The Lightstep (6 page)

But she would have seen the other marks, the old white scars.
She would know that it was not the first time.

'What makes you so angry?'

He gave a helpless gesture with his good hand. 'Many things.'
He smiled, ruefully 'Your mother was right about that. It is a
weakness I have.'

He added, 'I was a revolutionary once,' as if that might explain
something.

'I have been told so. You are Captain Michel Wéry are you
not? That was the name you gave at the door.'

'Yes.'

It was the first sign that any of them knew who he was.

'My brother wrote so much about you. Yours is an exceptional
story.'

He nodded. Suddenly, he felt relieved – relieved that someone
in this house had at last acknowledged his link with Albrecht, and
therefore his right to have come to them. And triggered by his
relief, he felt also an urge to explain himself. He wanted her to
understand why he, a sane, thinking and compassionate man,
could have been moved to behave as he had done in her home.
If he could do that, he might also be relieved of his shame at the
things he had said here.

But she had not come to listen to him speak of himself.

'What seems to me to have been most exceptional, Lady
Maria,' he said, 'was the generosity of an Erzberg officer who
made an enemy into a friend.'

When she did not answer, he added, 'I may say that your
brother saw fit to call me "Michel".'

She nodded, slowly. But she did not answer, because at that
moment the servant Hans reappeared with a bowl and rags. Wéry
held out his hand to be cleaned and dressed. As he watched the
little man fussing over his marks he was aware of the woman
beside him.

He was very strongly aware of her, sitting there, studying him
with eyes that might have been her brother's.
'Hey, Michel! Have
you ever looked at somebody? No, I mean, truly looked at them? Look
at old crook Bannermann there, dishing out the schnapps ration. Go on,
look your hardest. Tell me his past, his hopes, his fears, if you see them.
And I'll tell you if I think you're right . .
.'

What did she see?

An unlovely thing, surely: a story of so many failures that they
might almost have been crimes. He winced inwardly. And he
realized that he had committed yet another offence, even as
he had tried to undo his earlier one. Of course no woman in her
position could call him 'Michel', whether at the first meeting or
at their fifty-first. It must always be 'sir' or 'Captain' or 'Count'
or what-have-you. It must always be that polite, protected
distance. Her brother had been free to condescend – free to step
out of his aristocratic skin into that of a petty gentleman and
revolutionary; free, even, to imagine himself as a fat and corrupt
quartermaster's assistant, if the whim took him. For her, it would
never be allowed.

He risked a quick glance from the corner of his eye – quick,
and away at once, as though his attention had never left the
dressing of his hand.

That was Albrecht's Maria, there: his sister, of whom he had
spoken often. Strange! His stories had been of a mischievous
childhood – of shared adventures, tree-climbing, stealing sweetmeats
and smuggling hurt wild animals into the house. He had
talked of a laughing, witty little sprite, who had stolen his spurs
so that he could not be cruel to the horses. Wéry had never
imagined this solemn figure, pitched abruptly into the world of
full adulthood. He had never been told how she could address
idiot brothers and rude strangers with a patience that neither
deserved.

Tell me her past, her hopes, her fears . . .

He stole another glance. She was no longer watching him. She
was waiting, with her eyes on the fire. So now he could look at
her, spying on her from the corner of his eye, while keeping his
chin pointed firmly at the servant who was dressing his hand.

In profile her face had the same delicacy about the nose and
eyes as those of her mother and brothers, although there was a
slight heaviness to her jaw, he thought, that dulled the effect. She
was taller than her mother by a head, but the muted colours
she wore, in contrast to Lady Adelsheim's bold pinks, had made
her almost invisible when he had first stepped into the library.
Now that he looked more closely he saw that the dress was old,
a little short for her, and the lace that trimmed the skirts and
sleeves was tinged with yellow. An orange-gold ribbon drooped
where the overdress joined across her breasts. Her skin was
powdered, and so was her hair – piled and powdered as her
mother's had been. At another time, Wéry thought, looking at
her would have been pleasing enough – although he would also
have liked to have seen her wearing the new classical styles of
France, with her hair left its natural dark colour and done in
ringlets.

But before all that, she should have been happy.

She was doomed from birth: doomed into her narrow degree,
here in this house between that lightning-witted mother and her
father and brother who had no wits at all. All her growing life she
must have watched Adelsheim decay: debts and misfortunes,
exacerbated by the tolls of war. Now, without warning, she was
mourning a loved brother who should have lived. And the hopes
of her house were in ruins around her, and she herself must be
the last asset left: the marriageable daughter who could offer to
her husband the Adelsheim pedigree – the full sixteen quarterings
on the coat of arms, which would open so many doors
among the exclusive aristocratic castes of the Empire. Wéry had
an idea that her hand had already been claimed by some cousin.

Perhaps marriage would change her life for the better. Who
knew?

The servant rose, and Wéry remembered to thank the little
man as he departed. Now they could both look at one another.
And now he saw, as if for the first time, the heaviness of shock in
her eyes – the shock that he had brought to her. The white
powder on her cheeks was still pure and unmarked. Soon, when
the world would permit her privacy, it would be tracked with the
tears she held inside her. He could do nothing for her, except to
make her misery complete.

'We had thought him safe,' she said.

She sounded very tired.

'The last we had from him was a letter that reached us only
late last month, almost the same day as news of the peace. He said
nothing was happening and that it was all very dull. Then he told
us about driving pigs through a Cravatier officer's tent.'

Wéry smiled grimly. 'Yes, he did. The Cravatiers were not
pleased with us.'

'Was it a duel, then?'

'A duel? No.'

How little they had grasped of what he had said to them!

'It was the French,' he said. 'They crossed the Rhine the day
after his letter was sent.'

He drew breath. 'They were in great strength, and they had a
new commander, Hoche. We suffered losses, and fell back.
Albrecht was unhurt, then, because his battalion was not engaged.
We joined the retreat towards Frankfurt.'

(Retreat! How could he describe the chaos – the orders that
came from the Imperial headquarters, urging them to do this, do
that – and none of it either possible or meaningful? Some
regiments refused to obey commands. Others were not supposed
to be where they were, or, when you reached them, proved to be
nothing but a handful of men with a banner. Officers shot at their
own men, and men murdered their officers and left their bodies
by the road.)

'Hoche pressed us hard. We were very nearly trapped. We were
at risk of being cut off and caught with the rest of the Imperial
army. But the Erzberg commanders saw that if we could gain the
crossings at Hersheim we would have a safe road home – for
ourselves and maybe for the rest of the army too. So they changed
route.'

She was listening, but she did not look at him as he spoke. She
had gone back to watching the embers as if she could follow
there the last acts of her brother and his friends, as if she could
see the small, massed columns, many-legged, marching into the
fire.

'The French reached the crossings first – only a battalion, with
some guns, sent ahead of their main body to cut us off. But they
were digging earthworks, and of course they could have been
reinforced at any moment. Count Balcke-Horneswerden ordered
the infantry to attack. They had to cross the open ground down
to the banks, wade the river and climb the far side, with the
enemy's cannon firing all the time. Some of the men lost their
nerve and tried to shelter under the far bank. Albrecht rode into
the water to encourage them. That was when he was struck – by
canister, I think . . .'

Now she stirred.

'Canister?'

'A case of musket-balls, about so big.' He made a round with
his hands. 'It is fired from cannon at close range, to kill many
people at once . . .'

She was looking at his fingers, measuring their circle with her
eye. He could see she was trying to imagine the weight of the
shot. She was picturing how they might smash into a man's body.
He saw her bite her lip.

'You said – his servant also died,' she said.

'I am sorry. Yes.'

'We will have to tell his family how.'

'It was shot from the same battery. He was trying to reach your
brother.'

'Then – my brother was still alive?'

'The men he was rallying pulled him to the bank. They were
able to bring him in when the enemy position was overrun. But
– the surgeons could not help him.'

There was no point in trying to explain the dilemmas of the
surgeons, working into the night on whomever they thought
they might save while more and more shattered men were laid
around them.

'Was he in much pain?'

(Don't lie. It will hurt her worse if you lie, and she sees it.)

'I fear he must have been. But it would not have been for
long.'

'Were you there?'

'No.'

She looked away.

'I had been sent to the Imperial headquarters to inform them
of what the Erzberg troops were doing,' he said. 'I did not return
to the camp until that evening, carrying news of the armistice.
When I heard he had been wounded, I went straight to the surgeons'
tents. But he was already . . .'

He broke off. She had put her hand to her mouth in a sudden
gesture. Her lips had formed a silent 'Oh!' Her pale skin now
seemed white in the gathering evening.

Heavens! Was she about to faint?

'Was it really that close?' she asked, in a voice that almost
cracked. 'He need only have lived one more day?'

'I fear that is true.'

'So – it was needless, then! It should not have happened!'

It should not have happened. That was true, of course. That
was the devil of it. Wéry spread his hands, helplessly.

'Our attack, or theirs?' he said. 'We all knew the negotiations
had started. But nothing might have come of it. And one side
cannot stop fighting if the other does not.'

She was not satisfied. Of course she was not . . .

But once again they were interrupted. Once again he must
climb to his feet. Standing in the doorway was a lady in middle
age, with close brown hair and a dress rather duller and less
elaborate than the girl at Wéry's side. She did not seem to be a
servant – there was no air of officiousness or function about her
– but there was a diffidence in the way she held herself which
said that she was not a full member of the family either.

'Anna!' exclaimed the girl.

'Forgive me, my dear. She is asking for you again.'

'Oh – dear Virgin!' Maria groaned.

But in a moment she gripped the arms of her chair. 'Yes, of
course,' she said. 'I will come. Anna, this is Captain Wéry. You
remember, in Alba's letters. . . Captain, let me introduce to
you Madame Anna Poppenstahl, who has been a lifelong friend
and companion to my mother, and even more than that to my
brothers and me.'

Anna Poppenstahl, thought Wéry, bowing over the woman's
hand. So this shy, plain creature was the beloved Anna, Albrecht's
governess.

And this was the woman who, all unknowing, had been the
link of fate that had brought him to Erzberg: to Albrecht, to his
commission, to his place in the struggle against France.
'My cousin
was his governess,'
Maximilian had said in the dusk of the ramparts
of Mainz.
'She still lives in their house!

She still did.

'Madame,' he said. 'It is a sad day, and nothing will change that.
Nevertheless, I am glad to have met you. I made the acquaintance
of your cousins, the Jürichs, in Mainz some years ago. I owe them
a debt of gratitude to this day.'

Madame Poppenstahl's face was drawn, and her fingers
worked together as she stood before them. She bobbed at his
words, but did not answer him.

'Maria,' she said anxiously. 'Please.'

'Yes, yes. At once. Perhaps you would be so good as to remain
with Captain Wéry until . . .'

Wéry read the exchange of glances. The governess was
distracted and unwilling: the shy product of a sheltered life.
Strange captains, even ones who claimed the acquaintance of her
cousins, were more than she knew how to deal with. And the
daughter was also distracted, and yet felt herself to be in sole
charge of the house. She was determined, even now, that their
guest should be shown some courtesy.

Beyond the thick clouds, the sun must be low. It was more
than a league, by narrow and twisting paths, to the nearest
inn in Erzberg territory. His presence here was already an
embarrassment. If he remained another hour, they might
even feel obliged to invite him to stay the night. And what
would Lady Adelsheim sly in the morning, when she discovered
that such an unwelcome visitor had sheltered under her
roof?

He had done enough harm here.

'You are good,' he said bowing. 'But time does not permit me
to stay. If word could be passed to the stables for my horse, I will
make no further demands of you.'