Marry in Haste (17 page)

Why not? ... What was there frightening about that? ... It was no use; she gave up trying to think and drifted off again into a place of troubled dreams.

When she next woke, Chloe was back by her bed watching her anxiously. The room was full of evening shadows and Camilla could hear, outside, the. steady rush of rain. She shivered. “It is cold,” she said, and then, “how long have I been ill?”

Not long; though it seems an age. A little more than two weeks. Camilla, are you really strong enough to talk?”

“Of course. But, tell me, where is Lavenham? You said he was coming for tonight. Why? Where are we going?”

“Home, I hope. As for Lavenham, he is aboard the
Hibernia
with Strangford and Sir Sidney Smith, and mad, I can tell you, with anxiety for you. The doctors said you could not be moved, you see.”

“So you stayed here with me? Thank you, Chloe. But I still do not understand ... “ Once more, her hands began their restless movement, and Chloe, noticing it, hurried to give her a brief explanation of the events that had taken place during her illness, of Junot’s approach and the Prince Regent’s belated recognition of danger. “You should just have seen the harbour two days ago, when the Court were going on board; I spent all day at the window here, watching: you never saw anything like it. The whole Court, the archives, the treasury—everything, out there in the pouring rain. The mad old Queen, they tell me, crying, ‘
Ai Jesus
,’ harder than ever, the Prince Regent with tears running down his cheeks, the proudest ladies of the Court wading into the water to beg for passage ... And many of them without a scrap of baggage to their name. It will be an unhappy enough voyage even for those who have managed to beg or bribe their way on board.”

“But when do they sail?” asked Camilla.

“Why, that’s the rub. They have been ready for two days now, but the wind is against them. They cannot stir. And all the time, Junot is getting nearer. That is why Lavenham is coming for us tonight. He thinks it possible Junot may be here tomorrow and dares not risk a further delay. We are to meet him down at the little harbour. What a happy man he will be when he sees you recovered. Tell me, are you strong enough to dress? The men will carry you down, but you would be better dressed.”

Camilla laughed. “I should rather think I would. Well, let us make the effort.”

She found it an exhausting enough business, but with Chloe’s loving assistance managed, at last, to put on a warm travelling dress of dark green sarsenet and its matching pelisse. After the effort, she was glad enough to lie back on her bed while Chloe hurried away to make her own preparations. Lavenham had told her that they must bring as little as possible, but her jewels and Camilla’s must be packed into the smallest compass, together with a minimum wardrobe for the voyage back to England. “We shall be nothing but a pair of waifs and strays when we get home,” she told Camilla, “but luckily Grandmamma will be so delighted with your news I am sure nothing will be too good for you.”

“My news?”

“Why, the baby. Or were you funning? Oh, Camilla, surely not?”

It seemed an odd enough kind of a joke to Camilla, although she was tempted, for a moment, to pretend that it had been a misunderstanding. But what was the use? The truth would have to come out sooner or later. If only she knew whether she had succeeded in convincing Lavenham in that last dreadful scene, of which she had only fragmentary memories. But the fact that he had not spoken of her condition, even to Chloe, was anything but hopeful. Her hands resumed their nervous movement as she begged Chloe to say nothing about the baby to anyone. “Do not, I beg of you, tease Lavenham about it ... there will be time enough, on the voyage home.”

Chloe looked appalled. “Oh, Camilla, how could I be such a muttonhead! Did I not explain? Lavenham does not come with us. He has been appointed to escort the Prince Regent to the Brazils. It is a great honour, of course ...” Chloe was dwindling to an unhappy silence when she was interrupted by an agitated servant who announced that there were men below who insisted on speaking with the ladies.

“Men? What men?” Chloe was beginning, when she saw another figure enter the darkening room behind the servant. “You?” she said.

“Myself. And entirely at both your service.” Charles Boutet removed his hat with a flourish, dismissed the man in fluent Portuguese, and advanced towards the window where Camilla sat transfixed. “My dear Sister, I am delighted to see you better. When our beloved Chloe told me the good news I was transported with joy—for many reasons.”

“What do you mean?” It was no comfort, in her cold terror, to see that Chloe shared it.

“Just what I say. That I am glad to see you better. Whatever risks milord your husband might have been prepared to take with you, I should have been most reluctant to move you against the advice of the doctors. But now, everything is altered,, and just in time. I am come to offer you asylum, my dearest Sister, and to you, my ever beloved Chloe, my heart and hand.”

“What can you mean?” For all her illness, it was Camilla who spoke.

“Why, that I am come to take you home. You did not, surely, think that I would stand by and let you return to England with that tyrannical husband of yours? No, no, I am a better brother than that, and a better lover, too, as my dearest Chloe will admit, I am sure, before many days are past. For the moment, there is no time to be lost in talk. You, I am sure, have no more desire than I have for an encounter with your braggadocio husband, in which he must inevitably be defeated. So come, you are packed and ready, I see. We have not far to go: I am much too considerate a brother and,” once again there was a proprietorial smile for Chloe, “lover for that. We will just take you to a safer shelter far enough sway so that milord the husband cannot find you, and there, for tonight, you may rest. Tomorrow, Junot will be here, and all Lisbon yours. You will find it somewhat different from playing the beggarly British suppliants, I can tell you.”

Chloe spoke at last. “Traitor,” she said. “I should have known. And all your talk of love was time-serving and treachery. Camilla, will you ever forgive me? It was I—I am the traitor. I told him all our plans. I wanted—God help me—I wanted to say goodbye to him. Because, you see, I loved him. Or,” she was standing beside Camilla now, one hand protectively—or for protection—in Camilla’s, “I thought I did.”

Charles Boutet smiled mockingly. “A pity to change your mind now, when everything is in train to make me the happiest of men. But come, we are wasting time. Tell me, ladies, do you propose to accompany me willingly? It will be very much your wiser plan. I should be sorry to have to mar our relationship with any show of force, but, believe me, I shall not hesitate to do so, if you make it necessary. Dom Fernando’s officer has been dealt with; your servants have taken our hint and fled; there is no other house within earshot; my carriage is outside. And I am sure you, my love,” he turned to Chloe, “will agree with me that any scene of violence will be the worst possible thing for our dear sister’s precarious health.”

Chloe and Camilla exchanged despairing glances. It was all too evidently true. The house was silent, and Chloe, white with rage, could see that Camilla was near fainting. Charles Boutet settled it. “Of course,” he went on, “if your pride compels you to make some show of resistance, I shall feel myself constrained, however regretfully, to separate you from our sister, who would, I am sure, sadly miss your nursing.” Once more the girls exchanged glances. Then Camilla spoke, “Very well,” she said. “We will go with you, but do not imagine that we will ever forget or forgive this outrage.”

“No?” He raised mocking eyebrows. “Speak for yourself, my dearest Sister. Perhaps you may be so foolish as to continue resenting my freeing you from an unloving husband, but I am sure my beloved Chloe will forgive me soon enough when once we are man and wife.”

“Never,” Chloe began, but he had turned to summon his men. Speechless with indignation, she nevertheless found herself helping in the business of carrying Camilla down through the deserted house to the closed carriage that waited outside. To the last moment, both girls had expected a miracle, had refused to believe that this could really be happening to them, but no miracle took place. With a careful solicitude that was, somehow, the last straw, Charles Boutet’s followers laid Camilla down on the back seat of the carriage, where Chloe supported her as best she might. Charles Boutet stepped in beside them, gave an order to his men, pulled down the shades, and settled himself on the front seat with a little sigh of satisfaction. “
Bon
.” He lapsed comfortably into French. “Now no one will disturb us. Besides, the world has other things to think of, today. Come, my dearest Sister, do not fret,” for tears were slowly following each other down Camilla’s cheeks. “I have left a note for that bullying husband of yours telling him not to derange himself on your account since you have followed your heart, to France.”

It was too much. Camilla, who had been fighting for consciousness with every breath she took, slid once more into a faint. When she came to herself again, she was lying on a hard bed, with Chloe once more anxiously beside her. “Was it a nightmare?” she asked.

“No,” Chloe said. “It is all true, and all my fault. But if it has not killed you, Camilla, perhaps there is some hope for us yet.”

“Hope?” Camilla asked sardonically. Then, looking around the darkening room, “But at least we are alone.”

“Yes. That is why I dare speak of hope. When we reached this house—and God knows where it is, for I certainly do not—there was a messenger waiting for Charles, an urgent summons to join Junot on the march. I am glad you taught me some French, Camilla, for Charles thinks I do not understand it. He has left us here, with only two of his men on guard. We are locked in, of course, and they think us safe till morning. I heard them say so. They are downstairs, in the servants’ quarters, with a cask of wine. We are at the very top of the house; they think we cannot possibly escape.”

“Well,” Camilla said reasonably, “how can we?”

“By climbing down the vine that grows up this side of the house. You should just see it, Camilla, it has branches as big as your arm. It will be a ladder for us—a ladder to freedom. Camilla, say you can do it.”

But Camilla, all too evidently, could not. When she tried to rise to her feet, it was only to fall back, half fainting, on the hard bed. “It’s no use,” she said. “I cannot do it. Chloe, you must go alone. If you cannot get to Lavenham, go to Dom Fernando. He will help us, I am sure.”

“But, Camilla, how can I leave you?”

“You must. It’s our only chance. And besides, consider. Charles can only hold me to ransom, but he means to marry you.”

It was a clincher. Chloe kissed Camilla, asked her once more for her forgiveness, pinned her skirts up carefully around her knees, and disappeared, with one last near-smile, out of the window. Camilla, listening desperately, heard a continued rustling, then silence. No sound of a fall; no sound of pursuit. Perhaps there really was hope. Amazingly, she slept.

She woke to morning light and the sounds of altercation downstairs. And also to an almost forgotten feeling She was actually hungry. I must be better, she thought, and then suspended even thinking in her effort to make out what was going on below. A few more anxious moments and she heard voices on the stairs. Chloe burst into the room, followed by Dom Fernando. “Thank God,” she said, “you are still here. We are safe, Camilla.”

“But Lavenham?”

Chloe’s face fell. “You must be brave, Camilla. He was gone when I reached the house. And—the wind has changed; the fleet is putting out of the harbour. Listen!” A volley of gunfire sent her running to the window. “It is the British and Portuguese fleets saluting each other,” she said, “and, oh, Camilla, I fear Lavenham must be aboard. He must have believed that lying note Charles left. Though how he could leave us so passes my imagining.”

“I collect he could not help himself.” As always, Camilla rallied to her husband’s defence. “He has his duty, after all.”

“Duty! And leave us to the mercy of the French! Were it not for Dom Fernando we would be in their hands tonight.”

“And may be yet,” interposed Dom Fernando himself, “if we lose more time talking here. I am told that Junot’s advance guard is already on the hills above the town.”

“Oh.” Camilla sank back despairingly on the bed. “Then how can we be safe? Lavenham gone ... Junot coming ... what hope have we?”

Chloe took her hand. “Do not despair, Camilla. It is bad, I know, but not so bad as it might be. Dom Fernando has an admirable plan for us: we are to pose as his two mad nieces, who used to live on his estate south of the Tagus. It is but to row across the river—and vanish. Charles will think we succeeded in rejoining Lavenham and have sailed with the fleet. Besides, the French will be occupied enough for some time in taking over Lisbon. By the time they get south to Almada, we will be perfect in our disguise; I promise you, they will never find us.”

“And then what?” Camilla asked.

“Why, then,” Dom Fernando said, “as always, we must trust in God.”

CHAPTER 10

While Camilla and Chloe were being hurriedly rowed across the Tagus by Dom Fernando’s servants, Lavenham was pacing up and down the deck of the
Marlborough
in an agony of indecision. The combined British and Portuguese fleets were clear of the harbour now, all except one frigate that had had difficulty in crossing the bar, and as Lavenham stood, looking longingly back towards Lisbon, he saw a puff of smoke from the cannon in the fort of St. Julian. The French advance guard must have taken the fort already and had lost no time in turning its guns on the last straggler from the fleet. But their shot fell short, and the frigate crossed the bar at last and joined the rest of the squadron.