‘And today that is what you did. This Mallington looked upon you with his dying breath. It is done, Captain. Your father is avenged.’
The line of Dammartin’s mouth was hard. He said nothing. It was true that Dammartin had looked into Mallington’s face and revealed his identity. But thereafter nothing had been as the French Captain anticipated, and he was left feeling cheated.
Lamont fetched his own battered tin mug and sat down on his pack by the fire he had lit on the hearth. Steam rose in wisps from the steaming-hot coffee. Lamont wrapped his hands around the mug, seemingly impervious to the scald of the heat, and gazed into the flames. ‘Perhaps my ears deceived me, Captain, but I thought the Englishman said the girl was his daughter.’
‘He did.’
‘Sacré bleu!’ cursed the Sergeant. ‘It shows the nature of this Lieutenant Colonel Mallington. Only a crazy Englishman would bring his daughter with him to war.’ The Sergeant drilled a forefinger against the side of his head. ‘Crazy.’
‘So it would seem,’ said Dammartin, remembering the image of the girl standing alone and seemingly unafraid before the men of the 8th Dragoons to defend her father.
‘She is so young, so fragile looking. It does not seem possible that she could have survived this hell of a country.’
‘So fragile that her bullets are lodged in half our men,’ said Dammartin sourly.
‘That is the truth,’ Lamont said soberly, and took a gulp of his coffee.
Dammartin retrieved a small, silver hip flask from his pocket and loosened the cap. ‘Brandy? To keep the damp from your bones tonight.’
Lamont gave a grin and nodded, holding the still-steaming tin mug up.
Dammartin poured a liberal dousing of the amber liquid into the proffered mug before doing likewise with his own. ‘Why should Mallington have sacrificed his men over a deserted village in the middle of nowhere? It makes no sense. Wellington’s forces are all down at the lines of Torres Vedras and Lisbon. What was Mallington even doing up here?’
The sergeant shrugged. ‘A scouting party? They were riflemen after all.’
‘Perhaps—’ Dammartin sipped his coffee ‘—Mademoiselle Mallington may be able to shed some light on her father’s actions.’
Lamont glanced up quickly at the young captain. ‘You mean to interrogate her?’
‘She is the only one still alive. Who else can tell us?’ Dammartin’s expression was unyielding.
‘The English Lieutenant Colonel gave her into your care,’ protested Lamont. ‘She’s only a girl.’
Dammartin glared unconvinced.
‘She’s the daughter of a gentleman, and today she watched her father die.’
‘She is the daughter of a scoundrel, and an English scoundrel at that,’ Dammartin corrected. ‘Shehandled that rifle as good as any man and she is not to be trusted. Where is Mademoiselle Mallington now?’
‘Locked in the cellar below.’
Dammartin drained his mug and set it down. ‘Then it would seem that I have work to do this evening.’
Lamont stopped nursing his coffee to look at Dammartin. ‘I pray, my friend and captain, that you are certain as to what you are about to do.’
‘Never more so,’ said Dammartin, and walked from the room.
Josie sat perched on one of the dusty wooden crates, hugging her arms around her body, trying to keep out the worst of the damp chill. Wherever she looked, it seemed that she saw not the darkness of the cellar in which the French soldiers had locked her, but her father’s face so pale and still in death, the blood seeping from his mouth to stain his lips and dribble down his chin. Even when she squeezed her eyes shut, she could not dislodge that image. All around in the dulled silence she heard again the crack and bang of rifles and muskets and the cries of dying men. She stoppered her hands to her ears, trying to block out the terrible sounds, but it did not make any difference, no matter how hard she pressed.
That morning she had been part of a section of twenty-five men and three women. She had collected the water from the spring behind the monastery and boiled it up to make her father’s tea, taking the place of his batman for that short time as was her habit. They had laughed and drunk the brew and eaten the porridge oats that were so warming against the cold.
She remembered just those few hours ago in the afternoon when her father had told her of the column of Frenchmen marching through these hills and how he would have to go in closer to discover what they were about. Papa and a handful of men had gone, leaving Josie and the others in the old monastery, cooking up a stew of rabbit for the evening meal. But the small party’s return had been panicked and hurried, retreating from the pursuit of the French, scrambling to send their captain and first lieutenant with news to General Lord Wellington. And then Josie’s world had exploded. Papa would not laugh again. He was gone. They were all gone. All except Josie.
Even though she had seen their broken bodies and heard her father’s last drawn breath, she could not really believe that it was so. It was like some horrific nightmare from which she would awaken. None of it seemed real. Yet Josie knew that it was, and the knowledge curdled a sourness in her stomach. And still the images flashed before her eyes, like illustrations of Dante’s Inferno, and still the racket roared in her ears, and her throat tightened and her stomach revolted, and she stumbled through the blackness to the corner of the cellar and bent over to be as sick as a dog. Only when her stomach had been thoroughly emptied did she experience some respite from the torture.
She wiped her mouth on her handkerchief and steadied herself against the wall. Taking a deep breath, she felt her way back to the wooden box on which she had been seated.
It seemed that she sat there an eternity in the chilled darkness before the footfalls sounded: booted soles coming down the same stairs over which the French soldiers had dragged her. One set only, heading towards the cellar. Josie braced herself, stifling the fear that crept through her belly, and waited for what was to come. There was the scrape of metal as the key was turned in the lock, and the door was thrown open.
The light of the lantern dazzled her. She turned her face away, squinting her eyes. Then the lantern moved to the side; as her eyes began to adjust to the light, Josie found herself looking at the French captain whom her father had called Dammartin.
‘Mademoiselle Mallington,’ he said, and crossed the threshold into the cellar. His lantern illuminated the dark, dismal prison as he came to stand before her.
He seemed much bigger than she remembered. The dust and dirt had been brushed from the green of his jacket, and its red collar and cuffs stood bright and proud. The jacket’s single, central line of brass buttons gleamed within the flickering light. His white breeches met knee-high, black leather boots and, unlike the last time they had met, he was not wearing the brass helmet of the dragoons. Beneath the light of the lantern his hair was shorn short and looked as dark as his mood. She could see that the stare in his eyes was stony and the line of his mouth was hard and arrogant. In that, at least, her memory served her well.
‘Captain Dammartin.’ She got to her feet.
‘Sit down,’ he commanded in English.
She felt her hackles rise. There was something in the quietness of his tone that smacked of danger. She thought she would defy him, but it seemed in that moment that she heard again her father’s voice, Trust him, Josie. Trust him, when her every instinct screamed to do otherwise? She hesitated, torn between obeying her father and her own instinct.
He shrugged a nonchalant shoulder. ‘Stand,