Pemberley to Waterloo: Georgiana Darcy's Diary, Volume 2 (22 page)

I had been determined all day not to be a missish, fainting female--or give way to terror over all the what-ifs in our present situation. But on the other hand, it seemed to me that there was a definite line between bravery and stupidity. And four women, alone and undefended in a house in the wealthiest part of town, would make for an easy target for French soldiers. Or for the troops of our Prussian allies, for that matter; the Prussian soldiers are said to be even more rapacious than the French. Besides which, if any of the townsfolk tried to steal the Forsters' horses--I'd been watching such occurrences all day--I doubted any of us would be able to stop them.

Sergeant Kelly was frowning over what I had said. "Four of you on your own? No, that'll never do. Not but what I'm certain our lads will give old Boney's lot a grand beating tomorrow. But you ought to have someone here, just in case anything turns nasty." He nodded with sudden decision. "Right, I'll stay." His teeth flashed white in the midst of the dark beard. "Not but what I wouldn't stay for your own sake, Miss Darcy. But apart from that, I'm thinkin' the colonel would make me wish I'd had my arm cut off and both my legs as well if I let harm come to you."

Sunday 18 June 1815

They say the battle is to be fought at Waterloo, just as the Duke of Wellington said at the Duchess of Richmond's ball. Or maybe it has already begun. It is ten o'clock in the morning now. And I am sure it will be hours yet before we have any news.

Brussels this morning is quiet. So many have fled to Antwerp. Kitty and I went out earlier to the chemist's shop to buy more lint and bandages--only we didn't have to buy them, the shopkeepers are charging nothing.

We have been busy all morning with the wounded men who are staying here--the ones too gravely hurt to be moved. There are four of them: three younger soldiers who took shots to the body. And one--a dark-haired man a little older than the rest--in officer's uniform whose leg was crushed by a cannon shot. The field surgeons had to amputate before they sent him back here to Brussels in a wagon.

The first three are Captain Pringle, Sergeant Hawthorne, and Sergeant Smith. They're in terrible pain, I think. But they are so polite and grateful for any attention we give them. I don't know the fourth man's name--the officer who lost his leg. He has been delirious with fever ever since he arrived and has not been able to speak. Not coherently, at least. He mutters and tosses restlessly on the mattress we laid down for him on the dining room floor. I sat with him for a while early this morning, trying to get him to drink some broth that Madame Duvalle had made. I don't think he swallowed any. But I did bathe his face with water, which seemed to ease him a little. At least he stopped tossing and turning quite so much and seemed to fall into a more peaceful sleep.

If yesterday caring for the wounded men seemed a nightmare, I am grateful for it today. It helps to be kept busy--to feel as though I am doing something of use--instead of thinking of the battle that is to take place today. Barely ten miles south of here; I managed to find a map in Colonel Forster's study and looked up where Waterloo is.

Sergeant Kelly seems much better this morning. His arm is still bandaged, of course, but he says it scarcely pains him at all. And he has been helping with shifting the other wounded men so that we can bathe and tend them, so he must not be entirely lying.

Later ...

I feel as though this day is never going to end. It is barely seven o'clock in the evening now--but already I feel as though it has lasted an eternity.

There was an alarm just a short while ago. A group of the Cumberland Hussars galloped through town shouting that all was lost and the French were on their heels. Not that that signifies. If I have learned one thing in the last two days, it is not to put too much credence in those sorts of alarms.

What is worse are the accounts from those who have seen the battle themselves. The first wounded are just beginning to trickle back. Sergeant Kelly went out into the town to see if he could gain any news. And when he came back he looked grave and said that by all accounts, the battle was the bloodiest any of the men he'd spoken to had ever seen. Impossible even to say who was alive and who had been killed in all the carnage and smoke.

He couldn't learn anything of Edward, nor yet of Captain Ayres or Colonel Forster.

I should get back to Kitty and Harriet. I don't think any of us wants to be alone tonight.

Monday 19 June 1815

The battle is won.

I can scarcely believe I am writing that. All the signs yesterday seemed to portent disaster and defeat. But it is true. Wellington and his armies have been victorious over Napoleon Bonaparte.

I should be relieved. I
am
relieved. Or I think I would be if I weren't tired enough to be in a kind of waking daze. We sat up nearly all through the night--Kitty, Mrs. Metcalfe, Harriet and I. All grouped together in Harriet's bedroom, so that we might not disturb the wounded men downstairs. We did finally persuade Mrs. Metcalfe and Harriet to lie down. And Kitty and I dozed a little, sitting in chairs beside the bed. And then this morning at around six o'clock we were woken with the news--our armies have defeated the French and put Napoleon's forces utterly to the rout.

It is good news--the best news we could have hoped for. And yet the cost of the victory already seems too much to bear.

Colonel Forster is dead.

Sergeant Kelly rode out at once to the field of battle to learn what he could. He came back this afternoon looking ten years older than when he had left here this morning. Older and in greater pain even than when I had found him lying in the street, every last trace of the usual humour in his face gone.

Kitty, Harriet, and I were all in the parlour, tending to the wounded. There is barely room to walk in the room now, the floor is so crowded with mattresses and feather beds that we stripped off the beds upstairs. We have taken in six more men, some wounded at
Quatre Bras
, some the first to return from the battle yesterday. And one of them--a red-haired man with a round, freckled face--has already died. Died before we could even learn his name.

When Sergeant Kelly came in, we all of us froze at the sight of his face. Harriet half rose, one hand going to her throat--as though she'd had some sort of premonition of what he was about to say.

Sergeant Kelly's blue eyes fixed on her, and his bearded face contorted with pity. But he got the news out in a single blunt sentence. "I'm sorry to tell you, ma'am. Your husband the colonel was killed. Struck off his horse by a cannonball."

I'll never, ever forget the look on Harriet's face. It was as though some part of her had died, too. And then she just ... crumpled. Folded up and fell to the ground, crying in great, gulping, wrenching sobs.

Mrs. Metcalfe came out of the kitchen--she has been helping Madame Duvalle there, since the servants are all gone--and between us we managed to carry Harriet upstairs and settle her into bed. Mrs. Metcalfe gave her a dose of the laudanum we have been giving the wounded men downstairs, and Harriet took it without even seeming to notice what it was.

That was mid-afternoon. It is evening, now, and she is still asleep. Which I suppose is kindness, to give her a short respite from facing the reality of Colonel Forster's death. I can't help thinking of what her waking will be like, though.

I am so sorry for her. And yet--

And yet I feel horribly guilty, too--because I seem barely to have space to grieve for her loss. Every part of me feels filled up, choked, suffocated with the fear that Sergeant Kelly is next going to fix me with that same look of pity, and say that Edward is dead, as well.

Tuesday 20 June 1815

I cannot believe it. I seem to be writing that over and over again. But it is true--these past days have been nothing I could ever have imagined or believed.

There is a chance Colonel Forster may still be alive.

This morning, a soldier--a sandy-haired man who gave his name as Lieutenant Jenkins--came to the house. He asked at first for Mrs. Forster. But Harriet was upstairs in bed. She wouldn't take any more of the laudanum last night--she said the wounded men need it more than she does. But she was awake nearly all the night through, lying in her bed and crying. Mrs. Metcalfe, Kitty, and I took it in turns to sit with her. And finally towards morning she did drift off to sleep.

I did not want to wake her, so I asked Lieutenant Jenkins whether he might give me whatever message he had for Harriet. I had to see him in the kitchen; the other downstairs rooms are all filled with wounded men.

Lieutenant Jenkins accepted my offer of tea and sat down with me at the big scarred kitchen table. And then he told me that he had been sent here by Colonel Forster, who greatly desired that his wife be reassured that he was alive, though gravely wounded.

At first I was so stunned I could only stare at him. And then I asked him what he could mean by coming here with such a message--because we had heard yesterday that Colonel Forster had been struck by a cannonball and killed.

Lieutenant Jenkins' brow furrowed--and then cleared as he said, "Ah, that must be Colonel
Foster
you heard of, miss. Colonel William Foster of the Coldstream Guards. I did hear he had been killed that way."

It must have taken me nearly a full minute to find my voice. "And this man--this Colonel Forster you say is alive--you are sure it's the right man? The same Colonel Forster who has rented this house here?"

Lieutenant Jenkins shrugged. Now that the first shock of the news had passed, I had attention enough to notice that he looked exhausted--beyond exhausted, really. His eyes looked as though some part of him were still reliving the battle he had just fought. "That I can't say, miss, never having met the man before the battle was fought. We're still working to carry the wounded off the battlefield. There's hundreds of men still there, lying out in the open and dying of their wounds. I carried this man to one of the wagons. And he said his name was Colonel Forster and begged me to take a message back to Brussels for his wife. He didn't give me an address--he's wounded as I said, and too weak to talk much. But I asked all over the city and finally found that a Mrs. Forster lived in this house. So here I am."

I thought quickly. And then I asked, "He's wounded you said--wounded how? Do you think he will live?"

The lieutenant shrugged again. Which might have seemed callous, except that he ran his hand down his face as though trying to conceal the spasm of pain that clenched his jaw. "Even odds, I'd say. His arm looked like it would have to come off. The surgeons will probably have done it by now. If the shock doesn't kill him, he could survive."

"And where is he now?"

"Mont St. Jean. One of the farmhouses--a great many wounded have been carried there."

I nodded--and then stood up and held out my hand to Lieutenant Jenkins. "Thank you so much for coming. I will make arrangements to bring Colonel Forster here. And I will see that his wife gets the message."

And I will. But not until I know for certain that the man Lieutenant Jenkins brought word of really
is
Harriet's husband.

After Lieutenant Jenkins had gone, I went, not to Harriet's room, but out into the stable yard, where Sergeant Kelly was sitting on an upturned barrel and eating a quick meal of bread and bacon before going out again. He looked up when he saw me coming--and I saw his blue eyes had the same distant look as the lieutenant's, the same look Edward's eyes have after a nightmare.

I keep trying not to think of Edward. But it seems everything reminds me of him.

At least Sergeant Kelly's arm seems very much better.

I came to a stop before him and said, "I need you to take me to Mont St. Jean."

Sergeant Kelly's shaggy eyebrows shot up, and I said quickly, before he could protest, "There is a man there--it may be Colonel Forster. It seems there's reason to hope he is alive after all. But I can't tell Harriet. Not until we know for sure whether this man really is her husband. She is so lost in grief now, thinking him killed. If we raise her hopes, I don't see how she could bear it if the man turns out not to be Colonel Forster after all."

Sergeant Kelly's eyes widened slightly with shock. Then he frowned and nodded slowly, "Well, and if that's true it wouldn't be the first time names have got mixed or a false report's been taken for truth. But you can't be going to Mont St. Jean, Miss Darcy. That's right on the edge of the battlefield. It's no place for a lady just now. You stay here, let me go."

I shook my head. "That won't work. You have never met Colonel Forster. You won't be able to recognise whether this man really is he. And the man is wounded--very seriously so. He might not even be well enough to be moved. He might be dying, even."

"Well, and if he is dying, surely it's a kindness not to tell his wife about him at all? She already thinks him dead."

I shook my head again. "No. If it is Colonel Forster, Harriet needs to know. Even if he is dying. She might be able to see him one last time. And I know she would want that. Even if it was just for five minutes, she would want to see him, be with him at the end. I know I would feel the same, if--"

I found myself rubbing the emerald on Edward's ring again, and stopped myself before I could finish. But from the look on Sergeant Kelly's face, he knew what I had been about to say. The words felt like sharp-edged rocks in my throat, but I couldn't stop myself from asking, "If you had news of him--of Edward--you would tell me, wouldn't you? Even bad news. You wouldn't try to keep it from me, to spare me pain?"

"Of course I would." Sergeant Kelly's voice was gruff. "But I still say, Miss Darcy, that you oughtn't to go out there to the battlefield. You don't know what it's like. You--"

I cut him off. I had been stuffing everything--anger, grief, worry, terror--away, trying to lock it all up in a box somewhere just so that I could go on and keep getting through the hours of each day. But Sergeant Kelly's words made the lock on the box suddenly spring open and everything come flooding out. It felt like being torn and pulled by the furious gale of a thunderstorm.