In fact he and Louis would be cleared completely if the gendarmes accepted that whatever Stafford was doing had nothing to do with his employer or Louis. Let's see what happens, Ramage thought. For the moment I remain the Italian shipbuilder outraged that he should be lodged in jail for the night . . . All that gaunt-faced policeman knows is that my foreman was in someone else's room: no one has challenged my story that I was asleep at the time. With a bit of luck they'll release me tomorrow with suitable apologies!
Ramage thought of asking to be allowed to write to his own country's ambassador in Paris protesting at his arrest, but he remembered, just in time, that the Republic of Genoa, whence he allegedly came, was now Bonaparte's Ligurian Republic. Then the officer, who had been staring at the top of his desk for several moments, looked up.
'If he was trying to seduce her with her consent,' he said coldly, his voice sounding to Ramage like that of every outraged father or cuckolded husband, 'why did she scream?'
Ramage shrugged his shoulders expressively. 'How should I know? Perhaps she changed her mind.'
'She is in love with the lieutenant,' the officer said doggedly. 'It is impossible that she went to the room to meet your foreman.'
'Very well,' Ramage said in a bored voice, 'she had an assignation with the lieutenant in his room. Clearly not a very virtuous young lady, eh?'
'She did not have an assignation with the lieutenant in his room,' the officer said angrily, his right eye winking and his shoulder jerking.
'What was she doing in the room, then? Meeting my foreman instead?'
'She had written a note for the lieutenant and was leaving it in his room. Where is your foreman now?' Again the wink and shoulder twitch.
'I don't know,' Ramage said impatiently. 'Perhaps he has an assignation with the young lady's mother - have you inquired? '
It must be midnight by now. Had Louis managed to get that damned loaf to the courier? If Ramage could be sure that the report - he found himself trying to avoid even thinking of the name Bruix, as if the police officer might read his thoughts - reached Jackson on board the Marie, it would make it worthwhile. What worthwhile, he found himself asking. Stop thinking in euphemisms. If I know that my copy of Vice-Admiral Bruix's report on the state of the Flotille de Grande Espèce has reached Vice-Admiral Lord Nelson safely, then tipping over on the bascule, and staring down into the basket which will catch my head a fraction of a second after the guillotine blade lops it off, will be a little easier to bear.
It must be easier to die when you know you have achieved something. On the average, Ramage had gone into action four times a year, for the past three years, never expecting to come out of it alive. There had been a good chance that a French or Spanish roundshot would knock his head off or - involuntarily he reached up and rubbed the scars on the right side of his brow - he would be cut down by a cutlass or skewered on a boarding-pike.
For Lieutenant Ramage, there was no difference between having his head knocked off by roundshot or lopped off by guillotine. Yet, in a bizarre sort of way, there was. If the copy of Bruix's dispatch reached Lord Nelson safely, there could be nothing more in his career (even if he lived to become an admiral) that could match it in importance. The sort of things that involved the risk of having your head knocked off by a roundshot were relatively triviaclass="underline" it is only when you play for the very highest stakes that you risk 'marrying the Widow.'
The officer was staring at him and when he caught Ramage's eye he asked curiously: 'What were you thinking about?'
‘That if my foreman did have an assignation with the landlord's daughter, I envied him. Pretty girl - have you seen her?'
The officer flushed, a redness that stained his lined and wrinkled face like wine soaking through lasagna, and Ramage realized that the man must have been speculating about her.
'The other man you were with - the Frenchman: who is he?'
'You mean to say you don't know?' Ramage was scornful.
'Why should I?' the officer asked defensively.
'One of your ministries sent him along to spy on me wherever I go, that's all I know!' As soon as he saw the officer nodding, as though the information was credible, Ramage decided to embellish it. 'I can tell you, I've had enough of his company. "Won't you have another bottle of wine, M'sieur?" he says ... And I have half a glass and he finishes the whole bottle. Who pays, eh? I do. Liqueurs - you tell me why all the liqueurs go on my bill? And the brandy -Mama mia, how much that man can drink! I pay for it, every drop. Not -' Ramage added hastily, as though suddenly nervous, 'that I'm saying anything against him, you understand.'
The police officer nodded sympathetically. 'He was sent from Paris, no doubt.'
'Yes, he joined me in Paris after my visit to Boulogne was arranged.'
Nothing said about Louis up to now could incriminate either of them. This local police officer might accept that Louis was working for some ministry or committee - he would be used in secrecy - without checking up. He might well think that arresting a foreigner who was being supervised by the employee of a ministry or committee would leave him open to an accusation of interfering ... it was a faint hope.
'Where is he, anyway?' Ramage asked crossly. 'Let him speak for himself - he's always very secretive, although he keeps a sharp enough watch on me.'
'Probably writing a report on this affair for his superiors,' the officer said. 'I expect he'll be in to see me later.'
'Well,' Ramage said calmly, 'he can tell you all about everything, so there's no need for me to stay. You'll find me at the hotel.'
He had not walked two paces before the officer was shouting. Ramage turned to find himself covered by the pistols of the two gendarmes.
'You are going to a cell!' the officer said angrily. He pulled a large book towards him, a book that reminded Ramage of a ledger in a counting-house. 'Now, I want your full name and address, and all the details of why you are in France . . .'
The cell was square, five paces along one side and five paces along the other. It had a chill of its own, something which had nothing to do with the outside temperature, for it was a warm night. Ramage only saw the inside for a brief moment, in the light of the guard's lantern, before being pushed in and having the door slammed behind him. As his eyes became accustomed to the darkness he saw that there was a single small window high in one wall, and although it was barely large enough for a man to put his head through, there were iron bars.
He had seen a low wooden cot but in the darkness misjudged the distance, finding it by banging his shin painfully on a comer. A moment later he kicked over a bucket, and from the smell guessed its purpose. There was a thin palliasse of sacking and straw on the cot, and he thought momentarily of all the bedbugs lurking in there, waiting for the majesty of French law to provide them with their next meal.
He sat down on the cot and realized how tired he was. The strain of the last hour had drained his energy, and he hoped he was tired enough to drop off to sleep quickly, instead of finding his mind invaded by a dozen worries which tightened his muscles and chased sleep away. Having already been caught once in his nightshirt he decided that undressing would be confined to his boots.