The Sherbrooke Series Novels 1-5 (27 page)

“It was Georges Cadoudal and he would have taken you.”

“How did you know?”

“The good Lord save me from stupid females. Alexandra, you were screeching French loud enough for all of London to hear. I saw another gentleman you haven’t even met and he told me about your
merde
at the top of your lungs. Everyone knows and I doubt not that I will receive a good dozen visits from people to tell me of my wife’s exceedingly odd behavior.”

“I said other things too, Douglas.”

“Yes, I know. You’re going to Paris with your husband tomorrow.”

“And I screamed for help too in French.”

“And another thing,” he began, really warming up to his theme now, then stopped cold, for she’d pulled a small pistol from her reticule.

“I also took this. I’m not stupid, Douglas. That man couldn’t have harmed me. I didn’t leave the house without thought and preparation. I was bored, Douglas, please understand. I was bored and I wanted to do something. All went just fine. He tried but he failed. I also hit him on the head with Sinjun’s novel. He didn’t have a chance.”

Douglas could but stare down at her. She looked so proud of herself, the little twit. She was completely convinced she was in the right of it. She was innocent and guileless. She had no more chance than a chicken against a man like Cadoudal. He took the pistol from her, his muscles spasming at the thought of having that damned thing turned back on her, and then walked very tall and straight and very quietly from the room. He didn’t say another word.

Alexandra looked at the closed door. “He is trying very hard to control himself,” she said to no one in particular.

He wasn’t at home for dinner. He didn’t come to her that night.

They left London at eight-thirty the following morning. Summer fog hung low and thick throughout the city, clinging like a dismal chilled blanket until they were well onto the road south.

Douglas sat silently beside his wife. She, curse her nonchalance, was reading Sinjun’s novel.
The Mys-
terious Count.
What bloody drivel. Then he remembered Sinjun telling him about his Greek plays, and shuddered. This was probably filled with heroines swooning rather than taking off their clothes. “Why do you read that nonsense?” he asked, thoroughly irritated.

Alexandra looked up and smiled at him. “You don’t wish to speak civilly to me, the scenery is nothing out of the ordinary, and I don’t wish to nap. Have you a better suggestion than reading? Perhaps you have a volume of moral sermons that would elevate my thoughts?”

“I’ll speak to you,” he said, his voice on the edge of testy.

“Ah, that is very nice of you, Douglas.”

He searched her words and tone for irony but couldn’t detect any. He sighed. “Very well. I was worried about you. You must give me leave to worry, particularly when there is danger I know exists and it could touch you. All right, I apologize for leaving you alone, but you should have obeyed me.”

“That is kind of you. I do appreciate your concern. I should appreciate it even more if you would explain the nature of the danger to me.”

“I don’t wish to. I wish you to trust me. Don’t you understand the need to trust me? Tell me you understand.”

She looked at his austere profile and said, “Yes, Douglas, I understand.” She returned to her novel.

Douglas brooded in solitary silence for nearly an hour. Then he called out the window of the carriage for John Coachman to stop. They were deep in the country. There were no people about, no dwellings, no cows, nothing of any particular interest, just trees, blackberry bushes, and hedge rows.

Alexandra looked up, alarm in her eyes.

“No, it’s just that I imagine you would like to stretch a bit, perhaps relieve yourself, in the woods yon.”

She did wish to relieve herself, but she imagined that it was Douglas who had the need as well and thus the reason for their stopping.

He helped her down, clasping his hands around her waist, swinging her to him, hugging her close for a brief moment, then setting her on her feet. “Go to the maple copse. Be brief and call if you need me. French isn’t necessary, but if you would like to, I shall be listening.”

Alexandra smiled at him, saying nothing, and gave him a small wave as she walked into the midst of the maple trees. It was silent in the wood, the maple leaves thick and heavy, blocking out the sunlight. She was quickly done and was on the point of returning to Douglas, when, quick as a flash, a hand went over her mouth and she was jerked back violently against a man’s body.

“This time I’ve got you,” the man said, and she recognized Georges Cadoudal’s voice. “This time I’m going to keep you.” She had neither Douglas’s pistol nor James the footman nor John Coachman. But she had Douglas if only she could free herself for just a moment, for just a brief instant.

She bit his hand and his grip relieved for just a moment. A scream was ready to burst from her mouth when she heard the whoosh then felt something very hard strike her right temple. She went down like a stone.

Douglas was pacing. It had been a good ten minutes since she’d walked into the maple wood. Was she ill? He fretted, then cursed, then walked swiftly
toward the wood, calling, “Alexandra! Come along now! Alexandra!”

Silence.

He shouted, “
Aidez-moi! Je veux aller à Paris demain avec ma femme!
” Even as he shouted that he wanted to go to Paris on the morrow with his wife, he felt his muscles tensing, felt his mouth go dry with fear.

There was more silence, deep, deep silence.

He ran into the woods. She was gone. He looked closely, finally seeing where two people had stood. There’d been no struggle. There hadn’t been a sound. Georges had taken her and he’d either killed her or knocked her unconscious. No, if he’d killed her, he would have left her here. Douglas continued his search. He quickly found where a horse had stood, tethered to a yew bush. He saw the horse’s tracks going out of the woods, saw that the hooves were deeper because the animal was now carrying two people.

He had no horse. There was only the carriage. He couldn’t follow. It was another hour before the carriage bowled into Terkton-on-Byne and he was able to obtain a horse that wasn’t so old and feeble it swayed and groaned when it moved.

He was furious and he was scared. He was back at the maple wood in half an hour and he was tracking the other horse within another ten minutes.

He prayed it wouldn’t rain but the building gray clouds overhead didn’t look promising. Cadoudal was heading due south, toward Eastbourne, directly on the coast. Was he intending to take her to France? Douglas’s blood ran cold.

It began to rain two hours later. Douglas cursed, but it didn’t help. The tracks quickly disappeared,
but he had this feeling that Georges, the brilliant strategist, wasn’t going to have an easy time of it with Alexandra. She wouldn’t swoon; she’d try her best to get away from him and that frightened him more than soothed him. Cadoudal wasn’t used to having anyone go against him; he was unpredictable; he could be vicious. Douglas plowed forward toward Eastbourne.

Just before he reached the town, soaked to his skin and trembling with cold, he knew that it would be next to impossible to find Cadoudal by himself. He would need much more than luck; he would need help. He needed many men to scour the inns and the docks and check into all the ships’ passages.

He was tired, exhausted really, and knew that there was simply nothing more he could do. Yet he still rode into Eastbourne and stopped at three inns. None recognized his descriptions, that or they’d been paid by Georges to lie. Defeated, he mounted his horse, more exhausted than he was, and rode the fifteen miles to Northcliffe Hall.

Hollis took one look at His Lordship and called immediately for his valet. Douglas was bundled off to his bedchamber and put into a warm dressing gown. Hollis then deemed it appropriate for him to receive family, beginning with himself.

He said, “John Coachman told us what happened. I’ve sent out word and there are thirty men ready to do your bidding. You have but to give me instructions.”

Douglas stared at his butler and wanted to fling his arms around the man. He said instead, his voice slow and slurred with fatigue, “Georges Cadoudal has her, Hollis, and I fear that he has already taken her to France. I did track him nearly to Eastbourne
but it began to rain. I had no luck at the local inns.”

Hollis patted his shoulder as if he were a lad of ten again. “No trouble, my lord. You will provide me with a description of this Cadoudal and I shall give it to all the men. They can be off within the hour. As for you, you will rest before you leave this chamber.”

Douglas wanted to resist but he was so weary he merely nodded.

“I will bring you food and some nice brandy. Your brain will commence to work again very soon.”

So it was that twenty-two men fanned out toward Eastbourne within thirty minutes, such an efficient general was Hollis.

He said to Douglas, “I also sent word to Lord Rathmore. I expect him shortly. His Lordship has never let you down before, you know.”

Douglas grunted and sipped at the stomach-warming brandy. He’d eaten his fill, the fire in the fireplace was warm and soothing. He leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. He slept deeply for an hour undisturbed, awoke and was greatly refreshed.

He opened his eyes to see Sinjun standing by his chair. For an instant he didn’t remember and said, “Hello, brat. Where is Alexandra?”

The truth slammed through him and Sinjun watched as he paled.

“I’m sorry, Douglas. Despite what Mother says, I will accompany you to search for her. Shall I notify Tysen?”

“No, leave him be at Oxford.” Douglas rose and stretched. “I don’t believe this,” he said to no one in particular.

“It’s late, Douglas. Too late really for you to set out again. ’Tis nearly midnight.”

“There are twenty-two men out searching, Sinjun. I must join them.” He paused and gently cupped her face in his palm. “I thank you for wishing to come, yet I must ask you to remain here and run things. You know Mother . . . well, I want to be assured that all will be in readiness for Alexandra’s return.”

Douglas rode from Northcliffe Hall toward Eastbourne. It had stopped raining, thank the benevolent Lord, and there was a half-moon to light the way. He met McCallum, his head stable lad, at the Drowning Duck Inn on the docks in Eastbourne.

“Ah, Your Lordship needs a pint. Sit down and I will tell you what we’ve learned. I’ve made this inn a headquarters and each thirty minutes a group of fellows come to report their progress to me. That’s right, drink your ale and sit down. Now just listen, my lord.”

At two o’clock in the morning, five men trooped into the taproom to report that Cadoudal and Her Ladyship had taken a packet to Calais. Unfortunately they couldn’t follow because of the contrary tides and the storm that was now blowing in. There was nothing they could do until the weather cleared and the tide changed.

Douglas told McCallum to send the men home. He arrived back at Northcliffe Hall at four o’clock in the morning.

He found himself going into Alexandra’s bedchamber. He lay down on her bed in the darkness, staring up at the ceiling, exhausted but wide awake. He remembered every harsh word he’d ever said to her. He remembered the hurt in her eyes when he’d
spoken of Melissande and how she would have acted the lady and done as her husband told her.

He felt pain wash through him, deep aching pain and an emptiness that was at once unusual yet not unexpected, not now, now that he’d finally come to realize that he couldn’t live without his wife.

He heard her speaking French, saw her sitting at his desk, looking so very young, her voice clear and precise, her accent atrocious. He smiled even as the pain ebbed and flowed deep inside him.

He would find her; he had to. He couldn’t now imagine facing a life without her.

The following day the storm had become a gale. No one was going anywhere. Rain splattered the windowpanes, and thunder shook the earth. Tree branches on the poplars were pressed nearly to the ground by the force of the wind. Douglas prayed that Georges had gotten Alexandra to France safely. He laughed harshly even as he prayed for that.

As for his mother, Lady Lydia sensed that the upstart wife who had been unknown to her son before she’d thrust herself into their lives had shifted in his regard. She wasn’t stupid; she kept such thoughts as let the twit stay gone behind her teeth. As for Sinjun, she tried to keep her brother occupied.

It was no good. The storm raged outside and Douglas raged inside. Even Hollis was looking thin about the mouth. The entire household was tense, silent.

That night Douglas slept in Alexandra’s room. He slept deeply simply because Hollis had slipped laudanum in his wine. He dreamed of Alexandra and she was standing there at the stables, laughing, patting her mare’s nose all the while, telling
Douglas that she loved him, loved him, loved him . . .

And then he was awake and Alexandra was standing there beside the bed, speaking to him.

H
E STARED THEN
blinked rapidly. It wasn’t so very dark in the bedchamber and that was surely strange for it had been black as pitch when he’d gone to bed. But no, there she was, standing next to the bed, and he could see her clearly, too clearly really, and she was smiling gently down at him, saying, “She is all right.” But she hadn’t really said anything, had she? Yet he’d heard those words clearly in his mind.

It wasn’t Alexandra. He reached out his hand and she stepped back very quickly, yet she hardly seemed to move, but he knew that he’d touched her sleeve, though he’d felt nothing, just the still air.

He felt a deep strangling fear, fear of the unknown, fear of ghosts and goblins and evil monsters that lived in cupboards and came out at night to bedevil little boys.

“No,” Douglas said. “No, you’re not bloody real. I’m worried sick and my mind has dished you up to torment me, nothing more, nothing, damn you!”

Her hair was long and straight and so light a blond that it was white, and the gown was billowing gently around her yet the air was still and heavy with the weight of the storm. He had, of course, seen her before, rather his mind had produced her before with a goodly amount of fanfare. She’d come to him
that long-ago night when Alexandra had tried to escape him. She would have succeeded in escaping him had his mind not brought
her
to him.

Suddenly, without warning, Douglas saw Alexandra in his mind’s eye. She was in a small room lying on a narrow cot. Her gown was wrinkled and torn. Her hair was straggling around her face. She was pale but he saw no fear. Her wrists and ankles were tied with rope. She was awake and he could practically see her thinking, plotting madly for a way to escape, and that made him smile. She had guts. Then he saw just as clearly the small cottage where she was and the village. It was Etaples.

Georges Cadoudal had a sense of irony.

He said aloud, his voice low and slightly blurred, “This isn’t possible. You’re not real. But how . . .”

“The storm will be gone early in the morning.” The words swirled and eddied in his mind. She was leaving, gently and slowly she backed away and she was smiling at him and nodding slightly, moving backward, always moving, more like floating, and then she was simply gone.

Douglas refused to accept it. He leapt from the bed and he ran in the direction she’d gone. Nothing. He lit the candle beside the bed and held it up. The room was empty except for him. He was breathing fast, his heart pounding hard with the shock of it, the fear of it.

“You wretched piece of nothing, come back here! Coward! You ridiculous mind phantom!”

There was no sound save the rain beating steadily against the windows and the occasional branch slashing and raking against the glass.

He stood there for a very long time, naked and shivering and wondering. He had a headache.

At dawn the rain had slowed to a drizzle. At seven o’clock, the clouds parted and the sun came out.

Douglas came downstairs, fully dressed, and strode into the breakfast room. He drew up short. Tony Parrish was seated at the breakfast table drinking coffee and eating his way through eggs and bacon and kippers and scones.

He looked up and smiled at his cousin. “Sit down and eat. Then we’ll leave. We’ll find her, Douglas, don’t worry.”

“I know,” Douglas said and joined him.

Tony waited until Douglas had eaten steadily for several minutes. “What do you mean you know?”

To tell the truth? Ah, no, not the truth, but it would be a treat to watch Tony’s face change until he was regarding him like a Bedlamite. He just smiled, saying, “Georges Cadoudal took her to Etaples. We’ll leave in just a few more minutes. We’ll make the tide and be in France, with luck, in eight hours. Then we’ll hire mounts and be in Etaples in the early morning.”

“How do you know where she is, Douglas? Did Cadoudal leave a ransom note?”

“Yes,” Douglas said and took a bite of toast. “Yes, it was a note. I would have left sooner but the storm prevented it. Is Melissande with you?”

“Yes, she’s sleeping.”

“Ah.”

“While you’re eating, tell me about this Cadoudal fellow and why he took Alexandra.”

Douglas told him the truth, there was no reason now not to. He didn’t tell him of Cadoudal’s plan nor his million guineas from the English government to bring Napoleon down, sow insurrection in Paris, and put Louis XVI’s brother, the Comte d’Artois, on the
throne. But he told him of Janine Daudet and how the woman had told her lover Georges Cadoudal, that he, Douglas, was the father of her child. She’d been too afraid to tell him that it had been General Belesain or one of the men he’d given her to who had impregnated her. And then she couldn’t take it back. She hadn’t known that Georges would seek retribution until it was too late.

“The woman’s mad!” Tony said. “Why should she serve you such a turn, Douglas? Good God, you saved her!”

Douglas toyed with a limp slice of bacon, memory ebbing and flowing in his mind. “It’s quite simple, really, from her point of view. I rejected her.”

“I don’t understand any of this. What the devil are you talking about?”

But Douglas had pushed back his chair and stood. “I will tell you on the way to Eastbourne.”

The air was crisp and cool and a slight breeze blew in their faces. Garth was full of energy and spirits and Douglas had his hands full controlling him. Both men carried pistols and knives. They both wore tall boots and buckskins and capes.

Douglas said finally to Tony, “She believed I didn’t want to take her to bed because she’d been turned into a whore by General Belesain. It wasn’t true, of course. As for the general, it’s quite possible he used her as his own private whore, for visitors, for friends, whoever. He gave her to me for my enjoyment, no reason to believe that he hadn’t given her to other men before I arrived. In any case, she was furious and hurt because I wouldn’t bed her and she dished me up when she realized she was pregnant.”

Tony shook his head. He cursed. Then he frowned,
musing aloud, “I wonder why Cadoudal sent you a note. If he wanted retribution why wouldn’t he simply take Alexandra and say nothing? He wants money?”

“No. He wants something else.”

Tony started to ask what it was the man wanted, saw the closed look on Douglas’s face, and held his counsel.

They arrived in Eastbourne in good time. Douglas had hired a weathered but worthy sloop. Their captain cursed the air blue. The crew didn’t seem to mind, just went efficiently about their business. They were on their way within two hours. The tide was strong and swift.

They arrived in Calais seven and a half hours later.

She’d fought and struggled when he’d held her in front of him on his horse. He’d struck her with his pistol to keep her quiet. He’d struck her hard so that when she finally came to herself again, she had a deep pounding headache that made her want to retch. She was lying propped up against an oak tree. Since her hands were bound, she determined not to retch. She would be strong; she would control her body. She had scarce time to gather her wits when he was there, beside her, and he was forcing liquid down her throat. Before she lost consciousness she knew she smelled the sea.

She realized once she’d awakened that he’d drugged her. But how long ago? Where had he brought her now? She had no idea where she was, in a small house somewhere, since she was lying on a bed, securely bound, feeling dirty, hungry, and quite thirsty, but where?

She was alone. Any guards he’d left were outside the single door. Her thoughts were muzzy and she closed her eyes to try to regain clarity.

“So, you’re awake. I’d hoped I hadn’t killed you. I have never been any good guessing at amounts of laudanum. Of course,” he added quickly, “I am good at everything else.”

She opened her eyes. He was standing beside the bed, looking down at her. How had he come into the room so quietly? He looked tired, his flesh drawn more tightly over his cheekbones, his eyes more heavily lidded. His black hair was long and needed some soap and water. His clothing was that of an English gentleman, of good quality, but wrinkled and soiled. His expression was chilling. Still, oddly enough, she wasn’t afraid, at least not at that moment, for Douglas was safe.

“I’m glad you didn’t kill me too. I didn’t hear you. You must have cat’s feet.”

He started, then shrugged. “Yes, I have many talents, and revenge is one that I take very seriously. I have perfected it to a fine art. I am a genius. It is unfortunate that you will never know of my fame, for I am also discreet. I leave nothing to chance, nothing to find, nothing to lead your damned husband to me. Your husband won’t find you so you may quash your silly hopes that he will.”

Still the fear simply wasn’t upon her even though she was flat on her back, lying on a bed, bound. “I will tell you the truth, monsieur. I want only that my husband be safe. He is all that is important to me.”

Georges laughed, a mean laugh that made his eyes look as black as satan’s. “How very affecting! What a romantic child you are. Well, I imagine
that this childish devotion of yours gratifies Lord Northcliffe at the moment. I also imagine that you are pleasing enough to his eye and young enough to give him passing pleasure. Men of his stamp aren’t ever satisfied though, even with a little virgin with hero worship in her eyes. He would have played you false, probably by the end of summer.”

Alexandra frowned at him. Because she loved her husband he believed her to feel hero worship for him? She wanted to inform him that she wasn’t such a silly twit, but she said instead, “You are thinking of Janine.”

Again, Georges Cadoudal started. “How do you know of Janine? Did he actually have the arrogance to tell you what he did to her? Did he boast about it? To you? His wife?”

“He told me that he rescued her in France and brought her to England.”

“Ha! I trust Douglas Sherbrooke as much as I can trust any ruthless Englishman. He betrayed me. He raped her. That animal who was holding her prisoner gave her to Douglas because he’d won a card game, and he raped her repeatedly, hurting her, ripping her. Then he demanded her cooperation for she is strong, my Janine, and not easily subdued. It was his price for bringing her to safety in England, to me.”

“Oh no, Douglas would never do that. He is a gentleman, a man of honor. You are wrong. This Janine lied to you. I wish I knew why she lied, but I don’t speak French so I couldn’t understand what she was saying to Douglas. I did ask him but he told me it was none of my business.”

Georges Cadoudal had planned to ravish this little pullet, then send her back pregnant to Douglas. He
didn’t doubt his own virility for a moment. It would not take long. It would be an eye for an eye and then he would continue with his plan to kidnap Napoleon. But she wasn’t at all what he expected. He shook his head, remembering how she’d reacted in that damned bookshop, screeching like a banshee in her absurd French. She’d even struck him in the nose with that book of hers. His nose hadn’t been broken, but he hadn’t liked the humiliation of it nor the pain. He looked at her now, brooding. Why wasn’t she crying? Why wasn’t she pleading with him to spare her, begging him not to hurt her?

“Just what do you mean you heard her speaking to Douglas?”

“It was at the Ranleaghs’ ball. I saw her clutching at Douglas’s sleeve. She looked as if she were trying to seduce him. I tried to listen, to eavesdrop if you will, but as I told you, I don’t speak French. It was so provoking. I tried to get Douglas to tell me, but he wouldn’t. He has too much honor to break a promise. I am very thirsty. May I have some water?”

He did as she wished, simply because she took him so utterly off guard. After he’d unbound her hands, watched her rub feeling back into them, he handed her the mug. He realized what he had done, but it was too late to jerk the mug of water from her hands. It was proof that he’d temporarily lost his control and his dignity and hadn’t even realized it until it was too late. She finished it quickly, taking great gulps, so thirsty that water dribbled down her chin. She wiped it away with the back of her hand, then closed her eyes in bliss.

He stared at her and heard himself say, “Do you want more?”

“Yes, please. You are kind.”

“Damn you, I’m not kind!” He stomped out of the door, slammed it behind him, and she heard the key grate in the lock. Alexandra would swear that she heard him cursing under his breath. She’d swear she heard at least one
merde.
At least Douglas had evidently taught her one of the most useful of French curses.

The moment she was alone again, the fear, stark and ugly, struck her full force. Lord, what had she done? She’d spoken to him as she would to a vicar, all trusting and confiding. She was a fool. He was probably now plotting how to torture her, to make her pay for what he believed Douglas had done to this Janine woman, the wretched lying hussy. Why had Janine lied like that about Douglas to her lover? After all, he had rescued her. To make him jealous? Surely that was going too far.

Alexandra lay back, closing her eyes, wishing that Douglas had spoken frankly to her so she could use the truth now with Georges Cadoudal. It was another minute before she realized that he had left her hands unbound. She couldn’t believe it. She raised her hands and just looked at them.

New energy pounded through her. Alexandra untied the rope about her ankles. She stood and promptly fell back onto the bed. Several minutes of rubbing her ankles, of trying to stand and falling and trying yet again.