Marrying the Royal Marine (11 page)

Only one feeble idea came to mind, one so puny that on an ordinary day, it would never have seen the light of day. She kissed Colonel Junot on his cheek and then his ear, all the while tightening her grip, looking at the approaching soldiers, who had stopped to watch, wary but interested. ‘This is my husband, Lieutenant Colonel Hugh Junot of the Royal Marines. Please do not kill him.’

At nearly the same time she spoke, Colonel Junot did, too, also in French that sounded much better than hers. ‘Don’t touch my wife,’ he said, his voice weak, but with as much determination as she had ever heard from any soul living. ‘We are worth more to you alive.’

His eyes so serious, Colonel Junot kissed her cheek. He turned around again and made himself comfortable, his head against her breasts in a gesture both familiar and possessive. The French soldiers squatted on the deck, uncertain and coming no closer.

‘Where were you hit?’ she asked him softly in English. Then, ‘We’re married. I couldn’t think of anything else.’

‘The back of my arm. Nothing much. You can treat it with a strip of petticoat, my love,’ he told her. ‘As for being married, I couldn’t think of anything else, either. I recommend it right now, even though our courtship was amazingly swift.’ He took one of her hands that crossed his chest, and slid it inside his uniform jacket in an intimate move.

He sat so calmly that Polly felt herself begin to breathe normally again. ‘I don’t remember saying yes.’ It was the feeblest of jokes in the most dire of situations, but she had to concentrate on him.

‘You didn’t say yes,’ he assured her, settling back more comfortably. ‘I told you it was swift. Brandon, we might keep each other alive. I can’t think of a better way.’ He took her hand out of his uniform front and kissed it. ‘Apparently you couldn’t, either.’

Sister Maria Madelena shrieked as the soldiers carried her off the
barco
, set her on her feet and stripped off her habit in one wrench, leaving her standing on the dock in her chemise. She dropped to her knees, crouching there with her arms wrapped around her, and looking around wildly.

‘We have to do something,’ Polly urged, even as the Colonel turned her face gently towards his chest and pressed it there with his hand, shielding her from the terrible sight before them.

‘We won’t do anything until I see someone above the rating of Private, Brandon. Just hold me. Look at me now. Not at the dock.’

She did as he said, even as she heard Sister Maria Madelena’s terrified screams. Her breath must have been coming faster and faster, because the Colonel told her calmly to breathe in and out more slowly.

‘We can’t help her right now. If we try anything, you will be next,’ he said. ‘My God, Brandon. What can have happened?’

She shook her head, then looked up when she heard a new voice shouting at the dock. Another soldier ran from the church and was flailing about his own men with his sword, beating them back from Sister Maria Madelena. Polly looked down again, in tears now at the sight of the nun kneeling on the cobblestones, her arms pinned back, her head down.

‘It’s a Sergeant,’ Colonel Junot said, and there was no mistaking the relief in his voice. ‘Brandon, help me to my feet.’

Not even sure she could stand on her own, Polly surprised herself by doing exactly what he asked. She hauled him upright, and then braced herself against the gunwale as he sagged against her, then slowly straightened up.

‘Don’t let go of me,’ Colonel Junot ordered. ‘Put your hand through my belt. I’ll hold you as tight as I can.’

She did as he said, clutching him in a firm grasp. The Colonel leaned against one of the kegs lashed to the deck as ballast. Polly gasped and turned her face into his uniform jacket when one of the soldiers on the dock grabbed Sister Maria Madelena by her arms, slung her over his shoulder and walked towards the church, even as she shrieked and begged for mercy,

‘Deep breaths, Brandon,’ Colonel Junot said. ‘Perhaps I should call you Polly now.’

He stayed where he was, but he stood taller, almost willing himself into his usual impeccable posture and bearing, even though the welt on his face was turning a mottled colour and blood seeped from his sleeve. Polly released him long enough to hand him his hat, then twined her hand through his belt and clutched it.

‘Sergeant, I am Lieutenant Colonel Hugh Junot of the Third Royal Marine Division of his Majesty’s British maritime forces. I implore your protection for my wife, Polly.’

He spoke calmly, but his voice carried across the bloody deck, where the bodies of the Marines lay sprawled and the
barco
crew was silent in death. Polly held her breath as the French NCO scowled at them. Decades seemed to pass before he gestured them forwards.

‘One foot in front of the other, dear wife,’ Colonel Junot said. ‘That’s how any journey begins.’

Chapter Eleven

C
olonel Junot staggered, but Polly held him up, her arm tight around him. She draped his arm over her shoulder and they stumbled across the deck. When they reached the opposite gunwale, the Sergeant nodded to one of his Privates, who held out his hands and helped them to the dock.

‘We did not expect to see a Colonel,’ the Sergeant said in French. He gestured towards the dead Marines. ‘We have been watching, too, for several days. Is the war going so ill for England that Lieutenant Colonels come on patrol? I cannot think you were much help.’

Polly felt Colonel Junot stiffen. ‘No, I was not, was I? We are your prisoners, Sergeant.’ With some effort, he unbuckled his sword without releasing her and handed it to the NCO, who grinned at the sight. ‘I surrender to you and implore your protection for my wife.’

‘Not you?’ the Sergeant asked, a slight smile on his face, as he accepted the sword, then casually tossed it to a Private, who looked at it and threw it in the river.

‘Damn! That was a gift from my father,’ Hugh said in English.

The Sergeant laughed at the look on Junot’s face. ‘Why would anyone want your stupid sword?’ he asked in French. ‘Why do we even want you, Colonel? Your delicious wife? Now that is another matter.’

‘Sergeant, I implore your protection for her,’ Hugh said again, his voice softer this time, more pleading. Polly could hardly bear to watch him pawn his dignity, but there was the Sergeant, running the blade of his sword across her breasts now.

The Sergeant apparently had no intention of making anything easy. He walked around them, patting the back of Polly’s dress with his sword, then ran the blade slowly down her hips and legs. Hugh set his lips more firmly in a tight line.

The Sergeant continued his leisurely circuit, this time standing too close to Polly and flicking her hair with the point of his sword. ‘Here we thought only to bag partisan scum passing information, and what do I find but a Colonel?
Mon dieu
, war is strange.’

She flinched, scarcely breathing. When his words finally settled in on her terrified brain, she wondered if she had heard him correctly. ‘Information?’ she asked, hoping she sounded much braver than she felt.

Obviously enjoying himself at their expense, the Sergeant smiled broadly as he flicked the blade across the front of her dress, slicing off a cloth rosette. ‘And you did not know? Answer this one carefully,
s’il vous plaît
.’

‘There was nothing to know,’ she replied, trying to slow her breathing so her breasts would not rise and fall so rapidly. ‘What can you mean? Sister Maria Madelena and I come to São Jobim to take young women who have been—’ She stopped, wondering at the wisdom of saying more about the girls violated by French troops. ‘We come here to take young women to a safer place, in time of war.’

The Sergeant was practically standing on her toes now, his eyes on hers. Polly glanced at Hugh, who was breathing shallowly, too. The Sergeant took the pommel of his sword and put it under her chin, raising her face to meet his scrutiny. ‘Why is this man along? Your husband, you say?’

‘My husband is here because he has been in Lisbon for a month, is headed out on another assignment, and wanted to see me in between. I am certain you understand.’

The Sergeant stared at her. She gazed back, not even blinking. He took the sword from her chin. ‘You must be a challenge for him,’ he said, stepping back. He looked at Colonel Junot. ‘How do you manage her?’

‘Very gently,’ Colonel Junot said, his voice firm.

‘With a whip? How is she to ride?’

Polly felt the blood drain from her face, as Hugh stepped close to the Sergeant this time. ‘Sergeant, I resent your foul comments about my lady,’ he said, biting off each word, as if he spoke to troublesome Marine Privates, and not the man holding all the cards. ‘Do not tell me Napoleon makes war on officers’ wives now. I would not have believed him capable of that.’

The men stared at each other. Polly held her breath, waiting for the Sergeant to run the Colonel through with his sabre. At the same time, she felt a spark of pride at Colonel Junot’s defence of her, and both of them so powerless.

Hugh spoke first, and his tone was conciliatory now, although by no means subservient. ‘Sergeant, has a mistake been made here? This nun only seeks to rescue those who often get trampled upon in time of war.’

‘No mistake,’ the Sergeant said crisply. ‘None at all.’ He shook his sword at Polly. ‘We have been watching you.’

‘In the greater scheme of things, I can’t imagine why,’ Polly murmured.

‘Oh, you cannot? Let me enlighten you. This way, please, you two. Do you need some help, Colonel?’

‘You’re so kind to ask,’ Junot said. ‘My wife will help me.’

Escorted by Dragoons looking hugely interested, they followed the Sergeant across the small square. Polly stopped once when she heard a series of splashes, and looked back to see other Dragoons throwing the dead Marines and crew of the
barco
overboard. ‘Sergeant, can they not have decent burials?’ she asked, horrified.

‘The British? Why,
madame
?’ was all he said, sounding supremely bored.

‘Don’t worry, Polly,’ Colonel Junot whispered. ‘This is better. The bodies may get snagged on limbs and rocks on the way downriver, but perhaps one of them will reach Vila Nova de Gaia.’ He sighed. ‘It’s puny, but all we have, my dear.’

She was silent then, as the full force of their capture slammed itself home. The village appeared deserted. Who knew what terrors the French had promised to the towns-people if anyone so much as made a peep to the allies downriver? Uneasy, Polly looked up at the Colonel, and was comforted to see him looking at her.

‘We haven’t had any chance to get our stories straight,’ he whispered in English. ‘What say we’ve been married since June?’

‘Where?’

‘Vila Nova, where your brother-in-law gave you away.’

Thinking of Laura and Philemon brought tears to her eyes and she looked away. In answer, the Colonel tightened his grip on her shoulder and kissed the top of her head. ‘We’ll stick together like glue, Brandon,’ he assured her. ‘I’m not leaving your side.’

They reached the closed door of the church, thick doors that she already knew could muffle any sounds, because she had been inside several times and enjoyed the ecclesiastical quiet within. It was different this time. Shivers travelled up and down her spine as she heard Sister Maria Madelena screaming. Unnerved, Polly stopped, but was prodded from behind. In response, Colonel Junot pulled her in front of him, protecting her with his body.

The Sergeant bowed elaborately and opened the smaller man-gate. ‘Do come in, Colonel and
madame
,’ he said, gesturing as though he welcomed them to a farmhouse in Gascony. ‘Think of this as a wayside shrine on the way to perdition.’

Even at mid-day, the squat building’s interior was shrouded in shadow. This was no church of the Renaissance, but a shabby little relic of the Middle Ages, charming in its own way, but not now, and probably never again.

Clad in her chemise, Sister Maria Madelena crouched below the altar, her screams tinged with madness. Before she could react, Colonel Junot turned Polly’s face into his tunic. ‘Oh, God, don’t look!’ he said, his voice suddenly filled with horror. She felt his fingers shaking as he forced her against him.

Other hands pulled his fingers away, compelling her to stare at the altar and then up to the large crucifix, where the French soldiers, those students of the Revolution, had crucified São Jobim’s parish priest. Naked, pitiful, he hung on the cross, his arms bent at weird angles, his head down as though contemplating the ruin of his pudgy body. In his own death agonies he had moved his bowels.

Polly couldn’t help herself. Her knees sagged and it was the Colonel’s turn to hold her up. He stepped in front of her, blocking the view, but she knew she would never forget the sight before her. She wanted to close her eyes and keep them shut until the whole nightmare went away and she was back on the
barco
, with nothing more on her mind than negotiating the next stretch of white water. How puny that seasickness had been her biggest fear, how trivial.

Instead, she opened her eyes and looked into the Colonel’s concerned face, so close to her own. ‘I’ll be all right,’ she whispered to him. ‘The poor man. What did he do to deserve this?’

Colonel Junot shook his head. ‘There is a deep game going on here, Polly. I don’t think we know even half of it.’

With his help, she stood upright again and turned away resolutely, to find herself looking at Sister Maria Madelena, kneeling and sobbing. Shaken, Polly turned her attention to the Sergeant, who seemed so sure of himself, almost swaggering in his command of this sorry situation. This was probably no more than a typical day for him. ‘How can you permit your men to…to…?’ She stopped, unable to think of a word to adequately cover what was happening, considering her own genteel Bath French.

The Sergeant mocked her expression, bowed elaborately, and held out a note. ‘Perhaps you might consider what she has been doing to
us
!’ he declared, triumph in every line of his body.

As she watched, aghast, he stalked over to Sister Maria Madelena and shook her by the hair. Colonel Junot tightened his grip on her when she started towards the nun. ‘Don’t move,’ he whispered. ‘These men are wolves.’

‘But he’s—’

‘Stand still.’

She did as the Colonel said, even when the Sergeant tightened his grip on Sister Maria’s hair and pulled her head up. ‘Tell this Colonel’s wife how you have been taking notes from the priest to the Navy docks in Vila Nova,’ the Sergeant roared, shaking her head like a terrier with a mouse.

‘Sister Maria, you don’t have to tell me anything,’ Polly said in English, as the Colonel tightened his arms around her.

‘Tell her!’ the Sergeant demanded of the nun, shaking her again and again until Polly wanted to scream. He looked up at the dead man and let go of Sister Maria Madelena. ‘We…persuaded the priest to admit he gave her communiqués to pass on from the interior. Tell her, you whore!’

Polly couldn’t stop shaking, not even with Colonel Junot holding her so tight. She leaned back against him, trying to keep the crucified priest and nun out of her sight. ‘Sister Maria?’ she asked softly, her voice quavering.

The Sergeant released the nun and she struggled into a sitting position, trying to cover herself with her arms. As Polly watched, horrified, she willed herself into a state of calm and then slowly raised her bruised head and held her hands out, palms up, in supplication.

But it wasn’t supplication. Polly jumped when Sister Maria Madelena suddenly clenched her hands into fists. Her tired eyes flashed, and the scar across her face stood out in raw, red relief against her paleness.

‘Viva Portugal e viva España!’
she declared in a loud voice.

‘There’s your answer, Polly,’ Colonel Junot murmured in her ear. ‘She
was
a messenger. Is she even a nun?’

‘I…I…I didn’t know,’ Polly whispered. ‘I did wonder once…. I thought I saw a note.’ She turned her face into Colonel Junot’s tunic. ‘I do know she was a victim, too, like the young women we cared for.’

‘Madame Junot,’ the Sergeant said. He was closer to her now, stepping over the nun, who had slid back on to the stones, exhausted and drained. ‘Madame Junot?’

‘Polly,’ Colonel Junot said in English, ‘he is talking to you. Polly, pay attention and remember who you are.’

It was her turn to get a firm grasp on her emotions, to dig down deep inside herself where she had never gone before, and pull out more courage than she knew she possessed. Perhaps the Sergeant would not know how terrified she was. He was addressing her as Madame Junot; she would have to remember that and respond.

‘Yes, Sergeant?’ she said, as she rubbed her cheek gently against the Colonel’s tunic as his hand went up to caress her hair.

‘Did you know of this deception? Do answer carefully.’

I am no liar
, she thought. She continued to rest her head against Colonel Junot, as she realised it was time to think of him as Hugh, the dearest person in her universe. She chose her French with precision. ‘Sergeant, on the last trip, the one yesterday, I thought I saw her take something from Pai Belo. It was the merest glimpse. It could have been anything.’

The Sergeant grunted and took the folded scrap from his tunic again. ‘This is what he gave me today, just before we hoisted him on high.’

Polly shuddered as she looked at the bloodstained sheet. To her horror, it was covered with numbers, and she recognised the Portuguese words for ‘regiment’ and the names of Spanish towns.

‘We have other messages,’ the Sergeant told her, folding the note. ‘How many trips have you made to São Jobim?’

‘I hope you are not planning to implicate my wife in any of this,’ Hugh said.

She wondered at his ability to sound so protective, when he was as much a prisoner as she. ‘Hush, my love,’ Polly said. ‘This is my fifth trip, Sergeant. That is all. I have only been in Vila Nova for eight or nine weeks, visiting my sister.’

‘And not your husband?’

She realised her mistake, and fought down panic.
I am no actress, either
, she thought. ‘Sergeant, surely that goes without saying. We were only married in June, and this war keeps getting in our way.’

To her relief, he seemed to find her statement funny and laughed. ‘Oh, you British!’ he exclaimed, his tone almost fond in a way that Polly found more repulsive than a curse. ‘What am I to do with you?’

‘What will you do with
her
?’ Colonel Junot asked, looked at Sister Maria Madelena.

The Sergeant glanced around almost carelessly, as though she was already someone in his distant past. He shrugged. ‘I will turn her over to my soldiers. They will make sure she is dead when they are done. You can watch. In fact, I will insist.’

Unable to help herself, Polly sobbed out loud. ‘Shh, shh, my love,’ the Colonel crooned, his hand gentle on her hair again. ‘I have no say in this, Sergeant, but I wish you would just kill her outright. If she must die—if she is a spy, you have your rights, I acknowledge—then kill her cleanly.’