Ebb Tide (24 page)

Edward shook his head. 'For God's sake,' he said, dropping his voice still further, 'I am neither an ingrate nor a monster. I have the chance to make some sort of reparation for the past. I need your help. If you cannot do it for me, pray do it for Hortense's sake. She said you were fond of her, that you had duelled with each other for years...'

'Did she?' Drinkwater said flatly. 'Duelled, eh? Is that how she put it? Well, I suppose 'tis as good a metaphor as any. Tell me how you met her. That strikes me as the oddest coincidence of all.'

'It is easily explained. Hortense was a friend of Madame Ney's. The Marshal had made something of a reputation in Russia and Prince Vorontzoff wished to meet him. I was on the Prince's staff and we attended one of Madame Ney's
soirées...'

'Where you met Hortense, and thereafter matters took their natural course.' Drinkwater's tone was rueful.

'Quite so.'

'But how', Drinkwater went on, 'did you make the connection with me?'

'It was our intention to marry...'

'You and Hortense proposed to marry!'

Edward nodded. 'Yes. Does that surprise you?'

Drinkwater shook his head. 'No,' he said, giving a low, ironic laugh, 'no, not in the least. Pray continue.'

Edward shrugged. 'The war was over and I obtained my discharge from the Russian army. Paris was most congenial, and my long acquaintanceship and service with the Russian
ton
had taught me French. I thought in French and now hardly ever utter a word in English, though Prince Vorontozoff knew me to speak it and, as I was in his confidence, he occasionally conversed in it with me.'

'Did he know you to be an Englishman?'

Edward nodded. 'Yes, there are many foreign officers in the Russian service, though most are Germans. I gave out that I came from a family of merchants who had lived abroad for some time.'

'And by the time you met Hortense, you had proved yourself to the Russians.'

'It was difficult after Tilsit, but Prince Vorontzoff was wholly opposed to the alliance with Napoleon. He retired to the country and I went with him. He had Arab bloodstock and you will recall my interest in horses.'

Drinkwater nodded. 'But you have not told me how you linked Hortense with me.'

'Well, I wished to marry her and settle in Paris. I had provided for myself quite well.' Edward grinned. 'There were some rich pickings between Moscow and Paris, but that is by the by. Hortense struck me as being alone, despite her intimacy with Madame Ney. Baroness de Sarrasin was suspicious of her, due to the disgrace of her first husband, and it was clear she was the recipient of charity. The fall of Napoleon did not divide France, it fragmented the country. Many of the Marshals accepted the restoration of the Bourbons in return for the retention of their positions, titles and fortunes. Be that as it may, Hortense accepted me. In confidence, she told me she received a small competence from a source in England for services to the British government. I assumed this was to prove to me that her loyalties were sound. I also assumed she meant a pension and she might have lied, but she didn't, she said no, it was from a man she held in the highest esteem, though fate had made him an enemy. I thought, of course, that she had been this mysterious benefactor's mistress and that the enmity had grown up after some intimacy, but she denied this vehemently. Sheer curiosity led me to ask the name of her benefactor and sheer innocence led her to reply with our ... your surname.'

'God's bones, I had no idea...'

'You see, the fact that she was an intimate of the Neys, and I knew she was the widow of a disgraced officer, Edouard Santhonax, yet had a pension for services to Great Britain, led me to conclude that her past was as complex as my own, beset by divided loyalties and so forth.' Edward rubbed a hand over his sweating chin. 'I suppose it gave us something in common; we were both what used to be called, with disparagement, "adventurers".'

'So you told her you were my brother?' Drinkwater asked, frowning.

'Yes, eventually. When Napoleon escaped from Elba and Paris was in an uproar. Friendships that seemed to cement the new order of the restored Bourbons dissolved overnight. Everyone seemed compromised, some more than others. There will have been no shortage of informers to jostle the petitioners at Napoleon's new court. Ney rode south to bring back Bonaparte in an iron cage and promptly went over to his old master. As for me, I was now a Russian living in a city which was set fair to turn hostile, and Hortense was among the tainted. In addition the Baroness arrived, her husband dead, her own fortunes overturned. She was now in the same position as her once despised sister-in-law. Hortense was fond of her brother's children. She had had none of her own...'

'I never thought of her as a matron ...'

'She was not all ambition, you know, but she was brave and resourceful.'

'She suggested you contacted me, I suppose.'

Edward nodded. 'Yes. She regarded you as a person of some influence. I had no idea whether you were an admiral, but from our last meeting I recalled you were engaged in matters usually outside the competence of a common captain in the Royal Navy. Hortense knew that you and a certain peer were involved in clandestine activities, so naturally you seemed the only person we could turn to. This was as clear to me as to her, but over this fortuitous circumstance lay the foolish actions of my youth. I had compromised you fatally. I had to tell her we were related, and why I could not come directly. She was astonished, of course,' he said with a wan smile, 'and at first refused to believe that I could possibly be your brother. I think she thought the claim an extravagant attempt on my part to impress her, but she eventually saw the folly of that and I was able to persuade her by revealing the few facts I knew about you.' He sighed, then added, 'She knew you a long time ago, I gather.'

'I rescued her from the revolutionaries — oh, years ago — just as it appears I must do again with this Baroness of yours.'

'Nat...' Edward leaned forward, his face earnest, his voice very low. Grasping his brother's wrist he said, 'I have not forgotten the great debt I owe you for helping me escape the gallows...'

'You escaped justice, by God!'

'Maybe. But the rescue of the Baroness and her children is something in reparation.'

'A noble expiation', Drinkwater said with heavy irony, 'which you have already alluded to, but somewhat dependent upon the charity of your over-burdened kin.'

'And I have lost Hortense ...'

'Perhaps we have both lost her.'

Edward frowned. 'You were never her lover...'

'Is that a question or a statement? But no, I never was,' Drinkwater said hurriedly. He paused a moment, then asked, 'Hortense was not the only woman in your life. Have you not left a wife in Russia?'

Edward shook his head. 'A mistress, yes, in fact two, both married. But I am not the complete smell-smock you think me.'

Drinkwater smiled. '"Smell-smock", now there's an expression that betrays how long it is since you spoke English.' He sighed. 'Well, it is good to see you again. Our last meeting in Tilsit was, you will recall, dangerous enough...'

'Look, Nat...'

'For God's sake, do not relax your guard! Stop calling me that, or 'twill slip out!' Drinkwater snapped. 'I have a great deal...'

'I realize what you have done ... Look, I have no intention of being anything other than a Russian officer. I can arrive in England as a Russian officer protecting the Baroness. I can spend the rest of my life speaking French. I can retire as the Baroness's protector, if she wishes, and live somewhere quietly. God knows I've endured my own share of frozen bivouacs! This might not quite equate to your cumulative privations, but I do not think there is a soul alive who would recognize Ned Drinkwater, do you?'

Drinkwater looked at his brother. 'How did you get that?' he asked, indicating his own nose. 'A sabre cut?'

Edward nodded. 'On the field of Borodino. A cuirassier of the 9th Regiment, They carried the Raevsky redoubt at the point of the sword. It was my misfortune to have borne a message into the place about thirty seconds before they arrived!'

Drinkwater rose and drew out a bottle and glasses from the locker. 'You will not know that it was Hortense's husband who tried to frustrate my return from Tilsit with the intelligence you obtained for us.' 'That is not possible!' 'And I killed him,' Drinkwater added. '
Mon Dieu!
' Edward sat back, clearly astonished. 'I think', Drinkwater said slowly, handing Edward a glass, 'that your services at Tilsit might buy you immunity for your crime.'

Edward shrugged. 'Perhaps, but I should not wish to put the matter to the test. It would still cloud your own reputation. Aiding and abetting...'

'Yes, yes,' Drinkwater interrupted testily, 'those two words haunt me to this day.' He tossed off his own glass and rose to stand swaying in the cabin as
Kestrel
stood out to sea.

'I can stay Russian,' Edward almost pleaded. Drinkwater paused and the two men stared at each other in the shadowy cabin. 'What damned curious lives we have led,' Edward added reflectively.

'What damned curious times we have lived through,' Drinkwater replied. 

'D'you remember what Mother used to say?' 'No, what in particular?'

'That "a friend is a friend at all times, but a brother is born for adversity".'

'Am I supposed to find that consoling? If so I find it confoundedly cold comfort. We are about to stick our heads into a noose, Colonel. By demonstrating so conspicuously outside Calais last night and this morning, in order that somehow you should be made aware of our presence, we have alerted the authorities very effectively. Now we must turn back and make a landing. I presume this Baroness and her children are in Calais itself?'

'No, at a small farm outside. You will need to get ashore to the east of the port if you don't wish to pass through Calais itself.'

'I certainly have no wish to do that. On an open beach, in an onshore wind, with a single small boat. You certainly were born for adversity, Colonel.' And with that Drinkwater left his brother with the bottle, the bucket and his thoughts, making his way on deck to try to put his own in order.

CHAPTER 10
The Landing

April 1815

Kestrel
stood offshore until the coast of France had dropped over the horizon astern, then they altered course to the east-north-east and ran parallel with the shoreline before turning south again. Just as twilight occluded the day, they saw the faint glim of light at Calais and, allowing for the set of the tide, laid their course for a point some five miles east of the town. In the interim, Drinkwater had told Frey the bare essentials of the operation. The Russian officer, Colonel Ostroff, was responsible for aiding the escape of a French baroness and her two children. They were currently in a farmhouse outside Calais and a small party was to be landed on the beach that night. Frey's orders were to haul offshore and to wait. Ostroff had assured Drinkwater that they could reach the farmhouse, withdraw the fugitives and escape to the beach before daylight. The shore party was to consist of Drinkwater, Ostroff and Jago, for the latter's knowledge of the local dialect might prove useful.

Both Drinkwater and Frey knew that the operation hinged entirely upon their getting safely ashore and pulling the much larger party out again. It was one thing to land three men through the surf, men who might flounder ashore wet but in reasonable safety, but quite another to re-embark those three men after a night's march with the added encumbrance of a woman and two children. However, any alternative plan seemed too risky, and it was a business Drinkwater had some knowledge of. He therefore gave Frey careful instructions, and the entire crew of the cutter were made aware of the night's business.

As they ran in towards the coast again, they all ate a hearty meal of boiled ham, onions and carrots, accompanied by the last of the fresh bread. Ostroff and Drinkwater prepared a brace of pistols each which, with their swords, were neatly parcelled up with powder, ball and shot, and wrapped in oil-cloth. Drinkwater pulled grey trousers on over his boots but wore his old undress uniform coat and a plain bicorne hat. Ostroff remained in his dark civilian habit and Jago was loaned a blue coat.

There would be a quarter moon after midnight, though the night sky was cloudy and the blustery northerly breeze was chilly enough to drive people indoors after dark. The breeze would, however, also create a heavy surf on the beach, and Drinkwater tried to warn his brother of the problems they might encounter. It was an hour after dark before they finally closed with the coast, the boatswain plying the lead amidships. The proximity of the shore was announced by a steepening of the sea and the appearance of the pale strand with its fringe of rollers above which the spray smoked pallidly in the fitful starlight. Frey brought the cutter to, the boat was launched and the three men tumbled into it, Drinkwater amidships at the oars, Jago forward and Ostroff aft. Each man carried his oil-cloth bundle over his back on a line. The two oars were secured by lanyards so that they should not be lost, and in Jago's charge the boat's painter was secured to a long length of line flaked out on the cutter's deck, a line made up of several lengths which the cutter had provided and which included the unrove halliards from the main and jib topsails.

As soon as the boat had shoved off, Frey dropped the cutter's head-sails, scandalized her mainsail and let go her anchor, to hold
Kestrel
just long enough to let the boat, under the impetus of wind and sea, drift and be paddled towards the beach. Drinkwater gently back-watered, keeping the boat's head to sea, while Jago watched the line as the men on board
Kestrel paid
it out. The boat bobbed into the surf where it fell first one way and then the other, the drag on the line and a deft working of the oars by Drinkwater amidships keeping her from completely broaching to, though she rolled abominably and Edward shifted awkwardly, clearly unhappy with the violent motion and the occasional slop of water into her.