CHAPTER TEN #2
There had been no message, no secret instruction.
Grace was on her own. If there was a decision to be made, it must be hers alone.
Instantly she realised there was no decision to make.
If there was the slightest chance the papers might save Henri — from the French or the English both — she had no choice but to open them.
Two minutes later she broke the first seal.
It was luxurious for a prison. Henri suspected he had been housed in one of the less costly of the bedchambers Wooferton let out on hire.
It was set between two of the eaves, which argued its lowly status.
But it was furnished with a comfortable four-poster, a rickety commode upon which were placed a basin and ewer, and a chair by the casement window — too small for a man to get through.
He spent most of the day resting on the bed, taking care to eat everything brought to him at meal times, for he knew he must keep up his strength. Towards the late afternoon, he received a visit from Reuben.
“Mr Mayberry knew as how I’d been a-serving of you out at Miss Grace’s,” said the lad, “and he give Mr Wooferton the office to let me in.” He grinned. “I said as I had ought to see to your wound, Mister Henry.”
Henri clapped him on the back. “A ploy extremely clever, mon brave.”
To his surprise, Reuben was indeed armed with salves and bandaging, together with a new cloth to be turned into a sling. Henri was sure he had come from Grace. The disappointment, when Reuben denied it, was intense.
“I ain’t seen Miss Grace, sir. It were Mab as sent me. But she give me the office to go back by way o’ Wonts, Mister Henry, if you was wishful to send a message.”
Henri had yearned to send to her. But what to say? He was not ready to request his documents. Nor did he dare to pen such words as might be intercepted. Indeed, to give Reuben anything at all was to put him in danger. Would he remember if he were given an oral message?
“Tell to her —” No, there was nothing he could say that could be heard by other ears. “Tell to her only that I am well, that I have eaten, and that they give me this excellent chamber, even though they have locked it.”
Reuben repeated it all, and assured Henri he could remember it very well.
He then helped Henri to remove his upper garments, and assisted him at his ablutions before applying his salve and rebandaging the wound, remarking in a puzzled manner upon its having opened again.
Henri refrained from enlightening him as to the cause, and remained silent for a time, caught by the memories invoked.
In his mind, he added to the message he had given Reuben.
Words and feelings that could not be spoken.
Of affection, of missing her, of needs and desires that might never be fulfilled.
Almost, when Reuben was waiting at the door to be let out by the guardian outside, Henri voiced such thoughts aloud.
Honour alone prevented him. Until he had won this battle, he must not speak.
With Reuben’s departure, there was too much time for thought and remembrance. But his desires drove his mind backwards in time, beyond the moment of encountering Grace to the causes that would prevent him from returning to her.
Dinner came and went. He was glad he had kept the bottle, for he had little to do beyond brooding and the wine was welcome. The opening of the door alerted him, and he looked up from contemplation of his glass. Jean-Marc entered the room.
Henri started up, instinctively throwing himself out of the bed on the other side for safety. He addressed the man in French. “How have you got in here?”
Jean-Marc smiled unpleasantly, responding in their own language. “Did you think I would let these English pigs stop me? The man Wooferton chooses badly for his tools.”
Wary, Henri shifted out into the room, trying to see if Jean-Marc was armed.
Would he shoot him in cold blood in the bedchamber of an inn?
No, too risky. The man was no fool. With so many on the premises aware of the situation, he would be caught.
Sir James would have him tried for murder. Jean-Marc must have the man’s measure.
Some other method then. A knife? Poison? Then he must get near enough to try it. He watched Jean-Marc softly closing the door, and took up his remark.
“What have you used, bribery? Or drugged ale?”
Jean-Marc shrugged. “What is it to you?”
“Who now is out there? Augustin?”
“I say again, what is it to you?”
Henri’s back was to the window. Much good would it do him!
No escape that way. He must rely on his wits, for he had little strength to match his enemy.
Nevertheless, he took the precaution of removing his arm from the sling.
One-handed, he would be helpless. He leaned against the wall in a pose deceptively relaxed.
“What do you intend, Jean-Marc? To kill me in this room?”
“You take me for a fool?” The other’s lip curled. “All along, this has been your trouble, Henri. You believe you only have the brains. Yet you have not brains enough to know when the time has come to give up.”
A riffle of anger threw Henri’s guard off. “Ah, but you knew? Give up? One does not give up such a cause, except that one is a traitor.”
“You, Henri, are the traitor, do you not remember?” It was hard, and cold.
Henri almost spat the words. “Traitor to whom? Le Directeur? Yes, assuredly. Just as were all four of us, loyal to a different master.”
Jean-Marc’s cheeks darkened. “I recognise only the government of France as my master, citizen.”
“Since when? From the beginning you will tell me, is it thus?”
The other was silent. Henri eyed him, feeling the anger burn in his gut. He must not allow it to inflame him. He needed his wits about him now. But the bitter gall of disillusion would not be entirely suppressed.
“One honours an enemy, citizen,” he said coolly. “But a turncoat one can only despise.”
Something flashed in Jean-Marc’s eyes, and died quickly. A sneer curved his mouth. Sliding a hand into his pocket, he brought out his pistol, but aiming only loosely. “You speak with authority for a man so close to death.”
Henri eyed the pistol, and wondered briefly if he had the strength to wrest it from that slack hold. Risky, but an opportunity might occur. His glance shifted from the pistol to Jean-Marc’s face.
“Were we not agreed you are not a fool?”
Loriot laughed and suddenly relaxed, shifting to the bed where he leaned nonchalantly against one of the posts, the barrel of his pistol pointing to the floor.
“Is it impossible to realise, Henri, that a man may change? We began as young hotheads, mon ami, and we knew not what we fought. Yes, we took these identities and seized our chance to get close to the top. To have gambled so far was a miracle. But Citizen Robespierre —”
He paused, and Henri saw in his eye the gleam of fanaticism that had characterised Le Directeur and his ilk. Was it possible Jean-Marc had truly experienced a change of heart? The man straightened.
“He taught me, Henri. Could you not also see it? He made me understand why this revolution was necessary. Piece by piece I came to recognise that all who opposed it must be sacrificed.”
Nausea twisted in Henri’s stomach. “Even your kinsmen? Your friends?”
Jean-Marc’s features relaxed, and there was almost a smile to be seen. “You strike a chord there, Henri. It is why I found a way to come to you here.”
What new ploy was this? Henri searched his face. “I do not understand you.”
The smile came, and it was almost the old one of the affection of their shared youth. “That is your trouble, mon ami. For that you are my friend, I desire to give you this one chance. To redeem yourself, to live.”
Momentarily thrown off balance, Henri frowned. “How?”
Jean-Marc’s pistol hand waved an arc. “Renounce your former loyalties and join our cause.”
Henri almost laughed in his face. “Are you mad?”
“It is a good cause, Henri, you have seen that for yourself,” said the other, straightening. “And you are too good a man to be lost for the sake of this lost cause you have continued to believe in. Come back with us, and I will see you released from all accusations.”
“As if you have such power!”
“In my new post, I have more power than you realise.”
It was a trick. It must be. Jean-Marc could not possibly suppose he was open to such a bargain? Not seeing fully what the man was at, Henri stalled.
“You are offering me my life if I will abandon my chosen path, as you have done. I presume I have the task to convince Sir James Levisham that he should place me in your charge. What would you desire I say to him?”
Jean-Marc uttered a sound of contempt. “We do not parley with these English! It is arranged, my friend. Your word only is needed.”
“And then?”
“And then we leave this place.”
“All four of us?”
The other nodded, looking smug. “We depart in secret, and make our way to the river across this marshland.”
“Where you will then shoot me unhindered, and leave my body to rot in the mire,” finished Henri. “I thank you, Jean-Marc, but I am not altogether a fool.”
Jean-Marc shrugged, losing some of the false air of camaraderie. “Believe as you wish.”
“Yes, I believe! I believe that you find yourself at point non plus, that you must take either the dangerous procedure to kill me in this room, or make me this farce of an offer that you may kill me at your leisure. No, Jean-Marc, I do not take one step in the company of a man who betrays his own kind.”
The face of his enemy changed, his lip curling upwards in a species of snarl. “And your hands are clean, I suppose?”
“In this regard, yes. If I have dirtied them, it was not to turn upon my own.”
“Your own, let us say, Citizen Rousselle. I have disowned them.”
Despite everything, the avowal shocked Henri. “Bon dieu, but if your father could hear you!”
Jean-Marc spat comprehensively, a purely republican gesture. “He was of the old regime. They are gone, and not to be regretted.”