The Privateer's Revenge

application for a menial post intrigues me.'

Renzi's uneasy smile brought a further penetrating glance. 'Of course, this would be a capital way for a spy to inveigle himself into my headquarters. Are you a spy, Mr Renzi?'

'I am not, sir.'

'Then?'

'My last post was that of a ship's clerk, sir, lately Teazer, brig-sloop. For reasons that need not trouble you, this position has now been closed to me.'

'Clerk? How interesting. It would disappoint me to hear that your removal was for . . . peccant reasons.'

'No felonious act has ever attached to my name, sir,' Renzi snapped.

'Do pardon my direct speaking, sir. You see, your presenting at this time comes as a particular convenience to me.'

At Renzi's wary silence he went on: 'Let me be more explicit. As commodore of the Jersey Squadron I have my flagship round the coast at Gorey. This little office provides an official pied-a-terre in St Helier and my private house is nearby. As it happens, sir, I have an especial regard for those who have in their person suffered in the terrible convulsions of the Revolution—the royalistes.'

He looked at Renzi intently. 'Here there are many emigre French to be seen wandering the streets, poor souls, some even standing for long hours on the cliffs mooning over their lost land, which is in plain view to the east. I do take a personal interest in their plight.'

Shuffling some papers on his desk he said, 'It is for this reason I maintain an old, contemptible castle near Gorey, which I devote to their cause. Now, there is nothing in the naval sphere available,' he said regretfully, 'but I have recently lost a valued confidential secretary and the creatures offering themselves in his place are—are lacking in the article of gentlemanly discernment, shall we say? Therefore, should you feel inclined, there is a post I can offer, which shall be my secretary for emigre affairs.

'You have the French, I trust?' he added.

'I do, sir.'

'They are a distracted and, some might say, fractious community. Dogmatic priests, aristocrats insisting on the forms of the ancien regime, a thankless task. For this, shall we say fifty livres a month?'

A princely sum! It was more than he had dared hope, and—

With only a single glance at Renzi's scuffed shoes d'Auvergne added smoothly, 'Of course, this will be at the castle—Mont Orgueil, I should inform you—which is at a remove from St Helier, and therefore I feel an obligation upon me to offer you a room there for a trifle in the way of duties out of the normal hours.'

'That is most kind in you, sir.'

'Then may I know when would be an acceptable date for your commencement, Mr Renzi?'

'This is a very remarkable achievement, sir,' said Renzi, standing next to d'Auvergne within the grim bastions of Mont Orgueil, softened with tasteful medieval hangings and well-turned Gothic furniture. The castle, four-square and forbidding on a prominence looking across the water at France, had its roots in the age of the longbow and armoured knights, but with the arrival of cannon, it had been abandoned in Elizabethan times to genteel decay.

D'Auvergne had brought back some of the colour and grandeur, particularly in the part of the edifice he occupied, the Corbelled Tower, now an impressive receiving place past the four outer gates and a higgledy-piggledy final spiral staircase.

The rest of the castle was an eccentric accretion of bluff towers and quaint gateways that led to open battlements at the top. There, stretching over two-thirds of the eastern horizon, was the coast of France—the ancient enemy of England.

D'Auvergne gave Renzi a pensive look. 'I like to think I am its castellan of modern times and I'm rather fond of it. 'Time has mouldered into beauty many a grim tower,' it's been said. 'And where rich banners once displayed, now only waves a flower . . .' Sad, for there's myriad tales untold here, I'm persuaded.'

He collected himself. 'You shall bed in the Principal Yeoman Warder's room. Don't concern yourself on his behalf, pray—the last he had need of it was in 1641.'

Renzi found it hard to avoid being affected by the atmosphere; the musty stonework of the upper floors had some life and light but other places lurking below in the dark and unfathomable depths of the fortress made him shiver.

D'Auvergne continued, 'There is a small staff. I have had the kitchens removed to this level, else it plays the devil with keeping the food hot. The gate porter you'll find in St George Tower—be sure to address him as the marechal—his lodgings are found by the King's Receiver and he may claim one gallon of imported wine and a cabot of salt for his pains.'

At length they returned to d'Auvergne's apartment, where he sat behind a Gothic desk, set before diamond- mullioned windows, and steepled his fingers. 'So. You have the measure of my little kingdom, Mr Renzi. What do you think?'

It was impossible to do justice to the sense of awe and unease that this lonely sea-frontier redoubt had brought to him so Renzi murmured, 'Quite of another age, sir.'

'Just so. Er, at this point, perhaps I should introduce myself a little more formally. You see at the recent demise of Leopold, Duke of Bouillon, I have succeeded to that principality and am thus entitled to be addressed as, His Serene Highness, the Prince of Bouillon.''

Renzi sat back in astonishment, remembering just in time a civil bow of his head.

'You will, no doubt, be more comfortable with the usual naval titles at which I will be satisfied. However, I do insist on the style of prince in my correspondence.'

'Sir.'