Georgette Heyer (51 page)
Authors: Royal Escape
The Colonel looked at him, his face a little grim. Mansel's smile grew. 'Oh no, Colonel!' he said. 'You need not fear me, nor do I wish to know the names of these – er – unfortunate gentlemen, whom I am to have the honour of assisting.'
'Oh, as to that, I think you would be little the wiser!' replied the Colonel. 'Tomorrow, then; and I will not fail to bring a horse for you.'
He then left the merchant's house, going first to the inn where Tom Gounter stayed for him, and, pres ently home to Racton, where he ate his dinner, and a little rested his horse before setting out once more for Hinton Daubnay. The weather was very bad, sheets of rain being driven across the countryside by a wind that brought the yellowing leaves down from the trees in swirling drifts. The Colonel's horse was nearly done, and he was forced to ride more slowly than he wished, arriving at Lawrence Hyde's house only in time for supper.
Wilmot was overjoyed to hear of his transactions with Francis Mansel, his approval being tempered only by regret that the merchant had been unable to go that very day to Bright helmstone. He had had word from Dr Henchman that the King was well, and in good spirits, his presence at Heale quite unsuspected; but the fact of his being confined to one small room, with only two elderly ladies to wait on him, made my lord extremely anxious to remove him. When he learned that the village of Brighthelmstone was situated nearly thirty miles to the east of Chichester, he began to fret again, foreseeing that it would be impossible for the Colonel to go there, and return to Hinton Daubney in one day. The Colonel, however, promised to come to him again with all possible despatch, but was forced to beg Lawrence Hyde for the loan of a good horse, his own being quite spent. As ill-luck would have it, the only horse in Hyde's stables that could be spared, or was up to the Colonel's weight, was the falconer's, a sturdy beast, but no flyer. Mounted on this animal, Gounter left Hinton Daubnay late that evening, once more declining a most pressing invitation to remain there for the night.
A few hours' sleep was all that he allowed himself when he reached Racton. He rose from his bed at dawn, heavy-eyed, but denying any extraordinary fatigue, and set out for Tom Gounter's house, there to borrow a horse for Francis Mansel. This accomplished, and Tom promising to repair to Hinton Daubnay, to assure Wilmot that the business was in train, the Colonel rode into Chichester, to Mansel's house.
The merchant was ready for him, but insisted that before they set out on their long ride, the Colonel should partake of breakfast. 'You are not one who lets the grass grow under his feet, I perceive,' he said, with his thin-lipped smile. 'But fair and softly goes far in a day, my dear Colonel. Eat first, ride after!'
They reached Brighthelmstone by two o'clock in the afternoon, and repaired immediately to the only inn so mean a village possessed. It had been agreed between them that Mansel should conduct the nego tiations with the master of the barque he had in mind, and upon their arrival at the George he left the Colonel to smoke a pipe in the parlour while he went out to look for the mariner. He returned in a short while with the unwel come tidings that Stephen Tattersal had already bargained for a freight in Chich ester, and was gone there. This was a bitter set-back, but when Mansel further disclosed that Tattersal had touched at Shoreham, a port four miles to the west of Brighthelmstone, and was in all probability there still, the Colonel at once persuaded him to send off a messenger, begging Tattersal to come to him upon urgent business.
Mansel raised his brows slightly, but obeyed. While they waited together in the inn, he asked the Colonel what price he was willing to pay Tattersal for the busi ness.
'I will pay what I must, but I beg of you to get it as low as you may,' replied the Colonel.
'You need have no fear of that,' said Mansel.
It was dark before an answer to his message was received, but it came at last in the person of Captain Tattersal, who rolled into the inn as the Colonel and Mansel were sitting down to supper.
Mansel at once invited him to join them, and he sat down to table, declaring that he was very willing. He was a thick-set man with a weather-beaten complexion, and a bluff voice that could easily make itself heard above the howling of any gale. He announced that he would not have broken his journey for any other than Mr Mansel, and demanded to be told why he was sent for.
'I have a freight for you,' replied Mansel.
'Then I'll compound with you, and let my other bargain go hang, for you and me has dealt together oft-times, and I know you for a warm man,' declared Tattersal, helping himself liberally from the blackjack full of sack that stood on the table. 'Is it coals?'
'No,' said Mansel, in his calm way.
'What then?'
'That,' said Mansel, 'you shall know when the time comes.'
''Sblood, what's this?' demanded Tattersal, his little, quick eyes bright with suspicion. 'I'll know what I'm to carry, or I'll not treat!'
'Presently, presently!' said Mansel.
But it was not until two o'clock upon the following day, which was Saturday, 11th October, that a bargain was finally struck. Mansel, although unwilling to do so, was forced to disclose the Colonel's story of the mythical duellists before Tattersal could be brought to enter into any agreement; and after this there was still much haggling to be done.
Finally, Tattersal pledged himself to carry the unknown passengers to France for the sum of sixty pounds, to be paid to him in hand before he took them aboard his vessel. He agreed to hold himself in readiness to set sail upon an hour's warning, and to bring his boat to the little hamlet of Southwick, which lay between Shoreham and Bright helmstone. Mansel, upon being privately assured by the Colonel that, besides receiving his fee of fifty pounds, all his charges should be defrayed, consented to remain at Brighthelmstone, under pretence of freighting the barque, so that he could keep a watch over Tattersal, and be certain that all was in readiness for whenever the Colonel should bring his friends to Brighthelmstone.
The Colonel took leave of him at about three o'clock, and set out to cover the forty miles to Hinton Daubnay before nightfall. Since he had his portmanteau strapped to the saddle behind him, and had warned his wife that he might be absent for some days, he wasted no time in calling at his own home, but pushed on as speedily as he could to Mr Hyde's house, arriving there shortly before nine o'clock in the evening.
Lawrence Hyde himself came out to greet him, exclaiming; 'Well, George! If you are not dead of fatigue, you should be! Come you in, man! How have you fared?'
'Well, as I hope,' the Colonel answered, easing his aching limbs. 'I've left Mansel at Brighthelmstone to see all prepared. The bargain was not concluded until two o'clock this afternoon, which has made me later than I wished to be. How is my lord?'
Hyde took him into the house, with a hand thrust in his arm. 'My lord is – very much like himself,' he said. 'He is not here at this present.'
The Colonel turned his tired face towards Hyde. 'Not here?' he said sharply. 'Do you mean that some thing has gone amiss?'
'Nothing in the world that I know of,' replied Hyde. 'But some friends chancing to visit me yesterday, my lord took fright, believing he might be recognized, and that my house was, besides, too public for safety. He could not be at ease, so your cousin Gounter removed him to his sister's house, where he awaits you.'
'To Anthony Brown's?' said the Colonel, in rather a blank voice. 'Well, I suppose he is secure there, but –' He broke off, and, happening to catch Hyde's eye, could not help laughing. 'Nay, poor man, it's no wonder that he goes like a cat upon a hot bakestone! But I must not stay here, if he is gone.'
Hyde opened the door into one of the parlours, and thrust him in. 'My dear George, not one of us looked to see you back this night, so you may be easy! Go you in: I swear you shall not leave my house until you have at least drunk some sack, and eaten a biscuit. I have Robin Phelips with me, who will be glad to hear how you have fared.'
He made the two men known to each other, and went off to fetch refreshment, while Colonel Gounter sat down, stretching his muddied boots to the fire, and answered Phelips's anxious questions.
The two Colonels were in odd contrast one to the other, Phelips being stockily framed, and of a fleshy habit, slow of mind and of speech; and Gounter a tall man, with a body hardened to the temper of his own sword, and movements that were as quick as his brain, and as decided. He gave Phelips a brief account of the arrangements he had made. It was evident that he saw nothing remarkable in his own driving energy, but Phelips, quite lost in admiration of the man who could not only, without apparent discomfort, spend four days in ceaseless searching, but who was also not in the least afraid to take upon himself the direction of the whole, dangerous affair, could only stare, and ejaculate: 'You shall be a saint in my almanack for ever! I had not thought it possible you could have concluded the busi ness in so short a time!'
'Ah!' said Lawrence Hyde, smiling. 'It's plain you don't know my kinsman, Robin.'
He turned to Gounter, to suggest to him that he should postpone his departure for Brown's house until the following morning. This, however, Gounter could not be persuaded to do, for he knew that although Hyde might not have expected him to return so soon from Brighthelmstone, Wilmot would certainly be looking for him. He finished his sack, and got up.
'Well,' said Phelips, heaving himself out of his chair, 'I doubt you are right to go, and I will come with you, for it seems to me that you and I have some things to discuss, my lord being no more fit to have the ordering of his Majesty's removal from Heale than my spaniel. Let him have his way, and there will be a dozen men pulled into the business, and all with a different plan.'
The Colonel laughed, but said quickly: 'He has not let my Lord Southampton set about the finding of a ship, has he?'
'No,' replied Phelips, with a grim little smile. 'He has not, for he sent me to discover the King's will in the matter, and the King, hearing that you had gone to Brighthelmstone with a very fair hope of engaging a vessel there, said he would not put my Lord South ampton to the danger of having anything to do with it. I can tell you, Gounter, that's a man of quite another kidney for you.'
'Southampton?' Gounter asked.
'Nay, the King. I'll own, when I first clapped eyes on him, I was sadly taken aback, for he is a damned ugly lad, you know: no more like his father than chalk is to cheese. 'Deed, I knew not how to take him, for I never saw a man so merry, no one that cared less for danger. Well, I'll not deny I came nigh to forgetting my duty when nothing would do for him but he must ride coolly into Mere all for the sake of his dinner! But the truth is he's like a cat: fling him which way you will, he'll light on his legs!'
'Merry?' Gounter said. 'Is he indeed
merry
?'
merry
?'
A reluctant grin stole into Phelips's eyes. 'As merry as cup and can,' he asseverated.
Twenty-one
Brother Roundhead
After consultation with Wilmot, it was decided that Phelips, and not Gounter, should go to Salisbury upon the following day, which was Sunday, to inform Dr Henchman that all was in order to the King's escape; and, through him, to provide for Charles's leaving Heale very early upon Monday morning. Although Gounter was respon sible for the arrangements, and was considered by Wilmot the better man to send upon such an errand, he was plainly so tired-out that if he was to be of any further use to Charles, he must be allowed to rest for a day. When he found that Phelips, no less than Wilmot and Tom Gounter, looked to him for orders, and that all three of his companions were relying on him to direct every detail of the King's journey to Brighthelm stone, the Colonel himself realized that it was extremely necessary that he should clear his head of the befogging effects of weariness. Before he retired to rest, he sat with the others round a table in Anthony Brown's parlour, and forced his brain to grapple with the new problem presented to it. His eyes were bloodshot, and he found it difficult to keep his weighted lids from sinking over them; but after he had drunk a glass or two of wine he was able to hammer out a plan that met with Wilmot's approval. Phelips had provided himself with a rough map of the district. He and Gounter bent over it, deciding upon the route along which he was to lead the King, and the precise point where it would be most convenient for Wilmot and both the Gounters to meet them.
'And where is his Majesty to be housed on Monday night?' demanded Wilmot.
'Why, at Lawrence Hyde's, surely?' said Phelips, raising his head. 'It is the fittest place I know, besides that Hyde has engaged himself to provide absolute security for him.'
'No, no, I like it not at all!' Wilmot said, with a quick frown. 'It is too public, and has no secret place. Moreover, I myself stayed there over-long, so that the news of it may have spread abroad. I'll not expose his Majesty to that risk.'
'For my part, I see no risk,' growled Phelips. 'I warrant his Majesty will be pleased enough to go there. It's but for one night, and Hyde positively expects him.'
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