Violet

Chapter Eleven

London

“THE KING'S INSANE, PRINNY'S AN ARROGANT DUNderhead, and the rest of ‘em are clods.”

This succinct, wholesale condemnation of the royal family was received in a gloomy, accepting silence. The speaker took a deep draft of his wine and glared around the table in the square chamber in the palace of Westminster as if challenging potential dissent. He was a man in his late sixties, black eyes hard and sharp as flint beneath bushy gray brows and a mane of iron-gray hair.

“And they're demmed expensive into the bargain, Penhallan,” one of his three companions rumbled, leaning back in his chair, loosening a button on the striped waistcoat that strained over his ample belly. “Prinny's monstrous fantasy pavilion in Brighton! I've never seen anything like it. All those domes and dragons.”

Cedric Penhallan snorted. “Hideous monstrosity. And Society nods and beams and congratulates the fool on his taste and imagination and Parliament foots the bill.”

“Quite so.” The agreement came from the prime minister, who sat up straight in his chair with an air of resolution, as if deciding it was time to take control of the meeting. “That is precisely the issue, gentlemen. We have Wellington demanding money on every mail ship from the Peninsula, the Admiralty needs more ships, and the palace grows greedier by the day. We cannot defeat Napoleon and indulge every bizarre whim of Prinny's… not to mention the demands of his brothers on the civil list.”

Cedric Penhallan took an apple from a chased silver bowl on the table and carefully peeled it with a tiny dessert knife, frowning as he took the peel off in one perfect spiral. The conversation at this dinner with the prime minister and his few closest intimates had taken a familiar turn: how to balance the conflicting needs of a country at war, with the financial demands of an idle, autocratic regent who saw no reason why his demands shouldn't be instantly gratified by a servile Parliament.

“The Stuarts learned their lesson the hard way,” he said with a cynical curl of his lip. “Maybe we should give the House of Hanover a taste of Stuart medicine.”

There was a moment of stunned silence; then an awkward laugh rippled around the table. Men who dined with Lord Penhallan learned to expect the sardonic harshness of his opinions and remedies, but to hear Penhallan recommend revolution and regicide, even ironically, was a little too much even for his intimates.

“You've a dangerous sense of hum or, Penhallan,” the prime minister said, feeling a slight reproof was required.

“Was I jesting?” Lord Penhallan's eyebrows lifted, and a disdainful amusement sparked in his eyes. “How long does the British government intend to pander to the vulgar extravagances of a German lout?” He pushed back his chair. “You must excuse me, gentlemen. My lord.” He nodded at the prime minister. “An excellent dinner. I look forward to your presence in Grosvenor Square next Thursday. I've a consignment of burgundy I'd like you to try.”

Having made his farewells, Cedric Penhallan left his companions still at the table and walked out into the chilly March evening. The conversation had irked him, but he'd made his irritation felt and hopefully sowed a little seed in the corridors of power that might bear fruit. At some point someone had to put a rein on the royal family's profligacies. It was high time to remind the government that the king and his family were merely foolish mortals who could be controlled by Parliament.

He smiled to himself as he walked briskly through the streets, his step surprisingly light for such a big man. He'd enjoyed shocking them with that insouciant reference to Charles I's execution. Of course, he'd never seriously advocate such a course, and they knew it… or at least they thought they knew it.

His smile broadened as he climbed the steps to his own front door. He worked his own political influence behind closed doors, more with whispers and innuendo than with direct statements. In the House of Lords he was rarely seen on his feet, but Lord Penhallan's power was many-tentacles and had a long reach.

His front door swung open before he could put his hand on the knocker, and the butler bowed him into the hall.

“Good evening, my lord. You had a pleasant evening, I trust.”

Cedric didn't respond. He stood frowning in the candlelit hall. A high-pitched squeal came from the library, followed by a burst of drunken male laughter. “My nephews are home for the evening,” he commented acidly. It was the butler's turn not to respond.

Cedric strode to the library door and flung it open.

His lip curled at the shambolic sight within. Three women, wearing little more than the paint on their faces, were standing on a table, performing a lewd dance for a group of five men, sprawled over couches and chairs, glasses in hand.

“Governor, wasn't expecting you back so soon.”

One of the men stumbled to his feet, a fearful note underpinning the drunken slur.

“Clearly not,” his uncle declared in disgust. “I've told you before I'll not have you whoring in my house. Get those harlots out of here and conduct your business in the stews, where it belongs.”

He stood to one side, watching with searing contempt as the men lurched to their feet with mumbled apologies and the women stepped off the table,.hastily scrambling back into skirts and petticoats, their eyes glazed with drink yet haunted with the predatory hunger of the desperate.

One of them approached David Penhallan with a deprecating smile. “A guinea apiece, sir,” she whined. “You promised, sir.”

She went reeling as Cedric's nephew backhanded her. “You think I'm fool enough to pay a guinea for a drunken dance by a scrawny bag of bones?” he demanded savagely. “Get out of here, the lot of you!” He raised his hand again and the woman cowered, her hand covering the mark on her cheek.

“Oh, we should give them something for the dance, David,” his twin said with a chuckle that sounded more menacing than humorous. Charles reached into his pocket and threw a handful of pennies at the women. His aim was true and vicious. A coin struck one woman in the eye and she fell back with a cry of pain, but then she bent with the others, scrabbling to pick up the coins amid the laughter from the men, who all joined in the new game, bombarding them with coins-an assault that they couldn't afford to run from.

With a disgusted exclamation Cedric turned on his heel and left the room. He despised his nephews, but he wasn't interested in their puerile little cruelties. The women they were tormenting meant nothing to Lord Penhallan; he just didn't want them in his house.

He marched up the stairs, pausing for a minute to look at the portrait of a young woman hanging above the half landing. Silvery fair hair, violet eyes, she gazed down at him with the same defiantly mischievous smile he remembered across the mists of more than twenty years. His sister. The only person he believed he had ever cared for. The only person who had dared to challenge him, to mock his ambition, to threaten his position and his power.

Cedric could still hear her voice, her chiming laugh as she told him how she'd overheard his discussion with the Duke of Cranford, how she believed that Williarn Pitt would be most interested to know how one of his most trusted advisers was working behind the scenes to oust him. The price of her silence was her own freedom from her brother's authority. The freedom to pursue whatever little adventures she chose, and, when she was ready, the freedom to choose her own husband without thought to whether he might be useful or a liability to her brother's ambition.

Pretty, lively little Celia had made herself too dangerous.

Shaking his head, he went on upstairs, ignoring the renewed shrieks and gales of drunken laughter m the hall as the women were chased from his house followed by the revellers heading out in search of new entertainment.

Portugal

“So what's behind this journey, little girl?”

Tamsyn looked up at the sky, following the flight of an eagle as it soared above the mountain pass, its magnificent wingspan black against the brilliant, cloudless blue.

“We're going to be avenged upon Cedric Penhallan, Gabriel.” Her mouth was set, her eyes suddenly hard. She looked across at him as they rode abreast, following the line of a goat track etched into the mountainside. “And we're going for the Penhallan diamonds. They were rightfully my mother's, and now they're rightfully mine.

Gabriel drew a wineskin from his belt and tilted the ruby stream down his throat. He knew the story as well as Tamsyn did. He passed her the skin, saying thoughtfully, “You think the baron would have wanted you to seek his revenge, lassie?”

“I know he would,” she said with quiet certainty.

“Cecile was cheated out of her inheritance by her brother. He planned her death.” She tilted the skin, enjoying the cool stream as it ran down her dry throat. “The baron swore he would be avenged. I used to hear them talking at night.”

She fell silent for a minute at the memory of those evenings when she lay in her own bed, the door ajar, listening to the soft voices, the baron's rich chuckle, Cecile's musical laugh, and occasionally the chilly ferocity of El Baron roused to anger by some stupidity or perceived failure of loyalty. Cecile would defuse his anger, but she never interfered in his dealings with his men, and she'd never been able to soften his icy rage at what Cedric Penhallan had paid the robber baron to do.

Gabriel frowned, his customary placid demeanor disturbed. He wasn't sure what position to take on Tamsyn's plan because he wasn't sure what position the baron would have taken. “The baron had a powerful grudge against your mother's family,” he said, feeling his way. “But I don't believe he considered it your grudge, too. And Cecile always said there was nothing to avenge because her brother's plans went so far awry.”

Tamsyn shook her head, screwing the top back onto the skin and passing it across to him. “And you know the baron always denied that Cedric's plans had failed. He wanted his sister out of the way, he wanted to bilk her of her rightful inheritance. He succeeded. The baron always intended to redress that wrong. He's not here to do it, so I will do it for him.”

Gabriel's frown deepened. “Cecile counted that wrong as a good,” he said. “There's never been a love like theirs, and she always said it was the Penhallan who put them in the way of it.”

“Cedric Penhallan paid for Cecile's abduction and murder.” Tamsyn's voice was almost without expression. “The fact that she found a lifetime's happiness instead with the man Cedric paid to do his dirty work is no thanks to him. It's time he paid the price.”

Gabriel clicked his tongue against his teeth, considering. The baron had confided his intention to concoct an appropriate vengeance on the Penhallans. It could be said that that confidence had laid the burden now upon his old friend to do what he could no longer do. Gabriel certainly had the responsibility to protect the baron's daughter, and if she chose to exact her father's vengeance, then it seemed he had no decision to make.

For a man of action rather than decision, the conclusion came as a relief. “So how will you prove your kinship?”

“I have the locket, the portrait, and other documents. Cecile gave me all I would need to prove that I'm her daughter.” Tamsyn adjusted her position in the unfamiliar side-saddle. “She also told me that her real name was Celia. She started to call herself Cecile when she was fourteen because she thought it was prettier.” A misty smile touched her lips as she heard again her mother's laughing description of her own youthful romanticism.

“She said she had some romantic notion about the name when she was a girl, and it annoyed her brother almost more than anything else when she refused to answer to anything but Cecile.” She looked.across at Gabriel. “She said that should I ever need to prove my identity to the Penhallans, it would be the final confirmation for Cedric if I told him that, because it was not something anyone else knew about.”

Gabriel whistled through his teeth, nodding. “If she gave you all that, little girl, I'd guess she wasn't totally against the idea of vengeance, after all.”

“No,” Tamsyn agreed. “But she would have called it restitution.” She chuckled. Cecile's delicacy of phrase had always amused her robber-baron mate. “And she also gave me a written and witnessed account of her abduction,” she continued, serious again. “If that found its way into a London newspaper, vouched for by her daughter, it might cause her brother some considerable embarrassment, don't you think?”

“If her brother's still alive.”

“There is that,” she conceded. “If he is, I shall know what to do. If he's not then what I do will depend on his successor on the rest of the family, really. If they had nothing to do with Cedric's plan, then I can hardly hold them responsible. We shall see what we shall see, Gabriel.”

“Is it blackmail you're talking, little girl?”

Tamsyn shook her head. “No, I intend to expose Cedric Penhallan's treachery to all the world. But for it to be credible, I must have a reputation for respectability myself. That's where the colonel comes in. Once I'm established in society as the protegee of such an eminent aristocrat, my story will carry much more weight than if it came from some unknown who just popped up out of nowhere. And once the truth is known, the diamonds will come to me without question, because they're indubitably mine by right.”

“And how much of this does the colonel know?” Tamsyn glanced down the mountainside to where the broader, more frequented, path wound its way through the pass. The tall figure of Colonel, Lord Julian St. Simon rode at the head of the baggage train, six villainous outriders bristling with weapons in escort, the pack mule carrying Josefa plodding steadily in the rear.

“None of it,” she said. “He knows nothing of the Penhallans, of the diamonds, or of the plot to murder Cecile. He and Wellington know only that I'm an orphan with Cornish connections, alone in the world, desperate to find a home and family.”

Gabriel threw back his head with a snort of derision.

“And they fell for that story! Och, little girl, shame on you. You could make grown men weep with your tales.”

“Cecile always said the chivalry of an English gentleman was a very useful weakness,” she said with a complacent grin. “I need a base in Cornwall, and I need the right entrees. Under the colonel's protection, ensconced in his family home, I shall have them.”

“I'd watch my step with the colonel, if I were you,” Gabriel advised. “He's not one to care for being made game of… however chivalrous he may be.”

“But I'm not making game of him,” Tamsyn said judiciously. “Only use.”

“He'll not care for that either.”

Tamsyn was inclined to agree. “He won't be able to do anything about it. I don't intend to stay in England once I've done what I set out to do; besides, the colonel will be so relieved to get back to his beloved war, he probably won't give a damn by then anyway.”

“You'd better be right, lassie.”

Tamsyn merely shrugged and raised a hand in greeting as the colonel looked up toward the higher path, shading his eyes against the sun.

Julian didn't acknowledge the wave. It annoyed him that she chose to ride apart as if she and Gabriel were still riding as partisans. It left him journeying in solitary splendor with only the swathed Josefa on her pack mule as companion. One could hardly consider the outriders companions. They were the most ruffianly pack of scoundrels, led by a one-eyed villain who made no secret of his suspicion of the English colonel. However, they looked as if they'd prove effective defenders of Tamsyn's treasure if pushed to it.

He glanced up again and saw that Tamsyn had left the goat track, and Cesar was picking his way down, sure”'“ footed, through the scrub and cactus clinging to the mountainside. They reached the main path a little ahead of the baggage train in a shower of loose gravel.

Tamsyn had no difficulty riding side-saddle, but he hadn't really expected her to. She was as at home in the saddle as if it had formed her childhood cradle. It would be interesting, however, to see how she took to the hard, backless English saddle. She'd certainly have to abandon her exotic cushioned Spanish version for ridding the tan in Hyde Park or even the quiet country lanes of England if she expected to be accepted by the highest sticklers.

“Are you lonely?” She greeted him cheerfully, turning her horse neatly on the narrow path to ride beside him.

“You and Gabriel seemed to be having a very intense discussion,” he responded. A spot of color blossomed against the sun-browned cheek, and he wondered why.

“Oh, I was just filling him in on the details of the plan,” she said. “I didn't really have the time to do it before.”

“I see. And did he embrace your scheme with avid enthusiasm?”

“Why wouldn't he?” Tamsyn responded a shade truculently to the colonel's heavily sardonic tone.

“Oh, no reason.” Julian shrugged. “I'm sure he has not the least difficulty in giving up the life and land he's called home for so many years. And even if he did have, you would still expect him to do as you wished.” His voice was as dry as sere leaves.

Tamsyn's flush deepened. “I don't know what you mean.”

“My dear girl, you know exactly what I mean. When you want something, you make damn sure you get it.

Gabriel's loyalty won't permit him to refuse you his support, and you'll use that without compunction.”

“Oh, how horrid you are!” she exclaimed in a low voice. “What a horrid thing to say about me.”

“You forget that I've been swept up by your broom as well,” he replied as aridly as before. “You didn't give a thought to my position or my feelings in the matter.”

Tamsyn bit her lip, startled to find tears pricking behind her eyes at the harshness of a judgment that seemed to have come out of nowhere. A judgment that deep down she recognized had some merit. Since the glorious evening in Aladdin's cave two days before, they'd hardly met at all. She'd understood that the colonel would have much to do preparing for his journey and arranging to hand over the reins of his brigade, so she'd made no further attempt to seduce him from his work. But when they'd set out from Elvas that morning, he'd been morose and uncommunicative. Hoping that quiet reflection would bring about a change in his humor, she'd chosen to ride apart with Gabriel. A forlorn hope, clearly. There was no dent in his resentment.

She blinked rapidly and urged Cesar forward, drawing away from the colonel, breaking into a trot and then a canter. Cesar threw up his head and sniffed the wind, then lengthened his stride, breaking into a gallop on the narrow, treacherous path.

“Tamsyn!” Julian yelled, his heart in his throat as horse and rider careened round a tight bend in the track where the mountainside fell steeply away; then they were gone from view.

“Said something to upset her, did you?” Gabriel's horse skittered down the mountainside onto the path beside them.

“She is the most ill-conditioned, unschooled hellion” Julian exclaimed. “She'll break her neck, if she doesn't break one of that animal's legs first.”

“No.” Gabriel shook his head. “I doubt that. They know each other too well. What did you say to upset her?”

“A couple of home truths,” Julian said. “Long overdue.”

“That'll do it every time,” Gabriel observed placidly, offering the wineskin. “Doesn't like to be told she's wrong. It was the same with the baron… particularly if he was wrong.” He chuckled, turning in his saddle to observe the progress of the mule train behind them. “I suggest we get off the road well before sundown. There's some tricky spots coming up, and I'd not relish a dusk ambush.”

“Those scoundrels you picked look ready for anything.” Julian handed back the skin with a nod of thanks.

“Maybe… but there's no point taking foolish chances.”

“I agree. We'll stop at the next village with a hostelry of some kind.”

“Won't be much, at best,” Gabriel said. “Not in these parts.”

They rode without any sign of Tamsyn for another half hour. Julian tried to conceal his anxiety since Gabriel clearly didn't seem to feel any. He told himself he had every right to lash out at her as severely as he chose. She'd forced him to leave his brigade at the most inopportune juncture. It had been one of the hardest things he'd ever done. Wellington had marched a detachment of men into Badajos and erected a gallows in the central square. Men had been tried for looting and hanged. It had brought the rest of his demoralized army straggling out of the city and back to the camp, where their officers had somehow to put them back together again. It was a dreadful time for a commanding officer to leave his brigade, even in the competent hands of the newly promoted Tim O'Connor ably assisted by the rest of his staff

So Julian had been in a vile temper that morning when they left Elvas and he hadn't missed the opportunity to chastise the cause of his grievance. For some reason though, anger at his exploitation didn't preclude worrying about her safety, and he couldn't deny the surge of relief when she reappeared, cantering toward them.

“There's a pueblo up ahead, about three miles,” she said, offering the fruits of her reconnaissance. “It's not much, but there's stabling for the animals and a stone byre where we could store the goods. It would be hard to mount a surprise attack on it, and it could probably be guarded safely with just two pickets; so if we have several watches, everyone should be able to get a few hours sleep.” She addressed her remarks to Gabriel and avoided the colonel's eye.

“What kind of shelter does it have for the rest of us?” Julian asked neutrally.

Tamsyn shrugged. “The farmer offered his barn and hayloft. It'll be cleaner than his cottage, which was crawling with vermin.”

The colonel nodded. They had their own provisions and needed only shelter from the cold mountain nights. He glanced at her; noting that she was still looking rather crestfallen. It surprised him that she should have taken his harshness so much to heart; it didn't seem to jibe with the manipulative brigand he knew her to be.

However, she deserved whatever treatment he chose to mete out.

“You will oblige me in future by not disappearing in that fashion,” he said shortly.

“I didn't seem to be very welcome here.”

“Do you expect to be?” He stared ahead down the path, his mouth hard. “Thanks to you, I've had to leave my men in the worst possible circumstances.”

Tamsyn nibbled her lip unhappily, then said, “I'll try to make the journey and… and later… pleasant for you.”

Julian shot her a look of total disbelief Her anxious returning gaze was candid and ingenuous. She really didn't understand what she was doing to him? Where had she come from? How could anyone possibly reach adulthood so devoid of a sense of ordinary social responsibility? He took a deep breath and attempted a lesson that he felt was doomed to failure.

“Your compensations, my dear Tamsyn, are certainly pleasant, but that is not the point. You can't manipulate people and events to your own ends and then calmly offer your body and its admittedly manifold charms and expect that to make everything all right.”

“But it's only for six months.”

Total failure! He shook his head and gave up. “There's no point talking about it. I'm stuck with the situation, and I'll do what I contracted to do. If we can get through the next six months with simple civility, I'll consider it a major achievement.”

Tamsyn fell in beside him and rode in thoughtful silence until they reached the village. It seemed obvious to her that six months of the colonel's time… a mere hiatus in his life… wouldn't have a faring effect on his future, whereas in the scheme of her own life, those six months could mean everything. It was obvious to her, but totally lost on the colonel.

The village folk crowded out of their cottages when the procession entered the pueblo, bisected by the mountain path as its single street. Ragged children ran onto the path, shouting and waving, black-clad women stood in doorways, shawls drawn over their mouths and noses, black eyes watchful above. Men appeared in the gateways to small malodorous farmyards where scrawny chickens scratched in the dirt fighting for scraps with grubby goats.

A stream trickled down the mountainside into the middle of the pueblo where a rough dam had been built, forming a deep pool to provide the village's water supply.

Tamsyn hailed a man rather more prosperous looking than the others, standing in the doorway of a relatively substantial cottage. “He's the village elder,” she explained. “It's his barn and byre we can use… for a consideration, of course.”

Gabriel dismounted and went over to him.

“He won't negotiate with me,” Tamsyn explained to the colonel, “because I'm dressed like a woman. If I'd been dressed as a partisan, he would have treated me as an equal.”

Julian merely raised an eyebrow and shrugged.

“At least a riding habit is easier to wear than a dress,” Tamsyn persevered, trying to elicit some conversational response. “I'm wearing britches underneath, so it feels almost normal. But it's still a disadvantage in situations like this.”

“Get used to it,” he advised as he'd done once before, choosing to respond to her light observations as if they were complaints. “Women don't act like men in English society… or not if they wish to be accepted.”

Tamsyn gave up trying to conciliate. “The baron considered Cecile to be his equal in everything,” she said fiercely.

Julian looked politely incredulous. “Then he was a very unusual man.” He swung to the ground and lifted Tamsyn down before she could leap with her usual agility from Cesar's great height. He closed his mind to the feel of her body in his hands, to the scent of her skin, which made his head spin with voluptuous memory.

“Women also allow men to assist them with certain actions, like mounting and dismounting, alighting from carriages, and taking their seats,” he informed her with the air of a conscientious tutor, setting her firmly on her feet.

“Oh, pah!” Tamsyn said disgustedly. “There's nothing the matter with my legs.”

“No, but you must learn to pretend that you go along with the myth of the gentler sex and show that you appreciate the little gentlemanly courtesies.”

Tamsyn's expression was one of acute distaste, and Julian began to enjoy himself “Unless, of course, you'd prefer to forget the whole thing,” he added nonchalantly.

Tamsyn stuck her tongue out at him in a childish gesture that somehow expressed exactly how she felt. The colonel laughed, infuriating her even more, and strolled over to where Gabriel and the farmer were concluding their negotiations. He stood slapping his gloves into the palm of one hand, looking around the village, assessing its strategic advantages.

“If we post pickets at either end of the street, we should be safe from marauders approaching conventionally.”

“Aye, but there's always the way down from above, Gabriel said, glancing up at the mountainside towering above the village. “We'll need to guard the byre itself I'll take the first watch with three of the men. You take the second… if it's all right with you,” he added, almost as an afterthought.

“Who's likely to know what we're carrying?”

“No one or everyone.” Gabriel frowned. “Word spreads like wildfire in these passes, colonel. And there are eyes everywhere. They may not know what we've got, but they'll know by now that it's worth defending, and presumably, therefore, worth stealing.”

“Well, let's make camp as we can.” Julian turned back to the mule train and saw that Josefa and Tamsyn were already carrying supplies into the barnyard, Tamsyn kicking aside the skirts of her riding habit with an irritable mutter. Suddenly she stopped, dumped her burden onto the ground, and swiftly unhooked the skirt of her habit, stepping out of it with visible relief, revealing her lower limbs clad in soft leather britches. She glanced across at him with a hint of defiance as she bundled the skirt under her arm.

He chose to pretend he hadn't noticed, strolling back to the mule train.

Tamsyn and Josefa occupied themselves lighting a fire in the barnyard and preparing food. Julian, busy with the men bestowing the treasure and organizing its defense, was surprised how willingly. Tamsyn assumed domestic responsibilities. He'd expected her to be working with the men, leaving the female side of the operations to Josefa. But the two women chatted cheerfully over the fire, and soon the heady aroma of coffee rose on the evening air.

He went over to them. “Something smells good.” “Polenta,” Tamsyn said, looking up from the pot she was stirring with a great wooden spoon. “There's a cask of wine to be broached. Would you do it? The men'll be thirsty… Oh, it's all right, Gabriel's doing it.”

Josefa muttered something as she shook a pan of mushrooms over the fire, and Tamsyn glanced quickly at her. “Oh, dear.”

“What is it?”

“Well, Josefa's afraid Gabriel's going to enjoy himself this evening. She says it's been at least a month since he let himself go with a cask of wine, and he's got good company for it.”

“He wouldn't drink himself stupid with that treasure to guard, surely?”

“Oh, he doesn't ever drink himself stupid,” Tamsyn said. ''Just aggressive. If you get on the wrong side of him. The treasure will be as safe with Gabriel drunk as sober, I assure you.”

“He wants to take the first watch.”

“Then he is intending to get soused,” Tamsyn said with conviction. “He plans it so that he'll be able to sleep it off and be good as new in the morning. Stir this, will you? It mustn't stick. I have to find the outhouse.”

Julian found the spoon thrust unceremoniously into his hand as Tamsyn skipped hastily over the cobbles in the direction of the pueblo's communal outhouse on the outskirts of the village.

Gabriel came over with two tankards of red wine.

“Drink, Colonel? Santa Maria, but I've a thirst on me tonight.”

“Thanks.” Julian took the tankard. “And I gather you intend to slake it.”

Gabriel looked over to where Josefa, still muttering, was slicing onions. “The old woman's been talking, eh? Well, it does a man good once in a while. I'd invite you to join me, Colonel, but you'll need your sleep in the first watch, and I'll need mine in the second.” He chuckled hugely and drained his tankard with one interminable swallow.

“It's not really my style,” Julian said. “If those villains of yours pass out, we'll be in poor shape to defend ourselves.”

“Oh, I'll not be drinking with them,” Gabriel said.

“They'll have a glass or two with supper, but they'll keep themselves sober or feel my whip at their backs, and they know it. No,” he said happily, “I've discovered some friends in the village. A little dice, a little card play… relaxes a man.”

Julian raised an eyebrow but offered no contradiction to this. The evening would bring what it would bring.

After supper a group of men drifted in from the village, rolling another cask of wine between them. They greeted Gabriel with much backslapping and shoulder punching before they settled down in a corner of the barnyard to play dice on an upturned rain barrel.

Tamsyn came back from the stream with Josefa, where they'd been cleaning the supper bowls and trenchers. “He's well away,” she commented, stowing the dishes in a saddlebag with a deft domestic efficiency that again surprised Julian. Josefa was still muttering, casting black looks at the men in the corner of the yard. Then she shook out a blanket and spread it on the cobbles, hauled a saddlebag onto the blanket as a pillow, and promptly lay down, drawing her various shawls, mantillas, and cloak around her.

Tamsyn chuckled, whispering, “She'll not let him out of her sight when he's started on this road. Not that he appreciates it. He'll curse her up hill and down dale if she interferes.”

Julian glanced up at the velvet-black sky with its dazzling panorama of stars. The air was chill now, a fresh breeze coming down from the mountain peaks. “You'd better get some sleep in the hayloft.”

“What about you?” Tamsyn hefted a roll of blankets ·onto her shoulder. It dwarfed her diminutive figure, yet she carried it with ease.

“I'll bed down somewhere,” he said dismissively.

“But I could make up a bed for both of us in the loft,” she said, her teeth flashing in the darkness as she smiled invitingly. “It'll be cozy in the hay.”

“For God's sake, girl, what does it take to get through to you?” he demanded in a fierce undertone. “Get up into the loft and get some sleep. I'm going to have a word with Gabriel.”

He turned away from her hurt gaze, which reminded him absurdly of a kicked puppy, and strolled over to the now noisy group. Gabriel looked up, his eyes bleary but his expression jovial. “Anything I can do for you, Colonel?”

Julian shook his head and pulled out his watch. “I'll relieve you at two.”

“Och, aye, that'll be grand,” the giant said serenely, attempting a wink but managing a squint instead. “I'll be a rich man long afore then.” He rolled the dice and chuckled at the three sixes they gave him. “Can't do a thing wrong tonight.” There was a guffaw from the men surrounding him, and the village elder refreshed

Gabriel's tankard of wine from a stone jar he held between his feet. Fortifying it with the rough, stomach burning brandy of the region, Julian assumed. A mixture that would put an ordinary man under the table after a couple of swigs.

He cast a glance around the yard. Gabriel had positioned his sentries sensibly enough. One of them was stationed at the rear, commanding the foot of the goat track that wound down from the heights. He had a pitch torch at his feet, a rifle between his knees, and was smoking a noxious pipe. The other two were stationed at either end of the village, guarding the main path. Gabriel had seated himself so that he faced both the entrance to the yard and the byre where the treasure was stored.

But the man couldn't see straight!

Julian decided he'd keep his own watch during Gabriel’s tour. He'd had many a sleepless night during the four years of the Peninsular campaign-one more wouldn't hurt him. He turned toward the barn.

“Keep the bairn close to you,” Gabriel called after him, and his voice was less thick than it had been.

Julian glanced back. Gabriel nodded significantly at him. Drunk or sober, his little girl's safety was clearly still uppermost in his mind.

Julian raised a hand in acknowledgment and went into the barn. The other three outriders were sleeping on the floor, snoring in the straw until it was time to take their watch. He sat in a corner of the barn, close to the ladder to the hayloft, drew his cloak tight around him, and· prepared to wait until Tamsyn was safely asleep.

After half an hour he judged it safe to go up to the loft. Temptation should by now be deeply asleep. He climbed the ladder softly. Tamsyn had spread the blankets and was curled in a comfortable nest of hay. Moonlight fell through the round window, silvering her pale hair, and her deep, even breathing filled the small fragrant chamber.

Julian tiptoed to the window. It looked down on the yard, and he could clearly see Gabriel and his fellow drinkers. It looked a peaceful, convivial scene.

He glanced back at the sleeper. Only her silvery hair was visible in the straw and blanket nest. How could such a wild and unusual girl expect to make her way in English society; expect to persuade some stiff-necked Cornish family, overly conscious of lineage and position, to take her to their bosom? It was always possible she was mistaken about her mother's social position, and her family were simply landed gentry or country squires. If so, she might have a better chance of winning them over. But to turn this bastard brigand into an English aristocrat was the stuff of a lunatic dream. It would take a damn sight longer than six months to achieve such a miracle. And it would need more of a miracle worker than he believed himself to be. But he hadn't guaranteed success, he reminded himself Then again, he couldn't tolerate failure. He never had been able to.

Grimly, he turned back to his observation of the yard. He didn't know how long he'd been staring down at the glowing embers of the fire and the flickering torchlight around the dice players when he caught sight of the dark shadow flitting behind the byre. He blinked, wondering if it was a trick of the shifting light, and then Gabriel bellowed, leaping to his feet, sending the rain butt crashing and rolling onto the cobbles. A cudgel appeared in his hand from nowhere, swinging ill a deadly arc. Julian was already sliding down the ladder, his pistol in his hand, when Tamsyn sat bolt upright, wide-awake, listening intently to the confusion below.

The three outriders still slept in the hay at the foot of the ladder, and Julian kicked at them impatiently, trying to rouse them. The only result was a deeper snore and a muttered protest. His foot caught on something, and a stone jar like the one he'd seen in the yard rolled along the floor. He picked it up and sniffed. The jar had contained brandy and something else; a white, powdery residue coated the bottom. Gabriel had forbidden them to drink after supper, but obviously someone had provided them with liquor, carefully spiked.

He raced into the yard. Gabriel was surrounded by the men he'd been drinking with, wielding his cudgel and bellowing some bloodthirsty Highland war cry as they came at him, moonlight glinting on steel.

Julian drew his curved cavalry sword and leaped into the fray. Clearly the threat they'd had to worry about came from within the village. He could see the dark shape of the other sentry on the ground, presumably dispatched by the black shadow he'd noticed from the loft, and he guessed the two at the entrances of the village had been taken from the rear as well. But if they'd been intending to put Gabriel out of commission with the same draft they'd given the outriders, they'd miscalculated.

The man was a lion, still roaring his war cry. His eyes shone red in the light of the torches they'd been playing by, and he greeted Julian's arrival with a ferocious snarl that Julian correctly interpreted as “Welcome to the fight.”

The men began to fall back as the two wielded cudgel and sword; then suddenly Tamsyn was in their midst. She grabbed one of the flaming-pitch torches and drove it into the face of a man flourishing a wicked serrated knife. He covered his face with a shriek and the knife clattered to the cobbles. She dived to the ground, snatching up the knife. And then the men were running from the courtyard, pursued by Gabriel and Julian and an irate Josefa, who, Julian realized incredulously, was wielding a broomstick to painful effect.

“Madre de Dios,” Gabriel said as they slammed shut the gates to the yard. He wiped sweat from his brow with his forearm and grinned. “I do believe they thought to get me drunk.” He laughed uproariously, his massive shoulders shaking with mirth.

“They were spiking the wine with more than brandy,” Julian said. “Those three”-he gestured with his head toward the barn-”are out for the count.”

“Pedro's got a bump on his head the size of an apple, but he's alive.” Tamsyn had run with Josefa to examine the stricken sentry. “What about the two in the village?”

“Let's hope they'll be no worse,” Julian said, frowning at her. “That was a foolhardy trick with the torch. You could have set fire to the barn.”

“I was careful,” she retorted. “And it worked.” “Yes, I grant you that. But it was still foolhardy.” Tamsyn shrugged. “In an emergency you use what tools are available.”

Julian couldn't fault this logic. He knew he'd have done the same himself He turned to Gabriel with an abrupt change of subject. “We'd better hole up here until dawn and then make a break for it.”

“Aye.” Gabriel nodded. “We'll pick up the other two as we leave. Let's get these others sobered up. We'd do well to show all the force we can on the way out, although I doubt they'll be too anxious for a repeat engagement. Woman, make more coffee.”

Josefa, without a word, dropped her broomstick and went to the still-glowing embers of the fire.

“Help me load up the mules.” Julian beckoned Tamsyn, who came over with alacrity, her eyes sparkling in the firelight, her body thrumming with energy in the aftermath of excitement. “I want to be ready to go the minute the sky starts to lighten.”

“They won't give us any more trouble,” Tamsyn said confidently. “A tribe of shameful incompetents.” She grinned. “The baron would never have taken them into his band. His raids never failed.”

Julian chose to refrain from comment.

Two hours later they stormed out of the yard, Julian with drawn sword at the head of the column, Gabriel bringing up the rear on his charger, waving his broadsword and bellowing his war cry. Tamsyn drove the laden mules between them, cracking a mule whip with gleeful ferocity, the three less than fully conscious outriders swaying in their saddles but still brandishing weapons.

The village stayed behind its shutters, however, recognizing it had met its match. They found the other two outriders sitting beside the road, nursing bleeding heads but able to mount their horses, and the procession continued its way to Lisbon.