‘Mead stripped me as tenderly as if I were a baby,’ he grinned. Then, looking up at Mead who was still in the doorway, he asked him to bring in some coffee.
‘Have you eaten?’ Pettigrew asked. ‘Mead will make something for you if you haven’t. He’s a good cook. He’d put most women to shame.’
‘I had something with my husband,’ she said. ‘I just called to see how you were. I can’t stay long.’
‘Surgeon Lewis said it was the best bit of stitching he’d seen in a long time,’ Pettigrew said. ‘I suspect he wished he’d got you to stitch up “the noble Yachtsman’s” wounds too.’
Hope laughed. ‘I think I would have let my scissors slip,’ she said.
‘Are scissors your weapon of choice?’ he asked.
Hope sat down in a chair beside his bed. A fire was burning in the hearth, the oil light gave a honey-coloured glow to the bare, rough walls, and after the hospital and the tent, it felt very luxurious and almost homely.
‘They could become so,’ she said airily. ‘But without further ado, I want to know about Nell and how she came to be your housekeeper.’
Hope hung on his every word as he explained how he’d met Nell while out riding in the early spring of ’48 and offered her the position as his housekeeper. When he said he met her on the bridge at Chewton she could visualize the millpond, the willows coming into leaf, and the sound of running water.
He was neither sentimental nor brusque, and while providing only a modicum of detail, he still managed to give Hope a very clear picture of how it all came about. He touched lightly on Nell’s state of mind following her discovery that Hope had vanished, but lessened any anxiety Hope might have had by enthusing about how she’d taken him and his house in hand, and explaining that she was secure and contented now.
It was the account of a man who fully understood heartbreak; a compassionate man who was more than aware how hard and unfair life could be for women in Nell’s position. In that respect he was very like Bennett, and Hope found herself warming more to the man as each minute passed.
Pettigrew went on to explain how he and Nell had heard about the fire, how Nell had taken Lady Harvey from Matt’s to the Warrens’ house, and he also spoke of Sir William’s funeral which he had attended.
‘It was quite the most disturbing funeral I have ever been to,’ he sighed. ‘Usually there is just deep sadness, especially when the death has been unexpected. But this was bafflement; the ordinary people from the village could not accept that a man they knew, who had prayed with them in church, could be evil enough to set fire to a house knowing there were people in it.
‘Poor Nell was distraught, even though it had been years since she’d left Albert, and indeed had spoken out against him to anyone who would listen. I think she felt partially responsible.’
‘She would,’ Hope agreed. ‘She always felt it was her fault when any of us did something wrong. But how did Rufus stand up to the funeral?’
‘His rage was palpable. He gave a reading from the Bible during the service and his voice was firm, but he was quivering, and his eyes were like ice. He had by all accounts been of the opinion for years that Albert was dangerous – he told me he had refused to come home that Christmas because he didn’t like the liberties the man was taking with his parents. He’s a fine young man now, Hope. Tall, athletic and very handsome. He is so like William at the same age, it took me right back to when I used to pester him to take me riding.’
Hope hadn’t realized that Pettigrew had known Sir William since childhood and she encouraged him to talk about it.
‘I was six and he was ten when we first met. My father was a soldier too. I was staying with my aunt and uncle in Chelwood when the news came that both he and my mother had died of fever. I suspect William’s parents had told him he had to be kind to me because of it. And he was very kind, like an older brother.’
He stopped abruptly, half-closing his eyes, and Hope guessed he was feeling guilty about Lady Harvey.
‘Enough of me,’ he said suddenly. ‘Tell me about the day you left Briargate.’
‘It was your letter to Lady Harvey,’ she began.
She cut the story right to the bone and merely said that she’d gone into the gatehouse to hide the letter and Albert had caught her.
Yet even as she told him how Albert had hit her and forced her to write a goodbye letter, she could feel the weakness of her story and kept hesitating.
‘He said if I didn’t go he’d take the letter to Sir William and that Lady Harvey would be disgraced, and Nell would be dismissed too for covering up,’ she said, blushing because Pettigrew was looking at her so intently. ‘He told me that if I left and never came back he would keep quiet.’
‘But if Nell had been dismissed, surely he would have had to go too?’
‘That would have been even worse,’ Hope said quietly. ‘Nell would have been alone and friendless with him.’
‘Why didn’t you go to Matt?’ he asked, his face very stern. ‘Or Ruth in Bath?’
She didn’t know why she suddenly started crying. It might have been because he knew these people she had missed for so long, or perhaps she was upset that once again Albert was forcing her to keep quiet about what she knew.
‘He told me I wasn’t to go to them, and if I did he would make Nell’s life a misery,’ she sobbed out. ‘He hit me, shoved me out in the rain without a penny, you can’t imagine what I went through.’
‘I think I can,’ he said softly. ‘Bristol is not a good place for anyone young and friendless. I talked about you to Rufus after the funeral; he said that he always knew Albert was responsible for you leaving and he hated him for it. He also felt the man had something over his father.’
‘Of course he did, he knew about you and Lady Harvey.’
‘At first I thought it was that. But Rufus was quite specific about his father and Albert. You see, he had discovered that Albert had been given a great deal of money by William over the years. Now, I have my own opinion as to what this hold might have been, but I have no proof. Although I think you do.’
Hope lifted her head, and she saw he knew the truth.
‘I would never have voiced what I suspected, ever,’ he said quietly. ‘And now he is dead, it should die with him for Rufus’s sake. He’s a fine young man, Hope, with none of his parents’ weaknesses. I know from Nell how close you were as children. That, of course, was the most compelling reason for you to obey Albert, wasn’t it? For you couldn’t go to anyone for help without revealing what you knew.’
There was no point in denying it, so she nodded. ‘I walked in on them together,’ she whispered, tears running down her cheeks. ‘But it wasn’t just Rufus; it was Lady Harvey and Nell too. They would all have been shamed.’
His hand reached out and took hers. ‘Your loyalty is a credit to you, Hope,’ he said with a break in his voice. ‘I think most people would only have thought of themselves. But don’t be afraid, I will never divulge what you’ve told me.’
‘I must go,’ she said, getting to her feet and wiping her eyes. ‘I’ve stayed too long and Bennett will be worried. But what do I tell Nell?’
‘Just about the letter, that will do fine, she’s not as suspicious or as worldly as I am. Don’t feel badly towards William for he couldn’t help the way he was made. I’ve met many men like him since I’ve been in the army, good, brave men who try so hard to suppress it. Sometimes they just can’t any more. I did my best to fight off loving Anne, but I couldn’t. In many ways that’s the same.’
‘I never felt hatred for Sir William,’ she said, her eyes swimming with tears. ‘Only for Albert, and not because of that either. But for his cruelty to Nell and for forcing us apart.’
He looked at her long and hard, then smiled. ‘You know, you are everything Nell said you were, and more. Write to her at my home, Willow End, Bath Road. You see, there is a God, even in this place where it seems He has deserted us. She will have had my letter by now, but it will be you she wants to hear from.’<
br />
On an impulse Hope bent and kissed his forehead, then rushed for the door and left without another word.
*
On the day after the battle of Balaclava there had been another small battle near a deserted village called Inkerman. Shortly afterwards, Russian troops were observed massing up on the Fedioukine Hills, and it was clear they were planning another far more powerful attack soon. But worrying as that was, while the guns were firing constantly up at Sebastopol, sending a daily stream of wounded and sick soldiers down to the hospital, there was too much to be done to consider how they would cope with yet more casualties.
On 4 November it rained hard and the men on picket duty keeping an eye on the Russian troops reported a quiet night, but, as they were coming off duty at dawn on the 5th, the attack came.
There was thick fog, and the allied troops were heavily outnumbered and short of ammunition, but what they lacked in numbers, they made up for in courage and initiative, and by mid-afternoon the Russians were in full retreat.
Word of the victory came quickly to the hospital, but it was hard for anyone to feel a celebration was in order, not with 2,500 of their men killed and wounded, and another 1,700 French soldiers likewise. They had no doubt either that some of the 12,000 Russian casualties would end up here too. But they did what they had to, rolled up their sleeves and prepared for the onslaught as best they could.
That night, and for the following three nights, Hope had only a couple of hours’ sleep. She knew the surgeons were justified in saying they would do more harm than good attempting to operate in poor light, and understood why they took themselves off to their beds at night, but she could not walk away with the cries of the suffering ringing in her ears.
It was so cold, and many of the wounded lay shivering on the carts that had brought them there, for there was no space to bring them inside. All she could do was tuck a blanket around them, help them sip some brandy or merely wash their faces. But at least asking their names, telling them they’d be seen as soon as possible, and showing that she cared, helped them to get through the night.
Captain Pettigrew came to the hospital at dawn on the fourth day when she was alone in the room with the most seriously injured. He was walking with the aid of an improvised crutch, and when she saw him, she flew at him to reprimand him.
‘Are you stupid?’ she hissed at him. ‘You’ll break that wound open!’
‘It’s fine,’ he said. ‘Nothing compared to some of these injuries. I came to see if there was anything I could do.’
He was clearly serious, and Hope saw the horror in his eyes as he noticed a box of amputated limbs which hadn’t yet been taken away for disposal by one of the orderlies.
Hope quickly covered it with a blanket. But she couldn’t conceal the number of men with blood-soaked dressings, or the wailing from one soldier in the corner. Everywhere the Captain looked there was horror, and even to someone with no medical knowledge it was clear most of them would die.
‘It was good of you to offer help,’ she said. ‘But you shouldn’t be in here. Maybe in a day or two you could talk to some of the less seriously injured – a lot of them can’t manage to write a letter home and they’d appreciate you doing it for them. But go now, before you fall and burst your stitches.’
He held on tightly to the crutch, but reached out and tucked a stray curl back under her cap. ‘With the best will in the world, you can’t make everyone better,’ he said with the tenderness of understanding. ‘I know you’ve been here for at least twenty hours a day and you’ll become ill if you continue to do that. You need some rest, food, and probably a bath. Come to my house later and you’ll get all that.’
‘A bath?’ she said in astonishment. He had hit on the one thing she would sell her soul for. ‘You have a bath?’
‘We do,’ he chuckled. ‘And Mead will fill it for you. Bring Bennett with you, for I know he’s worked as many hours as you.’
‘But…’ she started to protest.
‘No buts,’ he said firmly. ‘Nell would want me to bully you into seeing sense. And I’ve had a letter from her. If you don’t come, I won’t let you see it.’
‘What does she say?’ Hope was suddenly like a young girl again, excitement bubbling up inside her, for this letter had to be in reply to the Captain’s news that he’d met her in Varna.
‘You’ll find out after you’ve had a meal and a bath. Not a word till then.’
Bennett smiled as Angus nudged him and pointed at Hope. She had been sitting on the bed, running her fingers through her hair to dry it, but now she’d slumped back on the pillow and was sound asleep.
‘I’d better get her back to the tent,’ Bennett said, rising to his feet.
‘You’ll do nothing of the sort, she can stay there,’ Angus said firmly. ‘And you can get in there with her, you look close to collapse too.’
Bennett took the quilt from the bottom of the bed and covered Hope, standing by her and looking down at her for a moment. She had been so happy to have a bath, even though it had only been six inches of hot water in a tub barely big enough for a child. Now, sound asleep with her damp hair loose around her face, she looked no older than she had the first time Bennett saw her.
‘She is a very beautiful woman,’ Angus said softly.
‘Isn’t she?’ Bennett agreed. ‘But there is so much more to her than a lovely face. I met her, you know, when she was nursing her two friends with cholera. Just seventeen, yet so strong, capable and compassionate.’
‘Today has been a good one for her,’ Angus said thoughtfully. ‘Those few words from Nell meant so much, didn’t they?’
Bennett nodded and returned to his chair. They had come to Pettigrew’s house at noon, and his servant had made them a wonderful robust stew with herb dumplings. Then they’d had their baths, and put on clean clothes. It was only then that Pettigrew, or Angus as he insisted they should call him, had got out Nell’s letter.
Bennett had been rather surprised that Nell wasn’t as literate as Hope. She had written only a few lines, and clearly she’d laboured long and hard over them. But not even the greatest writer in England, neither Thomas Hardy nor Charles Dickens, could have got so much feeling and delight into such a few words.
‘You have given me the Crown jewels,’ was how it started.
I haven’t stopped crying for joy yet. Imagine my Hope married to a
doctor! And there where you can keep an eye on her for me. This is
the happiest day of my life. But how much more I will cry and laugh
when she comes home. Kiss her for me. Tell her to keep out of
danger. And make her write soon.
‘Fate moves in mysterious ways,’ Bennett chuckled. ‘Fancy us having to come right across Europe for this.’
‘You could have just gone to the village back home and had a short cut to it,’ Angus said with a wry smile. ‘Tell me, Bennett, why didn’t you?’
‘When was I supposed to? You aren’t the only one in the army! I got home in January, got married, had a short honeymoon and then we came out here.’
‘Yes, I can see you had little time. But when you first wanted to marry Hope, knowing what you had learned of her circumstances, I would have thought that might have been an appropriate time to do some investigation on her behalf. You could have gone into the local ale house and asked a couple of questions and you’d have discovered for yourself that Nell was with me.’
‘That’s easy for you to say now, after the event. But Hope wouldn’t hear of me going there to ask questions.’
‘I don’t think you ever suggested it,’ Angus retorted. ‘You wanted to keep her all to yourself, didn’t you?’
‘Now, look here!’ Bennett exclaimed.
‘No, you look here,’ Angus interrupted him. ‘I saw your face when Hope read out that letter. You were touched, but a little afraid too, afraid that Nell and the rest of the family would steal her from you.’
‘Of course I’m not afraid.’ Bennett sn
orted with derision.
‘Yes you are. It’s hardly surprising, she’s a great prize, and when you are the only person in her life, you can have all of her. But take some advice from me, don’t cage her. Let her fly!’
‘And am I supposed to believe that you understand anything about married love?’ Bennett said with icy sarcasm.
‘Sometimes those on the outside can see it clearer than from the inside. But Bennett, I’ve said enough for one day, and you are as exhausted as your wife. Go to bed now before you keel over.’
Bennett was sorely tempted to lift Hope from the bed and take her home, just to show Captain Pettigrew that he cared nothing for his advice or opinions. But he was too tired for protests and Hope looked far too comfortable to disturb.
‘But where will you sleep?’ he asked.
Angus gave a wry smile. ‘Don’t worry about me, I’ll find another bed.’
In the cold, wet days that followed, the general euphoria in Balaclava which had come with the Russian retreat at Inkerman faded quickly. The almost constant gunfire up at Sebastopol, and the received reports that little or no damage had been done to the town defences, made it increasingly clear that it could not be taken quickly. The harsh reality was that the troops would almost certainly be in the trenches all winter.
Anxiety grew daily in the hospital. Forty or fifty men reported sick every day and were sent down there. Another twenty or thirty would be wounded – in fact there were only 16,500 men fit for service when initially there had been 35,000. Cholera was still with them, along with typhus, typhoid and malaria, although the last three were usually just classed as general fever. With few medicines, and not enough nutritious, easily digestible food available for the sick, their chances of recovery were poor.
Bennett was often filled with white-hot rage, for the urgently needed goods and provisions would come into the port, but bureaucratic bungling made it impossible to get them to the appropriate destination. Men were building a railway for a siege train which when it was finished would make transportation to the Heights much easier. But this monstrously hard work was enough to kill men already weakened by sickness and hunger.
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