42. Confrontation

Chapter forty-two

Confrontation

G yles had not yet reached the stables when a faint feminine shriek pierced the dark air. Deuce take it! Was that Louisa? Cosette? Gyles increased his pace, trying to run as the unwieldy trunk bumped and bruised his straining shoulder. A great thud followed by a clatter met his ears. From inside the stable walls, he heard a lifted voice that was incontrovertibly Louisa's. "Stop it! You must not hurt him."

Gyles skidded to a halt, stepped off the path, and laid the trunk on the ground. The "him" must refer to Jacques, and if that mountain of a man had been harmed by someone, it was best to proceed cautiously. There was a small door at the side of the stable that opened to a workroom. Hanging on the shadowy wall were pitchforks, shovels, brooms, and other implements for scouring the stables. Gyles took down a shovel and peeked through the leather flap that separated the workroom from the main stables .

The lit carriage lanterns showed Jacques pinned to the floor with a footman muscling down each of his arms and another sitting on his legs. They were all wearing the Empress Josephine's livery, but it was no mystery whose orders they were obeying. "Hold him down!" shouted Alphonse, distracted with trying to do the same to Louisa. She was almost a match for him, and he had much ado to keep her from clawing his face. Cosette was nowhere to be seen. Jacques let out a groan and closed his eyes. They must have surprised him with a hit to the head before knocking him down onto the hay, but they were wise enough not to release his arms and legs, for if he made it back onto his feet, he could easily have cracked their skulls together.

Gyles grimaced. Now would have been a good time to be a master of the fencing sabre, or at least, a decent shot with a brace of pistols in his hands. But as fate would have it, he was not a dashing Corinthian, but only a gentleman-gardener from Derbyshire. And the only weapon in his possession was a long-handled shovel used for scraping up manure.

Louisa gave another scream and Gyles, from behind the leather flap, could see that Alphonse had twisted her arms behind her back without any consideration for the pain it would cause. "C'est incroyable!" he bellowed. "That you would try to leave without at least a good-bye, after all that I have done for you. I gave up Hortense. And Mireille as well. I would have bestowed on you the name you tried to steal. But how do you repay me? With scorn! With contempt! You prefer your footman as a lover."

Louisa tried to stomp on Alphonse's foot with her half boot, but he saw what she was about and avoided the blow. Manhandling her roughly, he used one arm to hold her hands behind her and pulled her against his open-necked shirt with the other. His tall turban with the outrageous ostrich feather bobbed in the carriage light as he declared his displeasure.

"But what you do not count on is that Josephine is my friend. She knows everything that occurs at Malmaison. She has ears at every door and eyes at every window. She tells me her servants have observed your greenhouse tryst. She tells me you have changed into travelling clothes and left with your maid through the front door."

He pulled her closer so that his mouth was directly beside her ear. " Eh bien, you'll not make a fool of Alphonse in such a way. If you won't marry me by fair means, I'll have you by foul ones. I'll—"

A thud sounded, stopping Alphonse's impassioned threats. Gyles had slipped behind him in the shadows and delivered a mighty blow to the back of his head with the metal shovel. As Alphonse reeled and staggered, Gyles reached for Louisa and pulled her behind him. The footmen began to jabber at each other in consternation, but he could see that they dared not let go of Jacques in case the huge Samson regained his strength.

Unfortunately, the Arabian prince's turban had taken a great deal of the shovel's force. Instead of falling to the ground, Alphonse righted himself within a few seconds and pulled a pistol out of the purple sash wrapped around his middle. It was the sort of small pistol a lady might carry in her muff, or a country doctor might carry in his pocket. But it was still deadly enough to kill and Alphonse was demented enough to fire it.

"At last! The footman shows his face." He raised the barrel of the gun. Louisa wriggled out of Gyles' protective grasp and stepped in front of him .

"Out of the way, ma cousine, " shrilled Alphonse. "When we are married, you may have your amours with the proper class, but I draw the line at servants."

"You do?" called a sunny voice from the darkened stalls at the far end of the stable. It was Cosette, closer than anyone had expected, and foolishly giving away her own position in order to make a point. "That wasn't apparent when you offered to make me your mistress after you'd married my lady."

Alphonse let out a cry of annoyance along with a string of French words that Cosette had omitted to teach Gyles. The pistol began to wave erratically in his hand.

As Gyles attempted to pull Louisa back out of harm's way, he heard the rasping noise of a metal bolt being drawn. One of the stalls was opening. He could only assume that Cosette had done it. A cascade of strange, clattering foot beats reverberated across the floorboards of the stable. No horse's hooves had ever made that sound. What strange beast had fearless Cosette unleashed into their midst?

A horrendous squawk filled the air. Jacques' horses began to whinny and shuffle in terror, pushing the carriage back against the water trough. Was this the demon that Jacques had mentioned earlier?

Josephine's footmen, clearly cognizant of what was about to befall, leaped up from their post and fled as fast as their stockinged legs could take them, out of the stable and into the night. Jacques lifted himself onto his hands and knees and crawled weakly over to the carriage, trying to calm the horses with clucks and hums. Meanwhile, Gyles propelled Louisa backwards towards the wall. Just as the shrieking ostrich reached them, they ducked beneath the leather flap that led to the workroom full of tools .

Alphonse, alone in the path of the bird's fury, let out a scream shriller than that of the ostrich. The gun fired into the air. But the Frenchman, it seemed, was even a worse shot than Gyles, and the bullet embedded itself into the wall of the stable. Attracted by the sound of Alphonse's screaming—or perhaps by the bobbing plume atop his turban—the long-legged bird ran at the count with outstretched neck.

It was not the French aristocracy's finest moment. Wailing with fear, Alphonse tore his turban from his head, tossed it at the snapping beak, and then took to his heels as fast as his pointed slippers would carry him. The ostrich followed, shrieking like an archfiend. As Gyles and Louisa held each other tightly in the stable workroom, they could hear the screams of the fleeing victim as the demon of Malmaison chased him into the night.