She was about to set it on the table and succumb to ogling Simon’s handsome face like some sort of degenerate when her hand slipped. She caught the book in time to keep it from dropping with a loud thud on the floor, but as she did so, it opened to a page toward the end. This page held no words. Instead, it was full of lines and shapes. It was bound into the book but folded, and when she unfolded it, her mind rearranged the shapes and lines into a map of the coast.
The British coast. Xes were marked throughout—she didn’t know what they signified, perhaps safe havens for smugglers—but she found herself unable to breathe. She couldn’t stop staring at those Xes and the rough drawing of the coastline.
And then abruptly she was on the floor, clutching her head. She felt as though someone had taken a cleaver and split it in two. She gasped and reached for Simon, but she couldn’t make her hand close on his arm, though it was just a few feet away. The room was spinning, and she was grasping at air. She’d seen those maps at the bookshop and nothing had happened, but now she couldn’t catch her breath.
Nausea bubbled up. At first, she tried closing her eyes and forcing the queasiness back down. She took a shallow breath, sat up, and her gaze caught the map again. The nausea washed back over her. On hands and knees, she crawled to the table, pulled the bowl down, and was violently ill.
“Marjorie!”
She didn’t dare move away from the bowl where she was hunched, but she felt Simon’s arms come around her from behind. “What can I do?” He scraped her hair back and lifted it, cooling her neck. She struggled to tamp down the nausea and the pain in her skull. After a few minutes, Simon moved away and returned with another bowl. Then he dropped the blanket over her shoulders, causing her to realize she had begun to shiver. “I put the kettle on. Should I send for the doctor?”
She shook her head. “No.” She leaned her head back against the table. “I remembered something.” She opened her eyes, and he was staring at her with a mixture of hope and concern. “Give me a moment.”
He crouched before her and took her hand. His was so warm against her freezing flesh. “There’s a map,” she said slowly. “In the cave.”
“The cave at the beach.”
The kettle began to whistle, but they both ignored it. “I hid it there.” She pressed her hand to her forehead as a slice of pain cut through her. She must have sat there for several moments because when the pain had passed, Simon had silenced the kettle and was sitting cross-legged before her.
“Take your time,” he said.
She nodded. “When we first arrived, I hid the map in the cave.”
“It’s a map with the rendezvous point marked?”
“Yes. I didn’t want it here.”
“I understand. Anyone looking for such a map would search here first.” He put a hand on her knee. “Did you suspect someone was after it?”
“I don’t know. No. I think just...protocol?” She took a shaky breath then looked up at him, and he nodded.
“Is the map still in the cave?”
“I don’t know. I went to—oh, God.” The bowl was in her hands again, and she emptied the scant remains in her stomach. When she’d finished, Simon took the bowl and handed her a damp cloth. She rubbed her face with it.
“Just breathe,” he said. He’d moved beside her and rubbed her back.
“It’s my head,” she said through gasps. “Every time something comes back to me, I feel as though my head is splitting in two.”
“You’re very pale. Do you want to lie down?”
“No—yes. Simon, I don’t know if the map is still in the cave, but that’s why I was there that night. I was retrieving it before our meeting.”
“I’ve already come to that conclusion.” He lifted her up and carried her to the couch, holding her until she ceased shaking. Gradually, her headache began to fade and then the room began to fade.
Eight
He’d come to several conclusions. First, Marjorie had hidden the map with the rendezvous point marked in the cave without telling him. Secondly, she had gone in the middle of the night to fetch it so she would have it at the ready when they met with the smugglers. She’d been attacked on that foray. His third conclusion was that she was right to hide the map because someone was obviously watching them and waiting for the opportunity to steal the map or kill them or both.
What he didn’t know was whether whoever had attacked her had done so before she’d collected the map or after. If she’d had the map in her possession before she’d been struck, then the map was in enemy hands, and he had to warn Melbourne as soon as possible. It was probably too late to stop the British troops from journeying to the rendezvous point on the Continent, but if there was any chance of warning them, he had to take it.
If the map was not compromised, however, then they had mere hours to find it and send the ships with the arms on their way.
Simon glanced down at Marjorie. A little color had come back to her cheeks, but she still looked wan and surprisingly small. He’d looked up to her as an agent and, at times, a mentor. In his mind, she’d always been impossibly robust, staggeringly beautiful, and unbelievably competent. Now she looked frail and delicate, her skin almost translucent so he could see a blue vein in her temple.
He wanted to let her sleep. His conscience told him to carry her to the bed and sit by her side all night, watching over her. If men’s lives and the fate of the country didn’t hang in the balance, he would have wanted nothing more than to watch her sleep.
But neither of them had that luxury. He couldn’t give her more than an hour or two at most. Then they’d have to return to that cave. He allowed himself to enjoy holding her, hearing her breathe, feeling her skin thaw until they were both pleasantly warm. And then he set her down and went to the kitchen, returning with tea and toast. She hadn’t moved, and he hated himself when he shook her gently. “Marjorie.”
