The Blighted Cliffs (48 page)

'And
if they did?'

A
second man spoke, and I felt a shiver of righteous vindication as I
recalled hearing that dangerous condescension in the glass office
above the harbour: Mazard. Though it remained to be seen whether I
would live to remind Crawley and Bingham how they had scorned my
intuition.

'Dawn's
not long off anyways,' Drake was saying, unworried.

'We'll
be expectin' the dragoons for breakfast. We can hold them if they get
here early.'

'And
you can keep them at bay for two days?' Mazard sounded quite
insistent. 'It all hangs on that.'

'We'll
hold 'em. Asides, once the colonel gets his men aloft they won't know
which way to shoot.'

'And
the gold?'

A
French voice, Laminak's, directly above me.

'Already
loaded aboard my ship,' answered Mazard. 'The Navarre will sail with
the tide, before the navy have the wit to close the harbour. Fifty
thousand guineas for his Majesty the emperor to do with as he will,
provided it comes back at forty per cent. And much more to follow, if
our plans go as they should.'

'You
can watch from the top of the tower when the boat sails, Colonel,'
said Drake moodily. 'Where I'll be stringin' up Sir Lawrence
Cunningham, soon as there's light.'

Mazard
chuckled. 'Poor Cunningham. A true zealot - how it blinded him to
greater opportunities. Perhaps I will go and pay my last respects.'

'You
do that,' said Drake. 'I'll see to the walls, so to speak. And you'd
best make sure you gets your machine up,' he added, apparently to
Laminak. 'Don't want hot lead flyin' too near it. And it'd spoil it
if they saw it comin'.'

The
toes in front of me swivelled left and moved away; from the tramping
on the floor, I guessed Mazard and Drake followed. Still, I stayed
motionless. I did not think there had been anyone else involved in
their counsels, but I waited another five minutes, just to be sure.
Of course I could not be sure - there was too much commotion outside
for that - but it would not do to be found cowering here when Isobel
led Bingham's men through.

I
chanced it. Pushing hard on the wood above me, I leaped out,
brandishing my pistol wildly in as many directions as I could manage
and trying to keep my balance as I tripped on the lip of the floor.
My luck held: no-one challenged me. I brushed the loose hair from my
face and stood up, backing against the wall to be sure I was alone in
the small guard room I had entered. Then, keeping as much in the
shadow as I could, I looked through one of the narrow windows - such
as an archer might have used in a previous century - to my left.

It
opened on to a courtyard, lit by many fires, and by their light I
could see scores of blue-coated soldiers moving purposefully about.
Sergeants bellowed orders in French, and their men moved with
urgency, but in strangely erratic patterns, as if following an
invisible, meandering path. The reason, I saw soon enough, was the
bodies - dozens of them strewn over the cobbles in dark pools, mostly
still wearing their red coats. Behind them the sharp, square walls of
the Norman keep rose into the night. And around its corner, I saw
with bewilderment, there seemed to be many men putting up a tent.

Crouching
to keep below the windows, I edged my way around the room to the
door. I was on the east side of the courtyard; the main, northern
gate would be somewhere to my right. I waited for a lull in the
activity I could see, then, praying that no-one was watching, I
slipped out.

I
had thought to find a dead Frenchman, drag him inside and commandeer
his uniform, but the brutal efficiency of Drake's operation thwarted
my intentions: all the bodies I passed seemed to be English. I moved
from corpse to corpse, growing ever sicker at the sight of their
wounds and ever more anxious that I was carried too far from safety.
My eyes jerked desperately over the bodies as I carried on. In my
mounting panic I could not even spare precious seconds to the few who
were still dying, who moaned or cried as I passed, much though I
hated myself for it.

I
heard the measured tramp of marching soldiers rounding the corner
behind me and froze. I was too far from the guardhouse to go back -
probably they could see it already. Hardly able to think, I glimpsed
a shadowy doorway in the wall to my right and fled inside, my heart
pounding with the hope I had not been observed.

Keeping
very still, I noticed that I had not entered another room, but was at
the head of a descending shaft of stairs. The tread of the soldiers
grew steadily nearer, and the darkness about me was not as complete
as I should have liked. I dived down the steps just as the light of
the soldiers' torches passed the threshold.

I
was led further down than I had expected - two storeys at least, I
guessed - and unthinkingly I followed the stairs to the bottom. The
air was dank where they emerged, in a narrow, brick-vaulted passage
whose only entrance was the stairs by which I had come.

Three
iron-studded doors were set into each wall, all with small barred
windows in their centres; they looked like nothing so much as cells.
I recalled Drake's exhortation to take no prisoners. Perhaps, if they
had failed to be quite so ruthless, I might discover a company of
soldiers and improve the small odds in favour of my improbable task.

A
task I might never begin, for even as I considered it I heard
footsteps once again, echoing off the stair shaft and descending ever
closer. Someone must have seen me, must have followed me down into
this rat-trap. I tugged desperately on one of the oaken doors, but it
gave not an inch. The footsteps rang loud; in a moment they would be
round the last corner and I would be caught.

I
lifted my pistol, though it was scant consolation. I've met men who
swore that as long as they took an enemy with them they would not die
in vain, but that always seemed a poor bargain to me. Could I
surrender? After I had escaped their captivity once that day, they
might well conclude I would not profit them the trouble.

Almost
too late, I saw my chance. There was a small, sloping alcove under
the curve of the stairs where I would be hidden from the sight of
anyone coming down. It was not much of an escape, but it would serve
better than being found meekly waiting. I squeezed myself in and
crouched on my haunches, thumbing back the lock of my pistol as the
feet passed over my head and stepped into the passage.

Involuntarily,
I had clenched my eyes shut, but I opened them again as my head
calmed and I realized I could hear only one man's footsteps. And they
were not bearing down upon my little hole, but had stopped by one of
the walls. Was he listening for me?

A
key snapped in a lock, and a door swung open. He must have stepped
through it, for immediately the sounds became fainter. And then I
heard voices.

'Come
to gloat, have you, Henri?'

I
tensed so tight I almost blasted off my pistol in my shock. I knew
that voice, would have recognized its grating whine anywhere. The
diction lacked a little of its habitual precision, and sounded more
fatigued than usual, but I could not mistake it. Sir Lawrence
Cunningham.

'To
say adieu, Cunningham. I do not suppose we will meet again.'

Mazard!
The new arrival. So here they were, the two traitors conspiring
together, as I had so long suspected. Damn Crawley and Bingham and
all the others for ever doubting me, for allowing the villain to
throw me in gaol.

'I
suppose I should have known better,' Cunningham spat. 'I knew you'd
sell your daughter to an Ottoman if you thought you could profit
sixpence on her - that, after all, is why I chose to do business with
you, but I never guessed you'd give over the country to rack and
ruin. Not with the profits you were making on it.'

'Profits?'
Mazard sniffed disparagingly. 'When were you ever acquainted with
profit? Carrying beer and bread, landlording alehouses, forcing poor
girls to scrub and sew petticoats? All the pursuits of a noble
English gentleman.'

This
did not sound like the conversation of conspirators. I shuffled out
of my niche, the better to hear them, keeping close to the wall and
ever alert for any sound from above.

'Why
be a man of principle like you, Cunningham, if it blinds you to true
opportunities, for true profits? All the world is at war, the most
expensive war ever fought by men, and it is much in our greatest
interest to keep it so.'

'You
won't prolong the war by opening the door to Buonaparte's invasion
fleet. However handsomely he pays you.'

'Invasion
fleet?' Mazard echoed. 'Is that what you think this is? A hundred
thousand Frenchmen swarming across the Channel to put England to the
sword and complete the tyrant's mastery of Europe?'

That
had certainly been my understanding, whatever Cunningham thought, but
Mazard's derision was manifest as he continued his haughty lecture.

'Buonaparte
has no army within five hundred miles of here, and could hardly bring
them across the Channel even if he did. But a small detachment, a few
hundred soldiers smuggled over by men who knew the coast, they could
make a landing. Nothing serious, of course: a castle sacked, a
garrison killed, a prominent local magistrate publicly murdered.
Enough to put all thoughts of peace from the hearts of our leaders,
to strengthen the feeble minds of a weak government.'

'And
all so you can maintain your position as the smugglers' venturer,
when we earn handsomely enough carrying the navy's provisions?'

Cunningham
sounded sickened.

'All
so I can maintain my position as banker to the world,' Mazard
corrected. Conceit filled his voice. 'A venture you'd never have
undertaken, with your provincial way of thinking. A venture to supply
the Emperor of France with enough golden guineas to maintain an
empire.'

I
heard a fumbling, and the clink of metal.

'You
see this guinea, Cunningham? In this room it is worth twenty-one
shillings, but take it to Paris and they will give you thirty
shillings for it, so desperate are they for gold. Thirty shillings,'
he repeated, almost in awe. 'Nine shillings on the guinea. You will
not make that with your washerwomen.' There was no disguising the
triumph in his voice, and he did not try.

So
that was it. All those golden coins I had seen flowing into Dover,
and doubtless many thousands I had not, were channeled through Mazard
and carried to France by smugglers, to fund Buonaparte at usurious
rates of return and prolong the war from which Mazard already reaped
enormous profits. Amid all the confusion that besieged my thoughts, I
wondered vaguely how long he had wanted to boast of this to
Cunningham, to show his plodding, conservative partner what vast sums
he, Mazard, could conjure up.

'And
they pay you back in brandy?' Cunningham asked. 'And gin and tobacco
and cloths?'

'Some
of it. And some in coin, mostly to be repaid over many years. I find
it tedious to have to swap gold for bulky goods, of which I must then
dispose. Even a man such as Lieutenant Jerrold might find the crew
who had to carry fifty thousand guineas' worth of brandy ashore. I am
happy to cast my gold upon the water, and await my just returns.'

The
insult stung. Rapt though I had been by this extraordinary tale of
treason, I began to think again on the urgency of my predicament.
Bingham and his soldiers would be arriving soon, perhaps into an
ambush, and I had said I woul'd have the gate open for them. But I
had Mazard standing on the other side of the wall from me; it would
be a useful piece of work to bind him up there, to await justice. And
though it defied my every inclination, I could free the innocent Sir
Lawrence as well. Mazard had come down alone, and I had heard no
others either in the cell or on the stairs above. These were the sort
of odds I favoured.