The Tide Watchers (51 page)

Windham swore hard, realizing what Wright meant: the essential list of British espionage agents in France. The names and covers of over three hundred of their best. “What happened?”

“Most were burned, sir, never fear—but two bundles escaped. We can't know who's implicated as yet, but we had to hide for two hours before we could escape. As we left the town with this gift for you”—indicating the trunk—“a boy jumped on the runner board. I gather he's Tidewatcher's cabin boy.”

“Annersley,” Windham corrected in cold precision. “He's no longer one of us.”

Wright didn't waste time on semantics or indignation. “The lad has vital information for us, sir. I brought him along with us. He's outside the door now.”

“Bring him in.”

Wright called, and a lad strutted into the room as if he owned it. A shock of spiky red hair, a cheeky grin, and eyes alive with intelligence, the skinny youth couldn't be more than fifteen. Windham had a vague recollection of him. The boy made a jerking bow, his eyes filled with a mixture of hero worship and wariness. “Mr. Zephyr, sir, you're gunna wanna hear what I got to say, cos some o' your best ones are in mortal danger.”

As this book took years to get right—from first draft to final production—I have so many people to thank that should I forget any, you have my deepest apologies.

First, to my wonderful, supportive agent, Eleanor Jackson: There are no words. Four years ago I had to make a choice, and I've never regretted it. You're the agent I want to keep until I can no longer move my fingers to write. Your commitment to
The Tide Watchers
through the years, your certainty I'd create the version that would sell to the right publisher and editor and give me a career that would, in your words, keep me happy as a writer, kept my faith alive. You never gave up on me or on the book, which meant I couldn't either. Thank you for everything. I hope we work together until I fall off my perch!

To Emily Krump, my brilliant editor at William Morrow: You brought this book to greater life with your comments and questions and constant willingness to call me and talk things through. Your commitment to making this book the best it could be kept me focused. Thanks for loving this book as much as I do. I hope we work on many, many more projects together.

To Fiona McIntosh, wonderful author and excellent course-giver: Thank you for offering the Popular Fiction Masterclass. It inspired me to the rewrite that led to the sale to my dream publisher. Thank you over and over again for your no-nonsense, no-excuses course on how to be a professional mainstream writer. The sheer amount of published authors that have come from your course is proof of what a fabulous teacher you are.

I have so many writer friends who have helped me through the years with this book: to my creative partner of fifteen years, writing coach
extraordinaire and heart sister, Mia Zachary—I honestly don't know what I'd do without you. Rachel Bailey, Hayson Manning, Barbara de Leo, your critiques on the earlier versions of the book, our group chats, and emails helped me focus on Duncan's character and strengthen him. Big thanks to All of Us, email group extraordinaire, dear friends of many years who are always there for me. And massive thanks to the Beau Monde, a historical writers' group that constantly inspires me with its deep knowledge and willingness to share, never rude or competitive.

To my local critique group, the Valleygirls, and Kerri Lane in particular: you've been a big sister, a mentor, and a loving bully at times, but your incredible work ethic is ever inspiring, your generosity and kindness limitless.

Absolute massive thanks to Heather Cleary. You didn't know what would happen when you gave me those hard-to-find books on espionage in Britain and France in Napoleonic times; you just understood that I thirst for historical knowledge as you do. Without your generous gift, the core plot of
The Tide Watchers
wouldn't be what it is, its knowledge halved.

Diane Gaston, you always read parts of this book when I needed it, put me up in Washington when I cross the ditch, and always happily argue plot points with me (bulldog). Margaret Riseley, thank you for reading parts of this book over and over, and always giving encouraging advice. Your advice about seeing every scene as part of a movie has remained with me through the years.

Barbara and Peter Clendon, the lessons you gave me on raw beauty, and writing what is essential without self-indulgence, have never left me. Fiona Brand, your advice way back in 1999 on “the overreaching arc,” or describing my book in three lines or less, helped me focus this book to the best of my imperfect ability.

Special thanks to Dallas Gavan, friend and military expert: your knowledge will hold me in stead throughout the book series. Thanks to Gail Mellor, dear friend for many years, for the reintroduction, and just being a friend still.

To Helen Selvey: I'm so glad we met at the Popular Fiction Masterclass. We don't just work together on historical detail, we're friends and inspire each other. History nerds unite—and there's always The Admiral!

Big thanks must go to the excellent staff at the State Library of New
South Wales in Sydney, especially Jaisong and Cathy for finding a map of the exact region I needed in the era I needed, and for helping me with the order. You went above and beyond. Thank you both so much.

To my former critique partner, Maryanne Cappelluti: I wish you knew, my darling friend. To my soul sister, Helen Yde, who wanted me to write historical mainstream along the lines of
The Scarlet Letter
, a book she loved—I wish you could see this book. I still love and miss you both.

To my dear friends Dan and Liz Eliza: You read the book, gave good advice, put us up, fed us excellent food, encouraged and listened, and let me have hours to write when inspired, and took us on great walks too. You even came to Scotland on my research trip. I'll never forget your friendship (or the hours watching Eureka when I needed to unwind!). Thank you for being who you are.

To my fantastic “ideas person” and brilliant friend, Olga Mitsialos: I don't need to say it; you know. You always understand. How many times did you read this book for me and give me great ideas? You even read a book on Napoleonic espionage for me—a great sacrifice! Beach walk soon? Or a research trip?

And finally, to my wonderful and very grounding family: to my husband, Jim, who read this twice and gave me excellent insight into the male mind, bluntly letting me know when I'd overwritten or made something “too girly.” To my mother, Mary Price: thanks for reading over and over, for listening to new ideas, and being a general cheerleader. To my daughter Katie for all her technical help, advice on social media, and being a good ear; to daughter Jaime and son Justin for being proud of my achievements, loving history, and being willing to bring me down to earth when I need it. I have no doubt I'll need it again in the future! And Chris, my darling son-in-law, I
just love you.

To all my extended family and dear friends I haven't mentioned, I love you and just thanks for being there.

About the author

Meet Lisa Chaplin

About the book

The Story Behind
The Tide Watchers

Read on

For Inspiration or Pleasure

Photo by Crown Imagery

Meet Lisa Chaplin

LISA CHAPLIN
has published twenty contemporary romances under a pseudonym, but the publication of
The Tide Watchers
marks her mainstream debut. Lisa, her husband, and their three children currently reside in her home country of Australia.

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The Story Behind
The Tide Watchers

T
HOUGH
I'
D ALWAYS WANTED
to write historical fiction, I was writing contemporary romance when a friend from the United States visited Sydney with her family. In April 2006 I showed them around Sydney, including Darling Harbor and the maritime museum. Touring the museum fired my imagination for historical writing. I wandered around, dreaming up stories. Then at the museum store, I picked up a book called
The Terror Before Trafalgar
by Tom Pocock. I looked at the first few pages and knew I had to buy it.

As I read Pocock's book, a brief reference caught my attention. Unnamed English spies found a fleet of ships in the Liane, the river behind Boulogne-sur-Mer harbor, in late 1802 or early 1803. The ships launched in March 1803, after a horrendous winter of storms. Some ships sank eight miles out to sea and the rest returned to France. Two months later, war resumed. I knew I'd found a story I
had
to tell—the story of the unnamed spies who'd found and sabotaged Napoleon's secret fleet. I read the book cover to cover, making notes throughout, making special note of who was in France at the time and what they did, especially what trouble they got into. I bought more books and researched online. Reading about fascinating people like Captain Wright, spy extraordinaire; Robert Fulton, brilliant American inventor; the Mad Baron, Lord Camelford; and what we'd nowadays call a colorful identity, Captain “Guinea-Run” Johnstone—not to mention learning such weird and wonderful facts as the Archbishop of Narbonne's false teeth—I knew I had to include them.

With each new fact I discovered about the era, I realized the sabotaging of this fleet had been almost totally shrouded in history. I even had people tell me it didn't happen.
You mean 1798, when the fleet sank in the Irish Sea
, or
No, there was only the 1805 invasion attempt from Boulogne
.

These were knowledgeable people, and I began to doubt. But then I discovered some crucial facts. In late 1802 British spies discovered Bonaparte's
Grand Armée
of 100,000 men, half of them bivouacked in the Channel region. Just after the war resumed in July 1803, over 1,400 ships and boats were anchored in the Channel region. Under the terms of the Treaty of Amiens, neither side was to accumulate more ships than it already had. Bonaparte had five hundred more than he had in 1801. Though since 1798 he'd invaded Piedmont, Parma, Venice, and finally Switzerland, and had taken their wealth away; he was pushing the Americans hard to buy Louisiana for fifteen million dollars—a massive amount back then. He'd already brought France back into economic balance. Why did he need all this money? By the time he stopped hiding his invasion fleet in late 1803, boats and ships filled the region from Boulogne-sur-Mer to Audresselles, over ten miles away. Why, if he was committed to the peace he'd created? He was too
prepared
for this open invasion to have only begun building ships and buying armaments less than a year before.

I kept searching for more of this hidden history, the invasion that “never happened,” and Bonaparte never talked about. Why hadn't he? Of course, from pharaohs of old to Charlemagne, leaders never spoke of their failures or allowed historians to write about it. But why would
Britain
keep this stunning success secret? There had to be a solid reason why, when so many victories were publicly celebrated and spies had their achievements credited to them in history and this one did not.

The more I read of the time, the more I saw that while
men
were credited, the women working for the British Alien Office (the forerunner of MI6, started by Prime Minister William Pitt in 1793) were rarely even named. Researching the etiquette of the times and how women were expected to behave, I began to feel excited. Was the secrecy because a
woman
had been, not just a saboteur, but the instiga
tor of an idea? That was when the book really began to take off.

In 2007 my family moved to Switzerland, and I left the idea as I explored my new world, learned German, and kept writing romance novels. But I kept researching, until I had twenty-four books, three DVDs, and endless web pages on the era and the subject. I wrote earlier versions under another title, which didn't sell. It was a case of “write what you know”—in my case, romance—meeting far too much research for a genre focusing on the relationship, not the history.

In 2009 my beloved sister-in-law died. Before she passed away, she made me promise to write a story with substance about a woman who mattered. When I returned to Switzerland burned out, I took a year off writing but couldn't leave the promise to Vicky unfulfilled. I began rewriting the book. In 2010 I signed with my agent Eleanor Jackson, who tactfully began steering
The Tide Watchers
into the genre she believed it belonged in from the start. In 2011 I visited the Channel Coast region of France and bought a DVD that again mentioned the amount of ships in the region
before
war resumed in May 1803, the river ports built not just in Boulogne-sur-Mer, but in surrounding villages; it was mentioned only in passing references, but it was there. I watched it over and over, convinced I was right: a secret invasion attempt had occurred, but it remained all but secret 208 years later.

We moved back to Australia in late 2011. I was still feeling unenthused about writing romance. I fulfilled my last contract, and quit in 2012 to concentrate on getting the book right, but it was missing something.

Then my friend Heather Cleary, a librarian and historical author, lent me a book:
Secret Service: British Agents in France, 1792–1815
by Elizabeth Sparrow. This fabulous book had the inspiration and information on politicians, spymasters, missions, spies, and code names I'd been missing. I raved about the book to Heather, who generously told me it was mine. I rewrote my book again and it came close to selling, but again, something wasn't right. Finding veiled references to spymaster Joseph Fouché wasn't enough. I bought
Joseph Fouché: Portrait of a Politician
by Stefan Zweig, and it rounded out the book still more.

Then I realized my romance voice was still too apparent in my mainstream writing. I began attending mainstream courses. I heard about a master class course run by fantasy and historical bestselling author, Fiona McIntosh. After a week with that blunt-spoken and inspiring woman, I knew what to do. I went home, rewrote the book from the first line to the last, and submitted to my agent. Eleanor said, “This is it!” Three weeks after sending it out, I found my home with William Morrow. Since then I've been continuing my apprenticeship on writing historical mainstream, with my editor's help.