Where the Light Falls(117)
Jean-Luc balled his fists so tightly that his nails dug into his palms. “Where is he, Lazare?”
“Come now, no need to be short with me.”
“Tell me where my son is!”
Lazare leaned his head to the side, whistling a sigh through his pale lips. “Would you like my help?”
“You know I want my boy out of prison. I beg you to tell me: what do you want?”
Lazare’s eyes were unblinking as he sat across from Jean-Luc in the shadowy coach. His face, after a long look of thoughtfulness, eventually folded upward, his lips spreading into a thin smile.
“What do I want?”
Jean-Luc swallowed, staring at the face opposite him.
“How about an exchange?” Lazare leaned forward, his voice quiet as he continued. “I shall help you get your darling son back, and, in return, you help me get something I’ve wanted for a very long time.”
“Tell me—whatever it is, I will do it.”
“It’s simple. And I do believe that you are capable of arranging it.”
“What? Tell me.”
“Give me Sophie de Vincennes.”
Jean-Luc fell silent, the impact of these words blunting his ability to reply, even to think. A trade? This man, this sadistic man, was really holding his little boy hostage in order to gain access to Sophie? Jean-Luc stammered, his thoughts awhirl with the desperate need to save his child and to find a way to protect Sophie. Before he could reply, another voice filled the street, and Jean-Luc heard it through the open door of the coach.
“He doesn’t have to. I am here. I will go with you, willingly.”
Jean-Luc turned and saw Sophie standing on the street. She wore her travel cloak, her face an implacable mask. “I will go with you. But not until you’ve returned Mathieu.”
“Sophie.” Jean-Luc stepped out of the coach and toward her. “This is madness. An exchange? This is utter madness. Surely we live in a land of laws. Mathieu has broken no laws. We must think—”
Sophie held up a gloved hand, resolute. Her eyes communicated her message; they both knew this was a land devoid of the law. This was a land where people in power made the choices, and people without power paid—often with their lives. “I am through allowing others to suffer…allowing others to sacrifice themselves for me. Not this time. Not like Remy. Not like André. No, Mathieu will not suffer. Nor will you or Marie, not after the kindness you’ve shown me. I will go. I go freely.” She turned from Jean-Luc to Lazare, her posture rigid with her defiance. “Bring back the boy at once, and I’ll go wherever you take me.”
Summer 1798
André’s stay on Malta was brief. After a sleepless night in a dark, cramped upper bedroom of a private dwelling in the Maltese capital, he and the rest of the French force were ordered back to the harbor below where their ships waited, ready to lift anchors.
“André Valière?” A heavily mustached soldier blocked André’s way at the top of the gangway to his ship.
“Captain Valière,” André corrected him. “What do you want?”
“You are hereby placed under arrest.” The sergeant nodded and two soldiers appeared behind André, taking his hands in their thick fists and clamping irons around his wrists.
“What do you think you’re doing?” André struggled uselessly against their collective force, glaring at the sergeant. “Need I remind you that I am an army captain serving aboard this ship? I’ve been reinstated by Captain Dueys. I just took part in the capture of Malta, in the presence of General Bonaparte himself.”
“Ah, yes, the young nobleman who played such a significant role. You held a velvet pouch, was that it?”
André knew that voice. He wheeled around to behold a familiar face—pale gray eyes and inky black hair.
“Good to see you again, Valière.” General Murat stood before André dressed in a clean brigadier general’s uniform, a tricolor sash across his waist, a mirthless smile on his lips. “Thought you could escape your sentence just because you were floating in the middle of the Mediterranean? Have you forgotten that our Revolutionary justice extends beyond our borders?”
“I serve on this ship for Captain Dueys.” André raised his chin, speaking with an authority that belied his inner dread. “I am here on orders as a member of General Bonaparte’s Army of the Orient.” His words rang hollow, and both men knew it.
Murat waved a hand as if in boredom. “Captain Dueys has been…reminded…of the situation.” The general smirked. “Some of my colleagues have short memories, I’m afraid.” Murat stood so close now that André could smell his breath. “But I haven’t forgotten. No, I will never forget. You are a prisoner exiled from the Republic, not a hero in pursuit of the glory that rightfully belongs to other men.”