Helen Dickson by Highwayman Husband Page A

bourgeoisie and peasants appearing in countries all over Europe, and French émigrés pressing unceasingly for war against the revolution. Reluctant to start such a conflict, the foreign secretary, feeling that some special purpose might be gained, sent me to Paris to act as a detached observer.’
    ‘A spy, you mean.’
    His expression was grave but calm. ‘I prefer to call myself a government agent.’
    ‘Is there a difference?’
    ‘No. I was not the only one employed as such. God alone knows how many foreign spies were loose in France at that time—and now, for that matter.’
    ‘And—were you carrying any despatches?’
    ‘No,’ Lucas went on, feeling duty bound to answer her questions, but careful not to reveal too much. ‘It would have been too dangerous—should they fall into the wrong hands. I carried nothing with me except false credentials.’
    ‘And what happened to you when the vessel bringing you back from France sank? I was informed that only one man survived and that he managed to make it back to England. According to him, the Pelican was attacked by some unknown force and everyone on board killed and thrown into the sea.’
    ‘That is more or less what happened. Who that man was I really cannot say, and how he made it back to England is a mystery to me. With so much traffic passing back and forth in the Channel it is likely that he was picked up by a vessel. But, contrary to the account he gave to the Admiralty, he was not the only one to survive. Along with one other I was pulled from the sea by the captain of aFrench vessel on patrol. Unfortunately, having received a severe blow to the head, I was unconscious at the time. When the captain demanded to know our names, the other man—a mariner from Roslyn village who died soon afterwards—knowing nothing of my mission, gave the captain my true identity.
    ‘Unfortunately it was not unknown to the French, since my coming and going between our countries engaged on secret missions during the American war had been greeted with suspicion and made me most unpopular at the time. I was taken back to Paris, where I was pronounced a traitor, and without a trial I was thrown into prison—La Force, a notoriously vile, appallingly overcrowded place, a common jail, where criminals of every kind who roam the slums of Paris and elsewhere are incarcerated.’
    Laura was horrified. ‘But—how could they imprison you, an Englishman?’
    ‘My mother was French,’ he told her. His voice was grim. ‘They knew this. She was a member of the detested aristocracy, from the Languedoc region—the same aristocracy the people are feeding to the guillotine every day.’
    ‘Oh!’ Laura exclaimed, expressing her surprise. ‘I didn’t know.’
    ‘No,’ he said quietly, his eyes calmly watching her. ‘There is a lot we don’t know about each other, Laura.’
    ‘We—we hear such dreadful things about what is happening in France…with so much internal unrest,’ she faltered, unable to stem the warmth his disturbing gaze sent pulsating through her veins. ‘Did—did they interrogate you?’
    ‘I was—subjected to questioning,’ he told her hesitantly, sparing her the gruesome details of how he had been shackled with a length of heavy chain hand and foot, tortured at the hands of experts, before being dumped unceremoniously into an underground hell-hole, a pathetic, clankingheap of misery. This was not for the ears of a respectable young woman.
    ‘But I gave no account. In the beginning I was kept in complete isolation—unable to make contact with the outside world—in a place where a man loses count of the days and where death can strike in many ways. I had plenty of time to think, but I tried not to. When a man loses his freedom, thinking is a dangerous business—apt to drive him mad. Eventually I was taken out and put in a cell with two other prisoners.’
    Pain and disbelief streaked through Laura at the thought of Lucas languishing in one of France’s