A Victory for Love Read online

  Author’s Note

  One of the great menaces of the War waged in Spain and France by the Duke of Wellington’s Armies against Napoleon was the scavengers who stole everything they could from the dead and dying on the battlefield.

  Bodies that were left for any length of time became unidentifiable when they were finally collected, either by members of their Regiments or by the nuns and others who were merciful.

  This pernicious practice of stealing continued right up to my grandfather’s time when he remembered seeing, after the Battle of Sedan in 1870, hundreds of letters strewn about the battlefield that had been written by men before they had been killed. They were blown by the wind after their clothing and everything they owned had been taken from them.

  Chapter One ~ 1817

  Farica, walking through the wood very quietly on moss-covered paths, thought that the trees with their first summer foliage were lovelier than she had ever seen them.

  She knew that in a moment or two that there would be an opening and she would see ahead of her the magnificent facade of Lyde Castle.

  The Castle of the Earl of Lydbrooke had been to her a Fairy Palace that had coloured the stories her mother read to her and those she later told herself when she was always the heroine.

  Today Lyde meant something definite to her personally, although she was not certain if it pleased her or not.

  As she moved through the trees, looking in her green muslin gown as if she was part of them, she saw with surprise that there was a man sitting on a fallen tree trunk just ahead of her.

  It was a trunk that she had intended to sit on herself to look at The Castle and she stopped, thinking it extremely annoying that there was someone else already there.

  She wondered if she should retreat rather than encounter a stranger.

  Just as she was feeling indecisive, she saw something glitter in his hand and a second later was aware that it was a pistol.

  He lifted it a little and with a feeling of shock Farica was certain that he was going to raise it to his temple.

  Without thinking that she might become involved, without considering what might be the consequences, she ran forward and in a low breathless voice asserted,

  “No – you must – not do that! It’s a – wicked – cowardly thing to do!”

  As she spoke, she put out her hand and laid it on his arm.

  He turned his face towards her obviously startled by her interference.

  As she looked at him, she was aware that he was a man she had never seen before and he was also a gentleman.

  For a moment they just gazed at each other.

  Then she said a little incoherently as she took her hand from his arm,

  “I-I am sorry – I thought you – intended to – kill yourself.”

  “And you considered it your duty to stop me.”

  His voice was low and deep and Farica blushed as she replied,

  “Perhaps you think – I had no right to interfere. But life is so precious – it should not be wasted.”

  There was a faint twist to his lips before he replied,

  “Where I have come from life was a very cheap commodity and of little value. But I am sure, where you are concerned, it is indeed very precious.”

  She realised that it was a compliment and blushed again.

  Then she said,

  “I can only apologise – but we are not used to people brandishing pistols about in this part of the country, unless, of course – they are highwaymen.”

  The gentleman smiled.

  “And you don’t think that I am one?”

  “No, I am sure you are not,” Farica replied. “At the same time please – put that dangerous weapon away. It frightens me.”

  As if the gentleman suddenly realised that he was sitting and she was standing, he rose to his feet and as he did so put his pistol into the pocket of his coat.

  It was of a cheap material and not in the least fashionable and yet as he stood facing her she was still sure that in spite of his appearance he was well bred.

  Then he smiled and it seemed to transform his rather thin grim face.

  “I suppose I should be thanking you for your consideration of me,” he said, “in what was meant, I am sure, as an act of kindness.”

  Farica did not answer and after a moment he added as if to himself,

  “And I am very much in need of kindness at the moment.”

  Looking at him Farica saw that there was a long scar at the side of his square forehead and she said a little tentatively,

  “I think, sir, that you have been – a soldier.”

  “Does it show so obviously?”

  “Then you have!” Farica exclaimed. “If you have just returned from France, after perhaps in the last year being in the Army of Occupation – you must find things very strange and different in England.”

  “So different,” the gentleman replied, “that it made you think that, being unable to face it, I intended to shoot myself.”

  Farica looked at him wide-eyed and he went on,

  “Well, you are not very far from the truth. I do find things very different, but I am not sure what I can do about it.”

  “I am sorry,” Farica said in a soft sympathetic voice. “I know how hard it must be for you. Papa has been desperately perturbed about the way our soldiers who fought so gallantly against Bonaparte have been disbanded without a pension and nothing is done to find them employment, which is very difficult to obtain at the moment.”

  The gentleman nodded his head as if this was what he had found himself and then Farica asked him,

  “Will you tell me what Regiment you were in?”

  To her surprise the gentleman seemed to hesitate for a moment before he replied,

  “I was in the Life Guards.”

  “Then you fought at the Battle of Waterloo,” she exclaimed breathlessly.

  The gentleman nodded again and she went on,

  “I have read everything I could find about that magnificent battle and how brave our soldiers were.”

  She gave a little sigh and murmured almost beneath her breath,

  “But – a great many – died or were wounded.”

  “That is true.”

  Without being aware of what she was doing Farica walked round from behind the tree trunk and sat down on it.

  “My brother was – killed in the Peninsula,” she said. “He died gallantly – but I still find it hard to believe that I shall never – see him again.”

  The gentleman resumed his seat on the trunk beside her before he replied,

  “War is cruel, not only to those who fight but to those who wait behind.”

  Farica gave a deep sigh.

  “That is true. We waited and waited, because the first letter from Rupert’s Commanding Officer never reached us and when at last we knew the truth – it almost killed Papa.”

  There was a little sob in her voice and her eyes were misty.

  The man beside her said nothing but looked at her.

  She was very small and sylph-like with a pointed face and strange eyes that turned up at the corners, giving her an elfin look.

  ‘She is quite beautiful,’ he thought to himself, ‘beautiful with her hair the colour of the copper beech, every curl gold-tipped as if touched by the sunshine.’

  It was a strangely haunting little face that, he told himself, a man would find it hard to forget.

  Her voice was soft and musical like the wind blowing in the leaves.

  With an effort Farica seemed almost to shake herself before she said,

  “I should not be talking about myself but about you. Now you are back from the War, what are you going to do?”

  “That is exactly the question I was asking,” the g
entleman replied, “and when you appeared to prevent me from committing what you called a ‘cowardly act’, I had not found the answer.”

  He smiled as he finished speaking, but Farica looked serious.

  “It is going to be very very difficult for you,” she said, “if you have no money and no family to look after you.”

  “I suppose that is the luck of the draw. I must just pray that Fate or the Gods will be kind to me, which they have been already in letting me meet you.”

  “Thank you,” Farica said, “but I don’t want you to pay me any compliments. I wish, if it is possible, to help you.”

  “Why?”

  The question was sharp and she looked at him in surprise before she replied,

  “Because you have been a soldier and because, although it may seem a strange thing to say, you have brought your problem to the same place as I have – brought mine.”

  “You have a problem?”

  She nodded her head.

  “A very big one!”

  The man beside her looked at her for a long moment before he said,

  “Now I am being perceptive or perhaps you would call it ‘clairvoyant’, but I am sure your problem concerns a man and, of course, love and marriage.”

  “It is not – quite like – that.”

  “Then marriage!”

  She did not reply, but he knew that he had struck the right note.

  “And you have come here,” he said, as if he was thinking it out for himself, “to decide whether you should marry somebody who I am sure is important and distinguished and who has asked for your hand, but you do not love him.”

  “That is – right,” Farica agreed a little breathlessly. “How could I marry any man – unless I loved him? That is what I came here – to ask myself.”

  Her eyes, which had a touch of green in them, were troubled and, as she looked towards Lyde Castle, vast, impressive and magnificent in the sunshine, the gentleman followed the direction of her eyes and said,

  “Are you telling me that your suitor is the Earl of Lydbrooke?”

  Farica gave a little cry.

  “Please – you must not probe too deeply or guess at things that do not concern you. Papa would be very shocked that – I was talking so intimately with a stranger.”

  There was a little silence and then the gentleman said,

  “I think for the moment, here in this wood, we have stepped out of time and space and away from all the conventions of life.”

  He paused and, as Farica looked at him wonderingly, he went on,

  “You are a nymph from the woods who has a problem and I am a wise old man, a sage if you like, who will try to guide you so that you don’t hurt yourself, but will find the golden path to happiness.”

  He spoke in a low deep voice that seemed to be characteristic of him and Farica clasped her hands together as she said,

  “That is a lovely idea! I only wish I was a nymph of the woods, a real nymph, and then I could disappear into the trees and no one could find me – or make me do things I have no wish to do.”

  “I think by that you mean you have no wish to marry.”

  She twisted her long thin fingers together before she replied,

  “How can I marry him when I have – only seen him two or three times? And I cannot believe – whatever Papa may say that he – loves me.”

  There was poignant silence for a moment.

  Then the gentleman said,

  “Tell me about the Earl. Before I went abroad to the War his father, I think, was living here at The Castle.”

  “He was a dear old man,” Farica replied, “and he was kind to Papa when he bought The Priory where we live. Our other neighbours in the County, because we were newcomers, were rather inclined to – ‘look down their noses’ at us.”

  “Then what happened?” the gentleman prompted.

  “The Earl asked Papa to dinner. Of course I was too young in those days to be invited, but he used to speak to me out hunting and – after he had led the way everybody accepted Papa and invited him to their houses.”

  Farica paused for breath.

  Then she went on,

  “Papa told me how worried the Earl was that his son was in the thick of the fighting. Everybody around here loved him, the Viscount, and prayed that he would come home safely.”

  “Are you saying that he was killed?” the gentleman asked.

  Farica nodded.

  “Right at the very end of the War. In fact at the Battle of Waterloo, although no one knew it for some time.”

  She sighed deeply before she said,

  “I think that made the Earl no longer wish to go on living – and at his funeral they mourned his son with him.”

  Her voice was very moving and there was silence until the gentleman asked,

  “But who is the new Earl who is asking for your hand in marriage?”

  “He is a nephew and never came here during his uncle’s lifetime – because they did not get on.”

  “Why was that?”

  “Papa told me that it was because Fergus, that is the present Earl’s name, was wildly extravagant and preferred the gaieties of London to sport in the country.”

  She gave him a little smile before she added,

  “I am being very indiscreet and just repeating gossip when I say that the old Earl paid his nephew’s debts over and over again until he told him that he would do so no more.”

  “And this is the man your father wishes you to marry?” the gentleman asked and the surprise in his voice was clear.

  Farica looked embarrassed as she said,

  “Papa is very rich and I cannot help feeling that is really the reason – why the Earl of Lydbrooke is interested in me!”

  “I cannot understand how your father can consider such a marriage for you,” the gentleman commented with a sharp note in his voice.

  Farica made a little gesture with her hands.

  “I think the truth is that Papa has always felt that despite the support he had from the old Earl, many people in the County felt that he was not really grand enough for them. He is only a second Baronet, while the people around here are utter snobs and keep talking about their ancestors as if they were all derived from Adam!”

  The gentleman laughed.

  “I know exactly what you mean. At the same time you must think of yourself and remember it is you who would be marrying the Earl and not your father!”

  “Papa is pleased at the idea of my being the chatelaine of Lyde Castle and, as his estate marches with this one, which was, I think, originally part of it, it would seem a very sensible arrangement if the boundaries were merged.”

  She paused and then went on,

  “You have no idea how much disagreeableness there is every year because Papa’s gamebirds fly onto the Lyde estate and they say we poach theirs. The keepers are always at one another’s throats!”

  The gentleman laughed.

  “I can imagine that happening.”

  “You have no idea how seriously they take it,” Farica said. “And it is the same with the farmers who vie with each other over their sheep and cattle. Those on the Earl’s estate are furious if Papa wins a prize with his cattle or pigs.”

  Again the gentleman laughed.

  Then he said in a different tone of voice,

  “We are not talking about pigs and cattle but about you. Incidentally you have not told me your name.”

  “We should have introduced ourselves,” Farica said solemnly. “I was christened ‘Farica’, and my father is Sir Robert Chalfont.”

  The gentleman held out his hand.

  “My name is ‘John’,” he said, “‘John Hamilton’.”

  Farica put her hand in his and as she did so she was conscious that his clasp was strong and firm and she felt something, which she knew were his vibrations, touching hers.

  She was always very conscious of people’s vibrations and she thought sometimes that she could see an aura around them that was either dazzling lik
e a light, grey like a fog or at times black and frightening.

  Now, strange though it seemed, she felt as if the gentleman in his cheap ill-fitting clothes was enveloped by a light that silhouetted him against the tree trunks behind him.

  Then she told herself that it was just a trick of the sunshine and that she was being imaginative.

  “Now we have met each other,” the gentleman said, “I intend as the sage, whom you are consulting as regards your future, to give you my advice and hope you will follow it.”

  “I will certainly listen very attentively.”

  “What I am saying is very important,” John Hamilton continued. “It is, because you are very beautiful and very imaginative, that you must never marry anybody unless your heart tells you that he is someone you can love and trust.”

  Farica’s eyes were very wide as she said,

  “That is what I thought myself. You have put into words exactly what I was thinking.”

  “So be very firm,” John said, “and don’t be inveigled into doing anything that you might afterwards regret.”

  Farica looked at The Castle and said,

  “It is easy for you to say that, but it is very very difficult to oppose Papa and, of course, the Earl.”

  “Then play for time,” John insisted firmly. “But whatever happens, don’t allow yourself to be rushed into making a hasty decision or into hasty actions.”

  “I shall try – but it will be unpleasant.”

  Her voice was low and the worried expression was back in her strange eyes, which reminded him in their clearness and innocence of a forest stream.

  Then in a different tone Farica exclaimed,

  “Look what has happened! I said I was being selfish in thinking and talking about myself instead of you. You have inveigled me into telling you my troubles and I have not listened to yours.”

  “Very well, I will tell you mine,” John replied. “Can you think of anywhere in the vicinity that is cheap where I can stay and like you consider my future?”

  “I know of one place,” Farica replied, “but you might not think it grand enough.”

  “I can assure you I am not in a position to be grand for all I possess at the moment is a few, a very few sovereigns, a horse waiting for me outside the wood, and the pistol that introduced us.”

  Farica gave a little laugh.