The Spy's Reward (9 page)

“My guess, from the bits of clothing, is that they are an old guard unit attached to the
Sûreté,
Napoleon's Secret Police. They have set up some sort of blockade here.”

“But—under whose authority?”

“Their own, which makes this a very dangerous situation. Watch what you say; some of the
Sûreté
officers speak English.”

They approached the improvised checkpoint side by side, slowing again to a walk. Now she could see Diana's face, pale and strained. Roth, oddly enough, looked slightly bored. He was talking to the man holding his bridle, and suddenly the Frenchman gave a huge guffaw and slapped Roth's leg so hard his horse shied backwards. Diana shot Roth an absolutely poisonous glare.

“Good boy,” breathed Meyer. His own expression shifted somehow; it slid from fierce concentration into a combination of annoyance and anxiety. He looked coarser, less intelligent. She would hardly have recognized him.

“Mama!” called Diana, waving anxiously. Then she saw Abigail's oversized coat and her eyes widened. She had the grace to look a bit guilty.

Abigail and Meyer drew up a few yards from the runaways.

“What seems to be the problem, monsieur?” Meyer inquired courteously of the man holding the gun. His French sounded very odd, as though he was hissing slightly.

“Are these two in your party?” The guard gestured with the stock of the rifle towards Roth and Diana.

“Yes, monsieur.”

“The young lady has no papers.”

Abigail gave Meyer a quick glare.

“Mademoiselle left in some haste,” Meyer explained. “She intended to return to Sisteron.” He pulled a packet from an inner pocket and handed it to the Frenchman. “Here are the passes for mademoiselle and for madame, her mother.” He indicated Abigail, who gave a stiff nod.

The man perused them in silence. “English,” he said in disgust. “Pah!” He looked hard at Meyer. “And you? You are Spanish?”

Bowing, Meyer handed him yet another packet. “These are my documents, and also those of a servant, who follows with the luggage.”

Suspicious again, the man looked at Diana and Anthony, and then back at Meyer. “I thought you said mademoiselle planned to return to Sisteron? Why are you now here? Why does the servant come with the bags?”

Meyer dismounted and drew the man aside slightly, lowering his voice as though shielding Abigail. “After mademoiselle left, I heard that the emperor's troop was advancing north very quickly. It is my job to keep the ladies safe. Since they are English, I thought it prudent to change our plans.”

This made sense to the Frenchman; he nodded.

“Joseph!” It was one of the other guards. He was holding up a pistol, which he had taken from its saddle holster on Meyer's horse. “Look at this!”

The first man frowned. “Search him,” he ordered.

Meyer made no protest as two of the other guards took off his greatcoat and quickly ran expert hands over his arms, his torso, and his legs. Abigail had assumed they would find nothing; to her astonishment and horror, he was carrying another small pistol and two knives, one of which had been concealed in the cuff of his boot. Diana's eyes went wide. Roth, she saw, was unsurprised, although he was beginning to look worried.

“You know,” said the man with the helmet to one of the searchers, “I thought he had a military look. Let's have his jacket off.” The man yanked it off. “And his shirt.” Meyer gave a small sigh, untucked the shirt, and pulled it off over his head.

There were scars everywhere. A small, dimpled one on one shoulder. An ugly gash across his chest. Gouges on both arms. The Frenchman walked around Meyer, studying his prisoner, who stood impassively, shivering very slightly in the cold wind. “Bayonet,” commented the guard, pointing to something Abigail could not see, on Meyer's back. “Gunshot. Knife, knife. This one, a saber, I think.” He looked at Meyer, who nodded.

Abigail closed her eyes. She felt slightly dizzy. That lean, muscled body, inscribed with the signatures of a dozen weapons, could not be the body of a banker. Could it? She knew what a banker's body should look like. Both her husbands had been cargo brokers. They were not unattractive men, the Harts, but their chests had been paler, softer; their arms more rounded. And how did Meyer come to have papers describing him as Spanish? How, for that matter, had he learned to speak Spanish? Where had he acquired Rodrigo, who treated him not as a valet treated a master but as a bodyguard treated a commanding officer?

“May I put my shirt back on, monsieur?” Meyer asked.

The guard tossed it to him, and the scars disappeared. Neckcloth, jacket. Now he was once more Nathan Meyer, would-be suitor, the same man who had bowed over her hand that first afternoon in Digne-les-Bains.

No, she thought. Not the same. This was no gentleman of leisure. That man had never existed. Leisure did not involve close encounters with bayonets and bullets and sabers.

The man in the helmet was frowning, studying Meyer's papers again. He pointed to the little pile of weapons at Meyer's feet. “Are these the weapons of an innocent traveler? And your scars, how do you explain those?”

Meyer shrugged and looked embarrassed. “Monsieur, I was a partisan in Spain. I will confess it to you, a fellow soldier. I came to know some English officers, and after the war ended they recommended me to their acquaintances who wished to tour Europe. Many regions are still very unsettled. The English travelers hire me to escort them. I speak French, and some English, and even a little German now. I know how to watch for bandits, for pickpockets, for ostlers who mix straw in with the oats for the horses.” He indicated the silver buttons on his jacket. “I have done very well for myself. These ladies”—he gestured towards Abigail and Diana—“have asked me to guide them safely out of France, and I am endeavoring to make sure they come to no harm. Naturally I carry weapons. What fool would not, with such a charge?” He glanced pointedly at Diana. He lowered his voice. “Only yesterday monsieur Roth here was injured defending her from two drunks. And now, this morning, you see the result.”

As the guard hesitated, still suspicious, Abigail saw Diana's eyes narrow. She knew that expression, it was one of Diana's few traits inherited from Abigail herself. And with Diana, it usually meant trouble.
No
, she thought, panicking.
Don't do it, whatever it is.

But Diana, for once, did something right. She didn't say anything. She merely looked at the guard, her huge blue eyes filling with tears.

The Frenchman surrendered. “Pah,” he grunted. “I will let you go. You cannot be planning mischief against the emperor traveling with two women. But your passes are not valid any longer, do you understand? You must stop in Gap and have them reissued by the municipal guard.”

“Thank you, monsieur, thank you very much.” Meyer took back the pile of papers. He cleared his throat. “And my weapons?”

With a jerk of his helmeted head the guard signaled one of his henchman to restore everything except the smallest dagger. “Trust a Spaniard to have a knife in his boot,” he muttered. “I will keep this one.”

He stepped back, motioning his men to release the bridles. “Move on. I will pass your servant through when he arrives here.”

The reunited party rode off northwards at a slow trot, with Meyer a bit ahead of the two women and Roth behind them, like miniature advance and rear guards. Abigail glanced over at Diana. She was sitting very straight in the saddle, but tears were pouring down her face. “We will stop as soon as we can,” Abigail said quietly.

“Oh Mother, I am so sorry!” Diana said, half-whispering, half-sobbing. “I am so very, very sorry!”

“It was not your fault,” Abigail told her. Her own voice was shaking; she steadied it as best she could and said, “I was very angry when I got your note, but there is nothing like having a rifle pointed at one to restore a bit of perspective.”

“I will make it up to you,” Diana promised. “I will brush your hair every night. I will be polite to—to everyone. I will be more tidy.” She looked at the bunched-up sleeves of Abigail's borrowed coat and winced. “And I will give you back your cloak, as soon as we stop.”

They now were riding past the little roadside shrine, and the old woman there curtseyed as they passed by. Diana nodded back, looking very uncomfortable. After a minute, she said hesitantly, “Mama, I did something else I should not have.”

Puzzled, Abigail turned to face her.

Diana would not meet her eyes. She took a deep breath and blurted out in a rush, “I made an offering at that shrine. That was where I found Mr. Roth, and I got off my horse, and the woman came over with the candles, and I bought two, and I lit them.” She added, almost defiantly, “I made a prayer.”

Abigail stiffened; her hands clenched the reins so hard that her horse almost reared.

“Mama?” Diana looked alarmed.

“My horse stumbled,” Abigail lied. She forced herself to relax, to ask casually, “So, you bought the poor woman's candles?”

Diana smiled, relieved. “You do not mind?”

“A little . . . not very much.” She would have to speak with Diana later. But not now. No scolding now, no lectures. “What did you pray for?”

Hanging her head, Diana confessed, “For something exciting to happen.”

Abigail looked back at the statue of Mary, who was smiling serenely at the baby in her arms as the candles sputtered by her feet. Abigail wondered, not for the first time, if God had a sense of humor.

10

“That was dangerous back there,” Meyer told his nephew. “And you did very well.” The party had stopped to rest at a village inn, and when Rodrigo had arrived a few minutes ago Meyer and Anthony had decided that he needed help rearranging the hastily loaded baggage. In reality, for different reasons, each man was avoiding the female members of the party, who were inside finishing a cold lunch. “You kept your head admirably. I saw you joking with the man holding your horse; that was a clever touch. What did you tell him?”

“That I was no longer so certain I still wished to marry Miss Hart.” He colored. “I had told them she was my fiancée. It seemed the best thing, under the circumstances, especially as I was the only one with papers.”

“She did not take it well?”

“Take what well?”

“The announcement that she was your fiancée.”

“Oh.” Anthony coughed. “No, she did not. But by then she had sense enough not to contradict me.” He shook his head. “I will never understand women. When I jested that I no longer wanted to marry her, she didn't like that either, and she must have known it was all an act.”

Meyer remembered the furious expression on Diana's face after the Frenchman had slapped Anthony's leg. She had not been entirely playing a part at that moment, he suspected. Nor had Anthony when he announced his reluctance to marry her. His nephew was behaving like someone who had been rudely awakened from a very pleasant dream. He had tried to avoid Diana when they had stopped here to eat and rest. But the hunter had become the hunted: the girl had pursued him, puzzled and hurt when he made excuses to move away from her. Even Diana's mother could not repress a flicker of amusement by the fourth iteration of the little comedy.

Anthony was looking rather drawn, even paler than usual. There were little lines around his mouth. Meyer suspected that his broken rib was aching fiercely. “I think you should ride in the gig this afternoon,” Meyer said abruptly. “It will be no more uncomfortable than trotting. And Miss Hart will be on horseback, if that is your concern.”

His nephew sighed. “Was I that obvious?” He looked down at a chicken pecking at some gravel in the small stable yard. “You must think I am very fickle. A short time ago I regarded a chance to be alone with her in a carriage as a great prize.”

“I think you had a very unpleasant experience yesterday, and the bruises were the least of it,” Meyer said quietly. “And then you had another unpleasant experience two hours ago. You cannot tell me that you were not frightened when you found yourself alone with Miss Hart confronting five armed, self-appointed imperial police.”

“I was frightened,” Anthony admitted. “I was more than frightened; I was terrified. I will say for Miss Hart that she seemed remarkably unafraid, at least while it was all happening.”

“Discretion is the better part of valor,” Meyer observed. “The former quality being somewhat lacking in Miss Hart.”

“You should have seen her yesterday, when those oafs barged into our parlor.” Anthony gave a short laugh. “It was a crack-brained thing to do, to scold them like that, but she certainly had courage. I, on the other hand, did not show to advantage in that encounter.”

“Did you not? Well, then, what of me, today?” Meyer's voice was harsh. “Do you think I fancied standing in front of all of you half-naked while that greasy vigilante paced around cataloguing my wounds? Do you think I did not choke, inside, while I was thanking him effusively for letting us go? In that encounter did I show to advantage, as you put it?”

“But—but,” Anthony stammered. “It was an act. Of course you thanked him, of course you let him search you. There were five of them, and they were armed, and the women were there.”

“And yesterday?” Meyer was angry now. “When you were outnumbered two to one, taken by surprise? Yes, Rodrigo appeared and disabled your attackers. You compare yourself to him and feel inadequate. His opponents were facing the other way, you young idiot, focused on you! The women were there with you as well. How much difference would it have made if you had known some sparring techniques? Is it not possible that resistance would have angered them even further? Or that in a three-way fight in a small room one of the women could have been hurt? I accepted my humiliation to prevent something worse from happening. Is your dignity so much more precious than mine?”

Anthony was looking a bit stunned. Meyer realized that he had been nearly shouting. It was unlike him. He was always quiet, cool, collected. For years he had worked doggedly to become imperturbable, a man ruled by logic, a man who calculated costs and benefits even when the costs were lives. Logic had told him that he should placate the man with the rifle, should allow himself to be searched and even to be stripped. But logic was no consolation afterwards. The memory of their safe escape was an abstraction—a negative, a sorrow avoided rather than experienced. The memory of standing in the wind while eight people eyed his battered torso was all too concrete.

“I am sorry,” Meyer said, drawing in his breath. “I am overwrought. But think about what I said. You give yourself, and perhaps Miss Hart as well, too little credit. Our situation is difficult. We should not reproach ourselves if we sometimes make poor choices in the heat of the moment. Or even good choices with unpleasant consequences, as in your case.” And in his own case as well. The unpleasant consequences had not yet arrived. But they were coming.

Anthony nodded, a little shamefaced, and started to walk away. But then he paused. “Sir,” he said, turning back, “will Mrs. Hart be riding in the gig with me?”

“Very likely. Why?”

His nephew looked uncomfortable. “What shall I say? That is, if she asks me about—what she saw.”

Here, of course, was one of the unpleasant consequences, the first and most obvious one. “Tell her you were as surprised as she was.”

“She will know I am lying,” Anthony said with certainty. “I can spin tales quite happily to armed thugs; I cannot be so plausible when I am speaking to someone I respect.”

Meyer made a helpless gesture of frustration. “Tell her something. Anything. Be vague. Look unhappy if she presses you.”

“Why not simply let me tell her the truth?”

It would almost be a relief to have it over with. He wavered.

“I know some in the family are embarrassed by your activities, but I am not one of them,” Roth said. “Trust me, I would not condemn you to her.”

No, he thought. I am managing that quite nicely on my own.

“Do as you think best,” Meyer said at last.

 

 

Abigail did not ask Roth about his uncle. She certainly wondered about Meyer's scars, and about the little arsenal which had emerged from various hidden pockets in his clothing, and about his sudden transformation into a Spaniard. But it seemed to her that Roth had been through quite enough in the past two days. More to the point, she was not certain he really knew the answers. Instead she waited until they stopped again to rest the horses and have some refreshments. After they were all seated indoors, and Meyer was busy forcing an increasingly pale and feverish Anthony to drink some tea, she slipped out and went to the stables.

“Mr. Santos,” she called softly, stepping inside. The place seemed empty; the only sounds were the occasional thunk of a hoof against wood or the soft crunch of some animal eating its hay.

He appeared suddenly right next to her. “Did you call me, Mrs. Hart?”

Startled, she jumped. “Ah. Yes. Do you have a moment?”

He nodded. It didn't look like an answer to her question so much as it looked like a confirmation to himself of something he had suspected. “If you would come this way?” He ushered her into a small tack room. Most of it was taken up with a table, strewn with various bits of harness and awls and nails and scraps of leather. He pulled out the lone chair and held it for her.

Sitting down was a mistake. She realized that as soon as she did it. Now she was looking up at him. And she could not be as firm, as insistent, when she was sitting down. But it would look rather odd to get up again. She compromised on looking around for another seat for Rodrigo, and spotted a bench with a saddle on it. “Please sit,” she said, indicating the bench. “And pull it closer to the table. I wish to speak with you in confidence.”

He gave that same unsurprised nod, and dragged the bench over.

After he had been sitting in front of her for a full minute, she realized that he was not going to help her by providing any helpful prompts, such as “How may I help you?” or “What did you wish to ask?” On the other hand, he had not refused to speak to her, and he would have been well within his rights to do so. He was no servant of hers. She decided to start with something neutral and work her way up to the questions he would not want to answer.

“How long have you been with Mr. Meyer, Mr. Santos?”

“I do not use my surname unless absolutely necessary,” he said, almost apologetically. “For personal reasons.”

“Oh.” Well, not surprisingly, the mysterious Nathan Meyer had an equally mysterious servant.

“Ten years.” When she looked confused, he clarified his response. “The answer to your question, señora. I have been with him for ten years.”

“Did you meet in Spain?”

“Yes.”

“Was Mr. Meyer there on business?”

“Señora,” he said gently, “why not ask what you really want to know? Someone might come in here at any moment.”

She looked at him warily. “Will you answer me?”

“Perhaps. It depends on what you ask.”

She was beginning to feel as though she were in an ancient temple, consulting an oracle that answered only in monosyllables, or worse, in riddles.

What did she really want to know? Did she want to know how Meyer had come by those scars? Why he had a knife in his boot? How he had made his face look like someone else's, just by changing his expression? She blurted out the first question she could think of. “Does he have any children?”

Rodrigo looked surprised. “He has a daughter and a son, both recently married.”

The daughter was the one who had married a Christian. As far as Abigail was concerned, she no longer existed. “Is the son a banker as well?”

The servant shook his head. “He is a captain in the army.”

She frowned. Surely Jews could not hold commissions? The son, too, must have converted. She thought of Diana, lighting the candles at the wayside shrine as though it were some quaint local custom. How big was the gap between the sentimental gesture of a tourist and conversion? If Diana married outside the faith, would Abigail renounce her?

Suddenly she knew the real question she wanted to ask. “Does he see his children often? His daughter? Are they—are they still fond of each other?”

“Of course.” The Spaniard looked surprised.

That offhand “of course” was very, very painful. She got up abruptly. “This is very wrong of me. I should not be asking you questions about your employer. It places you in an impossible position. Please forgive me. I do not know what I was thinking.”

 

 

After she had gone, Rodrigo sat back down on the bench and waited, frowning. That conversation had not gone at all as he had expected. He began sorting the bits of harness into neat piles. He had barely started the first pile (“needs new buckle”) when a shadow fell onto the table.

“Well?” asked Meyer impatiently. “Did you tell her?”

Rodrigo shook his head. “She did not ask. I think she meant to, at first, but then she changed her mind for some reason.” He looked at Meyer, exasperated. “Señor, why do you not go to her yourself? She will hardly be surprised, after what she saw this morning. Go now, before something else happens.”

“Impossible.”

“What do you think she will do? Denounce you to the next group of vigilantes? Shoot you? Scream and run away? She seems to be a very sensible woman.”

“Sensible, yes. But also principled.”

“True,” Rodrigo conceded. “She did not leave just now because she heard you coming, for example. She decided that it was wrong of her to question me about my own master.”

“I know.” Meyer leaned against the wall. “I heard that part. I was eavesdropping, of course, as I so often do. Here I was, listening to a conversation she thought was private. And she, with ample evidence that I was at the very least a liar and likely something far worse, had scruples about questioning my servant. The contrast between her principles and my lack thereof struck me forcibly.”

“Señor,” he said, exasperated, “you should go to her yourself and explain.”

He set his jaw. “No. It would do no good now. If I had confessed before she suspected anything, it would be different. But after this morning she will think I am simply making the best of a bad situation.”

Rodrigo gave up. “Am I driving again?”

Meyer nodded. “Anthony by all rights should be in bed, but the gig is the best we can offer at the moment.” He thought of something else that was worrying him. “Did they search it, by the way?”

“Search the vehicle? At the roadblock? Yes. Ruffled through a few bags.”

Well, obviously they had not found anything, or Rodrigo would not be here. He told himself not to be so nervous. But then, he did not usually have secrets from Rodrigo as well as from the French. If his servant ever found that jar of sulphur, there would be hell to pay. There would still be hell to pay, eventually, but Meyer was hoping to postpone it until the jar was empty.