Improbable Eden (26 page)

“
No!” Eden pummeled him with her fists, but he grabbed both wrists, swung her around and held her hands behind her back.

“
Why the fuss?” Rudolf asked with a malicious chuckle. “If you're telling the truth, think of what delights I can teach you! And if you're not, consider the mutual sport we shall enjoy! Mayhap you can teach me!” With a vicious thrust, he kneed Eden in the small of her back, knocking her off her feet and pulling her arms painfully taut. She screamed, but Rudolf only laughed and sat down on a brocade-covered bench, hauling Eden across his lap. He held her wrists together above her head with one hand while the other stripped away the cravat at the neck of her lingerie shirt.

Eden's breath was coming very fast, and her mouth had gone dry. She felt drained from crying, yet knew she must somehow stop Rudolf's assault. Her unshod feet kicked out, striking nothing but air. She screamed again, but it would do no good. There was no one at Zijswijk who would lift a finger to help her.

“
You're too loud!” Rudolf exclaimed, no longer making an attempt at his customary bonhomie. “Be quiet!” He slapped her hard across the face, then ripped shirt and chemise to the waist in one rabid gesture. The sight of Eden's breasts sent him into a frenzy. Rudolf threw her onto the floor and fell on top of her, making low, growling animal sounds in his throat. Fighting for breath, Eden writhed under him, as terrified by the shocking transformation as by his intentions.

He was tearing at her skirts and pressing wet kisses on her neck and breasts when a loud knocking resounded at the door. To Eden, struggling to keep her legs locked together and clawing at Rudolf's face, the pounding seemed to go on forever before Rudolf noticed. At last he paused in his feverish pursuit and called out, “Go away! Damn you, go away!”

But the knocking persisted, followed by a dull voice that Eden presumed to belong to her surly keeper. “It's the Prince. He's here.”

Eden felt her entire body turn weak. Rudolf tensed, his weight crushing her. For several seconds he remained motionless. “Later!” he finally called. “Hold him below!”

Eden let out a terrible wail of despair, but rallied when she heard a swift series of thumping sounds in the hallway, just before the door flew open. Twisting her head, she saw Max not ten feet away, a double-barreled pistol in his hand.

“
Get up!” he thundered at Rudolf. “Now, before I blow you to hell and back!”

Slowly, Rudolf eased himself off Eden, but remained on his knees near her. The room was eerily silent for a long time, with Max's gun trained on his cousin, Eden trying to recover her senses, and Rudolf undergoing a change in reverse, from ravening beast to worldly nobleman.

“
Come, come, Max, the little peasant wench and I were just playing farmer in the barn. You'd hardly shoot me over
that
.”

The gun exploded with a deafening roar, rocking the furniture and illuminating the room as if it was high noon. Rudolf jumped and rolled over. His smile was rather shaky when he saw that the wig stand had been blown to pieces. “You're done for now, Max!” he spat, hauling Eden to her feet. “My men will come running, and if you fire your other shot, you'll hit the peasant!”

Max's mouth was set in a grim line as Eden wriggled in Rudolf's grasp, her wide eyes both frightened and furious. Max had never hated Rudolf more than he did at that moment. But he could not kill his kinsman, though the opportunity was there. Either in arrogance or stupidity, Rudolf had miscalculated. Eden's head only reached midway up his chest. Max raised the pistol, took aim and fired.

The ball struck Rudolf in the shoulder, knocking him backward onto the hearth. His head hit the fireplace fender with a sickening crack. Eden stifled a scream as she reeled sideways to collapse against the mantelpiece. When the smoke cleared, she made a trembling gesture toward the recumbent figure on the hearth. “Is he … dead?”

Max moved quickly to kneel by Rudolf. “No. I didn't shoot to kill. It's only a flesh wound, but he knocked himself out on this.” Tapping the fender, he stood up and grabbed Eden's arm. “Let's get out of here. He was right about one thing, his men will be here any minute.”

They were, in fact, already tromping down the hall. Max froze at the door. “
Schoft
,” he muttered. “Here,” he said, yanking off his suede jacket and throwing it over Eden, “cover yourself.”

Eden obeyed, all but swallowed up in the big garment. “How can we get out? The windows are too high—I've already looked a hundred times.”

Max chewed his lip. “We'll have to negotiate, I suppose, although our prospects aren't particularly rosy with a crew of French mercenaries.”

Rudolf's men were at the door, pounding loudly. Max was loading his pistol and looking worried. On the hearth, Rudolf began to stir. The door caved in, splintering halfway across the room. Max raised the pistol but was confronted by a dozen soldiers, all armed with swords or harquebusses.

“
Hold!” he shouted. “Your master is unconscious! Tend to him and let us go. He needs a surgeon more than he needs to keep us prisoner.”

“
Sacre merde!
” cried the apparent leader, barging into the room. “How do we know he is not already dead? Drop your gun!”

Max didn't comply, but instead gestured with a nod of his head at Rudolf. “He's groaning even now. Do as I say, or he won't live to pay you.”

The man's mouth curled in a snide smile. “Then we must steal our wages. Meanwhile, we will ransom you
à deux
, eh?”

In desperation Eden snatched one of the tapers from the mantel and hurled it onto the brittle pages that were scattered across the wine-soaked bed. The counterpane exploded, sending flames shooting up into the heavy hangings. Max looked away from the soldiers for an instant but never let his pistol waver.

“
Come get the Count!” he ordered, as Eden rushed to his side.

But the flames had already enveloped the bed and were licking at the draperies. The soldiers pressed closer, saw the burgeoning inferno, and all but their leader turned tail and fled.

Smoke was filling the room, making Eden and Max cough. Shoving his pistol in his belt, Max bent down to tug at Rudolf's feet in an effort to drag him to safety. But Rudolf was awake.

“
You pig,” he growled at Max, his voice barely audible over the crackling of the flames, “do you expect me to be grateful to you for saving my life?”

Max was motioning to the soldier to help him move Rudolf. “Save your breath. We're all suffocating.”

“
Let go!” The scream was torn from Rudolf's throat. “Don't touch me with those hands that soiled Sophie! Killer hands! Swine!” Kicking at Max, Rudolf began to cough, a horrible, strangled noise that made Eden cringe.

Max backed off. “
Schoft
,” he muttered, waving at the smoke and grasping Eden by the hand. “Get him out of here,” he called to the soldier, whose form by now was almost obscured. The fire was scorching the far walls, and two of the windows had shattered from top to bottom. Eden put one of the long sleeves of Max's coat over her face as they fought their way out of the room.

The hall was full of smoke, but here the heat was far less intense and the sound of the flames was muffled. Max was propelling Eden down a staircase when they heard the shot. Both jumped, and Eden would have fallen had Max not held her arm.

“
What was that?” she gasped, her voice hoarse.

Max gave a fleeting look up the stairwell. “I don't think I want to know,” he said, and swiftly crossed himself.

M
ax and Eden rode due west at breakneck speed, and neither spoke for the first half hour. The rain, which had blown in from the sea, was behind them, and the September night was surprisingly mild. The landscape was flattening out, the horizon broken only by a few trees, windmills and the square outlines of tiny farmhouses. To Eden's relief there was no sign of recent devastation in this part of the world.

At last Max slowed their horse to a walk. No one at Zijswijk had tried to stop them. The French mercenaries had been too busy looting the estate, the servants engaged in saving their own possessions. Nevertheless, Max had been intent on putting as much distance as possible between them and Rudolf's country home.

“
Do you think he's dead?” Eden finally asked.

Max's shoulders sagged. “I suspect so. His hirelings preferred plunder to wages, which is predictable of mercenaries. Rudolf was a fool to recruit such a villainous lot. But it was typical.”

From behind spent gray clouds the moon made coquettish appearances. “But won't that soldier be arrested? Surely he'll hang for killing a count!” Despite Rudolf's brutality, Eden couldn't suppress a shudder at the thought of cold-blooded murder.

Feeling her tremble as she clung to him, Max gave Eden a wry glance over his shoulder. “You're such an honest little maid that you tend to believe in justice and integrity and all those other upstanding virtues. The fact is, Eden, that mercenary will never be charged with his master's death. He has a dozen witnesses who will testify in all honesty that I shot Rudolf first. And for a price, that same dozen will swear that I shot him again.”

“
Oh, no!” Eden buried her face in the back of Max's shirt. “But I know you didn't!”

She felt rather than saw Max shrug. “And who will believe the woman that half the world takes to be my … uh, paramour?”

“
But I'm not,” Eden attested staunchly. And with a pang, she wished the rumor mill hadn't been grinding in vain. It was only then that she remembered what Keppel had told her about Lady Harriet's defection. But this was not the time or place to speak of such matters. Instead, Eden asked Max how he had found her.

“
Simple enough,” he replied as a dog howled at the moon from the edge of a ditch. “Rudolf broadcast the news of your abduction far and wide. I was nearby, in Liège, when I heard. Indeed, I'd just missed him as he called on his accomplice, the archbishop.” Though Max had spoken with resentment, his tone abruptly changed. “Holy St. Hubert, as much as he hated me, I never wished him dead! He was, after all, part of Sophie Dorothea.”

“
And, of course, she was perfect,” Eden retorted, and was immediately sorry. “Oh, Max,” she said quickly, squeezing him around the chest, “I didn't mean that the way it sounded. I know how much you loved her!”

Max stopped the horse at the rise of a narrow bridge over a canal. Eden froze, her arms still around Max but her heart thumping with anxiety. She must have infuriated him.

But after a long, dreadful pause, Max said in his most casual manner, “We'd better stop for the night.” He urged the horse into a trot, they crossed the bridge, and he scanned the horizon. “The next town is Louvain, but it's some distance. Let's hope we can find a fanner who keeps late hours.”

Eden could see a cluster of buildings just ahead. “What about that village? Can't we find a hostelry to take us in?”

Max chuckled. “You, perhaps, but not me. That's a
begijnhof
, rather like a convent, except it's a village in itself. And though the women who live there are deeply religious spinsters and widows, they aren't nuns. As you can guess,” he added grimly, “there are a great many
begijnhoven
, thanks to the wars with King Louis.”

“
Max!” Eden exclaimed, “If Rudolf's dead, does that mean you'll get Vranes and Dillenburg back?”

She saw him incline his head. “Perhaps. That's up to King William … and Louis. I must still prove my loyalty to our sovereign. Dead men can't lie, but they can't tell the truth, either.”

Eden was about to vent her indignation at such a potential injustice when Max espied a feeble light glowing behind a window in a cottage set off from the road. The iron gate creaked as he led their horse up the path and rapped on the door. Eden stood next to him on the stoop, as pleasantly surprised as ever at the tidiness of Fleming and Dutch alike, even in the remote countryside.

A bearded fanner, candle in hand, cautiously opened the door. Eden could not understand the language Max used, and discreetly tried to peer around them both to see inside the little house. A woman was cradling an infant, while two older children grappled with each other in a sleepy, halfhearted manner on a trundle bed. At last Max handed over a bag of coins. As Eden crossed the threshold, she realized for the first time since they left Zijswijk that she was not only extremely tired, but ravenously hungry, as well.

“
The baby is teething,” Max said in a low voice to Eden, “which is why they are up so late. They have a loft. I told them we were a married couple who'd been set upon by marauders so they wouldn't refuse us common quarters.” He made a droll face at Eden. “These are fine folk hereabouts, and they take their virtue seriously. Their name is Boeykens.”

Their hospitality was as faultless as their virtue. As if by magic, the good
vrouw
or madame—Eden wasn't sure which country they were passing through—produced spicy sausages, brown bread and three kinds of cheese, washed down with a tasty pale beer.

Replete, Max and Eden ascended to the loft. Pallets were already laid on freshly strewn straw, awaiting the arrival of relatives from Louvain, who would be passing through the next day on a journey to Lille.