“What in hell’s teeth is going on down there?” he demanded angrily. “You wretched urchin! What do you think you’re doing?”
“Trying to wake you up, Brian,” Olivia called sweetly, softly. “I have a message for you from Lord Channing.”
Brian stared at her, recognition slowly dawning. “Olivia!”
“The very same.” She dropped him a mock curtsy made ludicrous by her britches. To her astonishment she was enjoying herself. It was just the way she had felt when she’d put powdered senna in his ale and condemned him to hours of purging on the close-stool.
“Come up here!” he commanded.
Olivia shook her head and laughed at him. “I’m not such a fool, Brian. I’ll see you in the open street. I have a most urgent message from Lord Channing.”
Brian retreated from the window, and Olivia went into the dim cool of the inn’s hallway. She stood listening, her heart thumping. He would come down. He wouldn’t be able to resist.
Everything happened very quickly. She heard a muffled cry, then footsteps on the stairs. Heavy footsteps. Three men went past her, carrying a wrapped shape. They disappeared into the street.
Anthony and Adam came slowly down the stairs.
“All right?” Anthony touched her cheek.
“Yes.”
“You want breakfast or not?” a plaintive voice called from the taproom.
“Yes, but we’re only three now, I’m afraid,” Anthony responded cheerfully. He put an arm around Olivia’s shoulders and urged her ahead of him into the taproom.
Bert looked at the tumbled black hair, the female figure outlined in the tight-fitting britches and jerkin, and thumped three laden plates on the counter without a word.
Chapter Nineteen
On the battlements of Carisbrooke Castle, Colonel Hammond stood and watched the dawn. Behind him two sentries marched their route, back and forth with monotonous rhythm.
“You’re up and about early, Hammond.”
The governor turned at the pleasant tone. “As are you, Lord Granville.”
Cato nodded and came to stand beside him.
“There was quite a fracas out at St. Catherine’s Point last night,” the governor observed. “Those damnable wreckers were about their business but someone stopped them. We got a message from someone not willing to give his name to go and pick up the pieces. We found the beacon and a neat parcel of wounded men waiting for us on the beach.”
“I wonder if Caxton had a hand in it,” Cato mused. “I’ve just had my sergeant’s report on the couple he took into Yarmouth Castle last night. There seems little doubt that Caxton is our man. Turns out he’s both a pirate and a smuggler… has a frigate which he keeps in some secret chine. He knows this coast and the French like the back of his hand.”
“Then we had best pick him up,” Hammond said. He looked around in some annoyance. “I sent for Channing half an hour ago. It’s not like him to delay answering a summons.”
“Perhaps he’s a heavy sleeper,” Cato suggested. “We do face a small problem in picking up Caxton.”
“Oh?”
“We don’t know where to find him,” Cato pointed out gently.
The governor only grunted at this reminder.
“Yarrow mentioned a cove, Puckaster Cove, that he thinks might have some relevance to Caxton’s ship. Rothbury’s gone with some men to take a look. They’ll throw a net over the area and see if they catch anything.”
“If he doesn’t know we suspect him, he might turn up here. He did last night… played whist with the king.”
“I think we need to move the king,” Cato said decisively. “Move him in secret to Newport.”
Hammond looked worried. “I don’t have orders from Parliament,” he pointed out.
“You may consider that you have,” Cato said aridly. “I’m representing Parliament in this matter.”
“You will take responsibility?”
“Haven’t I just said so?”
Hammond bowed his head in acknowledgment. “It might be difficult to move him secretly.”
“We do it now while the island’s still half asleep. Have you visited His Majesty this morning?”
“Not as yet. I don’t usually go in to him until after seven.”
“Well, let us pay him a visit now. Have a closed carriage ready and waiting in the courtyard. We’ll both accompany the king to the barracks in Newport. You’d best send a messenger ahead to have his lodging prepared.” Cato was already moving briskly back along the battlements as he spoke.
The governor hurried after him. “Channing can take the message, but where the devil is the man? You there…” He beckoned a servant, who came running. “Go to Lord Channing’s chamber again. This time make sure he’s awake before you leave. Make sure he answers you.”
The man ran off.
The sentry outside the king’s chamber in the north curtain wall saluted.
“Has His Majesty sent for his valet as yet?”
“Aye, Colonel. He’s with him now.”
Cato knocked imperatively on the door and it was opened by the valet.
“His Majesty is not yet attired to receive visitors, my lord.”
“His Majesty will excuse our intrusion,” Cato said brusquely. He stepped around the valet and bowed to his sovereign. “I give you good morning, Sire.”
The king was in the process of being shaved. He looked at his visitors in some indignation. “What is this?”
“Your Majesty is to be moved to Newport,” Cato said.
The king paled. He wiped soap from his face with a towel and stood up. “I beg your pardon?”
“Parliament’s orders, Sire.” Hammond stepped forward and bowed. “You are to be moved immediately.”
The king’s eyes burned in his white face. It was the end, then. They had been discovered. Within hours of his rescue. His disappointment was so profound he made no attempt to conceal it. He knew it had been his last chance.
“May I ask why?” he demanded when he had mastered himself sufficiently to speak.
“I believe Your Majesty knows why,” Cato said quietly. “You will leave within the hour.”
“I have not yet broken my fast.”
“It is but two miles to Newport, Sire. A meal will await you there.”
The adamant tone was laced with courtesy, but it didn’t disguise the fact that the marquis had given his sovereign an order.
“Granville, you were once loyal,” the king said sadly. “A most loyal friend.”
“I am loyal to my country, Sire, and I would continue to stand your friend,” Cato said in the same quiet voice. “I will leave you to your preparations.” He bowed low and stepped out of the chamber.
Colonel Hammond made his own obeisance and followed. The servant he had sent for Godfrey Channing was waiting in the corridor.
“Lord Channing, sir, he wasn’t in ‘is chamber. His man said his bed ’asn’t been slept in.”
“Good God!” Hammond exclaimed. “How could that be?”
“It seems unlike the man,” Cato observed. “He’s always been most assiduous about his duties. However, it seems we must do without him for the moment. Who else can you send to Newport?”
“Latham. He can keep a still tongue in his head.” The colonel sent the messenger for his other equerry. “D’ye care to break your fast, Granville, while we wait for the king to complete his toilette?”
Brian Morse gazed up into the face of a man he’d never seen before. A man he felt sure he would never wish to see again.
The man knelt beside Brian as he lay bound, swaddled tightly in the thick, heavy folds of a cloak, under a dripping hedge some half mile from the village of Ventnor. Brian had been carried to this spot, his mouth stopped with the folds of the cloak. Three men had carried him as easily as if he were a baby.