The Mercenary Major

The Mercenary Major

by Kate Moore

Stillpoint/Romance

She sought to unmask an imposter. . .but exposed her heart instead

Copyright © 1994 by Kate Moore

All rights reserved

ebook edition

ebook conversion by David Kudler, 
StillpointDigitalPress.com

ISBN: 978-0-9848971-2-4

Original edition: 0-380-77541-7

To Jack’s first fans -

Barbara and Pam,

Joanne, Tracy and Joan

and Monica

Thanks

IRRESISTIBLE IMPOSTOR

“Whoever you are, you appear to have no scruples whatsoever and to rely on an ingratiating manner and bold deception to achieve your self-serving and mercenary ends.” She paused. She doubted such a speech would have any effect on him, but it did relieve her feelings. She turned toward the stairs.

But the impostor grabbed her right wrist and swung her around. He caught her about the waist and pulled her body tight against his. Victoria gasped.

“You couldn’t love me then, could you?” he asked in a fierce whisper.

“Love you?” The words stunned her. She couldn’t believe he’d suggested it. She couldn’t believe they were touching.

He smiled. He looked wicked, but not in any of the ways she had accused him of being wicked . . .

“There is indeed no doubt, from the circumstances that occurred, that the greater number of those men who behaved so outrageously in the city, came to Spa-fields with a premeditated design not to take any part in the business of the Meeting, but to commit riot, as it appears that about two hundred men, chiefly dressed like sailors, had no sooner arrived there, than they found the man above-mentioned ready to lead them, and they immediately followed him. These formed the chief part of the mob in the city. It is evident, therefore, that all this was the result of some previously concerted plan. . .”

The Morning Chronicle

December 3, 1816

**** 1 ****

T
he spy looked up as the three strangers entered the Swan. They were riflemen in the distinctive dark-green uniform of their regiment, and one of them was an officer. Lovett, the proprietor, hurried over to them, led them to a table, and offered them a tankard of home-brewed on the house, as he was paid to do. The spy nodded his approval. The Swan had proved a good place for his business, and Lovett had been particularly useful.

The spy studied the newcomers, trying to preserve a professional detachment, but already he felt a mild buzzing excitement along his nerves. There were dozens of old soldiers in the Swan, many sporting the frayed remains of once-bright regimental jackets, but none had the pride and assurance of the officer now removing his stovepipe shako with its silver badge and green cords. The man slipped his fur-edged pelisse from broad shoulders.

He was tall, at least six feet, and he moved with that aristocratic ease that always infuriated the spy when he encountered it in those who hired him. Men in his neighborhood either moved quickly and furtively, snatching what they could from their fellow men, or plodded doggedly, bowed down by the weight of their poverty. The tall officer looked about him, apparently indifferent to his surroundings, and the spy studied him. Thick dark hair, cut to no particular style, framed a strong sun-browned face. Clear light-blue eyes looked out from under slanting brows. A straight, elegant nose suggested aristocratic breeding. A full black mustache and beard hid the mouth and jaw but could not quite conceal the man’s youth. The major, for that was the rank his uniform revealed, had not seen thirty.

Suddenly the clear blue eyes that appeared to take so little interest in the crowded taproom looked straight at the spy, and he felt his breathing stop. Sweat beaded on his brow. He had been discovered. He gripped the edge of the table, prepared to shove back his chair and flee. Then he reminded himself that he was sitting in the darkest corner of the tavern with his hat pulled low. It could only be a trick of his own imagination that the man had stared so directly at the spot where he sat. The man’s gaze passed on, and the spy began to breathe again.

His testimony had sent dozens of wretched men to the gallows, but to send a proud man like this, to reduce such a man to helplessness—now that would be something. His professional calm restored, the spy turned his attention to the man’s two companions—a lanky sergeant and a short, broad-shouldered corporal. It was from one of them that he must coax and tease the information that would bring the proud man down.

Jack withdrew his gaze from the dark figure hunched in the opposite corner and let his eyes pass idly over the crowd in the Swan’s main taproom. The voice in his head had spoken, clear and urgent, in spite of the loud rumble of talk that filled the tavern.
Run, Jack!

And the voice had never failed him. For fourteen years it had warned him of danger, waking his instincts instantly. Now, in an English tavern among other veterans of the long war with Boney, he felt he was behind enemy lines.

Beside Jack, Sergeant Hengrave set down his shako, loosened the collar of his jacket, and rubbed his hands together. “Boys,” he said, inhaling deeply and leaning forward so they could catch his words above the loud talk around them, “we’re home.”

“If they ask to see the color of our silver, I won’t stay,” grumbled Corporal Gilling as he settled his broad person in a chair on Jack’s right.

The host returned. “So yer home from the wars, are ye?” he said, plunking brimming cups on the table. “Well, ye did right in coming to the Swan. Know ‘ow to respect a man that’s fought, we do. First one’s on the ‘ouse.”

Imitating his friend Hengrave, Jack drew in a deep breath through his nostrils. Sweat, rank straw, sour ale, and smoke with plenty of grease in it dominated the air of the Swan, a far cry from the sweet smells of the countryside they had passed through that day, countryside greener and richer even in autumn than any Jack could remember seeing.

“Home?” Jack asked. He could not imagine patriotic fervor being stirred by the coarse atmosphere of the Swan.

“You can’t feel it yet, lad, but you will. It’s in your blood, for all your years in Spain,” Hengrave assured him.

Jack cocked an eyebrow, but his friend only laughed.

“Mark my words, you’re an Englishman, Bandit . . .” With the arrival of the proprietor to take their order, Hengrave left off extolling the wonders of England. “Do you have a mutton chop for me and my friends, landlord?” he asked.

“Coming straightaway,” said their host, cheerfully turning from them.

It was the first time in two days they had not been asked to show their money. Hengrave grinned at Jack and Gilling, and took a deep draft of ale.

Jack tipped his chair back against the wall and swallowed a bit of the dark brew, testing the flavor of it. Full and heavy, nothing like the fruity, bracing wines of Spain that had been his first taste of alcohol, the ale warmed him slowly. He had not forgotten that they were being watched, but he hoped the watcher had been lulled into complacency by the ordinariness of their actions. Whatever his intentions were, the watcher did not seem ready to make his move. Jack knew how to hold a position and wait.

Hengrave began to explain the standards that a really excellent chop must meet. But other voices, strident voices, emerging from the general clamor around them could not be ignored. A fellow on Jack’s right spat contemptuously and said, “Moderate reform?” Jack made a glancing assessment of the men at the next table. The speaker’s companions, all sailors, studied their ale cups, except for the one who had apparently championed such a position. A woman boldly displaying her charms was waved away.

“Would you do business with a tradesman who was
moderately
honest?” asked the contemptuous speaker. His listeners shook their heads. “Would you want your sweetheart to be
moderately
virtuous? Why, what’s
moderate
reform? It’s a retention of all the vices that disgrace this nation, that’s what it is.”

“I still say,” protested another man, “we must petition the Regent.”

“Bah, petition,” said the scoffer, a lean, sharp-faced fellow with protuberant blue eyes. “Your petition will do nothing but gather dust in goody Sidmouth’s office.”

Jack raised his tankard and took another draft. He weighed the details of the scene again. The singularly cheerful, trusting landlord, the angry disaffected drinkers, many of them soldiers or sailors, the watcher in the dark corner. He didn’t like it.

Hengrave and Gilling were arguing the wisdom of ordering the chops before ascertaining the price. Jack leaned his head against the greasy wall as if at ease, and studied the doors off the main room.
Always have an escape
was one of his rules. By turning to his left, he could just see through the closest door down an ill-lit hall, along which were several other doors. At the second one a man knocked, waited, whispered something, and entered. In a minute a pair of men left and returned to the main taproom. Once again Jack got the clear and sharp sensation that he was being scrutinized. He did not need to turn his head to know that the watcher’s gaze was fixed on him. Apparently the watcher did not appreciate Jack’s curiosity about the room down the hall. He withdrew his gaze from the doorway, leaned forward, and planted his elbows on the table.

“Hengrave,” he said, interrupting the sergeant’s discourse on the superiority of the English tavern over its Continental counterparts, “maybe you ought to forget that situation your uncle promised you. You wouldn’t want to miss your calling in life.”

Hengrave stared at Jack blankly. Jack winked at Gilling.

“My calling?” asked the sergeant.

“You should apply to be the poet laureate, Hengrave,” Jack said. “It’s the easiest thing in the world for you to knock out an ode—’The Alehouse,’ ‘To a Chop,’ or . . .”

Hengrave laughed. “Now Bandit, I know I’m glad to see home, and I may have talked a bit more than . . .”

‘To the bard,” said Jack, raising his ale in a salute to the sergeant.

“Bard it is,” said Gilling.

Hengrave groaned, and Gilling took up the teasing.

By Jack’s count the strange performance at the door in the darkened hall was repeated five times while they ate their chops.

When the mystery door opened again, a fair-haired young gentleman staggered out, braced himself against the wall with his left hand, and lurched toward the public room. His black evening clothes and snowy linen proclaimed him a gentleman, but the empty right sleeve of his jacket suggested that he, too, had seen the war. Crossing the threshold, he lifted his head and blinked in the relative brightness of the larger room, and Gilling touched Jack’s arm.

“It’s George Bertram, sir,” he said, speaking Jack’s thought aloud.

The young man in question recognized their party at the same instant, and for a fleeting moment a smile of genuine pleasure restored a bitter face to youthful charm.

“Bandit! Is it really you?” he cried. He took an unsteady step in Jack’s direction.

Jack stood and in two steps positioned himself to accept a heavy embrace and steady his friend. “George, what are you doing here?”

“Having a glass or two or three. You’re still wearing the green, but you’ve sold out, haven’t you?” Bertram looked from Jack to the others.

“Been given our medals and sent on our way, Captain,” said Hengrave.

“Hengrave, Gilling, hullo,” Bertram held up the empty sleeve of his right arm. “Can’t shake your hands, but at least I can buy you a round. Lovett,” he shouted, and the landlord appeared. With some difficulty Bertram extracted a purse from an inner pocket of his jacket. “I want to buy drinks for the house. We’ve got a hero here, a hero of Waterloo. That’s something to drink to.”

Mr. Lovett neatly caught the purse flung in his direction and headed for his tap.

With a sudden bound the unsteady young gentleman leapt to the chair Jack had left and stepped up onto the table. He gave a shrill whistle that drew the attention of many in the crowded room.