Voyage of the Sparrowhawk Page 17

  The good sisters felt no concern about either of these visitors, knowing they meant the travellers well.

  But now there was this English policeman.

  *

  Henri de Beauchesne, when Albert visited him in Paris, had been very apologetic but completely unhelpful. He remembered the Sparrowhawk, of course – such an odd boat, who wouldn’t? – but he had not seen her since Calais. After leaving Henri’s apartment, Albert had walked for a long time through Paris, thinking. With no knowledge of where the Sparrowhawk was, he asked himself why she was in France. What had possessed Ben and Lotti to undertake such a perilous journey? In Albert’s experience, the two most common reasons for such extreme behaviour were fear, and love. You didn’t need to be a detective to work out what Albert’s fugitives were afraid of: Ben was afraid that his lie would be found out, and Lotti (understandably, thought Albert) was afraid of her uncle. But why France?

  Love, love, love …

  Ben has gone to look for his brother, John Snell had said. Could it be that …

  Albert Skinner sent a telegram to his colleagues in Great Barton:

  WHERE DID SAM LANGTON GO MISSING?

  He left for Buisseau two days later, as soon as he received the answer, arriving just a few hours after the Sparrowhawk had left the convent.

  The next morning, he walked to the bombed hospital site in search of clues, and sat by the river as Ben and Lotti had. As he contemplated the ruined landscape, Albert thought of his son, lying in his nursing home with his gas-damaged lungs, screaming with nightmares every night, and his mind wandered past the scene before him to another river long ago where his son had paddled as a child, and he sighed heavily for all that was lost.

  Back in Buisseau, still shaken from his reminiscences, he sat in the café in the south-west corner of the main square, where the waiter who had refused to serve Lotti brought him a cup of coffee. It was Saturday, market day. As Albert drank, he noticed a small crowd gathered around a nun carrying a basket. Curious, he approached to look …

  *

  ‘It was the fault of Delphine!’ wailed Sister Monique, back in the convent kitchen. ‘And of Federico, with the ears! She looks too much like her father! And now the policeman is with the Reverend Mother, and she will tell him everything.’

  ‘You should not have taken Delphine to market,’ grumbled Sister Véronique.

  ‘You know how she cries whenever I leave her! She is a tyrant, that one – worse than Napoléon, or my aunt Florence who made everyone take a siesta after lunch every day, even at Christmas. And that policeman, he is clever. I did not think Englishmen were clever like that. The way he interrogated me! Excuse me, sister, where did you get that puppy? – except in English, I had to ask Monsieur Gautier from the café to translate – and I was not able to lie!’

  Sister Monique punched a lump of bread dough.

  ‘Is there any chance,’ she wondered, ‘that the Reverend Mother might lie?’

  Sister Véronique just looked at her.

  Albert Skinner left the convent for the railway station at St Matthieu, there to catch a train to Armande.

  Nobody waved him off.

  *

  Trains being substantially faster than narrowboats, Albert arrived in Armande within a few hours. He took a room in a hotel by the river, with a window overlooking the quayside, from which he could see any boat arriving or departing from town. A swift enquiry confirmed that the Sparrowhawk had not arrived. Satisfied, Albert sent a telegram to Hubert Netherbury, to inform him of what he had discovered.

  Hubert Netherbury’s fury on learning that Lotti had absconded from school was nothing compared to his rage when he found out that she was heading to Armande.

  He replied to Albert Skinner’s telegram by return.

  ON NO ACCOUNT ALLOW CHARLOTTE TO SEE HER GRANDMOTHER … STOP … GRANDMOTHER GRAVE DANGER … STOP … LEAVING IMMEDIATELY … STOP … WILL ARRIVE ARMANDE LATE SUNDAY AFTERNOON … STOP … I REPEAT, CHARLOTTE MUST NOT SEE HER GRANDMOTHER …

  Less than an hour later, Hubert Netherbury was on a train pulling out of Great Barton station.

  And the race was on.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  Lotti adored the Sparrowhawk but oh, why was she so slow?

  A day and a bit to reach Armande, Ben had reckoned from the map. They had hoped to arrive late on Saturday, but now it was past lunchtime on Sunday and they were still not there. Lotti sat with Federico on the foredeck, willing the Sparrowhawk on. She knew that Ben and Sam were pushing her as hard as they dared, but the little narrowboat had given almost all she had to give. The rattling in her hull had grown worse, and she crawled along at a walking pace. She might have fared better on the still, calm waters of a canal, but they were travelling on rivers, buffeted by swirls and eddies and unpredictable currents. The river they were on since this morning was wide and strong, and now they had to contend with increased traffic as well, and the wake of much larger boats. Lotti knew from the glances Ben and Sam exchanged that they were worried, and they were so kind to be taking her to Armande … But somewhere out there was Albert Skinner, the policeman who never gave up, and somewhere behind Skinner there must be her uncle too, and beneath the fear of both of these, all the time, was the fear of Moune’s reaction when she saw her.

  Lotti felt sick just thinking of it.

  The door to the foredeck opened and Clara came out, carrying a mug of tea.

  ‘Drink,’ she said, passing Lotti the mug. ‘And stop worrying.’

  Clara was being kind too, making meals, making tea, she hadn’t once mentioned going back to England. Everyone was being kind …

  But oh, why couldn’t the Sparrowhawk go faster?

  *

  It is a widely accepted fact that the best way to approach Armande is from the water and from the east, where the river swoops round a wide bend and the town, with its ancient bridges and Gothic architecture, its tall cliffs topped with timber-framed villas, presents itself in all its glory. True, you can get a similar effect from the road, which at this point runs alongside the river, but the view is better from the water. To this end, a private company in this first summer after the war had set up a paddle steamer to run up and down the river, charging tourists for the view. And it was the wake of this steamer that finally did for the Sparrowhawk.

  She passed the Sparrowhawk at speed a mile short of Armande, just before the bend in the river. The waves she threw up were nothing like the waves on the Channel, but they were strong enough to rock the Sparrowhawk, and now to the rattling inside her hull a ghastly creak was added, as something deep inside gave way.

  Once she began to take on water, the Sparrowhawk’s end was fast. There was just time for Sam to bring her to the bank. Clara held fast to the mooring lines while Elsie and Federico ran up and down the shoreline and the others salvaged all they could – the puppies in their crate, the splintered robin and the kingfisher, Nathan’s books … rucksacks, clothes, the three tin mugs … Clara was struggling to keep the Sparrowhawk alongside the riverbank. Sam jumped ashore to help her, and Ben tore about the cabins alone, panicking, seizing what he could … a box of paints, a frying pan, a pillow, a blanket … passing them up through the cabin hatch to Lotti on deck as all the time his mind shrieked at him that this couldn’t be true, this couldn’t be happening …

  ‘Ben! Lotti!’ Sam shouted. ‘You have to get off! You have to get off now!’

  For the last time, Ben and Lotti leaped from the deck on to the bank. Then, with an awful groan, the dear Sparrowhawk, where for nine years Ben had felt safe and loved, which had carried him and Lotti so bravely on their quest to find Sam – the Sparrowhawk disappeared underwater.

  For almost a full minute no one but the barking dogs made a sound.

  Damp, bedraggled, their shoes and clothes dripping muddy river water, Lotti and Ben stood clutching each other.

  ‘It’s my fault,’ said Lotti at last in a strangled voice. ‘If I hadn’t wanted to come here, if I hadn’t be
en in such a hurry …’

  ‘No, no, no,’ whispered Ben. ‘It’s my fault. I’m the one who said she could make it …’

  ‘It’s nobody’s fault,’ murmured Sam. ‘The old girl broke doing what she’s always done, rescuing people. It’s what she was best at.’

  ‘Poor Sparrowhawk.’ Clara swallowed a sob. ‘Poor, brave Sparrowhawk.’

  The sun, which had disappeared behind a cloud, came out again, glinting on the water, and everyone’s behaviour shifted. Only Federico remained where he was, absolutely still, watching the spot where the Sparrowhawk had gone down, as if expecting it at any moment to break through the water and reappear. Elsie left the shoreline to return to her puppies. Sam and Clara began to gather the rescued items from the shore. Lotti and Ben let go of each other to help. In due course, they would mourn the Sparrowhawk fully, and think about what came next. For now, her loss was too much to process. It was only possible to think about what they should do this minute, and in the minutes which followed.

  From the road behind them came a rumbling sound, loud and intrusive, but they ignored it.

  Lotti said, in a tiny voice, ‘Maybe my grandmother will let us all stay with her. How far is it now to Armande?’

  Ben, his voice equally small, said, ‘About a mile.’

  ‘We can walk it,’ sighed Clara, but nobody moved.

  Behind them, they heard footsteps.

  ‘Oh, what is it?’ cried Clara.

  She turned, and gasped.

  On the side of the road above the riverbank stood a motorbike. And walking towards them, untying his leather helmet, came its rider …

  Henri de Beauchesne looked less splendid than he had on the ferry crossing when he’d first met Clara. His journey from the convent had been fraught. The motorbike had broken down twice, he had got lost three times and he had slept in a barn. He was tired, unshaven and his clothes were stained with engine oil. As he strode towards the group by the river, removing his goggles and helmet, he felt suddenly very nervous, unsure of his reception, worried that in coming here he had offended Clara, that he should have stayed away. Nevertheless, he spoke with as much confidence as he could muster the words he had come all this way to say.

  ‘Please, Mademoiselle Clara … may I help?’

  *

  The captain, having been quickly apprised of the situation, immediately became efficient.

  ‘I will go to Armande and send a car to fetch you and your belongings,’ he declared. ‘Where should it go? To your grandmother’s house, Lotti? No, that is a bit much perhaps, so many people and dogs at one time, after all these years. The quayside then, which is famous in Armande. And Lotti – no, do not argue, I know how independent you are, but it seems from what you have told me that time is of great importance here – I will take you to your grandmother alone.’

  ‘On the motorbike?’ asked Ben, with a stab of envy.

  ‘Of course on the motorbike,’ said Henri, very seriously. ‘Perhaps later if I may be useful to you, I can take you somewhere also?’

  He looked at Clara and added, with a return of his earlier nervousness, ‘Will that be acceptable, Mademoiselle Clara?’

  Clara nodded, and smiled, and kept on smiling as a few minutes later, Henri left on the motorbike with Lotti, bound for her grandmother’s house.

  *

  On the quayside at Armande, Albert Skinner waited.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  Lotti had never ridden a motorbike before, but she was too full of emotion to pay attention to how it felt. The war had barely touched Armande. Over the wide stone bridge they went where she had sometimes fished with Papa, past a waterside park where Mama had liked to walk. Skirting the quayside where Albert Skinner waited with his eyes on the river, they entered the town, zoomed past the covered market where Papa had once bought Lotti a secret éclair, round the main square with its Gothic cathedral where they came for Easter mass, and with each familiar landmark Lotti held on a little tighter to Henri. On the corner of the square, Henri stopped a cab and ordered the driver to fetch the others, and then the motorbike began to climb up, up through steep cobbled streets towards the clifftops, and Lotti couldn’t breathe but clung to Henri as though to a life raft.

  Moune’s house was the last at the end of a pleasant tree-lined street, separated from the road by a stone courtyard full of roses, just as Lotti remembered, with a shady garden at the back. Henri stopped by the side of the road and Lotti climbed down. She was shaking, but it had nothing to do with the motorbike ride.

  That everything here should still exist as if nothing had changed!

  ‘What if she won’t see me?’ she whispered to Henri.

  ‘Why shouldn’t she see you?’ he replied.

  ‘But what if she’s not happy to see me? What if she’s angry? What if she sends me back?’

  ‘Then you’ll be no worse than you are now, will you?’ he reasoned. ‘Come on, Lotti. You’ve made it this far; you’re not going to give up now. It can’t be worse than that storm on the Channel.’

  Gently but firmly, he took her by the shoulders and turned her towards the house.

  ‘You’re right,’ said Lotti. ‘I’ll do it quickly, before I lose my nerve.’

  ‘Want me to come with you?’

  ‘No, it’s all right. I’ll do it on my own.’

  Lotti took a deep breath, then ignoring her jelly legs, walked fast across the courtyard to the house. The front door had been painted green, which was new, but the knocker in the shape of a lion’s head, which had delighted her as a child, was still there. Lotti grasped it, breathed again, then rapped three times.

  A stern, middle-aged woman in a housekeeper’s dress and apron answered the door.

  ‘Yes?’

  Lotti’s heart sank. The housekeeper was looking at her in exactly the same way the waiter at the café in Buisseau had, like she was some sort of street urchin. Too late, she wondered if she should have changed her clothes.

  Well, she couldn’t do anything about that now. Lotti raised her chin and, in her most defiant voice, announced that she had come to see Madame St Rémy.

  ‘Madame St Rémy is resting,’ replied the housekeeper, coldly. ‘She cannot be disturbed.’

  Lotti faltered. ‘Would you mind … please could you … could you tell her that her granddaughter is here?’

  Madame’s granddaughter! Well, that settled it. The housekeeper had not worked long for Madame St Rémy, but Madame kept a photograph of her granddaughter on her desk, and the child looked nothing like this. Madame’s granddaughter was a pretty little thing with long shiny curls, pleasingly dressed in the sort of frock in which rich English people liked to show off their children.

  She was not an urchin.

  The housekeeper blamed the war, which had caused people to become desperate and crime rates to soar. Thieves would try anything to trick you out of your money. Just outside the gate, she spotted a rumpled-looking man with an eyepatch, who had clearly slept in a ditch and was obviously an accomplice.

  Nonetheless, if there was the slightest chance …

  ‘Do you have proof?’ asked the housekeeper.

  ‘Proof?’ stammered Lotti.

  ‘A passport maybe, something like that?’

  Lotti felt all the colour drain from her face.

  ‘I … I don’t,’ she gabbled. ‘I mean, I had one but … the thing is, I was on a boat, and it sank, and …’

  ‘A likely story,’ said the housekeeper.

  ‘Oh, please!’ begged Lotti. ‘There’s a policeman after me, and …’

  The housekeeper closed the door in her face.

  Dazed, Lotti returned to Henri and told him what had happened.

  ‘What shall I do now?’

  ‘What do you want to do?’

  ‘Wring her neck,’ said Lotti fiercely. ‘Kick down the door. Or scream and scream until Moune wakes up. Horrible old bat! The way she looked at me!’

  ‘I’m not sure that would help.’ Henri looked a
t Lotti appraisingly. ‘I must say, I don’t think I’d believe your story either if you turned up on my doorstep. Come on, the others must have arrived by now. Let’s go and get your things and tidy you up and come back when your grandmother’s awake. We’ll bring Mademoiselle Clara with us too. She can vouch for you.’

  ‘But Constable Skinner …’ wailed Lotti, her fierceness deserting her. ‘My uncle …’

  ‘Uncles and policemen be damned,’ said Henri. ‘I’ll protect you.’

  And so back on to the motorbike climbed Lotti, and back down the winding road she went with Henri de Beauchesne, past the square and the market to the quayside, and there, just coming out of the taxi, were Ben and Sam and Clara and the dogs with all the things rescued from the Sparrowhawk.

  Henri pulled up beside them.

  ‘Well?’ asked Clara.

  ‘Slight hiccup,’ said Henri. ‘We need to tidy Lotti up.’

  Muttering under her breath, Lotti began to rummage through her rucksack. Was there anything, anything, which didn’t look as if it had been pulled from a jumble pile? And why did it matter? Must she really dress up, pretend, play respectable for a housekeeper? This wasn’t what she had run away for! Dimly, she was aware of Federico barking, of Elsie joining him, of Ben shouting … She heard a boat engine rumble then go quiet, footsteps approaching and then the dogs barking louder, a grumpy voice saying, ‘Well, Federico, well, Elsie, it’s good to see you again,’ and Ben sort of gasping and laughing, and at last she looked up and squealed because it was Frank, returned from Belgium.