A Valentine Wedding (32 page)

“Aye,” Jemmy said shortly. He led the way up the back stairs and turned unerringly down the corridor leading to the front of the inn. At Alasdair’s door, he paused, his hand on the latch. Then tentatively he knocked. There was no reply. He knocked again. Still no answer.

“Reckon you’ll be disturbin’ ’is beauty sleep,” Sam offered helpfully.

Jemmy didn’t respond to this obvious fact. He raised the latch and pushed the door open. The chamber was empty, the bed unslept in. Jemmy scratched
his head. “I’d swear it was this’un. I was in ‘ere this evenin’ when the master was dressin’ fer dinner. He give me me orders fer the mornin’.”

“Well, he ain’t ’ere now,” Sam declared with another yawn. “I’m fer me bed.” He turned to leave, then stopped. “Eh, what was that, then?”

Jemmy had heard it too. A faint moan from the other side of the wall. He stood stock-still, head cocked toward the wall. It came again.

The two men exchanged a look, then with one mind raced from the room to the door to the neighboring chamber. The door was not properly closed and swung open with a slight push.

“Lord-a-mercy!” Jemmy exclaimed, dropping to his knees beside the crumpled figure. “Lord-a-mercy.”

Sam bent over Alasdair, pressing his finger to the carotid artery. “ ‘E’s alive,” he said. “Saints alive! Whoever did this knew what they were adoin’.” He examined Alasdair’s body with a degree almost of respect as one who had had experience of the finer points of beating a man to a pulp.

Jemmy gave a grunt of disgust. He stood up and fetched the jug of water from the washstand. “I ’ates to do it,” he muttered, “but ’e needs to come back.” He dashed the contents of the jug into Alasdair’s face.

Alasdair came to. He turned his head sideways and vomited in agonizing misery, waves of nausea coursing through him as his excruciated body returned to full awareness.

“Eh, sir, easy now.” Jemmy held his head until the sickness receded. “Lie still while we see what the damage is.” He laid his head gently down again.

Alasdair closed his eyes. His mind was a blank; he was aware of nothing but pain. And then gradually
memory returned. He groaned in a horror of despair. They had Emma.

“Coupla broken ribs, I’d say.” Sam’s knowledgeable hands were moving over Alasdair’s body. “Collarbone’s all right, though.” He sat back on his heels and pronounced, “Could be worse … aye, could be a lot worse.”

Alasdair tried to find some comfort in this, but looked in vain. For a moment of pure self-indulgence, he wished he were dead, out of this pain, and out of the dread that consumed him.

“We’ll strap up the ribs, sir,” Jemmy offered. “Not much else you can do wi’ ’em.” He spoke with the authority of one who had broken a good few in his career as a jockey. “The bruisin’s summat chronic. Must ’urt like the devil.”

“An understatement, my friend.” Alasdair was astonished that he could produce such a dry response. He tried to sit up and immediately blacked out again.

When he came to, Jemmy was efficiently strapping his ribs with strips of linen torn from the bedsheets. “Sam’s gone to fetch arnica and witch ’azel, sir. ’E says a poultice of mallows’d be best, but he ain’t got any to ’and. We’ll get some from the apothecary when it’s daylight.”

He sat back and examined his handiwork, then slid an arm behind Alasdair’s shoulders. “Let’s see if you can sit up now, sir.”

Alasdair tried to help himself but the strain on his abused stomach muscles made him cry out, and Jemmy took his full weight, heaving him into a sitting position.

The effort exhausted Alasdair and he leaned back against the wall, eyes closed, his breath coming in ragged, labored gasps.

“There’s laudanum too,” Sam announced as he came hurrying back into the room with an old leather kit bag. “A good dose o’ that, sir, an’ a good long sleep.” He set the bag down and took out vials of arnica, witch hazel, and laudanum.

“Sam’s somethin’ of an ’orse doctor,” Jemmy informed Alasdair, stepping aside so Sam could go to work.

“Then do what you can,” Alasdair said. “But the laudanum’ll have to wait. Saddle Phoenix and two others from the stables here. They need to be strong and fast.”

“Eh, sir, you’ll not be ridin’!” Jemmy was aghast.

“You seem remarkably uncurious as to why you find me in this miserable condition,” Alasdair observed with a gallant effort at his customary sardonic humor, hoping thus to keep the threatening panic at bay.

“Eh, sir, I ’aven’t ’ad a chance.” Jemmy defended his lack of curiosity with a hurt air. “We was too busy.”

“Yes … yes.” Alasdair raised a placatory hand. “Lady Emma has been abducted.” He closed his eyes again, trying to force away the pain and the dread. If he allowed his desperation to take over, he would lose what little strength and will he had remaining.

“We have very little time to get her back before …” He shook his head. He
must
not think about what they could be doing to her.

“Eh, mebbe she was in that post chaise, then,” Jemmy said.

Alasdair’s head seemed to clear. His eyes focused properly for the first time. “What post chaise?”

“That’s what we come to tell you, sir.” Jemmy gave his news.

Alasdair listened, feeling the first faint glimmer of hope. If they knew what they were following and which direction to take, they had a chance. Denis would not have expected the beaten man to recover consciousness until the morning. Probably not until he was discovered by an inn servant much later. By which time Denis would be well away, plunged into the dark chaos of London’s underbelly, where Emma could be hidden and disposed of without remark.

“There, sir, that’s the best I can do.” Sam stood up, regarding his patient with concern. “I doubt you’ll be able to sit an ’orse, though.”

“I must. Help me stand up.” Alasdair took a deep breath and gathered his forces. The deep breath sent an agonizing shaft of pain stabbing into his chest.

Jemmy and Sam took his arms and heaved him upright. His head spun and the blackness threatened to engulf him again. But he fought it off. Breathing was an agony and he tried to take shallow breaths.

“Sam, go and see to the horses. Jemmy, help me dress.”

“Take a small dose of laudanum, sir,” Jemmy suggested. “Just enough to take the edge off, but not enough to put you out.”

“Aye. Riders do it all the time.” Sam produced his vial. “It’ll ’elp.”

Alasdair decided that the combined advice of an ex-jockey and a man whose face was as battered as a prizefighter’s was worth taking. He swallowed the measured dose Sam handed him.

Even with Jemmy’s assistance, dressing was so painful and such an effort that he wondered how it had ever been so simple and automatic a procedure he had never given it a thought. His head was clearing fast though, the pain becoming a part of him so
that it no longer encompassed him and blocked all else from his mind.

“Did you say six horses, Jemmy?” Barely breathing, he eased his jacket over his shoulders.

“Aye, sir. Goin’ like bats outta hell.” Gently, Jemmy drew the sides of the jacket closed over Alasdair’s strapped-up chest.

Alasdair glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece. It said three o’clock. He calculated rapidly. The chaise had maybe a two-hour start. But they would have to change horses somewhere. Or at least rest them. They certainly couldn’t drive them at racing speed for any length of time. Fast-riding horses would have a chance to overtake them on the turnpike.

Unless they took the byways. But Alasdair dismissed that possibility. A chaise and six would have a hard time on the narrow, rutted lanes across country.

He sat down gingerly on the end of the bed, and Jemmy put his boots on for him. Bending was an impossibility. His eye caught his image in the mirror on the dresser. He was surprised to see that his face was less marked than he’d expected. They had concentrated most of their blows on his ribs, abdomen, and kidneys. Presumably it was where they could do the most damage in the shortest space of time, he reflected grimly. The attack had been utterly without the personal malice that would have led his assailants to disfigure him.

And these men with the same chilling efficiency would soon be working on Emma.

He stood up again. “Bring my pistols, Jemmy. They’re under the pillow.” He walked to the door, every step a supreme effort of will. But now he was infused with a terror-fueled determination that transcended his body’s weakness.

Sam was waiting for them in front of the inn. He led Phoenix to the mounting block used by ladies, and overweight squires after an indulgent evening in the inn’s taproom.

Alasdair managed to heave himself into the saddle, where he slumped for a minute, getting his breath back. It was so hard when he could take only these short, shallow breaths. Then he straightened in the saddle, taking up the reins.

Jemmy fastened the pair of pistols to the saddle. “You and Sam have your own?” Alasdair asked, adding grimly, “You’ll be needing them.”

“Oh, aye,” Sam said. “Pistols and this.” He grinned, and the moonlight caught the flourish of a curved cutlass. “Prefer knives. They’re quieter.”

“Oh, there’s nothin’ like a blunderbuss for creatin’ mayhem,” Jemmy said with his own grin, patting the weapon that was strapped to his own saddle.

Alasdair felt his optimism grow a little at his companions’ apparent enthusiasm for a scrap. He had little doubt that their skill and courage matched their enthusiasm.

“Let’s go.”

They took the London road at a gallop.

Emma had lost the feeling in her hands after the first interminable hour. Her head pounded remorselessly. Her fear grew with every passing moment. Paul Denis sat opposite her, his arms folded, his eyes sometimes closed, but mostly they watched her with all the cold interest of a snake watching the approach of a prey.

He had no reason to keep her in this acute physical discomfort except to soften her up for what was to
come. To increase her dreadful anticipation. And it was working. By degrees her determination to resist his questions, to deny all knowledge of Ned’s poem, was being eaten away.

She was not prepared for the moment when Paul leaned forward suddenly and pulled the gag from her mouth. The relief was astounding. But for a moment she still couldn’t speak. It was as if her tongue had lost the power or the memory of movement.

“So, let us talk a little of your brother.”

She stared blankly at him, trying to moisten her parched mouth.

“Would you like water?” he inquired almost solicitously.

Emma nodded.

He bent and brought a leather flask from beneath the seat. He opened it and held it to her lips. She drank greedily, heedless of the water spilling down her chin. He took away the flask long before she’d slaked her thirst, but at least it was better than nothing.

“So?” he said, replacing the stopper. “Your brother. Let us talk a little of Lord Edward Beaumont.”

Emma thought of Alasdair, lying unconscious, beaten and broken. She faced Paul Denis, her eyes flaring in her pale face. “My brother is dead,” she said. “Why would you be interested in him?”

“Oh, I believe you know,” Paul said, leaning back and folding his arms again. “I’m quite certain your lover has told you all there is to know. Why else would you be trying to escape me?”

“Why indeed?” Emma said with scorn. “Whatever makes you think we were trying to escape anyone? We were going into Lincolnshire for the hunting.”

“Oh, come now, don’t try my patience.” He shook
his head almost regretfully. “It’s really not in your interests to do so.”

Emma closed her mouth firmly, although her belly was quivering with dread. She didn’t think she’d ever met anyone as intrinsically terrifying as Paul Denis. She couldn’t understand why she hadn’t noticed it before. But she had, deep down. She’d been aware of that predatory aspect to his nature. She’d been aware of his air of being perpetually poised to strike. And God help her, there had been a time when she’d found it attractive.

“I can’t feel my hands,” she said.

“A pity.” He shrugged. Then he moved abruptly, leaning forward, seizing her jacket at the throat, jerking her upright so that her face was very close to his. “You received a communication from your brother after his death. What did it say?”

His breath was hot and slightly sour. His black eyes were pinpricks of menace. Emma tried to pull away. His hand tightened and his knuckles pressed against the pulse in her throat.

“His last letter was full of instructions about the estate,” she said, trying to turn her head aside. “I can’t remember all the details. Why would they interest you?”

“Your brother was a spy, and a courier, and a master encoder,” Paul stated, articulating each word so that they were spat at her.

“Was he?” She made her voice careless. “I didn’t know.”

He pushed her from him with a vicious movement, and she fell back onto the seat in a heap, unable to help herself with her hands.

He leaned forward, grabbing her face, pressing his fingers into her cheeks so that tears started in her
eyes. He forced open her mouth and shoved the wadded scarf inside. Then, his face wiped clear of all expression, he lifted the blind at the window and leaned out. “Luiz!”