Olivia chose to ignore it and walked purposefully over to her valise. Taking a mental inventory of her meager possessions, she thought of one or two things she could use to defend herself if she could just get to them.
Yet even as her hands closed over the handles, Capitaine de Jenoure’s clamped down over hers. “And what treasures do you have in here?”
He shoved her down on a stool and opened the valise, his brow cocking arrogantly as he started to paw through her belongings. First to come out were the twill britches. He shook his head, muttering something about loathsome English fashions. The britches were dispatched with all due haste.
“Let those men go,” Olivia said, trying to distract him from digging deeper into her valise.
“What, those thieves?” he scoffed. “I think not. They’d murder us in our beds before the night was over. Your concern for them is quite touching but most misplaced.” He brought out her dimity gown, which elicited much the same response as the britches.
Next came her notebook. “Ah, now this might be most interesting.” He settled down on the other stool, and poured himself a glass of wine. After taking an appreciative sip, he opened the book. Flipping through the pages, his expression was one of bafflement as he tried to decipher her notes. “I admit my English isn’t perfect, but none of this makes any sense. Perhaps you would like to decipher this scrawl for me.”
Outside, the dragoons’ voices rose in a boisterous and rousing song.
Olivia smiled. “Not unless you let my friends go.”
The capitaine shrugged and threw her notebook on his bed. “Yes, well, we have many nights ahead of us to discuss the contents of that and how best to translate them.”
He returned to pawing through her valise, this time bringing out her pistol. “Tsk. Tsk. Such an ugly thing for a lady to carry. But considering the company you have been keeping, I can see why you might have found it necessary. I am sure by the morning you will agree that French hospitality is more to your liking.”
Olivia had an entirely different opinion on that subject.
The next thing he pulled out was the sprigged muslin. It nearly brought tears to her eyes to see this loathsome man handling her beautiful dress, the one Robert had gazed upon her with such passion as she’d worn it.
Now he was gone, and they would never have another night like they’d had on the
Sybaris.
“I would have you wear this for me,” the Capitaine was saying. “It would be much more fetching than those rags this rabble has tried to disguise you in.”
“I prefer these, thank you,” she said, tightening her shawl around her shoulders.
He gave the sprigged muslin another leering glance and then tossed it on the bed alongside her journal. “You can wear it when I present you to the emperor.” He reached inside her valise again and this time came out with a handful of items, including the packet of deadly powder Alamar had given her.
And it gave her an idea.
“As my friend out there said, monsieur, you are a long way from France. What makes you believe you can get me to Paris?”
Her sneering question elicited exactly the reaction she’d hoped for.
He slammed his fist down on the table, sending the various items fluttering to the floor. “You English bitch. By the time you get to France, you will be crawling into my bed, begging for my attentions.”
Lady Finch had always said the French were a hotheaded lot. Happily, she was right.
In his anger and arrogant display, the paper filled with Alamar’s murderous potion fluttered from the table and landed at her feet. She gulped, feigned dismay at Capitaine de Jenoure’s display and let her shawl drop to her feet. When she bent to pick it up, she palmed the packet.
Robert surveyed the camp below calculating how best to liberate Rafe and his men.
And Olivia.
He tried not to think of her down there amidst these drunken French dragoons, who thought nothing of cutting up their victims for sport. He’d seen enough French atrocities during his time behind enemy lines to haunt his dreams for a lifetime.
“I count seven of our men,” Gaspar whispered. “That means one of them is either missing and got away, or . . .”
He didn’t need to finish his thought for Robert to know exactly what he was thinking. He’d already made the same difficult count and reached the conclusion that one of their group had probably died.
It also left Olivia unaccounted for. Where the devil was the little termagant?
Now, when he had finally gotten up the nerve to tell her how he felt—how much he cared for her, how much he needed her forgiveness.
“I say, isn’t that the Queen?” Jemmy said, pointing toward the lone tent in the middle of the camp.
Silhouetted on the wall of the canvas was the figure of a man bent over a table. As he rose and held something up for examination, he revealed a second occupant in the tent.
Olivia,
Robert’s heart sang.
Suddenly he suspected this surprise attack hadn’t been just happenstance after all. “Gaspar,” he whispered. “Look there.” He pointed at the mules that had yet to be unpacked, the poor animals hobbled together, but not unloaded. “If we could get down there and get our hands on a box of powder, do you think we could add some fireworks to their celebration?”
Gaspar grinned, then put his knife between his teeth and began a silent crawl toward one of the soldiers posted on the camp’s perimeter.
“What do you want me to do?” Jemmy asked.
“Cover me,” Robert told him, as he set out for the line of pack animals.
The bulk of the French force was getting drunk around the fire, while the few men who had been set to guard duty were spending more time watching their comrades with envy than attending to their duties.
Robert made it to the first animal, and to his dismay, it turned out to be Evaline. The horrid little donkey took one look at him and rolled her eyes, while her lips peeled back over her great yellow teeth. She let out a bray that could have alerted every single French soldier from Spain all the way back to Bonaparte’s headquarters in Paris.
“Shut up,” he whispered. “Be quiet. Don’t you know I am trying to save you.”
Evaline regarded him for one blessed silent moment and then cut loose with another raucous chorus of complaints.
“How did you manage to find me?” Olivia asked. “The Spaniards hate the French, so I doubt one of them would sell me out to the likes of you.”
The man laughed. “You underestimate the lure of gold.” He paused for a moment before refilling his glass. “But if you must know, it was one of your own countrymen who helped us. A man who was quite willing to bring us to you for a portion of the reward.” He held up the flagon to Olivia. “Would you care for a glass before we retire?”
“It isn’t my vintage,” she told him, trying without any success to find a way to distract him long enough to pour the powder into his cup and more importantly to avoid his bed.
If it came to that, she might be tempted to take the damned poison herself.
Off in the distance, Evaline made a distraught braying noise. It caught Olivia off guard because it was the same distinct protest the little donkey made every time Robert tried to make friends with her.
Robert?
The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end as Evaline protested again, while Capitaine de Jenoure covered his ears to blot out the discordant noise.
Olivia bit her lip. It couldn’t be! But it had to be. Evaline reacted like that to only one person.
Robert!
Suddenly a new hope swelled to life inside her heart. Could he have escaped the fate Capitaine de Jenoure had described?
Meanwhile the capitaine crossed the tent and opened the flap, giving her just the chance she needed.
Olivia glanced over her shoulder at him to make sure he wasn’t looking, then dumped the contents of Alamar’s powder into his wine cup.
“Silence that wretched animal. Now!” he was shouting at one of his men, as Olivia watched the powder bubble for a moment then disappear into the ruby-colored wine without a trace.
Meanwhile Evaline continued to bray and protest as if the entire camp were filled with Roberts.
The capitaine stomped back to the table and picked up his wine. He waited for a moment until the report of a gun silenced her faithful little donkey’s cry.
“There, that ought to be the end of that wretched beast,” he said as he quaffed the entire contents of the cup.
And yours as well, you wretched man,
Olivia thought.
Just then the camp rocked with an explosion, then another. A flurry of gunshots followed. The capitaine strode toward the doorway, reached for his pistol, but came to an abrupt halt.
He spun around, clutching at his throat, his eyes wild. Then his frantic gaze landed on his empty cup.
“You—” he managed to sputter, trying to raise his arm and aim his pistol at her. But before he could pull the trigger, his body went into a series of jerky spasms and he fell over dead.
Olivia jumped over his body and grabbed up her pistol as well as the capitaine’s. Outside, men were shouting in several different languages, calling out orders, the replies coming in gunshots.
The flap of the tent flipped open, and Olivia whirled around, a pistol in either hand. And in that instant before she made the decision to pull the trigger, Robert stepped into the tent.
“Don’t shoot me, I’m here to rescue you,” he said, as she came flying across the tent and into his arms. He glanced over her shoulder at the body of the capitaine. “Once again, it looks like you were doing fine all on your own.”
R
afe’s troop had suffered the loss of four men in total, who they buried hastily, murmured prayers over their unmarked graves and vowed once again to rid the Peninsula of the French pestilence that had killed so many good people.
The dead dragoons they tossed into the ravine, but not before they had relieved them of their weapons and munitions and—almost as valuable—their boots.
After that Robert and Rafe decided it was in their best interest to put as much distance as possible between them and the grisly scene in case Capitaine de Jenoure had not been working alone.
So with it still dark, they packed up and rode. Into the dawn and well into the next day they continued their flight through the barren, rough, mountainous spine separating Portugal from Spain. When the sun started to dip well into the western horizon, they stopped to make camp in an abandoned convent perched on a precipice and with the vantage of affording them a good view of the countryside around them in case they’d been followed.
After everyone took a few hours of much needed rest, the camp stirred to life. They were getting close to Badajoz, and most of the men were confident that by tomorrow they would see the banks of the Rio Guadiana and Wellington’s camp.
The convent also afforded a luxury that not even Olivia had expected. In the former laundry there was a large cistern that filled and overflowed with water from an underground spring. The men left her to her privacy, so she was able to bathe and wash her clothes.
The brisk water and a bit of soap she’d purloined at the inn made for a heavenly bath, and she reveled in the unexpected luxury of it. With her regular clothes all hung out to dry, she donned the sprigged muslin and smiled as she pinned up her damp and curling hair.
She hoped Robert would notice . . . and remember the last time she wore this dress.
In the relative safety of their secluded hideout, Rafe’s men built a fire and prepared a great meal to celebrate their last night on the road. When Olivia made her entrance, she was greeted with cheers and applause. With a shy smile at such flattery, she curtseyed quickly and then took a seat.
Cautiously, she glanced over at Robert, only to find that his gaze were very much upon her. He did remember, if the smoky fire lighting his eyes told the truth.
After everyone had eaten their fill, Paco began regaling them with tales of Spanish heroes and clowns, leaving his avid audience laughing and crying.
Finally Olivia spoke up. “Tell me the story of
El
Rescate del Rey.
”
All the men grew quiet and stared at her, as if she must be joking.
She shrugged her shoulders. “Truly, I do not know the story.”
“How can that be, little Queen?” Paco asked. “You have Caliopa’s heart and her daring. Yet you claim you don’t know her story?”
Olivia shook her head and waited eagerly for Paco to begin.
Like a good storyteller, Paco let his audience wait for a few moments and then he began.
“In the dark first days when the Moors invaded our country, King Álvaro, a brave and wealthy ruler from the North, heard of his country’s fate in the South, so he raised his army and went to meet the barbarian invaders, much against the wishes of his Queen .. .”
Spain, 712
“My Queen, there must be another way,” the lady’s confessor pleaded. “You could feign illness. You could flee. You could come with me tonight. There is a convent in Badajoz that would take you in. You would be safe there.”
Queen Caliopa listened to Father Mateo’s words and wished there was an alternative.
Damn the Moorish invaders for holding her husband hostage, and damn their enemies from within,
she wanted to tell the gentle priest, but instead she shook her head, her hands already wringing the embroidered belt hanging at her waist. If she thought the silver and gold thread decorating the expensive piece would add to the likelihood of saving her beloved husband, she would have plucked every metallic strand from the design.
Already the small chest at her feet sat weighted with all the gold and silver she’d been able to wrangle from her husband’s treasury. And when that hadn’t been enough to satisfy the sultan’s demands, she’d filled the remaining space with gems and jewels that had been in her family for centuries. Before she closed it, she pulled her betrothal ring from her hand and held it tightly.
“No, my Queen. Not your ring,” Father Mateo said, his words more a prayer than a plea.