The Launching of Roger Brook

by Dennis Wheatley

  Now that the morning light had come the peasants were wending their way out into the fields, but he took no notice of them or of the countryside through which he passed. His every thought was concentrated on choosing the best ground for his mount, and seeing that each time he adjusted its pace it should not jolt and tire him needlessly.

  By seven o’clock he reached Gournay, changed his chestnut for a bay mare at the Auberge du Nord, and took the road to Neufchatel. This stage was longer than the last and the vigour of the good wine he had drunk in Mantes had now passed out of him. Moreover, shortly after eight o’clock it began to rain, which soon made the going heavier; so he did not reach Neufchatel until a quarter past nine.

  He had now covered over fifty miles and still had twenty-five to go; the fourth and last stage of his journey being considerably the longest; so, on dismounting in the yard of the Lion d’Or, he decided to give himself a rest before undertaking it.

  Going into the inn he ordered coffee, laced it well with cognac and, lying back in an elbow chair with his long legs stretched out before him, drank it slowly. At a quarter to ten he went out into the rain, mounted a mettlesome strawberry roan that had been saddled for him and took the road to Dieppe.

  A wind had now got up and was blowing the rain against his face in gusty squalls. Before he covered half the distance he was feeling both tired and dejected. His knees and thigh muscles were aching acutely from their hours of constant pressure on his mounts, in two places he was saddle-sore and the slippery reins were hurting where he gripped them with the gloved fingers of his left hand. Despite these physical afflictions he had no doubts about his ability to reach Dieppe, but he was now extremely perturbed by the state of the weather. The fine spell had clearly broken and with every mile he covered towards the sea conditions worsened, so he was desperately afraid that all sailings might be cancelled on that account.

  At a quarter past twelve he urged the flagging, foam-flecked roan past the turnpike at the entrance to Dieppe and asked the way down to the harbour. He was aching in every limb and soaked to the skin, but he had done the journey from Paris well under twelve hours and he felt confident that no ordinary courier would do it under eighteen; so, with the hour or two’s start he must have had over any agent that M. de Crosne might have despatched to Dieppe, he felt that he still had a clear field for the best part of eight hours, and would get clean away if only a boat were leaving before nightfall.

  But on reaching the pier from which the packets left for Newhaven, his worst fears were realised. He was told that the boat that would normally have left at six that evening would not be sailing, owing to the storm in the Channel.

  He knew that the first inquiries for him would be made at the official posting-house; so instead of going there he went to a small inn on the Quai Henri IV, called Le Bon Matelot and stabled his horse. Then, tired, wet and sore as he was, he went out and spent two hours dragging himself round the harbour district from one drinking-booth to another, frantically endeavouring to find a Captain who would put out for England in the storm.

  Normally, the money he had on him would have been ample to induce some poor fisherman to undertake the trip, but none of them would do so in such weather. It occurred to him then that this was just the sort of emergency that Athénaïs had had in mind when she had given him de Caylus’s ring; so he showed it to several of the fishing-masters and offered it in exchange for an immediate passage to England.

  It was a beautiful sapphire, surrounded with small diamonds and he thought that it must be worth at least a hundred louis; but all of them shook their heads. One after another they pointed out that neither gold nor jewels were of use to any man if he was lying rotting at the bottom of the sea, and that as the waves were riding too high for the packet it would be suicide to attempt the crossing in one of their much smaller craft.

  A little before three, Roger realised that further efforts were useless. Neither prayers nor bribes would induce any master to leave Dieppe harbour that night. In the dramshops that he had visited he had had several cognacs to whip up his failing energies but now he felt utterly done, and knew that when he did sleep it would be for many hours.

  By morning it was as good as certain that the authorities would be hunting him. De Crosne’s agent would have picked up the fact overnight that the fugitive had left the Lion d’Or at Neufchatel on a roan horse, and the steed not having been handed in at the Dieppe posting-stage would be would be found at Le Bon Matelot, so for him to spend the night there obviously involved a considerable risk. In consequence, he went to another small inn, near the Eglise St. Jacques, called the Chapon Fin, and took a room there.

  Going straight upstairs he emptied his pockets, pulled off his soaking clothes, and gave them to the chambermaid to be dried at the kitchen fire, then flopped naked into bed. He was utterly exhausted and, despite his anxieties, was overcome almost instantly by a deep and dreamless sleep.

  He slept for sixteen hours, waking a little before eight the following morning. He was terribly stiff, but his head was clear and he felt ravenously hungry. Giving scarcely a thought to any of these things, he jumped out of bed and ran to the window. In a second he saw that the rain was sheeting down and being driven in violent gusts against the panes. With a curse, he turned away; but, none the less, seeing that the maid had brought back his dried clothes while he slept he began to hurry into them.

  On getting downstairs he at once questioned the landlord about the prospects of the packet sailing that day, but the man said that the weather had worsened during the night and it was certain that no ships would be leaving port while the gale continued. Roger could only attempt to console himself by ordering two boiled eggs and a fillet steak to be served in the coffee-room with his petit déjeuner.

  The astounded landlord gave him a nasty jar by declaring that he ‘must be an Englishman in disguise’. For a second he thought that he had aroused the man’s suspicions in connection with a description of himself which might have been circulated to innkeepers during the night; then he remembered that he was, after a lapse of years, once more on a coast where the habits of the English were well known, and realised that the man was only joking.

  Yet, all the same, while Roger was eating his eggs and steak he knew he must face the fact that M. de Crosne’s courier would have reached Dieppe the preceding night, and the odds were that the police would be combing the town for him that morning. As he had arrived at the Chapon Fin hatless, coatless and without baggage of any kind, it seemed certain that suspicion would swiftly fall on him in the event of any inquiry being made there. So after breakfast he paid his bill and left the inn.

  In spite of the rain and the blustering wind he went along the harbour to make quite certain that no ships were leaving. He found it practically deserted and an old salt who was splicing a rope under a lean-to told him that, even if the wind dropped, which he thought unlikely, the seas would be running too high for any vessel to venture out into them for another twenty-four hours at least.

  Cursing the weather that, by its foulness, was placing his life in jeopardy, Roger set about endeavouring to alter his appearance. After buying a large canvas grip he visited a secondhand clothes’ shop, where he bought a tattered cloak and a seaman’s stocking-cap. Putting these on outside, to conceal the clothes in which he had left Paris and hide his hair, he visited another secondhand shop in a better part of the town and bought there a more expensive outfit. It included sea-boots, blue trousers and reefer coat, a topcoat with a triple collar and a low, square-crowned bowler hat with a shiny leather band, of a type often worn by the officers of merchant ships.

  Having crammed his purchases into the bag he carried it to the far side of the channel leading from the harbour to the sea, where he had noticed that morning a number of sheds and half-built boats on stocks. No one was working there in the teeming rain so he entered one of the wooden sheds and, without fear of interruption, changed into his new clothes. Next, he plaited his back hair and, doubling the
thin end under, tied it with a piece of ribbon in a nautical queue. Then he made a bundle of his Paris clothes, weighted it with stones and, carrying it to the water’s edge, threw it in.

  It was only with the greatest reluctance that he parted with his elegant, soft-leather riding-boots and the expensive lace at his wrists and throat, but he knew that it would have been madness to keep them, as they were just the sort of things that would have given him away.

  Returning to the town side of the harbour it struck him that, since he must remain in Dieppe for at least one more night, he would be seen by fewer people if he took lodgings rather than a room at another inn; so he set about hunting for something suitable. Happening to notice a street sign reading ‘Rue d’Ecosse’ he thought that a good omen and turned along it. Sure enough a hundred yards from its entrance he came upon a neat little house with a card bearing the carefully-drawn words Apartement a Louer in its ground-floor window.

  The door was opened to him by an immensely fat woman who, puffing and wheezing, took him upstairs to a sparsely furnished but clean-looking bedroom and sitting-room. For appearance sake he haggled a little over the price and made her include his petit déjeuner in it; then he took the rooms, paid her a deposit and went out again, to get himself a midday meal.

  After eating reasonably well in an unpretentious restaurant he bought a bottle of wine and some cold food for his supper, and a few toilet articles; then he returned to the house in the Rue d’Ecosse and, since he had nothing else to do and would at least not be seen there, went to bed.

  For the first time since leaving the Rue St. Honoré to fight his duel with De Caylus he had leisure to think over the tornado of events in which he had been caught up. The duel seemed to him to have taken place at least a week ago, yet curiously enough, he was under a vague impression that it was only that morning that Athénaïs, if all had gone well had married de la Tour d’Auvergne in Evreux. But after a minute’s thought he realised that while the duel had taken place less than forty-four hours ago, Athénaïs had most probably been Madame la Vicomtesse for thirty hours or more. It was actually Wednesday the 30th of August, the day that she was to have married de Caylus, and while the long hours of Monday night had been crammed with happenings that stood out in Roger’s mind Tuesday had passed him by almost unnoticed, owing to his exhausted state in the morning and his having slept through the whole of the latter part of the day.

  As he thought again of the fateful conference, he got out the letter signed by the Compte de Montmorin and re-read it. When he had done so it struck him more forcibly than ever how extraordinarily fortunate he was to have secured such a document. Despite his periodical communications to the mysterious Mr. Gilbert Maxwell, the British Government might well hesitate to accept his bare word as conclusive evidence on a matter of such extreme significance. In view of the Commercial Treaty with France and their greatly improved relations with that country, it seemed certain that his revelations would come as an appalling shock to them; and doubt that he could possibly be right would almost certainly prevent them from taking any positive action until his statements could be verified. Yet in some immediate démarche, such as an ultimatum, lay their only hope of preventing the French from seizing the Dutch ports.

  He realised now that, had he arrived in London as he had originally planned, he would have had little hope of saving the situation; whereas if he could do so with the letter, so damning were its contents and the signature of the Foreign Minister whoever saw it could not possibly require any further evidence of France’s intentions, and there would be a real hope of averting war.

  Rolling the precious parchment up into a thick tubular spill he tied a piece of string round it and then made a loop of the string to go round his neck, so that it should hang there like a locket and there would be no risk of it being lost by being inadvertently jerked out of one of his pockets. Then he took off the sapphire ring as being too valuable a gem for an ordinary ship’s officer to wear, and tied that also to the string about his neck.

  About seven o’clock he had his cold meal and drank the bottle of rich white Château Coutet, from the estate of the Marquis de Lur Saluces, that he had bought to wash it down. Then at half-past eight he blew out his candle and soon fell asleep.

  He woke as the first pale streaks of dawn filtered through the flimsy curtains and, scrambling out of bed, went to the window. It was still raining, but gently, and the wind had dropped. His impulse was to dress at once but, knowing that no boats would put out until the sea had gone down, he restrained his impulse and went back to bed.

  At seven o’clock a slatternly maid brought his petit déjeuner. After eating it he got up, dressed, and went down to the port. There was still little activity there and the packet-boat, laying alongside her jetty, showed no signs of preparing to put to sea. Near the landward end of the jetty there was a large notice-board and, thinking that a notice might have been put up there giving some information about sailings, he walked over to it.

  A thick-set, middle-aged man with heavy eyebrows, was already standing in front of the board, reading a large placard occupying nearly half its area, which, from its cleanness, could only recently have been pasted up. As Roger came up beside the man and his eyes fastened on the notice, his stomach seemed to turn over. It read:

  Attention! A felon of exceptional ferocity and baseness is urgently sought by the Government. Five hundred Louis d’Or will be paid by M. le Comte de Crosne, His Majesty’s Lieutenant of Police, or by any accredited agents of the Crown, for information leading to the securing of the person, dead or alive, of one

  ROGER BROOK

  The above is an Englishman, giving himself out to be the son of a British Admiral, and a nephew of the Earl of Kildonan. Yet he speaks French with the fluency of one born in this country and has passed for several years as a native of the province of Alsace, under the name of BREUC.

  The man wanted is tall and slim. He is about twenty-one years of age, having a fine figure, pleasant, expressive countenance and good complexion. His hair, worn long, is dark brown, his eyes a striking deep blue with dark lashes. His nose is straight, his chin firm and he has good teeth.

  He dresses with elegance and has the manners of a person of quality. When last seen he was wearing a plum-coloured satin coat, flowered waistcoat, red twill riding breeches, brown Hessian boots, and lace ruffles and jabot.

  A further reward of five hundred Louis d’Or will be paid to anyone returning a stolen document that the above-described felon is believed to be carrying on his person. The said document is a letter signed by M. le Comte de Montmorin, His Majesty’s Foreign Minister.

  The aforesaid ROGER BROOK alias BREUC, is required to answer to charges of murder, theft and treason. Attention!

  ONE THOUSAND LOUIS REWARD

  The reward offered was an extraordinarily high one, showing how concerned Roger’s enemies were to effect his capture, and he had to admit that the de Rochambeaux had been generous enough in their description of him; but for all that the portrait was damnably accurate and he was conscious of a rising wave of fright at the thought that everyone he met could hardly fail to recognise him from it.

  On remembering that he had at least had the sense to change his clothes he gave vent to a sign of relief; but, next second, he was seized with consternation. The thick-set man beside him had turned and was staring at his face.

  Suddenly the man spoke: ‘You fit that description strangely well, Monsieur. I’ve rarely seen such deep blue eyes as yours.’

  With an effort Roger forced a smile. ‘Nay. I’m an honest seafarer, and my purse has never run to satin coats or lace folderols.’

  ‘You might have shed those overnight,’ said the man, meditatively. ‘You’re the right height, too, and have just shown me two sets of good even teeth.’

  Roger could not divine if the fellow really suspected him or regarded his likeness to the description as pure coincidence; until, with a sudden narrowing of his close-set eyes, the man went on:
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br />   ‘What would you be doing down here at the jetty in this weather, eh? Sang de Dieu! I believe you’re this English murderer, trying to get away to your own damned island!’

  With his heart in his boots Roger gave a swift glance round. They were hidden from the greater part of the quay by the wooden offices of the Packet Boat Company. At the moment there was no one in sight, but the man looked tough and brawny. He might put up an ugly fight and raise the alarm before he could be knocked out; and Roger knew how swiftly a mob could suddenly congregate at the least excitement in an apparently empty street. He decided that he must keep his head and try to bluff it out.

  ‘Listen to me, mon ami,’ he said, with sternness. ‘You have this matter wrong. If you wish I will accompany you to the office of police and prove to them before you that I am one Julien Quatrevaux of Rennes, a Breton by birth and second officer of the India trader, Tobago Queen, now lying in Le Havre. But to do so it will be necessary to send for papers to my lodgings, which are at the far end of the town, and my whole morning will be lost. I have a seat booked in the diligence to carry me back to Le Havre. If I miss it I’ll not be there by nightfall and my ship may sail without me. That would put me to considerable loss as well as great inconvenience. Should I be so subjected on account of your wild fancies I will not only sue you for detaining me without warrant and for the loss I shall sustain, but seek you out later with a seaman’s cudgel and beat you to within an inch of your life. Now! Do you wish to gamble your absurd imaginings against these penalties, or not?’

  The man hesitated. One thousand louis was an enormous reward; to a poor man it was a fortune. But the account given by his vis-à-vis of himself seemed solidly circumstantial and, if true, threatened to land him in endless trouble. After a moment he shrugged, and said:

  ‘Monsieur, I meant no offence. But you must admit that you are like enough to the description of this felon to raise anyone’s suspicions.’