“One - I happen to know that my wife was defending herself, fighting for her life. Two - your wife, if that’s her real identity, is an agent of the French royalists and just took possession of a havey-cavey locket which has a hidden packet of powder that I doubt you would wish to have examined if we were to bring this before Governor Lowe. And three - Captain Still of the Arethusa knows exactly what is inside the locket, because he took it into safe-keeping for my wife while I was incapacitated from a beating ordered by one of your lot.”
Lieutenant Towle paled and pushed away the other woman’s hand which she’d moved to cover one of his. “Go on,” he said. “We’ll say nothing.” He waved a hand at them.
The dark-haired woman stood and accused Willa. “Did you leave the locket intact?”
“Maybe I did, and maybe I didn’t. I suppose one of you will have to test the contents.” Willa rose from the table and Cullen stalked behind her out into the sun.
“Ye couldn’t leave well enough alone, woman? Ye had to poke the bear one last time?” Cullen shook his head at his wife’s insane insistence on cracking the whip of her tongue to have the last word over the royalist spies.
They walked briskly back down the mountain path, not trusting the couple they’d left in the cottage.
Cullen eyed Willa solemnly from the side. “I had no idea what a bloodthirsty lass I married.”
Willa did not deny his words but threw him an angry stare.
He blinked. “I’ll take that to mean I should sleep with one eye open from now on.”
Cullen sat in a damp sitting room and listened to the rustling of mice in the walls at Longwood House. And he prayed to God the world’s most famous prisoner would not show up. He’d had word sent to the Arethusa by the shore boat waiting on the quay in Johnstown. He and Willa would be ready to board that afternoon after his “summons” to give medical advice on the state of the prisoner’s health.
Captain Still had kept the ship out, not far beyond the harbor, patrolling and guarding who knew what secrets. He was beginning to get an uneasy feeling that Captain Still knew more about the state of the politics and intrigue on St. Helena than he’d let on. Cullen, for one, would be grateful to get this assignment behind him.
He’d nearly nodded off after several hours of sitting in an uncomfortable wooden chair when he was suddenly alert again. A whispered conversation floated across the screens separating the waiting area of the long sitting room. From the rhythm and tone of the back-and-forth of the words, he guessed an argument and debate were taking place. Great. He was within an hour of turning his back on the madness of St. Helena.
Just when he thought someone would come out and dismiss him, a young Frenchman appeared. His English was heavily accented, but good enough. “The General has decided it would not hurt to give you an audience from behind the screen. You can ask him questions about his health, and, if appropriate, he will answer.”
Cullen’s mouth dropped open. He could not think of any intelligent response to such an addle-pated suggestion. But he did want this ordeal to be over.
“Fine. I would be happy discuss the Emperor’s health.” When he stood, the young man dragged his chair across the thin, faded carpet to the area next to the screen.
Cullen sat gingerly on the wobbly chair which could use re-assembly with some new nails.
After a long silence, a low voice from the other side admitted, “The pain - it never ends.”
“Where?”
“My stomach.”
“Which side is the pain worse?”
After a long pause, the voice resumed. “On the right.”
“High or low?”
Another pause. “About the middle.”
“I can’t tell you anything without at least seeing where you’re pointing for pain.”
“What would be your guess, Dr. MacCloud?”
Cullen jerked at the mention of his name and then automatically suggested what he would for any patient with unexplained stomach pain. “There’s always bleeding, a bland diet, perhaps a tonic, or calomel for purges, and of course, laudanum for pain.”
The voice on the other side of the screen turned abrupt and dismissive. “That is quite enough. You do not seem to have any more knowledge than all of the other know-nothing physicians who have seen me over the years.”
“I’m sorry, sir. I wish you well.”
And that was the end of the strangest patient conversation Cullen had ever had.
He shook his head hard and headed out the door behind the young man who had summoned him.
Outside, Cullen accepted the loan of a mule to transport him down to the harbor as quickly as possible. The animal could be returned by the next visitor to Longwood. All he wanted now was to return to his own surgery and his beautiful, maddening, unpredictable wife, who by now would be waiting with their things aboard the shore boat with a group of His Majesty’s Royal Marines. Thank God.
Willa’s stubborn husband leaned against the bunk in their cabin that had once again become the place where they shared the nightly dialogue that had gone on for months. She knew every plane, every bumpy surface on his body. In the dark of the tiny space they’d shared, she’d gone over the rough chart of his face with her fingers more times than she could recall. She kissed those lips and greedily sucked in his warmth. But she still did not have a map of the uncharted depths that lay behind his thick skull.
Cullen broke the extended silence. “Now what is going on behind those sinful gray eyes, lass? Today, they look like the foam that crashes over rocks near the shore. Just waiting to take down an unwise sod like me who doesn’t care if he gets dragged under and sucked back out to sea.
“You know what I want.” Willa
