43. Homeward

Chapter forty-three

Homeward

A s Alphonse disappeared from the scene, Louisa let out a sigh of relief. She felt herself go limp against Gyles firm chest. His hands came around her waist to hold her up, a gesture far more intimate than the slight support he had rendered so long ago in Hatchard's bookstore.

"Well, Julia, was my interruption superfluous this time?"

Julia…? Julia!

As Louisa heard him say that name, half of the air left her body. All this time, when she thought he had forgotten, that memory of Carlton House had always been there. He had remembered their first meeting. He had remembered her .

"Have you always known it was me?" she demanded.

"Of course," said Gyles, lifting a hand to caress her cheek. "From the moment I saw you in the hallway at Kendall House. There she is , I thought, the most beautiful flower in the Carlton House garden . "

"Well, you certainly didn't show it. I thought you were as oblivious as an Oxford professor."

"You were obviously pretending to be someone else. I didn't want to give it away before Mr. Digby did."

Louisa leaned into the hand that lay against her cheek. "Thank you. For the interruption in the pavilion. And for the interruption today."

He gave her a lopsided grin. "I may not know how to shoot or fence, but I can handle myself with a shovel."

"And you're quite adept at rescuing ungrateful damsels from perilous predicaments."

"Oh, this one will be grateful," said Gyles. "I'm sure of it." His face descended towards hers in the dark, and his nose nuzzled her cheek as his lips searched for hers.

"I love you, Gyles," said Louisa, filled with a desperate urgency to say those words aloud, words that she had never uttered in the whole of her life. Not to her mother, not to her father, not to a single soul in all of England or France.

"I was hoping you might," said Gyles. "And that's quite fortuitous, for I love you too." His lips found hers in the darkness, and they held onto each other with an even greater understanding and confidence than they had enjoyed in the glass greenhouse one short hour ago.

"Shouldn't we be going?" interrupted Cosette, peeling back the leather flap that covered the entrance to the workroom.

"Erm, yes, of course," said Gyles, reluctantly separating from Louisa. It was painful to pull away from her after they had finally come to such an understanding, but there would be other opportunities for affection and time was of the essence.

As they emerged into the main stable, hand in hand, Gyles saw that Jacques had soothed the horses until they were able to stand composedly. The large man was holding a handkerchief to the contusion at the back of his head, a petite, lace-trimmed handkerchief that he must have obtained from Cosette.

"They waylaid me before I knew they were coming," he grumbled, gesturing to a stout pole lying on the hay that the Empress' footmen had used to strike him on the back of the head. Cosette bent down and found his pipe, which fortunately had not been lit when it fell into the hay. She handed it to him with a grin.

"Jacques, you must sit inside the coach and rest," said Gyles, clapping a hand on the injured coachman's shoulder. "I will drive."

"You?" The Frenchman was possessive of his team, and he protested the plan initially. But after Louisa offered to sit in the box too and make sure Gyles did nothing ham-handed with the horses—and after Cosette offered to sit in the carriage with him and tend his throbbing head—he agreed to the matter and climbed weakly into the carriage.

Gyles helped Louisa up into the box and then carefully guided the carriage out into the darkened stable yard. "We mustn't forget your trunk," he said. Slowly, he guided the carriage towards the gravel path where he had left the trunk in the garden.

"Who is that?" demanded Louisa, grabbing Gyles' arm in alarm.

By the light of the moon, they could make out a tall, slender shape staring down at the trunk. Was it another of the Empress' footmen, sent to accost them and prevent their departure? The man looked up as the coach approached. He was making out their faces by the dim light from the carriage lanterns.

"I say, Lady Lou! What are you doing here in France?"

"Oh, Mr. Smythe," said Louisa, her voice filled with relief. "I might ask the same of you."

Gyles hopped down from the carriage box and bent over to retrieve it.

"Is thish your trunk?" the blond Englishman asked in bewilderment. "And is thish…Mr. Audeley!" He sounded as if he had imbibed more of Empress Josephine's rum punch than he ought and was now wandering the grounds to clear his head. But by the keen way he was eyeing them, Gyles began to wonder if Mr. Smythe's penchant for drinking was more show than actuality.

"Hello again," said Gyles, shifting the trunk to balance it on his left shoulder and reaching out to shake Horatio Smythe's hand. The firm grip Mr. Smythe gave him was quite noticeable until it relaxed into the flaccid floppiness more typical of the inebriated. "I hope you're taking eggshellent care of her." He met Gyles' eye.

"Indeed," said Gyles. "We're leaving France as soon as possible."

Mr. Smythe released his hand and reached into his waistcoat pocket. "Here." he said in low tones. "This might help." He handed Gyles a folded paper which Gyles palmed and then slipped into his own pocket.

"Good-bye, Mr. Smythe," said Louisa as Gyles secured the trunk to the back of the carriage.

"Good-bye, Lady Lou," replied Mr. Smythe, waving his hand—as incongruous a figure in the grounds of Malmaison as the ostrich or the kangaroo. The carriage pulled away until his shadowy silhouette disappeared in the blackness.

"He recognized both of us right away," said Louisa. "What do you think he is doing in France? He's just the sort of muddle-head I would expect Josephine to collect, but I wouldn't think he would have braved the Channel crossing or the blockade just to come to a house party."

"I'm not positive," said Gyles, who had been turning the same question over in his mind, "but the last time I saw him, he said something about diplomatic service for the Crown. With Prince George about to assume the Regency, the war with Napoleon may become more fierce. And the Crown may want to know just how loyal Josephine remains to Napoleon after the divorce."

Louisa's large eyes grew even wider. "A spy? You're saying that Mr. Horatio Smythe is a spy?"

"Are you sorry now you didn't accept him?" Gyles nudged her with his elbow. "He would have made a much more glamorous husband than I."

"Of course not. And such speculation is utterly ridiculous. If he were an agent of the Crown, the empress would have ferreted out his purposes before he could say boo."

"Maybe," said Gyles thoughtfully. "But I'm beginning to think he's far cleverer than he lets on."

"Hmm," said Louisa, not quite ready to believe him on that topic.

They continued through the park until they came to the main road. "Are you sorry?" asked Louisa suddenly. "That you did not get to explore the empress' greenhouse in full? And that you did not get to take cuttings back with you for your own garden? "

Gyles, concentrating on keeping the horses out of the hedgerows on this moonless night, took a moment to answer her. "How could I be sorry? I have a lifetime to gather a garden like hers, but some things come into one's life only once."

"Or twice," murmured Louisa.

"Or twice," repeated Gyles, laughing in agreement. He would always be grateful that the girl from the Carlton House gardens had reappeared in his life a second time.

Ahead of them, the road forked, one side heading west towards Paris, the other side heading north to Picardy. "Where to now?" Louisa asked. "It would be the height of folly to return to Paris with Alphonse in such a temper and Empress Josephine set against us."

"But what about your mother's jewels?" Gyles had assumed they must, at least, stop by Paris briefly to retrieve the rest of his beloved's belongings.

"I am not sentimental. If you can afford to lose the world's greatest collection of rosarian knowledge, I can afford to lose a few necklaces. And besides, if we need travel expenses, I've sewn some sapphires into the hem of this dress. Finding a ship will be the hard part. If Morlaix is the only port sending vessels to England, I daresay we'll have to go west and skirt Paris as best we can—"

"Perhaps, said Gyles, disliking the idea of travelling across the breadth of France without the proper papers. He flicked the reins to encourage the horses on to greater speed. "What does the note in my pocket say?"

"Pardon?" asked Louisa, confused by such a request. After a little further explanation, however, she reached into Gyles waistcoat pocket and found the folded paper from Mr. Smythe. Her eyes strained to read the small script by the light of the moving carriage lantern. "Gyles!" she exclaimed. "There's a boat waiting off the coast of Calais. An English one. And this letter instructs the captain to carry the bearers of this letter over to Dover without delay."

"Well, well," said Gyles. "Apparently, Mr. Smythe is more highly connected than one would surmise. North it is! And God willing, we'll be at home in Derbyshire before the week is out."