“Stupid bitch,” Henri snarled. “You…”
There was a small squashed thud. Henri yelped in pain. More thuds—one, two, three. The table scraped sideways. Something large and soft fell.
No movement. He heard Annique breathing hard, the smallness of it and the contralto gasps uniquely hers.
Planned. She’d planned it all. He crouched, tense as stretched cord, and acknowledged how well he’d been fooled. She’d planned this from start to finish. She’d manipulated both of them with that damned act of hers.
There was a long silence, broken by intriguing rustling sounds and Annique grunting from time to time. Her footsteps, when she walked toward him, were sure and unhesitating. She came in a straight line across the cell as if it were not dark as a tomb.
“What did you do to Henri?” The issue, he thought, had never really been in doubt.
“I hit him upon the head with a sock full of rocks.” She seemed to think it over while she sat down beside him. “At least I am almost sure I hit his head once. I hit him many places. Anyway, he is quiet.”
“Dead?”
“He is breathing. But one can never tell with head wounds. I may have yet another complicated explanation to make to God when I show up at his doorstep, which, considering all things, may be at any moment. I hope I have not killed him, quite, though he undoubtedly deserves it. I will leave that to someone else to do, another day. There are many people who would enjoy killing him. Several dozen I can call to mind at once.”
She baffled him. There was ruthlessness there, but it was a kind of blithe toughness, clean as a fresh wind. He didn’t catch a whiff of the evil that killed men in cold blood, from ambush. He had to keep reminding himself what she was. “You did more than knock him over the head. What was the rest of it, afterwards?”
“You desire the whole report?” She sounded amused. “But you are a spymaster, I think, Englishman. No one else asks such questions so calmly, as if by right. Very well, I shall report to you the whole report—that I have tied Henri up and helped myself to his money. There was an interesting packet of papers in a pocket he may have thought was secret. You may have them if you like. Me, I am no longer in the business of collecting secret papers.”
Her hands patted over him lightly. “I have also found a so-handy stickpin, and if you will lift your pretty iron cuff here. Yes. Just so. Now hold still. I am not a fishwife that I can filet this silly lock while you wriggle about. You will make me regret that I am being noble and saving your life if you do not behave sensibly.”
“I am at your disposal.” He offered his chained wrist. At the same time he reached out and touched her hair, ready to grab her if she tried to leave without freeing him.
She put herself right in his power—a man twice her size, twice her strength, and an enemy. She had to know what her writhing and whispering did to a man. Revenge and anger and lust churned in his body like molten iron. The wonder was it didn’t burn through his skin and set this soft hair on fire.
“Ah. We proceed,” she said in the darkness. “This lock is not so complicated as it pretends to be. We are discussing matters.”
She edged closer and shifted the manacle to a different angle, brushing against his thigh. With every accidental contact, his groin tightened and throbbed. All he could think of was her soft voice saying, “I will oil my body and dance in the firelight.” He was no Henri. He wasn’t going to touch her. But how did he get a picture like that out of his head?
“And…it is done.” The lock fell open.
She made it seem easy. It wasn’t. He rubbed his wrist. “I thank you.”
He stood and stretched to his full height, welcoming the pain of muscles uncramping. Free. Savage exultation flooded him. He was free. He bunched and unbunched his fists, glorying in the surge of power that swept him. He felt like he could take these stones apart with his bare hands. It was dark as the pit of hell and they were twenty feet under a stronghold of the French Secret Police. But the door hung open. He’d get them out of here—Adrian and this remarkable, treacherous woman—or die trying. If they didn’t escape, it would be better for all of them to die in the attempt.
While that woman worked on Adrian’s manacle, he groped his way across the cell to Henri, who was, as she had said, breathing. The Frenchman was tied, hand and foot, with his stockings and gagged with his own cravat. A thorough woman. Checking the bonds was an academic exercise. There was indeed a secret pocket in the jacket. He helped himself to the papers, then tugged Henri’s pants down to his ankles, leaving him half naked.
“What do you busy yourself with?” She’d heard him shifting Henri about. “I find myself inquisitive this evening.”
“I’m giving Henri something to discuss with Leblanc when they next meet.” It might buy them ten minutes while Henri explained his plans for the girl. “I may eventually regret leaving him alive.”
“If we are very lucky, you will have an eventually in which to do so.” There was a final, small, decisive click. “That is your Adrian’s lock open. He cannot walk from here, you know.”
“I’ll carry him. Do you have a plan for getting out of the chateau with an unconscious man and no weapons and half the Secret Police of France upstairs?”
“But certainly. We will not discuss it here, though. Bring your friend and come, please, if you are fond of living.”
He put an arm under Adrian’s good shoulder and hauled him upright. The boy couldn’t stand without help, but he could walk when held up. He was conversing with unseen people in a variety of languages.
“Don’t die on me now, Hawker,” he said. “Don’t you dare die on me.”
Two
“ME, I SHOULD NOT BE PLAYING NURSEMAID TO a couple of English.” The woman shifted to take more of Adrian’s weight. “We go left here, English, if you are set upon coming to this place.”
“It’s the closest church?”
“It is indeed. There is the Church of St. Cloud midway down the hill, of course, which is a more proper church—in daylight you could see the steeple—but the chapel in the orphanage is by far closer, if you do not mind that it is ruined, which I suppose is a matter wholly indifferent to you. It was burned in the Terror. They are all gone now, the nuns and the orphans, to God alone knows where.”
“If it’s the closest church, there’ll be a message.” If he were lucky, his friend Doyle would be waiting for him.
“The English spies in Italy had a similar arrangement. I am all comprehension.”
Night stretched unbroken on every side, lightless, but decent and clean after that cell. He took a deep breath. The possibilities seemed endless, under this sky, breathing this pure, empty chill. They’d come this far. He’d get them all to safety. He’d find a way.
“I do not know why I am helping you. It is an example of disinterested benevolence, this.” He could imagine the resigned shrug. Already he knew her that well. “And therefore doubtless unwise. Ah, we have removed ourselves from the road slightly. We shall edge back. Yes. Thusly. Take care.”
They supported Adrian between them while Annique tapped the path ahead with the broomstick she’d picked up in the chateau garden. She’d saved his life again and again tonight. It was Annique who’d counted out the steps of a complicated route through the maze of the chateau cellars. She’d known the secret of the door hidden in the back of a storage closet. In utter blackness, with assurance a cat would envy, she’d threaded a way past the unseen hazards of the gardens. She found water caught under leaves in a deep stone basin. As long as he lived he’d remember that water. He’d remember Annique cupping water in her hand and holding it to Adrian’s lips before she took a drink herself.
He could never have lifted Adrian over that last wall alone. It had been an endless, agonizing ordeal, accomplished in uncanny silence, while fifty yards away guests came and went on the front steps of the chateau and music of unearthly purity hung in the air like crystal.