Page 30 of The Forbidden Love of an Officer
When he came to the room to fetch her, he was still in the guise of a military man, so although she wished to hug him, she did not. She did not think he would welcome it. But outside the barracks, he offered his arm and said he would walk her back to the inn and eat luncheon with her before returning alone to speak with the officers.
She wondered if this would be her new life, watching his through occasional windows, while he fulfilled his duty and excluded her with stiff, silent coldness? In order to do his duty, he must close off his emotions – she understood – but she did not love the soldier, she loved the man.
When he left after luncheon, he did not leave her with nothing to do, though, he ordered her to make a list of everything she would need to take to America, and bid her to write an advertisement for a woman to act as her maid, and general help. He said they would employ a woman when the regiment reached Cork.
7
Ellen stood on the ship’s deck clutching the rail at its edge, watching England disappear. It had been two days since she had first watched the regiment parade. Four days since they had arrived in Portsmouth.
It was midday. Paul had taken her aboard, then spent the last hour instructing his men and ensuring they were all aboard and their kit stowed away before the ship sailed on the high tide.
She had met the other four wives who were travelling with the regiment, all married to men of a lower rank than Paul. They were on deck too, keeping out of the way as the men worked below decks to organise the space the regiment had to share.
Only an hour ago, Ellen had learned she and Paul were to sleep in the open galley with his men. There would be no privacy. But they would reach Cork in two or three days. Yet when they sailed to America, there would be weeks with no privacy.
A longing for home caught in Ellen’s breast. Her fingers closed about the wooden rail, holding it tightly. She thought of Penny at home, possibly sitting before a warm fire working on her embroidery at this hour of day, or perhaps she was practising the pianoforte, or the harp.
Something touched her waist, a hand, and then a tall, strong presence settled behind her. Her husband. ‘You look sorrowful, Ellen.’
She looked up and back. She breathed out a breath she had not even known she had held in.I am a little sorrowful– but only because she could not yet picture the future. She was happy now, but there were so many unknowns, and she missed her sisters. She did not admit her insecurity; that would be disrespectful… ‘I am well. It is simply odd to leave England when a month ago the farthest I had travelled was barely ten miles from home.’
His fingers tucked a lock of hair, which kept catching the breeze and blowing across her face, behind her ear. ‘This must be difficult for you.’
Ellen held his gaze. ‘I am not afraid.’
‘I think you are, if you take the trouble to say you are not.’ His fingers brushed over her cheek and tapped beneath her chin. ‘Remember, I have seen enough recruits preparing for battle to know the signs, Ellen.’
She swallowed, then licked her lips to stop them feeling dry and saw his gaze lower to watch the movement of her tongue. ‘I am a little afraid,’ she admitted. ‘But only of what I do not know – what life will be like.’ In recent days, he had become more the soldier she did not know well, and less the man she had met in her father’s drawing room.
‘Ask the other women. They shall tell you. Make friends. I know at times it will not be easy but I shall do my best to make you happy.’
‘I know I will be happy, I have you. I am not afraid of that.’
‘Then I am content. I must go and speak to the lieutenant colonel. You will forgive?—’
‘You do not need to ask forgiveness for fulfilling your duty, Paul.’
His palm cradled her cheek and he smiled, before walking away.
The beat of her heart thumped steadily. The other women had not really spoken to her, she presumed because they thought she was too wellborn compared to them. Paul had not told anyone she was anything other than his wife, yet her voice, posture and clothing made her stand apart from the other women. She was not and never would be a common soldier’s wife. She was an officer’s wife, from a titled family. She would never quite fit in. But she longed to, she missed the company of her sisters, their whispered conversations and laughter. But Paul’s men did not seem to judge him by his birth, perhaps she could at least make friends with the women.
She looked back at the thin line of green and grey along the horizon, England.
If her father knew she wanted to be accepted among commoners, he would scold her.
* * *
The women dined with the men, clustered at the end of a long, scored, dark oak trestle table, giving Ellen an opportunity to speak with the other women as Paul sat among the men, further along.
Now was her chance to be accepted.
‘How do you travel with the men in general? I presume we must walk behind them…’ she asked of the woman beside her, before taking a sip of the watery broth in her bowl.
The woman glanced at her with uncertainty; all the women had been sitting stiffly since she had joined them. On deck earlier, they had talked easily with each other.
Ellen longed to say,you need not be afraid of me, but that would sound patronising when she was much younger than most of them. ‘I have no idea how I shall be living now…’ Ellen added, her uncertainty and fear slipping into her voice.
‘Simply, ma’am,’ a woman said, ‘we mostly ride on the baggage carts if the men are on the march, but sometimes we must walk if the terrain is too difficult for the horses, or the carts. When we travel by boat, then we must make do with whatever accommodation we can obtain.’ The woman lifted her spoon and ate another mouthful of the weak broth.
