“Perhaps, we must go.”Darcy put his arms around her once more, and he held her tightly against him.“But he shall not be permitted to win.Yes, we must go, and I fear that you will be the bait to draw the vile dragon out of hiding, so that he may be trapped and his hoard seized.But we can slay this dragon.”
“Do you mean that?”
“I mean it.I have a scheme in mind.We’ll win through this and turn the tables on him.”
Chapter Twenty
A week later
“Jove I wish I could go with you,” General Fitzwilliam loudly proclaimed, as they all stood in the midst of the town in Cambrai where his regiment was accommodated.“Would be a nice chance to see the old boy again.Have a friendly-like talk with my cousin.Alas, the Duke would not give me leave for such a family matter, not after I only so recently returned.”
“I understand,” Darcy replied with a quiet voice.“I wish you would be with us as well.”
He embraced his cousin, and then he entered his carriage into which he had already handed Elizabeth.
They would immediately travel to Calais, where a boat waited to take them to Brighton.The regiment of a friend of General Fitzwilliam’s from the Peninsula was quartered there, and they planned to gather a substantial escort of soldiers which they could take to the Kentish estate of Lord Lachglass.
Lord Lachglass had demanded Elizabeth come to meet him, and meet him she would.But she would not meet him alone.
*****
A week later yawing and creaking their ship sailed into the harbor at Brighton, pulling against the pier on a calm early summer day.“Are you well, my dear?”Darcy whispered to Elizabeth.
She shook her head no.Elizabeth still felt queasy as the gangplank was extended out to the pier.
Her stomach had become no stiffer since the she had left England on General Fitzwilliam’s ship to Calais.She had eaten nothing since leaving Calais the previous evening, and the billowing sea breeze felt cold against her sweaty face.
Darcy stood next to Elizabeth with his arms around her as they waited to disembark.
“I shall not make this journey often,” she groaned.“Hardly worth the illness to see what is on the other side of the ocean.”
He squeezed her closer against his side and kissed the top of her bonnet.Elizabeth sagged against Darcy and closed her eyes until he tugged her to walk towards the gangplank when everything was ready.
When they reached the end of the pier, twelve soldiers waited for them in fine redcoats, with their muskets loaded and pointed upwards.
They had delayed for two days in Calais before sailing to Brighton, so that arrangements for the arrival could be made via letters sent express before they arrived.
The letter General Fitzwilliam had sent to his friend in Brighton had arrived by then, and the soldiers were here to meet them to ensure that no ruffians hired by Lord Lachglass could attack them the instant they stepped onto British soil.
There was still the threat of the Bow Street Runners, but after discussion with a lawyer Darcy had called from London to Calais, they had determined that at this time that while it would be a very frightening event if Elizabeth was put up for trial, there was no longer any practical chance she would be found against.
Elizabeth had nightmares each night since they had received the letter.
Nightmares of Kitty shot, blood gushing from her skull.Of Mama, crying in her natural complaining way, “If only you had been quiet and let him have his way with you, it would have quickly been over, and I would still be alive.”
NowElizabeth felt for the first time something like guilt.
She had been a little annoyed at first with General Fitzwilliam, wanting to blame him for the essay she had written to destroy Lachglass’s reputation.The timing of the abduction of her family suggested that his dismissal from the cabinet — Elizabeth and Darcy had cheered and toasted with fizzing champagne when they heard of it — had triggered his choice to seek revenge in this new way by abducting her mother and her sister.
Elizabeth swallowed.
Much as she hoped everything would turn out well, and that Darcy’s scheme would succeed perfectly and in the end they would all be alive, she was not in any sense entirely persuaded it would.
An odd beggar in a giant shaggy coat stood near the soldiers who waited for them on the dock.He had a huge bulbous nose, and a giant scar across his neck that he pointed to whenever anyone stepped near.He then extended his hand out pathetically asking for money without being able to speak.
Elizabeth smiled at the beggar.
Another person caught her eye.She stood beside the captain who commanded the platoon of soldiers sent out to meet them.A young woman Elizabeth had not seen for four years.
