“I’m sorry, Alex,” Catherine cried softly. “We didn’t know what else to do, where else to go to feel safe.”
Alex drew her gently into his arms. Safe? He could have cursed the word for mocking him so. Safe?
“Corporal Peters—” His eyes sought the young officer over the top of Catherine’s head. “For what you have risked and everything you have done for my wife and for Mrs. MacKail, you have my deepest thanks and my humblest apologies. If there is anything—anything I can do to repay you—please let me know.”
“Your … wife, sir? But—” Peters frowned and some of the rigid army discipline deserted him. “B-but I thought … I mean, they told me Mr. Montgomery was a merchant …”
Catherine disengaged herself from Alex’s arms and turned to the bewildered corporal. “I’m sorry for lying to you, after all you have done. I just was not sure what your reaction would be if you knew my husband’s true identity. And my name is Cameron. Mrs. Alexander Cameron.”
Corporal Peters returned her weak smile and was about to offer the same to Alex when he seemed to notice for the first time the jet-black hair, the massive shoulders, the power and authority rippling through every muscle, echoing in every word. “Jesus H. Christ on a stick,” he muttered slowly. “You’re him, aren’t you! You’re the one they call the Dark Cameron!”
“Alexander will do. Alex, if you prefer.” Wrapping an arm protectively around Catherine’s waist, he thrust his other hand out toward the corporal. It took an additional moment or two for Peters to acknowledge the gesture, then to wipe the dampness from his palm and accept the offered handshake.
“I’m honored, sir. And indeed, there is something you can do for me: You can honor me further by personally accepting my sword in surrender.”
Alex started to protest, but the corporal’s grin cut him short. “Please, sir. My father has been drinking secret toasts to the ‘king over the water’ for the past forty years. I guess I just didn’t think I had the guts to join you before, but … well, now that I’m here, and … and … well …”
Alex shook his head. “In case you haven’t been listening to your own dispatches, Corporal, we’re in retreat. You may be picking the wrong time to change sides.”
“I don’t think so, sir. If Mrs. Mon—Mrs. Cameron has enough faith to join you, I cannot see any mistakes being made at all.”
Alex’s smile slipped. He glanced down at Catherine and felt a resurgence of anger boil into his blood again, only this time it was solely for his own inadequacy as a husband and protector. She was standing firm, putting up a brave enough front, but most of her weight was trusted to the arm he had around her waist. Her head was leaning gratefully on his shoulder, and she seemed unaware of the people around her.
“Alex?” Aluinn dragged his attention away. “Do you want me to find Archibald?”
“What?”
“Archibald,” Aluinn repeated the question gently. “Do you want me to fetch him?”
Alex suffered another severe jolt as his focus reverted to the bruises on Catherine’s cheek and throat. Those were only the ones he could see; there were sure to be others, possibly even more devastating.
“Deirdre?”
She could read the question and the fear in the dark sapphire eyes and she shook her head. “No, sir, he didn’t hurt her … not that way. I think she’ll be all right, now that she’s here with you. She’s exhausted, to be sure, and I don’t know how she managed to stay in a saddle as long as she did, but a few good hours of sleep should work wonders.”
Alex nodded and smiled his thanks. It was the Italian, Count Fanducci, a silent observer up until now, who took a cue from the way Alex tightened his arm around his wife and stepped out of the shadows to deliver a devastatingly well-executed bow in Catherine’s honor.
“Signora Camerone! A very brave-a lady. If there is anything I, Giovanni Alphonso Fanducci, can do for either of-a you beautiful ladies, you joost-a snap-a you fingers, si? But for now, we leave-a you alone. Come, come!” He flicked his hands to indicate everyone should share his fine sense of timing and vacate the tent. “I’m-a personally posting the guard outside so no one is disturbed, si?”
Aluinn did not need to be told twice to take his tearful wife into his arms and lead her out of the tent to seek their own. MacSorley crammed his blue woolen bonnet on his head and offered a final, muttered curse to the British army, then clamped an almost friendly hand on the corporal’s shoulder and ushered him out into the crisp, dark night air, the count following close on their heels.
Alone, Alex surrendered to the overwhelming need to circle his arms around his wife and bury his lips in the damp fragrance of her hair. He held her as closely as he dared, aware of the tiny shudders of pain she was doing her best to conceal. Not so easily contained were the tears that began on a stifled sob, swelled in volume and substance until she was crying openly, her fingers clutching the lapels of his coat, her body shaking against his like a leaf in a storm.
“It’s all right,” he murmured. “You’re safe now. You’re with me, Catherine. You’re safe … safe.”
“Alex—” Her eyes swam before him, two enormous pools of glimmering violet and blue and deepest, darkest black. “Please don’t send me away again. Please. I know you are angry with us for coming here, but we had nowhere else to go. Please, Alex, please, I—”
Her pleading whispers drove through his heart like steel spikes. He silenced them beneath his lips and felt a scalding sensation flood his own eyes. “I am not letting you out of my sight again, Catherine, you may count on it. I only hope you can forgive me—”
Once before he had sworn to keep her safe, to keep her sheltered and protected and loved, and a specter by the name of Malcolm Campbell had nearly destroyed them. Alex had sent her to Derby, again to be safe, sheltered, protected, and loved … and God only knew what horrors had been stamped on her mind and body this time. All because of him. Because of him!
“Alex—this wasn’t your fault,” she cried weakly, her hands reaching up to cradle the bronzed cheeks. “None of it was your fault, you mustn’t blame yourself.”
“I am your husband,” he rasped. “Who else should I hold to blame for not shielding you against all of this?”
“Alex … it would have happened regardless of whom I loved and whom I married. It would have happened to anyone who crossed paths with the lieutenant … Deirdre, me, anyone!”
It was a weak platitude at best, and it brought his dark head bending forward. “I am truly damned if I know why you love me, Catherine. I seem to cause you nothing but pain, show you nothing but ugliness and fear and death where you should only be surrounded by beauty and happiness. If I’d known … if I’d had any idea at the outset that any of this was possible, let alone that it could happen—” He shook his head and Catherine’s fingers were there, pressing over the stern lines of his mouth.
“What would you have done about it? Changed who you are? Changed what you believe in? Or perhaps you would have walked away and left me to Hamilton Garner? I asked you once to run away with me, to take me to France or Italy—anywhere as long as we were safe and together. But I doubt I would have loved you a fraction as much if you had turned into a parlor dandy—nor you me, for taking you away from your family, your loyalty, your honor. I believe our love is quite inevitable, my lord, and I give thanks for every moment we are together. You are my love and my life, and I am resigned to accepting whatever that entails, my darling. Quite, quite happily so.”
The long speech drained both her strength and her remaining ability to speak through the bruised chords in her throat. She gave herself to the clouds of darkness swirling gently around her, aware of Alex’s arms there to catch her, to hold her close as he carried her to the narrow cot. The aches and stiffness in her body melted away, taking with them the last traces of the pampered Mistress Catherine Ashbrooke and leaving behind the proud and determined Lady Catherine Cameron.
12
Each town and city the rebels pa
ssed through on the retreat was far less friendly than it had been during the advance. The good citizens of Manchester, for one, gathered in mobs and threw stones. In lieu of having his men return fire, the prince levied a hefty fine on the city, although with Cumberland’s vanguard closing fast, there was not enough time to collect it. The pursuing forces entered the English town of Preston less than four hours after the Jacobites had cleared it, and at Lancaster, Cumberland was so close, Lord George Murray rode out with Lochiel and Alexander to choose ground advantageous for a battle. The threat was subsequently postponed when a handpicked Jacobite detachment of the Manchester Regiment, dressed in captured government uniforms, brazenly circled around behind the duke’s army and delivered an urgent message to the effect that the French had landed in force on the south coast. Cumberland halted at once and spent three days waiting impatiently for couriers to travel back to London for new orders.
Temporarily gaining an advantage of time, the prince seemed to rally some of his former spirit. He no longer rode in the covered cart but marched alongside the clansmen once again. Lord George Murray maintained his vigilance in guarding the rear of the retreating army, with various regiments spelling the Athollmen from their dangerous and active position. Losing Cumberland for a time provided a much-needed breathing space, but companies of local militia enthusiastically took up the duke’s task of harassment. So keen were they to prove their newfound boldness, Lord George found himself organizing frequent skirmishes to scatter the militiamen into the trees. They always came back, like an itch that could not be scratched, and valuable time was lost in these minor raids.
On December 18 the rear guard of the Highland army reached the village of Clifton and were once again alerted to Cumberland’s presence on their flank. Lord George Murray sent ahead for reinforcements from the main column, but the prince, unaware that the duke was less than a mile from the rebel guard, decided to march on to Carlisle and make a stand there. By the time Lord George received the order not to confront Cumberland, but to retreat with his men to Carlisle, members of the King’s Own Regiment of Dragoons and Kingston’s Horse were forming for the attack. With Alexander Cameron riding by his side and fewer than eight hundred men at their command, Lord George drew his broadsword and led half his forces into a charge. The other half were split in two, positioned along either flank of the advancing government forces, and ordered to make enough noise and flying dust to convince the English the entire Jacobite army was waiting in the wings to attack. The ploy worked. The dragoons were put to flight, and the bulk of Cumberland’s forces retreated a discreet distance from the field. When it became apparent that the English general was in no haste to attack again, Lord George recalled his men to Penrith, then to Carlisle, where he rejoined the prince.
Freshly invigorated by the victory, however minor, Lord George was at first shocked, then outraged to learn that Charles Stuart, against the advice of his council and without troubling to consult with his general, had made the decision to leave a garrison of men at Carlisle to delay Cumberland’s advance rather than having to march with one eye constantly over their shoulders. Lord George argued passionately that it was a suicidal detail; four hundred weary men could not possibly hold off three times their number of fresh, seasoned troops. Furthermore, it was the prince’s choice to designate the Manchester Regiment for the dubious honor, and, being Englishmen, if captured, they would be treated doubly harshly, as both rebels and traitors.
Unable to convince the prince of his folly, Lord George then volunteered himself and his Athollmen for the hazardous duty. It did his heart good to see Lochiel, Keppoch, Ardshiel, and a dozen other chiefs instantly volunteer themselves and their clansmen to share the burden, but in the end the gestures were made in vain. Despite the ever-increasing animosity between them, Charles Stuart knew he could not afford to sacrifice his only general, and Lord George’s orders were countermanded.
On December 20, suffering with the guilt of knowing that they could never hope to return to Carlisle in time to relieve or save the four hundred brave men, Lord George led his dispirited troops to the banks of the River Esk. It was the prince’s twenty-fifth birthday, but there was no time for celebrations. Recent rains and heavy snowfalls had swelled the waters to such a depth the men could only stand and stare in horror at the swift, raging currents that marked the border between England and Scotland.
Two men, attempting to ford the river at its narrowest point, were swept off their horses and carried several hundred yards downstream. As the troops were unable to wait out the floods, both directions of the bank were scouted. After holding a brief council with Lord George, Alexander selected the men riding the tallest, stoutest horses to follow himself and Shadow into the icy waters above the ford, forming a living dam to break the force and speed of the currents. Lord George was the first to wade into the river. Even with the dam, the water was so deep that only the heads and shoulders of the men rose above the surface. Shorter men were helped or carried by their comrades. Struan MacSorley, looking like a maypole, walked across with men hanging off his arms and clinging to ropes slung through his belt. The prince, Lord George, and the Duke of Perth made countless trips, back and forth, ferrying men and women on horseback. Many of the supply wagons had to be abandoned, the supplies carried across on the men’s backs. To Count Fanducci’s overwhelming distress, the cannon—those same guns captured at Prestonpans and nursed faithfully by the energetic Italian all the way to Derby and back—had to be spiked and abandoned.
Catherine was, for once, thankful not to be sharing Shadow’s saddle with her husband, and rode across the inky, rushing waters, balanced securely on Struan’s broad shoulders. Her first steps on Scottish soil in four months were not taken without some misgivings. She stared back across the raging river, knowing for certain her choice had been made, irrevocably so, and she might never be free to cross back into England again. Behind her, the pipers played and the men danced reels to warm and dry themselves, but Catherine could think only of Rosewood Hall, of her mother, and of the sheltered, socially regimented life she had once lived, one that was completely foreign to her now. She had forfeited it willingly, knowing her life and future belonged to Alexander Cameron, but there were still some sad memories: She had left Harriet behind, and Damien. Her mother was sailing for the colonies, and it might be years before she ever heard word from her again …
Such thoughts were quickly pushed to the back of Catherine’s mind, for there was still a great deal in the present to be concerned with. In less than a fortnight, an army consisting mainly of infantry had withdrawn nearly two hundred miles, chased every step of the way by cavalry and still threatened by Wade’s army of regulars garrisoned at Newcastle. The weather conditions were deplorable. When it was not snowing, they were buffeted by high winds, rain, and sleet. The men were cold, hungry, and tired; many had worn through their shoes and marched barefoot through icy puddles and drifting banks of snow.
Once into Scotland, the army divided into two columns, Lord George taking one by the low roads toward Glasgow, Prince Charles and the Duke of Perth marching by the high route through Peebles. They arrived at the port city a day apart, and, like the people of Manchester, the Glaswegians reacted with open opposition and hostility. Tempers were so worn on both sides that only Lochiel’s intervention prevented the city from being sacked and razed in retaliation. Again the prince sought to levy a fine, this time collecting it from the merchants in the form of clothing, blankets, and warm footwear to refit the ragged Highlanders.
For the first time, no attempt was made to conceal or exaggerate the size of the army that had marched to within striking distance of England’s captial city. Hoping their audacity would have inspired support from home, both Lord George and the prince were surprised to learn the opposite had occurred. In mid-October, the Earl of Loudoun had traveled by sea to Inverness and had taken command of a sizable force of troops recruited by the Lord President, Duncan Forbes. Forbes had commissioned officers from the clans l
oyal to the House of Hanover and also had threatened, bribed, and extorted some of the most influential Jacobite chiefs to ignore the increasingly desperate pleas from their prince. Moreover, the entire territory controlled by the Argyle Campbells was firmly in support of the government—lands that stretched from the lowland border to Lochaber. Territory north of Inverness was committed to Hanover; the western Highlands of Skye were firmly held in the hands of Sir Alexander MacDonald of Sleat and The MacLeod of MacLeod—both of whom had initially sup ported the prince but who now led companies in the service of Lord Loudoun.
In the prince’s absence Edinburgh had received reinforcements by sea, and the city’s population—those same throngs that had turned out in cheering and waving crowds to greet the Stuart prince—now cheered as long and hard for the new commander-in-chief in Scotland, General Henry Hawley. A seasoned campaigner who had fought with Cumberland at Dettingen and Fontenoy, Hawley was supremely contemptuous of the prince’s army and was determined to make his mark as the general who had defeated and disbanded the rebels for all time. As soon as word reached Edinburgh that Charles Stuart had returned, Hawley prepared his army to march.
The news was not all bad. A second Highland army numbering upward of thirty-four hundred men had been forming in Aberdeen and, upon word of the prince’s arrival in Scotland, marched to Stirling, effectively doubling the size of the forces at the regent’s command. Among them was Lord John Drummond, the Duke of Perth’s brother, newly arrived from France with eight hundred men. Declaring himself and his Royal Scots official representatives of King Louis, Lord Drummond sent a dispatch at once to the commander of the Dutch forces who had sailed to England to support King George, reminding him of the terms of a recent treaty between the Dutch and the French, wherein the Dutch had pledged not to fight against them again until after 1747. The seven thousand troops Cumberland had counted upon to bolster his forces had no choice but to embark for home again without having completely dried the salt spray from their tunics.
The Blood of Roses Page 26
