by Mary Balogh
He moved to her side and set his arms about her. She snuggled into him and sighed.
“Joana,” he said, “we ought not to have started this.”
But she lifted her head sharply and kissed him on the mouth. “There is no such thing as reality before dawn,” she said. “No such thing at all, Robert. You must not spoil this night. Oh, please, you must not.”
But it was spoiled nonetheless. For somewhere not far behind the pretense was the reality. A reality that was perhaps not painful for her, for reality for her was an artificial world where she piled up conquests for her own amusement. But for him reality was going to be painful indeed.
“Reality?” he said against her mouth. “What is that?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “I have never heard of it. Robert?”
“Mm?” he said.
“Will you give me the sunrise tomorrow?” She lifted a hand and set it over his mouth. “Don’t you remember at Obidos? What you said about ribbons and stars and the sunrise?”
Yes, he remembered. God, he remembered.
She should not have asked that question. She closed her eyes and buried her face against his chest. She should not have asked. Because the ribbons and stars and sunrise were what he would give his love, and his answer could bring her pain. Oh, Robert, she pleaded with him silently, please give me the sunrise. Please give me the sunrise.
But she knew he could not. And she knew she had spoiled the night for herself.
“The sunrise comes after the dawn,” he said quietly, and his hand smoothed over her head.
“And so it does.” She lifted her head and smiled at him. “But what comes before dawn, Robert? Anything else? Or have I succeeded in exhausting you already?”
* * *
A great deal came before dawn. They loved and dozed and loved and dozed. And each privately gloried in their love and each privately grieved at the imminence of dawn. And finally they lay together, passion spent, waiting for the moment when daylight would begin to gray the windows and there would be nothing to do but get up and dress themselves and resume their roles as jailer and prisoner.
She might have pleaded with him and tried to persuade him of the truth. It would not have been impossible, she believed. But she would not do it. Dawn had still not come and she was jealous of their one night of love. It was he who finally spoke.
“Joana,” he said, one arm beneath her head, his hand playing with her hair. “That first love of yours?”
“Robert?” She smiled and turned her head to him. “Is it not a coincidence that you have the same name?”
“Not really,” he said. “Joana, he did not boast to the servants about you. He did not call you a French bitch—not at that time, anyway.”
She looked at him and frowned slightly. “You think not?” she said. “I don’t think so either.”
“He loved you totally,” he said, “as perhaps only a seventeen-year-old can. He did not lie when he said he loved you, though he did not want to say it aloud. And he did not lie when he said he would come for you on a white charger on your eighteenth birthday and ride off into the sunrise with you. I suppose he knew he would never do any such thing, but he spoke the heart’s truth. That is what he passionately wished he could do.”
She was staring at him in the near-darkness, wide-eyed.
“If he is precious to your memory,” he said, “then know that the memory can be unsullied. If you have ever harbored doubts, however faint, you can discard them. He did not do those things.”
Still she said nothing.
“He was deeply hurt,” he said, “at being told that you would never seriously have given your love and your troth to a bastard. Even though he knew your words to be true, he was hurt. And hurt by his father’s laughter that he had dared raise his eyes to the daughter of a count. He decided on that day that he would never again lay himself open to people’s contempt. He decided to make his own way in life, starting at the bottom and ending there too if he could not raise himself up by his own efforts. He has not done badly. You can console yourself with that knowledge, Joana, if he is still of any importance to you. Your Robert is well-satisfied with what he has done with his life. There was no smallpox, you see. He did not die—at least, not yet.”
“He had his mother’s name,” she said, “not his father’s.” She was whispering as if she thought they might have been overheard. “What was it? What was his mother’s name?”
“Blake,” he said. “Her name was Blake.” He closed his eyes.
The silence seemed to stretch forever.
“Robert,” she said at last, and he hardly recognized her voice. It sounded lost, hurt. “Ah, Robert.”
“It was a long time ago,” he said. “A very long time. He is a different person, Joana, except in name. And you are a different person. It was all so long ago. Way back in the age of innocence. But he is alive. And he did love you.”
“Ah, Robert,” she said again. And there was such pain in her voice that he could think of no way of comforting her.
They lay waiting for the dawn in silence.
24
“JOAQUINA gave it to me,” Carlota said, setting the large and battered gun down carefully in a corner. “She said she would never have the courage to use it, and I said I would, and so she gave it tome. Don’t laugh at me, Duarte. Anything but that. Don’t laugh at me.”
Duarte laughed. “It must surely be one of the first guns ever made,” he said. “You would probably blow yourself to bits with it, Carlota, if you ever fired it. So you chose to stay and fight, did you, instead of running for safety? I must admit I would have been surprised not to find you here when I came.”
“And now you have come,” she said warily, “you are going to try to shoo me off westward with Miguel, aren’t you? But you can forget it, Duarte, and if you are planning to argue, then I am sorry that you came home at all. I have known nothing but boredom and inaction for weeks—though it seems more like months—and now by some good fortune the French have stumbled on this ungodly route to the west. And you expect me to miss the opportunity of a lifetime? You do, don’t you?”
“Carlota—” he began.
“You do,” she said, hands on hips. “Well, I won’t go. I will go up into the hills with you and see what I can do to trouble the army as it passes. And Miguel will come too. This is his country, his birthright, as well as ours. And if you do not like it, then I shall go alone. I shall find another band to which to attach myself. And if you will not provide me with a decent weapon, then I shall take this one and blow myself into a million pieces with my first shot. Stop laughing at me.”
“I love you,” he said, silencing her effectively. “And there is no fight left in me—not for you anyway. Up into the hills we go together, then. Joana has not been this way, you said? Nor Captain Blake? I thought they would have come to warn you.”
“Two dozen men at the very least have come to warn us,” she said. “There have been nothing but warnings. And always the French are at the very heels of those who warn. And yet I have not set eyes on a blue uniform yet.”
“The foolish woman has not told him the truth,” Duarte said. “Or at least she has not insisted that he listen to the truth. She is teasing him with the impression that she is a spy for the French.”
“Yes,” Carlota said, “Joana would tease. Good for her. If that man did not believe her the first time she told him, why should she beg and plead with him?”
“She is his prisoner,” Duarte said with a grin. “I would bet that a jailer has never been so plagued.”
“Ho,” Carlota said, “and what a jailer. I would bet that Joana is enjoying every moment of her captivity.”
“I think she is,” Duarte said. “But if they do come this way, Carlota, we must follow her lead. I believe she does not even know you. She has been accused of flirting with me and trying to take
me away from you.”
“And that handsome Captain Blake is pitying me, I do not doubt,” Carlota said, hands on hips again. “Men! Why must they always assume that women are poor helpless cringing creatures?”
“Probably because they do not all know you or Joana,” he said, still grinning.
The French were still at Viseu, and there were enough men between there and Mortagoa to sound the alarm if they marched unexpectedly early. There was all day in which to pack what must be taken and to destroy what must be left behind. There was no great sense of rush, although a home was to be broken up within twenty-four hours. But then, both Carlota and Duarte had known homes broken far more bitterly just a few years before, and since that time they had lived with impermanence. They felt no great unhappiness on this occasion.
“It is so good to be back with you and our son,” Duarte said, catching Carlota to him at some time during the afternoon. “You cannot imagine, Carlota, how lonely it has been without you.”
“Can I not?” she said, and her voice became indignant. “Oh, can I not indeed?”
But he hugged her and kissed her and refused to quarrel. “We have each other and Miguel,” he said when she finally returned his kisses. “That is all that really matters, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” she said fiercely against his mouth. “And having a country in which to live together freely.”
Captain Blake and Joana arrived late in the afternoon, the former knocking at the open door and peering into the dark, bare interior. Duarte strode to the door and clasped his hand.
“You made it safely this far, then,” he said. “Good. You are only a few miles from Bussaco, where the army is gathered. Did you know?”
“I will be with them tomorrow,” Captain Blake said. “I guessed you would be here, but we came to warn Carlota just in case she had not heard.”
“Had not heard?” Carlota said, raising her eyes to the ceiling, but crossing the room nevertheless to greet their guest. “I have heard nothing else for the past week. I am so delighted that the French have proved stupid enough to come this way that I hardly know how to contain my excitement. I am glad you got safely out of Spain, Captain.”
“With Duarte’s help,” he said, and he stood aside to reveal a smiling Joana. “Do you know the Marquesa das Minas?”
Carlota knew that he was looking at her keenly. “Everyone knows the marquesa,” she said. “Welcome.”
“Carlota?” Joana said, smiling more broadly. “And where is the baby?”
“Miguel?” Carlota said. “Sleeping and quite unperturbed by the fact that his first home is being destroyed around him. Come and see him.”
Joana took a step forward, but she turned first to Duarte before following Carlota into the inner room. “Duarte,” she said, stretching out both hands to his. “How lovely to see you again.”
He grinned at her and squeezed her hands. “Hello, Joana,” he said.
“Is she your sister?” Captain Blake asked abruptly when the women had disappeared to look at the baby.
“Does she say she is my sister?” Duarte grinned.
“Yes.” Captain Blake looked grim. “Half-sister. She says that you have the same mother. Do you?”
“If Joana says it,” Duarte said, “then it must be true, mustn’t it? Would she lie? She must be my sister if she says so—pardon me, my half-sister.”
Captain Blake looked somewhat exasperated. “Very well,” he said. “I’m sorry I asked. What news have you had today?”
“The French are still at Viseu,” Duarte said. “But they will surely move tomorrow, unless they are cowardly enough to turn tail and run. Since they have come this far through impossible country, I think that unlikely. And Lord Wellington has moved all his forces up from south of the Mondego, where they were expecting to do battle. They have such a good position at Bussaco that one almost feels sorry for the French. Almost.” He grinned again. “But not quite.”
“God,” the captain said, “it is so long since I was in an all-out battle. I missed Talavera last year by a day. A forced march from Lisbon in a time that still has people gaping in wonder, and still we missed it by a day.”
“And thereby perhaps you missed your death by one day too,” Duarte said. The women had come back from the inner room. “You will stay here with us tonight? You can have the inner room, Joana. Captain Blake can sleep out here with us.”
Joana smiled dazzlingly. “But I am Robert’s prisoner, remember?” she said. “He is not willing to let me out of his sight for longer than five minutes at a time, especially at night. Are you, Robert? We will share the inner room. Are you outraged, Duarte?” She turned her smile on the captain. “Brothers sometimes are, at such situations.”
“The inner room is yours, then,” Duarte said. “Carlota and I will sleep out here with the baby. Tomorrow we will all leave early. With any luck, some real action will begin tomorrow.”
They sat eating and quietly talking among themselves and with other members of the band and their women who were still at the village, until darkness fell, and then retired to hard beds on the floor.
“Duarte,” Carlota whispered, curling up close to him after she had soothed a fussing baby, “did you see her? Did you see Joana?”
“I have not had my eyes closed all day,” he said. “I would say that those who worship the Marquesa das Minas would simply not recognize her now. A dress more faded and ragged than ever. Hair tangled and unkempt. Skin bronzed like a peasant’s. That unladylike stride.”
“Oh, yes, yes,” she said impatiently. “But I meant her, Duarte. Her eyes. It has finally happened to her, hasn’t it? I always said it would one day.”
“I would say they are certainly lovers,” he said. “They would both have to be made of stone not to be, since it seems they are compelled to spend their nights together.”
“Oh, not just lovers, you fool,” she said. “She loves him, Duarte. She worships him. It is there in her face for all the world to see. Joana has never loved anyone, for all her hordes of worshipers.”
“Yes,” he said, “I see it too, Carlota. And the same look in his face, for that matter, hard and disciplined as it is. But it will not do, you know. She is an aristocrat both by birth and by marriage. He is apparently a nobody and has made the army his career. They are from two worlds that can never meet, except briefly and under strange circumstances like this.”
“Oh, fool,” Carlota said. “Idiot. Men can be so stupid. As if such things matter when the heart is involved. You are a nobleman and I am a doctor’s daughter. Does the difference keep us apart? Or perhaps you don’t intend to marry me after all.”
“You must admit,” he said, “that the difference between us is somewhat less extreme than that between them. And I intend to be married by the very next priest we encounter—whether you like it or not.”
“Well,” she said, “I will think about it. Are you intending to spend our first night together since I-don’t-remember-when talking?”
“Not I,” he said, turning toward her. “Talk on if you wish, Carlota, but I have better things to do.”
“I too,” she said. “I have missed you.”
“Mm,” he said. “Show me how much.”
* * *
The high ridge of Bussaco ran ten miles northward from the great perpendicular cliff rising from the Mondego River. Its top was bare apart from some heather and spiky aloes and the occasional pine tree, and apart from a few stone windmills and the Convent of Bussaco, two miles from its northern end.
Viscount Wellington had taken up quarters at the convent, together with his staff. The two armies under his command, the British and the Portuguese, were strung out in a somewhat thin line across the entire ten miles of the ridge.
But the apparent weakness of the lines was deceptive. They were on top of the heights, or, to be more accurate, beyond the top, out of sight
of anyone approaching from the east. There would be no way of an advancing French army knowing for sure that they were there or of estimating their exact position or numbers. And the French now had no other way of advancing westward and ultimately southward to Lisbon. Their way lay over the ridge of Bussaco.
And finally Massena and his army were on the move. On September 25 they passed through Mortagoa, only eight miles from Bussaco.
Somehow, Joana thought, trudging after Captain Blake over the rugged and wooded country below Bussaco on that same day, the news had filtered through. They met few people between Mortagoa and Bussaco, but all those people knew that the French had left Viseu, that the battle would take place very soon, perhaps even the next day.
She was feeling unaccountably depressed. They were nearing the English and relative safety. Soon, before the day was out, she would be back where she had started from, reporting success to Viscount Wellington, the Marquesa das Minas again. Matilda would be waiting for her, she would wager, or at least would have made some arrangements for her comfort. The following day, while the battle was being fought, she could be making her way farther back into safety. And it would be safety—she knew about the Lines of Torres Vedras.
She had nothing to feel depressed about. But of course she did. Did she hope to fool herself by claiming that she was unaccountably depressed? Of course she was depressed.
Captain Blake turned back to look at her. “You are all right, Joana?” he asked.
She smiled brightly at him. “Am I likely to complain of blisters or fatigue at this late date?” she asked.
But he did not walk on as he had done after several similar stops that day. “Joana,” he said, “it is possible to respect and even to admire an enemy, you know. I respect you and admire you. You have an indomitable spirit.”
“Ah,” she said, “but I am not an enemy, Robert.”
