Page 5 of The Avenging Angel and the Spy
“Mademoiselle?”
She did not at first notice the touch on her wrist, it was so butterfly soft.
“Mademoiselle. I think we are approaching the posting station.” The tug at her arm became more insistent.
“What?” Belle lowered her hand to meet Phillipe’s concerned gaze. “Oh, yes. The posting station.”
When she glanced out the window, she saw that the sun had set, the glass pane curtained with the purple haze of twilight. The occasional flicker of a lantern marked their approach to Lillefleur, a hamlet of thatch-roofed cottages with the spire of a church set in their midst.
“You looked so distressed a moment ago when you first opened your eyes,” Phillipe said. “Did you have a bad dream?”
“No. I never have dreams anymore.”
Belle composed herself. By the time she turned back to face Phillipe, she had shaken off the memory of Jean-Claude. Gripping the back of her seat, she braced against the jolt as the carriage trundled along the rough lane leading through Lillefleur.
Madame Coterin and her daughter were startled awake. Sophie whimpered and Belle could hear the child’s frightened breathing like a small creature cornered in the dark.
“There is nothing to fear,” Belle said. “We are going to stop to change the horses. It will not take long, and then we will be on our way again.”
Sophie ducked her head and burrowed deeper against her mother. On the outskirts of the village, the carriage halted in the yard before a row of long, low stables. Belle could hear the postboy scrambling from his perch on the box, the ancient Feydeau alighting at a slower pace. The coachman’s gruff voice rang out, greeting the station’s ostlers and giving them his commands.
Presently, he stuck his grizzled head inside the coach door. “The change, it take twenty—maybe thirty minutes,” he said.
“So long,” Madame Coterin faltered.
“My fault, it is not.” Feydcau leveled a fierce look at Belle. “What more is to be expected when you do not send the outriders ahead to bespeak the horses.”
The lack of outriders had been a source of contention between Belle and Feydeau at the outset of the journey, Belle insisting that outriders would only serve to call more attention to their carriage.
“Twenty minutes is fast enough,” Belle told the old man. “Though you might see what you can do to hurry them on a bit.”
“Merde!” Feydeau said, but went to do as she suggested.
Belle bit back a smile. Feydeau might be surly and his speech as vulgar as a Petit-Pont tripe vendor, but Belle had worked with the old man enough to know that he could be depended upon, capable of keeping a sharp wit in case of any unforeseen disasters.
Belle did not foresee anything going wrong, not on the fringes of this quiet village. The wait proved not so much nerve-racking as it was tedious. Phillipe fidgeted in his seat, and Sophie tugged at her mother’s sleeve.
“I am so hungry, Maman.”
“Hush, Sophie,” Madame Coterin crooned.
The child subsided at once, but Belle could see her thin shoulders tremble. Sophie spoke so seldom, and Belle could not recall her ever having asked for anything. These past few days the child had borne fears and discomforts that would have set many adults to whining, and she had every right to complain of being hungry. The last of the provisions that had been brought with them had been consumed early that afternoon. When Baptiste had packed up the hamper for them, he had not expected it to take so many days to reach the coast. Never venturing farther from his beloved Paris than the fringes of the great Rouvray Forest, the little Frenchman was obviously unfamiliar with the conditions of the roads this far from thecity. The French had been so busy these past years shrieking for liberty, equality, and brotherhood, no one had troubled about anything so mundane as filling in the ruts.
Belle lowered the window glass, the cool evening breeze fanning her cheeks. She poked her head out the window and looked for Feydeau. The old man was busy lighting the coach’s lanterns. He would likely snap her nose off if she sent him to find food. Belle glanced back at Sophie’s wan face. Surely it would not be such a great risk if she were to alight and purchase something for the little girl at the posting inn.
Belle gathered up her muff and announced her intention, but as she pushed open the coach door, Phillipe piped up, “I shall escort you, mademoiselle.”
“Thank you, Phillipe. That will not be necessary.”
“But I cannot allow you to venture alone into a vulgar place like an inn.”
Belle stifled a sigh. If the boy only knew how many ‘vulgar’ places she had been obliged to enter alone in the course of her life.
“Please, Phillipe. I should feel much more comfortable if you remained safe— Er, that is, I think your mama and sister need your protection far more than I do.”
“That is so, Phillipe.” Madame Coterin clutched at her son’s sleeve. “You listen to what Mademoiselle Varens tells you.”
“But—”
