Fortune's Bride (12 page)

“Naturally, I shall do whatever you think is best,”
Esmeralda replied, “but you need not send a man unless you really believe there
is some danger. I am not at all nervous, and I am sure the man will be of more
use in keeping the animals moving than simply riding along with me. I will have
Carlos.”

“Well, I
don’t
think there is any danger. If I did, I
wouldn’t let you go, with or without an escort, but I also don’t think it would
look right for you to arrive with official information without an official
escort.”

Esmeralda laughed. “Very well, but I’m not at all sure that
one of those scarecrows you said General Freire sent will add much to my
status.”

“And neither will that hat,” Robert remarked teasingly, as
he sat down to write the notes.

He was joking, of course, knowing that Esmeralda would have
better sense than to wear a peasant-woman’s working hat when she made a call on
the
regador
, but it showed his uneasiness. Nonetheless, everything
worked out very well, and Esmeralda was able to send her escort back with the
name of the inn in which they were to be quartered, as well as information on
where the animals were to be held for the night. Moreover, by the time Robert
arrived, a meal and rooms were ready so that he had no more to do than eat and
tumble into bed, for which he was extremely grateful. Needless to say, that
night he did not lie awake thinking about Esmeralda or any other woman.

This system of travel and lodging arrangements worked so
well that they used it on each of the two succeeding days. However, as the
animal drivers and soldiers moved into unfamiliar territory, farther from their
homes, they were far less tempted to abandon the cortege. And as they grew
accustomed to their duties and also realized that Robert meant every word he
said and would deduct the value of any animal lost or injured from their pay
but fully intended to add a reward if all arrived intact, they grew more
assiduous and efficient. Robert was not pressed so hard and could spend some
time each day riding and talking with Esmeralda.

As Robert’s duties became less demanding, they played cards
and talked in the evening—at least, Robert talked. Esmeralda said very little
beyond what was necessary to encourage him. She learned a great deal about the
European war, Bonaparte, the current political situation in England insofar as
it pertained to the war, Robert’s family, and Sir Arthur Wellesley. Since this
was exactly what she wanted, Esmeralda had no fault to find with the
entertainment, and Robert could not remember ever having enjoyed himself more.

Nor was his pleasure confined to the evenings when, having
examined the stock and assigned guards, he might with justice have put duty out
of his mind. It was equally delightful to ride to the head of the column and
find Esmeralda, cool and cheerful, under her funny hat. She had, as she had
threatened, embellished it with flamboyant ribbons and large, ugly, paper
roses, which she had begged from the innkeeper at their first stop. The hat and
its decorations had begun Robert’s second day, which he had wakened dreading,
on a bright note of laughter.

He looked forward to their luncheons, too. Esmeralda always
had some amusing or perceptive remarks to make about the march or the
countryside, and the meal, whatever it was, was tastefully set out, which
somehow lent a better savor to the most prosaic, and sometimes ill-cooked,
food. More than once it passed through Robert’s mind that this was the way to
campaign.

Sir Arthur might be the most brilliant general England
had—Robert judged him to be, although he felt Sir John Moore was almost his
equal—but Sir Arthur was extraordinarily single-minded. On campaign he
remembered the men had to eat and rest, since if they were not fed and rested,
they would not be able to fight well, but he felt no such compunction about
himself and his staff. They, he assumed, would do their duty fed or unfed,
rested or unrested. Thus, the food and wine he offered his staff at mess was
often very unpalatable, and he himself ate so fast that a man could choke
trying to get enough down to stave off starvation before the plates were
removed.

It would be very nice, Robert thought idly as Esmeralda was
putting away the remains of the luncheon and he stretched out on the blanket in
his shirt sleeves to doze through the worst of the heat, if there were a nice
little supper waiting for him in his quarters near a cozy fire, with a companion
who would be interested in what he had to say. If only there were some reason
why Merry could not leave immediately… And then his eyes snapped open with
shock. How could he be so selfish as to think for a moment of imposing more
discomfort and inconvenience on her? Just because she was so good and never
complained, or even looked dissatisfied, was no reason to think she did not
suffer. He sat up so abruptly that Esmeralda was startled.

“We will meet Sir Arthur tomorrow at Figueira da Foz,” he
said. “I will try to arrange that you be accommodated on the first vessel that
goes back to England with dispatches.”

Taken by surprise, Esmeralda cried out, “Oh, no! Please do
not send me away to England.”

“Do not send you away?” Robert repeated. “But—”

Esmeralda swallowed hard and fought to control her impulse
to fling herself into his arms weeping and pleading. “You cannot have thought,”
she said, her voice trembling, “that I am little better off now than when you
found me in the village. I still have no friends, no relatives, no papers of
identification, and nowhere to go. You may be the only person here or in
England who can vouch for my bona fides. I am sorry that I have been such a
trouble to you—”

“You haven’t been any trouble at all,” Robert interrupted.
“In fact, you’ve
saved
me a great deal of trouble. I only thought that
you would have had enough of this hardship and be glad to get back to
civilization.”

“But I have endured no hardship. Truly, Robert, I have
enjoyed myself. I remember that you said Sir Arthur did not approve of women
accompanying the army and I realize that in the future I may become a grave
encumbrance to you, but still, I beg you not to send me away until my presence
is truly inconvenient. I…I am afraid to go to England alone.”

It was not true, of course. Going to England was not what
Esmeralda feared. She knew that, with a letter from Robert and another from Sir
Arthur to identify her, she would have no trouble being accepted by her
father’s bankers. It was the collapse of her dream that widened her eyes and
filled them with tears, and drained the blood from her cheeks and lips. Robert
leaned forward and took her hands in his own.

“Of course I shall not send you to England alone if you do
not wish to go,” he assured her.

It did not seem strange to Robert that Esmeralda feared
making her way in English society more than she feared war. She must have heard
tales enough of the horrible fate awaiting young ladies who could not obtain
vouchers for Almack’s or find a sponsor to present them at Court, and she knew
nothing at all of war. He thought briefly of offering to send her to his own
family, but immediately realized that the complications arising from that might
be almost as appalling to her. Besides, he had few fears for the future. He was
perfectly sure that Sir Arthur’s campaign would be victorious. Thus, there
would be no danger for Esmeralda if she stayed.

“I cannot ask for leave to take you home myself just now,”
he went on before she was able to control her voice sufficiently to thank him without
bursting into tears.

“Oh, no!” she cried, so shocked at the appearance of this
new danger to her plans that her control was restored. “I would not think of
it,” she added more calmly. “You must not allow the misfortune of finding me to
interfere with your duty. I will manage very well. And if I stay out of Sir
Arthur’s way, perhaps you would not even have to tell him I was about.”

“Well, no,” Robert said, “I don’t think I could go quite as
far as that.” He grinned at her. “I don’t say I might not have tried if I
thought I could get away with it, but he’s sure to hear somehow. However, you
needn’t be afraid he’ll order me to send you home. Sir Arthur is extremely
chivalrous, and he tends to think of women as rather helpless creatures. When
he hears your distressing story, he will be most sympathetic. Only, for God’s
sake, don’t tell him you ‘enjoyed’ this little trip, careening around with
muleteers and the dregs of the Portuguese army.”

“No, no,” Esmeralda assured him, her color restored and the
mischief returning to her eyes. “I shall say no more than that setting me
adrift alone in England would be the very greatest cruelty to my delicate
sensibility. And I shall flutter my eyelashes.” She batted them exaggeratedly.

“I don’t think you’ve got the style of that exactly right,”
Robert said, chuckling, “and I’m afraid the delicate sensibility won’t go over
very well, either, unless you claim to have been in a faint the entire way down
from Oporto.”

“A shudder or two, then?” Esmeralda suggested. “And an expression
of pained fortitude?”

Robert laughed, released her hands, which were now relaxed,
and lay down again. He did feel one tiny prick of guilt because he had not said
a single word to suggest that there were things he could do to pave her way in
England, but it passed. She would be much happier, he told himself, if he took
her home personally. Besides, then he himself could see to the settlement of
her business with her father’s bankers, make sure that the competence she
expected was really adequate, and explain her situation to Perce and Sabrina,
who would then sponsor her and arrange for her to meet the right people so that
she would be properly established.

It would not be long before he was free to ask for leave, he
thought. Probably they would go into winter quarters by November or at the
latest by December His eyes closed, and he was asleep almost immediately, too
quickly for him to be disturbed by the wave of satisfaction that enveloped him
when he thought that Merry would be around for months.

They stayed at Coimbra that night in considerable luxury,
for it was a large town. The next day, after getting the men started, Robert
rode ahead to discover whether the troops were ashore yet and where Sir Arthur
desired him to bring the stock. He was confident that the men would not desert
or allow the animals to stray this close to the end of the journey. He was
delighted to find the Riflemen already some miles inshore, and fortunately came
across General Henry Fane, who greeted the news that baggage animals were on
the way with considerable enthusiasm and tried to lay claim to most of them.
Between the heat and the sand, he remarked dryly, he was likely to lose more
men from exhaustion than from action. Unmoved, Robert said the stock was still a
day’s march eastward and asked for Sir Arthur who, he learned, was at Figueira
da Foz.

Leaving the Riflemen to their unhappy struggles with the
heat and the miserable ground, Robert rode to the temporary headquarters, where
Sir Arthur received his report with a curt word of commendation. He then
summoned his secretary and directed him to write an order absolutely forbidding
any of his officers to preempt the animals and nodded dismissal at Robert.
However, when Robert did not move, Sir Arthur lifted his head from the papers
on the table to which he had returned his attention without noticeable
irritation.

“Could I have a moment, sir?” Robert asked as the secretary
left the room.

“You had trouble with the bishop?” Wellesley asked.

“Only in the sense that he wouldn’t lend me money,” Robert
answered. “In fact, no one would give me credit or even change more than one or
two pounds for Portuguese money.”

“That’s not—” Sir Arthur began, and then asked, “What the
devil did you need credit or more than a pound or two for? Good God, Moreton,
don’t tell me you’ve taken to gambling?”

“No, sir, of course I haven’t,” Robert replied. “But I
hadn’t much to do for a few days so I thought I’d ride around the country just
to take a look, show myself, and see if I could scare up a few more beasts, and
I found this girl—”

“Moreton!” Sir Arthur exclaimed in an exasperated voice.
“Don’t you know better than—”

“No sir, you don’t understand,” Robert interposed hastily.
“I know her. She’s British. I’d met her in Bombay. She and her father had been
shipwrecked going home to England.”

“You’d better sit down,” Wellesley said. “I have a feeling
this is going to take longer than one minute.”

Although it did, of course, take Robert longer than one
minute to tell the story, he managed not try his commanding officer’s patience
since he had spent the hours it had taken him to ride to Figueira composing his
tale. He explained everything to Sir Arthur, including the pretense of marriage
and his reasons for it.

“Nothing else you could have done,” Wellesley said in his
abrupt way, nodding approval. “It’s unfortunate, but the country round about
here seems to be clear of the French, at least as far south as Leiria. There
shouldn’t be any immediate danger. You had better bring…er…Mrs. Moreton here. It
will take several days longer to disembark the troops, and she can rest. After
that we may have to move pretty fast, though.” He paused, and his voice had
changed, carrying a roguish note when he added, “Pretty girl, eh?”

“Er…not a beauty, no sir.”

Robert was not prevaricating. He knew Sir Arthur to be a
flirt, and possibly more than a flirt, particularly with attractive married
women. There had been rumors that his relationship with Mrs. Freese in India
was not totally innocent, however, that was not the reason for his ambivalent
reply. Robert did not fear Sir Arthur would do Esmeralda any harm since he knew
her to be still an innocent girl. Actually he was really puzzled for an answer
to his commanding officer’s question. His recent impressions of Esmeralda were
at war with his earlier impression that she was not attractive.

“But she is a very sensible girl,” Robert added, “not at all
given to vapors or complaining.”

He had meant to assure Sir Arthur that Esmeralda would be as
little trouble as it was possible for a woman in an armed camp to be, but Sir
Arthur merely nodded again, waved dismissal, and looked back at the papers on
the table.

Robert left the building with an inexplicable feeling of
happiness. He knew part of it was relief. He had expected Sir Arthur to behave
precisely as he had behaved, but there had always been the chance that some
military order or some other stupidity of the Horse Guards would have
exasperated him. In that case, he might have lost his temper over Robert’s
adventure to give a relatively harmless expression to his spleen. He would not
have blamed Robert for his actions, but he could have provided funds enough to
leave Esmeralda at Coimbra and have insisted that Robert do it.

If Robert associated his high spirits and sense of relief
with anything, it was Sir Arthur’s seeming satisfaction with the military
situation. And when Lord Fitzroy pursued him out of the building, ostensibly to
hand him the orders he had forgotten to take, but immediately said, “What sort
of cock-and-bull story did you feed Sir Arthur? He called me in and told me to
give you a hundred
cruzados
out of his private purse as a wedding
present ‘to outfit your bride’ when you got back with the transport animals.
What bride, damn it?” Robert found himself mischievously amused.

“Esmeralda Mary Louisa, née Talbot, now Moreton,” Robert
said, perfectly straightfaced, although his blue eyes sparkled. “And it isn’t a
cock-and-bull story. How kind of Sir Arthur.”

“Kind!” Fitzroy Somerset sounded totally bewildered. “Mad, I
call it. What the devil do
you
need money for, Moreton? I mean, you’re
plump enough in the pocket, even if you did get married. No, I don’t believe
it. Damn it all,
how
could you get married?”

“It isn’t very hard,” Robert said. “You just stand up in church
and repeat—”

Lord Fitzroy made a sound remarkably like
grrr
, and
his face took on an alarming hue, so Robert stopped.

“As to the money,” he went on, “wait until you get away from
camp and ask a Portuguese banker to change pounds. I virtually had to get down
on my knees and plead. And credit is completely out of the question.”

This explanation scarcely contented Lord Fitzroy. He still
looked as if he were about to explode, and his voice was dangerously gentle
when he asked, “But why does the bride need outfitting? Surely that’s her
parents’ business.”

“Oh, that. Well, she was shipwrecked.” Robert laughed as
Somerset raised a doubled fist. “No, no, I’m not joking. That’s the truth, I
swear it. Look, I promise to explain it all when I bring the beasts in. Meanwhile,
give me those orders so I can get back. Merry’s alone with that troop of
halfwits Freire sent along as guards. I was just going to see if Mars or
Jupiter had been brought ashore yet. If they haven’t been, I’ll have to borrow
a mount from you or from one of the others. Hermes is about done up from racing
up and down the line like a sheepdog.”

Somerset’s mouth opened to protest that last remark. He
could not imagine Robert using his fine horse to herd cattle, but then an
expression of strong self-control settled on his features, and all he said was,
“Yes, the horses are ashore. We have taken over that barn,” he pointed, “for a
stable. I haven’t had time to look the animals over, so you had better walk
down yourself and see which of your mounts stood the voyage best.” However as
Robert turned away, having tucked the order into his breast pocket, Lord
Fitzroy seized his arm. “We will all be waiting to meet Mrs. Moreton when you
arrive this evening,” he said slowly and threateningly.

Not a muscle moved in Robert’s face. “I am certain you will
find her delightful,” he said, and did not permit himself to begin laughing at
his friend’s expression until he was safe in the barn, although the restraint
nearly choked him.

Under the circumstances, it was not at all surprising that
Robert and Esmeralda were met about three miles from headquarters by a
half-dozen neatly attired young men on exquisite mounts. A few of the ADCs were
on duty, and a number were still on the ships arranging the disembarkation from
that end. All who were free, however, had ridden out of the camp as soon as the
orderly they had set on watch had come galloping back to report that a huge
cloud of dust was approaching. Of course, Robert had warned Esmeralda that this
might happen.

“How the devil they imagine I planned to get away with it, I
can’t guess,” Robert had said after he had assured himself that everything was
under control with regard to the animals in his care and had come to ride
beside Esmeralda. “After all, I served with Sir Arthur. By the by, a lot of the
ADCs call him ‘the Beau’ because he is always so neat in his dress. As I was
saying, I served with him in India, and I’m not likely to underestimate him.
Still, Fitz, I mean
Lord
Fitzroy Somerset, clearly believes I picked up
some Portuguese…er…”

“Light-skirt,” Esmeralda supplied when Robert ran down,
obviously realizing all of a sudden that he was saying something vastly
improper.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to be offensive,” he said, rather
chagrined, “but you’re devilish easy to talk to, Merry, and I end up forgetting
myself.”

“And so you should,” Esmeralda assured him. “It will give us
away completely if you do not feel free to say anything at all to me.”

This, Esmeralda knew, was not necessarily true. She was not
unaware that some husbands treated their wives as witless dolls, and sometimes
with good reason. However, her primary purpose was to addict Robert to her
company, and one of the ways to accomplish that was to make him as comfortable
with her as he was with his male friends. Moreover, there was a double benefit,
in that his conversation would be far more interesting for her if he felt free
to talk about anything at all.

“Will it?” Robert asked, frowning in doubt. “Don’t think m’
father says anything
he
thinks to m’ mother.”

Esmeralda laughed. “I am quite sure you will not say
anything to me that your father would not say to your mother. If you really
believe that your mother is innocent of the existence of ladies of light and
easy virtue at this time of her life and that your father would not mention
them to her—in an impersonal way, of course—you are much mistaken. Probably
your mother would not speak to
you
about such women—”

“You mean my mother thinks
I
am innocent?” Robert
said incredulously. “I am seven and twenty years of age!”

Esmeralda laughed again. “I cannot imagine she thinks
anything of the sort. Nothing you have ever said to me has given me reason to
think your mother is a fool. But she would not wish to embarrass you. It is not
the kind of thing a woman discusses with her sons, but that is no reason to
think she is unaware.”

“Well, I didn’t think— Damn it, Merry, how did we get onto
this stupid subject anyway?”

“You were saying that you did not know how your fellow ADCs
thought you intended to pass off a Portuguese light-skirt on Sir Arthur as your
wife,” Esmeralda reminded him obligingly.

“Yes, well, that was not where I should have begun. The
point is that they are very curious, and we should have a reasonable story to
offer.”

“It would be best, I believe, to stay as close to the truth
as possible,” Esmeralda said slowly. “I do not think we can completely conceal
your chivalric motives.” Robert made an uncomfortable noise, but Esmeralda
continued without giving him a chance to interrupt. “Presumably your friends know
of your past determination not to marry until you were ready to terminate your
military career, and I am not the kind of girl over whom a man would suddenly
lose his head—”

“Not in those clothes I found you in, anyway,” Robert
admitted, grinning.

A sense of satisfaction rose in Esmeralda. She was certain
that only a few days ago Robert would simply have agreed with her statement or,
if he had remembered to be tactful, have remained silent. He would not have
attributed her lack of beauty to ill-fitting, unclean garments. Perhaps she had
reason to hope that he was beginning to think of her as somewhat attractive.

“And Fitz already knows you were shipwrecked,” Robert con­tinued,
unaware of what he had betrayed about himself and the pleasure he had given
Esmeralda, “because Sir Arthur was kind enough to contribute a hundred
cruzados
toward a new wardrobe for you. But I could have…er…been enamored in Bombay.”

Esmeralda giggled. “Not unless you were demented,” she
reminded him, but hope flared up again simply because he could say such a thing
now. “And being aware that one is badly dressed makes one awkward, which only
adds to the bad impression. However, there can be no harm in implying that we
knew each other better than we really did and that you found me a pleasant kind
of girl.”

“It’s true, too,” Robert said. “I mean that you’re a
pleasant girl. Fitz and the others will see that for themselves at once.”

“I hope so,” Esmeralda answered most earnestly.

She did, indeed, hope to make a good impression on Robert’s
friends. It would be fatal to her plans if, after their first surprise was
over, they continued to express wonder at what had made Robert so foolish as to
marry her. That would of course imply that he would not have done so under
normal circumstances and continually remind him that he did not intend to
remain married. On the other hand, if his companions soon began to regard the
marriage as reasonable, perhaps enviable, although she could not really hope
for that, it would be another inducement for him to maintain the status quo.

“That will do it, I think.” Robert nodded thoughtfully. “Sir
Arthur said there was nothing else I could have done, and if we were friends in
Bombay, all the others will agree.”