The Danbury Scandals (22 page)

‘What are you
doing?’ Adam’s voice seemed to come from a long way off. She whipped round
guiltily to find him watching her with eyes which were bright with fever, but
there was no doubt he was fully conscious. For a moment she did not speak and
they looked at each other with a great chasm of suspicion between them.

‘I’m sorry, my
dear,’ she said, and astonished herself with the calm way she spoke. ‘I was
looking for something to pay
monsieur.
’

‘Give it to
me.’

She bundled
everything together again and handed it to him. Then she said, ‘Excuse me,’ and
fled downstairs and out of the door.

She ran along
the towpath, her mind in such a whirl that she did not know
 
where she was going. That was why he had
refused to give himself up, that was why he made such elaborate plans to escape
and why it was so important to him to remain conscious and in control until
they had gone too far to turn back. He was not an innocent man, unfairly
accused, but a guilty one fleeing from justice. And she had thrown herself at
him and told him she would go with him anywhere! How stupid she had been and
how he must be laughing at her! And Jeannie Clavier too. She stopped suddenly
and sat down on the bank beneath a weeping willow to gather her wits and decide
what to do.

The water was
clear and she could see her own reflection. It looked the same as it always
had, except for the lines of fatigue around the eyes, but it belonged to a
different woman from the one who had owned it twenty-four hours earlier, and
that woman had been different from the girl of six months before. She should
have no compunction about handing him over, but to whom and how? She was in a
foreign land, with no money and no friends and her French was too inadequate to
explain her predicament to anyone. She put her face in her hands and groaned in
anguish.

‘Oh, Adam,
Adam,’ she whispered. ‘How can I love you after this?’

‘Miss.’ It was
the elder of the two fishermen, who had come to find her. ‘The tide is on the
turn and the wind is with us. We must set sail now, if we are to get back to
England tonight.’

England! Should
she ask to go with them? Should she leave Adam to his fate, whatever that was,
and return home? Once the fishermen had left, her last links with her homeland
would be broken and she would be entirely alone. Except for Adam. Did she
really want to turn her back on the man who lay so ill in the inn behind her,
and who, until a moment ago, she had trusted with her life and her future?
Because she had doubts, did that mean she did not love him enough? She had to
get to the bottom of the whole affair if she was ever going to know peace of
mind again, and there was only one way to do that.

‘Have you been
paid?’ she asked, dreading the thought of having to go back to Adam for more
money.

‘Yes, most
generously. If you ever want to return, you have only to send for us.’

‘Thank you,
I’ll remember that.’ She watched the men manoeuvre the boat out into the river,
where the sails picked up the breeze and sent it slowly downstream, then she
took a deep breath to calm the swift beating of her heart and returned to Adam.

The doctor had
left and the patient was sleeping peacefully. Some of the money lay on the
table by the bed, but there was no sign of the documents. His coat had been
hung on a hook behind the door and she wondered if he had left his bed to do
it, or asked someone else to hang it up. Silently, she went to it and felt in
the pocket. It was empty, which could only mean that Adam knew she had
recognised the papers for what they were and had hidden them away. She needed
to know what they contained for her own peace of mind and began a systematic
search of the room, looking for them. She had to give up when Adam became
restless, moving his head from side to side and flinging out his arms.

She hurried
over to the bed and sat on the side of it, taking his hand. ‘Lie still,’ she
whispered. ‘Lie still or you will bleed again.’

Her voice
roused him and he opened his eyes. ‘Maryanne, my faithful Maryanne, still with
me, I see.’

‘Where else
would I be?’ she asked with some asperity, then regretting her sharpness,
added, ‘How do you feel?’

‘Better. You
know, Maryanne, we cannot linger here; our arrival was too conspicuous. I
wonder how often they see an English fishing boat as far inland as this, and
how often a gentleman and his lady disembark, not to mention the gentleman
being wounded. News of that will travel fast, you can be sure.’

‘Surely no one
will follow us to France.’

‘I wish I could
be sure.’ He paused to study her face. ‘Is anything wrong?’

‘Wrong?’ How
difficult it was to behave naturally. ‘What do you mean?’

‘I don’t know,
but you seem tense and afraid, and that’s something you have never shown
before, not even when you were alone in your uncle’s cottage, nor when we were
being shot at; nor, according to the doctor, did you flinch when he dug that
bullet out of me.’

She made an
effort to sound light-hearted. ‘There’s nothing wrong with me that won’t be put
right as soon as you are well again.’

‘Oh, my poor
Maryanne. I’m so sorry, my little one, but you coped well, very well.’

‘I did nothing,
and it was my fault you had so much trouble. You could have escaped unscathed
without me.’

He smiled and
lifted her hand to his lips. ‘I could not have left you behind, my love; you
know too much.’

She jerked her
hand away, as if his touch had burned it, and began straightening the
bedcovers, anything to cover her dismay. ‘I promised the doctor I would see
that you rested, so no more talking. Tomorrow we’ll decide what is to be done.’

‘Very well, but
please rest yourself. I don’t need a nurse and you are not looking at all like
my high-spirited Maryanne.’

It was easy to
convince the innkeeper that she was afraid she might disturb her husband and
that what she needed was a room to herself, and one was soon found for her
along the corridor. She ordered a light meal to be taken there and retired for
the night, hoping that her fatigue would make sure she slept. But again and
again her thoughts echoed his words - ‘you know too much’- as if repetition
would make them go away or mean something different. The trouble was, she knew
nothing, nothing at all, and she would not rest until she found out what was in
those papers. The knowledge might be dangerous, but she had to risk that.

When she went
to him next morning, he seemed much stronger and although he occasionally
grimaced with pain he did not seem to be suffering too much and he was
inordinately cheerful. ‘Ah, Maryanne, my love, I do believe I feel well enough
to travel.’

‘The doctor
said...’

‘Be blowed to
the doctor. I mean to take you home.’

‘Home? Back to
England?’

He smiled and
reached for her hand. ‘You must stop thinking of England as home or you will
never become a real Frenchwoman.
Maman
, you know, forgot she was English
when she married Papa. For her, Challac was home and she never wanted anything
else.’

She smiled
wanly. ‘She had married the man she loved.’

‘Yes.’ He spoke
abruptly and pulled himself into a sitting position. ‘I think the time has come
to...’ He smiled wryly ‘... to put that little matter right. We can be married
before the day is out.’

‘No!’ She spoke
so sharply that he looked up at her in surprise. ‘I mean,’ she added, before he
could comment, ‘let’s wait until you are fully recovered. There is no hurry.’

He grinned.
‘No, I suppose the damage has already been done as far as the world is
concerned. I wonder what they are saying about us in the drawing-rooms of
London.’

He had not said
he loved her; he had not said he wanted to marry her for herself; he had not
said anything at all to put her mind at rest, and yet he must know that she was
troubled by more than what people might be saying about her. She smiled to
herself, remembering the Dowager Duchess; enough scandal for generations, she
had said, and that was before Maryanne had added to it. And for what? For a man
who had held her in his arms once or twice and kissed her, a man who might be a
murderer. It was nothing to smile about. ‘It will be a nine-day wonder,’ she
said. ‘soon forgotten.’

‘By all except
Mark Danbury. He will not forget. And I do not wish him to. He will live to
regret the inconvenience he has put me to.’

‘Inconvenience!’
She threw back her head and laughed. ‘Is that what you call me?’

He grinned and
swung his legs over the side of the bed. ‘I am glad you can laugh about it, my
dear. Now I must dress. Be so good as to see if the coach is coming.’

‘What coach?’

‘The one I
ordered yesterday. If you had not taken it into your head to make a little
excursion on your own, you would have known what the arrangements were. Where
did you go, by the way?’

‘Just for a
walk. I wanted to be by myself for a while.’

‘You were
alone?’

She looked at
him sharply. ‘Of course I was alone. Why do you ask?’

‘I don’t know.
I wondered if you might perhaps have wanted to return with the boat.’

‘Why should I
want to do that?’

‘A change of
mind perhaps.’ He paused. ‘Or a change of heart.’ He sat on the edge of the bed
looking up at her, searching her face. ‘I was right, you are tense. Do you
think I cannot tell when something is wrong with you?’

‘Nothing is
wrong.’

‘Is it because
I subjected you to a rough crossing and being shot at and having to nurse me? I
thought you were made of sterner stuff than that, Maryanne Paynter,’ he said.

‘None of that
would have made the slightest difference if...’ She could not go on.

‘If what? Come
along, tell me. We can’t go on with this between us; it will be unbearable. Do
you want to leave me and go back? I’ll make what arrangements I can, but I
can’t guarantee your safety.’

‘Is that what
you want me to do?’

‘What I want is
of no consequence. I am asking you, once and for all, are you going back or
coming with me?’

‘You are determined
to go, then?’

‘Yes. Are you
coming?’

‘I have no
choice, have I?’

‘My dear
Maryanne, you have always had a choice. You chose to come with me in the first
place, remember?’ He smiled but there was evidence of pain in his dark eyes.
‘Come along, we are wasting time.’

They were saved
further argument by the sound of horses’ hoofs and carriage wheels on the road
below the window. She went to help him dress but he shrugged her off, insisting
she wait for him downstairs.

He followed
soon afterwards, moving slowly and painfully, but he disdained the offer of her
arm and made his own way out to the coach which waited for them at the door. It
had certainly seen better days; its paintwork was scratched, its hood torn and,
what was worse, its springs looked decidedly lop-sided.

‘How far are we
going in that?’ she asked, knowing it would be uncomfortable for someone fit
and well, but for a wounded man it would be excruciatingly painful.

‘To Challac.’
He opened the door and motioned her inside. ‘Five days, a week perhaps more,
who knows?’

‘A week! No,
Adam, you will never survive. Couldn’t you find something a little better
sprung?’

‘Nothing is new
in France these days,’ he said, climbing in beside her and giving the order to
move off. ‘Unless it belongs to a wealthy Englishman. There are plenty of those
lording it about. They are not exactly loved by the French, you know, and we
need to avoid making ourselves conspicuous.’

‘You didn’t
think of that when you dressed in that finery.’ The coach lurched as the wheels
began to turn and she looked at him to see if he was in pain, but if he was he
concealed it well.

‘I had your
support then, or at least your compliance. Sir Peter and Lady Adams, on a
sightseeing tour.’ He sighed and looked down at his clothes. He had discarded
the embroidered waistcoat, which had been too blood-stained to clean, and put
the diamond pin in his pocket, and, although his coat had been cleaned, it was
not what it was when they left Dover. ‘Now it will have to be Adam Saint-Pierre
returning home from the wars and unsure of the welcome he will receive.’

‘Why are you
unsure?’

He smiled. ‘The
people are not always pleased to see the landowners returning to their estates;
too much has happened in the years since the Revolution. They have found a kind
of independence and going back to a life that was little more than serfdom is
something they will resist.’

‘But wise
landowners will not try to turn the clock back, will they?’

He laughed.
‘Tell that to the Bourbons. Louis thinks he can pick up where his brother left
off and ignore the fact that the Republic and Napoleon’s Empire ever existed. I
fear he will learn the hard way.’