Mademoiselle At Arms (20 page)

‘You do not use your head, Emile,’ she said flatly.

‘How so?’ he asked, and she noted that he allowed his pistol
to dangle a little from his fingers. So confident, Emile?

‘You fire the gun and you make one big noise. Immediately the
soldiers of the major will come from the gate. They will find me dead, yes. But
they will also find you. And this is not France, you understand. You cannot do
a murder and expect that you will not be punished.
En tout cas
, Gérard
will very likely kill you before the hangman has the chance.’

‘Why should Gérard care?’ sneered Gosse.

‘Because he knows you for an imposter,’ Melusine flashed. She
pointed suddenly at the portrait. ‘Moreover, no one will believe any more that
Yolande is me when they see this.’

Gosse’s eyes went to the portrait, and evidently took in the
uncanny resemblance, looking from it to Melusine and back again. A snarl
contorted his features, and he marched up to it, laying his pistol down on the
marquetry table so that his hands were free to grab the picture off the wall.

Melusine seized her chance. Turning, she flew for the nearest
door. She had just managed to reach it, grabbing for the handle, when the enemy’s
cracked command halted her.

‘Stand where you are, or I shoot!’

Like lightning, thoughts zipped through her mind. He might
miss at this distance. He had not had time to aim the pistol. If she kept on,
would she make it out of the door? Then what? He could come after her before
she could reach the secret passage. She dare not risk it.

Keeping hold of the doorhandle, she turned slowly. The
decision had been sound. Gosse had moved forward, his pistol arm out straight,
his aim true, the gun cocked. The picture of Mary Remenham was still on the
wall.

‘Very wise,’ he commented, slightly relaxing his arm. He
laughed lightly. ‘Do you know, Mademoiselle Charvill, you are a thought too
clever for your own good.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You must be got rid of, that is seen. And this damning
evidence―’ with a brusque gesture at the portrait ‘―must also be
destroyed. But to draw the attention of the
milice
, no, that is not at
all desirable.’

Dieu du ciel
, but she was a fool. Now
he would take her away from the house before killing her, and no one would find
her body at all. But at least it gave her more time.

Gosse was backing towards the table. His eyes on Melusine, he
uncocked the pistol, and then reached out to the portrait, grasping it by one
edge. He grunted a little with effort, and she realised the gilt frame must be
heavy. It dropped sideways and fell with a bang to the table. But in a moment,
it was tucked under his arm and, raising the pistol again, he gestured towards
the door opposite the one where Melusine stood.

‘That way. Move.’

Melusine hesitated. What could she do? Reluctantly, at a
second curt command, she began to step across the uncarpeted floor, her eyes
never leaving the threatening pistol. Gosse took a step or two towards the
centre of the room.

All of a sudden, there was movement behind him. Melusine’s
eyes shifted. The door leading to the front of the house was stealthily opening.
Her heartbeat quickened. Who? Could it be Gerald? Quickly, she looked back at
Gosse’s face, and found him frowning. Her steps slowed.

In the periphery of her vision, she saw the door pulled back.
A black-garbed figure crept forward, noiselessly, towards Gosse’s back. Jack!
Mon
dieu
, but he was unarmed. She must not show anything. The flicker of an
eyelash might betray his presence. Her mouth dry, she made her feet walk on,
not daring to utter a word.

As Melusine approached the door, she saw Kimble speed up. Her
heart in her mouth, she heard his foot scrape on the floorboard and knew from
his expression that Gosse had heard it too. She saw his finger pull back on the
hammer of the gun and shrieked a warning just as Jack launched himself forward
and Gosse turned and fired.

The deafening report froze time. As in a dream, Melusine saw
her faithful footman struck, his headlong progress checked. His hands came up,
his face broke apart. He reeled, and crashed to the floor.

For an instant in the silence that
followed, shocked into immobility, Melusine stared in horror at the body lying
there so still. Then a surge of rage welled up.

‘
Espéce de diable
,’ she screamed.

Running to Gosse, she seized the portrait from his hand and lashed
out, taking him off guard, so that he staggered back and fell against the card
table. Following him, and acting out of instinct rather than intent, Melusine
took a firm grasp of the gilt frame with both hands, lifted it high in the air
and, with a shrieking curse, brought it down hard.

There was a tearing sound as the canvas gave way, and the
precious portrait ripped apart as the top of the Frenchman’s head came through
it. Gosse sagged under the impact, knocking over the card table, and falling to
sit, half stunned, the discharged pistol flying from his slackened grasp.

Satisfied he was immobilised for the moment, Melusine fell to
her knees beside Jack, dragging at his suddenly heavy body to turn it on its
back.

‘Oh,
mon dieu
. Jacques, Jacques!’

His face was white, but his eyes were open, if a trifle
glazed. He groaned, much to Melusine’s relief.

‘Jacques, where are you hurt?’

But as she asked the question, she saw the wound. It was at
his side below the breast, hidden by the dark colour of his close-fitting
jacket. Melusine ripped at the buttons of the garment, dragging it open and
away, and gasped at the massive red stain on his shirt.

She glanced at the Frenchman, and found him struggling with
the portrait that was embedded around his scalp. All at once she became aware
of sounds outside. Furious shouting, and the thunder of running feet.

The soldiers! They must not find her here. Nor Jacques.
Better they should find the so-called Valade. They would arrest him for the
French spy they had thought her at first. What better way to be rid of him?

‘Jacques,’ she uttered urgently. ‘Quickly! You must get up.
We will go to the passage and then I shall bind you. Come,
mon ami
,
come!’

Ever faithful, Kimble dragged himself into a sitting
position, gasping at the pain this caused him.

‘
Parbleu
, the bullet is still inside you,’ Melusine
guessed, remembering how the Mother Abbess had diagnosed Leonardo’s suffering
when he had first come to the convent.

She looked round wildly, as if seeking some source of help,
as the boots halted at the front door and the shouting intensified.

But there was only Gosse, still struggling with the picture,
looking dazedly towards Melusine and the lad he had shot, then away towards the
sounds of pursuit, and back again.

‘Do not think—’ he panted, ‘that I am finished—with you,
mademoiselle.’

‘Let’s...go...while we can,’ Kimble managed, and dragged
himself onto his knees.

Melusine got to her feet and, tucking her shoulder under his
arm on the uninjured side, put her arm about him to hold his waist, and thus
contrived to take most of his weight. Together they made their painful way to
the door, not even checking, in the effort this cost both, on what Gosse might
be doing.

Once they were on the move, Kimble seemed to find strength
from somewhere. ‘I’ll make it, miss. Hurry...before them soldiers...get in. The
panel in the bookcase...it’s open.’

They passed through a little antechamber, and Melusine sighed
with relief as she entered the library next door. Activity in the hall
intensified. The militia were in already. They must have a key. She hurried
with Jack as fast as she could to the open door to the passage. The lantern was
on the ground inside, ready. She let Jack go as he passed through the opening.
He went in and leaned, panting, against one wall.

Melusine came in, picked up the lantern, and heard the
library door bang open just as the panel clicked closed behind her.

‘Come, Jacques,
mon pauvre
,’ she uttered, and reached
for the lad again, hardly aware of the muted sounds of running feet and much
banging and crashing beyond the secret door.

She helped Jack to sit down, and dragged the jacket off him,
lifting his shirt to expose the gash that had sliced across his side. Using the
shirt, she cleaned away the blood. It was not as bad a wound as she had at
first thought, and the blood was only oozing now. Melusine sighed with relief
and set to work by the light of the lantern.

Jack seemed glad enough to rest, his back against the wall,
and closed his eyes. Melusine ripped strips off her under-petticoats and
fashioned a pad, which she bandaged as tightly as she could over the wound,
working swiftly, unperturbed by the gore. She had not nursed Leonardo for weeks
for nothing. The nuns had no regard for the sensibilities of a “lady” and
expected Melusine—for it was her allotted task—to clean and tend the soldier’s
wounds even when they festered.

While she worked, Melusine worried over the problem of
getting Jack home. First the passage to be negotiated. Then a ride to London on horseback. Could she hold him and manage the reins? If only Gerald had not gone.
No, this was
imbecile
. She had begun alone. She would end alone.
Voilà
tout
.

‘Up, Jacques, up,’ she ordered.

Her faithful servant struggled, with her assistance, to rise.
Melusine’s heart ached for him, but she had to force him on.

There was barely room for one, let alone two, in the passage,
and Melusine ended up backwards, supporting Jack as best she could as he stumbled
along, grasping the rough walls on either side with both hands.

Melusine cursed herself for his injury. Cursed him for his
devotion that had made him come back for her, only to get himself shot by the
fiendish Gosse. And where was that devil? Had the soldiers found him? She could
not think he had escaped, for she had only just made it into the passage as
they entered the library. Unless—would he hide from them as he had hidden from
her? It was a big house, he said. Catch him, she begged silently.

All at once she realised that Kimble had halted, leaning
heavily against the wall.

‘Jacques?’

‘No...good, miss. I can’t...’

He slid slowly down and collapsed to the stone floor,
fainting dead away.

‘Jacques!’

Melusine dropped to her haunches beside his inert form,
feeling for the wound. It was bleeding again. She tightened her bandage and sat
back, biting her lip. They could not go on. Tears sprang to her eyes. What a
pig she was. If Jack should die, all though her fault, she could never forgive
herself.

She put a hand to the lad’s cold cheek and choked on a sob.
‘Jacques, do not die while I am gone.’

Grasping the lantern, and heedless now of the discomforts of
the passage, Melusine flew like the wind back towards the library, the vision
of Jack Kimble’s white face driving her on. Reaching the panel, she was able
with the aid of her lantern to find the lever at once. Her heart full of dread,
she dragged on it.

As the secret door opened, the sounds within the house came
at once to her ears: the tramping of feet above, and the hoarse voices echoing
through the mansion. Leaving the panel wide, Melusine dashed to the library
door and flung it open, racing into the hall.

‘You, soldiers,’ she yelled. ‘To me, quickly!’

There was a brief hush, and then the shouts resumed and
several pairs of feet clattered towards her from, as it seemed, several
directions. A militiaman came belting down the stairs, another leapt from
outside the front door, and a third, stalwart and stolid, came in through the
door that led to the rooms to the front of the house. Melusine recognised the
burly form of Captain Roding’s sergeant.

‘Ha! It’s you, is it?’ He threw a glance at his two juniors.
‘Cover her, men. That Frenchie, that’s who she is.’

Relief flooded Melusine. ‘You are the one that I have met in London.’

‘That’s right,’ agreed the militiaman, coming forward to
stand before her. ‘Sergeant Trodger is who I am. Now then, missie—’

‘
Bon
,’ said Melusine, interrupting him without
ceremony, and paying no attention to the muskets that were pointing at her from
two directions. ‘I am glad it is you, because you can help me.’

‘That depends, that does,’ said Trodger guardedly. ‘Now then,
where did you spring from?’

‘Do not concern yourself from where I come,’ Melusine snapped.
‘More important is that you help me instantly, as even your
capitaine
would command.’

‘Capting Roding wouldn’t never command me to help no
Frenchie,’ said the sergeant positively.

‘
Parbleu
, you waste time. Certainly your major—’

‘Ah, now that’s just it, missie. According to what I’ve
heard, you oughtn’t to be here. Major said you’d gorn.’