Prelude to Love (2 page)

Chapter Two

Colonel Bradford, lately retired from His Royal Majesty's Army with a chest wound contracted during the battle of Assaye, in India, was extremely frustrated. He was annoyed to see his only daughter, a once-intelligent girl, had turned into a simpering miss, her head full of nothing but beaux, balls and gowns. This was a minor, daily irritation; his great frustration was his physical condition.

After seeing active duty against the French forces in the Netherlands, the Americans in the Colonies, and the Marathas in India, it was demmed hard that he must be retired when a chance for glory rested on his own doorstep. On a clear day, he could see through his powerful telescope across the twenty-five-mile Channel to Boulogne, where the armies of Napoleon Bonaparte moved about, looking like a colony of ants from that distance, but with the glitter of a gun or bayonet picked out when the sun struck at the proper angle. One hundred and fifty thousand men were assembled, first making up the flat-bottomed boats from green lumber just cut for the purpose, then performing their maneuvers, and waiting for the weather to favor an attack on England.

The man London had seen fit to put in charge of the country's defense was another source of infinite frustration. Colonel Forrester was a green officer, whose experience was limited to parading up and down in front of St. James's Palace.

Had Forrester at least been of a lower rank, he might have been amenable to direction, but he was a colonel, like himself. He had taken his duties seriously enough at first, but after some months of waiting, Forrester had become bored and turned socialite. His time was spent in courting the local girls, arranging parades for their amusement, and most recently, a ball. Bradford had done what he could—taken over the running of the local volunteer brigade, but he knew a group of civilians with pikes and turnip sticks were not going to hold Bonaparte off for long.

He had his scouts set up on the highest point of the coast, twenty-four hours a day, with their two ricks, one of furze, to burst into flame at once, the other of turf, for a longer light. They were to be fired instantly at the first sight of the flat boats' approach. The ricks' firing was a signal to ring the church bells in a prearranged order, to assemble the volunteers. It was also the signal for the women, older men and children to run for their carriages and carts, wherein were assembled sufficient foods and blankets to ease their flight inland. He had seen, in foreign lands, the chaos, the panic that resulted from a lack of such essential preparation. Yet it was hard to convince the local citizens to make ready, when his own family made a joke of it, and when Forrester broadcast his simple-minded views.

The green colonel outlined in minute detail the conditions under which Boney would strike. There was to be a twenty-four-hour fog, accompanied by a dead calm, to enable the flat-bottomed boats to be oared across, while English sailing ships were becalmed. Forrester spoke vaguely of a spring tide as well, to hasten the charge. As spring was now past, the vigil had been relaxed. The men at the garrison had decided to dance the summer away, it seemed.

Bradford was not well, but he was not totally incapacitated, by a long shot. Many a dark night he went alone, or with his silent, sharp-eyed batman, Parkins, to the cliff to see the guards were awake at their ricks. This done, he would continue down the coast if the night was foggy, to listen and peer into the mist, his ears cocked for the sound of French accents. He knew every foot of the coast for ten miles in either direction.

From Tyne in the far north down the east coast and around the corner to Wight and even west to Land's End, watches were kept around the clock, but it was at Boulogne the army was preparing, and anyone but a nodcock must know that with flat-bottomed boats, it was a straight shot across the Channel that was to be expected.

Bradford's own defenses were concentrated between Dungeness and Eastbourne. Rye was a possibility—the French had hit there in 1377, as any student of military history knew. Unfortunately, Forrester was not aware of military history. He had his troops clustered farther south. Bradford knew all the possible landing spots, and knew too that Boney was minutely aware of where Forrester's armies were gathered. He would not attack too close to them, yet the oared boats restricted him to a limited stretch of coast.

When all his thinking was done, Bradford came to realize his own stretch of coast, just below Hastings, was as likely a spot as any. It thrilled him, to think he might stand with a rifle in his hands on his own land and repel the French invasion. Ha, there was more than one way to become a general! That would do it, retired or not.

The colonel could not sleep. He had moved his chamber to the front of the house to give him a view of the coast, but the view tonight was poor, due to a fog that hovered out at sea, and crept in to shift about the corners of the house. On such a night as this, the ricks might be fired, and the church bells rung. But if the French came, Bradford was not of a mind to learn it from the bells, which would be a half hour after the first onslaught. He felt a queer, tingling sensation along the back of his spine. A hardened veteran, he had more than once been saved from death by harking to these instinctive warnings. He arose silently, and without striking a light, shuffled into his buckskins and jacket, struggled with his top boots, wondering whether to rouse Parkins for the job. It bothered his chest, to have to yank and pull them on himself.

No, let the fellow sleep, for it was likely all a sleeveless errand, this quick dash down to the sea, to listen once again for the splash of French oars. He had learned that a French oar was indistinguishable from an English one. Oftimes he had stood with his heart hammering, his finger cocked on the trigger of his pistol, only to hear the familiar dull voices of the local fishermen, complaining of the cold and damp, or the paucity of their catch.

The night was dark and eerie, with a light wind soughing through the trees. There was a sudden flutter of wings as a great owl darted from a tree to catch an unwary nocturnal animal. A terrified squeal signified the owl's success, then silence descended again. He walked on, down to the shingle beach, looking and listening while the waves lapped at his feet.

The beacons on the hill were not visible from here. No matter, the lads couldn't see anything in this fog in any case. Boney might come tonight or tomorrow night or any night, and Forrester would be lying in a drunken stupor, or sitting in some lady's saloon. He pulled out his watch, reading with difficulty the hour was three-thirty. Nonsense. He'd go home to his warm bed. He was tired, with that old ache in the chest that limited his labors so severely. Seeing a large rock in his path, he sat on it to catch his breath.

Then he heard it, the telltale lapping of oars, out of rhythm with the louder lapping of the sea. As often as he had heard it, his heart still quickened. Listening more intently, he realized it was only one boat, and relaxed. Not the invasion, then. It might be smugglers, which was of interest only inasmuch as he hoped for a safe delivery. He liked his brandy very well. The boat, to his surprise, was landed, pulled with a quiet rasp up on the shingle beach. He was about to arise and make himself known when he heard a man say in a very low voice,
"Que penses-tu?"
He sat rigid, every nerve taut. Frenchmen! He could not see them, and assumed that he was equally obscured by the heavy fog.
"Pas trop mal, hein?"

A second man replied, also in French, but was understood by the colonel, who numbered French amongst his accomplishments. They were only two—youngish men, from their voices. The next speech brought the colonel to rigid attention.

"Looks like a good spot to me," the other man answered. "We'll scout farther along and see if there's any defense. Our general thinks not, but who can trust spies of any nationality?"

"Easy landing," the first speaker pointed out, the whole talk in French.

"Yes, but where the devil
are
we?"

"That place with the lights just northward must have been Hastings. We're a few miles from it. I'll go this way, you that. One of us is bound to meet our contact. We'll meet back here in an hour. If he says all is quiet here, no troops or guns in the immediate area, we shall suggest this spot to the general."

"A pity he hung back. We could have taken the
anglais
easily enough tonight, no?"

"You forget we wait for General Vachon and his men to join us from La Rochelle. It won't be before two weeks. Be careful."

They separated. Not even a shadow in the fog showed their routes. Bradford sat frozen to his rock, willing himself to silent invisibility. He heard their stealthy steps recede, and knew he had gone undetected. After a safe interval, he crept to the boat and searched it, but wasted very little time on this instinctive chore. They were not bringing messages or hiding plans in their small boat.

Impossible to credit they had made the crossing in it. No, they had come most of the way in a larger ship, certainly. And now one of them was going to meet a spy. He longed to learn the traitor's identity, but with two to follow, and with the fog to shroud them, it was difficult. He knew too that he was an old, disabled man. If he were found out, this precious information he had gleaned would be lost forever to England. His first duty was to get himself to safety, and the information to London. The name Forrester occurred to him, only to be rejected. He did not wish to have this priceless news treated as a joke, the hallucination of a quack, or worse, publicly discussed amongst the officers. It must be quickly delivered to the ears of some highly placed, trusted man in power, perhaps the secretary of state for war. A soldier himself, he had an innate mistrust of politicians, and sought about in his mind for another recipient of the news. He settled on Sir Giles Harkman, an ex-general turned privy councillor, a man he had served under in India and a trusted friend. He was now attached to the War Office in some capacity, which made him eminently suitable.

He hastened home at a pace that threatened his heart. He was gasping as he got through the great double doors of Levenhurst, to drag himself up the broad oaken staircase and fall onto his bed, exhausted. He lay for a quarter of an hour, catching his breath, and making plans to go to London at once with his important message. At the end of that time, he doubted he could even get out of his own clothing without Parkins' help, much less go to London. Perhaps he would feel stouter by morning. He would rest till dawn, and see whether it improved his condition.

He was still asleep when Parkins peeped his head into the room the next morning, to enquire in a condemnatory tone what he was about, sleeping in his jacket and boots.

Bradford considered informing Parkins of his discovery, then decided to keep it to himself. He ordered a valise packed and the horses put to for a drive to London.

"Not if
I
know anything, you're not going to be jostled to death in a carriage!" Parkins said sternly, staring up from his five feet three inches of wiry strength into the towering face of his master. "Wheezing, you are, and if you haven't got a chill, out prowling them beaches in the dark of night and sleeping without a blanket thrown over your body, it's more than
I
know."

Bradford prepared to set his batman down, but was seized with a bout of coughing that pained his chest badly. When it was over, he sank, weak and panting, on the side of his bed, perfectly aware that he was in no shape to deliver the message himself. He'd have to send Parkins. He ordered breakfast in his chamber, along with writing materials. While he ate toast and sipped tea, he wrote out in precise detail for the eyes of Sir Giles Harkman exactly what he had experienced the night before. Then, with a somewhat malicious smile, he went on to outline the mismanagement that was taking place under Colonel Forrester's command. He had been itching to do it for a long time, had restrained himself only out of a sense of respect for a fellow officer, and the fear of not being taken seriously. Imminent invasion was of sufficient importance to make his task a pleasant duty.

In an accelerating rush of enthusiasm, he went on to outline his own plans, filling two sheets with closely written lines. He folded them into an envelope, applied hot wax and stamped his seal on it. His daily mail was brought up as he finished this job. He recognized Sir Giles' own writing in the small pile of letters, and pulled it out eagerly. The two ex-campaigners kept in fairly close contact by correspondence. The letter informed him that Sir Giles was taking a short respite from his duties, at his home in Ipswich, a hard two-days' drive from Levenhurst. London could be reached in one.

This set Bradford frowning in distress. Harkman was the perfect man to tell his news to. The invasion was far enough in the future that the extra day could be spared. The next problem was that he was not well enough to part with Parkins for four full days—two there and two back. Feeling poorly, as he did, he needed this pair of legs to look after him, and to oversee the volunteer brigade's activities.

He sat considering who to send in his stead. A mad dash from the Bradford household might alert the spies in the neighborhood to the nature of the trip, and cause interference. In particular, he feared the unknown spy who had met the Frenchmen the night before. Having selected Bradford's very doorstep as the invasion spot, it was logical the man was keeping a sharp eye on himself.

But his daughter and her aunt—who would ever suspect two tame ladies of being involved in anything serious? Nothing would be suspected if Miss Bradford should go to visit her friend Lady Harkman for a week. It would be taken for a mere social visit. She must leave immediately to be halfway to Maidstone before anyone knew she was gone. In that way, it was impossible she should be overtaken.

Balls played so small a part in the colonel's life that he was only vaguely aware of the pending ball, did not even realize it was to occur that same evening. Vanessa was called to his chamber for instructions.