John took a sip of his drink, then returned the glass to the table. “You never seemed to want for dance partners.”
“I wish that were true,” Arabella replied.
Lady Langdon wiped the sides of her mouth with her napkin before directing a question to John. “How do you enjoy working as a barrister?”
John’s smile remained intact. “I find it to be rather rewarding.”
“That is good,” Lady Langdon replied.
“I am in a fortunate position where I can help people,” John said.
Lady Langdon bobbed her head in approval. “That must be a wonderful feeling.”
“As a third son, I knew my options were limited,” John responded. “I could either become a vicar or a barrister, and I do not believe the clergy would welcome me into their fold.”
“Whyever not?” Lady Langdon asked.
John grinned, unabashed. “I am much too argumentative.”
“Then you chose the correct profession,” Lady Langdon said.
“I agree,” John responded. “It has served me well these past few years.”
Colin leaned to the side as a footman removed the plate in front of him. “You could always have served in the military.”
John shook his head. “Again, I am much too argumentative,” he said. “I would have been flogged for my impertinence.”
“Perhaps, but flogging would have been only one of your concerns,” Colin remarked. “You could have been imprisoned in a dark hole or even transported to a disease-ridden colony.”
“That sounds awful.” John shuddered.
Colin shrugged. “At least you are still alive.” He frowned. “I was forced to witness many floggings over the years, some for the most petty offenses.”
“I’m sorry you had to endure that,” Arabella said quietly.
He met her gaze from across the table. “I had little choice in the matter,” he shared. “There were many times I wished I could have commuted the sentence, but it was not my place to do so.” He paused. “On one occasion, a soldier died because of his punishment.”
“One of our own soldiers was flogged to death?” John murmured, aghast.
“No, not in this circumstance,” Colin corrected. “The flogging, though painful, didn’t cause his death immediately. His wounds festered, and eventually he died of infection.”
“What was the man’s crime?” Lady Langdon asked.
Colin hesitated before sharing, “He stole from an officer’s tent.”
“How terrible,” his mother remarked.
With a shake of his head, Colin replied, “What was terrible was that I watched him slowly die right in front of my eyes. He was a robust man before his flogging, but once the infection set in, there was nothing the doctors could do for him. He was forced to endure an agonizing death, and I had no choice but to witness it from a neighboring cot in the medic’s tent, unable to move or render any assistance.” He paused. “When it is quiet, I can still hear the man’s screams as he begged for death.”
A dense silence saturated the dining room, and he wondered if he perhaps went too far in sharing his experiences. His pain, his grief, was his own. No one could understand what he had been forced to endure, what he saw in that medic’s tent and on the battlefield.
“Well, I am pleased that you are home where you belong,” his mother said, breaking the silence. “I constantly worried about you when you were fighting on the peninsula.”
“I was doing my duty to king and country,” Colin defended.
“That you were,” she conceded, “but it is a mother’s job to worry.”
A footman placed a dessert plate in front of Colin, and he reached for a fork. He was tired of talking about his service in the army. Quite frankly, he should have never brought it up. It always seemed to dampen his mood and it made it difficult to focus on anything else. How could he sit here and engage in menial conversation when the war took so much from him?
