I woke to damp, a briny smell, and sharp air. I shivered.
“Close the window, Bartholomew,” I tried to say.
The wind took my breath away. It was cold, damned cold, as though a gale had burst through my bedchamber. I reached for the blankets and touched only the stiff prickle of what felt like hemp.
I cracked my eyes open. Sunlight poured into them—I was outside, and lying on a hard surface. The world rocked and pitched.
A slap of cold water stunned me awake. I tried to sit up in alarm, but found myself bound fast to something unyielding.
“What the devil!” I shouted as loudly as I could, both in fear and the hope someone would hear.
Prying my eyes open all the way, I saw that I was in a boat, a small one, my hands and arms lashed behind me to a board on the bottom. My feet, I discovered as I tried to move, were likewise bound. My boots were gone, my ankles tightly gripped by thin rope.
“Bloody hell.”
Speaking out loud seemed to reassure myself that I was still alive. I cranked my head around the best I could to take stock of my situation.
The first sight I beheld was the soles of a pair of boots. Not mine—these were thick-heeled and well worn. I levered my shoulders as high as I could and followed the boots to homespun breeches and a wool coat on a round body. The wearer had an equally round face, red now from sun and wind.
“Bickley!” I shouted.
He was bound as thoroughly as I was. We were alone in this small craft, tossing on the waves, who the devil knew where. The boat was small, old—patches and holes in the sides met my eyes—and smelled strongly of fish.
With much struggling, I managed to lift myself enough to peer over the gunwale.
I saw nothing. Gray sea met my gaze wherever I looked, land nowhere in sight.
“Damnation.” I thumped back down, my head banging painfully.
Dizziness swamped me. My breath hitched, and as I tried to catch it, I recalled the gun, used as a club, that had rendered me unconscious. The hand that plied it had belonged to Comte Desjardins, his face lit with glee as he used his very costly Purdey to pummel me.
He must have trussed me up, or had help to do so, and trundled me out the open windows of Bickley’s back parlor. I had admired the unbroken way to the sea—so handy for spiriting us off to a waiting boat.
I’d been confident as I’d tamely walked to meet Bickley, certain Bickley had sent for me, not Armitage. Bickley had written the note, but he’d obviously lured me to the house so Desjardins could strike.
What had they threatened him with this time? Had they vowed they’d see him strung up for murder alongside me? Had Bickley decided to confess all, either to me or the magistrate? Bickley had a sister—I wagered Armitage had threatened to hurt her. Bickley would not be able to bear losing any more family.
But I supposed, from Bickley’s presence, that they’d decided to rid themselves of Bickley as well. They’d tricked Bickley today as much as they’d tricked me.
I also might have known that my plot—to have Denis imply he could deliver me to Desjardins and Armitage for a price—would not work. Either there hadn’t been time for Denis to get word to them, or they’d decided that their trap was the better one.
“Am I correct that they killed your son because he knew?” I croaked. “Joshua must have found out you were helping them with Isherwood’s murder, even if you were keeping yourself in the wings. Joshua was a good lad, by all accounts. I wager he tried to talk you out of giving me the opium. Did he vow to go to the magistrate?”
Bickley did not answer, did not move. I could not tell at present whether he was dead or alive.
I wriggled and thrashed, my left leg and head blasting pain through me in waves. I had to stop, breathe, and keep my roiling stomach from heaving up its contents.
How long had I been here? I’d departed to visit Bickley near noon, and the sun was on the horizon now. The wind was cold, but did not hold the iciness of dawn, so it must be evening, not morning. Sunset these days came about nine of the clock, which meant I’d been here nearly eight hours. I reasoned that I’d be wetter, more stiff, or possibly dead from my head wound and exposure if a night and a day had passed.
What was the idea? I wondered as I continued trying to loosen my bonds. To send us out to sea to sink, drown, or simply die of thirst and cold?
An inefficient way to kill us, but then again, possibly a wise one. Who would know, upon finding our bodies, what hands had thrust us into the boat and pushed us out to sea?
They’d done a similar thing to Josh, I realized, except he’d been strangled before being put into the boat. He must have fought his captors much harder than Bickley and I had. Josh had been killed on Monday night, soon after Isherwood or possibly even before, when he’d threatened to reveal the plot.
“Your son knew you’d dosed me or were planning to,” I told the inert Bickley. “I imagine he, an upright lad, was appalled at what you wanted to do. Then he stormed off. You weren’t worried enough about him that night to refuse to help stitch me up for Isherwood’s murder, so I wager you truly did believe he’d gone to visit friends in Hove. You had no idea they would kill him, no idea they were such monsters.” I paused, running my tongue over my parched lips. “You wouldn’t hurt me yourself, or even Isherwood, and so not violate the letter of your beliefs. But you’d be happy to see me disgraced, ruined, even hanged for murder. I deserved it, in your eyes.”
Bickley lay motionless. I thought I saw his chest rise, but it could be the dazzling light and my hopes.
I continued my struggles. “Men die in wars, Bickley. Your brother knew that. The battle at Salamanca was a confusion, and your brother fought honorably. He was a good officer. I always tried to keep my men as safe as possible, but there was only so much I could do. My orders were to skirmish with the French lines, to add to the confusion, and we did that. I lost several men that day. I hated it, but I knew at every battle it was a risk.”
No response. My words were taken by the uncaring wind, the boat rocking on waves I’d once thought beautiful.
“I am glad Grenville is not with me,” I said with grim humor. “He is terribly sick on boats.”
The thought of Grenville gave me some hope, as did thoughts of Brewster. Brewster would have reached the house where I’d met Bickley and realized I’d been abducted from it. He’d have sent word to my friends and family, and Denis.
Unless Armitage and Desjardins had waited for him and simply killed him. I prayed I was wrong about that.
The bonds around my arms began to loosen. More struggles and plenty of skin off my hands, including nearly wrenching my shoulder out of joint, broke one of the ropes.
An abler man would have thrown off his bonds, leapt overboard, and swam robustly to shore, whichever direction shore lay. I collapsed to the bottom of the boat, panting, wretched, and willing the feeling to return to my limbs.
“Bickley!” I shouted over the wind. “Wake up, damn you.”
I heard a faint moan, which reassured me he was still alive, but he remained unmoving.
The boat heaved on a swell and ran hard down its other side. The sky above us was mostly clear, thankfully, but wind could churn up the sea in a bad way. Our little boat might founder, and I doubted either of us would make it to back to land in that case.
After a long time of lying still, during which I nearly fell asleep, I pried myself up on my elbows. My legs were well wrapped, my boots gone, though they’d let Bickley keep his. My walking stick, needless to say, was nowhere in sight.
The bottom of the boat held no tools—they’d have cleared out any such useful items as hooks, fishing poles, the oars. A few old boards lay there, which looked as though they’d come off the hull.
I lifted a piece of board, splintery and rotted, and wedged it beneath the ropes that held my legs. I grimaced as I dug in, my trousers ripping as well as the skin beneath them. Grenville’s tailor had designed this suit for me, and I imagined the tailor’s anguish upon seeing its tatters.
I pulled and squirmed, fought and kicked, until the ropes loosed enough for me to begin unwinding them. I had to cease and rest from time to time, my injuries hurting like fury.
Once I finally freed myself of the ropes, I gathered them up and coiled them carefully—I might need them later.
I crawled the short distance to Bickley. He lay on his back, skin wan, but his ragged breathing told me he was alive.
I patted his face, trying to wake him, then tugged at his bonds. I was not gentle, I confess—he’d caused me the devil of a lot of trouble.
When Bickley finally opened his eyes, he blinked in confusion. Then awareness flooded him, and he tried to scramble away from me.
“Are you more afraid of me than our circumstance?” I asked in amazement. “God’s balls, Bickley. I can’t decide whether you are a coward or a fool.”
“Both.” His words were barely audible. “A sinner and a weak man.”
“You may flagellate yourself later. First, I’d like to decide how we’ll reach shore.”
Bickley summoned enough strength to peer over the gunwale. He took in the empty sea then groaned and dropped back, defeated. “It is fitting. I will fall into the deep and be eaten by a sea creature, like Jonah.”
“Let us hope,” I said. “Jonah was belched out after three days, none the worse for wear.”
“Because he was one of God’s chosen. I never will be.”
“I was taught as a lad that despair is a sin.” I worked as I spoke, not really aware of what I said. “It shows no gratitude for Christ bothering to die in such a horrible way. Which never made sense to me. Why should my way be paved to heaven because the Romans crucified a man?”
“Those are unworthy thoughts,” Bickley whispered.
“I am not an unbeliever, simply skeptical of interpretation,” I said. “God has looked out for me before, and I hope we can prevail upon that good will again. In the meantime, it would be wise to discover where we are.”
I dragged the last of Bickley’s ropes from him and coiled these as well.
Around us rolled a sea full of whitecaps, the boat skimming up the crest of one wave and dropping into the trough of another.
“We can’t have gone far,” I reasoned. “What say you? You’ve lived on the south coast all your life, haven’t you?”
Bickley cast another fearful look at the water and ducked down again. “I have never been in a boat.”
“Never?” I asked incredulously. “I grew up on the coast of Norfolk. I was out into the North Sea many a time with the fishermen around our village. I longed to be a fisherman myself, but of course my father beat that notion out of me. Not the profession of a gentleman.”
Bickley only stared, uncertain I hadn’t run mad. He did not know me well enough to understand that I used bluffness and irritating humor when I was in danger, to keep myself from giving way.
“A fact our fancy gentlemen did not count on,” I continued. “They know me only as the interfering cavalry captain—a thick-headed, gullible one, in their opinion. The perfect man to fit up for a murder of a colonel who’d grown inconvenient.”
“I do not know why they wanted to kill him.” Bickley regarded me pathetically. “They did not take me into their confidence.”
“Because he knew too much, of course. Isherwood was beholden to Armitage for paying off his debts, yes, but he might have been growing a conscience. Especially when he had a popular son who was swiftly rising in his career. What Isherwood did at Salamanca, at Armitage’s instigation was, quite simply, treason. Desjardins egged Armitage and Isherwood into it, wanting to tell Bonaparte—if Bonaparte prevailed—what he’d done to help. Both Grenville and Brandon told me that Desjardins tries to play all sides of the game. But Bonaparte is gone, Desjardins wishes to remain comfortably in England, and treason is not the charge either a lordship or a wealthy emigre want to answer to.”
I gazed at the horizon as I spoke. West was obviously where the sun was sinking. The coast of England had to lie to the north. If we drifted too far east or south, we’d end up in France, not so bad a thing, if we could survive the journey. West would take us to Cornwall, or, if we were unlucky, out into the Atlantic.
With no food or water and a boat that already had too many holes in it, I did not much like our chances.
I sorted through the boards until I found one that was wide and flat. “Do you think you can row?” I asked Bickley.
He glanced at the board in confusion. “I have no idea.”
“One of us will have to paddle while the other makes an attempt at steering. If this boat had a tiller, it is gone now.”
Bickley only stared at me dubiously. I tried to remember how the fishermen of my youth could slide out into the sea in craft even more rickety than this, and not only make it back home but bring in a large catch behind them. I longed for one of those wiry, taciturn, unflappable men with me now.
I hauled Bickley up and thrust a board into his hands. “Try. I’ll guide us.”
I had to show him how to dip the board deep into the water to make any headway, and also how to move from one side to the other, as in a coracle, so we’d go in a straight line.
After Bickley’s few feeble attempts, I realized he was hopeless. I took the makeshift paddle away from him and told him to sit in the stern. He fumbled his way back, nearly turning us over, but I managed to keep the boat upright.
The rope would help. I spent some time tying it to the top of the gunwale, which fortunately had a few rings for just this purpose. “Hold onto that,” I told Bickley. “If you feel yourself going, just hang on and shove your weight opposite to the way the boat tips.”
The keel had probably once had ropes attached for steering, hence the rings, but I would have to dive over the side to reattach them, and I’d never be fit enough for that.
The board was difficult to hold, especially when I had no gloves—my captors had taken those too—but I approximated a single oar with one hand on top, the other close to the water. It was damned awkward, but I did get the boat pointed more or less north.
“I’ve been piecing together events,” I said as I endeavored. I did not know if Bickley could hear me, but I did not much care. “After supper I quarreled with Isherwood, who was still annoyed with me about Marguerite. I thought at first someone had added something to the port I took with him, but Isherwood poured his measure out of the same decanter I did, and others, including Desjardins, had helped themselves as well.”
I paused to catch my breath, my labors rigorous. “My memories go hazy after I departed the Pavilion with Grenville. You must have accosted me soon after Grenville left me at the Steine. Appealing to me, in your sad way, to help you with a problem.”
“Yes.” Bickley wheezed out the syllable.
“I must rely on you for the gist of our conversation. Was Miss Farrow present when we reached the Meeting House?”
“She was. She often remains late to help clean, or prepare meals for those who need them. But Matilda knows nothing about this.”
“Good.” The upright Miss Farrow could remain on the moral high ground. “I like her. She was worried about Miss Purkis. You weren’t as concerned about Josh at the moment—at that time, you had no idea of his fate. But Miss Farrow had noted his absence and asked me to discover what had happened to him.”
I went quiet, out of breath, moving my paddle steadily. “Did you invite me in for a cup of something?” I asked when I could speak again.
“Tea.” The words were bitter. “Thou didst not want it but politely drank it.”
“Damn me and my good manners. I rarely drink the stuff—I prefer coffee.” I might not have noticed if the tea seemed off, as most tea tasted foul to me. Brewster must have lost me when I’d stepped inside the Meeting House for the fateful drink. “What did you put into it? Opium?”
“Yes. Very strong opium, I think. I am not certain exactly what it was.” Bickley coughed. “Fernand gave it to me.”
“Fernand? Ah, Comte Desjardins.” The man behind me had violated most of his own principles but still could not bring himself to call a count by his title. “Then your part was over. Harmless, you must have told yourself. All you’d done was give me a substance that some physicians use for healing. I must have felt woozy immediately, because when I went into the pub not far from the Meeting House, I asked for coffee, not ale. I must have wanted to clear my head.”
I ceased speaking to paddle for a time. My thoughts did not stop, however, and soon I was speculating aloud again.
“The lady who lured me out of the pub might have been Lady Armitage, though I suppose I will never know unless I ask her. I imagine she is in thick with her husband’s plots, has been since she met him in Vienna. She must have told me something alarming to make me run back to the Pavilion. I wonder whether Armitage or Desjardins killed Isherwood in front of my dazed eyes, or whether he was already dead by the time I reached the spot. I remember growing disoriented at the sight of Armitage the next night, so I will believe it was he who made the killing blow. The event must have stuck in my head. After that, Clement, up and about because he’s a young man with a healthy appetite, helped me leave the Pavilion. I found my way home to collapse into bed ,and remembered nothing when I woke.” I gave a breathless laugh. “The evil was in them, Bickley, not you. They are cruel men who will do anything to get what they want.”
Bickley said nothing. I risked a glance at him to find him openly weeping.
“None of that,” I told him sternly. “I need your eyes clear so we don’t run into anything. Even the smallest bit of flotsam might capsize this craft.”
Bickley shook his head. “I am sorry, Gabriel. I did not know how good a man thou art, but that should not have mattered. I conspired to ruin a gentleman, and I had no right to, no matter what I believed about his character.”
The words were broken, Bickley miserable. He’d been upset enough about his brother’s death to convince himself to help Armitage and Desjardins, and then he’d been punished in the most terrible way. No wonder he’d thought his own sins had been the culprit.
“I don’t mind what the bastards did to me,” I said. “Even Isherwood was a cad. But I’ll get them for killing Joshua.”
I’d make certain I lived, if only for that.
I closed my mouth and concentrated on paddling. I thought I was moving us in the correct direction, but the truth was, I could not say. The sun continued to sink, and once the summer twilight gave out, we’d be in complete darkness. If the film of clouds that gathered on the horizon spread through the sky, I would not be able to use the stars for navigation.
I continued to paddle. The sun slipped down, turning the water golden and too dazzling.
Bickley had fallen silent. I looked over my shoulder to see him slumped against the gunwale, hands wrapped in the ropes.
I opened my mouth to shout at him to stay awake, when I caught sight of a speck on the horizon beyond him. My heart banged, my throat and mouth impossibly dry, and I prayed.
The speck grew larger. I squinted against the glare to watch it, willing the thing to be what I wished.
I was rewarded when I saw the silhouette of a spread sail. It was a small ship, with only one mast, a cargo sloop, or possibly an excise cutter. Or a smuggler—but I wasn’t much bothered by that. As long as they pulled us out of this damned boat and gave us water, they could be pirates of the worst stripe for all I cared.
“Bickley.” The word grated from me, barely audible. “Take heart, my friend. There is a ship.” I dropped the board to the bottom of the boat and waved my arms. “Hey! Ahoy!”
Bickley woke with a start. I felt him moving, then he was laughing in relief, waving with me. Apparently he’d decided he wanted to live.
We shouted, arms moving rapidly, our motions nearly tipping us over. I removed my coat and stuck it on the end of the board, brandishing it like a flag.
As the ship neared us, I saw that it was too small for a cargo ship but also too clean and sleek for an excise cutter. I realized as it drew ever closer, that it was a yacht, a rich man’s pleasure boat.
I’d seen these small crafts sailing close to shore, and Grenville had told me it was popular for gentlemen sailors to ply the Solent, the water between Southampton and the Isle of Wight. Grenville had been asked many a time to join the fairly new Yacht Club, based in St. James’s in London, for gentlemen who owned such craft, but Grenville always declined with a shudder. A man who was a slave to motion sickness was not likely to hurry out and purchase a pleasure boat.
The boat drew alongside. I was worn out from shouting and had to sink down and wait. I hoped they had plenty of water and coffee—and a keg of brandy wouldn’t go amiss. I was chilled through.
The craft was lovely, the wood honed and cared for, the metalworks polished, the sails, now being furled, white and whole. A flag of the Yacht Club danced on a line.
A man appeared at the rail. Before I could appeal to him to take us aboard, he leveled a shotgun at me and fired it.