Ebb tide

'God's bones, I had no idea...'

'You see, the fact that she was an intimate of the Neys, and I knew she was the widow of a disgraced officer, Edouard Santhonax, yet had a pension for services to Great Britain, led me to conclude that her past was as complex as my own, beset by divided loyalties and so forth.' Edward rubbed a hand over his sweating chin. 'I suppose it gave us something in common; we were both what used to be called, with disparagement, "adventurers".'

'So you told her you were my brother?' Drinkwater asked, frowning.

'Yes, eventually. When Napoleon escaped from Elba and Paris was in an uproar. Friendships that seemed to cement the new order of the restored Bourbons dissolved overnight. Everyone seemed compromised, some more than others. There will have been no shortage of informers to jostle the petitioners at Napoleon's new court. Ney rode south to bring back Bonaparte in an iron cage and promptly went over to his old master. As for me, I was now a Russian living in a city which was set fair to turn hostile, and Hortense was among the tainted. In addition the Baroness arrived, her husband dead, her own fortunes overturned. She was now in the same position as her once despised sister-in-law. Hortense was fond of her brother's children. She had had none of her own...'

'I never thought of her as a matron ...'

'She was not all ambition, you know, but she was brave and resourceful.'

'She suggested you contacted me, I suppose.'

Edward nodded. 'Yes. She regarded you as a person of some influence. I had no idea whether you were an admiral, but from our last meeting I recalled you were engaged in matters usually outside the competence of a common captain in the Royal Navy. Hortense knew that you and a certain peer were involved in clandestine activities, so naturally you seemed the only person we could turn to. This was as clear to me as to her, but over this fortuitous circumstance lay the foolish actions of my youth. I had compromised you fatally. I had to tell her we were related, and why I could not come directly. She was astonished, of course,' he said with a wan smile, 'and at first refused to believe that I could possibly be your brother. I think she thought the claim an extravagant attempt on my part to impress her, but she eventually saw the folly of that and I was able to persuade her by revealing the few facts I knew about you.' He sighed, then added, 'She knew you a long time ago, I gather.'

'I rescued her from the revolutionaries — oh, years ago — just as it appears I must do again with this Baroness of yours.'

'Nat...' Edward leaned forward, his face earnest, his voice very low. Grasping his brother's wrist he said, 'I have not forgotten the great debt I owe you for helping me escape the gallows...'

'You escaped justice, by God!'

'Maybe. But the rescue of the Baroness and her children is something in reparation.'

'A noble expiation', Drinkwater said with heavy irony, 'which you have already alluded to, but somewhat dependent upon the charity of your over-burdened kin.'

'And I have lost Hortense ...'

'Perhaps we have both lost her.'

Edward frowned. 'You were never her lover...'

'Is that a question or a statement? But no, I never was,' Drinkwater said hurriedly. He paused a moment, then asked, 'Hortense was not the only woman in your life. Have you not left a wife in Russia?'

Edward shook his head. 'A mistress, yes, in fact two, both married. But I am not the complete smell-smock you think me.'

Drinkwater smiled. '"Smell-smock", now there's an expression that betrays how long it is since you spoke English.' He sighed. 'Well, it is good to see you again. Our last meeting in Tilsit was, you will recall, dangerous enough...'

'Look, Nat...'

'For God's sake, do not relax your guard! Stop calling me that, or 'twill slip out!' Drinkwater snapped. 'I have a great deal...'

'I realize what you have done ... Look, I have no intention of being anything other than a Russian officer. I can arrive in England as a Russian officer protecting the Baroness. I can spend the rest of my life speaking French. I can retire as the Baroness's protector, if she wishes, and live somewhere quietly. God knows I've endured my own share of frozen bivouacs! This might not quite equate to your cumulative privations, but I do not think there is a soul alive who would recognize Ned Drinkwater, do you?'

Drinkwater looked at his brother. 'How did you get that?' he asked, indicating his own nose. 'A sabre cut?'

Edward nodded. 'On the field of Borodino. A cuirassier of the 9th Regiment, They carried the Raevsky redoubt at the point of the sword. It was my misfortune to have borne a message into the place about thirty seconds before they arrived!'

Drinkwater rose and drew out a bottle and glasses from the locker. 'You will not know that it was Hortense's husband who tried to frustrate my return from Tilsit with the intelligence you obtained for us.' 'That is not possible!' 'And I killed him,' Drinkwater added. 'Mon Dieu!' Edward sat back, clearly astonished. 'I think', Drinkwater said slowly, handing Edward a glass, 'that your services at Tilsit might buy you immunity for your crime.'

Edward shrugged. 'Perhaps, but I should not wish to put the matter to the test. It would still cloud your own reputation. Aiding and abetting...'

'Yes, yes,' Drinkwater interrupted testily, 'those two words haunt me to this day.' He tossed off his own glass and rose to stand swaying in the cabin as Kestrel stood out to sea.

'I can stay Russian,' Edward almost pleaded. Drinkwater paused and the two men stared at each other in the shadowy cabin. 'What damned curious lives we have led,' Edward added reflectively.

'What damned curious times we have lived through,' Drinkwater replied. 

'D'you remember what Mother used to say?' 'No, what in particular?'

'That "a friend is a friend at all times, but a brother is born for adversity".'

'Am I supposed to find that consoling? If so I find it confoundedly cold comfort. We are about to stick our heads into a noose, Colonel. By demonstrating so conspicuously outside Calais last night and this morning, in order that somehow you should be made aware of our presence, we have alerted the authorities very effectively. Now we must turn back and make a landing. I presume this Baroness and her children are in Calais itself?'

'No, at a small farm outside. You will need to get ashore to the east of the port if you don't wish to pass through Calais itself.'

'I certainly have no wish to do that. On an open beach, in an onshore wind, with a single small boat. You certainly were born for adversity, Colonel.' And with that Drinkwater left his brother with the bottle, the bucket and his thoughts, making his way on deck to try to put his own in order.