Signora Ruggeri nodded, her eyes fixed in panic.
Above us, Madame Jourdain had managed to gain her feet. She staggered toward the road above, but I let her go. I’d save ourselves first, worry about Madame Jourdain later.
The three of us half hobbled, half ran toward the bridge, ducking into its shadow just as another bolt struck not far from where we’d come ashore. Signora Ruggeri yelped and flung herself to the damp earth.
“I want to go home,” she screeched, no longer bothering with French. “I never want to see this bloody country again!”
I barked a laugh as Moreau and I fell beside her, Moreau still coughing.
“I do not disagree,” I told her over the rampaging storm. “Where did you learn to handle a boat so well?”
Madame Ruggeri, who at the moment resembled nothing of the Paduan siren she pretended to be, gave me a shrug.
“Me dad ran boats from Manchester to Liverpool. I was on the tiller since I were a wee lass, weren’t I?”
“Thank God for that,” I said fervently.
Moreau coughed. “I owe you a debt, Madame.”
Signora Ruggeri—now plain Imogen Cooke—shrugged again, hugged her knees to her chest, and buried her face in her sodden skirts. She heaved with sobs, but I was too exhausted to comfort her, Moreau, or myself.
Another scream startled us. I crawled to the north edge of our hiding place and scanned the road above the bridge.
I saw Madame Jourdain, moving at a limping run. The coach Denis had hired closed in on her, and from it stepped Captain Vernet. His men came behind on foot, surrounding the woman, who began to fight.
Another coach halted near the first, Signora Ruggeri’s ruffian coachman leaping from its box. He caught Madame Jourdain and shook her until the woman ceased her failing.
I dropped back to the stones of the bridge’s base. “They’ve snared our bird. Did she murder Gallo? Or was it Madame Martin?”
Signora Ruggeri regarded me limply. “It was Jourdain, the old besom. She boasted that to me, today, when Madame Martin dragged me to her. Madame Jourdain turned on her own sister, can you credit it? And then she tried to do me over when I wouldn’t tell her where I’d hidden Vincenzo’s papers.”
“Where are they?” I asked her tiredly. “You won’t be able to use them now.”
“Safe.” Her lips tightened. “I’ll give them to you, don’t worry, if you promise to burn the lot of them.”
I exchanged a glance with Moreau. “We will,” I said.
Thunder rumbled once more, but more distantly, no longer over our heads. I climbed wearily to my feet.
“Well, mes amis,” I said. “Shall we retreat somewhere drier before we catch our deaths?”
I held out my hand to Signora Ruggeri, who let me lift and steady her. I extended the other to Moreau, who grasped it firmly as he rose.
He gave me a nod, and we limped back into the open. The rain slackened as abruptly as it had started as we emerged from under the bridge.
I saw, standing upright in the riverbed, its goose-head handle breaking the river’s waves, my walking stick, the one Donata had given me several years ago. I’d realized, shortly before then, that I loved her.
I burst into laughter and caught it up.
I leaned heavily on the walking stick—the old friend that had been my prop for years—and hobbled with my new friends up the remainder of the bank.
We reached the top and surrendered to the ministrations of the gendarmes who’d run to meet us. The coachman dropped Madame Jourdain unceremoniously and turned to Signora Ruggeri, his craggy face softening in relief. He had his own coat off and wrapped around Signora Ruggeri before Moreau and I reached the street.
Around them all came the unmistakable form of Brewster, who began cursing at me the moment he was in earshot.
Chapter 30
I managed—by sheer good fortune or the grace of God—to avoid catching too much of a chill in the events at the river.
