Page 84 of Echo in the Wind

Émile took a large swallow of the brandy Jean handed him and smiled at the housekeeper. “S’il vous plaît, pardonnez-moi.”

With Émile’s apology, Jean left the bedchamber. “I’ll look in on you later. I must check on the driver.”

Jean was descending the stairs when Giroud stepped into the entry hall.

Worrying his hat in his hand, the estate manager looked up at him. “The bodies are gone, M’sieur, their horses, too.”

Jean frowned and stepped down to the tile floor. “I half-expected it. Whoever they were working for would not want to leave bodies behind that might reveal his identity.”

Joanna walked in from the parlor, a worried look on her face. He wanted to take her in his arms and comfort her, but the presence of the others stayed his hand.

“Lady Joanna,” he said, “I don’t believe you have met my estate manager, M’sieur Giroud.”

Joanna acknowledged Giroud with a smile and he dipped his head.

“We are discussing the men who attacked the carriage, my lady.” He couldn’t bring himself to think of it as an attack on her or Zoé. “Did you happen to see them?”

“I did, but only the two M’sieur Bequel shot. The other one must have been in the front. They were rough men. On their faces, they wore black masks. Their hair was long and unkempt. Were they hired ruffians, do you think?”

“Possibly. But who would have hired them? Did they say anything?”

“Yes, one shouted a demand for the driver to stop, but I could not see him. One of the two close to me ordered his comrade not to fire into the carriage, that ‘he’ wanted ‘la fille’.”

“Zoé?”

“I thought so at the time. Wouldn’t he have said “la femme” if he meant me or Gabrielle?”

He was tempted to tell her with her hair worn long and tied back, she could pass for a girl, but he didn’t want to scare her. “Probably, but the more intriguing question is to whom was the man referring when he said ‘he’?”

Neither Giroud nor Joanna had any idea. Why would someone want to capture his niece? She was not the heir after all, could never be. And a ten-year-old girl could have no enemies. Was it to hold her for ransom for something they wanted from Jean? Money? An exchange of her life for his? If the vengeance against the Saintonges ran deep, the perpetrators might want to kill the new heir. They couldn’t know there was still another, his grandson, the babe Jean Nicholas.

Zoé came into the entry hall from the kitchens. “How is Monsieur Bequel?” she asked.

“Marguerite is stitching his wound and then she will give him something to make him sleep.”

Flashing her cognac-colored eyes, Joanna said, “I hear laudanum works well.”

At least the vixen still had her sense of humor. He remembered her rising from a laudanum-induced sleep to fire questions at him, as spirited as ever. What a wild one she must have been as a child.

Jean suggested they go in to dinner and led his small party into the dining room. They took their seats at the long table, sitting clustered together at one end. The meal that followed was a somber affair, which Jean regretted, but he and Giroud accomplished what they needed to regarding the large number of stored casks of cognac.

As the supper drew to a close, he turned to Joanna. “I want you and Zoé to stay close to the château for the time we are here.”

She nodded. “Of course, I understand.”

“Are we going somewhere, Oncle Jean?”

“Eventually, oui. I cannot leave you in Saintonge, Zoé. ’Tis not safe for anyone named Donet at the moment.” Casting a glance at Joanna, he added, “Or anyone close to us. Besides,” he said looking at his maître du château, “M’sieur Giroud is well able to handle the estate in my absence.”

Giroud appeared pleased for the trust placed in him, which made Jean wonder at the relationship the man must have had with the former comte. It could not have been a good one.

Chapter 20

The summons from the king came the next morning. Jean was not sorry for it. Given recent events, he was only too glad to leave Saintonge. Had he not been concerned for Joanna and his niece, he might have wanted to stay and solve the mystery of the attack on the carriage and the deaths of his father and brother, but that could wait.

As one new to his title, he would be expected to make an appearance before Louis. With Jean’s sojourn in England, his sovereign must have grown impatient. Then, too, he still had Vergennes to see. Oui, it was past time for him to return to Paris.

He found Marguerite in the kitchens. “Can our patients be moved?”