Christina Hollis (9 page)

‘And you, little one?’

Madeleine jumped like a frog as a second Customs man appeared at the window beside her.

‘I—I...’

‘The lady has no papers with her, gentlemen.’ Adamson’s voice was crisp and authoritative.

The men grinned at this spot of excitement in their usually dull work. No one was ever stupid enough to try and travel without papers. They knew it was hopeless.

‘Then the little chicken can’t pass. Simple as that.’

‘Not quite. It may be you who turn out to be the simple ones, gentlemen.’ Adamson tucked his coveted documents back inside his jacket and sat back with a smile. ‘What time did you come on duty?’

The men looked shifty and uncertain. Their spokesman scratched his stubbly chin and shrugged.

‘Dunno. Couple of hours ago, maybe?’

‘Then you will have seen a dark coach drawn by four bays leaving by this road?’

The description could have applied to any one of a thousand vehicles on the road.

‘The lady is travelling with us for company in these dangerous days, gentlemen. Her documents were accidentally left in a valise on the seat of her own coach. They will be recovered when we meet at the next staging-post. If you have been doing your job, citizens, you will have checked when the carriage was stopped here and found the papers quite in order.’

The Customs men looked at each other, shuffling excuses between them. They seemed to be on the point of leaving, but as the one Madeleine had recognised stood back he laughed out loud.

‘Wait a minute! I know you! I’d recognise those beautiful eyes anywhere!’

Embarrassment forgotten, he poked his head in at the carriage window, leering at her.

‘I’ve seen you down the Rue Mouffetard—yes! That’s it—and outside the Gobelins factory—’

‘I don’t think so, my man,’ Mistress Constance cut in coldly. ‘Now, would you excuse us? We wish to be on our way.’

‘Why aren’t you down at the Bastille with the others, citizeness? It’s about time we all pulled together and showed them who’s really in charge of this city!’

‘The lady is our gentle companion,’ Adamson said firmly, a note of irritation creeping into his voice now. ‘Your homespun politics are no concern of hers.’

Madeleine snapped her fan shut and gave Adamson a stare almost as penetrating as the one the Parisian was giving her.

‘As a Frenchwoman, sir, I feel our politics have everything to do with me.’

‘That’s the spirit, chicken! You tell him!’

The Customs man opened the carriage door and climbed up beside Madeleine to whisper in her ear, ‘I don’t know what your little game is, missy, but if you’re able to squeeze any cash out of an Englishman, I reckon you deserve every sou.’

‘What are you saying?’ Adamson snapped, thoroughly unsettled by the delay.

‘Keep your hair on, friend! I was only explaining the price your young companion will have to pay to travel on from here without papers.’

There was a rattle as Adamson drew out his money.

‘Oh, no. Not cash, squire. The price to beautiful young ladies is one kiss.’

Madeleine giggled as the Customs man bent to accept her offering, but Adamson leapt up and hauled him back. Instantly, weapons both inside and out of the carriage were cocked and Adamson was thrust back in his seat, the barrel of a gun jammed against his throat.

‘You’re not telling me you want to argue with this, Rosbif?’

Adamson was unwavering in his defiance. ‘Not while unarmed, citizen. We British prefer to settle our differences on fairer terms. I would be only too eager to take you on outside, both evenly matched.’

‘Philip! No!’ Mistress Constance squealed, flailing her hands in helpless terror. It was all Madeleine could do to stop her mistress fainting away altogether.

‘Don’t endanger yourself, Master Philip! I have no objection to his wishes—’

‘But I do, mademoiselle.’

Adamson’s eyes never left the Parisian’s face, even though his mother was in fits of tearful anguish.

After what seemed like an eternity the citizen stood up. Pulling away his gun, he used it to push back his grimy cap.

‘There, now!’ He chuckled. ‘See what your silly heroics are doing to this poor old lady. Go careful, Rosbif. One day you might be the cause of a death through your foolishness.’

With a rueful nod to Madeleine, the Customs man retreated from the carriage. Amid much ribaldry the Parisians let their quarry go, firing their guns harmlessly into the air.

As the coach horses reared and lurched forward the shots were joined by echoes of gunfire and shouting that whispered up the Rue du Faubourg-St-Honoré from the direction of the Bastille.

In a careering, buffeting confusion the coaches shot forward through the Customs post and out on to the open road.

It took a fair few miles before Adamson’s temper subsided. He spent the time glaring out of the carriage window, avoiding both Madeleine’s rash amusement and his mother’s horror.
        Only when the carriages were stopped to give the horses a rest did he begin to lose his look of righteous indignation.

While the horses were unhitched and rubbed down, the passengers sought the shade of some spreading chestnut trees. No one spoke. Only when Madeleine started to remove her bonnet were both the Adamsons stung into complaining.

‘I think I’d rather risk a touch of the sun than heatstroke in this wretched thing.’ Madeleine shook the bonnet crossly.

‘I think you should learn a little decorum, mademoiselle, if you are to continue as a suitable companion for my mother.’

The heat was making Adamson even crosser. Madeleine wondered if thoughts of the previous evening were adding to his evident discomfort. She watched him remove his hat and mop its inner band before replacing it upon his head. Dark tufts of hair that had escaped constriction by the hat stuck out around his head like a halo. Madeleine knew she would not be able to stand much more of this sort of behaviour without laughing out loud.

‘Removing your bonnet out of doors,’ he muttered. ‘Worst of all that shameless—no, I don’t think that’s too strong a word—shameless behaviour at the Customs post...’

Madeleine handed Mistress Constance back her fan and the two women exchanged glances.

‘I think Master Philip and I had better continue our conversation at a little distance, madame.’’

Pulling off a midsummer-tough chestnut leaf, Madeleine used it as a fingered fan to cool herself. With a meaningful glance at Adamson she turned and walked slowly away from the road to where trees grew more thickly.

With a long-suffering sigh he marched after her. When they were out of earshot Madeleine rounded on him.

‘Right, sir. While I must thank you for coming to my rescue over the travel documents, thanks can only go so far. Before we travel any further, I think there are a few things you and I ought to get straight. I am employed by your mother, sir, not you. That’s who I intend to take my orders from. I think Mistress Constance would rather have had her companion kissed than her son killed—’

‘It was a foolish, wilful act. You don’t know what those ruffians would have gone on to attempt!’

‘They would have shot you full of holes if you had backed down.’ She gave him a quick smile in the silence that followed. ‘It took a brave man to stand his ground, sir. Thank you, even if it was only foolish English pride that drove you to it.’

Adamson shrugged and brushed one foot across the heat-crisped turf. After a moment’s consideration he, too, smiled. It was with rather more warmth than was his usual custom.

‘It has been said that I am too old-fashioned for my own good, mademoiselle. Perhaps that is true, but in this case it is merely that I was disappointed to see you acting so—so—well, acting like that,’ he finished lamely, removing his hat again to fan himself with it in the heat.

‘It annoys you all the more to say these things to me after what happened last night, doesn’t it?’ Madeleine smiled at him cheekily.

‘Certainly not!’ Adamson retorted, flapping his hat a little harder. There was a pause, then he had to make an admission. ‘Yes. Yes, I suppose it does, mademoiselle. Am I never to be allowed to forget that error of judgement?’

Madeleine was disappointed to think his all too evident desire of the previous evening was now judged as nothing more than a mistake. ‘I like that!’ She looked at him directly. ‘You look more like the type that won’t let yourself forget it, to me. You’ll thoroughly enjoy feeling sorry for yourself, if I’m any judge!’

‘Manners, mademoiselle! I do not wish the matter spoken of further!’

This reproof over, he frowned as though at a loss for something else to say. He did not stop walking, Madeleine was pleased to notice, and they were heading further into a shady copse. They had travelled quite a little distance before Adamson spoke again.

‘This sort of weather will bring the harvest forward and no mistake. In that case...it is to be hoped that your receipt for lemonade improves under my mother’s instruction, mademoiselle!’

Madeleine laughed, eager to put him at his ease once more. ‘As the mixture seems to have restored you, sir, you must agree it has its uses!’

He had come around so far that Madeleine decided to risk a delicate question.

‘Master Philip—I hope you don’t mind me asking, but will you be accompanying us all the way back to your family home in England? I thought you wanted to stay away a bit longer?’

He pulled at a grass stem, a thousand seeds scattering on the warm breeze.

‘Mother needs help. I cannot put off returning for ever.’

He looked down quickly, frowning at the grass husks now powdering his breeches.

Madeleine touched his arm, concerned that the dark mood of the previous evening would envelope him again.

‘Why don’t you employ someone to do your share of the farm work, sir? Then you could go back to your studies and everybody would be happy.’

Adamson shot her a look as though he would rebuke her violently. The astonishment on her face must have convinced him that her concern was genuine.

‘Then you still don’t understand? Mother has not told you, mademoiselle? My family, such as it is now, is fighting to escape financial ruin. Father sank all our money into searching for my brother Michael. When my parents heard there was a chance he had gone to New England, Father set sail for America to try and heal the rift between them. The ship was lost in a storm.’

Adamson gazed at the rustling grasses about his feet. It was a little while before he could continue. ‘I had to return home to arrange matters, where I discovered the hopeless condition that the estate and accounts were in. The obvious solution would have been to sell up and start again in a more modest fashion, but with Michael the principle heir I could do nothing to jeopardise his inheritance. Instead I was reduced to accepting the grandly offered help of neighbours. The sort of generosity that can all too easily be called in. That was why I was so glad to see Ki—Miss Pettigrew. If anyone, anywhere can know where Michael is, it would be her.’

‘She looked that type,’ Madeleine said narrowly, but it missed the mark. Adamson was still staring at the greenery about their feet.

‘What with making payments against the loans and all the expense needed to put the estate to rights, Mother and I have been living hand to mouth, mademoiselle. This short break in Paris is the first relaxation of any sort we have had for over a year. You suggest taking on more staff? We can barely pay our existing servants a living wage, let alone hiring more.’

‘Then that’s easily remedied, sir.’

‘You have all the answers, I suppose?’

Madeleine ignored his savage glare and studied her gloves meticulously.

‘I was going to suggest that the staff you do have must learn to work harder and help you with the farm work. Make one person take on the tasks of two. It sounds as though you are already doing the work of half a dozen yourself, anyway. That’s a start.’

Madeleine went towards a fallen tree-trunk and to her surprise Adamson followed. As she went to sit down he hurried forward, and he was smiling slightly.

‘Don’t spoil your pretty dress. Sit on this.’ Removing his cream and brown jacket, he threw it down on the log. Such a gallant gesture deserved a reply in kind. Madeleine tried to copy the way the young ladies at the concert had gathered their skirts neatly around them before sitting down.

Adamson stood beside her, one foot upon the log. The evening before, he had been desperate for pity. The picture now could not be more different. Sunlight silhouetted his strong features and gentlemanly bearing.

‘I credited you with revolutionary tendencies, mademoiselle. I see now that I was wrong—you are as eager to work the downtrodden masses as our neighbour at home, the new industrialist!’

‘Not a bit of it, sir. I’ll be the first to offer you my help.’

‘A lady working in my fields?’ Adamson raised his eyebrows in horror. ‘The very idea! I’ll not hear of it!’

‘Come and sit down by me.’ Madeleine patted the coat-covered log beside her. Eventually he did sit down, a discreet distance separating them. Still twisting the grass stems between his fingers, he fastened his gaze on the coaches that were now half hidden by trees.

‘I’m no stranger to hard work, Master Philip. While I may never have had cause to do actual farm work before, show me what to do and I’ll gladly help.’ It was the least she could offer.

Madeleine paused, studying him to see what effect her words were having, but Adamson’s face was expressionless.

‘I hope you haven’t been upbraiding your mother about offering me a job as her companion, Master Philip?’

‘Of course not!’

‘Ah, I see.’ She took care to hide a smile when the over-swift retort confirmed his guilt. ‘Then I think I should tell you now that I intend to be much more than that. I’m stronger than I look, and healthy—you said so yourself. I’ll take on any work you want to give me, for no more payment than my bed and board, sir. If I can only ensure you get a decent night’s sleep each evening, that will help you.’

He looked at her sharply, and Madeleine sensed she might have said something out of place.