Ebb tide

cloaks, appeared from the door guarding the stairs and seemed to fill the kitchen with a nervous fluster. She looked anxiously at the strangers, darted an even more suspicious glance at the silent Cossack and, though Edward stepped forward to embrace her and reassure her, continued to regard them all with deep concern.

Edward briefly indicated Drinkwater, referring to him as 'Le Capitaine Anglais'. The woman half acknowledged Drinkwater's bow, then swung round and gabbled at Edward, but he was up to the occasion.

'Silence, Juliette!' He turned to the children. 'Allons, mes petits!'Allons!' He passed a handful of coin to the farmer and indicated the door. Drinkwater emerged into the stink of the yard once more. Five minutes later they were heading north along the track which was now bathed in pale moonlight.

Inevitably, the return journey took longer. Neither the Baroness nor her children were capable of moving at the speed of the four men. The girl whimpered incessantly until, without a word, Edward took her hand from her mother's and, clasping it in his own, led her on. After a few hundred yards she tripped over a flint in the track, pitched to her knees and began to wail.

Edward's palm covered her mouth as he picked her up. Whispering into her ear, he scarcely slackened his pace, giving the Baroness no time to commiserate with her unhappy daughter. The girl clung to his neck. The boy tramped doggedly on. Drinkwater had heard Edward say something encouraging to him in which the words 'soldat' and 'marche' were accompanied by 'mon brave'. After a while Jago fell in alongside the lad and, from time to time, spoke briefly in French. The boy responded, and Drinkwater judged from his tone of voice that the lad was not uninfluenced by the adventure of the night. He himself was left to offer the Baroness his arm. She accepted at first, but they had dropped somewhat behind when the girl fell and, having relinquished it in order to catch up, she did not seek his support again, politely declining further assistance. Despite this she made a greater effort to keep up, though Drinkwater thought she found the plodding presence of the Cossack at the rear of the little column intimidating.

Drinkwater now began to consider how on earth they were going to get the frightened trio and the Russian into the boat and soon decided that the method he had chosen would prove inadequate. He had mentioned this possibility to Frey who, with the change of tide, would have his own work cut out in remaining as near as possible to the landing place without dragging his anchor. The tide would be on the ebb now and, if they were much delayed, Frey might have to haul Kestrel off into deeper water. Drinkwater tried to console himself with the thought that they were making quite good progress, all things considered, though he wondered how long Edward could carry the girl. The wind had dropped a little too, he thought, and that was all to the good.

When they gained the chaussée, they turned right and, reaching the low stand of trees, they paused for a short break. Something seemed to be bothering Edward, for while the others caught their breath under the trees, he went out into the middle of the road, scuffing the dust with his right boot. Drinkwater pushed himself off from the tree trunk against which he had been leaning and approached his brother.

'Is something amiss?' he asked in a low voice.

'Yes,' said Edward, pointing at the ground. 'Since we were here last, some horses have passed through.'

'Cavalry horses?'

'Yes. Quite a lot of them too, I would say.'

'Going which way?'

'East. The wrong way for us.'

'God's bones!' Drinkwater considered the matter a moment. 'We shall be all right if we remain behind them, though, surely?'

'Let us hope so,' Edward responded grimly, 'but if I were you, I'd get your arms ready before we move off.'

'I'll tell Jago, but we don't want to alarm our friends.'

'They're alarmed already.'

'Your Cossack might prove useful. Is he armed?'

'He has a pistol.'

'How long has he been in your service?'

'Some seven years now. He attached himself to me after the battle of Eylau. Khudoznik is a nick-name meaning 'artist'. 'Tis a tribute to his abilities at foraging.'

'He will be quite unfamiliar with the sea, I imagine.'

'That, brother, is why I did not tell you of him before.'

CHAPTER 11 The Fugitives

April 1815

Before they set off again, Edward warned them to walk at the edge of the chaussée in single file and to drop into the grass beside the road at his signal. If they hesitated, he emphasized, they would be lost. Drinkwater was aware that he impressed this point upon the Baroness and that she nodded in acknowledgement, her face clear in the moonlight.

Drinkwater looked up at the sky. The cloud had almost gone, leaving only low banks gathered on the horizon. 'Of all the damnedest luck,' he muttered to himself. Then they set off again.

It seemed to the anxious and weary Drinkwater that they marched in a dream. The ribbon of road, set for the most part along a raised eminence and flooded by moonlight, appeared to make them hugely conspicuous and quite unavoidable. Their gait was tired and they stumbled frequently, the Baroness immediately in front of Drinkwater falling full length at one point. He helped her up, but she shook him off and, as their eyes met, he could see by the line of her mouth that she was biting back tears of hurt, rage and humiliation.

They walked like automata, their brains numbed by fear and exhaustion. Robbed of all professional instinct ashore, Drinkwater had abdicated responsibility to Edward whose military experience was, he realized with something of a shock, clearly extensive. Watching their rear, his brother would also, from time to time, run on ahead on some private reconnaissance. Once he stopped them and they crouched in the grass, unaware of what had troubled their leader, but after a few terrifying minutes which woke them all from their personal catalepsies with thundering hearts, Edward waved them on again and they resumed the bone-wearying plod-plod of the march. In a curious sense the return appeared to be both longer and shorter than the outward journey. Though they seemed to have been traversing the high-road for half a lifetime, quite suddenly they were approaching the huddle of buildings that formed the farm on the outskirts of the village and where the exchange of repartee had amused them earlier. Matters seemed less risible now.

Looking anxiously ahead, with apprehensions about the geese and dog uppermost in their minds, they had almost forgotten their rear when the Cossack suddenly ran forward to join Edward. The two men abrupdy crouched down. At the peremptory wave of Edward's arm, the rest of the party dropped into the grass again, sliding down the shallow embankment into the damp shadows. Raising his head, Drinkwater caught a glimpse of his brother staring back the way they had come. Then he heard a whisper in French, loosely translated by Jago. 'Keep absolutely still, sir. There's someone coming up astern.'

As he lay down and closed his eyes, Drinkwater felt the beat of the horse's hooves through the ground. He remained motionless as the noise peaked. The regular snort of the horse, the jingle of harness and the clatter of accoutrements seemed almost on top of them. Then the odorous wind of the passing of man and beast swept over them and was gone. Drinkwater looked up. The single horseman had not noticed them.

Edward wormed his way back down the line to where Drinkwater lay. 'That was a hussar orderly,' he whispered. 'My guess is that he had orders for the body of horse which passed along this road earlier. They may be