Gallant Waif by Anne Gracie (best ereader manga .TXT) 📕

starving, he managed to shoot a hare or something for the pot, just when I thought my stomach was going to stick to my backbone.” She rubbed her stomach reminiscently. “Jemmy could turn even a retreat into a hunting trip.”

Jack moved uncontrollably in his chair, flooded with anger, fighting an impulse to sweep her into his embrace. He, too, had fought at Talavera. He recalled only too well the horrors of that retreat, the starving men, the sheer bloody hell of being unable to provide enough food. That she should ever have been put in such a frightful position! How many times had this little creature faced starvation? He would never forget how thin and frail she had felt in his arms the first time he met her! How he wished he had known her earlier. He would have ensured she was never in danger, or frightened or hungry.

Kate blushed suddenly. “I’m sorry, I know it is unladylike to mention such things.”

Jack was amazed. She could casually refer to the experience of living through a frightful battle and retreating with an exhausted and starving army, then blush because it was unladylike to mention such a thing as a stomach. His eyes caressed her. She was unique, this little Kate.

“I was at Talavera,” he said quietly.

“Then you will recall that dreadful trip back into Portugal too.” She nodded. “Were the Coldstreams at Busaco? Jemmy was wounded there. Was that where you caught your facial wound?”

“No.” His hand crept up to his ravaged cheekbone. “This is a souvenir of Badajoz.”

They both fell silent, remembering Badajoz. The fire crackled loudly as a knot of sap burst. A log fell and sparks twirled madly up the chimney. In her comfortable wing chair, Martha stirred, then returned to her heavy doze. Kate regarded her with compunction. She was an old woman, and she should not be dozing uncomfortably in a chair at this hour, but tucked up warmly in bed. But none of Kate’s arguments could shift her—she was Kate’s chaperon, and her reputation would be safely guarded by her old nurse. Even though Martha knew there was no reputation to guard.

“You seem remarkably calm, relating your experiences.” Jack’s deep low voice pulled Kate out of her reverie. “Were you never frightened before a battle, for instance?”

“Lord, yes, utterly terrified,” she said simply. “Before every battle I was a mess—unable to eat, leaping six feet at every sound. . .even a little grumpy.”

His warm chuckle washed over her. “Grumpy? Now why do I not find that difficult to believe?”

Kate wrinkled her nose. “Yes, fear brings out the virago in me. I used to snap at Ben for being such a big, slow stupid!”

She paused and stared into the flames for a moment. “Ben was the eldest. He was the sort of person you could not for one moment imagine in a hurry, or a flap, about anything. Yet he invariably got things done just as fast and with none of the drama that Jemmy or I seemed to cause.”

She said in a slow, gruff voice, ” ‘This sweaty haste doth make my head spin all the day’—Ben was always saying that to Jemmy or me, and Father would always take him to task about mangling Shakespeare and mentioning sweat in front of me.” Her voice quavered a little.

Jack watched her from the shadows, his eyes unreadable. A father who didn’t want her ears sullied with the word “sweat’, but who took her into situations where she was surrounded by blood, sweat and far, far worse.

“Jemmy used to roast Ben about his unflappability too, but he was a wonderful brother. They were so different, those two—like quicksilver and stone… No, I don’t mean stone precisely because that suggests Ben was cold and he wasn’t—he was a big darling.” Her eyes blinked rapidly and her lips quivered with emotion.

Jack wanted to gather her into his arms and kiss her grief and distress away. Poor, gallant little waif.

“Ben never saw Badajoz. He was killed at Ciudad Rodrigo… Were you at Ciudad Rodrigo?”

He shook his head.

She continued, “I remember that first day there so clearly. It was terribly cold, and the snow was frozen and crunchy underfoot from the frost that night. But the morning was so still and perfect—simply beautiful, you know, the sort of day when you long to go for a good gallop, then come home to a lovely hot breakfast…

“And then the big guns shattered the morning, pounding and pounding until I thought my eardrums would shatter too, though I was a long way from them, you know. And I stuffed my ears with rags to stop the noise… Ben was killed the next day. I suppose you could say he was lucky, for he caught a ball in the temple and probably didn’t know what hit him before he was dead.”

She bit her lip. “You probably think I am unnaturally cold to say he was lucky, but there are so many more terrible ways for a man to—”

He could restrain himself no longer. He had to touch her. He reached across and took her small, cold hands in a warm grip-

“He was lucky, Kate. There couldn’t be a better way to go than instantly, in the open air, in the heat of action.” His hands enveloped hers in warmth.

They lapsed into silence. The only sounds were the crackling of the fire and the slow, rhythmic sound of Martha sleeping. His thumbs stroked back and forth across her skin. Soothing, wordless reassurance.

“How did Jemmy and your father die?”

She blinked the tears back for a few moments, then said softly, “They were both caught by snipers on the way to Salamanca. You recall the way our army and the French were travelling parallel and exchanging shots every now and then to relieve the tedium?”

He nodded. They had been in so many of the same places and yet their paths had never crossed.

“Jemmy was wounded in the chest and, a short time later, Papa was caught in