CHAPTER SIX #4
He breakfasted in bed as usual, and permitted Reuben to assist him with his toilette. But he insisted on dressing himself, the lad standing by in comical dismay as Henri donned the fresh shirt and drawers procured for him at Wennington. Henri laughed.
“Do not look so shocked, mon ami. You see that I manage.”
“Aye, sir, but you’re using your bad arm.”
Henri flexed his left hand. “It is stiff a little, but if used with care, it is possible to be without pain there.”
Reuben remained unconvinced, tutting over the exertion of tugging on the breeches, and refusing to be diverted by an aside of congratulation for his having found the correct size in garments at the tailor’s shop.
“I will send to you the money when I have more English guineas, Reuben.”
“It weren’t nobbut a few shillings, Mister Henry, and them things ain’t proper for a gennelman nohow.”
“They will serve me very well.” He finished buttoning the fall of his breeches. “And now for the coat.”
But here Reuben became stubborn, and would by no means allow Henri to manage the coat alone. Submitting, Henri admitted it was easier with his help. He had tried it by himself yesterday, and although it could be managed, it took time and much trouble.
“The sling, sir,” said Reuben, folding the square of cloth in two.
Henri held up his right hand. “But no, mon brave. I try without the sling.”
“Without the sling?” repeated the lad, dismayed. “Miss Grace will have me guts for garters, Mister Henry!”
“Peace! I will assure her that it is me who will not let you put it on.” But the boy looked so gloomy Henri was moved to reach up to his massive shoulder. “Do not fear, Reuben. If my arm begins the ache, I will use again the sling.”
“Well, you had ought to let me fashion it, sir, so’s you can slip it on at need.”
This Henri consented to do, and then he lifted it over his head and stuffed it into his pocket. He looked at Reuben and grinned. “My hair it is tidy?”
“Aye, sir.”
“My cravat he is tied straight?”
Reuben nodded. “You look fit as ninepence, Mister Henry.”
“Merci. Then let me present myself to Mademoiselle Grace.”
Leaving the lad to tidy up, he descended the stairs and made his way into the parlour.
Grace was seated at the table, where the breakfast things had been cleared away, all except the teapot.
She saw him, and Henri stood still, watching as she carefully set her cup down with fingers that trembled slightly.
He met her steady gaze, and could not but admire her courage. Her voice was expressionless.
“You are going.”
Henri felt ridiculously guilty. He did not answer at once, but came to the table and pulled out a chair. Playing for time, he smiled and gestured with his good hand at the teapot.
“You have some left for me?”
Her eyes did not shift from his face. “I thought you preferred coffee.”
“Oui, but one must accustom oneself, enfin. The tea, it is an English habit.”
Grace unconsciously wet her lips with her tongue. Henri felt a stirring at his loins and suppressed it. His gaze dropped to high neckline of her gown. She was again clad in the blue one, and it struck Henri inconsequently that the colour set off her grey eyes better than the green.
“You mean to remain in England?”
“I have not a choice, ma chère.”
Busying herself with the teapot, Grace strove to overcome the rise of feeling in her breast that urged her to plead with him to stay.
Even if his life did not depend upon his going, she could scarce demean herself in such a fashion.
But the effort to hold back put strain into her fingers and the spout of the teapot wavered, spilling the brown liquid.
“Lord, how clumsy!” Unaware she had muttered it, Grace set down the pot and handed the cup to Henri as she rubbed unavailingly at the stain on the cloth.
“You make it worse like this,” commented Henri.
She looked up. “Are you an expert? What do you know of housekeeping?”
The hint of mischief dawned in his eye. “I know much, Grace. An aide in this new France has not a servant.”
Grace left the stain and sat back, surprised. “None at all?”
Henri shrugged. “There was a concierge I paid sometimes to clean and cook, but I have done much for myself.” A sombre look replaced the mischief. “It is more safe, tu sais, that one has no servant. It is not a time of trust.”
A sliver of horror slipped between her ribs. “Did someone betray you to Loriot?”
He met her eyes. “Let us not talk of betrayal, ma chère. In my country, it has become — how do you say? — a way to live.”
Which gave Grace to understand, with a hollow at her chest, that Henri had been forced himself to use it.
The interior darkness she had sensed in him became almost tangible.
Not for the first time, she suspected there was that in his past which might be condemned by the authorities seeking to take him in charge.
She ought to range herself with them. Instead, she felt relieved Henri was taking his future into his own hands.
God forbid he should come to grief from her keeping him by her side!
Henri was sipping gingerly at the tea, a faint look of distaste in his face. Grace changed the subject. “Where will you go?”
“Northwards at first, for that Jean-Marc is searching to the west. Then I may make a way, by a route that goes round with no logic, to seek aid from some French who are here.”
“In London?”
Henri nodded. “Reuben gives me a little map that can help me until — how is it called? — Ilford, I think. From there I take a stagecoach to London.”
It was indeed a circuitous route. Grace wondered briefly at the identity of the French who would help him. émigrés, perhaps? It was apparent Henri had been giving his escape a deal of thought. Questions crowded her mind, but she asked only those of a practical nature.
“Have you money, Henri?”
He nodded. “Enough for the stage. I exchange more francs for guineas when I arrive at London.”
“But no luggage. Did you leave France with nothing?”
“It was not convenient to take something like a portmanteau, enfin. One has to hide that one is departing from France. From my position in particular.”
“As an aide, you mean?”
“Exactement. And for that I knew Jean-Marc and Etienne looked to know if indeed I would go. I did not succeed to deceive them.”
“Evidently,” agreed Grace drily. But her heart was heavy.
There was no more to say. She sipped her tea in silence, trying not to look at him, afraid he would see the devouring need in her gaze.
Henri felt her inner disquiet, and a wholly unlooked-for irritation bubbled up. He set down the cup with a snap. “Faugh! This tea he is not to my taste!”
A startled expression leaped into her features and Henri found himself reaching out to clasp his fingers about her forearm. He used the wrong hand, producing a twinge at his shoulder. He ignored it.
“Grace, are you a saint that you ask no question? You will make me say no reason? Sacré bleu, but it is not to believe!”
Almost her poise deserted her. She set down her cup and laid her fingers over his. “I know your reasons, Henri. And there is little point in my protesting. It will not stop you leaving. Indeed, I know I must not stop you, for your own safety.”
His hand turned, catching at her fingers and drawing them towards him. “I am in debt to you, Grace, for my life. But you demand nothing of me. It is — it is not nature!”
Grace could not help smiling. “Would it be more natural for me to weep and wail, as I promise you I feel like doing? Shall I complain and curse, and tell you everyone will suppose you have deserted me after wrecking my reputation?”
Consternation entered his voice. “You think this?”
“It doesn’t matter, Henri. We agreed to pay no attention to gossip. People will forget it all very quickly — even if I do not.”
Henri’s grip tightened on her fingers. “Yes, you will forget, Grace. It will be as a dream.”
She longed to deny it, to say it would be a dream she would cherish lifelong. But it would not do to let him go in concern about her. He must be free, in mind as well as body. Deliberately, she smiled at him.
“In time, I expect so, Henri.”
He nodded, releasing her hand at last, but his expression was unfathomable. Grace forced her mind back to the practical, and remembered Mayberry’s evidence.
“Your hat! It was found at the place where you were shot. Mayberry kept it, thinking it might belong to your would-be murderers. Only all three of them wore hats, so it must be yours.”
Henri shrugged. “It is nothing. One cannot ask him for it, enfin. I must be without.”
“But not without a greatcoat. I will find the one my brother left here. It will be big for you, for Constant is taller and wider at the shoulder, I think. But that’s all to the good. It will serve as some sort of disguise. And you must tie your hair back, for it is more usual in England.”
Henri objected that this would show his face the more. They were arguing the point when a heavy rat-a-tat at the door startled them both into silence.
Grace rose hastily. “If that is another wretch with some silly excuse —”
But it was not one of the locals. Within a very few moments, Jemima came tiptoeing into the parlour, one finger at her mouth, her eyes fairly starting from her head. Grace dared not move for fear of making a noise with her ungainly boot.
“What is it?”
Jemima reached them, and a terrified whisper came out of her mouth. “’Sakes alive, Miss Grace, it’s them Frenchies!”