The Flood-Tide (22 page)

‘What people?' Charles asked, reaching for his coat.

‘I seed Master Cluny and Master Hampson and suchlike people there, master, and there's an awful lot of strange-lookin' men wid guns. Master Courcey's gone meet them, and sent me to fitch you up to the house, quick as quick.'

‘I'm coming,' Charles said tersely. Cluny and Hampson were two of the leading lights of the Patriot Party in Virginia, known to be passionate orators and averse to any compromise on the war issue. 'Where's my wife?'

‘Missus there too,' Sam said, showing his disapproval. ‘Master Courcey tried to send her away, but she wouldn't go. You got to be there, master.’

Charles didn't need telling. Outside the porch of his own house were two cold-eyed men carrying shotguns; beyond the green lawns, tied up at the jetty, was a big sailing brig with a gun mounted on her fo'c'sle - a mere popgun, compared with
Ariadne's
nine-pounders, but enough firepower to threaten an unarmed house. Fear and outrage rose in him, and he thrust them both down, and strode past the sentries with as much confidence as he could display.

Inside the scene was less warlike. In the drawing room the deputation crowded, some seated, some standing, perhaps twenty men in all, but if there were guns they were not in evidence. Philippe was standing at the fireplace, looking somewhat at bay; it was Eugenie who surprised Charles, for she was seated in her usual place on her chaise longue, smiling and chatting to the grey-haired man Charles recognized as Mr Hampson, as if this were a mere social tea visit. Tea was, of course, out of the question. No east coast family had felt completely easy about tea since the Boston tea-party.

‘Ah, there you are, Charles,' she said now in her usual languid, lilting tones. 'We have some visitors - I have been telling them how pleasant it is to see new faces. We get so few visitors this far up the bay. Sam, will you go and see what has happened to the wine? I have ordered wine for our guests, Charles. Do come and meet them.’

He walked across to her, thoroughly confused. Was she being immensely brave, or immensely stupid? Did she know that her presence and her condition must hamper any attempt at violence on the part of the visitors, or did she really think they had come for a social visit?

‘Gentlemen,' he began, but could think of nothing whatever to say. Philippe gave him a desperate look, and he forced himself to go on. ‘Mr Hampson I know, and Mr Cluny I have heard of, by report, but I'm afraid I am not acquainted with the rest of you, and there are rather too many to perform introductions in the normal way. I am Charles Morland. Can I be of service in any way?’

There was an answering growl from the crowd by way of reply, and Hampson, who Charles was glad to see was a little put out by his reception, said, 'We have a matter of business to discuss. Can we see you and de Courcey alone?' He forced himself to bow to Eugenie, as if it were a social call. 'Madam, if we could persuade you to withdraw—'

‘Oh, but no,' she said at once, gaily, but quite firmly, ‘you cannot be so cruel as to deprive me of the first company I have had since Christmas! Besides, I must perform the duties of hostess, or be shamed for ever. You may discuss business in front of me. I am quite accustomed to it.’

Cluny gave Hampson a savage look, and there was a restless stirring in the rear ranks, where Charles saw two other men carrying guns, but holding them in such a way as to keep them hidden from Eugenie. Hampson said to Charles, 'Then perhaps if you and your father-in-law would step to the other end of the room with Cluny and me, we could speak our piece.’

So it was done, and while Eugenie gently chatted to the bewildered army, the four men walked to the far end of the room, where Hampson began without preamble.

‘You know the situation,' he said. 'This war is dragging on, and our men cannot continue without arms and money. General Washington has said that we cannot win without French aid. French aid we must have. That is where you come in.'

‘But surely Franklin is in France even now?' Charles said. 'He is a far more able ambassador than—'

‘Someone must go - someone with first-hand knowledge of the situation here - but there is the blockade to consider,' Hampson continued as if Charles had not spoken. 'None of our ships can get through it - but your ship, Mr de Courcey, might make it.'

‘She's sound and seaworthy,' Cluny took over, 'and the fact that your son-in-law is so friendly with the British navy might give you the edge. Oh yes, I know it isn't a thing you boast of to us, but you might boast of it to any British vessel that stops you. There'll be letters and despatches to carry, and, we hope, guns and supplies to bring back. Just the first consignment of many, if all goes well.'

‘And you want me to go?' Philippe said, astonished.

‘You speak the language. You're French yourself, you'll know how to put things across. And you're a famed sailor - the crossing will be nothing to you,' Cluny said.

‘We don't just want you to go - we're telling you to go,' Hampson said, quietly but with menace.

‘And if I refuse?' Philippe asked. Hampson gave a significant look, first at Charles, then at Eugenie.

‘Then we'll know where your sympathies lie,' he said. Philippe frowned.

‘Are you sure you know where they lie now? How do you know I won't take these despatches of yours straight to Admiral Howe?’

Hampson smiled, not a pleasant smile, and he nodded, acknowledging the courage that would suggest the possibility. 'We know you won't do that. After all, we shall be keeping a close eye on your daughter for you while you're away. You wouldn't want us to remove our protection from her, when she'd be so vulnerable, would you? A house in Virginia was burnt down last month, burnt right to the ground in the middle of the night. We can make sure that sort of thing doesn't happen to your house while you're away. A very pretty house it is too, with its chapel and all.’

Phillipe gave a slight bow, as if acknowledging a compliment. He gave Charles one look and the faintest shadow of a shrug, and then said, 'I am your servant, gentlemen, to command. I pledge myself to your noble cause.'

‘
Our
noble cause, sir,' Cluny corrected genially.

*

Duncan had been both right and wrong in his assessment of the situation: Henri's possession of Madeleine did not end his desire for her, though it did remove the urgency from it. He loved her more and more deeply, but was able to absent himself from her without fret.

The 'secret wedding' took place in the apartment in the Rue des Ursulines at midnight one night towards the end of October. The shutters were tight closed, and only one candle burned, and Henri and Madeleine waited from half past nine for the 'priest' to arrive. This was all part of the plan, so that Madeleine would be sleepy and confused and less likely to notice anything that might go amiss. At midnight there was a smart rap on the door, and Henri opened it to admit a figure muffled in a cloak with an enormous hood. When the cloak was removed, Henri almost applauded, for Duncan's disguise was splendid. He had gone to a young woman who worked backstage at the Opera for advice, and she had certainly helped him to advantage.

The man in clerical garb appeared to be old and immensely fat. He wore a huge white wig of the style of twenty years back; he had bushy white eyebrows, and in the dim and wavering light his face was much lined, and his nose somewhat bottled. A beard or moustache would have been the most effective disguise, Henri reflected, but in a clean-shaven age it would have attracted too much attention.

While the marriage service was spoken over them, Henri glanced from time to time at Madeleine, but could see no evidence of suspicion in her face or bearing. She was very quiet, in fact hardly spoke at all, and her face was grave, and he concluded that the scheme had worked in that she was by now too tired to harbour suspicions of anyone. The service concluded, the priest took a bumper of brandy with them with what Henri considered as too much enthusiasm, and after some hemming from Henri went on his way, leaving Henri alone with his 'bride'.

‘Well,' he said at last, 'and now you are mine.' Madeleine gazed at him for what seemed a long time with those level grey eyes, and then gave a small nod and stepped towards him.

‘Yes,' she said. Now I am yours.’

That had been the beginning of a night of bliss, followed by months of a strange deep contentment for Henri. Making love to Madeleine was unlike anything he had experienced before. She was virgin, of that he was sure, and yet she responded to him in a way so natural and unashamed, that after a few nights he had more physical pleasure with her than with the most experienced of courtesans. But it was not only that: there was another, deeper level to it. He discovered that making love to someone he was in love with was an entirely different experience.

It became inconvenient to have her so far from Montmartre, and he rented an apartement on the first floor of a house in the Rue des Martyrs, a ten-minute walk from the Rue de St Rustique, and there Madeleine settled down. It was better to have her further away from her father, too. He had disowned her for her disobedience, but with such a wistful air that Henri was sure he would forgive her if she once asked him to.

Henri had never kept a woman before, and he enjoyed it so much that he wondered other men did not talk more about the joys, thinking, in his innocence, that it was always like this. Madeleine was an excellent housekeeper. Under her skilled and vigorous hand the little house was soon cosy, neat and shining. The fire was always bright, and there was always a plump chicken bubbling in the pot, and bread and wine in the larder. The house on Montmartre seemed colder and damper and more cheerless as time went on, and more and more Henri came to relish the delights of the hearthside and the good wife. But he enjoyed his double life too much to abandon it entirely.

Besides, there were his Court attendances to perform, for he was still in hopes of gaining a position or a pension from the new King; there was the gambling and the card-playing, from which he derived a good deal of his income; there were his old friends and his old mistresses to keep up with; and however much he liked the simple life, the plain and savoury food, and the warm, tender, wholesome delights of Madeleine's bed, he never forgot that he was the Comte de Strathord, an aristocrat, and with royal blood in his veins. Elaborate clothes, rich food, brilliant rooms, and titled companions were a lure as strong, which kept him balanced in his orbits like a moon between two planets.

Madame de Murphy was amazed and delighted with the difference in him.

‘You have become such good company, Henri,' she purred one day as they lay in bed, eating dried figs and drinking wine. Her hair was tangled and her face paint smudged, and she looked most vulnerable, and therefore, to Henri's mind, at her best. 'I never would have thought you would sit all through one of my salons and say not one unkind or cutting thing! You gave the appearance of being most intelligent.’

Henri smiled wryly at the compliment. 'Anyone is intelligent who agrees with you, is that right?'

‘But of course,' she said charmingly. 'It would be most indelicate of you to suggest a lady can be wrong. But seriously, my dear, I am so glad to see you looking well. You have positively put on flesh, and you have an air of such—' she hesitated, searching for the word while her eye went over him again, approvingly, 'such contentment, like a man who is at peace with his world.'

‘Well, and so I am,' he said, stretching himself luxuriously in her silken bed. 'I am a man in the prime of life, with sufficient to eat, and a lovely woman of my own to please me - what more could any man want?’

Ismène raised an eyebrow at this description of herself, but let it pass.

‘But tell me, my dear, why did you come to my salon today? My heart sank when I saw you - I thought you had come to be rude.’

Henri laughed. 'Yes, I am just such a boor, am I not? I came to meet Monsieur Franklin, and hear what he had to say, of course. I have heard so much about him that I was naturally interested.'

‘And what did you think of him?' Ismène asked cautiously.

‘A gentlemanly old man, for all his strange clothes and downright air. A man, I think, who would be at home in any company. I can see why he was chosen for the Americans' ambassador - a better choice than one would have thought possible from a nation of uncouth farmers.'

‘I trembled when he talked of equality and republicanism,' Ismène confided. 'I was sure you would interrupt him.'

‘My dear, you know that talk of equality is all cant and hypocrisy, besides being impious. The lower orders were placed in the position it pleased God to give them, as were the upper orders. If it were not so, if men were all equal at birth as your Monsieur Franklin claims, then it would have to be the case that we had risen by our merits, and that the poor had sunk by their demerits, and you must surely see that that cannot be true? And if the poor are not poor because it pleases God, but because they deserve no better, then instead of helping and protecting them, we should blame and punish them. Is that what you want?'

‘Oh Henri, you argue like an eel. It is impossible to talk sensibly with you.'

‘That's not what—' he stopped abruptly, having been about to say, that's not what Madeleine says. It had been for her sake that he had attended Ismène's salon, for he knew she would be interested in what Benjamin Franklin had to say, and was looking forward to telling her and discussing him with her. He wished he could bring her to Ismène's salons - she would impress them with her wit, he thought, proudly - but that was impossible, of course. He must keep his two lives separate, or the fragile structure of his life would break.