‘Parbleu, you waste time. Certainly your major—’
‘Ah, now that’s just it, missie. According to what I’ve heard, you oughtn’t to be here. Major said you’d gorn.’
‘Yes, but I have not gone,’ Melusine said impatiently.
‘That’s just it. Why ain’t you gorn? Seems to me I had ought to arrest you.’
‘You may arrest me later. Now it is—’
‘What are you doing still here, missie, that’s what I’d like to know?’ demanded the man Trodger, sticking to his guns.
‘Oh, peste. What matters it? My servant, he is wounded—and by a Frenchman, if you wish to make an arrest.’ She frowned suddenly. ‘And why have you not arrested him? Do not tell me you have allowed him to escape you.’
Trodger eyed her with suspicion. ‘What Frenchman would that be, missie? We ain’t let no one escape.’
‘But if you have not seen him, then he has certainly escaped.’ Disappointment flooded her. Gosse had hidden himself successfully then. ‘That is the man who tries to kill me, but he wounded instead my servant. Did you not hear the shot?’
‘I ain’t saying as I didn’t hear no shot,’ Trodger said carefully, peering at her out of eyes narrowed with interest, ‘but what I do say is, it’s mighty peculiar you saying as how there’s a Frenchman in the case, when it’s as plain as the nose on your face that you’re a Frenchwoman yourself. And you know all about that shot.’
Melusine threw her hands in the air. ‘But you are idiot. I tell you, if you do not help me this instant, you will find that your major he will very likely shoot you.’
‘Woof!’
The sergeant appeared nonplussed, and Melusine pressed her advantage. ‘While you are making me this interrogation, my poor Jacques bleeds to death.’
‘Who’s bleeding to death?’ demanded Trodger.
‘But I have told you. My servant. He is in the secret passage.’
‘Secret passage, is it?’ The sergeant seemed to brighten at this. ‘Well, we’ll just go on up and have a look at this here passage, missie, shall we?’
‘Have I not been saying so?’ snapped Melusine, exasperated. ‘En tout cas, it is not up at all, but down.’
Trodger had started towards the stairs, signing to his men to get behind the lady. But at this, he halted, turning his frowning gaze back on her.
‘Now see here, missie. The major himself told me that this secret passage started upstairs. And if you’ve any notion—’
‘Yes, it is upstairs,’ Melusine agreed, crossing to the library door. ‘But so also it is downstairs. There are two ways to go in, you understand. But you must come this way now. Vite, I pray you. Jacques is very bad, and I am afraid he may die.’
Upon which, she darted through the library door, galvanising both the sergeant and his two militiamen into action. She heard them diving after her, and noted their starting eyes as they spied the opened panel. She did not wait, but grabbed up the lantern and slid into the passage, calling to them to hurry.
Her heart in her mouth, hoping against hope, Melusine made her way back to where she had left the boy. Jack was lying so still, for a moment she panicked.
‘Jacques, are you dead? Jacques, do you hear me?’
Melusine put her cheek to his lips, and felt the faint warmth of his breath. Relief flooded her.
‘Grace à dieu, he breathes still.’
Looking round, she found the little coterie of soldiers crowded into the passage behind them. ‘Why do you stand there? Take him up, and bring him out at once.’
But she reckoned without the fellow Trodger.
‘If you’ll have the goodness, missie, to move yourself out of the way,’ he said aggrievedly, ‘and let us at him, we might have a chance of doing just that.’
She was obliged to acknowledge the justice of this complaint, and moved further into the passage to allow the men access. But her temper almost flared again when the sergeant spoke.
‘Now then, my lad, you’re under arrest you are. But I suppose as I’ll have to wait until you can hear me to tell you again. Now then.’
Melusine had to bite her lip to stop herself from interfering as, under Trodger’s direction, the two militiamen gave up their muskets into his keeping and lifted Jack. With some difficulty, they managed to negotiate the passage with their burden and carry him out into the library.
‘Lay him down on a sofa,’ Melusine said, coming out behind them and moving towards the antechamber.
‘You keep a-hold of him,’ Trodger ordered his men.
‘Parbleu, do you think he will run away? He has a bullet inside him, and it must be taken out.’
‘If he has a bullet inside of him,’ said the sergeant stolidly, ‘there ain’t no one can take it out better nor me. Many’s the bullets I’ve dug out of fellows in my time.’
‘But you are not a surgeon,’ protested Melusine.
‘I’m a soldier, missie. Been in the wars with both the major and Capting Roding, I have,’ Trodger informed her loftily. ‘I knows how to do better nor any surgeon.’
‘Then do it,’ Melusine said with impatience. ‘But lay him down.’
‘Ah, but I’m thinking as how this here house ain’t the best spot for an operation of that kind, missie,’ explained the sergeant, and Melusine noted that his men exchanged anguished glances. Trodger laid down their muskets and turned on them. ‘That’s right, you bone idle do-nothings. You can come back for these, for you’ll carry him to the gatehouse, that’s what you’ll do.’
Melusine jumped. ‘The gatehouse? But why must you move him at all?’
