by Regina Scott
The gendarme curled his lips until his teeth showed, but his mouth held nothing of a smile. “You wouldn’t dare.”
“’Tis my food until you put money in my hand. I can sell it wherever I wish.”
“We might visit your farm in the night and raid your food stores.”
“Try it, and see how long Abbeville retains a gendarmerie post.”
A murderous look flitted across the soldier’s face.
“Does your captain know the threats you make?” Jean Paul growled.
The man just glared.
“Perhaps you should make yourself scarce next week when I deliver the foodstuffs, or I might find an urge to speak with your superior.”
“Jean Paul!” a voice bellowed. “I didn’t know you were here.”
He recognized the speaker before he turned.
Mayor Narcise waddled down the steps of the post, a smile wreathing his flabby face. “I’ve been meaning to talk to you, my boy.”
“Bonjour, Jean Paul.” Captain Monfort followed the mayor down the steps, his eyes surveying the near-empty wagon. “Our chef was saying to me earlier this week how much he appreciates your deliveries. Did he tell you such?”
“The kitchen was empty when I arrived.”
“Ah, I forgot he ran to the market. I trust Gilles here helped you unload?”
“In a manner of speaking.” Jean Paul slanted a glance at the gendarme, who was steadily backing away from the group with two of the crates.
The captain gave a curt nod and straightened the lapels on his coat. “Good. You’re dismissed, Gilles.”
The scrap of a soldier headed toward the kitchen at a brisk clip.
“Well, then.” The mayor gave Jean Paul a hearty slap on the back. “My sister’s been wanting you over to sup. Nagging me about it for nigh on a week now, but I haven’t seen hide nor hair of you.”
Supper again. Jean Paul stuck a finger into the collar of his shirt and tugged. He’d been to four meals in town during the past year, each painfully awkward. Everyone sat around the table staring at him, praising him for the day he stumbled upon Citizen Benoit and her daughter being set upon by three army deserters. He’d done nothing special, only what any man of character would have when he chased off two of the scoundrels and dragged the other one before the magistrate.
He hadn’t realized Citizen Benoit was the mayor’s sister.
Or that he would be hailed as a hero for his deed.
“Well, what say you to supper on the morrow?” The mayor slapped him on the back again, then gave Captain Monfort a wink. “We’ll even invite the captain here.”
Jean Paul shook off the mayor’s flaccid arm. “’Tis a busy week with the first vegetables coming on.”
“Make time, boy. You’ve tasted the food my sister serves. The finest in all of Picardy.”
“Oui. ’Tis so,” Captain Monfort agreed.
Jean Paul glanced between the two men, Captain Monfort with his pristine uniform and the glimmer of respect twinkling in his eyes, and the mayor with his protruding stomach and hopeful expression.
He swallowed hard. He was the last person to deserve such respect and reverence. But then, the mayor and captain didn’t understand the innocent blood that lay on his hands from the six years he’d spent away from Abbeville. He’d thought he’d been serving his country, but countless other men served France without ever spilling blood the way he had.
“I accept.” His throat tightened on the words, but he forced them out. He could manage one more night of hero worship.
If only he didn’t feel like a fraud.
*
Nothing. There was nothing here. Brigitte peeked under the bed one last time, just to be certain. What had she missed? No hidden journal of Citizen Belanger’s military days sat stuffed beneath his pillow. No tattered and stained National Guard coat was secreted away in his chest of drawers. And no mysterious trunk lay under this bed, nor under any of the three others inside the chamber.
Oh, the beds themselves were beautiful, just as breathtaking as the table and chairs had been. One had leaves and acorns carved on it while another had the same cornucopias as the dining set. But after an hour spent scouring every centimeter of the two-room house, she still had no information about where he’d been in April of 1794, when Henri was killed.
What was she going to tell Alphonse’s man? That Citizen Belanger had beautiful furniture? She bit her lip and stared at the empty space under the bed, willing a trunk or secret crate to suddenly appear. Then all she need do was look inside and find proof of Citizen Belanger’s…
Innocence? Guilt? What did she hope to find?
Citizen Belanger was big, like the man who had stolen Henri from their bed. And by his own admission, he’d been to Calais before. Yet Alphonse had said Citizen Belanger disappeared to Paris at the beginning of the Révolution, and she’d found nothing indicative of Paris in his house. Nothing indicative he’d been gone any length of time at all.
Perhaps he was innocent. The man had given her family three meals now and paid her two livres for a loaf of bread. Murderers didn’t care for the poor or search for excuses to give away money.
Did they?
She sighed and wiped a strand of hair from her face. She’d best go search the stable before she left. Perchance he’d something hidden away there.
“Ho, Sylvie.” A masculine voice resonated through the house, followed by the telltale creak of a wagon.
She stilled, blood rushing in her ears and her palms suddenly damp. Citizen Belanger couldn’t be back so quickly. She’d barely been here an hour.
Or had it been two?
She glanced out the bedroom window, its shutters thrown open to let in the warm summer air. The sun was high against the blue tapestry of sky, much higher than it should be had she only been working an hour.
The outer door to the house squeaked open and then thudded shut. She looked frantically about the room, then dove beneath the bed.
Chapter Six
Jean Paul scratched the back of his neck as he surveyed the main chamber of his house. Strange. He could have sworn he’d put Sylvie’s blanket in the stable yesterday’s eve, but the stable held no sign of it. The only other place it might be was inside the house. Yet no blanket lay in a haphazard pile on the table or hastily thrown over the rocking chair.
What had happened to it? A blanket didn’t simply up and disappear.
Or did it?
Mayhap he was losing his mind. There’d been a missing chicken yesterday, an absent mug this morn at breakfast and now his mare’s…
He looked around his cottage one more time. ’Twas more than a misplaced blanket or cup gone afoot. The entire house seemed wrong. The Bible lay at an odd angle on the mantle, the bench by the table was absent of dust, and the quilt on the rocker was folded a bit too neatly.
His heart quickened in his chest. Someone had been here. In his house. In his things.
He stood still, forcing his heart to slow and his blood to cease racing. Forcing the return of his old, familiar calm that had stayed him through all manner of horrors and deeds during the Terror.
He looked around a third time, assessing every centimeter of his house. Who had been here, and why?
Someone who knew of his past? Someone searching for him? Someone who wanted vengeance?
It couldn’t be. He’d moved back home over a year ago, and no one had since found him. Why would a person come looking now?
Or perhaps someone had learned of his letters to the Convention every month, of the men he sometimes sheltered in his stable. A hiding royalist that had escaped the terror, or a spy for the English that had sniffed him out. Then again, the man he’d harbored last night could well have been a spy selling information to the English while only pretending to work for the French.
No, no, no. It couldn’t be. His imagination was running amuck with strange and alarming possibilities while he missed the likeliest culprits: thieves. Or maybe a pair of deserters who had happene
d upon an empty house.
But while many things were slightly disturbed, nothing of worth was missing. A thief would have taken…
What? He kept little of value in the house, had learned long ago to hide the things he cherished. His gaze landed on the mantle above the hearth. His knife. That was gone.
He moved stealthily toward the bedchamber, footsteps soft, ears open for the slightest of sounds.
If an attacker had tarried, he’d likely be hidden in the bedchamber and would strike the moment Jean Paul opened the door. He glanced again at the empty spot where his knife usually rested, and his gut twisted. He reached for the kitchen knife hanging on a hook against the wall and held it at the ready.
He drew in a breath, then flung the bedchamber door open. It flew backward to bang against the wall.
Empty. The room held no one. But a person had been there. The dusty dirt floor bore fresh marks by all three of the unused beds, and the drawers of his dresser all fit perfectly into place. When was the last time he’d bothered to close the drawers properly?
A person had been here, and not some army deserter or thief looking for easy loot. A person had searched his house, and there could only be one reason for such actions:
Someone knew of his past.
*
Brigitte curled herself tighter against the wall and stared at the booted feet visible from beneath the bed. Did he know someone had been in his house, or was he merely retrieving something from the bedchamber?
She swallowed past a throat tight with fear. What if he sensed something amiss?
Would he hurt her if he found her? Take her to the magistrate for snooping about?
No, no. Surely not. This man had been kind to her, given her food and work, asked after her health. He wouldn’t hurt her.
Unless the kindness was all a farce, some odd sort of disguise for his past deeds. If he was indeed the man who had killed Henri and he found her hiding here, perhaps he would kill her, too. Kill her and bury her on the farm, where no one would ever discover—
The dusty boots turned suddenly and strode out of the chamber. A moment later the outside door banged shut.
Brigitte clasped a hand over her heart and willed its frantic pace to slow, willed the roaring in her ears to stop and the dampness to leave her hands and forehead. She was safe.
Well, mostly safe. She still had to climb out the bedchamber window and escape through the garden without being noticed. And then she needed to meet Alphonse’s man tonight and explain why she had no new evidence regarding Jean Paul Belanger.
She closed her eyes and let her head fall back against the cool dirt floor. ’Twould be astonishing if her heart survived this assignment.
*
Brigitte turned her back against the setting sun and moved her leaden feet along the clover field, skirting the trees that lined the edge. Had she really argued with Citizen Belanger over the price of her bread and snuck into his house earlier that day? The events seemed so distant, they might have occurred a week ago.
Her weariness was growing worse. Her joints ached as she trudged through the green countryside. Sweat slicked her hands and beaded on her forehead, and her head pounded with each step she took.
Surely she felt ill because of the meeting and what lay ahead at the rendezvous location, not because she was getting sick. She couldn’t get sick right now.
“Bonjour, Citizen,” a voice called from the field.
She stilled, her pulse thudding sluggishly against her throat. Had Alphonse’s man already found her? No one was supposed to know she was here besides the person she needed to meet—whomever that was.
“Bonjour?” she answered tentatively.
A man emerged from the midst of the cows grazing in the field, his clothing smeared with mud and hands crusted with dirt.
Or rather, his hand was crusted with dirt. He only had one. His other arm stopped somewhere beneath his elbow, leaving the remainder of his sleeve to hang free.
“Oh.” She took a step back. This couldn’t be the man Alphonse had sent.
“I’ve yet to meet you, Citizen.” The man dipped his head at her, his young face tanned beneath the uncocked hat he wore. “I’m Pierre Dufort, one of Jean Paul Belanger’s tenants.”
Well, that certainly explained his presence in the field. Her eyes slid to the gaping hole at the end of his shirtsleeve. How did a farmer work with only one hand?
“I lost it in the Batavian campaign.”
She jerked her eyes up to meet his and found herself staring once again into that terribly young face, a face not much older than Julien’s or Laurent’s.
’Twas almost worse than looking at the amputated arm.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have stared. My name is Brigitte Moreau and I’m—” She licked her lips. How to describe why she was here near Abbeville, let alone cutting through a field? “Living in the area for a bit. I trust Citizen Belanger won’t mind my travelling through his land?”
“Jean Paul’s hardly the type to bother with a person crossing his field now and then.”
She only hoped he was right, but then, he hadn’t been cowering under a bed in fear of Jean Paul Belanger eight hours earlier.
“And no need to apologize about staring. ’Tis hardly a secret.” He raised his arm, drawing attention to the incomplete limb. “I lost my hand. Everyone can see as much.”
But he was so young to face the rest of his days maimed. Had he a mother who sent him off to fight? A wife? Did he blame whoever had sent him into the army for the injury he’d suffered? She swallowed hard, then glanced away.
“Adieu, then. I must be…”
“I have two sons…”
The both spoke at the same time then fell silent.
“You were saying?” The subtle lines around Pierre’s eyes creased with curiosity.
“In the navy.” She cleared her throat. “I have two sons in the navy.” She wasn’t sure why she told him, save that he might understand something she couldn’t. Might be able to name the aching sorrow that filled her chest every night as she lay down to sleep and longed for her oldest children. And if he couldn’t name it, he’d assuredly felt it before. One would have to after losing an arm on the battlefield.
“Good seamen, are they? That’s noble of you, now, sending your boys off to serve their country.”
But it didn’t feel very noble, not at moments like this when she simply wanted them home. “I hope…” Her eyes drifted down to his empty sleeve again. “That is, I want…”
“Don’t worry yourself.” Pierre smiled softly. “Your boys’ll fare fine. Battle at sea’s a mite different then battle on land. I’ve nary met a sailor who lost his arm.”
Yes. Battle at sea certainly was different, because if either Laurent’s or Julien’s frigate was captured, her boys wouldn’t face the mere loss of a hand—they would be killed, thrown into a gaol or impressed onto a British warship. Was she mad for thinking the loss of an arm seemed the better consequence? What kind of mother sent her children into the navy at all?
The kind who wanted to help her country fight against its tyrannical neighbor.
The kind who wanted to keep them away from Alphonse Dubois.
“They’re only fifteen.”
Pierre put his hand on her shoulder, a gentle touch like one Laurent or Julien might use to comfort her were they here in Abbeville. “Citizen Moreau, Brigitte, why don’t you come home and sup with me and my wife tonight? Looks like you need a little cheer to lift your spirits.”
She looked up into Pierre’s face, kindness and hospitality emanating from a young man who had every reason to be angry at life.
“That’s a kind offer, but I must make haste. I’ve three younger children back at the house.” And she was already late for her rendezvous.
“Some other time, then. I’ve got a wee babe I like to show off, and my wife will be pleased to meet another woman. She and Citizen Fortier are the only two women on Jean Paul’s land, you know.”
&nb
sp; No. She didn’t know and hadn’t given much thought to who Citizen Belanger’s tenants were, whether they were married or widowed, whether they had all their hands or feet or ears. Though Jean Paul had told her there were women around to work as laundresses, and most farmers had wives and children to help bear the work.
“Au revoir, for I hope we meet again, Citizen Moreau.” He gave her a little wave.
“Au revoir.” She turned and took two steps away, then looked back. Pierre made his way along the edge of the field, his gaping sleeve hanging comfortably at his side.
“Did Citizen Belanger hire you after he learned of your arm?” The question exploded from her lips.
Pierre turned, a slow smile spreading across his face. “Oui. And I’d not have found work save for him. My father is the butcher, you see. There’s little one can do around a butcher shop when missing a hand. But I’m not the only one he saved from such dire straits. Citizen Courtemanche limps, and Citizen Fortier lost her farm after her husband’s death. Then there’s Citizen…”
She held up a hand to stem his words. “I understand.”
And she did. Pierre could likely go on for a quarter hour listing Citizen Belanger’s tenants and why each of them needed an extra bit of help. It certainly explained how he had three men waiting to become tenants in a country where all able-bodied men were off at war.
What murderer hired one-armed men, cripples and widows?
What murderer helped needy people with food?
She turned back toward the path that ran along the edge of the field. Maybe now she had evidence enough to give Alphonse’s man.
Chapter Seven
Jean Paul bent over the green-and-amber-tinted field and fingered the stalks of wheat. No orange or yellow stripes on the leaves, no powdery mildew coating the plant, no holes where aphids, worms or flies had chewed through the leaves. It was completely, utterly healthy.
Or it should be. But the stalks were only half the size of those in the field behind it. And the hulls growing on each plant considerably fewer than the number on the stalks in the neighboring field.