That did rouse the merchant’s interest. “How is that?”
“I seek a fugitive.” He slipped his unsmoked pipe into the pocket of his coat. “A man my Parliament would gladly hang, if they could get their hands on him, and for whose capture they have offered a reward that I intend to claim.”
“And he is here in France, this fugitive?”
“He is. His name is Thomson,” said the Englishman. “John Thomson.”
Mary’s feet were by the foot stove yet she felt a sudden rush of cold that settled in her marrow, and her hand upon the dog’s soft head fell still.
The Scotsman kept his eyes closed but she noticed his right hand had moved a little up his thigh so it was covered by a loose fold of his horseman’s coat. Her own hand had grown tighter in its grip on Madame Roy’s, until the older woman squeezed her hand by way of reassurance. Mary breathed, and tried to go on breathing normally.
“He’s been in France,” the Englishman went on, still speaking to the merchant, “since October last past, when he fled from London with a fortune of his own—five hundred thousand pounds, they reckon, robbed from the investors of the Charitable Corporation, some of whom were driven since to bankruptcy and suicide.”
The merchant clucked his tongue. “For shame.”
“Indeed. Though I admit I cannot curse him altogether, for his crime provides me with the means to line my pockets, as you see.”
“And do you know where he is now?”
“He was in Paris,” said the Englishman. “I had a friend there by the name of Erskine who was sure he knew the place. Well then, come in with me, says I to Erskine, and we can divide the profits, but the fool did tell me no, he’d put his trust in the police, whom he had plans to bribe. Good luck, says I, for I have contacts of my own who tell me Thomson has left Paris and has headed south. And I am on his trail.” He settled back against his seat with satisfaction, and remarked, “It is no different, really, than a common hunt, and I have hunted nearly every quarry you can name.”
“Ah, yes?” The merchant showed a quickened interest that revealed they’d hit upon another thing in common. “What do you most like to hunt, monsieur? The fox? The bear?”
“The boar, I think, does make a worthy adversary.”
For nearly half an hour after that the two men traded stories of their hunting prowess, while the others slumbered on or seemed to, leaving Mary sadly isolated in her disappointment at discovering that Thomson was no better than a criminal.
She looked at him with different eyes, as though the light by which she viewed him had been changed forever and she could see nothing but the parts that lay in shadow. Frisque sensed her change of mood and licked her hand but she was not to be consoled. She’d had too many disappointments lately, Mary thought. Too many people who had played her false and let her down.
She felt the prick of foolish tears and let her own eyes close to hold them back so nobody would see them fall…but even as her lashes drifted shut she saw the Scotsman’s eyes had opened once again, and he was watching her.
* * *
At supper at Saulieu they heard the howling of the wolves from deep within the forests of the Morvan, and their landlord told them how in wintertime, as it was now, the starved wolves sometimes ventured from their lairs to lie in wait for passing travelers. When Frisque demanded Mary take him outside after supper, she kept close beside the door and kept her eyes turned to the forest that lay dark beyond the city walls, where still the wolves howled eerily. The moon was entering its final quarter and the stars were half-obscured by clouds that moved by stealth and seemed to drive the wind before them, for it stung at Mary’s frozen cheeks and burned her eyes.
She smelled the pipe smoke first. She stiffened, for she did not wish to see Mr. MacPherson, nor yet any of the people who had brought her into such a business. Loyalty to king and country she could understand, although the king and country she was being asked to bear allegiance to were ones she scarce could call her own. Yet theft was theft, and there could be no honor in the robbing of the innocent, no matter how well cloaked it was in patriotic purpose. She had cast her lot with criminals, and Thomson had this morning stood at Mass beside her and received the Host and he had done it as though his soul was pure white as the snow that Frisque was turning round and round upon this moment. It was, Mary thought, a hard thing to forgive.
She had kept silent for the most part since they’d stopped here, and declined an invitation by the elder of the daughters to repeat their play at cards, and over supper she had spoken only when directly spoken to, and risen when it was polite to do so and retreated to her room, and would have been there still had not Frisque now demanded to come out.
The pipe smoke swirled its scent again from somewhere close behind her, and she braced herself and turned prepared to face Mr. MacPherson. But it wasn’t him at all.
It was the Englishman.
His name was Stevens. Mary wondered what he would have thought to know the fugitive he hunted had been sitting to his right hand all through supper, and had passed him salt and bread.
He said, “You’re brave to come outside, mademoiselle, after the tales we heard at supper.”
Mary drew the warm hood of her cloak about her face and lied to him. “I do not understand.” Perhaps, she thought, if she repeated that enough he’d let her be.
“The wolves.” He came another step until he stood beside her, looking out where she was looking. “I have hunted wolf before. It is a most diverting sport, yet dangerous.”