Absolute Honour (43 page)

He took a pace forward, shuddering, as the sword, which had pierced the tent wall, came out of it. Blood ran from his nose
and appeared at his lips, bubbles forming as he tried to speak. Jack moved further away, reaching the opposite wall in rapid
steps. Red Hugh fell. His body crumpled straight down until he was sitting on the floor, his arms resting on his thighs, his
head lolled over.

Cautiously, Jack approached. The Irishman made an attempt to lift the sword still clutched in his hand, but it slipped from
his fingers. Jack stepped in, moved the weapon aside, knelt.

The head came up. Eyes opened. ‘You’ve killed me, Jack.’

‘No.’ Now he was looking at what he’d done, he could not remember why he had done it. ‘I’ll call a surgeon—’

‘I’m past their skills. Not even a McClune could have the curing of this one.’ He coughed and blood surged again through the
whitening lips. In a moment Jack had his handkerchief out and was dabbing at the flow, as if cloth could hold in life. ‘ ’Twas
well done, lad. I was certain you had not the skill.’

‘I did not. Until Rome.’

‘Rome?’ Another cough, more blood. ‘Please tell me I didn’t spare your life so you could learn to take mine?’ Jack stayed
silent, and a little smile came to the reddened mouth. ‘Now isn’t that a thing?’

His voice was fainter now. Jack moved around, so the man
could lean back against his knees. ‘Wine?’ he muttered, and Jack reached up, grabbed the bottle, brought it to the Irishman’s
lips. When it touched, the eyes opened again.

‘My last pledge,’ he whispered. ‘What shall it be to, Jack? The King across the water?’

Jack watched the liquor flow out of the man’s mouth, then took the bottle and raised it to his own. He shook his head. ‘No,
Hugh. To you.’

He drank as a breath came, just one more, an exhalation. Then there were no other sounds save for the rain upon the canvas
roof, the fall of blood upon the earth. Jack listened to both and, for the longest time, did not move.

Jack lay on his bed in Absolute House, listening to the roar of London. Four years before that noise would have thrilled him,
had him seeking in his wardrobe for suitably fashionable attire to wear upon the town. There would have been friends at a
rendezvous, some hostelry in Covent Garden or Soho, turtle soup to be eaten there, ale or arrack punch to be drunk, the playhouse
to be visited followed by the bagnio, the billiard hall, the brothel; perhaps all these in a night and more.

But that was four years before and his wardrobe contained clothes measured for the boy he’d been then. Even if they’d still
been fashionable – which they were decidedly not, that much he had seen in the week he’d been back! – none now fitted him,
and he had so far avoided his mother’s offer to accompany him to Jermyn Street for a new set.

He sighed. Perhaps he should go out? Yet none of his Westminster friends were around. Marks and Ede were on the Grand Tour
– Jack shuddered to think what would have happened if they’d brayed his name across the Piazza di Spagna when he was spying
there – and Fenby was up at Trinity. And what would they have made of their old Westminster school fellow now anyway? He had
accompanied his mother the previous night to Drury Lane, in uniform. He could again. But the theatre, he had discovered, held
little delight. Artifice just seemed so … artificial after the reality of war.

He sighed again. He was in a funk, no question about it. He had spent the whole day upon this bed, trying to discover why.
Sometimes he thought it was the contrast between the last time he’d lain there, who he’d been then and who was lying there
now. The same person, despite the broadening, the tattoos, the scars, yet not the same person at all. Nothing old delighted
him. Nothing new had replaced it.

He heard the sound of cannon fire and turned instinctively toward it. It came from Hyde Park where the regiments that had
returned from European operations were drilling for the victory parades that would take place the next day. Since the Peace
of Paris had been signed in February 1763 just two months before, he knew that his comrades in Canada might only now be hearing
the news. It was his good fortune, he supposed, that the 16th were the
Queen’s
Dragoons and thus had been hurried home from Spain to take part. Just in time, he felt. Fighting had not resumed after Villa
Velha due to the winter and then the negotiations, but idleness, port wine and prostitutes had the potential to wreak more
damage on the regiment than the Spanish had ever done.

A third sigh galvanized him. This was absurd! He couldn’t lie about like this any longer. He would have to go out. He did
have an errand to run. Bibb’s were making him a new sword for the parade, since he’d managed to lose his own one in the aftermath
of battle and had survived on a borrowed one since. The sword-makers were in Newport Street, right between the Garden and
Soho. He could check on the weapon’s progress and retire to a tavern thereafter for a pint of porter. Or six. It was the one
aspect of London of which he could never tire.

His footfall on the stairs drew a shout from the parlour. ‘Who’s there?’ He went across, pushed the door. Sir James sat in
a large armchair, newspaper across his knees, a pipe and a bowl of chocolate on a table at his side. Lady Jane perched before
a stitching frame pushing thread through cloth.

‘Jack,’ they both declared as one before his mother went on, ‘We didn’t know you were about. Where have you been?’

‘In my room.’

‘You were never wont to be so quiet,’ Sir James grunted. ‘What have you been doing up there?’

‘Nothing, sir. Thinking.’

‘Thinking?’ His father looked at him with suspicion.

Lady Jane gestured to a chair. ‘Sit, Jack. I’ll have Nancy fetch up some chocolate.’

Jack hesitated. ‘I was on my way to Bibb’s, mother. Collect my sword.’

‘Bibb’s, eh? You treat yourself well.’ His father’s eyes gleamed. ‘I’ll come with you, then. Could use a new sabre myself.’

He was half-way out of his chair when Lady Jane spoke again. ‘Jack, the regiment only released you fully to us yesterday and
we’ve hardly talked about your adventures. Can you not spare your parents a moment?’

Jack sat reluctantly. It was the lesser of two evils. He and his father had not been alone together and so had never had a
chance to discuss Letty. He knew that Sir James had learnt of the dismal outcome and that he’d been horribly gulled in Bath
when he’d thought the match was with a noble, influential house. Burgoyne had told Jack so in Portugal. But how much more
did his father know?

He sat. A bell was rung, Nancy was summoned then dispatched to fetch another bowl. Fortunately Sir James had become distracted
again by the newspaper and went on a prolonged rant about the wickedness of the peace and the
concessions made, yet again, to craven Frog and perfidious Dago. It was thus a while, and Jack halfway through his bowl, before
the talk returned to him.

‘And so, Jack,’ his mother stuck the needle into the design, crossed her hands in her lap, ‘since you succeeded in writing
us only two letters in the four years you have been away, and since you told your father in Bath things he has largely failed
to remember,’ she smiled at her husband indulgently, ‘might you not vouchsafe us a tale or two?’

A tale? Which one could he tell his mother? His life as a slave with the Abenaki? His stupidity in love? His slaying of a
friend? Did parents truly want to hear all that? Then he suddenly thought of one. ‘I killed a bear in Canada, Mama.’

‘A bear, eh?’ Sir James put down the paper and leaned forward. ‘Brown or black?’

‘Black.’

‘Shotgun or rifle?’

‘Fire and rope.’

‘Pardon?’

It was a fortunate choice of story. Time had removed the horror of it, though not the scars the bear’s claws had made upon
his calf. These were exposed and the story told with suitable movements and sounds. More bowls of chocolate were ordered and
Nancy invited to remain for the recitation, which Jack then had to recommence. By the end, all were laughing hard, with Jack
not quite sure how the story had turned into a comedy, yet happy that it was so.

However, he knew that one tale would not suffice. His father especially would want to hear of the recent campaign in Portugal.
Indeed, when Nancy went to start supper, his father poured sherry and said, ‘Your mother and I have had a letter from Lieutenant-Colonel
Burgoyne. Full of praise for your conduct both in combat and in matters of intelligence.’ He glanced at his wife, smiled.
‘Seems you have
inherited from
both
sides of the family, then. He also says he will have you carry the Sixteenth’s standard in the parade tomorrow.’

Burgoyne had told him the same the day before. It was news that had filled him both with pride and, at the same time, some
unaccountable dread. This feeling dominated now, under his father’s beaming smile. He swallowed. ‘Do you, sir, parade tomorrow
as well?’

‘Indeed. The Hanoverians I served with in the recent war are not present, of course. But a friend in the Eighth Dragoons,
my old unit, has offered me a place with them.’ The smile widened. ‘So even if the Absolutes,
pater et filius,
did not go to war together, they will celebrate the victory so. Perhaps a vacancy will come up with the Sixteenth, eh? For
I have no doubt that there will be many other occasions in the future when we shall have the opportunity of killing Frenchmen
side by side. Ecod! Our ancestors have been doing it for seven hundred years now and this latest peace will be merely another
interlude in the dispute, mark my words.’

His father raised his glass in salute and drank half of it. Jack automatically raised his, yet it did not quite reach his
lips. His mother was frowning, with a darkness in her eyes he now recognized, staring at the men she’d sent off to war, seeing
herself doing it again and again. And in her eyes he saw the pair of them reflected back, and beyond them an endless parade
of Absolutes, all killing Frenchmen, Spaniards, Scots … Irishmen. Immediately, his mind went to another parade, the one that
had come to him in his dream in the tavern in Bristol. His victims. How many had he added since? Just turned twenty and he’d
killed – twelve men? Fifteen? He could not remember. Surely it was not a good thing that he could not remember.

It came to him then, in her look, in that memory, that if he was as yet uncertain what he wanted from his life, he suddenly
and clearly knew what he did not.

‘Actually, I do have something to tell you. I am going to resign my commission.’

The relief when he said it aloud! But he had not a moment to dwell on his good feeling.

‘What’s that?’ The smile still lingered, as if Sir James thought this merely another part of the bear story. ‘Resign? You
mean, of course, to go on half-pay.’

It was an option Jack had considered. Many regiments were fully disbanded at war’s end. The 16th were luckier, only losing
two troops. Though Burgoyne would object, Jack could volunteer to be one of the officers to go onto the half-pay establishment,
collect the paltry money on offer and retain his rank. But there was a catch, as his father now pointed out.

‘That way, when we do fight Frenchie again, you’ll be straight back to your regiment.’

‘But that’s it, sir. I do not believe I wish to live under an obligation to serve.’

‘Obligation?’ Sir James’s brow wrinkled. ‘There is virtually no obligation on half-pay. Not planning on serving with a foreign
army, are you?’

‘No, sir.’

‘Or entering Holy Orders?’

‘Hardly.’

‘Then I do not see the problem.’

‘I may wish to travel abroad.’

‘Hmm! Thought you would have had enough of that for a while. Still, even that’s possible. You’ll just have to return from
your travels when the killing starts.’

And there’s the rub, thought Jack. ‘I do not wish to kill again, sir.’

‘But for your King? Your country?’

‘No, sir. Not for anyone.’

‘What?’ So far his father had kept his temper. This word exploded, threatening others.

But his mother, hitherto silent, now spoke softly. ‘Let us hear what he has to say, James.’

The explosion was temporarily halted. Jack turned to her. ‘I am not sure I
have
anything more to say, Mother. I just know,’ he closed his eyes, ‘that I have already killed my fair share.’ He opened them
again, so he would not have to see the shadows, dancing there upon a canvas wall. ‘One more than my fair share, actually.
I have killed enough.’

The Llandoger Trow on the Bristol Docks had not changed much in the two years since his stay, but his reception there had.
He’d been slightly disappointed to discover that he no longer had his former allure for Clary the maid and the landlady, Mrs
Hardcastle. There was no fighting over his blanket now. Partly because there wasn’t one, partly because he was not alone in
the bed but shared it by day with a Maltese sailor called Cunha and half the night with a Scot who had vouchsafed no name
because he was always too drunk to recall it. The ladies remembered him well enough, to tell by their greetings; but they
remembered his purse even better, it appeared, and when they were made aware that it now contained only the sparse five guineas
his mother had managed to slip him when his father cut him off, they were quickly about other business.

Still, the tavern was the place to be, for all the news of the docks came to it with the clientele. If he were to find a ship,
the name would be mentioned there first. But Cunha and the insensible Scot were just two of many who also lingered. The war’s
ending had thrown sailors out of service along with soldiers. The privateers had disbanded, the Navy reduced its establishment
and the merchant fleet could take its pick of experienced seamen, thus severely reducing a landsman like Jack’s hopes of working
his passage. What was left of his guineas – most of it, he lived cheap – might buy him a fourth-rate berth in a fifth-rate
tub. But he would have nothing left when he reached his destination.