Opposite him at the edge of the firelight stood four new figures—Lieutenant O’Brian with Mrs. Kent on his arm, and Lieutenant Montmorency, escorting her. Mrs. Arrington’s lips were parted, her eyes shone like a cat’s, and she stared straight at him.
“That’s beautiful, Sergeant,” Flaherty said. “But what does it mean?”
Montmorency spoke before Will could find his voice. “It means,” he said with a slight sneer, “that the poet loved a lady above his deserts, and soon they both regretted it.”
Flaherty looked to Will inquiringly. “Something like that, yes,” he admitted.
“Do read another, Sergeant,” Mrs. Kent said. “I should like to hear the one about the marriage of true minds.”
“Yes, ma’am.” At that moment he wished himself, not illiterate exactly, but one of those slow, stumbling readers no one ever begged to read aloud. But there was no good way to refuse, so he found the correct page and began. “Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments.” He didn’t dare look up from the book as he read. If Mrs. Arrington watched him, he didn’t want to know it. He stumbled a little over the last lines. “Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, But bears it out even to the edge of doom. If this be error and upon me proved, I never writ, nor no man ever loved.”
He snapped the book shut, hoping that Mrs. Kent and everyone else around would take the hint that he was ready to have done.
“Bravo, Sergeant,” Mrs. Kent said. “Very well read indeed.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” he said, striving for the proper deferential tone. Mrs. Arrington had separated herself from Montmorency and stood on the other side of Mrs. Kent, her eyes fixed on some unseen point.
“Another early day tomorrow,” Lieutenant O’Brian said. “We’d best turn in.”
In the general bustle that followed, the ladies were the first to disappear behind the walls of their tent.
***
Neither Anna nor Mrs. Kent had brought a maid—Beatriz had been absorbed into Alec and Helen’s household—so the ladies helped each other dress. Anna found Mrs. Kent a reasonably congenial traveling companion for such awkward circumstances, though she was obliged to submit to being fussed over more than she liked. She was the same age as Mrs. Kent’s eldest daughter, so she supposed the motherly concern was unavoidable.
“That Sergeant Atkins must be rather clever,” Mrs. Kent said as Anna undid the laces of her stays for her. “He reads as well as many a gentleman, though of course no one could mistake him for one with that accent. Such a dreadful r!”
Anna forced herself to keep working without the slightest pause. “I daresay he spent a few years in some village school,” she said, “and as for being clever, I’ve never observed any correlation between rank and intelligence. At least, I’ve met a great many stupid gentlemen.”
“All too true, my dear. Speaking of gentlemen, what do you think of young Lieutenant Montmorency?”
“I was furious with him for telling that soldier what the sonnet meant. The question was meant for Sergeant Atkins, and it was rude to answer for him.” Anna spoke with more passion than she’d intended and hoped Mrs. Kent wouldn’t notice.
Now that her stays were unlaced, Mrs. Kent slipped them off her shoulders and set them neatly atop her trunk. “Turn around, my dear, and I’ll see to your buttons.” Anna obeyed. “I agree,” Mrs. Kent said, much to Anna’s surprise. “A newly arrived lieutenant ought to have the sense to cultivate his company’s NCO’s, not snub them. His actions violated both common sense and common courtesy, and on the whole I find I cannot like him.”
“Nor can I, ma’am.” She stepped out of her black bombazine dress and tossed it onto her cot.
“I think he could like you very well indeed, however,” Mrs. Kent said as she helped Anna unlace her stays.
Anna gritted her teeth. Today Lieutenant Montmorency had traded obsequious fawning for thinly veiled contempt, undoubtedly fueled by his suspicions of her and Sergeant Atkins. “I’m not so sure about that, ma’am. And if he did, it would avail him nothing.”
“I’m delighted to hear you say so, my child. I always think it unbecoming when a lady fails to observe the mourning period, no matter her situation. One can understand it with soldiers’ widows—most of them have no good home to return to and no money to get there, so taking another husband immediately is their best choice. But for you, it would be insupportable.”
“Indeed, ma’am, there’s been gossip enough already,” she replied absently as she pulled her nightdress over her head. To think, if Sebastian had been an enlisted man and she an ordinary sort of woman, she could marry Sergeant Atkins today and no one would bat an eyelash. If anything, her friends would congratulate her on her luck, for what better match could a soldier’s widow aspire to than a sergeant from a highly regarded regiment? This very night she could be sharing his bed—well, his bedroll. Though the night was warm, she shivered. Sleep would again prove elusive.
Mrs. Kent, blessedly oblivious to Anna’s turmoil, continued to prose on about Lieutenant Montmorency. “And even were it not so soon, I should hate to see you throw yourself away on such a man, without a penny to bless himself with.”
“I assure you, ma’am, if I ever remarry, I shall take care to choose a gentleman who cannot be suspected of using me to advance his career.” She folded her dress and put it away, snapping her trunk’s lid shut.
“That’s very wise of you, my dear.”
Anna took far more care than was necessary over arranging the blankets on her cot, the better to avoid Mrs. Kent’s too shrewd, too sympathetic eyes. Why did Sebastian have to die in such a shameful fashion? She couldn’t regret her freedom, but if only he’d managed to get himself killed in battle or from some fever or accident, everyone would have treated her as an ordinary widow, subject to no more than the ordinary allotment of pity and curiosity. She could’ve borne that easily enough.
The ladies bid each other good night, and Mrs. Kent put out the candle. Anna tossed and turned long into the night as she recalled Sergeant Atkins’s voice as he read that sonnet.
Nothing more could be allowed to happen between them. But it was a consolation, and a powerful one, to know that staying apart was just as difficult for him as it was for her.
Chapter Six
The third day passed uneventfully, and the fourth promised equal tedium. As the sun climbed through the morning sky, Anna rode her donkey to the front of the wagon column. She told herself it was to keep the dust kicked up by the wagon wheels and the soldiers’ feet from abrading her eyes or sticking to her perspiration-drenched skin, but it also put her in a position to admire Sergeant Atkins as he marched with the vanguard.
As noon approached, they rode into a broad valley. It was rocky land with no sign of habitation, and a steep bluff arose to their right. Anna was startled by pounding footsteps approaching along the road ahead. She looked up and saw the two riflemen who had been sent ahead as scouts returning as fast as they could run.
“Frogs! Frogs!” one shouted.
“Coming this way!” the other said as they skidded to a halt in front of Lieutenant O’Brian and the two sergeants.
Anna gasped. Their entire route was supposed to be in British hands. Where had the French come from? She was close enough to hear everything the soldiers said, so she leaned forward and listened anxiously.
“Bloody hell!” Lieutenant O’Brian removed his hat and raked a hand through his sweat-soaked dark hair.
“How many and what kind?” Sergeant Atkins asked.
“About five hundred, all infantry,” the first private answered.
“Did they see you?”
“I think they might’ve.” The second soldier rocked back on his heels and exhaled anxiously.
“Don’t worry, McGowan,” Lieutenant O’Brian said. “If they’re on this road, we can’t help blundering into each other. How far are they?”
“Five minutes, maybe.”
Anna’s heart pounded. So li
ttle time.
Sergeant Reynolds scratched his head. “Surely they’ll let us pass. What could they want with twenty wagons full of wounded?”
“But what are they doing here in the first place?” Sergeant Atkins asked. “They’re a long way from their army, unless our scouts are all blind fools.”
“That’s just what I’d like to know,” Lieutenant O’Brian said. “But I don’t want a fight, not outnumbered. We’ll parley, and with any luck, be back on our way within the hour. Then tonight I’ll send a rider back to the army to let them know there’s a rogue Frog battalion out here. Meanwhile, we’ll halt the convoy and deploy to defend it, just in case. I wish I spoke French—it’d make this easier. I reckon Montmorency knows it, but he’s with the rear guard.”
Anna had suspected since meeting him that Lieutenant O’Brian was only barely gentleman enough to make an officer, and his lack of French confirmed it. If he’d been highborn, he would’ve learned it in the schoolroom.
As she had. “I speak French,” she heard herself say.
Lieutenant O’Brian and the two sergeants turned to stare at her, then looked at each other consideringly.
“Why not?” Sergeant Reynolds said.
“I’d rather she was safely back in a wagon with the other women,” Lieutenant O’Brian replied.
“She should be safe enough,” Sergeant Reynolds said. “Why would they attack a wounded convoy?”
“The Frogs would never fire upon a woman, sir,” Sergeant Atkins said, “and maybe she can make our purpose clearer and have us on our way sooner.”
The lieutenant studied her, and Anna tried to look calm and competent despite her pounding heart.
“Very well,” he said. “Reynolds, halt the convoy and deploy the men. And send Lieutenant Montmorency forward. Mrs. Arrington, you’ll interpret if he isn’t here in time. Thank you, ma’am.”
She dismounted. Somehow it did not seem dignified to negotiate from the back of a donkey. Slowly she walked forward to stand at the shoulder of the lieutenant’s sturdy dun mare. Sergeant Atkins took up a position just behind her. She glanced over her shoulder at him, and he smiled at her, but it was a solemn expression, full of grave respect.
She was glad of his presence. Never had she been this close to the enemy. Always when Sebastian had fought, he had either been with a scouting expedition or there had been ample warning of impending battle to allow the women and children to get to the rear. Though she was happy to be of use and reasonably confident of her safety—the French and British armies were quite civilized in how they dealt with each other’s wounded and prisoners, violence being reserved for its proper time and place—still she felt a little frightened. Having Sergeant Atkins at her side, rifle at the ready, reassured her.
“What must I say?” she asked.
“Tell them we’re escorting a party of wounded to Lisbon, and all we want is to be on our way,” Lieutenant O’Brian said. “Ask that they let us pass by.”
“You might say we have surgeons and supplies with us, in case they’ve any sick or wounded,” Sergeant Atkins added.
“That’s good,” the lieutenant said. “Can you manage that, ma’am?”
“Yes.” To be sure of it, she began mentally rehearsing, summoning up her rusty schoolgirl French.
They waited in silence a few more minutes. For Anna it was a nervous silence, though Sergeant Atkins and Lieutenant O’Brian seemed quite at their ease.
At length they heard the approach of marching footsteps, and the French column came around a bend and into view. At the head of the marching blue-coated troops rode a pair of officers, one a man of about forty, gaudy in his epaulettes, ribbons and cocked hat, the other a grim-faced man a few years younger.
They halted about thirty paces away. Anna cleared her throat, swallowed and stepped forward to say her piece.
Before she could utter so much as Bon jour, the older French officer looked over his shoulder and lifted a hand.
A single shot rang out and Lieutenant O’Brian toppled in his saddle. His horse reared and screamed.
A body slammed into Anna, throwing her face-first into the road. For a horrified instant she thought it was the dying lieutenant, but as more shots echoed through the valley, the weight lifted off her and she recognized Sergeant Atkins, crouching over her to shield her.
“The stream,” he said in her ear, nearly shouting to make himself heard over the din of musketry. “Take cover. Hurry—but stay down.”
He rolled off her, staying between her and the French column, and together they crawled for the stream—more of a muddy ditch in summer’s drought—that ran alongside the road.
Anna forced down her terror and crawled as fast as she could, cursing her hampering skirts. They reached their sanctuary alive and unbloodied, and Anna half rolled down the bank, heedless of the sticky mud.
Sergeant Atkins scrambled down after her. The banks were about a yard high, and Anna curled herself into a ball to keep her whole body sheltered. But Sergeant Atkins unslung his rifle, knelt with his head and shoulders above the edge and, after what seemed an unconscionably long pause, fired his single shot.
He crouched down again, fully shielded by the bank, and began to reload. “Couldn’t get a clear shot at that colonel,” he said conversationally as he uncapped his powder horn.
Anna blinked at him. He was so steady at his work, and she wondered how he had ever grown accustomed to dealing death and running the risk of meeting his own amid this dreadful noise. The crackle of gunfire, the shouts, the screams, the confusion—if only the noise would stop! Anna shut her eyes and wished she could do the same with her ears.
She started as a gentle hand closed over both her own, tightly clasped around her knees.
“Mrs. Arrington.”
His voice was the calm in the storm that raged about them. She opened her eyes.
“We can’t stay here,” he said. “With Lieutenant O’Brian gone, I’m second-in-command, and Lieutenant Montmorency has never been in battle before.”
She swallowed. “So he may need help.”
“Exactly. I must find him.”
Anna uncurled herself from her protective huddle. “What must I do?”
“Just follow me. We’ll stay down here as long as we can, and we’ll get you back into cover as soon as we can after that. Don’t be afraid. They won’t shoot a woman.”
Anna tried to believe him, but she knew that in the haze of gunpowder smoke she would be merely another human blur, her sex undetectable. But Sergeant Atkins had his duty, and she could not allow her fears to detain him. “Very well. Lead the way.”
He squeezed her hand and leaned closer as if he meant to kiss her, but at the last minute pulled abruptly away.
Even in her terror, Anna was disappointed, and somehow that gave her strength. If she followed him without shirking or slowing him down, he might find cause to consider kissing her again.
He got to his feet, crouching low so that the bank almost concealed him. Anna followed his example and trailed close behind him, holding her skirts up with one hand and bracing herself against the muddy bank for balance with the other.
It was only fifty yards or so to the main body of the convoy, but it felt like a mile. She longed to stop and make herself as small as she could again until the dreadful din at last ceased, but she made herself put one foot in front of the other, doggedly following Sergeant Atkins.
“Will!” A voice rang out above the shouts and screams, the panicked lowing of the oxen, and the crack of musketry.
They looked over the edge of the bank. Sergeant Reynolds beckoned to them from alongside a wagon where he and several other riflemen, including a bugler, had taken up positions. The Portuguese teamster stood exposed at his oxen’s heads, cursing and praying as he endeavored to prevent the beasts from bolting. Wounded men peered out over the wagon’s sides.
Sergeant Atkins slung his rifle over his shoulder, climbed out of the ditch, and extended his hands to help Anna do the same.
They ran toward the wagon. Anna let out a squeak, though she managed not to scream, when a musket ball just missed them, hitting the plank side of the wagon with a thud.
He motioned for her to crouch down among the little clump of riflemen. She did so, and they shifted until she was surrounded by green-clad soldiers.
“How does it look, Dan?” he asked.
“Not good. Montmorency is down—he’ll live, but he hit his head when he fell, so he’s out cold. We’re better shots, but there’s so many of them, and they just keep coming.”
Sergeant Atkins nodded. “They don’t seem minded to go away now that we’ve bloodied their noses a bit, do they?”
Sergeant Reynolds fired toward a clump of French soldiers on the opposite side of the stream, then began to reload. “I don’t understand why they attacked us in the first place!” he exclaimed, giving voice to Anna’s thoughts. “Surely they can see we’re a wounded convoy.”
“Neither do I,” Sergeant Atkins said. “But I’m afraid we’ve no choice but to surrender, and hope they play by the rules for prisoners, at least.”
“Better than being picked off one by one,” Sergeant Reynolds agreed. The decision made, it was only a matter of finding a shirt to use as a white flag and sounding the bugle call for surrender.
After a moment’s confusion and a shouted argument in French that Anna couldn’t decipher, the noise of battle ceased. The riflemen waited. The two sergeants stood in front, and Anna stood at Sergeant Atkins’s shoulder because she felt safer there.
A few ladies of her acquaintance had been briefly held prisoner by the French last year, and they had told her the tale as ballroom gossip in winter quarters. They had talked of it as a lark—the French officers had treated them with courtly gallantry and sent them back to their own people as soon as it could be arranged. If only Anna could feel certain she would meet with the same treatment. But these particular Frenchmen had broken protocol by firing upon them in the first place. Could she trust them to behave honorably?
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