The Price of Honour

by Mary Nichols

  She did not hesitate, but packed all her belongings into a tight roll and took it out to the hut where Pegasus was hidden. She saddled him up, fitted her bundle to the pommel and set off in a south-westerly direction. With the craggy mountains at her back, she passed through pine and eucalyptus woods, then rolling hills covered with vineyards, small farms and orchards, heavy with the scent of flowers and buzzing with honey bees. Alone on the road, far behind the marching army, she felt at peace; the war seemed a million miles away.

  But that was an illusion; it was round every corner, behind every craggy rock. Hidden eyes watched the roads, ready to strike wherever a smaller than usual force, a baggage cart left too far behind, stragglers from the main march, made an easy target. Nothing was safe from the guerrilleros who stretched taut French nerves to breaking-point and caused their already elongated supply lines to snap under the strain. It had taken weeks to re-supply the army after the taking of Ciudad Rodrigo, but now they were on the move again, still under orders to drive the leopards back into the sea.

  But taking the Portuguese border stronghold of Almeida would be a very different proposition from taking Ciudad Rodrigo. The only way to enter the town was by crossing bridges and going through tunnels, and its huge star-shaped fortifications were in much better repair than those of the Spanish town had been. Robert had spoken of it as almost impregnable, which was why Colonel Clavier had been so anxious to make a name for himself and find a way into Portugal which avoided it. His hopes for promotion and an easy life among the generals and marshals of the Napoleonic campaign who seemed not to share the hardships of their men, but to travel with all the accoutrements of luxury, including their mistresses, had been balked by Don Santandos and his handful of partisans and he was a very angry man. He did not fancy Almeida, whose Portuguese garrison was headed by a British brigadier who would not easily surrender. The colonel took his time marching his men across the plains to rejoin the rest of Masséna’s army. It was then, in the half-light just before dawn on the twenty-fourth of July, he found himself face to face with General Craufurd’s skirmishers.

  Olivia, who had been riding Pegasus for twenty-four hours with only occasional snatched minutes of rest, heard the sounds of battle some way off and dug her heels into the horse’s side to make him gallop. Her place was with the women of the regiment, waiting as always, with the supply wagons in the rear, waiting, hoping and praying for the safety of their men and for the moment when the firing ceased and they could go forward to find them, alive and well, wounded or dead. It had been the same when she had been with Tom, the same with Philippe, and she could do no less for Robert, in spite of his rejection of her. What she could not understand was his willingness to take part in an action against his own compatriots; he must be made to see that he would never regain his claws that way.

  She came upon the baggage train grouped in a field, several miles short of the scene of the battle, and stopped to ask what was happening.

  ‘They’ve joined up with Marshal Ney’s corps,’ she was told by a burly pipe-smoking woman driving a wagon from which she sold drink and other personal items to the troops. ‘Seems they’ve caught Craufurd with his pants down.’ She laughed. ‘His backside is exposed and our cavalry are cutting him to pieces.’

  Olivia hid her dismay at this news. ‘And the infantry?’

  The woman shrugged her shoulders in the direction of the noise of guns. ‘Who knows? We can only wait and hope.’

  That was the worst of it, the waiting, but it had to be endured. Olivia dismounted and sat with the women in the shade of a copse of pine trees, all of them tense and listening, trying to judge from the changing sounds how the battle was going. At times it seemed uncomfortably close and they began to wonder if it would overwhelm them, then the noise receded, as the English struggled to return across the bridge to the far bank of the Coa and safety. It was much cooler now and heavy clouds were sweeping down from the distant mountains; fighting in the rain when it was difficult to keep guns and ammunition dry was even worse than fighting in the searing heat when the midsummer sun took its own toll of casualties.

  The baggage train eased its way forward in the wake of the battle, ready to provide fresh ammunition when needed and, later, treatment for the wounded and comfort to the weary. Olivia, riding Pegasus in a deluge of rain, a little ahead of the other women, found herself shivering, but it was not so much the downpour, coming after so much heat, which caused it, as the uncertainty of what she would find round the next bend.

  She remembered discovering Tom in the aftermath of the battle of Oporto, the horror of a battlefield when the fighting was done, the cries of the wounded, the shrieks of dying horses, the tattered shreds of colourful uniforms, the smoke and the stench of death. And Tom, dying in the middle of it all.

  She had to find Robert. She knew, as she searched the soaking ground around the approaches to the bridge where body was heaped upon body, that finding him alive and unharmed was the most important thing in her life at that moment. She would come to terms with what that meant to her later, when she had time to spare for such self-indulgence.

  Craufurd’s snipers, safe now behind the rocks on the west bank, took pot-shots at anyone moving on the approaches to the bridge, but the battle was over and, as far as the British were concerned, disaster had been averted. Olivia joined other women who moved about the battlefield in a kind of trance, searching for their men, crying with relief when they found them injured but alive, or moaning in despair when they found them dead or, not finding them at all, looking further afield in case they had been carried off or had deserted.

  Olivia, leading Pegasus, found no sign of Robert and was hopeful that he had somehow escaped having to do battle with his own countrymen. He had been attached to Colonel Clavier’s staff, so if she could find the colonel she might find the man who filled her thoughts and had filled them ever since the last time it had rained — the day they met. She made her way to a tiny hamlet she had passed on the road and here she found the regimental command post set up in the inn. The colonel, she was told, had been ordered to Marshal Ney’s headquarters to account for his actions.

  ‘And Captain Santerre?’ she asked the soldier who guarded the door.

  ‘Not here. Haven’t seen him since…’ The soldier racked his brain. ‘Since we joined up with the rest of the corps.’ He pointed across the street. ‘Try the cellar of that house; there are injured being looked after there.’

  She thanked him and hurried to cross the street, her thoughts so far in advance of her feet that she did not look where she was going and ran straight into the arms of a tall, heavily built man wearing a brown frock-coat and a top hat. He held her to steady her.

  ‘Sorry,’ she said and did not realise until she heard his gasp of surprise that, in her agitation, she had spoken English. She looked up and found herself meeting the blue-eyed gaze of the man she had seen coming out of Colonel Clavier’s house in Ciudad Rodrigo, the one she had half recognised.

  It came to her, like a clap of thunder, where she had seen him before, and she could hardly believe her memory. She had known him as Mr Rufus Whitely when he had visited her father in the early days of the war. Her father had treated him cordially and shown him round the manufactory and talked to him about the armaments being made there. Their visitor had shown particular interest in the new rockets being developed and tested on a secret site on their estate. The tests had not been successful — the rockets had been decidedly erratic in their trajectory and unstable to say the least; they were as likely to wipe out one’s own people as the enemy. Her father had been undaunted and was still working on the missiles when she left home. What was Rufus Whitely doing in Spain, and among the French at that?

  ‘Mr Whitely,’ she said, ready to brazen out her own indiscretion. ‘What are you doing here?’

  If he was surprised at her use of his name, he hid it well. ‘Madame?’ he queried in French.

  ‘Don’t you remember me?’ she persisted. ‘
Olivia Pledger, I was then. You visited us in England. As I remember it, you were particularly interested in Papa’s rockets.’

  She watched as he concealed his surprise behind narrowed eyes; he was cool, she would give him that. ‘You are mistaken, madame.’

  ‘I think not. What are you doing here, with the French?’

  His glance flicked over her dress and back to her face. ‘I could ask you the same thing,’ he said, apparently deciding not to continue with his denial. ‘Is your father here?’

  ‘Certainly not! He would never…’ She stopped. ‘I am here because I am married to a French soldier.’

  He looked round at the busy street, where troops and stretcher-bearers hurried back and forth and horses clattered up and down, harness jingling, then back at her. ‘I think we should talk,’ he said in English. ‘In private.’ He took her arm and led her to the inn where the guard stood aside to let them in without even questioning them. He led her through the house on to a cool, vine-covered terrace where tables and chairs were set out for the inn’s customers, now driven away by the arrival of the French soldiers. ‘Sit down.’

  ‘Why should I? Who do you think you are, dragging me away like that? I have other things to do. My husband…’

  ‘Your husband?’ He took her arm and pushed her into a chair and sat beside her. ‘You had better tell me about this husband of yours.’

  ‘Not until you tell me what you are doing here. You are English, or that is what you were pretending to be when you visited my father. From the Secretary for War, you said. Was that true?’

  ‘Of course it was true.’ He paused. ‘Madam, I must ask you not to divulge a word of what I am about to tell you to a living soul. I may assume you are a loyal subject of King George, in spite of appearances?’

  ‘Appearances can be deceptive,’ she said.

  ‘Quite so. My appearance is not what it would seem either.’ He smiled and reached out to touch her arm with a hand that was warm and sweaty. ‘I am an agent of the British, here at the express command of Viscount Wellington himself. I have an important task to do, do you understand?’ She nodded and he went on, ‘I must insist on your oath of secrecy.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘You must speak of this meeting to no one. If I find you have breathed so much as a hint that I am not the friend of Colonel Clavier I seem to be, then…’ he sat forward and drew a finger slowly across her throat, roused to a perverted desire by the fear in her expressive green eyes ‘…I shall denounce you to the French as an English spy and you will die horribly. You understand?’

  ‘Yes.’ She looked him straight in the eye, so that he found himself drawing back from her. ‘You have nothing to fear from me. As it happens, the man who is passing himself off as my husband is also English, masquerading as a French soldier.’

  He looked startled, his eyes widened and she noticed his hands tighten on the arms of his chair, but he quickly regained his composure. ‘A deserter.’

  ‘No,’ she said, without thinking. ‘Not a deserter. Someone like you, working behind the lines.’

  ‘Tell me about him. What is his name?’

  ‘Captain Philippe Santerre is the name he is known by, but it is really Robert Lynmount.’

  ‘Lynmount!’ He sat bolt upright, then laughed. It was a harsh sound which frightened her. ‘So this is where he has got to. I suggest, ma’am, that you stick to Philippe Santerre; Lynmount is not a name to be proud of.’

  ‘What wrong has he done?’

  ‘You do not know? He is scum, my dear, scum.’ He stood up so that he overshadowed her. ‘Forget you ever knew him.’ He put a hand on her shoulder. ‘More than ever, I must insist on your promise not to betray me. The successful outcome of the war could depend on you keeping your word. Say nothing; particularly say nothing to that miserable cur of a man who calls himself your husband. Husband!’ He laughed suddenly. ‘You would be very unwise to put your faith in him.’

  She rose beside him, her fists clenched at her sides. ‘You have no right to say that, none at all. What do you know of him?’

  He smiled, as if at some secret jest, as he took her arm to escort her back through the inn to the street. ‘A great deal, but do not distress yourself, my dear, your loyalty does you credit. Only remember, your allegiance to your country comes above all else and in the absence of any higher authority that means me. Put yourself in my hands, be patient and you shall be amply repaid.’

  ‘I want no payment for being a good patriot,’ she snapped. ‘All I want is to go home.’

  ‘Then you shall, but let me advise you against attempting to leave on your own; it could be dangerous, fatal even.’ Was he threatening her? His voice was silky smooth, but it held a menace that terrified her more than the idea of physical violence. ‘I will make the arrangements myself. Wait for my instructions.’ He smiled. ‘You may be able to do me a small service at the same time.’

  At the door of the inn he doffed his top hat to her and left her with a smile and a final warning to remember what was at stake if she failed him.

  Olivia stood staring after him for a long time after he had gone, her thoughts in a turmoil. Had he been telling the truth about himself? He had been very plausible and his story had sounded almost too fantastic to be a lie. What was, in some ways, more important to her — had he also been correct about Robert? His words echoed in her brain — ‘not a name to be proud of’. ‘Scum’. ‘Cur’. Were they the measured words of cool judgement or was there more to it than that? She could not ask Robert, even if she could find him, because she had given her word.

  Robert. Where was he? She crossed the street towards the house with the cellar full of wounded men, trying desperately to compose herself.

  She had gained the opposite side when a hand touched her arm and, keyed up as she was, she turned like a startled hare, ready to bolt. But it was Robert. He had a bandage round his head and his uniform was filthy with mud and dried blood.

  ‘You are wounded.’ Her relief at seeing him alive mixed with the doubts that Rufus Whitely had planted in her mind made her confused and ill at ease; she could hardly look him in the eye.

  ‘A mere scratch. What in Hades’ name are you doing here? I thought you would be on the other side of the river by now, on your way to Lisbon. Did you not read my letter? Father Peredo…’

  ‘Father Peredo is not my keeper,’ she snapped. ‘And neither are you.’

  ‘No, by heaven, or I would muzzle you like a dog.’ He moved to take her arm and she involuntarily flinched away from him. Puzzled by her reaction, he let his hand fall to his side. ‘Oh, I see, he has been filling your head with scandal. I am surprised at you, Olivia, believing his lies.’

  ‘Whose lies?’ she queried. ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘Don’t you?’

  ‘No, and it is more than careless of you to be talking at all in public, let alone in English. Or don’t you care? Have you already made your deal with the colonel? Is that why you tried to leave me behind?’

  He grabbed her hand and dragged her across the road to the stables beside the inn and pulled her inside. It was dark and cool and quiet but for the snort of a horse and the loud purring of the inn’s cat, which lay curled up on a bale of straw. ‘Having you with me is worse than being shot at,’ he said savagely. ‘At least in battle I can shoot back.’ He pulled her into his arms, holding her tightly against him and crushing her mouth with his, filling her traitorous body with an unbearable yearning. She felt herself melting into him, wanting more.

  She tore herself away at last, and stood facing him, nostrils flaring and hands shaking. ‘I suppose that is your idea of shooting back,’ she said, close to tears. ‘I can tell you now, I will not endure it.’

  ‘No?’ His smile was crooked. ‘Then why are you still here? Why do you continue to haunt me?’

  ‘I…’ She stopped. She could not tell him that ever since the battle she had been filled with a terrible fear of losing him, that wherever he went, what
ever he did, she wanted to be at his side. She had never felt like that about Tom or Philippe; this was new and both terrifying and exhilarating. If it had not been for meeting Rufus Whitely, she could have been happy, but now her mind and emotions were at loggerheads and she was thoroughly confused.

  ‘What are you up to, Olivia?’

  ‘Up to?’

  ‘Yes. What were you talking about?’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Just now. You and that…’ he paused to moderate his voice ‘…that dandy in the frock-coat and top hat.’ He took her shoulders in his hands as if he would like to shake her, but instead he held her away from him to look into her eyes, confusing her more than ever. ‘What did he say about me?’

  ‘Why should he say anything about you? Do you know him?’

  ‘I know him.’ He laughed grimly. ‘Whatever he said his name was, I can tell you it is Rufus Whitely, Captain Rufus Whitely, a British officer. I suppose he has been captured, caught out enjoying himself and not on the field of battle, by the looks of it.’ She realised he was referring to Mr Whitely’s civilian dress. ‘Of all the ill-luck.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, seizing on the explanation he had inadvertently given her. ‘It is unfortunate to be captured, but better than being killed and,’ she added with heavy emphasis, ‘especially being wounded by your own people.’

  ‘I was thrown when Thor was startled.’ He laughed. ‘My wound, such as it is, was caused by falling against a tree. And I was referring to my own bad luck in running into that blackguard, not his.’

  ‘Why should his being captured be bad for you?’ she asked warily, surprised that he should admit to being thrown. ‘He won’t betray you.’

  ‘No?’ His cynical smiled spoiled his normally handsome features. ‘I fully expect him to do just that.’