Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Seventeen

She clung to her father. "I didn't know. How could I, Papa?"

He tightened his grip. "You ask a very good question, my dear. If I had an adequate answer, probably none of this would have happened."

He released her from his embrace, and with an arm around her shoulder, led her into the house. Wilkie grinned at her from his place in front of the fire, where he warmed his hands. In another minute Harper came through the door, followed by her husband.

"Dare we hope that you have commandeered the ferry?"

That's not much of a greeting, Elinore thought. There was no mistaking the wariness in Jesse's words. She knew of her father's legendary thick skin—how else could he have skated so nimbly through the army for so many years?—but the words grated like a bone saw. She looked at her father. This is where you usually leave the room, she thought. I've never known you to face anything unpleasant a minute longer than necessary.

He surprised her by looking Jesse in the eye. "I am going to have to prove myself, am I not, sir?" he asked.

"You are," Jesse replied, his voice as hard as flint. "Your past actions put your daughter in deep peril, Captain Mason. You've secured the ferry?" he asked again.

Jesse looked at her then, and in the look Elinore saw all his love and longing, and the strain he had been under, trying to see his little army to safety and still preserve that part of himself that demanded a higher level of obedience to medicine. Without complaint, for weeks he had done things she could never do. The sacrifice of his own peaceful inclinations for a woman of breathtaking insignificance and two nondescript soldiers struck her with the force of a slap.

She left her father's side and walked to her husband. "Let me take your coat," she said, trying to keep her voice steady, her hands calm, when she wanted to grab him and never let go. "I can drape it over this chair by the fire. Harper, have we any food? You know how the Chief likes toasted cheese, and no one toasts it better than you."

Her calm words seemed to soothe the situation. Bertie managed a slight bow. "The ferry is mine. I bought the use of it for a week, and the services of the ferryman. Captain, I am amazed how many of our erstwhile allies are reluctant to take a government chit."

There was something in the offhand way he said it that made Jesse smile. "Do you suppose, sir, that the Spanish are as tired of us as we are of them?"

It was a good start, Elinore reasoned. She looked at her father, and for a change, he did not fail her. "Too true, Captain, too true." He made an apologetic face. "As much as it pained me, when he would not honor a government chit, I was forced to pay him in pounds sterling." He smiled at his daughter. "Imagine that, Nell, if you can."

She could not. Her jaw dropped and her eyes opened wide, to Bertie Mason's obvious amusement. He put his hand to his heart, and she saw a little of the old actor in him. "Do I see a certain disbelief in your eyes—Aren't they lovely, Captain Randall? She takes after me—that I actually have two coins to rub together?"

"It astounds me, sir," Jesse replied frankly.

Mason laughed. ‘Too much reclamation in the last chapter is the stuff of bad novels, Captain! I fear I am too old for reform of a permanent nature. Forgive me, my dear daughter. Let us bask in this temporary virtue as long as possible, and let us do it over dinner." He turned toward the fireplace, hesitated a second, then turned around suddenly and took her by the arms again. When he spoke, his voice held no assurance, no polish, no Bertie Mason dash, no pluck. "I did not know that I would ever see you again, Nell," he said, his voice so filled with genuine emotion that her heart seemed to stop.

She put her hands on each side of his face and kissed him. "Papa, I was in excellent hands, truly I was." She sighed and looked at Jesse, only to have to adjust her gaze again when her husband seemed to be struggling, too. She took a deep breath. "Private Harper, do let us see to that cheese. Papa, did you make soup?"

Wilkie located spoons while Harper toasted the cheese. Elinore stood with her back to the fire, lifting her sodden skirts, until her father called them to the table. With a flourish, he sat them down, and gestured for them to begin. No one argued.

Harper started on his second bowl, and Jesse finally set down his spoon when Bertie Mason cleared his throat. "It was the worst retreat imaginable," he began. "Two of our darling generals even got lost, if you can imagine such a thing, and there were the French, chewing at our heels. Captain, your hair will curl—well, yours is already curled— when you finally get to read Wellington's memo to the army." He shuddered elaborately. "No one knew where anyone was, and I suppose we all assumed that you were safe somewhere."

"Assume. I do hate that word now," Jesse murmured.

"The regiment was beyond Ciudad Rodrigo before anyone questioned the whereabouts of Number Eight," Mason said. His lively expression grew somber. "It probably would have been weeks before we knew, except that Major Bones just had to gloat. I suppose it is the nature of bullies." He looked down at the table. "We drank together one night. My apologies, Elinore, but I told you I am not a reformed man."

She made some motion with her hand, then allowed Jesse to take it and hold it. He kissed her fingers, then put her hand on his leg in a possessive gesture she knew he would never have dreamed of doing mere days ago.

"He told me what happened, gloating and laughing. God damn the man!" Mason said, not disguising his bitterness. "‘That surgeon thought he was so clever,' he told me. ‘He thinks he can have her, and you thought you could make me a laughingstock, Mason, by paying me back like that.'" Mason rose suddenly. "I humiliated him, he said."

"Did you mention this to General Picton or Sir Arthur?" Jesse asked.

Mason shook his head. Red spots burned in his cheeks. "Do you know anyone in the army who takes Bertie Mason seriously?"

"No, I do not," Jesse replied. "You assumed they wouldn't believe you."

"Yes," Mason said, his voice equally frank. "I have said how disorganized the retreat was. I am certain that General Picton would have laughed, patted my shoulder—you know how he is—and told me to give it a few days when we were all together in Lisbon again."

"I can see that, sir," Jesse agreed. "Just wait a few more days, and then Number Eight would probably materialize." He leaned forward across the table. "Do you know that Bones is directly responsible for the death of Surgeon Sheffield, and the ruin of a Spanish family?"

"Sir, if you'll pardon me, he almost got us all killed," Harper added.

"Dear God," Mason said. He paused a moment to collect his emotions. "I feared as much." He smiled, but there was no humor in it. "What do I generally do in extreme distress? Besides drink myself into a wrinkled wad?"

"Cards," Elinore said at once.

"Exactly. I knew I needed money, if I was going to go back to Spain."

"I would suggest you also needed some permission, Captain," Jesse said dryly.

"You may, but we can't have everything, can we?"

Elinore gasped. "Papa, are you on French leave?"

"Just a brief one, daughter."

"For me?"

She knew that if she lived to be old, blind, and toothless, she would never forget the look he gave her. "For you alone." Never one to invest in too many solemn moments, he winked at Jesse. "Oh, perhaps for you, too, but let me say here that no father ever looks with total approval on the man who beds his daughter. And don't you forget that!"

Jesse laughed, even as his face turned crimson. He moved Elinore's hand higher up his leg. "My blushes, Captain. I say, may I call you Bertram?"

"Yes, if we have advanced that far... Jesse." He looked around at them. "I told that bastard Bones I would play cards. I still had those ten pounds extra that you gave me."

"I believe it was twenty pounds, Bertram," Jesse reminded.

"Why must surgeons be so damned exact? I passed a number of wineries on the road to Ciudad Rodrigo."

"Obviously not without stopping."

"I played and I won, and I got up from the table with my winnings. The ferryman has a heavy pouch of sovereigns, and the promise of more, if he will ferry us and be silent. I have been here four days, wondering if you would arrive before the French."

"Only just," Jesse said. "I recommend a departure with the dawn."

"I couldn't agree more." Mason laughed. "This place is slow indeed. The wine is gone, the river seems to be rising, and the ferryman reeks of garlic from every pore."

"Poor Papa," Elinore said.

"Do you know what we will find on the other side of the Douro?"

"The French, I fear. The ferryman's uncle is watching for us on the opposite bank—Lord, he was expensive. He says the Frogs have crossed, but seem indecisive about advancing on Ciudad Rodrigo again. The armies appear not to be joined yet."

"A good run will get us into Rodrigo?"

"I think so, Jesse." Bertie touched his shoulder. "We should retire. You and Elinore will have the room beyond. I will split the watch with your soldiers here in the front room." He yawned. "I have been trying to stay awake. I wish we could eventually engage in a war where we could entirely trust our allies."

"I could watch, too," Jesse said.

"You could," Mason replied in a low voice, "but the way you keep inching my daughter's hand up your leg makes me suspect that, good intentions aside, you would be useless." He winked at Elinore. "I'm certain I did not suspect that our quiet little surgeon would be a Don Juan. Nell, I hope you are not disappointed how things have turned out."

"Quite the contrary, Papa."

He clutched her hand. "I did not do anything right."

She thought of the years behind her following the drum, forced to be the adult in the Mason family, working in the marching hospital to equalize family debts real or imagined, and the scorn of other officers' families. I could be bitter, she thought, and not even Jesse would blame me. I could argue successfully that I have learned more of virtue and character from both of Number Eight's surgeons rather than from my own parents. I can also be charitable.

"No, Papa, you did not," she said quietly, "but it doesn't follow that I am the poorer for it." She looked at his hand in hers, and rested her cheek against it. "You came to find us. What more proof do I need of your affection for me?"

"Goodnight now, my darling daughter."

The door had hardly closed behind them when Jesse took her in his arms. He kissed her, held her out from him as though for a good look, then pulled her close again, close enough to suggest to her that neither of them would be on their feet much longer. She could have wished for a bath, or a pretty nightgown, or even just a brush, but wasn't sure that any of it mattered much to her husband. She thought he would not object when she pulled away to unbutton her dress, but he kept her close.

"I must confess to a dreadful lie, Elinore," he told her. "You would never lie to me," she contradicted. She could at least unbutton his shirt, if he didn't want to pull away.

"I did, back there in the dead tent when we were married. Mind the neckcloth, Elinore. It's the only one I have left. When you asked if I would agree to let you make up your mind at the Portuguese border, I said yes." He moved back a little to unbutton her dress. "I didn't mean it." He stopped to look into her eyes, and then kissed her neck. "You already know that."

"I do." She looked down at him and smiled. "Jesse, I think one of us should unbutton your trousers. I have no needle and thread. If you pop those buttons, you will look more unsoldierly than usual."

He laughed, his hand over his mouth. "Get in bed, Elinore. Time's wasting."

She did as he said, and welcomed him inside her body with her usual earnest generosity. She knew he was tired, but he took his time, making sure that she climaxed first. When he came, she pressed her hands hard against the small of his back, with her lips to his ear as he muttered something into her neck.

He was in no hurry to leave her. "If I get heavy, just push me off, but Elinore, you feel so good, I hope you won't. Am I making any sense?"

"None whatsoever," she whispered back. "Is that common, at times like this?"

"I fear so. You will think you have married a gibbering idiot."

She laughed softly, adoring his warmth and the altogether seductive realization that she had the surgeon's full attention. She rested her legs on his. "Possessive, are we?" he asked, his voice drowsy.

"Most certainly, my dear," she replied. "I have observed you in the hospital for several years, and the reality is not lost on me that you have very little free time." She ran her feet up and down his legs several times, and felt herself growing warm again, and anxious. "Please, do humor me," she gasped.

He humored her.

Morning brought leaden skies, but no rain. She lay in bed and listened to the roar of the river. Jesse was already awake and dressed. "Up, my dear," he said, buttoning his uniform jacket. He sat down beside her and ran his hand along her bare shoulder. "Just think. You married me and got an exciting honeymoon trip through a foreign country, visited royalty, and improved your language skills. Now we have a voyage ahead, and perhaps a reception on the other shore."

She sat up, dragging the blanket around her shoulders. "What will happen to us?"

He kissed her forehead. "That, my love, will depend entirely upon the French."

She feared a mishap on the ferry, but there was none. When they were across, her father gave the ferryman his last handful of sovereigns. They followed their usual order of march, her father included this time, traveling single file down the narrow cow trail on the other side of the Douro. The closer they came to the river, the more French troops they saw on that opposite bank. Some of the fusiliers fired, but the balls fell short.

She remembered the Douro well from other crossings, and knew that soon they would reach the broad flood plain barren of sheltering trees. She looked around her at her companions on the retreat, observing their alert watchfulness, their silence, and the way they set their lips tighter, the closer they came to the plain. Tonight we will be inside the walls of Ciudad Rodrigo, she told herself.

Her father took the lead from Harper, and led them at an oblique angle away from the river. She could hear the water boiling in the gorge now, and knew the Roman bridge was beyond the bend. She raised up in her saddle and strained for a look at Ciudad Rodrigo, and there it was.

The next sequence of events happened so quickly that she knew she could never reconstruct them exactly, even if a wigged barrister had demanded a deposition. As the sun came out, she saw a flash of light and glanced to her left along the riverbank they were riding away from. The others had seen the soldiers, too, half hidden in the trees.

She saw the flash of a sword, and the guns fired. She screamed as Harper reeled in his saddle and clutched the pommel. Without hesitation and already fumbling in his medical satchel, Jesse rode to him. Her father leaned close and tugged her reins, indicating that she follow him. Wilkie immediately rode beside her to cover her from the tree line.

"Down here," Mason called, and she followed him down an embankment, fighting to keep her seat as her horse slid on his haunches. Harper was already on the ground, his back against the embankment as Jesse applied pressure to his bleeding arm. Elinore threw herself down beside him and pulled a pressure bandage from her satchel. He grabbed it, crammed it into the wound, and raised his neck so she would take off his neckcloth. He smiled his thanks and bound Harper's arm tight.

"Are you all right?" she asked the private.

He nodded, but he spoke to Jesse, his tone apologetic. "We shouldn't have been caught by that, Chief."

"I suppose not. Can you ride?"

"Better'n ol' Wilkie on 'is best day, sir."

It was a feeble joke, but Wilkie laughed. "You're a liar, and I'll prove you wrong. Watch me, 'arry."

A look passed between the two friends that set warning bells jangling in her head. "Please don't," she started to say, but the event was beyond her before the words left her mouth. Wilkie began to back up his horse along the embankment.

"Get on your horse, Mrs. Randall," Harper ordered. "You, too, Chief. Now!"

She obeyed the private without question, forced into obedience by the look in his eyes. She did not dare glance at Wilkie because she knew what he was going to do. "Don't, Wilkie," she whispered as her father threw her back into her saddle. His face white, Jesse helped Harper onto his horse and mounted his own. He turned to speak to Wilkie, but it was too late. After a wink at Harper, the private rode his horse out of the embankment at a gallop, slapping the animal hard with the reins, and dashed toward the river.

"My God! He'll be killed!" Jesse exclaimed. He gathered his reins in his hands.

"He told you once that the only military lesson he ever remembered was a diversion, Chief. Remember?" Harper shouted, his voice tight with pain. "He's trying to buy you a life!"

The guns went off, and Elinore burst into tears. When the guns continued to pop all along the line of skirmishers, Harper grabbed her reins from her with his good hand. "He's not making it easy for them Frogs, and I wish you and the Chief would move!"

"I can't leave him to die," Jesse said. "I have to do something!"

"No, I do," Bertie Mason said. Crouching over his horse, he rode toward Jesse and grabbed his sleeve.

"Let go of me!"

"No! Private Harper, do your duty with this stubborn man. I've been a captain longer than he has, and I outrank him. Here, I'll make it easier."

Her heart in her throat, Elinore watched as her father whipped out his saber and struck her husband on the temple with it. Jesse's eyes rolled back in his head, and he fell forward across the pommel of his saddle. Without missing a beat, Mason slung him onto Harper's lap. He looked back at Elinore. "Pity to do that to my only son-in-law. Do name one of your sons after me." He tipped his hand to her and rode out of the embankment.

Harper, his face wet with tears, clamped his bleeding arm over the surgeon, and nosed his horse forward. "Mrs. Randall, you ride at an angle toward the city. I'll be right behind you. Don't stop for anything."

Numb, she nodded, took a deep breath, and dug her heels into her mount. I can't do this, she told herself as she did it. She screamed again when the French guns roared, but they were not directed at her or Harper. Her last view of her father, before she focused her entire mind, sight, and energy on Ciudad Rodrigo, was the sight of him kneeling over Wilkie and then pulling his horse down beside him.

She must have hesitated, because Harper growled something at her. She gave him the coldest glare she could muster, but redoubled her efforts, even though it pained her heart to flog her tired mount with the riding crop her father had thrust at her before she rode out of the embankment.

The firing stopped when the French troops lost the range, but Harper was relentless in prodding her forward. The city gate opened when she and Harper reached the causeway. Her mind barely registered the new walls and the number of soldiers lining the ramparts who were cheering them. Oh, don't, she wanted to tell them. We have lost so much.

Once safely inside the walls, Elinore leaped from her horse without waiting for assistance and hurried to Harper, who by now was leaning low over the body of his chief surgeon, his whole arm crimson from the shoulder down. She stood there, hands cradling her husband's head as he dangled, insensible, across the private's lap.

General Picton himself rushed up. "Great Neptune's soggy balls!" he roared. "What on earth?"

"Marching Hospital Number Eight, reporting for duty," Harper said. "Better late than never," he managed to say before the tears came. Elinore reached up to touch his foot in the stirrup.

Picton gestured, and two soldiers gently removed Jesse from Harper's lap. "It's all right, lad," the general said as he helped Harper from the saddle himself. "We saw most of it from the ramparts. God's bloody wounds, we couldn't do a thing!" He looked at Elinore and seemed to remember himself. "Beg pardon." He peered closer. "Nell Mason, is it?"

She shook her head. "Elinore Randall now. Please, sir, can you take them to the hospital?"

"We can and will, little lady." He turned to the lieutenant hovering close by. "Allenby, find this lady a quiet corner with a bed and a fireplace."

"No. I will go with them," she said, her voice calm. "General, can you tell me how soon someone will be able to retrieve the ... the others from the plain?''

Picton's aide-de-camp made a small gesture, and spoke quietly to his commander, who nodded, his eyes troubled now. "As soon as we can, my dear.'' He put his hand on her shoulder, and there was no mistaking the tenderness of his expression. "I don't know when I've seen such a brave display, Mrs. Randall. We can all be proud of Captain Mason."

"And Private Wilkie," she said, not even daring to look at Harper.

He nodded. General Picton stood in silence beside her as Jesse was lowered onto a stretcher. The surgeon's eyes fluttered, then opened. He raised his hand, and Elinore came to his side and bent close.

"He has a request, General," she said, stepping back.

"Find Major Bones," Jesse whispered. He tried to raise himself up. "Find him now!"

She could tell that General Picton was startled by the fervency of Jesse's demand. "I'm certain that can be arranged, Captain, but surely it can wait until you feel more . . ."

"Find him before I turn Private Harper loose to look." He lay down again, exhausted. "Or Elinore. We have a vast grievance, General."