She began to tremble and stared at Jane in disbelief. Jane’s lips had gone white. “Billy,” Jane asked in a cracking voice, “what are we to do now?”
“Well—” he puffed his chest importantly—“that is why they sent me with you, instead of John Lucas, for I am quite the expert on foreign travel. We’ve got to get Lizzy out of the country, do you see, and South Africa is clearly out of the question. We’re to take the first train to New York, then sail for London at once.”
Chapter 45
Matlock
April 1901
Darcywaitedforthesurgeon to open the door to Richard’s room. It was not fear of his cousin’s state that made him pause—it was terror of himself, his own face and reactions to the man who was husband to his heart’s better half.
The surgeon did, at last, emerge to Darcy’s knock, and he cut a polite bow. “The colonel is awake now if you wish to speak to him.”
“How is he?”
“Well, the fever is still upon him, though considerably less so than it was. He is refusing more morphine, so he is in his right mind more often than not now.”
“And what of his mind? How sound is it?”
The surgeon frowned. “That is a harder question. Only time will tell, Mr Darcy, but he has been asking rather urgently for you since morning. I believe something troubles him deeply, and just relieving that burden will prove a cure of sorts.”
Darcy looked long and sceptically at the door. Elizabeth had been with Richard earlier. His aunt had told him... and in the next breath, she had warned him to stay away, not to race to her rescue. Because, presumably, Elizabeth did not need to be rescued from her own husband. It was a bitter hour that he prowled the halls until he heard her depart Richard’s room, going immediately to her own. He had not spoken to her at all.
There was nothing for it. Things must be said, trials canvassed, history and the future disseminated. If Richard were agitated now, he would only grow more so with delay. He thanked the surgeon and opened the door, bracing for the hardest conversation of his life.
The bed had been turned—sensibly, because this way, Richard could see anyone approaching from his good side. Darcy wondered if that was at Elizabeth’s suggestion, for surely the earl would not think to disrupt the established order of the room for such a consideration.
His cousin was propped up on a pillow and roused to full alertness at the sound of his footsteps. He grinned. “About time, old chap.”
Darcy lowered himself into a chair. “You look better than twelve hours ago. Feeling any stronger?”
Richard tried to lever himself up higher, and the tension in his voice belied the ease of his expression of a moment ago. “Darcy, you have to help me get out of here. Reginald will never hear of it, but you have more sense. Every day I spend here, and every person who hears of my presence hastens my hanging.”
“Hanging!” Darcy gaped at him. “Then it is true—you were not a prisoner. You were running, a deserter!”
Richard’s eye glittered in sudden fury. “How dare... Say that again, and I will club you in the mouth!”
“If you were not a deserter, why are you in fear for your life?”
Richard shifted and propped his arm on the pillow. “Because they think I am a traitor. I’m not, Darcy, but if caught, I would not give two bits for my life.”
“But why?”
“Kitchener and his camps.” Richard sighed and rubbed his forehead.
“During the ambush at Roodewal, I took some shrapnel to the eye. When the Boers ranged the field the next morning, I was unconscious from pain, covered in blood and filth, and would likely have died of infection in a day or two. A ranking officer—I shall not tell his name—had me taken to his tent and tended as one of his own men. The reason, he told me later, was because he had seen me during the battle trying to help my men above myself, and I suppose he thought my life worth sparing.”
“So, he turned you? Asked you to spy on your own countrymen?”
Richard snorted. “Adorable, Darcy, how simple you think everything is there. No, I was quite as much a prisoner as any other British soldier, but I was imprisoned alone for medical attention, sometimes eating at the table of my enemy. It took two months, but I fairly recovered and was about to be sent to the main prison camp. Then...” An agonised sigh left him. “Robertson’s men conducted a raid on the Boer settlement. They took everyone—women, children, elderly and infirm. Rounded them up in a camp outside Pretoria and sent word to the men that they could have their families back, if they laid down their arms.”
Darcy stroked his jaw. “I heard about this. A dirty sort of leverage, capturing women and children.”
Richard grunted. “My Afrikaner benefactor was mad with rage and grief. His family were among those taken, and one night he marched up to me in a frenzy, demanding—not asking, but demanding—my help in freeing them, in exchange for my liberty. Of course, I could not refuse, even if all I gained was a chance to run.”
“What did he expect you to do? Negotiate the release? Did he mean to trade you?”
“Hardly. I am notthatvaluable, and as I said, he was a high-ranking officer. His family would be the last released and the first to be killed if Kitchener had pleased it so.”
