The Sergeant Major's Daughter (3 page)

And everywhere the friendly voices followed her as she had picked her way past the loaded commissariat trains, between co
rn
bags and horse-feed bags and all the paraphernalia of an army moving into action.

Men were tumbling into the square from all directions, shakos askew, pulling on jackets as they came—some carrying children, with wives running at their sides—some alone. Young boys looking lost and apprehensive
... and old-timers for whom it was just another battle.

“Come to bid us farewell, have you, lassie?” grinned a burly rifleman, whistling through his teeth as he lovingly polished an already gleaming rifle. She had stayed among them until the lines began to form up in the paling light from the east.

And then the regiments were moving toward the Namur Gate, laughing and joking, their steady rhythmic tramp shaking the ground—and dear, funny old General Picton riding ahead of them with his top hat and his frockcoat, and his spyglass hung about his neck, calling cheerily to friends who lined the way and waving to the stolid, incurious Flemish folk coming into the city with their wagons of vegetables.

By four o’clock the sun was up, hurting her eyes as it flashed off sword-hilt and bayonet—picking out vividly the swaying scarlet phalanx of the infantry and the green-jacketed riflemen—the blue-coated Belgians and the Brunswickers in their black—and the gallant Highlanders, their kilts swinging to the skirl of the pipes...

And then they were gone ... out along the Charleroi road
...
the sounds dying away to mingle with the distant gunfire
...

Felicity had been sitting crouched upon a
corner
of the terracing which traversed the rose garden. She rose, cramped and stiff, and found her cheeks wet with tears.

Impatiently, she brushed them away; looking back was a useless exercise, after all; perhaps later, much later—when the hurt was less.

She t
urned
with a sigh to retrace her steps—and caught a drift of cigar smoke on the still air.

“Miss Vale?”

Oh, drat the man! Felicity bit her lip in vexation as the Earl approached her across the lawn from the shadow of the cedar tree.

“Lord Stayne. I am sorry. I have disturbed your walk.”

“You have not disturbed me—not in the way you mean.” He stood looking down at her through a cloud of smoke and then threw away his cigar. “I have been watching you for some minutes,” he went on in his abrupt way. “Tell me, are you unwell, Miss Vale?”

She averted her face, lest the lights from the house revealed too much. “No, my lord. I am quite well, I thank you.”

He frowned. “I wondered. You were not at dinner.”

“No, sir. I prefer to take a tray in my room.”

“Prefer, Miss Vale?” he queried with gentle emphasis. “Yes, sir.
I ...
do not find myself easy in the company of my cousin’s friends.”

The Earl uttered an abrupt laugh. “No more do I, Miss Vale—no more do I. I cannot allow that to be sufficient reason for skulking in your room. While I am in residence, at least, you will oblige me by dining with the family.”

He saw her figure stiffen and added with exaggerated courtesy, “If you please!”

Felicity nodded ungraciously and again attempted to leave.

“Miss Vale?”

“My lord?”

“Are you happy here?”

The question took her by surprise. Before she could frame a reply, he continued, “You do not look happy. It occurs to me that it must be quite unlike anything to which you have hitherto been accustomed.”

Her already lacerated feelings were instantly rubbed raw. How dare he patronize her.

“I may have lacked a settled home, Lord Stayne,” she retorted, “but I assure you my parents always managed to ensure that I lived tolerably well
.
”

The silence stretched until she could endure it no longer; but the Earl was before her, his tone cutting.

“My dear young lady, your life style is not in question. My concern is solely that you might be experiencing a loss of companionship—a bond of family affection which you must, until recently, have enjoyed.”

“Oh!” Hot color rushed into Felicity’s face, unseen; she lowered her head as scalding tears locked her throat.

Stayne surveyed the bend head and said in milder tones, “You really must strive to contain that impetuous tongue, Miss Vale. It will run you into serious trouble one day.”

When she still made no move, he added testily, “I trust you are not going to treat me to tears. Amaryllis invariably uses them as the ultimate weapon, but I must say I had not thought you so poor-spirited.”

Felicity swallowed hard. “Then unless you wish to be proved wrong, sir, you had best give me leave to withdraw.”

“Certainly not. I have not nearly done with you. There is a great deal more I would know of your background.” Amaryllis was right! The man had not the least delicacy of feeling! She straightened up and glared at him, not caring if he saw her lashes spiked with tears.

“That is much better,” he approved. “My sister-in-law has told me a little about you. Your father was a sergeant major. His regiment?”

“The 23rd Light Dragoons, my lord.”

“My brother was with the 12th. He died with General Hay at the siege of Bayonne, when hostilities were all but ended.”

There was that in his voice which made her feel she must have misjudged him. She said impulsively, “I’m sorry. You were close?”

“Very close.” His voice was curt. “But we are not speaking of my affairs, Miss Vale. Your father was killed at Waterloo?”

Felicity’s mind, still half-engulfed in searing memory, shied away. She nodded.

“And your mother?”

The thunder was rolling nearer—louder now. On the still, heavy air the scent of roses was overpowering.

“We knew she was dying,” Felicity said. “The doctors could do little for her and she refused to leave my father. When she became suddenly worse, Mrs. Patterson insisted on taking her in. They had known one another a long time—were two of a kind, in fact. The Colonel managed to arrange for my father to come—just for a few hours.” She could only guess what it must have cost Papa—sitting on her mother’s bed, smiling, her hands clasped tightly in his—and promising in that gruff, yet gentle voice he kept only for her, “This time we’ll fix ‘Boney’ for good, dearest—then it’s back to England for us—we’ll have you on your feet in no time at all...”

The Earl, watching her face, found it extraordinarily revealing and totally at odds with her prosaic account of events.

How many young women of his acquaintance, he wondered, would have had the stomach to stay beside a dying mother in a panic-torn city ravaged by terrible thunderstorms, the streets clogged by mud-caked fugitives and streams of wounded, while a troop of Hanoverian cavalry stormed through, scattering everything in its path and shouting that all was lost
.

And for this girl all
had
been lost. Yet here she was telling him, with only a slight faltering in her narrative, of riding out to the battlefield with one of
her father
’
s men, to bring his body home on a handcart so that she could bury her parents together in a little local churchyard, where pink cabbage roses climbed over the
walls
...

The reality defied imagination. “A harrowing experience, Miss Vale,” he said at last.

“It was not easy, but it had to be done,” she said simply, her voice a little huskier than usual. Talking had been an ordeal, but it had been worthwhile; she felt empty—yet, in a carious way, released. “Afterward there were so many wounded to be cared for; it left little time for personal grief.”

“But you had friends?”

“Oh yes! Many, many friends. People were unbelievably kind. The Pattersons in particular
—
I had stayed with them often over the years, helping with the children.

“However, with my father gone, I no longer had any place on the army’s strength
—
nor could I accept for long the hospitality of friends, however willingly offered.” She met his eyes with a shade of the old defiance.
“
Besides, there were too many memories.”

“So?”

“I found a note from Amaryllis among Mamma s effects, telling of her own mother’s death. It bore this address, so on an impulse I wrote to acquaint her with my own altered circumstances, hoping she might help me to find an agreeable situation—and set off without waiting
for a reply.”

In the light streaming from the windows of Cheynings the Earl’s glance was, to say the least, quizzical.

“Yes, I know,” she agreed ruefully. “I see now, of course, that it was an idiotish thing to do.

“As far as I could remember, Amaryllis and I had dealt tolerably together as children, though our paths seldom crossed. It was my Aunt Eugenie who couldn’t stand me
—
a skinny brown hoyden, all arms and legs and no manners, was how she described me, as I recall—and I daresay she was right!”

To Felicity’s surprise, Stayne laughed. “That sounds like Lady Whitney! I collect your mother and she were not much alike?”

“
Only superficially. Both were beautiful and it was intended that they should both marry well. Aunt Eugenie duly obliged, but Mamma was less conformable. She fell in love with my father and would have no other, so they washed their hands of her.”

“I see.”

There was a crack of thunder quite close; the first heavy spots of rain splattered the ground. The Earl put
a
hand under Felicity’s arm and turned her in the direction of the house.

“
Tell me, Miss Vale—has Amaryllis spoken of payment?”

Felicity stumbled and his grasp tightened.

“
Heavens, no! We have never discussed it, but
... no.
I am grateful for the breathing space
—
and, truly, young Jamie is no trouble.”

“I am astonished to hear you say so. To my mind he has been most shockingly spoiled!”

“There is nothing wrong with Jamie that time and a little true affection won’t mend. That—and perhaps a more regular interest taken in him by a man in whom he could repose his confidence and admiration.”

Stayne glanced down at her sharply. “Are you by any chance taking me to task, young woman?”

“I am stating a simple fact, sir. A boy of Jamie’s age sets great store by a man’s good
opinion—
preferably his parent, but in Jamie’s case his uncle and guardian. It is quite apparent that he holds you in high esteem; it seems a pity, therefore, that he must seek his credit elsewhere.”

There was silence.

“I wonder, Miss Vale—are you a complete innocent or a clever tactician?”

“Sir?”

“No matter. Either way I stand rebuked and the diversion has taken us very neatly away from my original query.”

“Lord Stayne—I beg you will leave matters as they are. I am more than grateful for a temporary roof over my head; to take payment as well would seem...”

“Like charity, Miss Vale?” The interruption was harsh. “No such is intended. But while you continue to minister to my nephew, you will be paid accordingly.”

“I shall not take your money, my lord.”

“What an infernally argumentative girl you are! Well, we shall see, ma’am!”

The rain put an abrupt end to the dispute; in a sudden deluge they were obliged to retreat with undignified haste to the shelter of the main portico, where the Earl favored her with a brusque good night and departed.

3

Dinner on the following evening was all that Felicity had anticipated. From the outset it was apparent that the company was unsure how far her presence should be acknowledged. Her kinship with Amaryllis amounted at best to that of a poor relation fulfilling the duties of a governess. They obviously thought it a very odd quirk of Stayne’s to require her attendance at dinner—as did Amaryllis.

Felicity felt a certain degree of sympathy with them in their dilemma, since the Earl, having all but commanded her attendance, made not the least push to engage her interest.

In the event, it was the conversation which most effectively ostracized her, concerning as it did people and events completely unknown to her.

On the whole, the gentlemen behaved rather better than the ladies, which aroused a wry conjecture as to their motives. She could in no way be considered above the ordinary; indeed, she was resigned to cutting a drab figure in her best black crape. Yet, even as she reminded herself sternly that she was in mourning, and was not there in order to shine, she could not suppress a stab of envy that, amid the rainbow glory of his guests only the Earl in the stark simplicity of his dark coat came anywhere near her for plainness.

So it was not her captivating beauty which caused the young tulip of fashion across the table to ogle her, or accounted for the way Mr. Tristram Dytton’s knee so often brushed against hers beneath the linen cloth. Did they perhaps imagine her position sufficiently ambiguous to admit the possibility of a little “back of the stairs” dalliance? Glory—just let them try! The thought kindled a derisive sparkle in her eye, rousing the gentlemen concerned to new peaks of curiosity.

The absence of any enlivening conversation enabled Felicity to watch entranced as dishes of turbot, salmon, and whitebait, each dressed in its own spicy sauce—together with truffled capons, bowls of asparagus, and tiny new potatoes—were removed and replaced with several roast duckling, two or three assorted raised pies, and a sirloin of beef, pink and succulent—all accompanied by a staggering variety of salads, vegetables, sweets, puddings, ices, sweetmeats, and a great bowl of strawberries and other fresh fruits.