Amanda Scott - [Dangerous 02] (4 page)

“Cousin Charley, listen! I think it’s Jeremiah!”

“
Mon Dieu,
can there really be someone down there?” The voice from above them was masculine and deep. It sounded much closer than twenty or thirty feet away.

Charley and Letty kept still, and when Jeremiah leapt to Letty’s shoulder and began to chatter excitedly, she grabbed him, shoved him under her cloak, and clapped a hand over his little mouth.

“N
OM D’UN NOM,
” THE
low, melodious voice went on, adding in heavily accented English, “first I am attacked by
le petit singe
in the night. Then I hear an angel’s voice floating in the dawn
sans
an angel’s body. Am I going mad, or what?”

Letty stifled a giggle.

“Alors,
an angel with a sense of humor. Come,
ma petite,
where are you?
Je suis un ami.
I am a friend. I will not harm you.”

Charley could see Letty more clearly. Dawn was coming. They would have to make up their minds quickly whether to trust this Frenchman.

“I like his voice,” Letty whispered.

“’Tis a fine voice,
mon ange,”
the Frenchman said. “How did you get down there? Were you in the carriage that so unfortunately plunged from the road. Do you always whisper to monkeys?”

Letty gasped, but Charley sighed and said, “I told you sound travels more easily than one might think. I certainly hope,” she added, raising her voice so the Frenchman would hear clearly, “that you are not one of the villains who fired upon us.”

“Nom d’un nom d’un nom! Deux anges!”

“Yes, there are two of us,” Charley said crisply. “And we shall be very much obliged to you if you can get us out of here. I must warn you, however, that most of this slope appears to be covered with loose pebbles and gravel that want to shoot one right over the edge when one tries to walk.”

“One moment then. I must consult with Annabelle.”

“You have a companion?”

“A most excellent one. Annabelle is the prettiest little buttermilk mare one could ever hope to see, and the wisest.”

“We are very cold, so could you please be so kind as to confer quickly?”

“
Mais un petit moment, ma petite.”

They heard a scrabbling sound, then silence. Letty said, “Do you think he is one of the smugglers, Cousin Charley?”

“At this point, darling, I do not much care who he is, so long as he can get us out of here and doesn’t murder us.”

“Papa said the citizens of Cornwall liked and protected the free traders when he was a boy. Do they still?”

“To an extent, I suppose. We hear many tales about whole gangs caught and sent for trial, only to have the jury or magistrate declare them innocent. Grandpapa was not so tolerant of their activities, however. He made it clear long ago that he would not allow such goings-on in St. Merryn’s Bay.”

“I am looking forward to seeing Grandpapa and Grandmama again,” Letty said. “I have seen them only twice, you know, and one of those times I was a baby. Still, it is sad that we shall take them such dreadful news.”

Charley did not want to think about that.

“That man mentioned the carriage,” Letty said in a small voice. “Do you think he saw it?”

From above, the Frenchman’s voice interrupted her. “If I throw a rope down, can you tie it round one of you, do you think?”

“Of course, we can,” Charley responded, “if you manage to throw it far enough and if we don’t have to scramble around to find the end.”

“It is only about twenty-five feet long,” he said.

“My goodness,” Letty exclaimed, “how do you come to have such a long one with you?”

“That,
ma petite,
is my business,” he said. “And I advise you to keep your voice down. I think we are alone, but it is possible that others linger in the neighborhood. Can you perhaps wave something so that I can see exactly where you are?”

“Wait,” Letty said, “I have a better notion. Jeremiah can fetch the rope end.”

“Jeremiah?”

“My monkey. He led you to us, after all.”

“Will he obey instructions?”

“I think so, though it’s a pity you have not got a bag of nuts to rattle. Call him.”

To Charley’s surprise, Jeremiah scampered off at the first call. Moments later, at Letty’s command, he returned with the end of a twisted rope. Charley could just reach it to take it from him, but there was no slack when she did so.

“Can you let us have a bit more?”

“That is all there is, I’m afraid. Will it not reach?”

“Barely, but I think we can manage. Look here, Letty,” she added, “you are going up first. I think if I brace myself against our boulder, I can help you move uphill until we can tie the rope around your waist.”

“But Jeremiah might not carry it back again to you. He’ll always come to me.”

“Nevertheless, you will go first.”

Letty did not argue with that tone of voice, and soon was on her way up the slope. Charley sat back down to await events. When Letty called down that she was safe, Charley called Jeremiah, but it was not the monkey who brought her the rope.

She knew the man was coming by the sounds of his descent on the loose scree, but even so, she was not prepared when he loomed over her in the semi-darkness. He seemed larger than his voice had led her to expect, very large. But since she was slight of build and only an inch above five feet, and he was uphill, she knew he did not have to be a giant to tower over her.

It occurred to her briefly that he might have come for her to pitch her right over the edge, but her voice was steady when she said, “Why did you not send Jeremiah back?”

“La petite
said the rope end barely reached you,” he said, his voice still low, his tone even. “She also said the footing here was particularly treacherous. I have tied the rope around my waist, so I cannot come closer, but I believe that if you stretch out one hand to me, while keeping the other on your boulder for balance, I can reach you. Annabelle will do the rest.”

“Annabelle?”

“Yes, Annabelle. Having no idea how large either of you was, and not being certain I could hold you if you lost your footing, I took the precaution of tying the rope to her saddle. It is specially designed to allow any number of things to be tied to it.”

“Which is how you came to have the rope,” Charley said, nearly certain now that her rescuer was one of the free traders. “Would I perhaps be more accurate in referring to that rope as a tub line?”

He chuckled, apparently undisturbed by her knowledge of smuggling equipment, and she found the sound infectious. It made her smile despite the horrid events of the night. He said calmly, “Give me your hand,
mon ange.”

“What is your name?”

“They call me Jean Matois.
Now
will you give me your hand? Annabelle is bound to be growing deucedly impatient. Not to mention
la petite,
though she seems remarkably levelheaded.”

Reminded that Letty was alone on the road with only a buttermilk mare to protect her, Charley stood again, bracing herself against the boulder, and reached her hand out as far as she could. The stranger grabbed her wrist in a firm, warm grasp, and automatically she caught his wrist with her hand. He did not wear gloves.

Her feet slid, but the stranger steadied her, and she soon stood beside him with one of his muscular arms tight around her. He made a clicking sound with his tongue that seemed as if it could not possibly be audible more than a few feet away, but Charley was close enough to him to feel the warmth of his body enveloping her, and to feel the rope grow taut around his waist.

“Annabelle is very well trained,” he said, his voice still low but reassuring. “Do not be frightened.”

“I’m not frightened,” she said. “In fact, I’m pretty well numbed by all of this. I expect it will overwhelm me tomorrow.”

“Tragedy affects some people that way,” he murmured. “I only wanted to reassure you about Annabelle’s ability to help us up the slope.”

“Oh, I can tell that she knows what she is doing,” Charley said. “I have trained horses since I was a child, and in my experience they are generally more to be relied upon than men are. I do not deny that I’d have managed all this better if I were not encumbered with skirts, of course, but in any event I am most grateful to have your support now. I think my hands would have been too numb to hold onto the rope. I had all I could do to knot it around Letty.”

He was silent, helping her work her way around a jagged outcropping.

She said, “I’m glad I didn’t hit this when we were flung out. At least, I don’t think I can have done so, although I don’t know what I did hit. I only know that I came down flat on my back with Letty on top of me.”

“You were fortunate,” he said.

“We certainly were.” She hesitated. Their progress was reasonably steady now. His grip was firm, and she could easily picture the mare backing away, pace by pace. Finally, gathering resolution, she said, “You mentioned the carriage, Monsieur Matois. If you were not one of the highwaymen, is it possible that you … that you were …” She could not finish.

“I was on the beach,” he said gently. His arm tightened around her when he said the words, as if he expected some sort of impulsive reaction, but Charley was made of sterner stuff than that.

She drew a long breath, then said, “So you saw the carriage after it fell from the cliff. Were … Did anyone … ? That is to say …” Again, words failed her.

“They are dead,” he said in that same gentle tone. “A man and a woman in the carriage and a second man some distance away. I did not see the second man at first, but when I went back—”

“You left them?”

For the first time, he hesitated. They were nearing the top of the slope, and even in her anxiety over what he might say, Charley became aware that Letty was not peering down, encouraging their progress.

Finally, her companion said, “I had to leave them for a time. There were others coming, you see, and—”

“I do see,” she said, “or rather, Letty did. I know if you were on that beach, you are either a free trader or a riding officer, though I must say that, frankly, you don’t sound much like either one. You need not worry that I will give you away. Folks hereabouts are generally friendly toward the lads, but if you mean to be so kind as to see us home, I advise you to say nothing to my grandfather about your activities. He is a justice of the peace, and he takes his position seriously.”

“As well he should,” her companion said, helping her onto the roadbed at last and making another odd clicking sound with his tongue as he climbed up after her. Then he whistled two notes, and Charley heard the quick clip-clop of a horse’s hooves on the road. A moment later Letty and the mare emerged from the gloom.

The child was grinning from ear to ear. “Cousin Charley,” she exclaimed, “isn’t Annabelle clever? Jeremiah and I were just telling her some of the things you’ve taught your horses to do, and we’ve become good friends.”

“Charley?”

There was an odd note in her rescuer’s voice when he said her name, and she looked up at him in puzzlement. “Close friends and some members of my family call me so, monsieur. I am Charlotte Tarrant. Letty,” she added, “our rescuer is Monsieur Matois. This is my cousin, monsieur, Lady Letitia Deverill.”

“Letitia
Ophelia
Deverill,” that damsel interjected. “Everyone calls me Letty. Why did you react like that to Charley’s name? Like you’d heard it before.”

Off to the east, Charley could see a golden-red thread widening on the horizon. She could see his face more clearly, too. He was not as large as she had thought him, but he was of greater than medium height, perhaps six feet tall. Although his shoulders were broad, encouraging one to think him very large, his figure was slender. The only memorable features of his face were light eyes set deep beneath a jutting brow and a square, stubborn-looking chin. His nose was straight but ordinary. He had a two-day growth of beard, and thick brown hair hung untidily over his forehead to his eyebrows. In back it touched the collar of the drab frieze coat he wore. His expression was wide-eyed, nearly simple-minded. Altogether an unremarkable specimen, she thought.

He did not answer Letty’s question, busying himself instead in coiling up his rope and fastening it to one of several rings stitched right onto his saddle. When Letty repeated the question in fluent French, he grinned at her. Charley found herself rapidly revising her first opinion of his looks. His eyes crinkled at the corners, as if he smiled frequently. A dimple danced high on his left cheek.

He said, “Charley is a strange name for a female, is it not,
ma petite?
Even in England. One merely remarked upon that fact. How much farther must we go to reach your home from here, mademoiselle?”

“About five miles inland from the next bay,” Charley said. “My grandfather owns most of the land this side of the River Fowey, from the bay to Bodmin Moor.”

“The Earl of St. Merryn is your grandfather then,” he said evenly.

“If you know of him, you must also know his reputation, monsieur.”

“I do,” he agreed. “A right stiff-rumped old reprobate, by what I’ve been told. Fires up like a Guy Fawkes rocket, they say, when anyone crosses his will. Never crossed paths with him myself, though.”

“Temper runs red in our family, I fear,” Charley said.

The corners of his eyes crinkled again, and as light from the east touched them, she saw to her astonishment that they were as blue as the sea on a sunny April morning. He said lightly, “Surely,
mon ange,
you do not have a fiery temperament. You are far too small.”

“She’s little, but she’s mighty,” Letty said. “That’s what my papa says of her, at all events.”

“Your papa reads Shakespeare,” Matois said.

“Is that from Shakespeare?” Letty asked.

“Oui, ma petite,
though you’ve got it wrong. It’s from
A Midsummer Night’s Dream,
and the right way is, ‘though she be but little, she is fierce.’”

Charley eyed him curiously. “How is it that a free trader comes to know Shakespeare, monsieur?”

He shrugged. “One learns English from the curé, the—how do you say it?—the parish priest. He had only the Bible and a set of Shakespeare’s plays from which to teach.” He shrugged, then added glibly, “Annabelle is well trained and has excellent manners, but I have never asked her to carry a lady. A sad oversight in view of the present circumstance, you will say, but it cannot be helped. We shall have to walk.”