Temptation (5 page)

His heart in his throat, he rifled through the letters on the silver tray, feeling a triumphant smile cross his face when he spied her handwriting.

He had a letter from Beatrice. She had replied to him, and by the weight of the paper it was no brief scrawled note, but a wonderfully long missive full of heart and soul.

Suddenly the weariness of the day left him and he no longer felt the discomfort of his damp clothes or the sunburn on his neck and cheeks. He felt ten foot tall and ready to conquer the known world.

He grabbed the letter and carefully slit open the seal with the letter knife. Then, ignoring his fellow officers’ calls to join him at the table, he hunkered down in the corner of the officers’ mess and began to read.

Beatrice lingered over the letter she had just received in reply to her last from Captain Carterton. She could not possibly take it down to share with the others, as had become their habit over the last few months since they had started writing to the soldiers over in South Africa. It was so much more personal than any of the letters the girls had received from the other soldiers. They wrote of the dust and the dirt, of the boredom of having little to do in a country that didn’t want them to be there. They wrote of blazing sun and of card games in the mess, and of the loneliness that engulfed them when night fell.

But Captain Carterton wrote of his dreams, of his feelings, of the things that mattered to him. Though she knew his words of love and desire were born out of loneliness and fantasy rather than from any true feeling for her, still his language was more than warm, it was positively scorching. It would be a breach of confidence to share any of his words, even the innocuous ones, with the other girls.

She refolded his letter and put it away at the back of her desk drawer where no one could possibly chance on it. He must be a true rake to write such words to her, but she couldn’t deny that they heated her blood. He described lying with a woman, with her, as pleasure not as a sin.

She wondered if she would dare to reply to him in the same vein…

Six or seven of the other girls were already gathered around the table in the parlor. She drew up a chair and joined the group. They did not even notice she came empty-handed.

“My soldier is asking for a photograph,” one of them said excitedly, waving her letter in the air. “He says he wants to see what his lady correspondent looks like. Do you think I should send him one? I could have a sixpenny tintype taken by the photographer who comes to the park every Sunday.” She turned her head to look out of the window. “He is probably still there now. I could find him if I hurry.”

“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” another girl ventured quietly. “He might come looking for you when he gets back home. Do you want to be courted by a poor soldier on half-pay?”

The first girl’s enthusiasm wasn’t quenched. “I’m sure I wouldn’t mind if he did want to court me.”

Beatrice was silent as the argument raged around her, lost in thought. Should she send a picture of herself to Captain Carterton, as he had asked her to? On the whole, she didn’t think so. She was still walking out with Dr. Hyde. Not that you could call him her sweetheart, exactly, their relationship was too rational and platonic for such an emotional term. Still, she didn’t want the captain to know her as anything other than words on a piece of prettily scented stationery. He was her fantasy; he had no place in the reality of her life. She wasn’t sure why she balked at the thought of sending him a picture, except that it would make their correspondence seem too real.

It was a pity that her relationship with the captain, if you could call an exchange of letters a relationship, was a hundred times more affectionate than Dr. Hyde’s tepid courtship. The captain’s letters were so much more intelligent and full of personal insight than Dr. Hyde’s conversation. So much warmer and more loving. So much more appreciative of her as a woman. And so much more inclined to make her think of deliciously intimate pleasures.

Captain Carterton had turned out to be a man of more substance than she had thought at first. He was clearly well educated and interesting, with a turn of phrase that could heat any young woman’s blood. If she were to meet him in society, they might even become friends. Or more…

“Of course you should send him a photograph if you want to,” Mrs. Bettina said stoutly, putting an end to the argument. “There’s nothing wrong with writing to a lonely soldier, and no harm in sending him a picture. A modest picture, of course.”

“I’m not so sure about that,” one of the others said darkly. “Don’t we all know what he wants to do with a photograph of a pretty girl. The saucier it is, the better he’ll like it.” She made an obscene gesture with one of her hands to make it quite clear to what she was referring.

The girls all laughed, and some of them, Beatrice among them, blushed. It seemed somehow wrong to think of the soldiers off fighting for their country as…as doing
that
, just as if they were grubby schoolboys.

But when Captain Carterton described it to her in his letters, he made it sound so delightful, as if bringing himself to orgasm while thinking of her was an act of love for her. She liked to imagine him lying in his tent, one hand stroking his stiff cock while the other held a picture of her. It made her want to do just the same, only with a picture of him.

Maybe she would send him a photograph of herself after all.

A saucy one. And ask him to send her his likeness in return. What Dr. Hyde didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him.

“They are all alone by themselves out in South Africa, after all,” one of the girls pointed out. “Without any English girls to keep them company.”

“Not that we’d help them out in that regard, even if we were there with them,” another said, her voice a bit tart. She had a reputation on the ward as being a bit of a tease. “A prick-tease,” Beatrice had heard her referred to as once by a disgruntled patient, a vulgar young bricklayer who’d wanted more from her than nursing.

“They can’t have much else to do, stuck in a dusty, hot place without any society.”

“We’d be doing a public service by helping them out. And it’s not as if it will hurt us. Or our reputations. We can’t help that men have baser needs.”

“Let’s all get tintypes done. We can ask the photographer man to come by when he is finished at the park. A few photos of each of us will make it worth his while. And keep the soldiers as happy as pigs in mud.”

Mrs. Bettina was the only one who demurred at the suggestion. “I do not think the sergeant-major would appreciate a photo of an old widow.” She heaved a sigh that spoke of wasted opportunities and regrets. “He would not be interested in my letters if he were to know how old I am.”

“You are not yet forty,” Beatrice protested. “And by his own account he is nearing fifty.”

Mrs. Bettina wasn’t convinced. “Women lose their looks sooner than men do. I am past being able to find another husband even were I to want one, but if he were to start looking for a wife he’d find himself a young girl of twenty who’d be glad to take him. Respectable men with an honorable profession are not two a penny.”

“He’s not looking for a wife—just a letter,” Lenora pointed out with unassailable logic.

“If it matters so much to you, send him a photograph of one of us instead,” one of the other girls put in. “As you said yourself, there’s no harm in innocently keeping a man happy.”

Mrs. Bettina allowed herself to be persuaded to at least consider the idea, and a couple of the girls ran off to the park to beg the photographer to pay them a visit on the promise of at least a score of tintypes to be taken.

In the resultant shuffle, Beatrice found herself sitting on the couch with Lenora.

“What has your soldier written to you this week?” Lenora asked with a smile of complicity at the game they were playing. “Mine writes of nothing interesting, except that he wishes I was there to keep him company. I doubt it would do him much good if I was—he is not the most articulate of correspondents and would doubtless be a dull companion. He’s not educated like Dr. Hyde, and he has no idea of wit or humor. But he was grateful for the socks I knitted him, so I am glad to be of some use.”

Beatrice shifted uneasily in her seat. Poor Lenora was too unworldly to hide her feelings. She was happily oblivious to the fact that all of the hospital knew of and pitied her for her unrequited affection for the doctor. Everyone liked Lenora too much to embarrass her by telling her that her secret was common knowledge.

Beatrice did not want to rub her friend’s nose in the doctor’s clearly expressed partiality for her. “You could liven your soldier up a bit,” she suggested, partly to take Lenora’s mind—and her conversation—off the doctor for once. “Get him thinking about you in a whole new way, and see what flights of fancy you can inspire him to.”