The Ravishing of Lady Mary Ware (2 page)

To save Georgina, Roger had again gone to Langenstein. But to get her away from the Schloss had presented a most difficult problem, as the Baron's retainers were under orders to keep a watch on her and prevent her from leaving. Roger had decided that the best chance of doing so was to suggest that they should all go on an expedition to Frankfurt, about which the servants would be told the previous night; then, during the night, to drug the Baron and Lisala. In the morning Georgina would say that her husband and Roger's wife were not going on the expedition after all. Instead, they had gone out early to see the vintagers at work. She and Roger would not then be prevented from driving off in the coach that had been ordered.

But they dared not leave their would-be murderers lying drugged in their beds, for it was certain they would be found there before the escapers could get away. So the question remained of where to hide them. As no-one went
into the
weinstube
until late in the afternoon, they had decided to conceal the unconscious Baron and Lisala in one of the big presses.

The plan had worked, except that when Roger had forced the coachman to turn the coach about and drive in the direction of Coblenz instead of Frankfurt, a footman had jumped off the back of the vehicle and run up to the Schloss to tell the Baron's steward what had occurred. The Baron's men had pursued them, but they had managed to get away. Had they remained on the Prussian side of the Rhine, the Baron could have had Roger arrested for carrying off Georgina; but, by crossing the river at Coblenz, they had entered French territory, so could consider themselves safe from his fury when he had sufficiently recovered to realise how he had been fooled.

Roger had had no means of assessing the power of the drug which he and Georgina had forced von Haugwitz and Lisala to swallow at pistol point; but he had quite reasonably assumed that its effect would wear off in twelve hours, so they should have come to soon after midday or, in any case, well before the vintagers came to the
weinstube
for the evening pressing. But evidently it had proved more potent than he had expected. That it had resulted in their deaths did not distress him. Even had he deliberately killed them, it would not have weighed heavily on his conscience, for both were given over to every form of evil and would, in due course, have brought pain and grief to many other people. So it was well that they were dead. Moreover, their deaths had altered immensely for the better the prospects of Georgina and himself.

Not only was he now free from Lisala for good and all. Had she continued to live, it was certain that, within a week or so, she would be back in Vienna, and revenged herself by denouncing him as an English secret agent.
So securely had he established himself over many years as a distinguished French officer that, at first, few people would have believed her. But, on returning from Brazil, she had spent some time with him in London. In consequence she knew so much about his English connections that it needed only for her statements to be checked by a French agent for them to become proven facts. That would have put an end for good to his activities as
Colonel le Baron de Breuc
; and, when the Emperor realised for how long he had been fooled, his fury would have known no bounds. Roger would have become a hunted fugitive in a Europe swarming with Napoleon's secret police.

Georgina, too, was no longer the wife of a husband whom she detested, and from whom she might have had great difficulty in freeing herself. Being English-born, she could expect no sympathy from the French, and her late husband's brother was Chief Minister of Prussia. His influence was great enough to have had her hunted throughout the French-dominated Continent and, if caught, sent back to her husband.

After the desperate anxieties of the past week, they had spent the previous day at the inn, quietly recovering. During that time they had discussed the future as it then appeared to them. In view of Lisala's almost certain denunciation of him, it was essential that Roger should not be recognised by one of the many hundred French officers with whom he was acquainted, and his whereabouts become known. As a first precaution, before arriving at the inn he had removed his rank badges, decorations and A.D.C.'s sash, and given their names as Captain and Madame Bonthon. As soon as he could, he intended to procure civilian clothes and get rid of his uniform; then make his way with Georgina by little-used roads from the Rhineland to Pressburg in Austria.

Ultimately, they were both anxious to get back to England—Roger to escape Napoleon's police, and Georgina to rejoin young Charles, her dearly-loved son by her second husband, the Earl of St. Ermins. But, although Roger had had himself smuggled many times across the Channel and the North Sea, he doubted his ability to do so with a woman companion, and was greatly averse to exposing her to such a risk.

An alternative occurred to him, owing to the fact that no great while since Georgina had had a brief but passionate affair with the Archduke John, youngest brother of the Emperor Francis of Austria. Hostilities in the war of the Third Coalition had temporarily ceased in July by France and Austria agreeing an armistice, which still continued. Meanwhile, Austria maintained diplomatic relations with her ally, Britain. Therefore, the Archduke was in a position to secure Georgina's safe passage to England, escorted by a diplomatic courier. So it had been decided that Roger should take her to the Austrian headquarters at Pressburg and, having handed her over to the Archduke, make his own way home.

They were now re-discussing the matter. Having laid aside the news sheet that gave them the welcome tidings that their marriages were at an end, Roger said:

‘For me this means that I no longer have to go into hiding from the French; but for you, my sweet, it makes only the difference that I can escort you openly to Pressburg, so be certain of getting you there safely and more swiftly. The good offices of your dear friend John remain the best method of conveying you back to England.'

Georgina nodded, her dark curls stirring slightly on either side of her rosy cheeks. ‘I think you right; though I regret that our parting should now be the sooner. I had looked forward to our making a long, circuitous journey together, with a spice of danger and many joyous nights spent at wayside inns. But what of yourself? Now that
you no longer have anything to fear, do you intend to rejoin the Emperor?'

‘That depends on yourself,' he replied, his bright blue eyes holding hers intently. ‘Do you at long last agree to marry me, wild horses will not stop me from joining you in England with all speed imaginable.'

‘Oh, Roger!' she protested. ‘We have talked of this so often through the years, and always reached the same conclusion. Our joy in sleeping together has never lessened since we first became lovers as boy and girl. But solely because fate decreed that we could share a bed only for brief periods, at long intervals. You have ever been the dearest person in my life, and so will ever remain; but had we married, our mutual passion would long since have waned, and we'd be no more than a humdrum couple approaching middle age.'

‘Ah, but that is just the point! I grant you that with our virile natures and lust for life, had we married when young we might, after a few years, have become satiated with each other and sought pastures new, or thwarted our instincts and settled into a dreary, joyless domesticity. But we are older now. Both of us have sown our wild oats, and far more abundantly than most. To my daughter, Susan, you have for many years played the part of a sweet and devoted mother. But your boy, Charles, needs a father to bring him up, and who better than myself? 'Tis time that we put casual lechery behind us and entered on the quieter joys of life.'

For a long time Georgina was silent, then she said, ‘You are right that Charles needs a father. How wrong I was to imagine that brute, Ulrich, would fill the role. And no-one could make a proper man of Charles more surely than yourself. I agree, too, that I have had my fill of lovers. How lucky I've been in that: a score or more of men, all handsome and distinguished. But now I feel the time has come when I could be a faithful wife. I make no
promise, Roger dear; but before we part at Pressburg I'll think seriously on it.'

‘Bless you for that, my love,' he smiled, as he refilled her glass with the golden wine.

When she had drunk, she asked, ‘Should I decide against letting you make an honest woman of me—what then?'

He shrugged. ‘I hardly know. I've been monstrous fortunate in that, during seventeen years of war, I have had many narrow escapes from death. But, on the law of averages, such luck cannot last indefinitely, and I'm much averse to throwing my life away on yet another of the Emperor's battlefields. On the other hand, I am much tempted to stay on with him, so that I may witness the final act of the drama he has brought upon the world.'

‘Meseems then that, should you survive, by the time you come tottering home the grey hair above your ears that now gives you such a dashing look will have spread to cover your whole head. England will never make peace with Bonaparte, and he is now more powerful than ever before.'

‘Most people suppose so. And with some reason, as his word is now law from southern Italy to the Baltic Sea and, except for severely wounded Austria, from the Atlantic coast to the borders of Turkey. Russia alone on the Continent of Europe retains her independence; but she is his ally. So, on the face of things, it does now appear that his position is impregnable. Yet it is well said that “all is not gold that glitters.”

‘No man is more greatly hated. There is not one of that horde of subject Kings and Princes who fawn upon him wherever he holds his Court who would not, given half a chance, knife him in the back. For the moment they are tied to his chariot wheels and forced to send their troops to fight and die in his campaigns, because all the fortresses in their countries are garrisoned by French
troops. Moreover, his demands on them for contributions to his war chest are insatiable. He is sucking their countries dry. A time must come when their people will revolt against this terrible drain upon their manhood and the intolerable burden of taxation.

‘That has already happened in Spain, and it will in other countries. Enormous as his army is, he'll not have enough troops to hold them all down. This vast Empire he has created is a house built on sand. Does he make one false move, and it will collapse about his ears.

‘He is, too, not only faced with this danger from without, but also a swiftly-growing canker in the very heart of his Empire. His personal magnetism is immense, so that whenever he appears, his own people are still hypnotised into giving him a great ovation. But no sooner has he turned his back than they now curse him below their breath. There is not a family in France that has not lost a father, a husband or a son in his wars. In every city, town and village, one cannot walk a hundred yards without seeing an ex-soldier who has lost an arm, a leg, or is blind. He has bled the manhood of France white, and is now scraping the bottom of the barrel by calling to the colours boys of sixteen.

‘Time was when, as the Paladin of the Revolution and new Freedom, he was defending France from invasion. Then the people gloried in his victories; but, in recent years, they have come to realise that all the terrible sacrifices they are making can bring no benefit to France, and that the wars he wages are solely for his own aggrandisement. Even his own troops are losing faith in him. Europe now swarms with French deserters. They can be numbered by tens of thousands.'

Roger paused for a moment to finish his wine, then went on, ‘And that is not all. Realising the desperate straits to which he has reduced their nation, many of his most trusted lieutenants have secretly turned against him.
All but a few of his Marshals are utterly sickened by his endless wars. They long for peace, so that they may return to France, live on the great estates he has given them and enjoy the vast fortunes they have acquired by looting the wealth of a dozen countries. Given a lead, they would betray him.

‘And that lead will come. The two most powerful men in France are Talleyrand and Fouché. As you well know, the former has been my close friend since my first years in France, while the latter, who at one time was my most bitter enemy, agreed with me to let bygones be bygones at the time of
Brumaire
. Up till that time they, too, were enemies; but it was I who brought them together and, between them, it was they who made possible the success of the
coup d'état
that raised Bonaparte to First Consul and Dictator. Now, as they have both told me, they are again leagued together, and have vowed to bring Napoleon down.'

Roger had been so engrossed in what he was saying and Georgina in listening to him, that neither of them had consciously heeded the clatter on the pavé of a number of rapidly approaching horses. A moment later a small cavalcade came into view. It consisted of a large travelling coach escorted by a troop of French Hussars.

The coach came to a halt in front of the low terrace of the inn, immediately opposite the place where Roger and Georgina were sitting. The door swung open, and a tall, lean officer jumped out. He was clad in the resplendent uniform of a Marshal of the Empire. Above the gleaming black, gold-tasselled Hessian boots and white doeskin breeches, the blue tail coat was heavily embellished with gold braid. His chest was a blaze of diamond-studded decorations. Above his hawk-like face his cocked hat carried waving ostrich feathers a foot high. As he glanced up, Roger instantly recognised him as Pierre Augereau, Duc de Castiglione.

Recognition was mutual. Staring at Roger in amazement, the Marshal exclaimed:

‘Blood of my guts! What in the devil's name are you doing here, Breuc, taking your ease with your woman? Why are you not making the ground fly beneath a horse's hooves? Do you not realise that the authorities are after you for murder?'

Roger had come to his feet. Staring down at the tall Marshal, he exclaimed, ‘Murder! I have committed no murder.'