Harlequin Historical February 2021--Box Set 1 of 2

by Virginia Heath

  ‘You were exhausted,’ Rhys said.

  ‘Asleep before your head hit the pillow,’ Grant added, taking the plate Rossiter handed to him and placing it in front of her. ‘How the devil did you get roped into helping with the wounded?’

  She shrugged and took another sip of tea. ‘The surgeon asked me. The wounded kept coming so I stayed.’

  She caught Rhys’s eye, seeing sympathy and pain there. She did not want them to feel sorry for her, though.

  She straightened. ‘I was glad to stay. There were others helping, but we were all needed.’

  * * *

  Rhys and Grant knew very well what Helene had endured. A surgeon’s table, a makeshift hospital, endless numbers of wounded men with horrific wounds. Blood everywhere. Perhaps some day Helene would tell him of it, describe the pain and gore, and purge it from her memory.

  Although he did not forget all he’d seen these last five years, in battle after battle.

  Her brow furrowed and her voice shook. ‘I never saw David. I hope he—’ She didn’t finish.

  Rhys exchanged a glance with Grant. He looked down at his food, then raised his head and turned to Helene. ‘I saw David.’

  Her face brightened. ‘You did?’ Then worry returned. ‘Where?’

  ‘He was with the Duke of Richmond and his son.’

  She let out a relieved breath.

  ‘But—’ How to tell her? ‘—but he got caught up in the cavalry charge and rode with them. They—they were attacked by French cavalry. I did not see David return.’

  She paled and her voice shook. ‘Then he could be dead?’

  ‘Or wounded,’ Grant said.

  ‘He rode in a cavalry charge?’ she asked in disbelief.

  ‘He got caught up in the excitement.’ It was the only explanation Rhys could think of.

  She glanced away. ‘Why would he do such a foolish thing?’

  If only David had heeded Rhys’s warnings.

  She started to rise. ‘I have to find him. ‘How can I find him?’

  Rhys leaned towards her and clasped her hand. ‘You cannot find him. There are thousands still lying in the fields. It would be impossible.’

  ‘I can’t leave him there.’ She stood. ‘I must at least try to find him.’

  Rhys jumped to his feet, as well. He held her by her shoulders. ‘You cannot go on to the battlefield. I cannot allow it.’

  Her eyes flared in defiance. ‘You cannot stop me! I am finished being told what I can and cannot do!’

  Grant stood, as well. ‘Lady Helene, the battlefield will be full of horrors. There are things you should not see—’

  She cut him off. ‘I have already seen countless things I should not have seen.’ She tried to pull away.

  Rhys continued to hold her. ‘He might not be there. He might be among the wounded. He might even have come through unscathed. He could be anywhere. It is more important we get you back to Brussels.’

  She wrenched away. ‘I am going to look for him here. I’m not leaving until I have at least tried.’

  Rhys wanted to argue with her, wanted to insist she do as he said, but was not he the one who’d wished she’d followed her heart instead of listening to her father?

  No soldier wanted to return to the battlefield the day after a battle. It was a nightmare of a place, showing the true cost of men fighting over such things as land or power. The thought of her stepping into that scene made his stomach roil.

  He tapped his fingers against his leg, not wanting to say what he was about to say. ‘Very well, Helene. But I will search for David on the battlefield. I saw where he rode. I have the best chance of finding him.’

  She straightened again. ‘I will go with you.’

  ‘No,’ Grant chimed in. ‘I will go with Rhys. You can, if you wish, look among the wounded who have not yet been transported. He might be among them.’

  Neither Rhys nor Grant really believed that, though. They knew the cost of that cavalry charge.

  ‘What say Smith and I help the lady look among the wounded?’ Rossiter spoke up.

  It was settled.

  Rhys and Grant would return to the battlefield.

  * * *

  Rhys and Grant walked towards the fields where the battle had taken place. What they saw before them was worse than their worst imaginings. The field was covered with the bodies of men and horses. The men were stripped naked, most of them, the plunderers already having swept through, taking whatever could be of value. Even the corpses’ teeth. Without clothing to distinguish one man from another, the task of finding David’s body was made even more difficult.

  Their progress through the part of the battlefield where the cavalry charge took place was slowed, because they discovered wounded men still lying on the field. They had to carry these wounded back to others who’d see to their care. Rhys and Grant persisted, however, not talking much, trying not to retch at the stench of sun beating down on the carnage. They managed to carry twenty men off the battlefield.

  Finally they pushed to the place where Rhys thought the cuirassiers and lancers had met the British cavalry. They came upon a dying horse and put it swiftly out of its misery.

  Walking a little further, Rhys stopped. ‘Did you hear something?’

  Grant listened. ‘Whimpering?’

  ‘Yes.’ Rhys started forward again. ‘That’s what I thought, too.’

  They walked around a pile of corpses lying next to a bush and found the source of the sound. A thin, naked figure sat, his back to them, crying like a baby.

  Rhys approached the fellow whose face was black with bruises. His cheeks were swollen and there was a cut above his eyebrow, but Rhys recognised him.

  ‘David?’

  David looked up at him, but without any sign of recognition. ‘They took my clothes! And my leg hurts!’

  There was a long, deep gash in David’s leg, and his body was covered with bruises.

  Grant reached Rhys’s side. ‘Good God.’

  Rhys leaned closer to David. ‘Do you see who I am? It is Rhys.’

  ‘Oh, Rhys!’ Tears rolled down David’s cheeks. ‘Look what they did to me!’ He glanced around. ‘I lost the Duke’s horse.’

  Rhys filled with pity for him. ‘We’re going to get you out of here.’

  David looked up at him with a helpless expression. ‘I cannot walk.’

  ‘We’ll carry you out, you dolt.’ Grant’s nerves were obviously frayed. He turned to Rhys. ‘I cannot believe it. We found him.’

  ‘Alive.’ Rhys had had no hope at all of even finding David’s body. He’d agreed to this search only to stop Helene from stepping foot into this nightmare. ‘Let’s get out of here.’

  Rhys slung David over his shoulder like he had that night in Brussels when he’d come face to face with Helene.

  David cried out, ‘My leg!’

  ‘We’ll get you to the surgeons,’ Rhys told him.

  And to your sister.

  * * *

  Rhys and Grant found Helene at one of the field hospitals. She was talking to a man Rhys guessed was the surgeon because he wore an apron soaked in blood. Rossiter and Smith stood nearby chatting with some soldiers from the 28th.

  ‘Rhys!’ She rushed up to him as soon as she saw him. Her eyes widened when she realised he carried a naked man over his shoulder.

  ‘Is it?’ she said. ‘Is he alive?’

  The surgeon appeared. ‘Here. Put him on a table.’

  ‘It is David,’ Rhys turned to answer her as he carried David to the table. ‘He is alive.’

  Grant spoke to the surgeon. ‘He was conscious until a few minutes ago. I think he passed out because of pain to his leg.’

  Helene came up to the table. She cradled David’s head. ‘Oh, David. Look at you.’

  His eyes fluttered open
for a second.

  The surgeon, examining the gash in David’s leg, beckoned some of his assistants. ‘We need to clean this out and stitch it up.’ He looked up at Helene. ‘Your brother?’

  ‘Yes.’ She inclined her head towards Rhys and Grant. ‘These are my…friends. Captains Landon and Grantwell.’ She looked again towards the surgeon. ‘This is Mr Goode, the surgeon I helped yesterday.’

  ‘Captains.’ Mr Goode nodded. ‘You know you pulled off a miracle, finding him.’ He didn’t have to add finding him alive.

  Rhys nodded to the surgeon. ‘If he can travel, I’d like to take them both back to Brussels today.’

  ‘We’ve been sending worse on to Brussels,’ Mr Goode said.

  Rhys turned to Helene. ‘We have our horses. We’ll ride you back today.’

  She walked over to him and wrapped her arms around his neck. ‘How can I ever thank you?’ She turned to Grant. ‘Both of you.’

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Brussels was a different city on their return. It was as if the field hospital had simply overflowed by twelve miles. Wounded soldiers were everywhere. In the Parc. On street corners. In shop doorways. Even in the Hotêl de Flandre where they were lying in the dining room and the hall.

  Grant left almost immediately to march out with the regiment, but Rhys arranged leave to stay with Helene and help with David. Helene sent word to Louise and Wilson that David had been injured. When Louise saw the conditions of the hotel, she immediately insisted Helene, Rhys and David stay at her house. Mrs Jacobs, who cared for several of the injured, visited there often to change David’s dressing and to see him through the inevitable fever from his wounds. Always full of news and gossip, Mrs Jacobs told them even the mansions of the town’s wealthy were commandeered as hospitals. Everyone was pressed into service.

  Louise put David in a cot in a little sitting room off her drawing room. Helene and Rhys shared her second bedchamber on the floor above.

  Besides her nights with Rhys, Helene’s favourite times were spent with Louise and Mrs Jacobs in the kitchen where they treated her as a friend—and a very uneducated friend indeed. They taught her how to make bread, how to cook meat, how to clean and launder, things never required of her before.

  Her friends were also very watchful for signs she might be carrying a baby, but Helene soon told them there would be no baby. Helene tried to tell herself it was for the best, but, in truth, she was deeply disappointed. Neither Louise nor Mrs Jacobs had any children and Helene wondered if they had yearned for a child with the men they loved. Louise was past the age of childbearing, but at least she and Wilson were to be married as soon as Brussels returned to normal.

  This morning Helene, Louise and Mrs Jacobs sat around the kitchen table drinking tea.

  ‘Now it is not any of my business,’ Mrs Jacobs said. ‘But are you and your Captain planning to get married?’

  ‘He has not asked me,’ Helene admitted.

  It puzzled Helene why Rhys had not spoken of marriage. She understood why he had not done so before the battle—how could any promises be made at that uncertain time? But now the war was over. Napoleon had abdicated a second time.

  Mrs Jacobs slapped her hand against the table. ‘He needs to marry you.’ She shook her head sympathetically at Helene. ‘I know how it is when two young people are in love, but he needs to be marrying you. I ought to give him a piece of my mind.’

  ‘Please do not!’ Helene cried.

  Mrs Jacobs crossed her arms over her chest. ‘Well, he’d better hurry or I just might.’

  Helene tried to change the subject. ‘How is your husband, Mrs Jacobs? Is he still feeling well?’ Her dear Hulbert had recovered and was back to work.

  ‘Fit as a fiddle.’ Mrs Jacobs then shook a finger at Helene. ‘Now what must we do to make your Captain come up to snuff?’

  ‘Nothing!’ cried Helene.

  Helene was gloriously happy to be with Rhys every day, to be sharing his bed every night. It seemed that they’d put the past thoroughly behind them, but why did Rhys not speak of the future?

  ‘Helene!’ David’s voice reached all the way into the kitchen.

  Her brother took up the rest of Helene’s time and she was very worried about him. At first, he was in a great deal of pain and the infection from his injury made him feverish, but now, after four weeks recuperating, he was more afflicted with nightmares and often woke in a panic.

  ‘Helene!’ he cried again.

  She finished her cup of tea. ‘I should go to him.’

  Mrs Jacobs stood. ‘I can see what the lad wants if you like.’

  Helene motioned for her to sit again. ‘No, I’ll go. You have your other patients to see. Finish your tea first.’

  She walked out of the kitchen, up the stairs and through the drawing room where she and Rhys had first spoken to Louise, to the small room behind it.

  ‘Helene!’ David’s voice became more hysterical as she reached the threshold of the room.

  ‘I am here.’ She tried to sound calm, but she was alarmed at this mania he seemed unable to shake. ‘What is it?’

  David sat upright in bed, his body trembling, his eyes wide with fear. The swelling in his face had disappeared, but his bruises had turned various colours, now a sort of yellowish brown. ‘I—I had a dream!’

  She walked over to him and brushed his hair with her fingers. ‘It was only a dream.’ She did not have to ask what of. She knew he’d returned to the field of the dead and dying. ‘We should do something.’ Something to distract him. ‘Would you like to get up? Play a game of cards? I’ll play cards with you if you get out of bed and come sit in the drawing room.’

  It was not good for David to spend too much time in bed, even though he required a lot of sleep to recover. It was sleep, though, that brought the nightmares. Helene needed to get him home to Yarford, to familiar surroundings where he could feel safe again.

  But home to Yarford meant leaving Rhys.

  Rhys was, at this moment, out looking for transport to Ostend and passage to Ramsgate for her and David. It was no easy task. So many wounded men were travelling home to be cared for by loved ones. David was by no means healed, but Dr Goode, who looked in on him from time to time, pronounced him fit enough to travel.

  Rhys, however, would be re-joining his regiment soon. Helene and David would be travelling alone. Helene could bear it if only she knew Rhys would eventually return to her.

  David groaned as he turned to swing his legs over the side of the bed. ‘Help me.’

  She picked up his crutch and brought it to him.

  He took the crutch and walked very unsteadily with it.

  Rhys had gone to a great deal of trouble to find that crutch in a city where perhaps more than a thousand crutches were in demand. David had been afraid to walk with it and Rhys very patiently worked with him until he could manage well enough.

  Helene followed close, in case David lost his balance or feared he would. He settled into a chair and she brought him a banyan to cover his nightclothes. He winced while she helped him put his arms through the sleeves. He’d been trampled on by horses and men and there were not many parts of his body that did not still hurt from it.

  ‘What would you like to play?’ Helene brought over the card table and placed it in front of him. She seated herself in a chair on the other side.

  He stared past her. ‘I don’t care. Whatever you want.’

  Piquet, the game they played together at home, would require more thinking than David was up to at the moment. ‘Two-handed whist?’ she suggested.

  He shrugged.

  There were times David would lose that distant look and return to his normal self—almost. Sometimes Helene merely needed to persist in pushing him to do normal things to make the old David return—almost.

  She shuffled the cards.

  From outside a man s
houted and the sudden sound of a galloping horse reached their ears. David flinched and his arms flew up to protect his face.

  Helene jumped from her chair and came to him. ‘It is nothing, David. A horse going by, that’s all. You are safe.’

  She grasped his trembling hand until she felt him calm down.

  ‘I want to go home,’ he cried, sounding like a little boy. ‘I want to go home.’

  ‘Rhys is trying to arrange it,’ she assured him. ‘We’ll go home as soon as he can find us passage.’

  He glanced away from her and nodded.

  She tapped on the cards she dealt him. ‘Pick up your hand. Let’s play.’

  Helene returned to her chair and sorted her own cards. ‘Would you like me to send word to William Lennox to call upon you again?’

  Lennox and his sister Georgiana had called a few days before, but David refused to see them. Helene was sure he would perk up from such a visit, but he would not allow it.

  ‘No!’ David covered his face with his hands as if suddenly feeling shame. ‘I lost the Duke’s horse and William’s clothes! How can I ever face him again?’

  ‘I’ve already arranged payment,’ she reminded him. ‘They did not even ask for it. I think William was simply worried about you.’

  ‘I do not want to see him,’ David insisted.

  Very well, Helene would not press him. It only distressed him more.

  They played out the hand, which Helene easily won, because David forgot what suit was trump and put down the wrong cards.

  She shuffled again. ‘Another?’

  He stared into space again. She wanted to shake him, as if that would restore him to himself.

  The door opened on the ground floor and footsteps sounded on the stairs. Her heartbeat quickened and she looked towards the doorway, knowing who it would be. Rhys had returned.

  ‘I am back.’ His eyes smiled at her.

  Sensation flared through her body at the mere sight of him. ‘I am glad.’

  ‘Let me go upstairs and brush some of the dirt from my clothes. I’ll be right back down.’ He turned and Helene could hear him taking the stairs to the second floor two at a time.