“I can see you perfected the stone,” rasped Casanova in Italian as his old acquaintance entered the room. The man had not aged a day since they had first met eight and twenty years ago.
“I can see you have not,” returned the Count of St Germain in the same language.
“I was never a proper alchemist, you know that,” said Casanova, his head falling back to the pillows.
“That did not prevent you from accepting thousands from Madame Pompadour, in payment for your services,” quipped thecomte, taking a seat next to the bed.
“Can you blame me?” Casanova barked out in laughter. “The woman wasted so much money, someone had to collect it.”
The two men sat late into the night, discussing the future of the continent, celestial alignments, and the properties of the philosopher’s stone.
“You are always at ease. The rest of us, scurrying about, we have so much to do before our time ends. You never seem concerned about the future, or what it holds for you,” said Casanova.
“Time has little meaning to those of us who understand it,” thecomtesaid, smiling sadly at the dying man.
“Do you believe there is anything after this?” Casanova asked. “If anyone might know, I feel it would be you.”
“There is, at least for some people,” answered St Germain as he gazed at the man laying back on the pillows.
“Well, that is something,” sighed Casanova, “I have lived as a philosopher, and die as a Christian.”
St Germain said nothing more, only sat next to the other man through the night, slipping from the room and leaving as the light of dawn crept in. When the maid entered an hour later, her master had passed on to meet his maker.
CHAPTER 48
The following day was a busy one at Bourne House. Ashley went about with Lady Catherine, and met with the magistrate, several local landowners, and the mayor. They also met with Mr Buckle from the East Sussex Volunteer Corps, and Ashley used all of his commanding presence as well as the promise of a generous donation to the corps, if they would rally their forces and continue the search for Darcy with renewed motivation.
Croucher dressed as a rough man and met with several local men in the pub. Men who had families to feed, and who were occasionally obliged to break the law to do so, but were still good Englishmen. They had been afraid to speak too much, but it had been them that had sounded out the local clergyman to alert the magistrate to the strange activity. There were several caves on the coast that were rarely used by smugglers, because during some tides, they were sometimes completely flooded, and therefore dangerous, although they did not usually flood entirely this time of year. These caves were only ever accessible during low tide, and few locals ever explored them. Even the lads knew better than to go exploring and get themselves trapped, or worse, drowned.
Croucher could not promise the men that the army would look the other way to their smuggling endeavours, obviously Richard was here to report whatever he found. But in consideration that there may be something far more sinister happening, perhaps the smugglers could pause their activities, and tellhimwhat they knew, and they might rid themselves of whatever intruders were encroaching on their territory. Knowing that the area was being investigated, the smugglers could absent themselves from the coast for a few weeks. They were not expecting a drop before then.
The men explained that there were few locations from which one might view the entrance to the caves at low tide without being observed, and made arrangements with Croucher to lead him there the following day.
The following day was Sunday,and the entire household was seen in church, and spoke to the townspeople of the search for Darcy as they departed. Ashley and Arabella, wishing to observe the Lord’s Day as well as they ought, but also needing to expend the energy of three rambunctious boys who had travelled by carriage for days, planned to take a basket lunch and their boys for a drive after church. Georgiana and their Aunt Priscilla – who was recovering from her ordeal – and appreciated the distraction – were desolate at the idea of being left behind, so Ashley had rented a shooting break?1 from the livery, and the outing would be comfortable and pleasant for all, even with their large party.
The family waved goodbye to their friends and relations as they pulled away from the church after services, and headed out towards the coast and the cliffs, followed by four armed men onhorseback. They drove for perhaps an hour, high spirits all the way, before stopping near a small village called East Dean, and took their picnic near the cliffs, running and playing with the children for two hours before they tired, when Arabella and the two younger ladies herded Ashley and the boys back into the carriage and headed for home.
When they were perhaps a mile from Eastbourne’s village, there came a shout from over a hill, and suddenly, a large group of brigands on horseback crested the small rise, and gave chase, whooping, and shooting into the air. There were too many for their armed guards to overcome on their own, and so their groom whipped up his horses, and drove them as fast as could be done without overturning the conveyance. The ladies screamed, and the boys began to cry in terror as Ashley turned about backwards and began shooting carefully with the two smoothbore muskets he had produced from under the bench. Each musket held four shots, and Ashley, one of the best shots of his year amongst the men at Cambridge, managed to hit two of the men who were chasing them, and the guards on horseback unhorsed two more, reducing their number to four.
All of the men were now without shots, and the brigands surrounded the carriage and engaged with their guards as the carriage fled down the lane, perilously close to the cliffside. Suddenly Ashley realised what was happening. “They are trying to drive us off of the cliffs!” he shouted to the driver, who in response sharply turned the horses away from the edge, and drove straight into the midst of their attackers, sending them and their horses scattering, though they turned and gave chase with their swords. The ladies and children huddled on the floor of the open carriage, crying and screaming, as Ashley did his best to shield them.
After a short distance, their attackers fell back. All of the men’s guns were now without shots, the attackers’ numbers hadbeen greatly reduced, and it was too late to drive the carriage off of the cliffs. They were now coming too close to the town, and as the attackers fell back. Ashley’s men followed them into the village, unwilling to leave their master and his family without protection in order to give chase.
Ashley and the men called to the house as the horse galloped into their crescent, and the driver pulled them up abruptly. Arabella and the ladies were entirely hysterical, and the children were sobbing and clinging to their mother, who was entirely overwhelmed. The women and children were all carried upstairs, the ladies dosed heavily with brandy and laudanum. Even the boys were given a heavy dose of brandy, but they could not be parted from their mother, and were all piled into her bed to collapse into shock and exhaustion with her.
The magistrate was sent for, not that there was anything he could do, but a great number of local men were roused from their homes to mount their horses and go out in search of the brigands. Obviously the ones who had escaped were not found, though the roads had been followed in all directions. The ones who had been shot were all dead. They were dressed as peasants, in homespun, though the quality of their muskets and swords, plus their ability to not only ride, but fight on horseback meant they were anything but what they appeared.
Pictures of the dead men were drawn by a local man, signs were put up all over Eastbourne and sent to the neighbouring towns, and rewards for information were placed in the newspapers, but there was very little information to go on. Ashley was enraged by the attempt on his family. He had recognised Wickham as one of the men on horseback, and swore upon all that he held holy, that if he encountered the man, he would not be nearly so lenient as his brother and cousin had been in the past.
Huggins was furious.“You failed? Failed entirely? You went out with seven other armed men on horseback, and did not even manage to harm a single hair on the head of even the most helpless child?” he shouted at Wickham in French.
“They had armed men with them,” Wickham protested in the same language. “We lost four of our own!”
“You don’t have a damned excuse to have lost four men, you stupid fool!” screamed Huggins. “Our contact’s terms were that these people were to be killed before the landing! What if he does something now to prevent it!”
“Why is it so important for the Fitzwilliams to die? Who the hell is your contact?” Wickham demanded in confusion.
“Now I must ensure that a group of men must attack the house during the landing. We need every man to engage the residents of this stinking town so that we can breach the castle!” Huggins said savagely, ignoring Wickham’s question. “I do not have fifty men to waste on doing the job which you have not!”
