala that he was in fact her lover. As a means of doing so, he questioned them about Persia, then said, ‘I have never been there, but have heard much about its marvels from a friend of mine who has travelled widely in the East. One of the greatest wonders that he told me of was about a mosque a few m
iles outside Isfahan, with minarets that shake.’
His remark could convey nothing special to the Senhora de Arahna; but it was immediately after visiting the mosque that he and Lisala had gone up the hill, at the top of which there was a Zoroastrian Fire Temple and, in a cave beneath it, enjoyed their first passionate embraces.
As he spoke, he was looking straight at her. She smiled and replied with a little laugh, ‘Indeed, that is so. Your cousin took me to see that mosque and afterwards up a hill with many caves, some of which were inhabited by hermits.’
He felt certain then that she had received his message. But the next fence he had to take was the much stiffer one of arranging a rendezvous with her. For the purpose he had brought with him a small, three-cornered billet-doux, which said: I shall come in over the garden wall tonight at midnight, and will hoot like an owl. Meet me there if you possibly can. I adore you.
However, to get it to her was another matter. He had hoped that refreshments would be sent for, and that he might manage to pass it to her under cover while offering her a plate of cakes. But when wine and cakes were brought in they were handed round by a footman who remained in attendance; so Roger was deprived of the opportunity he had hoped for.
For a while they talked of the terrible dilemma with which the Prince Regent had been faced: either to remain in Portugal and probably be deposed by the French, or accept the protection of the English and go to Brazil. Then Roger felt that without appearing ill bred and so jeopardising his prospects of being received there again, he dared not much exceed the regulation twenty minutes for a first call. A prey to acute frustration, he stood up to take his leave. To have palmed the billet-doux into Lisala’s hand as he kissed it could not possibly be done without her aunt seeing the manoeuvre; so he did not attempt it.
A moment later, inspiration came to him. Glancing out of the tall window, he said, ‘What a lovely garden you have. And that pavilion over there; how enchanting and romantic. I’d vow that if one were there at midnight, one would see the ghosts of past lovers reuniting.’
It could hardly fail to be a bullseye shot. He and Lisala were past lovers and surely Mr. Roger Brook was the ghost of Colonel le Chevalier de Breuc?
Seven hours later, wearing a long, dark cloak, his white cravat and the greater part of his face hidden by a silk scarf, Roger approached the garden wall. He had reconnoitred it again after leaving the mansion that afternoon and had found a place where, by climbing on to the roof of a shack, he could easily reach its top. On the opposite side there was a large nispero tree. Launching himself forward, he grasped the nearest branch, hauled himself along it and scrambled to the ground.’
Cautiously he made his way forward until, from behind a screen of flowering shrubs, he could see the house. A light showed only in one upper window. Treading very carefully, he advanced to the back of the pavilion, then made his way round it to a verandah that faced the house and overlooked a lily pool. As he stepped on the verandah, a board creaked. There came the soft rustle of silk garments and a quick, light step. A figure emerged from the shadowed porch. Next moment he had Lisala in his arms.
He had come prepared to give her an immediate explanation of his change of nationality. But when, after their first long kiss, he began, ‘I must tell you …’, she whispered breathlessly, ‘Later; later,’ and, clutching his hand, drew him inside the pavilion.
There was only a sliver of moon, but it gave enough light for him dimly to make out that the central room was furnished with cane easy chairs and a long settee. On the latter, in preparation for his coming, she had piled all the cushions from the chairs. As they embraced again, her hands ran eagerly over him; then she threw herself down on her back on the cushions. She had on only a long, fur robe and beneath it a nightdress. Panting with desire, she threw wide the robe and pulled the nightdress up above her waist. By then Roger, no whit less eager, had undone his breeches and thrust them down. As he bent above her, she clasped her arms round his neck and drew him on to her. They came together with the same delirious, blind abandon that had overwhelmed them that first time in the cave.
When it was over, they remained locked together and lay, panting heavily, for several minutes; then Lisala pushed Roger from her, sat up, drew her robe about her and said, ‘Oh God, how I have longed for you these past two months; and how happy I am that you should have followed me to Lisbon. But now tell me. Explain to me this extraordinary mystery of your having transformed yourself into an Englishman.’
Still a little breathlessly, Roger began, ‘My dearest love, you are to me as a magnet to a lodestone. How could I not follow you anywhere? But to rejoin you openly I had to make use of my early life of which, while in Persia, I told you nothing. I am, in fact, an Englishman and the son of an Admiral. My father attempted to force me to make the Royal Navy my career. But I hated the thought, so in my teens I ran away to France.
‘After a variety of experiences, I joined the French Army and was lucky enough to receive rapid promotion. I have served the Emperor well, but have never fought against my own countrymen. The French believe me to be a Frenchman born in Strasbourg; but I have several times been back to England and have numerous friends there. Naturally, they have no idea that I am also a Colonel in the French Army; and I account for my long absences by having led them to believe that, sometimes for several years, I am travelling in distant parts. Knowing the situation here, I felt certain that your father would regard M. le Chevalier de Breuc as an enemy and refuse to receive me; so, after crossing Spain, I entered Portugal as Mr. Brook and practised this deceit upon him of posing as my non-existent cousin.’
‘What an extraordinary life you have led,’ Lisala commented, ‘and how clever of you to have thought of this way to rejoin me.’
For a while they talked of the long journeys they had made from Persia. Then they made love again, talked, laughed, and made love yet again. It was close on five o’clock in the morning before they could bring themselves to part; but with the happy prospect of renewing their bliss during the nights to come.
The following day Roger slept late then, in the afternoon, took a stroll round the docks at Belem. They had become a positive hive of activity. The British merchants were still endeavouring to get their goods away in any ship at any price, and now the Portuguese were equally active. There were eight ships of the line, four frigates, four sloops and some twenty merchantmen, all being provisioned in frantic haste, in case the Prince Regent did, after all, change his mind and decide to go to Brazil.
After dining, knowing that he had another long night of love-making before him, Roger went to bed for three hours; then, at midnight, he again scaled the garden wall and, in the pavilion, enjoyed the passionate embraces of Lisala.
Next day, the 25th, he had himself rowed out to the Hibernia to find out if there was any reliable news. Sir Sidney told him that Junot’s advance guard was reported to have reached Alenquer only some thirty miles from Lisbon, but that the French army, with its Spanish auxiliaries, was said to be in a shocking state. Torrential rains and lack of sustenance in the country through which they had advanced had reduced their numbers by half. Hundreds of men had been drowned while fording rivers in spate, hundreds more had collapsed from illness and semi-starvation. Yet the remainder, driven by Junot who, no doubt, was being driven by Napoleon, were staggering on. In the Admiral’s opinion, if Don Joao had had the guts to order his army to resist the French, even the unwarlike Portuguese troops would have been certain of victory.
Roger stigmatised Strangford as a vain, spineless popinjay; since for some days he had made no further attempt to persuade the Prince Regent to go aboard one of the warships that were being prepared for a voyage to the Americas. But that morning, under a flag of truce, the Minister had gone ashore to deliver an ultimatum from Sir Sidney, ‘Either the Prince of Brazil would go to Brazil, and Portugal resume her status as Britain’s ally, or the British Fleet would bombard Lisbon until it was reduced to a heap of rubble.’
Retu
rning to the city, Roger spent an hour at his inn, then again presented himself at the de Pombal mansion. This time the Marquis was at home and he received Roger courteously; but he was in a state of considerable agitation. He had just returned from the Palace out at Queluz. Strangford and the Foreign Minister, d’Aranjo, had been closeted with Don Joao, while a host of anxious notabilities had crowded the salons and corridors. Apparently the Prince still refused to go, but at least he had agreed that the most valuable of his treasures should be loaded on to the warships, hedging with the statement that they could always be brought back to the Palace.
Roger then enquired whether, should the royal family leave, the Marquis would accompany them.
De Pombal frowned. ‘How can you ask that, Mr. Brook? If Don Joao does go, it is the clear duty of every member of his Court to go with him. In fact, many more people will wish to accompany him than there is accommodation for them in the ships. When you arrived, I was just about to set out for Belem with a view to securing in good time quarters for myself and my family.’
‘A wise precaution,’ Roger agreed. ‘I, too, am about to go there; because in the past twenty-four hours the situation of the English here has greatly deteriorated. A number of your high officials are pro-French, or wish to curry favour with them; so they are beginning to carry out the letter of the law as proclaimed in the Royal Ordinance. A number of prominent British citizens have been arrested; so I am leaving the inn where I have been staying and returning to my quarters in the flagship.’
The Marquis at once offered Roger a seat in his coach and they set off together. That morning Roger had already decided that the time had come for him to accept Sir Sidney’s invitation, and had packed a small bag with immediate necessities. On their way, he collected the bag from the Leão d’ouro, but left there the bulk of his belongings, either to be collected later or against his return to the inn should Don Joao finally refuse to leave for Brazil. He then drove on with de Pombal to the port, where they separated.
Evil in a Mask Page 31