Ramage and the Guillotine

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Next morning Louis left them after explaining that he was going to make the necessary arrangements while Ramage and Stafford wandered through the city, establishing themselves as innocent visitors. The short walk to the great Cathedral was almost frightening. The whole city seemed to be silent and foreboding; silent although horses' hooves clattered over thecobbles and cartwheels rumbled; although people walked the streets talking to each other and shopkeepers stood at their doorways, calling out greetings and trying to beguile prospective customers.

There were a few of the noises one would expect in a city; but in an almost deserted city. These were not the noises of a normal city going about its daily business, and he and Stafford had almost reached the Cathedral before Ramage realized exactly what was missing: no one was laughing and no one was bustling: it was as though everyone had a secret guilt and feared that the pairs of gendarmes who seemed to stand at every corner were watching and waiting to make an arrest; that they knew only too well there was among the quiet streets of Amiens a building with barred windows where a man who laughed loudly or joked or behaved in a carefree manner might be dragged before a tribunal and accused of being an enemy of the Revolution.

But surely these,people in the streets were the Revolution: surely it was for them, the sans-culottes, that the Revolution had been staged? With the aristocrats dead or exiled and their estates sold off to the people, with every man proclaimed as free and equal as his neighbour, and the armies of France standing astride Europe from the Mediterranean to the North Sea, surely now was the time for the people to be happy? Yet Ramage sensed that these people in Amiens were far from carefree; they were nervous and suspicious of each other, and looked at those gendarmes not as protectors against burglars, cutpurses and pickpockets but as honest men might be wary of large and unknown dogs.

Louis had told him all this; indeed, he had explained it with great care. Ramage admitted to himself that it had been easy enough to listen but too hard to visualize; one had to see it to believe it.

The majority of the French people had supported the idea of the Revolution: for generations under the monarchy taxation had been harsh and arbitrary, with the poorest always paying the most. But there had been such a struggle for power after the Revolution: such almost unbelievable cruelties and injustices committed with chilhng cynicism in the name of the Revolution by those very leaders, as each struggled for personal power, that the people were bewildered and disillusioned. Debtors denouncing their creditors to avoid paying their bills, vicious men settling old scores by the same means - the people had seen too much of it. Louis must be right - the majority of them were sick of the metallic hiss and thud of the guillotine, sick of passing a tumbril laden with white-faced men and weeping women. This was an aspect of the Revolution they had never visualized and never wanted — seeing former neighbours (and often former friends and sometimes relatives) dragged off to the Widow . . . This bore no relation to getting rid of the tyrannical landowners and the iniquitous tax collectors of the ancien régime; it had nothing to do with driving out the grasping priests and seizing the vast lands owned by the Church.

But in several cases the grasping priests had cast off the soutane, snatched up the Red Cap of Liberty and returned - in the role of rabid Revolutionaries. Joseph Le Bon, the former curé, had probably killed more innocent Frenchmen in the time of the Revolution than Bonaparte's Army of Italy lost in the march to Rome; and Joseph Fouché, former abbé of Nantes and professor at its university, was now the Minister of Police and the most feared man in France. It was, Ramage reflected, as though the old fierceness of the Inquisition readily converted into Revolutionary zeal; merely a question of changing the Church's rack for the State's guillotine in the determination either to command men's souls or kill their bodies. As with the Inquisition so with the Revolution: mere acceptance was not enough; one had to be a zealot,

As he and Stafford side-stepped to avoid three pimply boys who were begging, watched without interest by the gendarmes, he realized that although no one seemed to be starving, few were wearing clothes which had not been carefully darned.

A cool and supercilious look at the outside of the Cathedral. Two more gendarmes standing fifteen yards from the main door watching lethargically, although a strange face was a reason for them slowly swivelling their heads to relieve the boredom. One removed his tricorn and inspected the inside before replacing it on his head.

The outside of the Cathedral had suffered the sort of damage you would expect from excited schoolboys drunk for the first time on Calvados: the heads of all the saints had been smashed off and sculptured groups had been crudely mutilated in an attempt to make them look ridiculous. Yet it was an attempt that was itself ridiculous, since the Cathedral had stood for nearly six hundred years, massive and graceful. Disfiguring the small, sculptured groups had as much effect on its majesty as a man relieving himself against a buttress.

Ramage walked through the main door, and despite the gloom saw at once that the great altarpiece spreading the whole breadth of the Cathedral was untouched. As he noted that the beautiful chapels on either side of the choir also appeared to be undamaged he saw five people kneeling. Four seemed to be old women, the fifth a crippled man, one of his legs stuck out sideways. A wooden leg. Their presence emphasized the vastness and the emptiness and the silence: there was none of the distant chanting or murmuring that you usually heard the moment you entered the main door of a great cathedral: simply the chilling silence of an abandoned building ... As he walked towards the altar he saw that the famous marble statue of the weeping child had been damaged. The altar was bare - not surprisingly the Revolutionaries had taken the gold and silver candlesticks, and the rich red and purple hangings had vanished. Yet the stained-glass windows were mostly intact - a gap here and there in the delicate lacework of coloured glass showed where an eager fellow with a strong arm had lobbed a brick or fired a fowling-piece.

The crippled man hauled himself up with the clumsiness of pain and began hobbling towards the main door, but seeing Ramage and Stafford he waved his stick as if in greeting. He was tall, though his shoulders were now hunched; his hair was grey and his face lined, but Ramage guessed that pain and worry - or was it sadness? - had aged him more than the passing years.

'Good morning, Citizen,' he said carefully, as though wanting to pass the time of day but wary and unsure, like a man half afraid he was about to be accused of trespassing. Ramage thought of the two gendarmes near the main door. Perhaps they were more interested in visitors to the Cathedral than they seemed: a man attending church, albeit without there being a priest present, could be a man against the Revolution ...

Ramage shook hands and, guessing that the man could satisfy his curiosity about the Cathedral's fate during the Revolution, waved towards the altar: 'Things have changed since I was last here.'

'You are not French. Italian, perhaps?'

Ramage nodded. 'From Genoa. I've been to Boulogne; now I go to Paris and then back home.'

'Italy ... at the pass of Mont Cenis -' the man tapped his wooden leg with his stick ' - that's where I left this leg.'

Was there fighting up among the Alps? Who would be crazy enough to have a battle among the mountains? The man saw his puzzled look and said: 'The snow - my regiment was part of the Army of Italy. We marched over the mountains in thick snow. Some of us were too weak to get over the pass . . .' He glanced at Stafford, uncertain whether to go on.

'And the weak ones were left behind?' Ramage asked quietly.

The man nodded. 'If an arm or a leg freezes it dies, and if it isn't amputated quickly gangrene sets in. It can set in even if it is amputated. I was lucky.'

'They carried you in a wagon?' Ramage asked innocently, hoping to draw the man out.

‘They left me in the snow, just where I collapsed. There was a monastery nearby,' he added, almost absently. 'After the Army had gone the monks came along the pass to see what had been left behind. Not looking for loot, you understand; they were interested only in saving lives. They found me - and seventeen more like me. They carried us back to the monastery. They couldn't save my leg, but they saved my life. They had very little food, but they shared it with us - with eighteen atheists who up to a few hours earlier had belonged to the 24th Infanterie de Ligne. They nursed us and fed us and sheltered us. For the five of us that needed them, they made legs of wood, specially carved and fitted. It was five months before I was well again - and by then spring had come and the snow had melted and I could leave ..."

'So you returned to your regiment?'

'With one leg?' He knew Ramage was encouraging him to talk and he smiled. 'There was war in Italy and war in Austria — there was war almost everywhere; but there was peace in the monastery near the top of Mont Cenis, so I stayed and tried to pay my debt. I helped hoe and sow and reap the year's harvest - it's a very brief season - and I left the following spring, when the snow had once again cleared, just a year and a half after I first arrived. I got back to my home here in Amiens as winter began; it was a long walk for a one-legged man.'

'But your family was glad to see you.'

'I found that my family was dead.' Again that flat, expressionless tone of voice. 'My brother and my wife had been denounced as anti-Revolutionaries and guillotined, and the shock had killed my old father..,'

'Who denounced them?'

'The man who wanted our grocery shop,' he said simply. 'He is now the prefect of Amiens and the most powerful man in the city.'

'And you?' Ramage asked quietly. 'What do you do?'

The man glanced at the statue of the weeping child for a few moments, and then at the old women who were still kneeling. 'I come each morning and pray; I pray as I did before the Revolution and I pray as I learned to at the monastery. I pray for the souls of those I loved, and I have one other prayer which I can reveal to no man.' No flourish, no drama; just a plain statement by a man no longer afraid.

Louis had become an atheist at the Revolution; but now he prayed, too; he prayed that there was an after-life, so that Joseph Le Bon would be eternally punished. Had Le Bon worked here in Amiens?

'I have met men who have prayed for Citizen Le Bon,' Ramage said in a voice barely above a whisper.

The man's eyes held his. 'I'm sure you have; many true Normans say a prayer for him before they go to sleep at night.'

The man had spoken freely because he was beyond fear. At first he had been cautious - probably because he saw no reason to invite trouble - but Ramage thought he would probably talk as freely to a gendarme. Such a man had nothing more to lose to a regime which had abandoned him in the snow of an Alpine pass and slaughtered his wife and brother (and, to all intents and purposes, stolen the family business). Fortune held none of his family hostage because now he had none to submit. With one leg chopped off above the knee, he must find it hard to make a living - Louis had said something about the wounded being reduced to begging once the Navy or Army had finished with them, the same as it was in Britain - so threatening such a man with the guillotine was about the same as offering him a swift release from his misery.

Ramage glanced round at the great interior of the Cathedral. 'I expected to find more damage ...'

The man smiled grimly. 'You haven't heard the story, then? It's one of which we Normans are proud. When the Revolutionary Army arrived from Paris after sacking and looting the churches and châteaux along the route, the people of Amiens decided they were going to save their Cathedral. The tocsin was sounded, the National Guard of Amiens assembled, and with drums beating they met the sans-culottes, who had already begun their work - you can see the damage they did to some of the statuary.

'Well, there was a pitched battle right here, where we are standing, and the people of Amiens drove them out and mounted guard over the Cathedral, to make sure no further damage was done. Eventually the Army left to carry out their evil business elsewhere, but the leaders in Paris learned their lesson: they could drive out the priests, chase off the bishop, steal the gold and silver ornaments - but they must leave us our Cathedral.'

He looked round at the four old women. 'Yes, you are right to be puzzled: how is it that in our city of 14,000 people - that is all that are left now - you find only four women and a cripple in the largest Cathedral in France and for which the people fought the Army? I'm not sure myself; I only know that the reason is complex. The Cathedral has stood here since 1220 - it is Amiens; the city has grown up in its shadow. But since the Revolution the Church as an organization has been regarded as anti-Revolutionary.

‘Those that want to pray - well, they find it safer to pray in the privacy of their homes. A few, like those old widows -' he gestured at the women - 'are beyond caring what goes on in Paris, or in the rest of France: the Revolution has taken their sons and grandsons, and they have nothing more to lose. They refuse to surrender the only solace left to them. You could say they refuse to give up the habit of a lifetime. ..'

He held out his hand and as Ramage shook it he said, ‘They say Citizen Bonaparte has signed some agreement with the Pope, and we might be allowed to have a priest soon; perhaps even a bishop. But who knows -' he shrugged his shoulders. 'At least they haven't locked the doors of the churches, even though they watch us.'

With that he left, and the only sound in the vast Cathedral was the click of his sticks and the muffled, dragging thump of his wooden leg. Somewhere out in the streets of Amiens, Louis, the man who had lost a wife at the hands of Le Bon, was talking secretly with men who, if they had not been bereaved, at least had good reasons for working against the present régime. Ramage understood then that an ally was simply someone who shared the same aim, even if his motives were different.

Back in the Hotel de la Poste Ramage pulled off his boots and flopped back on the bed while Stafford poured water into a basin to wash his face.

'Whatcher make of it all, sir?' he asked, towelling his face vigorously. 'The town, I mean. Gives me the creeps. Like being in a graveyard.'

For all their long walk round the city after the visit to the Cathedral, they had been unable to talk for fear Stafford’s voice would give them away, and Ramage had been curious to know how it all seemed to someone with the Cockney's straightforward and uncomplicated approach to life.

'It's about as I'd expect a city to be if an enemy was occupying it.'

"That's what puzzles me, sir,' Stafford said, hanging up thetowel. 'After all, wasn't this 'ere Revolution supposed to make it better for 'em? In Boolong an' 'ere and all the places we went through, everyone 'ad a face as long as a yard o' pump water. Why, they've got as much food as we 'ave in England but not one in five score can squeeze a grin an' I don’t reckon none of 'em knows how to laugh -'

He paused a moment, listening to footsteps outside in the corridor: the sharp thud of booted heels and the jingle of spurs, the measured tread of a heavier man wearing lighter shoes, and what were obviously a woman's footsteps. The men's voices were little more than murmurs; the woman's voice was excited. There was silence for a few moments, then a door opened and shut.

The lieutenant-de-vaisseau had arrived. M'sieur Jobert was taking him to his room and Jobert's enamoured daughter was dancing attendance. What dispatches was the galloping lieutenant carrying to Paris?

Ramage had asked himself the question ironically, but as he thought about it he felt a chill of real fear creeping through him: up to now, thanks to Louis, the whole expedition had been successful enough, but up to now it had not really started. It was six o'clock and the lieutenant probably left for Paris by six o'clock tomorrow morning. Ramage had twelve hours in which he might be able to read the dispatches - and twelve hours during which he or Stafford might be caught as a spy ... or find that the lieutenant carried not secret dispatches from Admiral Bruix to the First Consul, but dozens of the dreary reports required each week by the French Ministry of Marine's equivalent of the Navy Board. The frigate Junon reporting that a cask of salt beef marked ‘154' contained eleven fewer pieces; the sloop Requin reporting that seaman Charles Leblanc had deserted; the cutter Mignon asking for the third time for a bolt of canvas to patch her ancient mainsail. All navies floated in a sea of forms; it always amazed him that when a ship fired a broadside a thousand quill pens did not fly across the sea in place of round-shot.

He heard Jobert and his daughter walk past the door again, no doubt returning downstairs to start preparing supper. The lieutenant would be busy with soap and water, razor and comb, doing a self-refit after his long ride, making himself ready for supper.

Supper! Would he, too, eat in his room? He certainly would! In a moment Ramage saw his plans shredded: the lieutenant would have supper served in his room with the daughter (and the mother as chaperone). The patron might join him later, and after the ladies had retired to bed both men would probably settle down to an evening's drinking and conversation. The wretched courier might not quit his room until he left the hotel in the morning to climb on board his damned horse and steer for Paris. Which meant that the risks increased a thousandfold: Stafford would have to wait for him to go to sleep and then break into the room (admittedly that would be easy) and then, while the lieutenant slept, find the leather pouch and get it out. And surely the lieutenant would put it somewhere safe. Even tucking it under the mattress at the foot or head of his bed (anywhere else would make an uncomfortable bulge with these thin feather mattresses) would be bad enough: Stafford would need a light, and even a shielded lantern increased the risk enormously since the smell of a smoky candle might well rouse a sleeping man.

He sat up suddenly, as if physical movement would ease the tension, and Stafford glanced round. 'You all right, sir?' he asked anxiously, seeing Ramage's expression.

Keep the ship's company cheerful, Ramage told himself; don't alarm Stafford, who has the most dangerous job. A confident man succeeds where a nervous man is bound to fail. At that moment there was a double tap on the door and Louis came in, a ribald greeting on his lips for the benefit of anyone outside. He shut the door carefully and grinned.

'Was your tour of Amiens successful?'

'Interesting - we weren't doing anything in particular!'

'Visiting the Cathedral, talking to a man suspected of being an anti-Revolutionary, having lunch in a café frequented by agents of the Church ...'

'We were being watched, then?' Ramage asked ruefully.

Louis shrugged his shoulders and continued speaking in French. 'No more than any other strangers walking round the city. The gendarmes are at every corner solely to keep an eye on everyone, and they report before they go off duty.'

'How do you know what they reported?' Ramage asked curiously.

'I have friends,' the Frenchman said with a wink. 'But don't worry, no one suspects you. As soon as you both left the Cathedral, the gendarmes checked that you were staying here and that your papers were in order. I'm only telling you so that you have an idea of how these people work. You are not used to a country where everyone is a potential spy, and where some men make a good living by acting as police informers.'

He sat down at the table and reached for the wine bottle. 'Well, our friend the lieutenant has arrived.'

'We heard him go to his room. He's still there,' Ramage added gloomily. 'I've just realized he may have his supper there, too.'

‘That would have made it difficult for Stafford, eh?'

'Of course it would - and may,' Ramage said sharply, irritated by the Frenchman's bantering tone.

'On the contrary,' Louis said cheerfully. 'Instead of the lieutenant eating in his room and we eating in ours, you and I will be eating downstairs at the same table. You'll be able to meet the lieutenant - and the landlord's pretty daughter. Who knows, you might make the lieutenant jealous!'

The Frenchman thought of everything. Ramage was both relieved and yet irritated: he hated being in another man's hands. He had commanded his own ship for too many years to like having the initiative taken out of his own hands. In the past he had received his orders and was accustomed to the brief nod of acknowledgment when he succeeded and had always been ready for the blame if he failed. But here in France, here on enemy soil, his world was turned upside down.

He had his orders, yes, and damnably difficult orders they were. Putting the success of his arrival in France in the hands of a smuggler - yes, that was unavoidable and had been anticipated by Lord Nelson. But being in the hands of another smuggler, a Frenchman into the bargain, for the rest of the operation: how could he ever explain that to His Lordship? Damnation, it was as much as he could do to accept it himself, even though he had absolutely no choice if he was to succeed. Well, success would be its own justification, and (he gave an involuntary shiver) if he failed the guillotine would make any explanations on his part not only unnecessary but impossible: the Admiralty would never know if it was the fault of Lieutenant Ramage, the First Consul or the fourth gendarme in the back row.

An orchestra! He grasped at the idea but knew it was a straw. Louis, Dyson, the two seamen, Stafford and himself - they were an orchestra, and unless he accepted the fact he would make his life a misery. Louis's part was making sure they did the right things in France; Stafford dealt with that part which - he could not suppress a grin - would land him in jail in London; Dyson and the two seamen looked after communications; and himself — well, he was the conductor. He waved his baton, having made sure everyone was playing the same music, and generally kept an eye on the whole thing, hoping no one would blow a wrong note or drop his instrument with a loud bang.

For a few moments he felt better; then he found himself thinking once again that it was not a nightmare; he really was sitting in a room at the Hotel de la Poste in Amiens with a French smuggler and a Cockney picklock: on their efforts, cunning and skill might depend whether or not the British Government would know in good time if Bonaparte's invasion plans were propaganda - a gigantic bluff intended to tie down Britain's Channel Fleet - or a vast operation which would go into action in a matter of weeks, if not days. And which, he told himself coldly in an attempt to drive out the fears, could result in the French Army of England becoming the Army ot Occupation. If life in Boulogne and Amiens were examples of what the new France did to its own people, it required very little imagination to think what the new France would do to old England. Old Britain, he corrected himself.

'Supper is at seven o'clock,'.Louis said. 'Unfortunately our friend Stafford has an upset stomach and looks too ill to come down, so he will be free to get on with his work while we and the lieutenant attack the soup - onion soup, the landlord tells me; bis wife's speciality. And I think you will have to retire to your bed when you begin to feel ill after the sole - the same symptoms as Stafford and due to something the two of you ate for lunch in that wretched café, no doubt. That will leave you free to inspect Stafford's work while the lieutenant and I attend to the roast sucking pig that you requested me to order specially - and which,' he said with a broad grin, holding out a hand as if to fend off Ramage's protests, 'and which is the reason why we are all supping together downstairs tonight: you ordered roast sucking pig and invited the rest of the guests in the hotel to your table.

'The lieutenant is the only guest, apart from ourselves. The landlord was very impressed with the generosity of his Italian guest: no doubt it will show on your bill,' Louis added impishly. 'I am, incidentally, a connoisseur of sucking pig: I can tell in a moment if it has tasted anything but its mother's milk; any innkeeper who tries to serve me a wretched little under-sized beast which had been fed on grain for a few days - well he had better watch out! I shall report in due course if I received value for your money!'

Ramage had never felt so hungry, onion soup had never been so delicious - or less satisfying. The sole melted in the mouth but did damned little to soften the hunger pains in his stomach. The lieutenant, young and fair-haired with long silky moustaches, was expansive and friendly; a casual onlooker would have assumed he was the host and Ramage and Louis his guests. The innkeeper wore a new blue apron and a frilled white shirt and walked round the room beaming, his dumpy daughter's cheeks were pink with barely controlled excitement and her eyes danced and were shiny with love for her lieutenant.

Louis spoke little and while not appearing to eat fast managed to consume twice as much as Ramage, who was obliged from time to time to answer the lieutenant's questions. The lieutenant, he swore to himself, was an expert in asking short questions that needed long answers. And all the while the delicious aroma of the sucking pig roasting on its spit wafted through every time the door between the kitchen and the small dining-room was opened. Ramage glanced at Louis and thought that if he could have had a few slices of the sucking pig he would not care if a cunning farmer had fattened the runt of a litter with grain; in fact a few slices of the toughest old sow in the whole of Normandy would be welcome.

Upstairs an even hungrier Stafford was at work: Ramage had tried to avoid thinking about the Cockney, not because he feared that he would fail but, with the French lieutenant sitting on the opposite side of the table, he had the uncomfortable feeling that if he thought about Stafford the Frenchman would suddenly remember something he wanted from his room. He had watched him all the time the soup was on the table: a splash of onion soup down the Frenchman's stock would be enough to send him upstairs to change. Then he had worried that a glass of wine would spill, or a piece of fish drop from a fork. And all the time Louis had eaten stolidly, eyes on his plate, shoulders hunched - but, Ramage sensed, his ears missing nothing, whether a horse's hooves in the street or the crackling of dripping fat as the sucking pig turned on its spit.

The innkeeper removed the plate which had been piled with sole and a moment later - for this was the signal - Louis was looking at him anxiously. 'Are you all right, M'sieur?'

In anticipation of the question, Ramage had been surreptitiously holding his breath until he felt dizzy. He put a hand to his head and groaned and with his head spinning found it required no acting skill. He stood up while he still felt dizzy and in a moment Louis was beside him, solicitous and reassuring the French lieutenant.

'He and his foreman - they lunched at a café. The foreman is already ill; now M'sieur is stricken.'

Ramage, suddenly afraid that the lieutenant would insist on helping him to his room and already worried about Stafford, found it easy to simulate a retch and a moment later retched again and tasted the onion soup. He muttered in Italian, brushed away Louis's hand, told them both to continue their meal and rushed for the door, as though about to be sick. As he closed the door behind him he heard Louis telling the innkeeper with artful hypocrisy that the Italians had to take the consequences if they chose to eat in cheap cafés . . .

He managed to stop himself running up the stairs two at a time; instead he walked up slowly and heavily, groaning every now and again. Would Stafford be back in their own room or still in the lieutenant's? For all his play-acting in the dining-room he now felt genuinely queasy, as though the sole had come to life in his stomach and was swimming round vigorously in the onion soup. He recognized it as an old friend (or enemy): the queasiness he always felt when fear and food met together. 'The condemned man ate a hearty breakfast.' Good luck to him; such a man had either no imagination or a stomach of iron.

He gave the pre-arranged triple tap on their door and heard a movement in the room. A moment later the door opened and as soon as he stepped inside was closed and quietly locked by Stafford. There was nothing on the table - and nothing on his bed or Stafford's. The seaman had failed. He must have entered the room but not found the satchel. Or the lieutenant was on his way to Paris to collect dispatches, not deliver them. The queasiness increased and he belched, a vile compôte of sole and soup.

He turned to ask Stafford what had gone wrong - and saw that the man was grinning.

The Cockney walked over to the chest of drawers, pulled out the second drawer and carried it to the table. Lifting out some clothes, he produced a shiny leather satchel the size of a family Bible and with a long shoulder strap. Ramage saw that the top flap was down and the clasp was locked,

With a flourish Stafford produced a thin sliver of metal, inserted it in the keyhole and turned. The flap sprang open from the natural stiffness of the leather, and Stafford took out a dozen letters and two slim packets.

Ramage sat down at the table, his heart pounding; one half of him wanted to snatch up the envelopes and see, from the superscriptions, if there was a dispatch from Bruix to the First Consul; the other half of him shied away like a horse balking at a fence, scared to take the plunge because the consequences of there being no such dispatch meant that he would have wasted several days by believing a fool of a corporal.

Stafford tapped one of the letters. 'My French is a bitrudeemental, sir -'

'Rudimentary,' Ramage corrected him absent-mindedly.

' - rudimentally, sir, but I think this is the one you want.'

Addressed to,’Le Citoyen Pierre-Alexandre-Laurent Forfait' at 'Le Ministère de la Marine et des Colonies' in Paris, a line of writing above the seal on the back showed it was a dispatch from 'Eustache Bruix, Vice-amiral, Commandant, Force Navale de Boulogne.'

Ramage put it to one side and looked through the rest. All were addressed to various departments in the Ministry; the sender's name on the back of each indicated its mundane contents — 'L'Ordonnateur de Marine à Boulogne,' 'Bureau des Armements et Inscription Maritime au port de Boulogne' and so on. None was addressed to the First Consul, but Ramage was not surprised: an admiral would report to his Minister. The First Consul was the Corporal's embellishment.

Stafford was setting out his equipment - a flat spatula with a wooden handle, several sticks of sealing-wax of varying shades of red, and a thin-bladed knife. He gestured to a candle already alight and standing on the chest of drawers - it would be an hour before it was dark and Ramage had not noticed it - and said: 'All right if I close the shutters, sir?'

Ramage looked out. Anyone at several windows in the house opposite could see into the room. The thought of the watchful gendarmes in their cocked hats decided him and he pulled the shutters close.

Stafford put the candle on the table and added paper, a bottle of ink and a quill to the collection of items. Ramage picked up Bruix's letter and examined it. The blob of red wax was perhaps half an inch in diameter, and soot from the clerk's candle flame had made black streaks in it. The oval crest - the impression of an anchor with 'Rep. Fran.' at the top and 'Marine' below - had been carelessly applied by the clerk who canted the seal as he pressed so that the wax was wafer-thin on the left side and a quarter of an inch thick on the right. Several small blobs of wax were spattered round it, as though the clerk's hands shook - or else he was a damned clumsy or careless fellow. Ramage could imagine what would happen if a British admiral ever saw his letter sent to the First Lord of the Admiralty in such a state: the clerk would suddenly find himself at sea as a cook's mate!

Stafford was holding the spatula blade in the candle flame, moving it so the metal heated evenly. 'That the one you want opening, sir?'

The Cockney was casual, almost offhand. Ramage had no idea how the devil the man was going to open a letter sealed with the stamp of the French Navy when he did not have the seal to make a fresh impression when he closed the letter again. Was he being too offhand? Did he realize that, apart from anything else, their lives might depend on his skill? 'Yes, but will you be able to seal it again so a clerk in Paris doesn't spot anything?'

'You won't be able to spot anything, sir.' He reached for the envelope. 'If you'll just hold this spatchler in the flame, movin' it like so, I'll get ready.'

Ramage took the blade, watching shadows dancing over the walls, and was reminded of a magician. Stafford picked up the letter and ran his fingers over it. 'One sheet of paper folded three times, ends turned into the middle, put inside a plain sheet which is folded three times and ends folded in the middle, an' a blob o' wax to seal it. People never learn!'

'Never learn what?'

Stafford grinned impishly. 'Never learn it ain't a safe way to send a secret letter wiv people like me around!' He picked up two sheets of plain paper from his pile and compared them with the letter. "Bout the same thickness: that's lucky.'

'Why?'

'Means we can experimentate wiv the 'eat o' that blade.' He folded the first sheet into three, and then folded the two ends inwards so that they met edge to edge in the middle, running his fingers along the folds to crease them, and making a neat packet. He then took another sheet, put the packet in the middle and folded again in the same way, holding the ends down with his finger. He picked up a stick of sealing-wax. 'Have to use the candle for a moment, sir - can you hold it for me?'

He heated the stick of wax and ran it on to seal the paper, dripping enough until he had the same thickness as on Bruix's letter. 'That's it: now, if you'll carry on hotting up the spatchler, sir ...'

He held his own packet in one hand and Bruix's letter in the other, as though comparing the weight; then he felt each of them with the forefinger and thumb of his right hand, as a tailor would examine cloth. 'Both about the same thickness,' he commented, putting Bruix's letter to one side and his own packet in front of him, next to it. 'That's what matters.' He took a piece of cloth from his pocket. 'Let me have the spatchler, sir!'

He wiped off the soot, slid it beneath his own packet directly under the wax, and pressed down, gently pulling up one end. In a few moments, as the spatula warmed the wax through several thicknesses of paper, the end lifted and he flicked away the spatula. 'Warm it up again, will yer, sir. Just right, that was.'

'Here, let me look at that,' Ramage demanded, and Stafford passed over his packet, taking the spatula and keeping it in the flame.

Ramage looked at the blob of wax. It was still the same shape except that it was neatly divided in two, half on one end of the paper, half on the other. Stafford's spatula had been warm enough to allow him to separate the ends, but not so hot that the heat distorted the impression of the seal.

'Can you guarantee to do that with the Admiral's letter - 1 mean, not damage the impression?'

'Bit 'ard to guarantee it, sir; just say I'm certain, sure I can,' Stafford said, still waving the spatula through the flame. 'Look on the back - no scorching of the paper, eh?'

There was no sign that the warm blade had been used.

'That's it, see. Most people think o' wax as 'aving to be 'ot to work it, but warm is enough. 'Ot on top fer an impression with a seal, yus; but warm's enough to separate it underneath, like you saw. Now, see the clerk was careless; the wax is thin on one side and thick on the other. Very lucky we are.'

Ramage nodded. He guessed five minutes had passed - by now the landlord downstairs would be marching into the little dining-room with the roast sucking pig on a plate. In another five minutes it would be carved and the lieutenant and Louis busy eating. Fifteen minutes for them to eat and have more. Well, he and Stafford were not behind schedule - yet, anyway.

'I'd like you to 'old the letter down when we're ready, six, so I get a clean lift up ... Reckon this spatchler's about ready.' He watched as Ramage put Bruix's letter square in front of him, the wax seal uppermost. In almost one complete movement he removed the spatula from the flame, wiped off the soot and slid the blade under the letter. With a surprisingly gentle touch - surprising, Ramage thought, until you remembered his original trade - he lifted the corners at the exact moment the wax was warm enough to part, once again nicking the spatula clear. He blew on the wax to cool it and handed the packet to Ramage without bothering to look at the seal.

Ramage saw that the seal itself was both intact and perfect: the wax had parted at the thin side and softened enough on the thick side to allow Stafford to detach it from the paper before the heat came through to the impression. Carefully he removed the letter which was folded inside, and opened it.

Printed at the top was the same symbol that appeared on the seal: an oval shape with an anchor in the centre with 'Rep.' on the left of the stock, 'Fran.' on the right, and 'Marine' beneath, following the curve of the crown and arms. 'Liberté' was printed in large letters to the left of the oval and 'Egalité' on the right.

The letter was written from Pont-de-Brique - that was where the Corporal had said Vice-Admiral Bruix had his headquarters - and dated 'Le 13 Prairial.' He could not remember the new system of dating the French used since the Revolution, with different names for the months and numbering the years from the Revolution instead of the birth of Christ, but yesterday was the first day of June.

Quickly he skimmed through the letter. Forfait's full name and title were repeated, and the letter itself began: ' Vous me demandez par votre dépêche du 1er de ce mois renseignement sur la . . .'

And there it all was: apparently Minister Forfait was asking Bruix all the questions that the Admiralty wanted answering! Indeed, not just Forfait: the information was needed for the First Consul. Bruix was explaining that he had received the questions but that it would take him several days to obtain all the details for the three lists and his report. Citoyen Forfait would understand that while it was easy to prepare the first list - the various categories of vessels that were completed and could be commissioned by the 13 Messidor - the shipyards would have to be inspected by naval officers to ensure the accuracy of the second list (showing the stage reached in each vessel under construction for the Invasion Flotilla at that date). The third list presented even more difficulties, because indicating how many of those under construction on 13 Messidor could be completed and commissioned by 14 Thermidor would depend on the number of workmen being employed, and that in turn depended on the money available for wages, on equipment and materials, all of which were in critically short supply.

Nevertheless, Bruix wrote, the complete report would be enclosed in his next weekly dispatch. He assured the Minister that he had always shared the First Consul's views on the need for urgency but 'you will understand, Citoyen, that I can only commission the vessels as they are launched from the shipyards if I have sufficient sails, cordage, blocks and armament, and it must be brought to the First Consul's attention that of the twenty-three barges already launched, only eleven could be rigged and commissioned ready for sea with the equipment at my disposal. Of the seventy-three gunboats so far completed, only nineteen are fit for sea and armed. We lack fifty-four guns and carriages for the remainder, and will need 359 guns and carriages to arm the gunboats required by the First Consul and ordered from the shipyards. I understand that General Soult is writing separately to Paris, in answer to the First Consul's questions about the Army's position, but I sincerely hope we shall not be expected to supply them with powder, shot or flints from our meagre stores.'

The rest of the letter was a subtle recapitulation of all the earlier requests that Bruix had made to Paris and seemed to be hinting to Forfait that he should prepare the First Consul for a disappointing report. Bruix said he would welcome by return an answer to his request for a total of 413 guns and carriages because, if only a portion was forthcoming, he would sooner transfer the workmen from the gunboats to the transports which required no guns. This was not to say, he added warily, that he considered the Invasion Flotilla could be protected by fewer gunboats than already decided on; simply thathe was anxious to make the most economical use of the available workmen. He was also waiting for money to pay the carpenters and shipwrights whose wages were now eleven weeks in arrears. There were signs that many workers, particularly foreigners, were leaving the yards, which in turn were demanding payments which had been owing for several months.

Ramage reached for pen, ink and paper, and hurriedly noted down the main points of the letter, taking particular care not to make any mistake with the numbers of vessels or guns. He slid Bruix's letter back across the table to Stafford and, after folding his own copy, tucked it down the front of his shirt. In the meantime the Cockney was heating his spatula over the candle flame, having refolded the letter inside its cover.

‘If you'll hold it ready, sir,' he said. 'Just make sure theedges are hard up against each other - that's it. I'll 'andle the spatchler an' 'otting up the wax as long as you keep the letter firm.' He touched the palm of his hand with the blade, winced and shook his head, putting the metal back in the flame. 'Take a bit more yet.'

He was utterly unconcerned; that was what impressed Ramage. No nervous twiddling, no silly jokes to reassure himself. Yet Stafford was smart enough to know that one mistake could result in them all being captured as spies, and he had seen enough guillotines in the past few days to have no illusions... '

The Cockney picked up the cloth. 'Just about right, I reckon,' he said, wiping the soot from the blade and sliding it beneath the letter. 'No, sir, don't press down - just 'old it still.'

Watching the wax carefully, he moved the blade away for a moment and then slid it under again. He crouched over the seal like a cat about to pounce, hiding it from Ramage’s sight. Suddenly the spatula was tossed aside again and Staffer was blowing hard at the seal.

He then stood upright and reached for the satchel. 'Any of these other letters interest you, sir?' When Ramage shook his head he put them back in the satchel and pointed at the dispatch. 'Pick it up and look if you want, sir; the wax has set now. All ready for the Minister, it is!'

He was not exaggerating: the red wax was adhering once again to both sides, and Ramage saw that Stafford had judged it perfectly, softening just enough of the wax to make it stick together but not enough to affect the impression of the seal.

The Cockney was holding the satchel open, but before Ramage had time to put the letter in he tipped the other letters out again, closed the flap and locked it. Then he put the satchel flat on the table and punched it with a clubbing movement, both hands clasped together. The blow was heavy enough to flatten the satchel, and as he opened the lock again and replaced the letters he said: 'Worth knowing, that. If I'd 'ad trouble with the seal, we could've put all the letters together so the seals line up, and then jumped on the satchel. That would've cracked all the wax. Wiv every seal broken, the clerks in Paris would reckon the lieutenant's 'orse must 'ave sat on the satchel. Not very bright, clerks isn't.'

He lifted the candle to illuminate the inside of the drawer, took out his set of picklocks, and picked up the satchel. ‘If you'd like to keep an ear open for anyone comin' hup the stairs, sir, I'll take the 'tenant's bag back. We all right for time?'

Ramage looked at his watch. 'Twenty-one minutes from the time I came in. Where did he hide the satchel?'

Stafford laughed dryly. "Very horiginal, our 'tenant. Hid it under the bed!'

It was nearly midnight before Louis returned to the room. Ramage and Stafford, lying on their beds, heard the lieutenant-de-vaisseau and the smuggler stumbling up the stairs, joking and guffawing in the confidential and noisy manner of men who had spent the evening getting drunk together. Louis escorted the lieutenant to his room, said good night with a flourish, and stumbled back towards his own room. Ramage heard the lieutenant's door shut, and a moment later their own door opened.

'How is the sick man?' Louis asked loudly in French.

'A little better, if you mean me. My foreman is much better - and hungry!'

'I thought so,' Louis said drunkenly, ‘wait a minute . . .'

They heard him stumble down the stairs again, to return with a jug in one hand, two bowls in the other and a loaf of bread tucked under his arm. Once he had pushed the door shut it was obvious he was as sober as when Ramage had left him at the table; the drunkenness was an act.

'Enough broth for both of you,' he said, putting it on the table. 'With the landlord's compliments. Now, how did it go?' he asked Ramage quietly. 'I made sure the lieutenant was drunk when he went to bed, just in case!'

Ramage and Stafford sat down at the table as Louis served the soup and broke the loaf into pieces. 'The suckling pig was excellent,' he chuckled. 'The lieutenant was as appreciative as myself. He was critical of the sole - as became a naval officer, perhaps - and as a true Norman he approved the onion soup.'

Absent-mindedly he extracted two spoons from his pocket, handed them round, and sat down opposite Ramage. He was obviously anxious to hear their news but both Ramage and Stafford were too busy with the broth to pay much attention. Stafford finished the bowl and eyed the jug hopefully. 'Some left,' Louis said. 'More for you, sir?' Ramage shook his head and nodded towards Stafford.

Leaving Stafford to finish off the soup with noisy gusto, Ramage took his notes, smoothed them out on the table, and said in English: 'Stafford did an excellent job: we - er, borrowed - the satchel for fifteen minutes. There were sixteen letters in it, and a dispatch from Vice-Admiral Bruix to the Minister of Marine Citizen Forfait . . .' Ramage could not resist pausing to tantalize the Frenchman,

'Were you able ...?'

'Stafford opened the seal and -'

'But was he able to close it again?' Louis interrupted anxiously.

' - and after I'd read the dispatch he sealed it again so that the clerk who applied the original wax would never know Stafford has - like you - skills not normally found in a sailor,

'The dispatch,' Louis prompted.

'Ah yes -' Ramage tapped the paper, 'most interesting. It seems that the Minister, on behalf of Bonaparte himself has just asked Bruix nearly the same questions that the British Admiralty wants answering: how many of the various types of vessels forming the Invasion Flotilla have been completed and are ready for sea; how many will be completed in a month's time; and the situation regarding the rest.

'Oh yes, and Admiral Bruix is having a great deal of trouble getting enough money to pay the carpenters and shipwrights at the various yards - all of whom are eleven weeks behind with their wages. And he is reminding the Minister that he has asked for more than 350 guns and carriages for the gunboats. They must be 24-pounders -'

'One for each gunboat,' Louis said.

'- exactly,' Ramage said, glancing at his notes. 'Here we are - seventy-three gunboats completed so far, and only nineteen ready for sea. No guns for the remaining fifty-four. Then he needs another 359 guns for the rest of the gunboats ordered by the First Consul. Then he says twenty-three barges have been launched but he has masts, sails and cordage for only eleven of them. All that bears out what we saw in Boulogne.'

Louis sucked his teeth. 'More than four hundred gunboats ordered, and guns for only nineteen . . . Masts, spars and sails for less than half the barges launched, and probably four times more are ordered . . . That's how this man Bonaparte seeks to challenge the British Navy, which has kept nearly every one of its ships at sea, winter and summer, for the past eight or nine years. Fill the gunboats with farmers' boys and clerks from the counting-houses and send them across the Channel,' he said, mimicking the Bonaparte portrayed by English cartoonists.

Ramage felt a great sympathy for the man, and noticed that Stafford was watching him curiously. By Bonaparte's standards, Louis was a traitor to France; but by the standards of men like Louis and the man with only one leg who was abandoned in the Alpine snows, it was Bonaparte and the new régime who were the traitors. What a dreadful position for men to be in, when they find their country's official enemies are their only friends ... As though all the jailbirds in Britain had suddenly seized control and, with their leader installed in St James's Palace, then set about making the country a safe place for thieves, murderers, panderers, blackmailers and sheepstealers to live in —and, the bitterest irony, did it all in the name of liberty, equality and the brotherhood of man.

Louis pointed at Ramage's notes, his finger emphasizing that they covered only one side of the page. 'Is that all Bruix reported? Surely it is not enough for your people!'

Ramage grinned. 'No, this is really only an acknowledgment of the Minister's request. I had the feeling that Admiral Bruix wanted to warn Citizen Forfait that the full report when it comes will not make cheerful reading for Bonaparte: he more than hints that the First Consul should be tactfully prepared in advance . . . And he's taking the opportunity to square his own yards, too, reminding Forfait that he has not received the guns, cordage, sailcloth and so forth that he has requested, quite apart from money to pay the workmen.'

'He'll need all the excuses he can think of, if the First Consul finds he has fallen behind schedule with the new Invasion Flotilla,' Louis commented sourly. 'And General Soult can abandon hope of ever getting a marshal's baton if the Army of England is not ready, right down to the last button and musket flint. But -' Louis hesitated, obviously still puzzled, 'what happens now?'

The Admiral has asked the Minister to tell him by return - presumably he means by this same lieutenant - when he can expect the 413 guns and carriages, and the money to pay the: workmen. He says the full report on the Invasion Flotilla will take a few days to prepare and will be included in his next weekly dispatch. So presumably it will be taken to Paris by our lieutenant this time next week.'

Ramage waited anxiously for Louis to absorb the significance of the timing. It was better to let the Frenchman think it out for himself. While lying on his bed waiting for Louis to return from the orgy with the sucking pig, he had considered all of the alternatives open to him. Thank goodness there were some: he was not forced into one course of action - except that in the last resort, if everything went wrong, then some time next Saturday the wretched lieutenant-de-vaisseau was going to be left for dead behind a hedge on the quietest stretch of road between Boulogne and Amiens,

Louis was slowly arranging the crumbs on the table in a neat little pile. He looked tired and there was a sheen of grease on his chin, a patch he'd missed when he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand after finishing the sucking pig. Damn the pig; he was still so hungry his thoughts kept going back to it. Now Ramage was having to wait, and regretting the way he'd tantalized Louis over the dispatch, though the Frenchman was not being deliberately slow. He was being thorough, if his past performance was anything to go by; like a good chess player he was calculating every move his opponent could make before deciding on his own.

He looked up and, with a gesture to Stafford, said, 'I talk in French; I can't think well in English.' He folded Ramage's notes along the original creases and then ran the edge of the paper along the line of his jaw, the paper rasping on the stubble.

'First, we need to look into the lieutenant's satchel again when he returns from Paris on Monday, so we know when - or if - Admiral Bruix can expect his 413 guns and carriages?' When Ramage nodded he commented: 'Your people should regard that information as more vital than knowing when the vessels will be completed, since without a gun a gunboat is useless.'

Ramage nodded again: so far Louis's thoughts had run parallel with his own.

'Second, we need to look into the satchel again when the lieutenant returns to Paris from Boulogne next Saturday, so we can make a copy of Admiral Bruix's full report to the Minister. After that, your people will know as much about the Invasion Flotilla as the First Consul, eh?'

'Perhaps more,' Ramage said dryly. 'I think the Minister will edit it carefully to safeguard himself before presenting it to Bonaparte ...'

'It's all politics,' Louis said gloomily. ‘The Admiral will write an honest report because he has probably done an honest job: he has built as many vessels as he could with the money and materials provided, and commissioned as many as possible. The men in Paris are responsible for the deficit - they did not supply what was needed. Forfait knows that he has not supplied the materials - because he has been unable to get them. The Treasury has not supplied the money - because it is not available. But the First Consul is certainly not going to blame himself for ordering more ships than was possible to build with the money and materials available: oh no, he cannot be wrong. Alors, there will have to be scapegoats - something that Forfait and the Treasurer know only too well. If Forfait blames the Treasury, he knows he makes a mortal enemy; likewise the Treasurer probably knows that he cannot throw all the blame on Forfait. So -' Louis gave an expressive shrug, 'between them they carefully edit Admiral Bruix's report. After all, he is a hundred miles from Paris, and at times such as these I imagine a man is wise not to be more than a hundred metres from the First Consul's ear if he wishes to remain in favour.'

The rasping of the paper on Louis's jaw was getting on Ramage's nerves. He gave a passable imitation of a Gallic shrug. 'Politicians are the same the world over; it probably happens in London as well.'

'It even happens in every town hall,' Louis said bitterly, 'only there they're after money, not power. But we stray from our problem. Can we safely stay here another week - that is what we have to decide.'

Ramage put his hands flat on the table. 'I accept your decision.'

'Without a good reason, it will be dangerous. Can you think of a reason?'

'Stafford's illness becomes worse?'

Louis shook his head. 'An illness means a doctor, and a doctor is likely to suspect Stafford does not speak Italian, Doctors know Latin, don't forget.' He looked up at Ramage and began laughing. 'You were the last one to be taken ill— and you speak Italian well enough to pass for one. Fm afraid you are the one who has to take to his bed. It is the most natural reason, apart from being the safest.'

The prospect of faking an illness for a whole week was far from pleasing, but Ramage knew there was no other way. Louis was quite right because the stage had already been set: both the landlord and the lieutenant had seen him taken ill at supper; they both knew the Italian's foreman had been taken ill a few hours earlier. Why, the damned lieutenant-de-vaisseau would no doubt be anxious to hear how il signor was progressing when he returned from Paris with his satchel.

'We have to get the word to Jackson that there's been a delay. He'll be returning from England and expecting us back in Boulogne by Monday. And I must send another report: the Admiralty will be interested in what we've discovered from the lieutenant's satchel.'

Louis nodded. 'Passing messages is the least of our problems.' He thought for a moment. 'If all went well, Jackson should be on his way back to Boulogne tonight. I can arrange for your report to reach him so that he and Dyson sail for the rendezvous again tomorrow night. He'd be in England on Monday and back in Boulogne by Tuesday.'

'Good: I'll write the report now, and orders for Jacksoa'

‘The sooner the better,' Louis said, 'it's a long ride from here to Boulogne, the way my man will have to go. And don't forget he might be caught: don't be too - well, too explicit, I don't mean in your report to the Admiralty,' he added hastily. 'Just make sure that if my man is.caught and the papers read, no one can trace us here!'

Ramage jerked his hand up to his neck in a chopping motion. ‘The sight of a guillotine blade guarantees caution...’