Read Online The Shadow of Albion by Andre Norton, Rosemary Edghill - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Andre Norton, Rosemary Edghill
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„There is a plot!“
„There is always a plot,“ Wessex murmured absently. His fingers were busy on
the knotted cords that bound deMorrissey’s hands and feet. They were bound so
tightly together that he did not dare to use the tiny knife he carried, and the knots
were difficult. And surely it could not be so very long until the Jacks realized that the
kitchen had two entrances.
„Saint-Lazarre is to be killed!“ deMorrissey gasped. „In England – an assassin is
on his way.“
„Who?“ Wessex demanded sharply. Victor Saint-Lazarre, that loyal French
expatriate and able courtier, seemed to be the only man who could hold the
squabbling French Royalist factions together. Without Saint-Lazarre to unite the
various Royalist cabals in support of the English war effort, King Henry’s hopes of
sparking a continental counterrevolution to restore a member of the legitimate
Bourbon line to the throne of France would suffer a fearful blow. The man’s
assassination would be a magnificent coup for the Republicans, as well as touching
off a wildfire of terror throughout the country once it was learned that the Corsican
Beast’s reach stretched to murder in England itself.
„Don’t know. The courier we retrieved knew only that Saint-Lazarre was to be
killed on sixteen Germinal“
„The Gazette places Saint-Lazarre at the Marchioness of Roxbury’s country seat
until Parliament resumes. That is where the assassin will strike. If we are separated,
you must do your utmost to reach England with the news,“ Wessex said quickly.
Sixteen Germinal in the Revolutionary Calendar translated to the twentieth of April
by civilized reckoning. Eight days from now. To reach London in time to warn those
in power would take superhuman luck and inhuman speed.
The last knot came free beneath Wessex’s expert fingers just as the door leading
to the kitchen garden burst inward with a clash. DeMorrissey rolled from the pallet
and stretched cramped limbs; a young John Bull in the flower of his manly strength.
His white teeth gleamed in the half-light as he smiled.
„You may depend upon me, sir.“
And then there was no more time for talk. The first Red Jack through the
doorway took a bullet in the throat from Wessex’s tiny pistol and fell to the floor in
a bloody thrashing of limbs. DeMorrissey seized the Red Jack’s truncheon of office
from the dead man’s hand and used it to great effect upon the jaw of the next,
gaining Wessex not only a truncheon of his own but a matchlock pistol primed and
cocked.
„Who wishes next to die?“ Wessex’s tone seemed to hold genuine curiosity as he
regarded the three men he faced. None of them, it seemed, was willing to give him
his answer.
From the corner of his eye Wessex saw deMorrissey edge around him and out
through the kitchen door. And that was well enough, save that in his disheveled
condition and lacking identity papers, deMorrissey would soon enough be seized by
any of the Citizen’s Safety Committees that roamed the city with vigilante
watchfulness. And deMorrissey, still, did not have a single word of French.
The Jacks’ scarlet caps were dyed even bloodier by the light from the stove, and
with admonitory gestures from his borrowed weapon Wessex herded them
backward until they stood in an untidy clump before it. They shuffled uncertainly,
mesmerized by the darkness at the end of his pistol, but in truth the advantage was
theirs and soon enough they would realize it.
„Come on!“ deMorrissey urged from the doorway in a strangled whisper.
Wessex raised the pistol and fired.
The ball struck none of the three men, but the Red Jacks had not been Wessex’s
target. He had been aiming at an object upon the shelf above the stove, and his ball
had flown true. Oil from the shattered jar his bullet had struck dripped down onto
the hot iron surface of the stove.
Dripped
„There is always a plot,“ Wessex murmured absently. His fingers were busy on
the knotted cords that bound deMorrissey’s hands and feet. They were bound so
tightly together that he did not dare to use the tiny knife he carried, and the knots
were difficult. And surely it could not be so very long until the Jacks realized that the
kitchen had two entrances.
„Saint-Lazarre is to be killed!“ deMorrissey gasped. „In England – an assassin is
on his way.“
„Who?“ Wessex demanded sharply. Victor Saint-Lazarre, that loyal French
expatriate and able courtier, seemed to be the only man who could hold the
squabbling French Royalist factions together. Without Saint-Lazarre to unite the
various Royalist cabals in support of the English war effort, King Henry’s hopes of
sparking a continental counterrevolution to restore a member of the legitimate
Bourbon line to the throne of France would suffer a fearful blow. The man’s
assassination would be a magnificent coup for the Republicans, as well as touching
off a wildfire of terror throughout the country once it was learned that the Corsican
Beast’s reach stretched to murder in England itself.
„Don’t know. The courier we retrieved knew only that Saint-Lazarre was to be
killed on sixteen Germinal“
„The Gazette places Saint-Lazarre at the Marchioness of Roxbury’s country seat
until Parliament resumes. That is where the assassin will strike. If we are separated,
you must do your utmost to reach England with the news,“ Wessex said quickly.
Sixteen Germinal in the Revolutionary Calendar translated to the twentieth of April
by civilized reckoning. Eight days from now. To reach London in time to warn those
in power would take superhuman luck and inhuman speed.
The last knot came free beneath Wessex’s expert fingers just as the door leading
to the kitchen garden burst inward with a clash. DeMorrissey rolled from the pallet
and stretched cramped limbs; a young John Bull in the flower of his manly strength.
His white teeth gleamed in the half-light as he smiled.
„You may depend upon me, sir.“
And then there was no more time for talk. The first Red Jack through the
doorway took a bullet in the throat from Wessex’s tiny pistol and fell to the floor in
a bloody thrashing of limbs. DeMorrissey seized the Red Jack’s truncheon of office
from the dead man’s hand and used it to great effect upon the jaw of the next,
gaining Wessex not only a truncheon of his own but a matchlock pistol primed and
cocked.
„Who wishes next to die?“ Wessex’s tone seemed to hold genuine curiosity as he
regarded the three men he faced. None of them, it seemed, was willing to give him
his answer.
From the corner of his eye Wessex saw deMorrissey edge around him and out
through the kitchen door. And that was well enough, save that in his disheveled
condition and lacking identity papers, deMorrissey would soon enough be seized by
any of the Citizen’s Safety Committees that roamed the city with vigilante
watchfulness. And deMorrissey, still, did not have a single word of French.
The Jacks’ scarlet caps were dyed even bloodier by the light from the stove, and
with admonitory gestures from his borrowed weapon Wessex herded them
backward until they stood in an untidy clump before it. They shuffled uncertainly,
mesmerized by the darkness at the end of his pistol, but in truth the advantage was
theirs and soon enough they would realize it.
„Come on!“ deMorrissey urged from the doorway in a strangled whisper.
Wessex raised the pistol and fired.
The ball struck none of the three men, but the Red Jacks had not been Wessex’s
target. He had been aiming at an object upon the shelf above the stove, and his ball
had flown true. Oil from the shattered jar his bullet had struck dripped down onto
the hot iron surface of the stove.
Dripped
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