Say Louis and Stafford managed to escape from Amiens and made their way to Boulogne, they would miss the Marie sailing with the dispatch, so they would have to wait for her to return on Tuesday or possibly not until Wednesday. They would be safe enough hidden on board her all day Wednesday, until they could sail on Wednesday night.
This meant that to give them all a chance of getting away - which was the least he owed the men - he needed to keep his secret until dawn on Wednesday. After that he could confess, tell blatant lies, bait the gendarmes or do whatever he wanted, knowing that he would not endanger the men or the dispatch. It was a long time to wait; today, Monday and Tuesday: seventy-two hours.
He stood up suddenly, as if to drive away the hours. It might not arise; Louis might convince the officer that all the trouble had been caused by a foreman with a roving eye. I’ll be back at the hotel by this afternoon, he told himself, and began pacing up and down the cell.
He was used to walking in a confined space - the quarterdeck of his last two ships had not allowed more than a dozen uninterrupted paces - but this cell was even smaller and the constant turning made him feel dizzy. Queasy, perhaps; the turning was swilling the gruel around in his protesting stomach, and the few pieces of stale bread he managed to swallow did nothing to ballast it down.
He flopped down on the cot and shut his eyes. He had felt trapped in the hotel room, but it had not really given him the slightest idea of what it was like to be locked in a cell. Once when he was a boy he had nearly drowned, and he remembered the terrible feeling of being utterly trapped, and the desperate way he had kicked his legs and flailed his arms to escape from the water which enclosed him like glue . . . A few days in this cell could drive a man mad. How did anyone endure being jailed for years? That's something I'll never know, he thought grimly; I'll have been freed, escaped, or they'll be leading me across the square to the guillotine long before a week has passed.
An hour later he heard the bolts being pulled back and the key turning in the lock. The door swung open and a gendarme with a pistol walked into the room, motioning him to remain sitting on the bed. He was followed by the gaunt officer, who nodded briefly.
'I trust you slept well,' Ramage said sarcastically. 'I'm sorry to be the cause of you getting to bed rather late.'
'I have my duty,' the man said, his right shoulder twitching. 'We guardians of the Republic's safety must always be alert.'
Ramage avoided saying 'Amen' and looked at the floor, waiting for the officer to start questioning him. Instead, the man said nothing. He stood and stared down at Ramage who, able to see what the man was doing out of the corner of his eye, was thankful he had begun looking at the floor before the officer began his curious vigil.
Ramage started counting the seconds, and had reached three and a half minutes before the man said: 'Are you ready to confess?'
Ramage was so startled that, without thinking, he said: 'Why, is there a priest here?'
The gendarme shook his head impatiently. 'Don't be ridiculous,' he said sternly, 'I mean, are you ready to confess what you and your foreman have been doing?'
'Doing!' Ramage said angrily. 'Well, all the time we have been in Amiens we have been sick - thanks to the bad food we were served. We shall be glad to say goodbye to Amiens, I can tell you.'
'The lieutenant-de-vaisseau - do you know what his orders are?'
'Of course I don't. Hardly to sail a ship, though; he seems to be a horseman rather than a seaman.'
'He is Admiral Bruix's personal courier,' the officer said, emphasizing each word.
'Indeed?' Ramage raised his eyebrows. 'What does he do, ride to Paris once a week and bring back the Admiral's truffles?'
The officer ignored the gibe. 'He carries the Admiral's dispatches to Paris, and brings back the orders from the Minister.'
'And ...?' Ramage prompted.
'And nothing!' he snapped. 'It is a very important task; surely you realize that, don't you? Admiral Bruix commands the Channel coast'
'He must be kept busy; all I heard in Boulogne were complaints about the British frigates capturing ships, so that supplies never arrived.'
'Your words sound very much like treason,' the officer said coldly.
Ramage stood up with a suddenness that made the gendarme with the pistol swing the muzzle up towards him. 'Treason!' Ramage yelled angrily, deciding that the moment had come for outraged indignation. 'You dare accuse me of talking treason! Mama mia! I, an Italian, come all the way from Genoa to Boulogne - right across the Alps and the Juras, no less, and all at my own expense, because your own shipbuilders can't launch vessels for the Invasion Flotilla fast enough! You are so behind with construction that unless something is done quickly, you will not be able to invade England for another two years.
'Your Admiral Bruix knows that - though,' he dropped his voice confidentially, 'he may not tell the First Consul, that is something only those two know, but I do know the Admiral found it necessary to send a thousand kilometres for a particular man. And who was that man?' He let his voice rise indignantly. 'Come on, name him! Who was this Italian shipbuilder that Admiral Bruix decided could help speed up the building of his Invasion Flotilla? You don't know perhaps, but I’ll tell you - it was me. Gianfranco di Stefano, shipbuilder and master shipwright - master shipwright at my age, that surprises you, doesn't it - and loyal subject of the Ligurian Republic. That is the man you accuse of treason!'
The officer was now looking worried. Ramage saw that his outburst had impressed him, but he feared that the fellow was plodding and tenacious, a man who would carry out an investigation like a keen chess player analysing all the possible moves.
‘I did not accuse you of treason, M'sieur; I merely said your words sounded very much like treason, which -'
'That is just as insulting as a direct accusation,' Ramage said huffily.
'I assure you that it isn't, M'sieur. If I accused you directly, you would be charged with treason. Now tell me, where is your foreman?'
Ramage sighed and sat down. 'You might just as well accuse me of witchcraft to ask me where that thrice-damned foreman is! How can I possibly know? You have kept me locked up all night, so how can I look for him? In some bordello, if I know him, and better a bordello than a cell, I assure you, since I now have experience of both.'
'The Frenchman,' the officer persisted, 'this Louis Peyrachon: where is he?'
'In his room at the Hotel de la Poste, I imagine,' Ramage said, playing for time as he absorbed the good news that the police officer had just revealed. 'Or with my foreman in the bordello. How else to spend a Saturday night in a town like Amiens? You French do not know how to live! Everyone seems to go to bed as soon as the sun goes down!'
'What did you arrange with him?'
'Arrange? What do you mean by that? After we had supper he went downstairs to play cards with your precious lieutenant, and I did not see him again until he came upstairs with the lieutenant after that silly girl started screaming.'
The police officer nodded, as though what Ramage had just said fitted in with information received from other sources. 'Where did you meet this man?'
'I told you that last night. I didn't "meet" him; he was ordered to travel with me. Which ministry he works for I do not know - he did not tell me, and I did not ask. I resented - and still resent - having someone escorting me everywhere, as though I was a dog on a leash.'
'Is it not strange, M'sieur, that the moment a young woman screams because she finds a man in the room of a naval courier, two men in your suite suddenly vanish?'
'Two men vanish?' Ramage exclaimed, his surprise unfeigned. 'Are you referring to the Frenchman? How can you say he vanished when I saw him - the lieutenant and the landlord can confirm that - in the corridor afterwards? I did not see my foreman from the time I went to bed, but the Frenchman, Louis, I did see. And don't refer to him as being in my "suite"; he was a thoroughly unwelcome addition, I assure you; as unwelcome as the grippe my foreman and I caught here in Amiens.'