The Duke Is Mine - Eloisa James [114]
By the time they broke out of the wood, the eastern sky was lightening. They continued to walk, through thick scrub, the smell of the sea keen in the wind. Olivia tried biting at the scarf in order to get it away from her mouth, but to no avail. She intentionally stumbled in an attempt to slow them down, but the man simply hauled her upright and thumped her in the back with something hard.
These brutish attacks had made her back bruised and painful, and for the first time, she felt truly frightened. A battalion of French soldiers was one thing. Surely they wouldn’t injure a woman, even an English one. But what if this thug belonged to a gang of smugglers? Or pirates? Or just common criminals?
The possibilities were all unpleasant.
They had been following the line of the shore, winding along, when the man suddenly directed her up a small trail that led inland, over some bluffs. Olivia’s skirts caught on a sturdy bramble, and she stopped, thinking the man behind her would untangle her. Instead the hard object jabbed her in the back again and she stumbled forward, her skirt letting go of the bramble with a long ripping sound. Now her back felt as if it were on fire.
Her eyes were pricked with tears, but if she hadn’t wept over Rupert’s death—or not much—the last thing she would cry over was this farcical situation. Not dangerous, she told herself; rather it was farcical. Quin would save her. The moment he knew she was missing.
The important thing was that Quin was with Rupert.
Furthermore, Rupert wasn’t in that smelly hut, but in a proper bed, on the Day Dream, with Quin. If there was one person she would want to sit next to her deathbed, it would be Quin, with his honest eyes and the reassuring low bell-sound of his voice.
After what felt like hours, they stumbled out of the scrub and into a gravel yard, on the far side of which lay a two-story brick building surrounded by a wall. A sentry stood at the gate in the wall.
“Who goes there?” he said, without much interest.
All of a sudden Olivia felt utterly calm. At least now she would know what was happening. They had arrived somewhere.
“A putain using Père Blanchard’s hut.” Her captor’s voice was toneless, and accompanied by a hard prod in the direction of the gate.
Olivia almost fell at the feet of the sentry. He was slim and weary, with a mustache so luxuriant that it looked as if his face had sprouted wings.
“I am not a putain,” she cried, her voice strangled by the scarf. She was fairly sure that a putain was the French word for a strumpet, a night-walker. Whatever it was, she was certain that it wasn’t nice.
The sentry narrowed his eyes at her and then glanced at the man behind her. “What’s the use of bringing her here?” he wanted to know. “Send her back to the village.”
“She isn’t from hereabouts, so that won’t work. I don’t recognize her.” Olivia lifted her chin and gave the sentry a fierce stare, willing him to order the scarf removed so that she could speak.
“Pretty,” he said, not noticing her glower—likely because he was too busy staring at her chest. “Take that cloak off, Bessette.”
With a jerk the cloak disappeared from around Olivia’s shoulders.
“Plump as a partridge,” the sentry said, with a toothy smile. “Are you vending your wares, Madame?”
Furious, she shook her head.
“Just another wayward wife.” He pulled on his mustache until his face looked lopsided. “What’s the world coming to? Le Capitaine or Madame Fantomas?”
“Madame. No need to bother Le Capitaine with this one. Think we can get twenty francs off her husband for retrieving her? See this cloak? Nice made, and it’s lined.”
“Might be petit bourgeoisie. Madame will decide. Take that scarf off her mouth, Bessette. I have to make sure she’s not a spy. Le Capitaine