Page 80 of The King's Man
‘No,’ Kit said with emotion choking his voice. ‘No, I won’t believe he’s dead until I dig his stinking corpse from the ground.’
‘I thought I knew you,’ Fitz said with dull resignation in his voice.
‘Nobody can really know another person, Fitz.’ Kit grimaced.
‘Well, I must give you credit, you are very good at what you do. You had me completely fooled.’ Fitz could not hide the bitterness in his voice.
Kit turned to look at his friend. ‘What are you going to do, Fitz?’
‘I have no choice. I have to advise the King and the others that you are not to be trusted. You’re finished, Lovell. When word gets around you will probably be a dead man, and it will all have been for nothing.’
Kit felt a momentary panic. ‘Give me time, Fitz. Let me fade into the background. I will go to the Colonies as I planned, as we discussed so often.’
‘I can’t, Lovell. You know that. You know too much and we don’t have the time. I have no choice.’
Fitz turned to face him, the light from the helm flashing on his pistol. Kit didn’t flinch. He lifted his hands away from the rail and turned to face his friend.
‘I’m unarmed, Fitz. My sword’s below. You can kill me now if you have to,’ he said quietly, keeping his eyes firmly fixed on his friend’s face.
Fitz hesitated, and in that fraction of a second, the boat pitched, throwing them both off balance. Fitz staggered backward, falling against the rail. The boat righted and Kit fell forward towards Fitz. He put out his hand to hold onto his friend but in the space of a heartbeat, Fitz had overbalanced, tipping over the rail of the boat.
Catching at the rail to stop himself from falling as well, Kit saw his friend’s mouth open in a silent scream, his arms flailing as he dropped into the dark abyss. Kit’s hands grasped frantically at thin air. He screamed Fitz’s name, the wind carrying his voice away unanswered into the dark, foul night. He pulled himself up and leaned over the rail, but the dark, seething water had claimed the only man he had called his friend.
He looked up at the helmsman. ‘There is a man overboard!’
The man shrugged. ‘I saw. There is nothing I can do,m’sieur. He is gone.’
Kit stared at the man, torn between seizing the wheel and beating him to a pulp.
‘Why do you care? He would have killed you,’ the helmsman observed. ‘It wasn’t your fault he is dead.’
The boat pitched and Kit staggered against the rail, his hands clasping at the slimy wood. He cast the sea one last regretfulglance and like a man in a daze, returned to his bunk in the cabin, where he was violently ill. This time it had nothing to do with seasickness. He curled up on the narrow bed and faced the damp wood and waited for the morning.
Chapter 23
Once ashore, Kit found the nearest inn and drank himself into insensibility. Alcohol’s amnesiac properties were only illusory. He awoke to find himself lying in a filthy alley, where he had been thrown from the last inn he had visited.
Heavy, dismal rain soaked him through to the bones and he pulled himself into a sitting position, laid his arms over his knees, lowered his head onto them and, as the memory of Fitz’s death came back with cruel, clear clarity, he wept. Slowly he raised his head and considered the grey, unappealing sky.
He let the rain wash his face and rose to his feet. A quick check revealed his pockets had been turned out for the few coins they contained but the papers he carried, that Fitz had died for, were still safe.
He stumbled through the narrow streets, oblivious to the sidelong glances and looks of disgust that his filthy, disreputable state attracted. Outside the respectable house he sought, he stopped and looked up at the lighted windows. Although itstill lacked an hour or so until nightfall, the dark and dreary afternoon had drawn in the gloaming.
Dragging his feet, he ascended the well-scrubbed steps and banged on the front door. A manservant opened the door, took one look at Kit and made to shut it again, but Kit had pushed past the man and stood in a respectable entrance hall that smelt of beeswax and wood smoke.
‘Where’s Thurloe?’ he demanded.
‘The master’ll not see you. You must leave at once.’ The man’s nose wrinkled with distaste as he made a grab for Kit’s jacket. ‘Now get out before I call the watch.’
Kit shook him off. ‘He’ll see me.’
He paced the front hall.
‘Thurloe!’ he yelled, his voice echoing up the stairwell. ‘Thurloe, come out and face me, you whoreson.’
A respectably dressed woman appeared at the top of the stairs, her face pinched with fright. ‘Who are you? How dare you! Get out of my house.’
A door opened and Thurloe appeared in the hallway.
