Barely a Lady (3 page)

“Thank you, Lady Kate,” she said, dropping a quick curtsy, her bag still clutched close. “I am grateful.”

Kate’s smile was incandescent. “I’m not sure you will be once you get wind of my household. But you’ve committed yourself, dearest Olivia. No turning back now.”

And with that, she pulled open the door to let in a blast of wind and rain. A footman waited outside with an open umbrella. Lady Kate sailed past him and ushered Olivia into the open door of her carriage, a sleek blue Berlin with ducal lozenges, which was drawn by what were undoubtedly two of the last horses in Brussels. The great shotgun Olivia saw lying across the footman’s lap might have had something to do with that.

Olivia was just about to lean back against the soft cream leather squabs when something outside her window caught her attention. A second man waited outside the pension door, huddled under an umbrella against the rain. What about him made her look? she wondered.

Then the pension door opened, and Gervaise walked out, umbrella up, to meet the man on the steps. Both turned to watch the carriage pass, and Olivia saw the second man’s face.

Middle-aged, lean, neat as a pin, with hair Macassarred back into a slick cap. Recognition flared in his eyes, and he quickly ducked, as if he could hide from her.

It was too late. Olivia had already recognized him. Her husband’s valet, Edward Chambers. Another unwelcome reminder of her past, another long-unanswered question. It seemed that he was now Gervaise’s valet. Answer enough, she supposed.

Turning away, Olivia closed her eyes. She was still shaking with fear.

There was so much at stake. More than her own honor. More than her life. More than any woman could bear. Because Gervaise wouldn’t rest until he dug out every one of her secrets to use against her. Until he tracked down the little cottage in Devon where Georgie hid and completely destroyed them all.

But she couldn’t put Lady Kate at risk either. She needed to tell her the truth. If she didn’t tell Lady Kate her real name, she risked Lady Kate’s reputation. If she didn’t tell the whole truth, she put that wonderful lady in danger.

But if she did admit the truth, Lady Kate would have to turn her out, and Gervaise hadn’t exaggerated—there really was nowhere else to go. No money. No way to evade Gervaise. No way to protect her little family, and everything she had borne the last five years had been for that one purpose.

She would tell Lady Kate the truth.

Tomorrow.

When she was rested. When she could think straight. When she didn’t feel such blind panic.

She just hoped Lady Kate didn’t suffer for it.

The next afternoon, Olivia found herself standing on the littered, trampled ground outside the massive stone wall that circled Brussels. She had never been so exhausted in her life. Lady Kate had indeed taken eight men into the house she rented on Rue Royale, but their care had been handed over to the house staff. Help was more desperately needed outside, where the situation had grown critical. Medical tents had been erected outside the Namur and Louvain gates, but the wounded had quickly overflowed them, spilling into the narrow cobbled streets and manicured squares of the medieval city. The crisis had left Olivia without a moment to speak to Lady Kate.

Aching in every joint and dizzy with exhaustion, she leaned against the cool ocher stone of the old wall. The late afternoon sun beat unmercifully down, wounded came without cease, and the distant sound of cannon fire came and went with the wind.

The great battle had commenced. Wellington had finally met Napoleon face-to-face in a field to the south of Brussels near the town of Waterloo. Already the list of dead was too long. Handsome young Lord Hay, who had enchanted every girl at the Duchess of Richmond’s ball, was gone, lost at Quatre Bras. As was the Duke of Brunswick, whose black-clad soldiers had personally carried him back to the city from the battlefield. And those striking Gordon Highlanders who had danced in their bright kilts three nights earlier slaughtered almost to a man. God knew how many more, either on the field or along the twenty-five miles that stretched from the battlefield to Brussels.

Olivia stepped to the flap of the medical tent to see that Lady Kate was helping one of the surgeons at the amputation table, her brash, bright smiles easing more than one man through the ordeal. Grace Fairchild was bent over a dying boy who clutched a miniature to his shattered chest. Women were doing work no one had ever expected of them this bloody day, and Olivia wasn’t sure how they would ever recover from it.

She herself had spent the twenty-four hours since Lady Kate had rescued her bandaging and comforting and carrying until one face melded into another, only their uniforms distinguishing the smoke-smeared men. No, not men. Boys.

They were boys, so brave and so frightened and so alone in the last moments of their lives. She couldn’t get around to them fast enough with the water she carried, often the only comfort they got. She couldn’t find the right words to ease them. She couldn’t stand the sound of crying and groaning. But even worse were the hard silences. Men with terrible injuries who stayed grim-lipped and quiet so they didn’t distress their friends.

Anguish burned her throat and churned in her chest. She felt so petty and selfish, worried about escape when these boys had faced so much more. Then she saw Lady Kate looking her way, and she realized there were tears in those magnificent eyes. Olivia deliberately straightened and smiled and walked back out to the narrow cobbled streets where more wounded waited.

It could have been minutes or hours later when suddenly one of the men grabbed her by the arm. “Listen,” he urged.

Olivia wasn’t sure what he meant. She still heard the cries of agony, the pleas for help, for water, for death. She heard…

The cannons.

“They’ve stopped,” she said. She looked down at the young man, a handsome ginger-haired boy from the 20th Light Dragoons who would lose his arm before the hour was out. “Have they? Does that mean it’s over?”

He wasn’t watching her. His eyes were out of focus, as if pouring all his energy into listening. He shook his head. “I don’t know.”

Olivia helped him sip some water and a bit of Lady Kate’s last reserves of brandy. They’d had conflicting reports all day long. Wellington had won. Wellington was in full retreat, and the French were poised to invade Brussels. They’d even had to avoid a full troop of Belgian cavalry thundering through the streets crying defeat. By now, Olivia almost didn’t care who won. As long as the carnage stopped.

“Well, I expect you to ask me for at least one dance at the victory ball,” she said to the boy.

His exhausted, haggard features softened into a smile. “It would be my honor, ma’am. Ensign Charles Gregson at your service.”

Olivia stood and dipped a debutante’s curtsy. “Mrs. Livvie Grace, Ensign. The Boulanger is my favorite.”

“Why, I excel at the Boulanger, ma’am.”

Olivia capped the brandy and smiled back. “ ’Til then, Ensign Gregson,” she said, and turned to the next soldier.

A white-faced Grace Fairchild blocked her way. Grace’s sweat-darkened hair was falling in an untidy lump from her bun. Soot smeared her face, and blood stained the apron that covered her practical gray dress.

“Olivia, may I ask a favor?” She looked as if she were holding herself together by the force of will alone. In the three days Olivia had known her, she had learned that Grace never asked for favors. Favors were always asked of Grace.

Olivia took hold of her arm. “Of course, Grace. What is it?”

“My father…” She looked toward the south, where the cannons had been heard all day. “I’ve had no word from him. He always manages to let me know how he goes. It’s been…”

She swallowed, as if the words were caught in her throat. Olivia wanted to put her arms around the girl. She had a feeling, though, that Grace had long since taught herself to withstand the worst. One show of sympathy might well defeat her.

“Do you know where he is?” Olivia asked.

Grace was still looking to the south. “The Guards have been fighting to hold Château Hougoumont. From what I’ve heard, the battle has been fierce there all day long. Its loss would cost us the western flank, you see.”

Olivia didn’t see. Her time on these streets was the closest she had ever come to battle. “Is there no one to go for you?” she asked. “You’ve been on your leg so long, I fear it will make your injury worse.”

For a moment, Grace looked confused. Then, gently, she smiled. “Oh, my leg. There’s no injury, Olivia. I was born this way. I assure you, it has withstood worse.”

Olivia flushed. “Oh. I’m sorry.”

Grace’s smile grew even softer. “Don’t be silly. How could I object to kindness? Would you mind coming along, though? My father’s old batman Sergeant Harper will accompany us. He is securing weapons. But he’d prefer I have a friend along in case… well…”

Wiping her hands on her own blood-streaked apron, Olivia cast a nervous glance toward the walls. “Of course. But are you sure you must go tonight? It’s already gone seven, and the soldiers say that the road is all but impassable.”

And those cannons stopped such a short time ago.

Grace smiled. “Not for an old campaigner.” She looked down at her hands, as if they fascinated her. “Don’t you see?” she asked with a stiff shrug. “I must know.”

Olivia looked up the shadowed ramparts to see the civilians holding still, as if to better assess the silence. She considered the steady procession of wounded who stumbled through the gates. It was hellish here. What could it possibly be like out there where the sounds of carnage had consumed the day?

Before she could give herself the chance to truly consider it, she gave a brisk nod. “Let me tell Lady Kate. With all those young men to charm, I doubt she’ll even know I’m gone.”

Grace’s face came the closest Olivia had ever seen to crumpling. “Thank you, Olivia. Can you fire a weapon?”

For the first time, Olivia smiled. “As a matter of fact, I can. My father had an inordinate fondness for guns. And I can’t think of anything I’d rather do right now than shoot anyone who kept us from getting to your father.”

Except maybe shooting Gervaise. But he’d been conspicuously absent since the duchess had rescued Olivia. Even he would never be so foolish as to challenge the duchess. She hoped.

No matter what her troubles were, though, Olivia knew they had to wait on Grace’s. So she threw her shoulders back, as she’d seen soldiers do before marching away to war. “Shall we arm ourselves like grenadiers, then, and follow Sergeant Harper into the field of battle?” she asked brightly.

Grace managed a smile through the tears in her eyes. “Indeed, yes. Adventure awaits.”

Only the fact that Sergeant Harper carried two shotguns across his knee ensured the success of their mission. It certainly wasn’t his size. Not much taller than Olivia, he was bandy-legged and had a shock of penny-red hair. But Olivia could see his bond with Grace and knew he’d never let harm come to her.

Lady Kate offered her carriage, her horses, and her coachman. They took the first two; the coachman had gone alarmingly pale when told of their destination.

Grace was the one who drove so the sergeant could have his hands free to defend them. Not anxious to sit alone inside the carriage, Olivia climbed up between them. Even the pepperpot pistol she carried in her big apronpocket didn’t soothe her as they crept down the Charleroi Road.

The land was undulating, with fields of wheat, rye, and barley spreading out in a tree-lined checkerboard to the horizon. The road was churned up, clogged with broken carts, dead horses, discarded gear, and wounded soldiers struggling to reach Brussels. Olivia saw more than one who had sat down beneath a tree for the shade and simply died. The smell was indescribable: death and smoke and blood, a stench Olivia knew she would carry in her memory the rest of her life.

She thought she had seen all manner of suffering in Brussels. One look at the men they passed dispelled that notion. To a man, they walked like the dead: haggard, soot-streaked, tattered, and bloody, holding each other up, sitting down right in the middle of the road when they could go no farther. They barely noticed the odd sight of women on their way to a battlefield. Those who did were more interested in the horses, but Sergeant Harper was enough to quell thoughts of theft.

For hours they struggled on, the late summer light guiding them. The rattle of rifle fire peppered the evening, and thick smoke rose here and there along the horizon. Olivia could see tents and lights to the east as they reached Mont St. Jean and turned west on the Nivelles Road.

“Close now, mum,” Sergeant Harper said, his head on a constant swivel, his finger never off the trigger as Grace maneuvered past another overturned cart. “See the smoke?”

How could he tell? There was smoke everywhere, blurring a fading sky. The sun had set and dusk was coming on, casting the scene in even greater shadow. Olivia squinted in the direction Harper pointed, and suddenly her heart fell away.

Oh, sweet Jesus, it couldn’t be real. How could anyone have survived? The fields of grain were gone. In their place was a carpet of the dead, bodies in red and blue and green, flowers blown over in a storm, lines of them, piles of them. The fading light glinted off swords and breastplates and guns, and hundreds of horses struggled in their death throes, some already bloating and twisted.