Death at Dawn - Caro Peacock [109]
‘Blackstone’s woken up. I think you should hear what he has to say.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
I wanted to run to him with my news, but I didn’t trust him over Blackstone. Perhaps I took a few steps towards him and stumbled, because he spread out his arms, as if to catch me.
‘Liberty, are you ill? I don’t believe you’ve slept or eaten.’
‘I’ll do very well.’
I made myself stand up straight and his arms fell to his sides. I took him by the back stairs into the courtyard and round the wall of the kitchen garden. When we came to the spiral path to the pavilion he offered me his arm, but I shook my head and went in front of him. At the door, he asked me to wait while he went inside, then beckoned me to join him. It was a big shadowy room, with camp beds arranged along both sides. Blackstone was lying flat on his back on one of the beds, very tidily, like a man trying not to take up too much space. A blanket covered him from feet to waist. Above it a white shirt slowly rose and fell to his shallow breathing. His complexion was grey, his eyes closed. He seemed even thinner than I remembered, and older.
‘Miss Lane is here,’ Daniel told him.
He opened his eyes, focused on me and slowly brought his feet to the floor. He was still wearing the black trousers of his waiter’s uniform. Daniel knelt by the bed, lending a shoulder to help him stand.
‘We can talk here,’ I said. ‘There’s no need to get up.’
‘If you’ll allow me, I feel a need for the sunlight.’
Blackstone gave a wan smile as he said it, but his voice was as creaky as his joints. He got himself upright, slipped his feet into a battered pair of black shoes and walked to the door, leaning on Daniel’s arm. Outside, the two of them waited until I sat down on the stone bench by the wall, then Daniel settled Blackstone next to me and sat on his other side. Blackstone paused for a while with his face to the sun, eyes closed, taking painful-looking breaths.
‘I did not kill your father,’ he said, eyes still closed. ‘I told you that in Dover, but you wouldn’t believe me.’
‘But you didn’t save him either, and you might have,’ I said.
His eyes jerked open.
‘That is not true. He was dead before I even knew he’d got to Calais. Believe me, if I’d had the slightest idea they would go to such lengths, I’d have found him and warned him. I never wanted him to interfere.’
‘But you must have known he’d been killed because of Mr Brighton. You knew he hadn’t died in a duel. If you were his friend, why didn’t you do something, make people investigate?’
His eyes closed again. A sigh fluttered his white shirt.
‘What good would it have done? Only caused a hue and cry that would alert Kilkeel to the fact that I was watching him? Nothing could bring Jacques back. If I failed in my duty to him, it was for a cause that your father would have approved, and you, Suter, approve as well.’
Daniel seemed about to protest.
‘What was that?’ I said.
‘Ridding the world of kings.’
‘Not by these methods,’ Daniel said.
Blackstone pushed himself away from the wall and sat straight-backed, eyes fierce.
‘By what methods, then? By politely asking, Be so good as to go, sir? Please be so kind as to stop fattening yourself and your brood on the wealth of the labouring people. Please be obliging enough to abdicate and let the men you call your subjects grow into free and honest citizens instead of demeaning themselves as your toadies and flatterers. Is that how you’d bring about a republic?’
His voice grew in force as he spoke and some colour came back to his face, like the glow of fire in a grey ember. Daniel looked ill at ease.
‘I’ve never denied my republican opinions, you know that.’
‘Oh no, as long as you can sing about them or recite poetry about them or drink toasts over the punchbowl to them, that’s well enough. Have you spent time in prison for them?’
‘You know very well I haven’t.’
‘Well, I have.’
‘I know that too. You’ve suffered for a cause we believe in, and I honour you for it. But I still don’t understand what you were trying to do this time.’
Blackstone didn’t answer