Hope (77 page)

‘She was poorly after she got the letter from you about Bennett,’ she began to explain, but realizing there was too much to tell all at once she cut it short. ‘And I think Lady Harvey’s funeral today was finally too much for her.’

Even as the words came out she wished she could retract them. If everything had been as it should be, tonight all four of them should have been celebrating the men’s homecoming. Nell had prayed for this day, planned it in her head a hundred times. She’d imagined a big spread on the table, the Captain’s bed aired and a fire lit in his room. But instead of feasting, laughing and crying tears of joy, she and the Captain were here in the kitchen with only bread and cheese, and now she’d made his homecoming even sadder by telling him that his love was dead.

‘I’m so sorry, sir,’ she said hastily. ‘So much has happened that it’s hardly surprising Hope isn’t herself, but I shouldn’t have told you about Lady Harvey straight off.’

He had more lines on his face than he’d had before he went away, he was thinner too and he looked tired. But he was still such a handsome man. Those dark eyes, so much like Hope’s, had a way of looking at Nell which made her feel he could see right down to her soul.

‘Anne’s dead? What caused her to die?’

‘Her heart, sir.’ Nell hung her head. ‘But she died peaceful in her sleep.’

She looked up and sawhis eyes were damp. ‘I’m so sorry, sir,’ she whispered.

‘All of us wish to die in our sleep,’ he said sadly. ‘But for most it is a painful process. I am very glad that she escaped that. How is Rufus holding up?’

‘Well enough, sir,’ Nell said. ‘He has been a good friend to us in the past months. But will you tell me how you found Bennett?’

He looked relieved that she’d changed the subject and explained that he’d gone to Scutari to look for him.

‘It was the very devil of a time,’ he sighed. ‘His name was not on the list of patients at the hospital. I had to go through endless ships’ reports and eventually found his name on one of those. Three unnamed men died on that voyage, and they were buried at sea, so it seemed that Bennett was one of them. But I searched out other patients taken on that ship, and one rifleman who knew Bennett well assured me he had seen him carried off the ship on a stretcher. So then I had the job of searching for him in the hospital. With over a thousand sick and wounded it was a long job, but I found him in the end. He had been listed under the wrong name.’

‘But how could that happen?’

Angus shrugged. ‘The place is vast, with so few nursing staff, it’s a wonder the records are kept as well as they are, especially when many are brought in too sick even to say their own name. He was still in a bad way when I found him, but once I started cracking the whip and got him moved to a healthier ward with a bit more attention he began to improve.’

At that point in their conversation Betsy had started crying and Nell got up to see to her. But her parents had got there seconds before her.

Nell had never seen anything more beautiful and touching than Bennett’s reaction to his daughter. Half-laughing, half-crying, he took her into his arms and told her she was to stop crying because that was no way to greet her papa.

‘You go down and take care of Angus,’ Hope said to Nell, smiling with the radiance of a new bride. ‘We can see to Betsy. I’ve given you enough trouble for one evening, and Bennett is very tired too. Tell Angus all the news and tomorrow we’ll all celebrate the homecoming together.’

Nell paused before leaving the bedroom and looked back. Bennett had Betsy cradled in his arms, Hope, wearing only the nightgown Bennett had put on her, had her arms around him, both their heads bent towards their child. It was a beautiful tableau and some sense deep within Nell told her they would all be fine from now on.

When Nell went back downstairs Angus had moved into the parlour and was slouched in his favourite chair by the fire.

‘So where were we?’ he asked. ‘You said so much has happened. Tell me about it.’

‘Well, Albert was the main thing,’ she began cautiously, unsure that she could even explain it in a way he could understand.

She had forgotten what a good listener he was. Apart from getting her to expand on a couple of points, he didn’t interrupt.

‘My God,’ he exclaimed as she finished. ‘I knew Hope had a very tough streak but I wouldn’t have thought her capable of taking on that blackguard. But how was she afterwards? That is not a pretty image to be left in anyone’s mind.’

Nell agreed. ‘But that wasn’t all,’ she went on. ‘Before Albert died he told Rufus about you and his mother.’

Angus winced. ‘Can I expect him to come round here like a mad bull?’

Nell smiled faintly. ‘No, he was upset at first, but not now. You see, her ladyship chose to tell both him and Hope something else that day too. And you might be the mad bull when I admit my part in that.’

‘Go on,’ he said, leaning forward in his chair.

‘That Hope was her daughter, and you are Hope’s father.’

He looked at Nell in puzzlement. ‘I don’t understand. How can I be? Hope is your sister.’

Nell began to tremble then, afraid he was going to be angry she hadn’t told him this when she first came to work for him, or even after Sir William Harvey’s death.

It was far harder telling him than it had been to explain it to Hope. She stumbled over the words, she wept, and she felt afraid because his expression was so stern and cold.

‘I didn’t have any choice but to go along with it then,’ she cried when she’d finished. ‘I didn’t know you then, or who her father was. I was so young myself and I needed my position because my folks depended on my wages. I didn’t tell her ladyship that the baby hadn’t died until the day I left Briargate.

‘I am truly sorry I didn’t feel able to tell you before. But you see, I gave her ladyship my promise.’

He sighed deeply, sat back in his chair and closed his eyes.

The rain was still pouring down outside, splattering against the windows, and the wind was howling in the chimney. Nell squirmed in her chair, expecting that at any moment he would make an angry outburst.

‘Why didn’t Anne write and tell me she was carrying my child?’ he asked eventually, his voice shaking with emotion. ‘I would have come for her, taken care of her.’

‘You know why. She knew her reputation would be lost. You might have lost your commission.’

‘I’d have worked as a farm labourer if necessary,’ he spat out. ‘I’d have overcome every obstacle, fought any battle for her.’

‘I know that now,’ Nell said softly. ‘And I think she always knew it too. But it was a tough time for her; she cared for her husband, and her position. Maybe if Bridie hadn’t told her the baby was dead it might have been different.’

He asked her a great many questions, about both Anne and Hope. Nell thought he was never going to get to the end of them. She was so tired, it had seemed an interminable day, and all she wanted was her bed.

‘And how did Hope feel when she was told the man she’d always called Father wasn’t her real one, or that you aren’t even her sister?’ he said finally. ‘It is no wonder she came close to losing her mind!’

‘You will have to ask her that yourself, sir,’ Nell said wearily. ‘She hasn’t said much about it to me. But I do know she is very fond of you.’

‘She saved my life in Balaclava,’ he said with feeling. ‘I have seen men die from far lesser wounds than I had. She has a healing touch. One of the other officers asked me soon after that if she was a relative of mine as he thought we were very alike.’

‘You are alike, sir.’ Nell nodded. ‘The first time I met you I knew you were her father, just by your looks. I wondered that her ladyship didn’t see it.’

‘Mostly we only see things we want to see,’ he replied, and smiled. ‘And I see you are tired, Nell. Go to bed now.’

Angus stared pensively into the fire for over an hour after Nell had gone to bed, his thoughts bittersweet. Anne’s death was sad, but not entirely unexpected, for when he’d seen her at William’s funeral she had looked old and seemed confused, and he’d heard later that her health had deteriorated still further.

There was no point in being angry that she had kept the birth of their child from him; he had, after all, always known that position and wealth meant more to her than love. But he found it hard to forgive her for not coming to him when she discovered that Hope was that child. Surely she must have known that he would have moved heaven and earth to find her?

Yet clearly it was written in the stars that he was intended to have Hope in his life, even if the path to that end was circuitous. When he met Nell by pure chance that day by the mill, he offered her the position of housekeeper more from sympathy than real need for help in his home. Yet it was one of the best decisions he’d ever made, for Nell had become a valued friend, and she’d created a stable, comfortable home, which was something he’d never had before.

When he discovered that the pretty surgeon’s wife who had been attacked in Varna was none other than her missing sister, he sawit as the most remarkable stroke of good fortune, a way of repaying Nell for all she’d done for him. Yet she was his daughter!

Looking back, and setting aside the connection with Nell, there was something about Hope which had drawn him to her right from the start.

He had, of course, thought it was only because of her sultry eyes, dark curly hair and her sweet face. In fact, he’d pulled himself up from thinking about her too often by reminding himself he was old enough to be her father.

Thankfully his feelings for her had never been ones of desire, but admiration at her courage, stoicism and nursing skills. Later, after she had stitched his wounds, there was deep gratitude, and amusement too because she was such a little firebrand.

Yet as time went on and he got to know both her and Bennett very well, he’d been stirred by what he could only call paternal feelings towards her. He felt real affection, he worried about her health when he knew she was carrying a child. When she left Balaclava he had felt emotional and even bereft.

It was that which had made him search for Bennett; and through the difficulties, he had urged himself on, going that extra mile for her. On the voyage home he felt so proud of himself for bringing her husband back to her. He had in fact been as excited at the prospect of seeing her again as Bennett was.

And now he’d been told she was his flesh and blood, that her baby was his grandchild. And that was like being presented with the sun, the moon and the stars.

‘She’s beautiful,’ Angus said gruffly, looking down at Betsy in her mother’s arms. ‘A father and a grandfather in one day! That’s enough to make even an old soldier cry.’

It was ten in the morning. Bennett was still in bed, Nell in the kitchen and Hope had come into his study with Betsy in her arms so he could see her.

‘Nell told you everything, then?’ Hope asked.

Angus nodded, and quickly wiped a tear from his cheek.

‘There’s so much to say, but I don’t know howto say it,’ he said. ‘I lay awake most of the night thinking on it. I thought I had it all straight in my head, but now I’m looking at Betsy…’ He stopped, fresh tears filling his eyes as he let the baby grasp one of his fingers.

‘We don’t need words surely?’ Hope said, looking up at him with tears in her eyes too. ‘We were friends from the first, weren’t we? Through you, Nell and I were reunited, and you made the Crimea a better place for me and Bennett by just being there. Then you rescued Bennett for me. So if it was some kind of apology you were trying to make, don’t.’

‘It wasn’t an apology I wanted to make,’ he said, reaching out to touch her cheek with tenderness. ‘It was more of a joyful outpouring of my delight. I am of course horrified and ashamed that I had no part in your childhood, for had I known of your birth I would have taken you and brought you up as my daughter, regardless of how others viewed that.’

‘Then perhaps it was as well you never knew about me,’ Hope said, and took the hand caressing her cheek and kissed it. ‘You would have been away soldiering and I would have been left with nursemaids who might not have been as loving as Meg Renton and Nell were.’

‘Always so practical and level-headed!’ He nodded. ‘But my dear girl, you have been through so much since Betsy was born, far too much, and we must be sure there is no repetition of what occurred last night.’

A cloud passed over her face. ‘I don’t know what possessed me,’ she said, dropping her eyes shamefacedly.

‘The human mind can only take so much,’ he said gently. ‘I have seen many men become irrational after battles and hardship, I suspect it is nature’s way of demanding that they allowthemselves to rest. But Bennett is back safe and sound, and I hope you will let me take care of my family now?’

‘Your family?’ she repeated, looking up at him in wonder. ‘That sounds so lovely.’

Angus put his arms around both mother and child and drew them to his chest.

‘It sounds lovely to me too,’ he said softly, his voice breaking with emotion. ‘I’ve never had a family, I was always the cuckoo in someone else’s nest. But the extraordinary thing is that if I could have handpicked the people I wanted in my family, you are all the very ones I would have selected. And with young Betsy, I will be able to give her the love and attention I never got the chance to give you. I think that makes me the luckiest man alive.’

Christmas, something Nell and Hope had barely thought about until the men came home, was suddenly only a week away and each day was full of frantic preparations. Bennett was still too weak to do more than play with his daughter as the women made pies and puddings and cleaned silver around him. Angus chopped wood, brought in huge bunches of holly and ivy, and went off to the market in Bristol. He brought home not just provisions, but a horse to pull the trap which had languished in one of the sheds since he’d been away.

Willow End was full of chatter and laughter. There were so many stories to share, lengthy discussions on past events, and what they would like for the future, but every now and then all four adults would sit around the kitchen table, just beaming at one another in their delight that they were all together again at last.