The Price of Honour

by Mary Nichols

  ‘What have you come to do?’

  ‘Better you do not know the details.’

  ‘Why not?’ she demanded, then added, ‘Oh, I see, because I am not to be trusted.’

  ‘I trust you with my life; is that not enough?’

  ‘What did you draw on that map?’ she asked, changing the subject abruptly.

  ‘The way to the monastery.’

  She was appalled. Telling the whole French army where they could find Don Santandos was tantamount to his murder. ‘How could you?’ She rounded on him. ‘They will all be killed.’

  ‘Why this sudden concern for a bunch of guerrilleros?’ he countered. ‘They killed your husband and they tried to kill me.’

  ‘That was before they knew who you were. They trust you now, at least enough to let you go. And they will have no mercy if you betray them. And Father Peredo has been set to watch us.’

  He smiled wearily; trying to appease Olivia without putting her in any more danger than she was in already was an exhausting business and he wished he did not have to do it. ‘In war it is often necessary to do things which are distasteful,’ he said. ‘Sacrifices have to be made. It is vital that the French trust me…’

  ‘And so you sacrifice your allies. I hate it! I hate you! And even more I hate myself for betraying Philippe.’

  ‘He would understand,’ he said softly. ‘Believe me, Olivia, he would understand.’

  She was silent. There seemed nothing that they could say to each other which did not rub them raw and, like it or not, they had to stay together, at least for the time being. They needed each other. England had never seemed more desirable than it did at this moment; she was surprised how emotional she felt about it. Angry with herself for her weakness, she turned from him so that he should not see her tears, and noticed the sergeant and his companions eyeing them with curiosity. She smiled weakly at them and grabbed Robert’s arm to alert him to the danger. He looked towards the men and grinned, just as they ambled over, drawn by curiosity.

  ‘This is the man the guerrillas cannot kill,’ the sergeant said to his companions. ‘He was hanged and yet he lives. Show my friends the mark of the rope, Lieutenant.’

  Robert obliged them, pulling aside his bandage. The weals on his neck seemed as livid as ever and Olivia strongly suspected he had done something to make them seem worse than they really were.

  ‘My!’ one of them said.

  ‘How does it feel?’ asked another.

  ‘He cannot speak. His voice has been permanently damaged,’ Olivia said.

  ‘Is that so? How will he do his work?’

  ‘I am his voice,’ she said. ‘Where he goes, I go too.’

  One of them laughed. ‘A man who needs a nursemaid is hardly a man for a battle.’

  Robert grunted, grabbed him by the front of his uniform coat and lifted him clear of the ground.

  ‘Don’t!’ Olivia cried, fearing that Robert’s wrath would betray them both. ‘Let him be. He didn’t mean anything…’

  ‘No, no, I meant no disrespect,’ the man squealed helplessly. ‘Let me down, Lieutenant.’

  Robert released him so suddenly that he fell to the ground, then glared round at the others, trying to convey his fury and a threat without speaking. Olivia marvelled at his control. Angry as he was, he had not uttered a word, either in English or French.

  ‘Best be off,’ she said to the soldiers. ‘The lieutenant may have lost his voice but he still has the power to punish you, if you cause trouble.’

  They drifted away, but she was worried. Robert had gained a reputation he could well have done without. Instead of melting into the background of a busy garrison town — difficult enough with his great height — he had become notorious as the man who had escaped a hanging, the man who had to rely on his wife to communicate. She pulled on his arm, trying to make him leave the scene, where everyone seemed to be staring at them and, to her mind, could see right through their subterfuge.

  ‘You should have ignored them,’ she said, when they were safely away and walking down a quiet side-street towards the bakery. ‘All you did was draw attention to us and that is the last thing we want.’

  ‘Why? I do not intend to skulk in dark corners. That is not the way to gain intelligence, and Lieutenant Santerre has nothing to hide.’

  ‘But Captain Robert Lynmount has.’

  ‘Who is Captain Robert Lynmount?’ he queried, drawing her arm through his and smiling down at her. The changes in his mood were like quicksilver. ‘I know nothing of a Captain Robert Lynmount.’

  ‘Neither do I,’ she said tartly. ‘He is a stranger to me.

  It was true. She knew nothing of him at all, nothing of his background, his family, his likes and dislikes, his loves and his hates. He had been in love, he had told her so, but he had never married. Had he been disappointed by a lady? Did that account for his less than chivalrous manner towards her?

  Honesty made her smile to herself; she had hardly invited chivalry. How could a man feel protective of a woman who could shoot as well as he could, who rode a horse as well as he could and, worst of all, refused to admit to any feminine feelings like helplessness and fear? How could a man feel protective of a woman who wore a soldier’s boots? She looked down at her feet; how long was it since she had worn shoes? It had been at Toulon, when she and the wounded Philippe had gone home. His parents had been horrified by her appearance, and rightly so, and Madame Santerre had insisted on buying her a whole new wardrobe. But it had all been so ridiculously extravagant and she had known how useless the garments would be in Spain. She had left them behind when they returned. But it would be pleasant to be softly feminine now and again, especially now.

  She stopped her thoughts abruptly. She was not out to impress this enigmatic man beside her and it would be folly to try. He looked on her as a comrade in arms, another soldier, a spy perhaps, but never a woman. That being so, she had best play her part well and then he would keep his promise to tak her home, and the sooner the better.

  ‘What are you thinking?’ His voice, still a little hoarse, broke in on her thoughts. ‘You have not spoken for at least five minutes and that is not in the least like you.’

  ‘How do you know what is like me? You know no more about me than I know about you.’

  ‘We ought to remedy that,’ he said, then spoiled it by adding, ‘For the sake of our story. You must tell me all about Lieutenant Santerre — his background and family and your life with him. I must do nothing that is out of character.’

  ‘You are enjoying this, aren’t you?’ she demanded, pulling her arm from his to face him squarely. ‘It’s like play-acting to you. You forget these are real people here, in this town, that Philippe was real and I am real. I think you want a new identity because you do not like your old one. Perhaps the disgrace of Captain Robert Lynmount is more than you can stomach…’

  She knew she had gone too far when she saw the smile leave his face and his hazel eyes harden until they flashed an anger which made her tremble. She waited for the tirade, perhaps a denial, but nothing happened for fully a minute, while they glared at each other in animosity. Then he took her arm again and spoke so softly that she was taken aback.

  ‘One day you will regret saying that, Madame Santerre, but in the meantime let us go home and you can tell me all about Philippe and the ways of the French army. Your chances of surviving to go home to England are dependent on my success and, reluctant as I am to say this, I need you in order to achieve it.’

  She turned her head away because there were tears streaming down her cheeks and the last thing she wanted was for him to see them. She did not know why she was crying; he had said nothing she did not know already, he had broken no promises to her and it was not his fault she was in the mess she was in.

  She lifted her hand and surreptitiously brushed away the evidence of her misery. ‘You are right, of course,’ she said, her voice brittle with the effort of sounding practical. ‘I will do what I can. The sooner it is a
ll over, the better.’

  CHAPTER FIVE

  EVERYWHERE the French were preparing to continue their advance. Guns and limbers and caissons of ammunition were being drawn up along the roads on the western outskirts of the town, wagons of food and carts full of forage were being trundled in from the countryside. Soldiers from the commissary’s staff were going from house to house, from farm to farm, from vineyard to vineyard and orchard to orchard, taking what little food and wine was still to be found in a country almost stripped bare by earlier foraging. The people grumbled, but they dared not refuse. They put their faith in the guerrilleros in the mountains to set them free. ‘The English have abandoned us,’ they said. ‘And soon they will abandon the Portuguese too. So much for their promises. Bonaparte was right — the wretched Leopard has no stomach for a fight; he knows nothing but retreat and still more retreat. We must rely on Don Santandos and our own men in the hills to set us free.’

  ‘And you have betrayed them,’ Olivia said to Robert when she heard this. ‘No wonder the Spaniards do not trust the English.’

  ‘They do not understand conventional warfare,’ he said. He had been promoted to captain and given a post on the colonel’s staff, which was as good a place as any to gather the intelligence he needed, but it also meant he had to watch the colonel flirting openly with Olivia. She was adept at holding the fellow off without antagonising him, but he was glad the army was on the move at last; he would not have been able to hold himself in check much longer. He wanted nothing so much as the satisfaction of punching the flabby regimental commander on his soft and bulbous nose, and before long he would have done it. Now, in the middle week of July, they had been given orders to prepare to march and Robert had returned to their quarters to collect his gear.

  It was small wonder he looked so tired, she thought; he had been sleeping curled up in a chair every night since they arrived, in order to leave the bed for her. He had not even hinted that they should share it, which was just as well because if he kissed her again she knew she would be every bit as weak as she had been before. He had curtly refused her offer to change places when she’d suggested he needed a good night’s sleep. That and the strain of being in the company of the colonel’s staff all day without being able to utter a word was beginning to tell on him. He could not keep it up much longer and she dreaded to think what would happen to them both when they were found out. Death would be the least of it.

  ‘You cannot fight a battle without planning it first,’ he said, waving the razor he was using to shave himself. ‘That is the trouble with the Spaniards — they either rush in without a thought about how they will extricate themselves if things go wrong, or they turn tail and run at the slightest resistance. Look what happened at Talavera.’

  ‘They are not cowards.’ She put a bowl of thin soup on the table, with a loaf of hard bread which had cost her dear, then fetched a spoon from a cupboard drawer. ‘They are just disorganised. It would be better if you helped to organise and lead them instead of making things worse by telling the French where to find them.’

  ‘There was a reason for that,’ he said mildly. He cleaned the soap from the razor and threw the contents of the bowl out of the window. There was a shout of annoyance from someone in the alley. Robert looked out and waved cheerfully to a Spaniard who had taken off his soaked hat and was shaking it up at him, then turned back to pick up his new coat. She had paid the tailor with Philippe’s money, realising that the old one was really too short for him and Philippe, aristocrat that he was, would never have worn anything so ill-fitting. It was important to keep up appearances. ‘The advance guard marches out today,’ he went on.

  ‘And you with it?’

  ‘Yes.’ He picked up a haversack from the corner and began stuffing his buttonless red jacket into it.

  ‘Why don’t you get rid of that coat? If someone should see it…’

  ‘I took it off a dead British soldier, a certain Captain Robert Lynmount…’

  ‘He is not dead.’

  ‘To all intents and purposes he is.’

  ‘You are a fool. It isn’t as if it were a new one. It is a rag which won’t even do up properly.’

  He put the rest of his kit on top of the red jacket and closed the mouth of the bag. ‘You never know, one day Robert Lynmount might need it again.’

  ‘I can’t make up my mind about you,’ she said, turning her head on one side to look at him as if doing so made her able to judge him the better. ‘I cannot decide if you are driven by pride or a determination for revenge, and, if it is revenge, who is going to be on the receiving end — the English, the French, or Don Santandos and his men?’

  ‘Does it matter?’

  ‘Was it a woman?’ she asked suddenly.

  ‘A woman?’

  ‘The reason you are here and not fighting beside your own countrymen.’

  ‘It is not a matter that need concern you.’ He paused to look closely at her, wondering if he would ever be able to talk about that day, months ago now, when he had stood rigidly to attention while the buttons and braid were torn from his coat. It was forever in his mind — the humiliation and the shame, the injustice and the helpless rage he had felt. And she dared to question him about it!

  ‘I have bought an old landau for you to travel in at the rear with the other women,’ he went on, carefully controlling his voice. ‘The driver will be waiting outside when you leave.’

  Finding a coach, and horses to pull it, was a miracle in itself but she chose to ignore that. ‘Oh, so you don’t need me any more? How will you go on if you want to speak?’

  ‘There will be little opportunity for conversation when we come up with the British advance guard. I shall just have to make do with signs. I am not having you riding up at the front; it’s no place for a lady.’

  She laughed suddenly. ‘I didn’t realise you thought of me as a lady at all. I am simply your voice.’

  ‘And a damned sharp one at that.’ He sat down at the table and picked up his spoon. ‘Where’s yours?’

  ‘I’ll have mine later.’ He would not eat it if he knew there would be none left for her and he needed it more than she did. ‘If I am not to leave when you do, there is plenty of time.’

  ‘Do you know the route?’ she asked, sitting opposite him and putting her elbows on the table in order to rest her chin on her hands. ‘Which way do you go?’

  ‘To Villa de Fuentes first and then…’

  ‘Do they know the bridge has been blown?’

  He smiled as he wiped a piece of bread round his plate to mop up every last drop of soup. ‘If they don’t, they will when they arrive.’

  ‘Then what? Will they go south to the plains or take the road to the monastery?’

  ‘Whichever it is, I do not want you anywhere near, do you hear? You stay with the baggage train until we reach Villa de Fuentes and then go to Father Peredo until I can arrange for you to be transferred to the allied lines. General Craufurd will pass you back and see you get home.’

  So that was it. She felt suddenly deflated, as if she had been drinking champagne and the light-headedness had worn off, leaving her heavy as lead and miserable as a wet Sunday in England. She shook herself. What had she expected? That he would fall on his knees and ask her to stay with him forever, to marry him? The mental picture of him doing anything so uncharacteristic brought a smile to her lips. It would not occur to him to think of her reputation back in England and she certainly did not want him to sacrifice himself for that. Being married to a martyr was not her idea of a good life. And besides, had she not sworn never to marry again? Had she not said she was done with all men? Was theirs not a perfectly practical arrangement, which had to come to an end some day? Had she not hoped and prayed it would end soon?

  ‘Very well,’ she said meekly.

  Her unexpected obedience took him by surprise. ‘You have understood me?’ he queried, looking up into her face, which betrayed nothing of what she was thinking. ‘I want no hot-headed, ill-con
sidered actions, nothing done to put either of us in danger, do you hear me?’

  ‘I hear you, but what are you going to do? Are you not going back to the British lines yourself?’

  ‘No. I gave my parole to Don Santandos.’

  ‘And then betrayed him!’

  He stood up, towering over her, his face white and drawn with fatigue. It took more than a few sleepless nights to bring him to his knees, though she seemed to have the knack of wearing him down with accusations he could not refute. He stared down at her oval face with its halo of red-gold curls for a long time without speaking, and then, tempted beyond endurance, he grabbed her shoulders in both hands and brought his mouth down to hers, crushing her lips in a kiss which was at once savage and demanding. Taken by surprise, she did nothing until he released her and then she put all her frustration and insecurity into a sharp slap across his cheek. ‘That was never part of our bargain.’

  ‘I beg your pardon,’ he said bitterly, rubbing the pink mark she had made on his face. ‘Above all, we must keep to our bargain.’ Then he turned from her to put a pistol in his belt, strapped on his sword, picked up his shako and haversack and left the room, clattering down the stone steps to the street.

  Trembling uncontrollably, Olivia sank on to the bed and put her head in her hands. If she was so sure he was a traitor, why had she helped him? Did that make her a traitor too? Had she been one before she ever met him? Marrying a Frenchman was hardly the act of a patriot, so why did she condemn him for something she had done herself?

  She had had her reasons and so, presumably, had he. He was such a confusing mixture of bitterness and cheerfulness, hate and anger, brute strength and gentleness. He could, against all reason and without apparently intending it, stir her latent passions to full flood, and it took all her self-control to keep her from throwing herself into his arms whenever she watched him moving about the tiny room in his shirt-sleeves and figure-hugging breeches. If he inadvertently brushed against her, shock-waves ran with tingling intensity through her body. He could be cruel too, but no more than she was. With her it was a defence, a way of keeping him at a distance where she could deal with him; his reasons she could not even guess at.