‘Sometimes I think maybe I should have sold the land, and taken a small house somewhere like Bath. I know Mother would have much preferred that.’ Rufus sighed. ‘But I would have had to find some kind of employment, and what could I do except become a clerk or some such thing? I had to use most of the money left by my grandfather to pay off Father’s debts, and I felt it was wrong to squander the rest staying on at Oxford while mother was living like a poor relation at Wick Farm. At least this way we still own the land, and if I make a go of farming, I might be able to rebuild Briargate and one day my children might have all the advantages I had.’
‘You did the right thing,’ Nell said stoutly. ‘Our Matt reckons you were born to farm, and I don’t think Lady Harvey would have been any happier in Bath, not without fine clothes, a carriage and servants. At least she’s got friends in the village, people who care for her. If you were my son I’d be right proud of you.’
‘Funny how things turn out,’ he said with a wry grin. ‘When I was small I was so envious of the village children. It seemed to me they had so much more fun and freedom than I did. Now I’ve got to work for a living it looks very different.’
Nell finished her work on the cake and took it to the pantry. ‘All our lives have been turned upside down,’ she said as she returned. ‘I just wish the police could find Albert and hang him. It’s like having a bad tooth. You know that the pain will keep coming back until it’s been pulled out.’
‘He won’t dare come anywhere near here,’ Rufus said comfortingly. ‘Whatever else he is, he isn’t stupid.’
‘No, but he was obsessed with the garden at Briargate, and I think he’s likely to come back to look at what’s happened to it,’ Nell said in a small voice.
‘Then he’ll die of shock when he finds it gone,’ Rufus chuckled. ‘I ploughed up the bottom lawn back in November, and I’ve got pigs where the rose garden used to be. You must come up and take a look, Nell. Not just at the farm, but the gatehouse too. The curtains you made for us are lovely.’
Nell shook her head. ‘I couldn’t, Rufus, too many bad memories for me. Maybe when Hope and the Captain come home I’ll feel different, but I doubt it.’
Nell stirred the soup while Rufus read Hope’s letters. Now and again he’d chuckle at something amusing, and she’d glance round at him, wondering how he’d react if he was ever to find out that Hope was his half-sister.
Proud and happy as she was that Hope had done well for herself and married a doctor, the secret of her true parentage worried Nell almost as much as the prospect of Albert turning up one day.
Hope mentioned Captain Pettigrew a great deal in her letters. Nell hadn’t of course given Rufus the first one in which she explained how Albert had caught her with the letter from the Captain to Lady Harvey and made several references to their love affair. But it was clear from the subsequent letters that she’d formed an attachment to the Captain while nursing him.
Angus’s letters showed the attachment was mutual, and though common sense told Nell this was probably because of their respective links with her, it felt like more than that. On the one hand she told herself that maybe she should tell them the truth. Hope had no other father now, the Captain had no other children. They would be a comfort to each other.
But there was Rufus. He might very well be so delighted that his childhood friend was in fact his half-sister that he’d overlook his mother’s infidelity. But she doubted he’d appreciate discovering that Captain Pettigrew, a man he’d known all his life and looked up to, was the villain of the piece.
When Nell heard the wonderful news that the Captain had met Hope in Varna, she’d gone straight to Matt to share it with him. He had passed it on to Rufus, who in turn had told Lady Harvey.
Lady Harvey had found a man to bring her here in a trap the very next day and she was all of a twitter. It was difficult to tell what she really felt: whether it was joy that Hope was alive and well, terror that her guilty secret was about to be exposed, or just plain jealousy that Nell received letters from the Captain and she did not. Perhaps it was some of each.
Nell had given her former mistress short shrift that day. She was so full of joy that her seven-year wait was finally over that she wasn’t going to allow it to be diluted by anyone. Lady Harvey had gone off in a huff, but not before she’d sobbed about how hard her life was now, and how misunderstood she was.
It was only days later that the whole of England had been shocked by the news of the carnage of the Light Brigade at Balaclava. Nell had been beside herself as she waited for news of Captain Pettigrew, and even when she knew he was one of the wounded, she couldn’t stop worrying for he might very well die later from his injuries. But finally his letter had arrived to tell her he had just been moved from the hospital where Hope had stitched up his wounds and he was doing well.
She must have read that letter a hundred times, crying each time. She had stopped going to church after Reverend Gosling had told her she was sinful to leave Albert, and showed no concern for Hope. But she went to the church in Keynsham that day and thanked God. Even now, with two more letters from the Captain and five in all from Hope, she remained totally convinced that it was God’s hand that had brought the two of them together, and that it was for a purpose which He would soon reveal.
‘Imagine Hope stitching up Captain Pettigrew!’
Rufus’s remark brought Nell sharply out of her musing. He looked so incredulous, wide-eyed and filled with the romance of war.
‘Eh! To think I taught her to sew too,’ she laughed. ‘But she makes it sound so dirty there. If it’s that bad, I don’t know how she can stand it.’
‘She’s just telling us how it really is. She doesn’t seem to think Lord Cardigan is the hero we’ve been led to believe,’ Rufus said, looking down thoughtfully at one of the letters. ‘Or Lord Raglan such a great general! It is appalling that so many soldiers are dying of disease, that they’re hungry with no warm clothes or even proper shelter.’
‘She always was soft-hearted,’ Nell said.
‘But very truthful, Nell,’ Rufus reminded her. ‘It looks to me as if we’re being given a false picture back here. How dare they put the blame for so many deaths on to the doctors, when really it’s the fault of the government because they didn’t plan this campaign properly from the outset.’
‘Well, I daresay you read all the newspapers and understand them,’ Nell said. ‘I can’t make head nor tail of it.’
‘Well, it does seem to me that they glorify war. They don’t tell us, like Hope has, about the men collapsing with the heat on the march to Balaclava because their uniforms were too warm, nor that they had nothing to drink. Imagine them being left there to die because there were no carts to put them on!’
‘I don’t like the parts of her letters when she goes on about things like that.’ Nell wrinkled her nose with distaste.
‘Then you are as bad as my mother,’ he said scornfully. ‘She’s only interested in soldiers when they are in full dress for a review, with the band playing.’
Nell turned back to her pot of soup so Rufus wouldn’t see her face, for she was afraid it would give her feelings away. She was pretty certain Lady Harvey would be eager to hear every last piece of news of the Captain when he got back to Briargate later. And she would see Captain Pettigrew’s injuries as the perfect excuse to write to him and try to win his heart again.
If she did secure it, where would that leave Nell?
Chapter Twenty-two
1855
Hope rubbed away the ice on the inside of the hospital window with the corner of her apron and couldn’t help but smile at the sight which met her eyes. Snow had fallen during the night and now at daybreak the harbour looked beautiful.
The ships had been transformed into fantastic fairy vessels, every rope, beam and railing lightly sprinkled with snow. No footprints had yet spoiled the virgin whiteness on the decks; even the planks to shore had a thick carpet of white.
All the terrible ugliness, filth and squalor on the quayside was covered. Crates, carts, barrels and other goods had been transformed into incredible snow sculptures. The steep craggy cliffs across the harbour had the appearance of a gigantic meringue.
The scene evoked memories of snowfalls in her childhood. She could almost see Joe and Henry eagerly dragging the sledge from the shed and arguing over who would have the first ride.
They would take her on it down to the village. She would cling to Henry’s waist as he steered in front, Joe pushing them until the sledge went fast enough to jump on too, and they’d whizz down the lane so fast she would scream with a heady mixture of terror and joy.
Hope had been at the hospital all night as there had been several amputations on her ward yesterday. Two of the patients had been in so much pain when they came round from the chloroform that she had been reluctant to leave them in the less than tender care of the orderlies. But they, like all the other patients, were asleep now, and the ward was filled with the sound of snoring, the breath rising from their mouths like smoke in the cold air.
She turned away from the window at the sound of feet stamping beyond the door, and sawit was Bennett coming in.
‘Doesn’t it look beautiful out there,’ she said as she walked over to him. ‘Was it fun being the first to walk on it?’
He gave her a withering look.
‘Sorry I dared speak to the eminent surgeon,’ she retorted with sarcasm. ‘Was it a night without me to warm you? Or just that you’ve become so used to ugliness you don’t recognize beauty any more?’
‘If we have this much snow down here, imagine how bad it will be up on the Heights,’ he said sharply.
That hadn’t occurred to Hope and she felt chastened that his thoughts were for the men in their trenches, while hers were of happy times in her childhood.
Hope wasn’t one for apologizing, so she began to tell him how Pitt and Moore had been during the night. ‘I gave them both a few drops of opium about two o’clock,’ she ended up. ‘They settled after that.’
He nodded, and she had to take that as confirmation he approved of her administering the only drug they had which actually had some benefit.
‘You’re very early,’ she said. ‘I didn’t expect you for at least another hour.’
‘I couldn’t sleep,’ he said. ‘And I had some things I needed to do.’
His tone was so chilly that Hope looked at him more carefully and saw his eyes were heavy, the way they often were when he hadn’t had any sleep. But there was something more – his mouth was set in a stiff, straight line, a sure sign he was worried about something.
‘What is it?’ she asked. ‘What’s happened?’
He took off his cap and ran his fingers through his hair distractedly. Hope knew he was playing for time. ‘Come on, out with it,’ she said sharply.
‘Colonel Lawrence came to see me last night,’ he sighed. ‘At Dr Anderson’s recommendation I am to rejoin the regiment before Sebastopol.’
Hope felt as if a rug had been pulled from beneath her feet. Dr Anderson was in charge of the hospital and he had always liked and appreciated Bennett. ‘Why?’ she gasped. ‘I don’t understand. Why send such an experienced surgeon up there?’
Bennett shrugged. ‘He didn’t give me a reason, but it’s almost certainly because someone feels I’ve been favoured by staying down here.’
‘Favoured!’ she exclaimed. ‘Working over eighteen hours a day!’
Bennett gave a humourless laugh. ‘They do that up on the Heights too. I suppose I’m getting a reputation as a nuisance, always complaining about the lack of medicine and provisions for the sick.’
‘Colonel Lawrence said that?’
‘Not in so many words, but he hinted at it.’
‘I suppose you can’t refuse?’ Even as she asked she knew the answer. An order had to be obeyed.
She felt almost faint with the shock. The three months since the hurricane had been incredibly grim for the men at the siege. While gunfire had been only sporadic and desultory on both sides during this time, and there had been no actual assaults, it had been bitterly cold, with rain, sleet and snow. The
Prince
going down with all the warm clothing, boots and other supplies they so desperately needed had been a monumental tragedy, which had become even more apparent as the winter set in.
There might have been fewer wounded men during the three-month period, but the numbers of sick men had increased enormously. Both doctors and officers had made endless complaints about the men spending all night getting soaked to the skin in the trenches and having nothing dry to change into. All the men were weakened by lack of food and the fatigue of digging trenches, building fortifications and hauling heavy equipment up to the Heights, which left them exhausted. But then to be expected to sleep on the cold ground, wrapped only in a sodden worn-out greatcoat and blanket, was inhumane.
It hurt everyone working in the hospitals to discover that the newspapers back home were implying that the high mortality rate of the sick and wounded was due to their negligence. The much-publicized arrival of Florence Nightingale and her nurses in Scutari, and their reports of the terrible conditions, appeared to have turned every hack reporter into an expert on hospitals.
Many of the senior doctors in Balaclava were incensed that it had taken a well-connected lady with precious little medical experience to galvanize the government into improving conditions, when their professional advice, reports and requests for supplies had been ignored.
Yet everyone continued to do their best, even though every single day was a battle they could never win. The sick and wounded were shipped off to Scutari too fast in their opinion, just when the patients were at their most vulnerable.
Yet however difficult and in the main unrewarding the conditions in the base hospital were, it was in a different league from the field hospitals up on the Heights.
Hope had twice made the trip up there with Bennett since Christmas to take much-needed dressings and medicine, and what they’d seen had appalled them.
All grass, bushes and trees were gone, leaving only a vast muddy quagmire studded with tents. The hospitals were just marquees, the wounded and sick had to lie on the ground, and the care they received would be of only the most basic kind until some form of transport could be found to take them the six or seven long miles down a steep slope to Balaclava. Sometimes, in the worst weather, this was on the backs of their comrades.