Carnal Pleasures (27 page)

“Upon my word, sir,” Dalhousie said. “You follow orders quicker than any officer I ever saw!”

Griff grinned. “You said ‘Take the village, sir,’ he explained. “As you can see, my lord, there it is, guns and all!”

The English aristocrat put up a hand to hide a smile. “Well done, Lieutenant!”

* * * *

From there, the British began flank attacks on the French defenders, slowly pushing them black toward the village. The French held on to give the baggage train a head start to France. The battle was no means over; they fought stubbornly over every yard of ground, their sharpshooters taking advantage for cover from every ditch and shrub. The noise grew more deafening until one had to shout to be heard over the din. Smoke lay heavily over the plain, the stench in the air acrid and suffocating.

Griff saw only a dark mass of the enemy from his horse. Shells screamed overhead and burst in flames, sending up showers of mud and stones that felt like sharpshooters’ bullets when they struck. Even more horrible debris, bits of gore and body parts, floated through the air. “Blast me!” Griff exclaimed with an aside to Pentagon. “I’ve never seen such an inferno!”

As he spoke, Bravo staggered from under him, clobbered senseless out-of-the-blue like a bird on the wing. Griff had just time to spring clear. He leaned close and searched for blood or a wound on the animal. He wasn’t conscious of any missiles falling close enough, but it was possible his mount was hit without Griff knowing it. He ran a hand over his sturdy gelding’s chest. The horse’s heart was thumping hard. To arouse him, Griff kicked Bravo in the ribs. The stunned gelding shook his head and scrambled to his feet. Griff jumped into the saddle again.

“Must’ve been a knock-out blow by a large stone,” a nearby soldier yelled. “Saw another one downed the same way and got up.”

As the brigade passed by the village of Vittoria, its advance was halted by an indescribable conglomeration of abandoned French baggage. Everything seemed to have been left behind, even the precious treasure chests. Fleeing to the east, the French took to their heels to avoid capture while hundreds of British troops plundered the caravan. The soldiers carried away cases of wine and brandy, ropes of sausages, full hams, and thick rounds of Swiss cheese. Elsewhere, chests lay open with broken hasps, treasure spilling out of them. A number of looters became wealthy men, stuffing their pockets with doubloons, jewelry, and trinkets easily carried away in canvas kitbags. It soon became necessary for officers to post pickets. Cavalry members pursued the routed Frenchmen well into the night.

Although it seemed Wellington’s forces won, the Allied Forces’ mopping-up operation was decimated by the loss of the badly needed, looted goods taken in tow by poorly paid soldiers.

Writing bitterly to Lord Bathurst at the War Department, Wellington complained:
‘The soldiers of the army have got among them about a million sterling in plunder.’
The commander-in-chief found himself left with only 250,000 French francs to bolster his war chest. During the encounter, the British lost some five thousand men. Seventy-five hundred Frenchmen were casualties at the battle of Vittoria.

Again, the weather was appalling. Thunder rolled incessantly, and the rain came down in torrents. The army plodded onward, marched in silence, and with gritted teeth.

* * * *

After a month of being badgered by daily posts from her stepmother to return to Town to finish the Season, Dulcie still held her ground. She politely wrote back, telling Agina that she would wait for Griffith Spencer’s return at Bonne Vista.

Dulcie made several trips into the market town, Pinkney-on-Barrow, to purchase a few new frocks. Autumn would soon be upon them, and she wanted heavier-weight clothes. This time she chose those that fit her as they should, and picked some brighter colors to compliment her complexion and her fresh, girlish looks.

Some days, Dulcie’s nights were fraught with loneliness. Before falling asleep she prayed fervently that Griff was unhurt. She dreaded the day a letter from her stepmother would bring the awful news of Griff falling in some vicious battle on the Peninsula from which he would never return. Should that happen, she knew Agina would demand she immediately agree to seek another suitor and marry him right away.

Dulcie missed Griff’s smile, his laughter, his teasing—and most of all, his heady kisses and caresses. She knew she shouldn’t. She knew their engagement was a fraud and was simply left in place to dismiss her stepmother’s greedy schemes and thereby, grab half of Dulcie’s inheritance for herself.

Dulcie was brave enough to write to her father’s solicitor and ask for a copy of the earl’s last testament. When she received it, Dulcie studied the document until she knew every line and nuance, spelling out as to what she was entitled. And to what the countess was
not
entitled. It was clearly stated in her father’s will.

As the summer days passed, Dulcie and Simon easily fell into their previous routine of an hour of daily playtime and long walks in the country. She went back to regular visits to the Bonne Vista’s tenants. She spent hours with the Walls in their comfortable cottage, talking and laughing with Denny much of the time. She often asked him to accompany on her walks with Simon.

“So, yer to be married, Miz Dulcie? And who is the lucky fellow? A rich nabob? An aristocrat like yer father?” He winked. “Or a blacksmith? Mayhap, even a poor gardener, like meself?”

“None of those, Denny. He has neither title nor wealth.”

“Well then, why in the world are ye to being leg shackled to the man? Yer a lady, not a common lass. Is he after yer money?”

“He told me he needs my dowry, Denny. He didn’t lie to me about that. We agreed upon a bargain.”

“A bargain, is it? And wot would that be, pray tell?”

“My stepmother arranged the match after I arrived in London. Griff…er…Mr. Spencer had just returned from India after a stint in the army. She told me he was her nephew, but he confessed later that she and he were not related at all.”

“Ye mean she set him up with ye so they would both share in yer inheritance?”

Dulcie hesitated, stooping down to pet Simon when they came to a turnstile in the thick, stonewall. She grazed her fingers through the dog’s thick, black fur. “Well, that’s not quite all the story, but yes, I suppose what you are saying is true.”

She looked up at him, seeing him frowning down at her.

“Where is the man now? Yer betrothed, I mean?”

“He re-joined the army and left for the Peninsula to fight Napoleon Bonaparte more than a month ago. He’s very brave, Denny, and quite honest. If he hadn’t left when he did, my stepmother would have forced us to wed almost immediately. For some reason, I have the feeling she is holding something over Griff’s head, things to which I am not privy.”

Simon jumped up first then leapt down off the boulders. Spotting movement in the tall grass on the other side, the dog streaked after whatever it was, probably a rabbit. Denny helped her over the loosely constructed wall.

“Griff and I agreed to stay engaged and postpone our marriage. We also agreed to cancel it when he comes home. Of course, we didn’t tell my stepmother. By then, I will have reached my majority and the greedy countess will be given a yearly allowance, not half of my inheritance, to which she believes she is entitled.”

“So that ‘tis the way of it. But if yer Mr. Spencer is kilt before yer birthday, what happens then?”

“She will demand that I choose someone else, or she will. The countess is my legal guardian, Denny. She can make me do what she asks.”

“Aye. Yer so right, lass.” He passed a rough hand down over his worried expression.

“So, you see, Denny, I’ve been praying hard that Griff stays alive until November twenty-second.”

Chapter Twenty-Seven

When Marshall Soult counterattacked through the Pyrenees, Wellington collected a sizeable force of twenty-four thousand able-bodied men he believed could stop an attack at Sorauren
.
While on reconnaissance, Wellington was almost captured by the French, but managed to elude them and return to his main force
.
Soult, who had sixty-thousand troops at his disposal, launched a vicious uphill assault with half of his men. The battle was bitter and bloody on both sides.

Griff and Captain Blakey had become good friends. Always impulsive, naturally warm-hearted, Griff at once forget Blakey’s affectations of speech and manners which initially irritated him. Griff was glad to have the man riding by his side. Blakey was cool in the thick of a fight, and therefore, a solid compatriot in Griff’s eyes. The Allies had held the French off.

“By Jove, Spencer! You’re a bully madman in battle,” Blakey congratulated Griff when the fighting slowed.

Griff merely grunted in reply.

I have things to prove,
he said silently.
To myself and to my family
.
Perhaps
then I can believe my earlier peccadilloes are redeemed, forgotten, and go on with my life, wherever it takes me.

Reinforcements arrived and more fresh British units reached the field. With his momentum slowed, Soult ordered the battered French troops back to their homeland to prepare defenses against the expected British offensive.

The next day, the Light division was invigorated by the sight of Wellington. His lordship looked to be in excellent spirits. He touched his hat in a salute to the troops and smiled. Presumably, he was satisfied by their performance.

Meanwhile, Sir Thomas Graham was besieging the town of San Sebastian on the north coast of Spain. The town, with its forbidding fortress sat on a great sandstone rock, surrounded on three sides with water.

The danger having ended at Sorauren, Wellington brought his full force toward San Sebastian
.
With Graham maintaining the siege, most of August, 1813, passed quietly for the Light division. Griff was glad of the respite. He was bone weary. The weeks gave him time to recover.

One day Blakey approached where Griff sat on his cot sharpening his sword. “You’re wasted in the army, I daresay,” his friend commented. “By God, man, what a smuggler you would have made. Perhaps, I’ll make use of you when I get back home to Cornwall.” He chortled pleasantly, raising a half-empty bottle of claret in his fist. “How did you manage this?”

“I found out the bloody Spanish peasants always trade contraband with the French,” Griff replied. “I bribed them, like everybody else,” he replied with a low laugh while uncorking his own full bottle of red wine and letting it pour down his parched throat.

The August heat wave ended. Volunteers were asked to hold one of the bridges of a town relatively near San Sebastian. Of course, Griff was one of the first, and another was Blakey. The two officers and fifty riflemen were sent out as pickets, not expecting to be assaulted by a greater force. The reconnaissance was held to be truthful by the higher-ups because of the damnable weather. What idiot would march forward as the drenching rain continued unabated, surging over the banks of the raging stream?

The staccato burst of rifle fire was drowned by the noisy, raging water of the stream. Within minutes, Blakey, Griff and their group of riflemen, fighting on foot, were hotly engaged. Straining to hear, Griff caught the all-to-familiar words of French commands. “Forward! By order of the Emperor!”

Soon the bridge was attacked by overwhelming numbers. Sentries had been double posted but the storm smothered the Frenchmen’s approach. The sentries had been bayoneted because the rain dampened their priming powder and their guns misfired. Molested badly by the French, the riflemen couldn’t withstand the waves of determined soldiers coming at them. The Brits were either killed or badly wounded. When the skirmish ended, the bridge was choked with dead bodies. Dead Frenchmen were tossed into the raging waters and floated downstream. Griff saw a British sergeant leaning on his rifle, trying to walk on a broken leg. Griff had caught a bullet in the fleshy part of his thigh—only a flesh wound although it bled like hell. Squinting through the thick veil of raindrops, he shouted to one of his men. “Where’s Captain Blakey?”

“Dead, dead!” was the hoarse reply.

A pained groan burst from Griff’s lips. He started to search for Blakey, unable to leave the man without knowing for sure if he were dead or alive. He came upon the body, finally. A bullet had pierced his brain. He must have died instantly, and felt nothing. Blakey’s aristocratic features were calm in death. A shadow of his lazy, mocking smile remained on his lips. Griff’s grief was acute. They had gotten to know one another, laughed together, been compatriots and friends, if only briefly.

Damn this bloody war!
he ranted, raising his eyes to the continuing storm.

* * * *

The siege of San Sebastian dragged into the first week of September. The fortress surrendered on the ninth day with General Louis Rey ending the negotiations. Wellington allowed the French to march out with full war honors, having defied the Allied army for more than two months. Rey’s men suffered more than two thousand casualties; the Allies lost almost twice as many.

Griff ground his teeth as he watched the Frenchmen leave, remembering his friend, Blakey, a stalwart, courageous soldier and an English peer, to boot.

Within days, Wellington talked of advancing. Every soldier was itching to set foot on French soil to get the job done. The Spanish members of the Allied forces, ragged and half-starved, were especially anxious to take revenge on the French who ravaged Spain’s countryside.

When the brigade left their camp in the first week of November, Griff was ready, eagerly attuned to the upcoming invasion of France, wondering if Wellington’s final campaign might end the war. The night was very dark, and there was no easy road over the mountains. Talking amongst the ranks was forbidden. Men in the Light division concentrated on the upcoming attack. Griff and few others volunteered to scout ahead.

One of the young foot soldiers waiting in the rear, his rifle lying beside him as he lay on the ground, whispered to the man next to him, trying to keep his teeth from chattering. “This looks like an awful bloody spot to start!”