Taking Liberties (45 page)

When she came back, Philippa did a rare thing; she reached for her mother's hand. ‘He'll come,' she said. ‘Andra will come.'

Makepeace nodded and said: ‘I looked for that book in Exeter, Pippy. The arithmetic thing . . .'

‘
Arithmetica
. Claude de Méziriac.'

‘They didn't seem to have heard of it.'

‘It's all right, Mama. Perhaps Andra will bring me a copy from Paris. He said that I would be ready to read it when I reached twelve.'

‘Oh, Philippa,' Makepeace said, ‘I missed your birthday.'

‘You were at the hospital, Mama. I did not expect you to remember. '

Makepeace shook her head. ‘I'm not a good mother, am I?'

Philippa considered it. ‘No, you're not,' she said. ‘But you are an unusual person and on the whole I would not have you any different.'

Makepeace leaned across and laid her cheek against her daughter's. ‘I do love you,' she said.

 
In the Great Hall, the Dowager sat as Makepeace had left her, arguing with a son who was three hundred miles away.

She listened to the reply and became irritated with it.

If it was someone
you
loved, if it were Alice
. . .

In her mind's eye, Robert hoisted Alice over a wall, took her hand and, glancing right and left, ran with her for the shelter of the trees . . . and the whole thing became so ridiculous that the Dowager pulled herself together.

Why am I bothering to justify it to Robert or anyone else? If I can get that man away, I shall do it and Hell won't stop me.

The Missus was right: he would try to get out; it was why he'd refused his parole. Years in the Bastille, then the freedom of the sea; he wouldn't be shut up again; he'd be crawling like a wounded animal through that bloody tunnel.

And the Missus was right again, I
was
dismissive of the boy Josh. Of course he will escape, the desire to be free beats as strongly in that black breast as any other. Can I help one man to liberty because I'm in love with him and deny the same to another because he is nothing to me?

All at once she was blasted, as if the hall's two great windows had blown in, allowing the wind to scour clean everything in it. A bigger vista opened before her, a greater canvas, nothing to do with the individual and everything to do with the human condition.

My God, that's what it is. That's what liberty is. It is indivisible; it can't be sliced like ham, a large portion here, a bit for some, none for the rest.

She was overwhelmed by the appalling simplicity of it. All her years she had joined in the belief held by every Englishman, rich or poor, that she lived in a free country, a democracy unique in the world. But the moment it had denied that democracy, that freedom, to America it had denied its own principle. Immediately, the thing had ceased to be freedom and become privilege. Until it was granted to everyone, American, black, white, slave, it was not freedom.

She thought: The Missus has known this instinctively all her life; it has taken me thirty-nine years.

She ran into the kitchen, calling for Tobias.

‘What ith it, your ladyship? What?'

‘We didn't complete it, where's my writing case?'

‘Complete what, your ladyship?'

‘Your freedom. If you left me, you would need to show a manumission to prove it.'

‘I don't intend to leave your ladyship.'

‘It doesn't matter. You must have it.
Now
.'

He fetched her writing case and shaped a quill for her—she had been wearing out point after point with her letters to the press. She dipped it in ink and was at a loss. ‘What should I say?'

Eventually they worked out a form of words. ‘I, the Dowager Countess of Stacpoole, do hereby declare that I have the right to declare this man . . .'

Oh God, she didn't know his surname; all these years and she didn't know what his name was.

‘Laval, your ladyship. My mother wath a thlave and she took the name of her mathter.'

‘. . . Tobias Laval, a free man with all the rights thereto. Dated October 28, this year of our Lord 1778.'

She shook the sand pot over it, dusted it away and gave him the paper. ‘And now fetch my cloak. I am going down to the Pomeroy, I have an apology to make.'

At the bridge she met an equally apologetic Makepeace coming up. They went back to the inn together to discuss mutual business.

 
As they were conducted into his beautiful upper room, young Mr Spettigue greeted them with the misty politeness he extended to everybody, as if he wasn't quite sure who they were. Today he was in black-and-white-striped velvet, with a beauty spot on each cheek.

As usual, Makepeace at the first sight of him wondered if they could entrust their business to such a vacuous fop; as usual he confounded her by being as sharp as a pin.

‘Oh yes,' he said. ‘Knew about the tunnel. Poor fellas, diggin' away.' He put the back of his hands together and flapped them sideways in a shovelling motion and immediately resembled a striped, ineffectual badger.

‘How?' Makepeace asked him. ‘How did you know?'

‘Froggy escaper mentioned it. Enterprisin' chap, came out in a barrel. Got returned to the brewery, waited 'til dark, hey presto.'

Diana had to ask. ‘Mr Spettigue, how do the escapers know to come to you?'

‘Imagine me name's passed around the prisoners, your ladyship, bit like a visitin' card really.'

‘Isn't that dangerous? Someone might give you away.'

‘Haven't yet, ma'am.' He nodded at her as if she'd pointed out a mistake in his reasoning. ‘Good point, though.'

‘If information comes
out
, can you get information
in
?' Makepeace said. ‘We sorely need to be in touch. Is there someone on the prison staff who will take a message and bring one back?'

He shook his head. ‘Never trusted fellas who lock other fellas up—that
would
be dangerous. Believe I told you before, ma'am, gettin' the prisoners out ain't my end of the business. Dealin' with 'em when they do, that's my job.' Wagging his lorgnette at them he said, ‘Don't count on anymore comin' out for a while, anyway.'

‘Why?'

‘Sunday market's closed down. Too many opportunities for escape. Guards on the
qui vive
. Fellas'll wait for the tunnel. Stands to reason.'

Makepeace massaged her forehead with the heels of her palms. ‘Did your Frenchman say where the tunnel would come out? And when?'

‘ 'Fraid not, dear lady.'

He had a map of Millbay Prison, minutely detailed, and spread it on a table for the three of them to pore over.

‘Ask me, that's where they'll break through,' Mr Spettigue said, pointing a manicured finger. ‘Beyond the north wall.'

Diana was doubtful. ‘It's a long distance. They wouldn't have so far to go if they dug the other way.'

‘Port's on the south side. Busy place. Risky.'

Makepeace twisted her head round to see better. ‘That's it,' she said, excited. ‘That's where they'll aim for, the north wall. It's where I waited for Josh. There's woodland on the other side of the road. If they know what's good for them, they'll come out somewhere along that stretch, among the trees.'

‘Isn't that where Josh was shot?' Diana said.

‘I know.' Then she brightened: ‘But this time he'll be coming under the wall, not over it. How long do you think it will take them to dig that far?'

‘ 'Bout as long as a piece of string, ma'am,' Spettigue said. ‘Tree roots, rivulets to divert, that sort of thing. Heavy clay an' gettin' rid of it . . . could take months.'

‘Months!'
She moved away from the table and sat down.

‘Mr Spettigue,' Diana said, cautiously, ‘did your French escaper mention how many men are expecting to come out of that tunnel?'

Mr Spettigue found a speck on his cuff and dusted it off. ‘All of 'em, really.'

‘Well . . . think so.'

‘Seven hundred men?'

‘Won't be that many, in effect,' he said, consolingly. ‘Prison becomes deserted, someone's bound to notice.'

She felt weak. ‘I expect they will.'

She was quiet as Sanders drove her and Makepeace back to Babbs Cove.

‘Scared?' Makepeace asked her.

‘Of course. I keep wondering quite how I find myself in this situation, doing these things, having these conversations. A few months ago I was a stately matron and now look at what I have become: a smuggler, a potential aider and abettor to my country's enemies . . .'

‘The Frenchman ain't an enemy anymore; he's too sick.' Makepeace could only think in terms of individuals. ‘And Josh, he should never've been mixed up in a war anyway, he's an artist.'

‘His drawing of Lieutenant Grayle was certainly exceptional. Where did he study?'

‘He was apprenticed to Joshua Reynolds for a time when he was living over here with me. John Beasley fixed it up—he knows everybody. Got a high regard for Josh, has John; thinks he'll be a great painter one day. Reynolds thought so, too.'

She says these things, the Dowager thought. She throws out the name of Sir Joshua Reynolds, and says her young black friend was his apprentice. And he probably was. It is not that I disbelieve her, it's just that she regards such things as unexceptional; the astonishing is matter-of-fact to her; she is making dispositions for the escape of two men from a war prison with the insouciance with which I would go shopping. It must be to do with being American, they regard the impossible as achievable.

‘She this?' Makepeace was delving under her cloak for a chain that hung round her neck. She dragged out the gold locket she always wore. ‘He did this. It was a birthday present. Josh sent it to me.' She opened it and passed the locket to Diana.

It was a miniature watercolour, a portrait of Philippa as a little girl, eight or nine perhaps. It was difficult to see in detail under the swaying lamp of the coach but the artist had caught exactly the gravity which, even then, suggested an unassailable common-sense.

‘He is very talented,' she said, handing the locket back.

‘He's even better with oils. I reckon he could make his fortune from portraiture when he's home in Boston.'

At once, they were thrown back on the question of how to get him there.

‘Let us approach this stage by stage,' Diana said. ‘We can assume that there will be no difficulty in getting them to France.'

‘Yes. The Gurneys will take them over on a smuggling run.'

‘And presumably the French authorities will be happy to return Josh to America.'

‘Yes. Spettigue says they do that.' Makepeace tapped her lips with a finger. ‘I wonder if Josh would prefer to go to Paris for a bit, learn from the French painters. No, I guess he'd prefer to go home; influence things through his work.'

‘Missus, I think we must stick to the matter in hand; he is not yet out of prison. So then, if we assume our two men emerge from the tunnel where we think they will—a large assumption, but never mind—we are left with the real difficulty, which is transferring them from there to Babbs Cove.'

‘My plan would have worked last time,' Makepeace said. ‘That's if they hadn't shot him.'

The Dowager sighed, but continued: ‘Very well, Sanders takes the coach and waits in the woodland to the north of the prison.' She thought about it. ‘And waits, and waits, and attracts attention because not only do we not know
when
the men will be emerging from their tunnel, nor where, the men themselves do not know that they are being awaited.'

‘That's right. We've got to get a message to Josh and de Vaubon and they've got to get a message out to us.'

‘Which we have just established cannot be done.' Diana leaned back against the seat and closed her eyes. ‘It's a game,' she said. ‘We are merely throwing dice. We are gambling on a double six to come up, yet we are only allowed one throw. The chances of some other combination are vast—a hundred things can go wrong.'

She heard the Missus say: ‘That don't mean we don't play.'

Makepeace had taken off her hat and her red hair, too curly ever to be totally tidy, framed a face that was all at once like a pug's in its determination. The swaying lantern shone on eyes that were the steadiest Diana had ever seen.

The Dowager knew then that Britain was not going to win the war. She was looking at the face of America, a composite of awkward, common people with all the odds against them who, when it was explained that they were already beaten by the biggest, best-trained army in the world, would merely say they were not—and go on fighting.

‘I'll think of a way,' Makepeace said. ‘Bribe somebody, maybe, threaten 'em. Only it can't be Sanders who drives the coach. You'd better ask Tobias.'

The Dowager sat up. ‘I'll do no such thing.'

‘Why not?'

‘It is dangerous.'

‘Well, I can't drive the pesky thing, I don't know how, you don't either. And Sanders has got a wife and children.'

Diana said: ‘I cannot allow a servant of mine to put his life at risk on a venture with which he has nothing to do.' She was clear on that; to send Tobias into the front line in order to rescue her lover . . . it was David and Uriah the Hittite all over again.