Chapter Ten
Rafe spent Christmas with his family. Gradually, Kitty Potter became more familiar to him as her grown-up self, and less a feminine version of Benjamin. After all, Ben had never been that pretty.
They passed many hours together playing games, chatting, and riding when weather permitted. Her laughter trilled frequently. Sometimes they sat side by side as he read and she drew. Being with her grew increasingly more comfortable. Yet, always his thoughts centered on Osanne.
A week after Easter, he bade his family farewell. Wrapped in a shawl to protect her from the brisk wind, Kitty arrived to see him off. This time, she offered him a folded piece of paper.
“Don’t open it until after you stop for the night,” she said. Swiftly, she kissed his cheek and hurried away.
With his arm resting on the saddle, he lowered his head to his arm. Had he raised Kitty’s expectations by spending time with her? Could he ever return her regard?
That night in a wayside inn, he opened the paper Kitty had pressed into his hand to reveal a drawing of Rafe astride Solo—a good likeness, and in such detail that she had even captured the folds of his greatcoat.
Yet, Osanne’s face, the timbre of her voice, her soothing presence, haunted his every idle moment, and riding about the countryside to pay the calls he had vowed to make provided many such moments.
Later, as he helped repair the roof belonging to the widow of one of his fallen men, he paused. Would Osanne approve of his efforts for them? Had he done enough?
Did he truly do this for them, or did he seek something for his own benefit?
Once the roof had been properly repaired, he climbed down the rickety ladder where the pretty young widow stood clutching her shawl about her.
“I’m grateful to you for your aid, Captain Beauchamp.” She tugged on Rafe’s hand, leading him toward the door of her humble cottage. “Stay the night with me?”
Inside the doorway, she dropped her shawl, revealing only a shift beneath. Slowly, she lowered the shift to reveal curves any man would desire. He was not immune.
Still, Rafe had never been a libertine and he was not about to start now. He caught the fabric before it fell completely from the young widow, and raised it back up to her shoulders.
He gave her a kind smile and shook his head. “I have not come to take advantage, nor do I expect any repayment.” He stepped back. “Farewell.”
She blinked at him, then hugged herself.
In the small barn, after saddling Solo, the only other occupant besides a milk cow, he tucked a small bag of silver coins in the chipped milk pail for the widow to find in the morning.
At a crossroads, he paused. The northerly route took him toward a handful of villages he planned to visit.
The other way lay the path to Osanne’s village.
Four months separated him from All Hallows’ Eve and Osanne, yet Madding Hollow had become familiar.
Its inhabitants, his friends, beckoned to him.
He patted Solo’s head. “What say you? Shall we go a bit early and pay a call on my friend Mr. Brown and his bride?”
His horse waffled and nodded his head, all the justification Rafe needed.
He turned toward Madding Hollow and reached it as the rising sun cast a golden glow over the land.
Summer gave the remote area a lush, wild beauty so different from the dying barrenness of late October.
The scent of rain-kissed flowers and leaves, and freshly-turned soil lifted his spirits.
Sunlight winked at him through the canopy of trees reaching over the road.
Birds flirted and sang all around him. A tangle of verdant green fields, wildflowers, fruit-laden trees, and shrubbery peppered with blooms tumbled over the countryside in charming disarray.
When he strolled into the familiar inn, Mr. Atwood took a second glance. “Well, bless my soul, it’s Mr. Beauchamp. You’re a mite early this year.”
“I am. Do you have a room I can have for a few days?”
“For you, always. Weather’s a bit warm for your usual mulled wine. What can I get you?”
“How about a few slices of bread and cheese?”
“Done. I have fresh pears, too.”
Rafe ate his fill before ambling to the Browns’ vicarage. Outside the front door, he found them murmuring with an older man in hushed tones.
“I understand,” Mr. Brown said. “Thank you for coming.”
The man, wearing the clothes of a laborer but carrying a leather satchel like a physician’s medical bag, put on his hat and nodded to Rafe as he passed by.
“Mr. Beauchamp,” Mr. Brown called. “How delightful to see you. Do come in.”
Inside, Mrs. Brown smiled at him. “I’ll have Molly put on the kettle.” She disappeared inside.
Rafe glanced at the direction of the departing visitor. “A doctor? Is everyone well?”
“This village is not fancy enough for a doctor; that was the apothecary from the next town. Last night, I feared Jake Wilson had finally drunk himself to death. We’re caring for him here.”
Soberly, Rafe nodded. “I’ve seen that a great deal among those who returned from war. Did the apothecary have a solution?”
“He did, but unless Jake wishes to give up the bottle, anything we do will be temporary, at best.” As they entered the vicarage, Mr. Brown said, “Perhaps you can speak to him. As a military man yourself, you may be able to counsel him in ways I cannot.”
Rafe hesitated. How could he counsel a man who had, at best, lived through unspeakable atrocities in Spain, and at worst, committed said atrocities? Did compassion have a limit?
Mr. and Mrs. Brown looked at him with such hopeful expectation that Rafe could not refuse. “I’ll do what I can.”
They led him to the guest bedroom.
Jake sat on the bed, hunched over with his head in his hands. He looked up at their entrance. The bleakness in his eyes tugged at Rafe’s sympathy.
Mr. Brown made the introductions and then left, closing the door softly behind him and his wife.
Jake peered at Rafe. “You’re that bloke what comes a visiting every All Hallows’ Eve, ain’t ye?”
“I am.”
“You’re a bit early.”
Rafe smiled briefly. “I like it here. Since the war, I’ve done a fair share of wandering, but this year I thought I’d spend more time here.” He sat on the wooden chair. “I hear you served in the Army?”
Jake looked down at the floor. “I did. The 5th Division.”
If Rafe remembered correctly, the fifth division had suffered catastrophic losses and had been part of the war-inflamed soldiers who sacked Badajoz. It fit with what Rafe had suspected. It was all he could do to school his expression to conceal his disgust.
“You were in the army, too?” Jake asked.
“Cavalry. The 7th Light Dragoon regiment.”
“You were one of the Hussars?”
Rafe nodded and held out his feet to show his hussar boots, dusty and worn now, but Rafe couldn’t quite put them aside. They’d become something of a badge of survival.
They made small talk for a moment before falling silent. Outside, a bird sang and a breeze blew in through the open window.
Rafe took a breath, “Several of my troopers found it difficult to live with what they had experienced in the line of duty, and they turned to the bottle. I admit I also walked that path for a bit. It seems you’re struggling with that, as well.”
Jake put his head in his hands. “Can’t shut out the images. Every night they come. If you knew what I done....”
As gently as he could, Rafe said, “You were in Badajoz in ‘12?”
Jake slumped further.
“I read the official reports. What happened?”
Jake sighed heavily and shut his eyes. In halting tones, he related the bloody battle where a shocking number of British soldiers lost their lives, of burying so many of his brothers-at-arms, and the rage that ensued.
Disciplined Englishmen had turned to violent savages.
Jake’s voice choked as he divulged his role in that nightmarish scene.
The official reports had not been exaggerated.
Cold all over, Rafe swallowed back his revulsion. Silence fell over the room.
What could Rafe say? Jake had acted abominably.
Grief, anger, too much drink, and the contagious energy of a mob’s lust for retribution had dulled his moral standards and code of honor.
Still, his conscience had clearly re-engaged; he tortured himself daily.
Perhaps he was not, after all, the devil incarnate.
Jake snorted. “You probably never done nothing that bad.”
Quietly, Rafe said, “No, but I have regrets.”
Jake grimaced and shook his head. If Rafe hoped to reach this tortured soul, he must prove that they bore common inner wounds.
Rafe held his breath. Could he bare so much of himself to another?
Jake put his head in his hands. “I tried to put a bullet in my head, but I couldn’t go through with it. I hoped drinking all that rum last night would do what I wasn’t brave enough to do with a gun.”
“I felt that way once. More than once, truth be told.”
Jake went still. He tilted his head to the side to eye Rafe, his attention caught.
After a bracing breath, Rafe described the agonizing decisions he had been forced to make to carry out orders from higher up the chain of command; all the maimed men he had watched suffer and die—and suffer and live; the letters he had written to the families of those he lost; and finally, the soul-crushing moment when he had held his childhood friend as Benjamin took his last breath.
Quiet settled over them like a shroud. Rafe unclenched his fists and forced them open onto his knees as he took steadying breaths. Feeling Jake’s stare, he looked up. Compassionate tears glimmered in the man’s eyes.
Jake moistened his lips. “None of that was your fault, you know. You obeyed orders.”
“Trust me, I relied on my own judgment plenty of times. I constantly questioned the commands I gave—had I done things differently, more of my men might have been spared. Benjamin might still live. Everyone has regrets, Jake.”
Everyone. A new kinship for the other man crept over Rafe.
Jake muttered, “How do people live with that? How do you?”
“I try to help others—try to ease the suffering of those who are left behind to grieve.” A sad, half-laugh whooshed out of his mouth.
Jake nodded. “Drinking does that for me. Don’t you get tired of wandering? Lonely?”
“I do, but I keep busy so I don’t have time to drink too much, like I did when I first came home.” He looked at Jake. “Don’t you get tired of being alone, here, among your own villagers, always in a drunken stupor?”
Jake nodded again and let out a long exhale. “Aye, I do.”
“Keeping busy might help you.”
“Staying put somewhere might help you,” Jake countered.
Jake's words rang of truth. Perhaps Rafe could find a home and stay there. Perhaps that home might be here. Did he dare?