Page 80 of Libby's London Merchant
The invalid was silent.
Nez looked about him at the men of business hurrying down the sidewalk, looking everywhere but at the beggar. He sniffed the odor of sewage, observed the dirt on the pavement. “Nice comer, Yore, but your view is somewhat limited. What do you do when it gets cold?”
“We’ll find out this winter, won’t we, sir?” came the reply. “Last winter I spent in hospital.”
“Infamous place, wasn’t it?” the duke said, making himself more comfortable, heedless of the stares and not at all concerned what people thought. “One would think that England could do better for those who defend her.”
Yore nodded and held out the cup again to his regular customers on Fleet Street. “You know, sir, if you remain here, it will be difficult for me to earn enough for a meal tonight.”
The duke got to his feet. He took the crutch that leaned against the wall and held out his hand to Yore. “I have a better idea, Private Yore,” he said.
The duke dined that night in his kitchen. It was the first time he had ever visited belowstairs, but Yore had become adamant to the point of hyperventilating about eating upstairs. Bullying him would serve no purpose. Yore was tired and hungry and his stump pained him. Better to eat belowstairs than make the good man regret that his former commanding officer was out to kill him with belated Christian kindness.
The food tasted better belowstairs. Nez made some remark upon that fact to the cook, who hovered about the table, eager to please, genuinely delighted to see firsthand the effects of his cuisine on the master.
“It is always better when it is hot, my lord,” said the cook.
The duke nodded and wondered what kind of eccentric he would be thought if he took all his meals in the kitchen from now on. The idea had merit. Since I will henceforth be known as the peer who does not drink anything but water and lemonade, he thought, I suppose I could hardly suffer any more if the word circulates that I take my mutton with my servants.
His great pleasure was watching Yore eat. The man was weary to the marrow, but utterly intent upon what was placed before him. Nez could tell by the look in the private’s eyes that the modest spread that the chef had created on short notice was more than Yore saw in a week.
Finally Yore had to admit defeat. He pushed back his plate and shook his bead regretfully when the cook—not unmindful of the preference of soldiers—whisked out a currant duff.
“You could wrap a slice in cloth, sir,” Yore suggested to the cook, who nodded. “I can take it with me.”
“Do you have any family here?” the duke asked when Yore leaned back in his chair. “Come to think of it, Private, what are you doing in London? I thought you were Norfolk born and bred.”
“That I am, sir.” He frowned and regarded the distant wall. “A mob of us were invalided home. We got as far as London before one of the aides robbed me. I didn’t have no choice but to beg, sir, and I am no closer to Norfolk.”
There was nothing to say to that artless disclosure. The duke sat in silent contemplation of that same back wall until the private sighed and recalled him to the present.
“What of Sergeant Quill?” the duke asked.
“Dead of fever. He never left Brussels, sir.” The private hesitated.
“Go on, Yore, say what you’re thinking.”
“Sergeant Quill told me you would come for us.”
The duke resumed his contemplation of the wall as his insides writhed. “What of Allenby? Isn’t he a Devonshire man?”
Yore nodded. “That he is, sir. The last I heard, he made it back to Pytch, and his wife is supporting them with laundry while he continues to heal.” Yore glanced at the clock. “I have taken up a good portion of your evening, sir.”
“Where do you sleep, Yore?”
The private shrugged. “Right now it’s a place with five others, each of us paying what we can. Better than the workhouse, so I am told.”
“More like,” agreed the duke, falling into Kentish talk. He leaned back, crossed his legs, and took a long look at Yore. The man was thin, his eyes tired, but the duke liked what he saw. There was the same air of calm dependability about Yore that he remembered from the frantic afternoon two years ago when they stood back to back in their decimated square and kept each other alive.
“Yore, as I recall, you were a bit of a genius with weapons.”
Yore grinned for the first time, and it cast ten years off his back. “Mayhap I was middling good, sir.”
“You were very good, if memory serves me.” The duke leaned forward and placed his hands palm down on the table. “Yore, I have a gun collection at the family estate in Yorkshire. Well, I say it is mine, but it goes back to the first Duke of Knaresborough. No one has ever done it justice through the years. I am wondering—would you like to bring that collection up to snuff and maintain it?”
Yore was silent, his mouth open, as he stared at the duke, who continued. “I mean, plenty of visitors come to Knare each year. They admire the old part of the house, envy my trout streams, and ogle the formal gardens. I would like to really give them something out of the ordinary to stare at. Yore, the job is yours, if you want it”
Yore began to breathe again, but he was still silent. “There’s a tidy apartment off the armory, probably full of cobwebs and mouse nests right now, but it wouldn’t take much to make it habitable. A cat would help. Your board would be included, of course, and there would be a stipend for all else. Yore?”
