But by night, having woken from a nightmare of darkness and suffocation, they would besiege her… Unfulfilled dreams of sultry nights in lush climes, flowers burgeoning with scent, jade leaves caressed by argent moonlight.
Were they dreams when one’s eyes were open? When the heat of a man’s touch still lingered on the skin. When a long-ago kiss spun her senses within dawn’s insurgency of radiance and light.
Verity turned her gaze to the box of oils in glass phials: lamp black, iron grey, umber brown.
No radiance or light.
But her life was settled, bounded but good, and so with a determined nod, she grasped a wet cloth and commenced cleaning her fingers of paint.
No more thoughts of what might have been.
Through the eyes of others, all she could ever do was look on.
All she could ever be was The Witness.
2
WHAT MEMORY FORGETS, NOSTALGIA IMPROVES
No. 32 Portman Square, Marylebone, London.
“Wot the bloody hell is goin’ on, Captain?”
Miles shrugged. “Damned if I know, Lynch.” And he took a swig of whisky. The knife had slashed a ragged tear in his forearm, shallow but lengthy, and would no doubt require–
“Stitches,” growled Lynch, poking at the wound with stubby fingers.
So Miles took another swig.
He’d entered his townhouse via the kitchens in order not to bleed on the hall rug and cause consternation for the housekeeper. Fortunately, Lynch had been supping an ale at the table and so they’d repaired to the study with all necessary wound accoutrements gathered from their years in the dragoons.
“Reminds me of old times,” Lynch said with rather too much glee, gold tooth aglitter in the desk candelabra light as he selected needle and thread from his satchel of horrors.
A murmur was Miles’ sole response, as thoseold timesfor both of them had largely consisted of mud, blood and cannon fire.
Mind you, when all was said and done, the dragoons had been the right path for Miles. Such a disciplined but uncertain life was not suited to all yet the comradeship had been unique and the acquired skills of survival would stay with him forever. Now, even lost within the exotic wildernesses he one day hoped to explore, he could likely get by with just a pocketknife, flint and pencil. Though medicinal whisky never went amiss.
He’d first purchased a commission at minimal rank – not solely due to lack of funds but also his preference to learn from scratch – yet he’d soon risen and finally made captain in the 13thLight Dragoons. As a higher-ranking officer, he’d been assigned the army’s equivalent of a valet – Lynch, a soldier-cum-orderly who’d looked after everything from his uniform to his horse, tent and maps. They’d survived everything together, from frostbite to fleas, until the terror of Waterloo had seen Lynch invalided home.
Miles himself had never intended to end his army career quite so soon but…
All had changed.
In this life, nothing was immutable, he knew that, but never had he imagined his elder brother Cameron departing this earth before himself, a brother who had been born for the earldom with his prosaic demeanour, mathematical acumen and fondness for starched cravats.
As youths, they’d been chalk and cheese.
Yet now it was Miles who’d ended up as earl.
And the first thing he’d done on his return to England was seek out Lynch. Second had been to abscond to the estate in Derbyshire for a year and work out what the hell being an earl entailed. He and Cameron had endured the same education butMiles’ restless nature and fondness for the outdoors had led him to…miss the odd lesson.
Lynch had become Miles’ general factotum over the last year and an indispensable member of the household, as although there was a plethora of servants – more than he recalled as a youth – Lynch still treated him as an army man and not some pampered earl who couldn’t remove his own boots at night.
“Like, d’ya remember…” Lynch stabbed at Miles’ flesh as though sewing up a coal bag – finesse not really a soldier’s trait. “Toulouse. When yer took on those three Frenchies about ter skewer me and Flanagan. Burst from the smoke on that horse like St George himself, yer did, sword slashing and hooves trampling.”
“Also got skewered in this same arm by a bayonet.”
“Aye, whole battle were a bloodbath. But yer got us through it.” Lynch tightened the thread. “And we snaffled that regimental standard, French eagle atop and all, yer remember? Apparently, it were in the papers back here.”
