WE DROVE ON IN A MOMENT, THOUGH MORE THAN ONE OF US craned a neck backwards to observe the progress of events on the cutter's deck; but though we espied the boat itself, the actions of its men were veiled from our sight, and the conclusion of such a story must await another day. Cassandra's eyes were closed, and her pallor such as gave rise to concern in my breast; but believing her to be resting, I chose not to disturb her with unnecessary enquiries. Turning instead to Captain Fielding, I thought to pursue a nearer interest, by probing his dislike of Mr. Sidmouth.

“I had understood you to tell me, Captain Fielding, that Mr. Sidmouth's relations in France were all deceased, and that Mademoiselle LeFevre represents the sole surviving leaf of the family's foreign branch.”

“I believe that to be the case,” he replied.

“And yet my sister Eliza finds that Mr. Sidmouth goes often to France — or did so, before the outbreak of the latest hostilities. Having been long a resident of that unfortunate country herself, she was delighted to meet with a gentleman capable of offering the latest intelligence regarding Parisian society, something for which she is always longing.”

“I am happy to learn that Mr. Sidmouth was capable of offering anything that could be described as pleasing,” the Captain rejoined soberly. “That he was engaged in conversing with a lady — and a lady of the world, as everything about your brother's wife proclaims her to be — must speak for itself. Sidmouth's charm is always most lively in the company of the fair sex.”

“You are aware, then, of his travel?” I persisted.

“I am. It has been many months since I have regarded it with anything but dismay.”

“Dismay!” I cried, with a look for Lucy Armstrong, whose eyes were cast down upon her folded hands. Her cheeks were remarkably rosy for one so apparently indifferent to our conversation.

“Indeed.” Captain Fielding appeared to hesitate, as if debating within himself; and then the desire to relate his anxieties won out over the impulse towards discretion. “I have reason to believe, Miss Austen, that Geoffrey Sidmouth is engaged in business of a most unscrupulous nature; that he ventures to Paris on behalf of certain nefarious interests whose result you saw only moments ago; that he is, in fact, none other than the reprehensible Reverend of whom the world speaks with such a strange mixture of repugnance and admiration.”

“Mr. Sidmouth! The very Reverend!”

“It cannot be,” Cassandra said, with some urgency in her tone. Her eyelids had fluttered wide, and two spots of colour burned in her cheeks. “Mr. Sidmouth retains every aspect of the gentleman. I cannot believe so good a man as he proved himself to me, in my time of need, to be so lost to the expectations of society — of duty — indeed, of every moral purpose!”

“I wish that I could share your approbation,” Captain Fielding said. He spoke gently to Cassandra, as was his wont, but his blue eyes were cold and hard in his tanned face. I understood, in gazing at him then, what it must have been to answer his commands on a surging deck in the midst of battle. “I have watched his movements for some time. The trips to France are but a part of it; to this, I would add the strangeness of waggons coming and going at the Grange at all hours of the night; the appearance of bands of men who shelter in its barns for a few days only, and then are seen no more; the constant traffic along the cliffs, in the foulest of weather; and the habitual walks of Mademoiselle LeFevre.”

“Mademoiselle LeFevre?” Lucy Armstrong said, in a tone of bewilderment.

“Mademoiselle LeFevre,” Captain Fielding rejoined. The barouche tilted suddenly, in turning into a private avenue of well-grown trees, and I looked up to find we were come very nearly to the end of our drive. “She is given to walking, as all of Lyme has observed, along the cliffs in her bright red cloak, and on particular afternoons.”

“There can be nothing singular in a lady's taking exercise, ” I objected, as the barouche rolled to a halt before Captain Fielding's door, “nor in the fact of a scarlet wrap, when one is speaking of Lyme.”[47]

“There can — and there is — when the lady's constitutionals are followed without fail by the landing of a smuggling ship along the beaches that same night. I am convinced her red cloak is a signal; she wears it for the benefit of the Reverend's cutters, lying offshore, and straining at their sea-glasses for a glimpse of scarlet. At times when the dragoons are particularly active — when they feel, for the sake of propriety, a need to assume an attitude of vigilance, and stand about the town as if ready to arrest us all — I have observed Miss Seraphine to remain within doors for whole days together.”

The Captain eased his game leg out of the barouche with the coachman Jarvis's assistance, and, once steady upon the ground, turned to hand down first Miss Armstrong and then my sister. “Having seen the cutter running offshore today, I find it in me to wonder, indeed, if Mr. Sidmouth's presence at Mr. Crawford's fossil pits was entirely without design. From such a point, one might have an unimpeded view of all sea traffic; he could combine a pleasure party with scrupulous observance of his cargo's fortunes.”

“But he departed before the cutter appeared,” Lucy Armstrong argued. Captain Fielding merely bowed, and gestured her towards the open door, where a housemaid stood ready to usher her within. Cassandra followed, with the faintest of smiles. Her gait was unsteady, as though she moved under the influence of a fearful headache. My heart misgave me as I watched; but Captain Fielding's hand was outstretched to receive my own, and I returned to the subject uppermost in my thoughts.

“You have indeed been an avid observer of all Mr. Sidmouth's movements,” I said, as I grasped the Captain's gloved fingers and found the carriage step. “I would venture to say that even your place of abode is not without design. With no other object than the closest scrutiny, can you have chosen to settle in a house not a half-mile from High Down Grange. For no other reason than to calculate his ruin, can you have chosen a neighbour so abhorrent to you.”

How my heart reacted to this knowledge of Captain Fielding's design, I cannot say. I confess to a confusion of emotions — some all in admiration of his penetration and bravery, and others, having more to do with Geoffrey Sidmouth, that were marked by regret. But I could not deny the calculation of Fielding's words, and the careful study behind them; I myself had spent two nights at High Down Grange, and had seen the red-cloaked girl with a lanthorn bobbing along the cliffs. What had Mr. Sidmouth said to Seraphine, in those few phrases of French? Something about the men, and the dogs, and the bay. And the name of the bottle-green boat on the beach — La Gascogne. Presumably a cargo was expected the very night of our precipitate arrival — hence the hostility with which we were met, and the stable boy's levelled blunderbuss. Seraphine LeFevre was undoubtedly dispatched to divert the men and their wares to another place of hiding, for the length of our unfortunate stay.

“You are possessed of a singular understanding,” Captain Fielding said, his eyes intent upon my face. We stood thus a moment in the drive while Jarvis remounted the box. “But then, I have allowed myself an unwonted frankness in your company. It may be that our minds are formed for such effortless meeting.”

“I am happy to learn that you are not entirely languishing in retirement, Captain Fielding” I rejoined, deflecting his gallantry with a smile. “Indeed, I think you are possibly the most active former Naval officer I have ever met.”

He threw back his blond head and laughed. “You have found me out, Miss Austen. I am, indeed, as yet employed — though on behalf of His Majesty's revenues rather than his seamen. I shall have the Reverend yet— and when I do, I shall be very much surprised if he is not Geoffrey Sidmouth.”