I looked my indecision at Martha, then impulsively seized Mr. Hill by the arm.

“For God's sake, let us be silent,” I said, “and reserve our breath for walking. Miss Lloyd must carry the young Seagraves back to the Dolphin, but I shall accompany you to Wool House. I cannot stay away.”

ETIENNE LA FORGE WAS NOT DEAD; BUT HE LAY IN AN attitude so narrowly approximating it, that I all but despaired of his life. The sharp brown eyes were completely closed, the jaw clenched in pain. He was drenched in sweat despite the room's raw atmosphere, so that his body was racked with chills. His ebony walking-stick lay by his side on the pallet, as though in the last extremity of existence, he would guard this one relic of home. He muttered fragments of French — phrases I could not always catch, or comprehend once I heard them. At times he seemed to be wandering in childhood; at others, he broke into bawdy song, and must be restrained or he should have attempted to dance. But for the most part he seemed torn with anguish, and struggled upright to cry aloud the name of Genevieve. His Beloved, perhaps? Left behind in the Haute Savoie — or in early death?

“Just so it has been,” Mr. Hill muttered, “since eight o'clock last evening. I do not know how much more the human frame may stand.”

Chessyre is dead. I shall not long—

I pressed LaForge's shoulders gently back onto his pallet and bathed his brow. I held a basin while Mr. Hill bled him. Where I knelt on the stone floor, the cold crept through my dress, deadening all feeling in my joints.

“He should not be lying in these dreadful conditions,” I burst out. “None of them should. It is shocking that we tf eat men this way — as though they were slaves, or less than human. He should be moved to a proper bed, near a proper fire.”

Mr. Hill did not meet my eyes. “Naturally. But his condition has declined so greatly, Miss Austen, that I do not think it possible to move him now.”

“This is nothing like the usual course of gaol-fever?”

The surgeon shook his head. “Did I know nothing of the case before this, I should pronounce him poisoned. He suffers, I should say, from an acute gastric complaint quite unlike the troubles of a few days previous. His sickness is lodged in the bowels. It is that which causes him agony.”

I felt my frame stiffen, the breath caught in my chest. “I once witnessed a death from poisoning. It was terrible to behold. Could something noxious have been introduced to his food?”

“But that is absurd! Why should anyone wish to harm a French prisoner? None but ourselves is familiar with even a particle of his history!”

“Monsieur LaForge was in despair yesterday at the suspension of Captain Seagrave's trial,” I told the surgeon urgently. “When he learned the news of Lieutenant Chessyre's murder, he declared that his life was forfeit for having related what he saw aboard the Manon. He is the sole witness to an attempted plot. Do not you comprehend the matter?”

“But who—”

“Whoever killed Chessyre! Have you received a gift of food for the prisoners?”

Mr. Hill hesitated. “Your eggs, of course,” he said slowly, “and a quantity of meat pasties from Mrs. Braggen's kitchen. They were sent in my absence yesterday. But surely Mrs. Braggen—”

“I should never accuse the lady or her household of ill intent. But if the food appeared in your absence — anything might have been done to it.”

“Then why did not every prisoner who partook of the food fall dreadfully ill?”

“Because the poison was meant for only one man,” I persisted.

Mr. Hill shook his head. “My dear Miss Austen, I fear mat your imagination is run away with you. You have been overwrought. All this talk of murder — it may give rise to the most dreadful fancies—”

“There has not merely been talk! Two men are dead. One was killed at sea, another not a mile from this door. It is you, Mr. Hill, who persist in fancy. You must treat LaForge as though he were indeed a case of poison. It can cost you nothing, and may save his life.”

The surgeon studied me shrewdly, then felt LaForge's brow with his palm. “Fever, a fluttering pulse, and a disruption of stomach and bowels. A purgative first,” he said decisively “Ipecac, I think, or perhaps the more gentle tartar emetic. Then a cathartic, to flux the bowels. I should attempt cremor tartar, but for its strength; perhaps a solution of castor oil and medicinal rhubarb will prove more gentle in its effect. Once the system is cleansed, we may see what a strong dose of charcoal in milk may do for what has already been consumed. It is a property of charcoal to attach itself to metallic substances, such as are often found in your common poisons; the stuff may then be passed harmlessly enough.”

“Can such doses harm him?” I enquired with trepidation.

“The combined effects shall work violently on his frame, and in such a weakened state — I should advise you, Miss Austen, to leave us for a period. I shall send word by messenger to your boarding house, once I am certain of the effect — whether it be good or ill.”

He began to rummage in his black bag, purposeful now that he had determined his course. I rose, took one last look at the sufferer, and quitted that dreadful place.

It was ten minutes past two o'clock. I went directly to St. Michael's Church, halfway along my path towards home, and knelt in the silence of the nave. I prayed for the salvation of Etienne LaForge — prayed as I had not done for some months since, with a passion and a purpose that could not help but sing its way to Heaven. If asked, I could not have said why the Frenchman's case burned at me so. I hardly knew die man. But the thought of so much wit and understanding finding an untimely grave was suddenly insupportable. In praying for LaForge, I prayed for all that I loved: Frank and Mary and their unborn babe; for my mother, and Cassandra, and the sprawling family at Godmersham; even for Mr. Hill, unstinting in his work to save this foreign life. In this quarter-hour they were all of a piece with that Frenchman: beloved of somebody, and dying alone.

Chapter 15

The Naval Set

27 February 1807, cont.

“A VERDICT OF WILLFUL MURDER WAS RETURNED AGAINST Tom Seagrave,” Frank said, as I entered Mrs. Davies's sitting-room at a quarter past three o'clock. “He is held at present in Gaoler's Alley, in expectation of trial.”

I sank into a chair ranged against the wall and closed my eyes. “That is very unfortunate. You told the coroner's panel of your express?”

“I did. The magistrate knew enough to direct the coroner's questions. There was little of surprise in anyone's testimony; and Seagrave refused, again, to disclose his movements on Wednesday night.”

“Did the charges of the court-martial arise?”

“Naturally. Percival Pethering has not the slightest authority in that case; but he sought to show that Seagrave had murdered his lieutenant — and all discussion of motive must involve events on the Manon.”

“And thus the panel was taught to regard Tom Seagrave as a man who is intimate with murder. No other outcome was possible. I feared as much.” I stared up at Frank. “Monsieur LaForge has taken a turn for the worse. Mr. Hill suspects poison.”

“Poison!” My brother's hand clenched spasmodically. “But who—?”

“The man who killed Chessyre, I suppose. Having despatched his conspirator, he could not allow a witness to survive.”

“If he dies, Jane, his blood will be on our hands,” Frank muttered. “It was we who urged LaForge to divulge what he knew.”

“Then we must pray that he does not die,” I said, and went to dress for the party.

“MY DEAR MISS AUSTEN! YOU DO US PROUD IN SUCH feathers, I declare — we shall be as the moon outshone by the sun!”