by Nancy Butler
“What happened then?”
“Prison,” he said simply. “French prison. Which means maggoty bread and foul water, beatings and whippings. The injured soldiers were not tended, not given any doctoring except what I could supply.”
She drew a sharp breath. “That’s inhuman.”
With a shrug he continued, “They have no reason to love us, the French. I daresay we treat our prisoners no better. Though I pray that will change someday.”
“How long were you there?”
“Nearly six months. Many of the men died in that time.”
Diana heard the chilling emptiness in his tone. “How is it you were able to get free?”
“I bribed a guard, and he allowed me to escape with the remainder of my men.”
“Bribed him? How? I would guess you had no money.”
“The guard had a family living nearby. One of his children was dying from typhus—it was rife in both the prison and the town. I told him I would nurse his little girl if he would arrange an escape for my men. He’d seen me caring for the soldiers who were stricken with the disease and thought I was a physician.”
“Did you cure her?” she asked, already knowing the answer in her heart.
“I got her through the worst of it. She was young and had not been weakened by starvation and abuse as my men had. She survived, and afterward the guard engineered our escape. I speak passable French and so we managed to get to the coast. I contacted a smuggler in Dieppe, and he carried us to Dover.”
“What a relief it must have been for you, to be home again.”
He shook his head slowly. “I was not the same man who had left England three and a half years earlier. The time in prison had worn down my reserves. I was still in shock, I suppose. I had managed to save a young girl, but had lost every one of my friends from the regiment. One by one, those gallant souls succumbed to the deprivations of that vile place. After I returned, I discovered why my well-born friends had not been paroled, as is customary with wealthy soldiers taken in battle—it was mistakenly reported that they had died in the fighting. That damned mistake was the final straw for me…the final straw.”
Diana’s heart twisted at the hollow despair in his voice. He had done all in his power to save his men, and had even managed to get the survivors back to England. But it was clear from his tone that he gave himself little credit for his deeds. On the contrary, he seemed full of self-loathing.
“What of the storms, Romulus?” she coaxed gently.
“Ah, yes. The storms that turn me into a madman.” His voice lowered. “The whole time I was in prison, I heard the cannons from that last battle, booming in my head. Over and over. Day and night. It was a death knell, Allegra. I knew I should have died there in that prison…with my friends. That’s what the guns were saying, ‘You. You. It should have been you.’ ”
Diana leaned from the sofa to reach for his hand. “And that is why the storms drive you into a frenzy? Because the thunder sounds like artillery fire?”
“Bloody foolish, isn’t it?” He tugged his hand back from her. “I’ve gotten over the worst of it. But when Lady Hamish found me in the hospital, I was a broken man. I couldn’t sleep, could barely eat. I still don’t understand how she could have offered employment to such a creature. And it’s no wonder the people of Treypenny thought I was deranged.” He added in a distant voice, “Sometimes I’m not sure they’re far off.”
“Don’t they know about what you did in the war?”
“Why should they care?” he muttered.
She slid off the sofa and went to stand before him. He looked past her, out the rain-dappled panes of the window. Diana grit her teeth. “Because you are a hero, that’s why. What sort of father did you have, who never taught you to be proud of yourself? For being courageous and strong. For helping others when they needed you.” When he made no reply, she flung away from him in frustration. “I think you must be daft,” she snapped over her shoulder. “If you can’t see those things.”
“Eleven men died, Allegra.”
“And how many lived?”
“Eight,” he said. “Only eight.”
“I wager those men don’t think ‘only’ anything. Or their families, either. And there was the little girl you saved. And Niall…and me. There, that’s evened the score, hasn’t it? Eleven lost. Eleven saved.”
Romulus made no comment. Diana returned to him and twined her arms around his shoulders. She could feel him trembling under her hands. “You were a captain,” she said softly. “You probably watched men die under your command in every battle.”
“True enough,” he whispered hoarsely.
“And yet you don’t blame yourself for those deaths. The men in prison with you were soldiers, Rom. They took a risk every time they marched into the field, the risk of being killed outright or of being captured and dying in prison.”
“It’s not the same thing!” he snarled.
“It is exactly the same thing!” she stormed back, pummeling his chest with her fists. It felt like granite beneath her hands. “I’m sorry your friends died, Romulus,” she cried hoarsely. “But you can’t spend the rest of your life regretting something you couldn’t prevent.”
She recalled the bleak anguish that had dulled his eyes when he’d killed the injured swan. Another failure, another unendurable loss. She knew then why keeping the swans safe had become almost an obsession with him. The brave, aristocratic young men had died, and Romulus saw protecting the swans as some means of reparation—preserving their elegant beauty for a world he could never be part of.
“It should have been me.” He repeated in a disembodied voice. “They had everything to live for.”
Diana cried out fiercely, “No, you have everything to live for. Oh, but you don’t want to be healed, do you? You’d rather hideaway on this island, letting your guilt destroy you, while you shut out the rest of the world. It’s a convenient place to escape to, isn’t it?”
“You should know,” he answered tersely.
She stiffened and stepped back. “No, I’m not here to escape. I stayed on until I could make a decision. Because, like you, I had a tear in my soul. A small one, I grant, compared to yours. But you fixed it, Rom. It is completely healed. And now I know what I must do.”
“Then I congratulate you,” he said in a cutting voice as he moved away from her. “And if you have any wisdom at all, you will heed what I have told you tonight. There are some wounds that are beyond healing. Some forms of madness that never go away.”
“I refuse to believe that,” she said heatedly.
“It doesn’t matter what you believe. I know it to be true. Now I am for my bed. All this melodrama has worn me down.” He brushed past her.
“What of the cygnets?” she called out, recalling the mission that had sent her from her room. Perhaps caring for the chicks would distract him from his pain. “They’re still outside—in the rain.”
He stopped and turned. “They’re swans, for God’s sake. Try to use your head once in a while, Allegra.” Then he went purposefully from the room, finding his way in the dark like a cat.
Diana sank down into a chair. Her heart was weighted with sadness. She had gotten what she wanted, it appeared—a genuine hero. But one who thought himself completely unworthy of the title.
His story explained so many of the contradictory things about him. He was not a laborer by trade, after all, but had been an officer in Wellington’s army, a man of stature and consequence, He had gone to university—which accounted for his refined speech and his appreciation of literature. And his painful recounting of his stay in the French prison gave her a complete understanding of why he was so loath to put another man behind bars, even one as detestable as Argie Beasle.
He had come to the island under Lady Hamish’s patronage, not as a hireling, but to be healed. It was clear the river had worked its magic on Rom’s broken body and his shattered nerves, but Diana feared it had done little to mend his soul. Not in the deep, da
rk places where self-recrimination and guilt resided.
She saw the glint of his flask lying on the open panel of the desk. Maybe if she drank herself into a stupor she could forget the searing pain she’d seen in his eyes, visible even in the darkness, as he’d told her his version of the story—the one where he thought himself culpable for so many deaths. If there was any justice in the world, she thought as she tipped the flask up to her mouth, one day he would believe her version. And then he might truly begin to heal.
Chapter 8
Diana awoke with a raging headache. Not that it was anyone’s fault but her own. She had stayed in the sitting room after Romulus stalked out, finishing off the contents of his flask.
She climbed from her bed and dragged on her clothing with slow, studied movements. The house was quiet as she tiptoed into the kitchen. Romulus was gone, his rucksack missing from its peg in the corner. Diana set the kettle on the hob for tea, and then eased herself gingerly onto a stool.
She had made a decision last night, before the brandy addled her wits—she was not leaving on Monday. This island was where she belonged. It was her home. Somehow she had to convince Rom of that.
She was still gnawing at the problem when Niall came bounding up the back steps, whistling his usual tune. “No!” she cried out as he started to slam the door behind him. It was too late. It thundered home and she put her hands over her ears to shut out the booming noise.
Niall eyed her with a wry grin. “Been having a night of it, then?”
She nodded. “I drank too much wine with dinner. I…I don’t think lessons are a possibility today.”
He pulled up a stool. “I can’t stay long. I only came to tell you we’re having a celebration tonight. The Yorricks have won their court case and have promised we can camp on their land as long as we like.”
“That’s nice,” she remarked halfheartedly.
“I…. I was wondering if you wanted to come?” Diana raised her head off her hands. “Me? Romulus doesn’t even allow me near the river by daylight. I doubt he would let me traipse over to Treypenny.”
“It’s not till evening, our celebration. It was just a thought. He’s invited, too, of course.”
“I’ll tell him,” she said. “But you know Mr. Starch and Vinegar. No amusements for him.”
“You two have had a row, haven’t you?” Niall was moving to ward off the kettle’s whistle before it sent Diana cowering under the table. “It was only a matter of time.”
“What do you mean?”
Niall grinned over his shoulder. “I told you…he’s prickly. And it must be playing fast and loose with his conscience to be keeping you here.”
“What?” Her voice had gone suddenly cold.
The boy bit at his lip and looked alarmed for an instant. Then a smile eased over his face. “It’s nothing. I was just rambling. Where does he keep the teacups?”
Diana was still looking at him with sullen suspicion. “Niall…?”
He shrugged. “Don’t pay me any mind. More hair than brains, my granty says. Here, drink your tea and you’ll feel worlds better. Now I’ve got to be off.” He turned for the door. “Oh, one more thing. I’ve got an important message for Romulus. You might want to write it down.”
“I believe I can remember it,” she said as she laid her head on her crossed arms, and closed her eyes.
He gazed at her lowered head with great skepticism. She looked like she was still fairly jugbit. “Suit yourself. Tell him Argie Beasle has been out on the river with Wald Chipping. Thick as thieves they are. But that’s not the worst of it—the Yorrick’s boatman swears he saw Argie on the island.”
Tell me something I don’t know, Diana remarked to herself. “Yes,” she said aloud. “I’ll remember.”
“And don’t forget the celebration,” he called from the top step. “My granty’s perishing to meet you.”
Niall closed the door noiselessly on his way out, which was a small blessing. It was balanced, however, by the curiously provocative statement he had made about Romulus. What had given Niall the idea that Rom was feeling guilty for keeping her on the island? She was the one who kept refusing to leave. And after last night’s wrenching revelation, she had no doubt that he wanted to see the back of her as soon as possible. He hadn’t yet discovered how stubborn a Yorkshirewoman could be. But he would.
Diana spent the early part of the afternoon floating in the punt, waiting for her headache to subside. It was midafternoon when she returned to take the cygnets to the pond. They were feeding themselves now on the grass in the pen, and when they weren’t eating, they terrorized the heron on the other side of the partition, leaping up and peeping furiously against the netting.
As she led them along the path, she kept a watchful eye out for the river rat. As a precaution, she had taken Rom’s walking staff from beside the door. And she had every intention of using it on an intruder.
The storm had driven away the fierce heat and the breeze which blew over the island had grown almost chilly. She would need to expand her wardrobe if she stayed on the island. A warm cashmere shawl would be her first purchase. If she’d had any money, that was. It occurred to her that James’s handsome dowry would be quickly rescinded when he learned of her intentions to live with a red-haired madman.
Romulus found her reclining on her favorite pondside rock, half asleep in the sun.
“Allegra,” he said softly.
She stirred and then sat up. “Hello,” she said, blinking several times. At least he was speaking to her. That was something. But his face still appeared taut and strained.
“Are you preparing to repel a French invasion?” He prodded the walking staff with the toe of his boot. “You may be carrying this guardian of the cygnets business a bit far.”
“I saw a fox,” she lied blithely. “Over there.” She pointed to the far end of the pond.
“That’s odd,” he said frowning. “In ten months here, I’ve never seen a single fox.”
“Maybe he swam over,” she offered helpfully.
He gazed out over the pond. “Then we’d best keep them inside tonight. To be on the safe side.”
Diana rose and dusted off her skirt. Together they led the cygnets back to the house and settled them in their crates. As Rom closed the door, she said matter-of-factly, “Niall left a message for you this morning.”
Rom’s eyes narrowed. “Yes?” He drew the single syllable out.
“The Yorricks have won their case against the Talbots, so tonight the Gypsies are having a celebration.” She stopped to weigh her next words. She was torn between her desire to visit the Gypsy camp and the fear that Niall would surely tell Rom about Argie if they met up with him at the gathering. Finally she said haltingly, “He thought you might like to go there.”
“Me?” Romulus frowned. “What business would I have at a Gypsy gathering?”
“It’s not just the Gypsies. The Yorrick servants will be there, as well. Niall invited me, you see.”
“Oh, I do indeed see.”
“Don’t get on your high ropes, Rom. I have never been to a gypsy camp. I thought it might be amusing.”
His eyes darkened. “Foolishness, is more like it. And was that the only message Niall gave you?”
Diana gazed back at him with sudden disquiet. “Wh-what else would there be?”
Romulus uttered a weary sigh. “This,” he said, pulling a tattered sheet of paper from his coat pocket. He handed it to her. “I found it down by the slip.”
The message was scrawled in black crayon on a receipt from the general store in Treypenny. “rom,” it read, “wld an argy ar wachng yu. argy has bin on th eyland. i tuld alegra, but she dint rite it dwn. nial”
Drat the boy, Allegra groaned to herself. Niall had properly let the cat out of the bag now.
She let the paper drop from her fingers. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you—it didn’t seem—important.”
He gave her a withering look. “You didn’t tell me because you knew how
I would react to this news.”
“What does it matter if he’s seen me?” she cried. “I’m dressed like a Gypsy…how could he know I’m not just some woman you brought here.”
“I have a feeling Beasle knows exactly who you are.”
“Then why don’t you ask him?” she responded archly.
“I’d rather ask you,” he growled. “Look, Allegra, the time for foolish games and playacting is over. Argie would like nothing better than to make trouble for me. The only way I can prevent that is to send you away.”
She tipped her head back and looked into his green-gold eyes, searching for some sign of regret, some sadness over the fact that he was about to banish her from his life. All she saw was stern intent.
“What if I refuse to go,” she said heatedly. “I am not a coward.”
“Perhaps I am, where you’re concerned. The gypsies can lie for you until the Second Coming, but it won’t save your reputation if Beasle has seen you here.”
She didn’t dare tell him that he most likely already had. And in that case, Rom was the one who was in danger. He’d lose everything that mattered to him if it was discovered that he had sheltered her. Could she ask him to venture so much? He needed to remain here, she’d seen that last night. He still had a great deal of healing to do, healing that would not occur if he was sent away from the island in disgrace.
“Well?” he said gently. “Will you go peacefully or will I have to truss you up like a Christmas goose?”
“I don’t want to make trouble for you,” she said with a sigh. “But I am so afraid of losing this haven.”
He looked down at her as he rubbed one finger over his upper lip. There was a softening in his eyes then, the hard determination replaced by a gleam of compassion. “Then there’s something you need to see.”
