‘Because I knew you,’ she said, staring at him as though he had asked a very stupid question. ‘How could I not? The battle was over and you had not come back. The chances were, if you had not been killed, that you were lying on the field somewhere with no medical help and would die.’
‘That applies to hundreds of men,’ Hal said harshly, wondering why he needed to push her like this.
‘I couldn’t help hundreds,’ she explained, patient in the face of his anger. ‘But I might help one. One that I cared for.’ He saw her closed expression and knew that was as close to a declaration of her feelings as he would get. ‘Even if you were dying, it would have been a comfort to your family to know you were cared for at the end.’
It would. Of course it would, he realized, staring up into the cob webbed gloom of the roof overhead. In all the years he had been fighting he had known the anxiety his family had suffered, their fears. But it had not occurred to him what anguish it would be to hear the details of the horrors of the battlefield and to know he had died there, perhaps lingering for days.
‘Thank you,’ he said at last, realizing it was not possible to say any more without shaming himself with tears. He had been angry with her for risking her safety and her reputation. She did not deserve that. She deserved that he do what he could now to protect her, and do it with good grace.
‘I will marry you,’ Julia said abruptly. ‘You are right, I must, I see that.’ The relief he felt must have shown on his face for she added, ‘Then you are not angry with me any longer?’ He could hear a tremulous smile in her voice.
‘I am relieved. I will do my best to make you a good husband, Julia.’ She bit her lip and looked away, so he hesitated over the softer words he had thought she might expect. Then the moment was gone as foot steps approached the hut.
‘Here’s the coffee.’ She got to her feet with what he had to assume was relief at the interruption.
‘I’ve found some planks,’ George said, putting down the mug close enough to Hal for the aroma to have his mouth watering. They could have extracted any kind of confession, he realized, just by torturing him with the threat to take it away. ‘Reckon I can push them under the pillow and wedge them up and you’ll be able to sit up a bit.’
It hurt, but he bit his lip and kept quiet. The relief of being able to lie back and look around, not at the roof, was worth every pang. Hal took the mug in his left hand and drank, almost moaning with pleasure as the strong, hot liquid slid down. It felt as though it was replacing all the blood he had lost with liquid fire.
When he stopped drinking and paid attention to what the others were doing, he found they were in elegantly tackling fried bacon wedged between slices of bread. The smell of the hot savoury fat floated across the hut, overcoming even the coffee. ‘Is there any more of that bacon?’
Julia smiled, ‘Oh thank goodness, you have an appetite after all. You must be recovering.’
Hal smiled back, realizing how good it
was to see her looking happy again. ‘I hate to cast down your spirits, but frying bacon would make a dead soldier walk.’
After the food, he lay there, realizing just how bad he had been feeling before Julia had found him and what a miracle she and the groom had wrought between them. It would take time, but unless an infection took hold, he was going to survive this, with all his limbs intact.
Alive, intact and committed to marry the woman he wanted above all others. Why then did he feel like hell? Guilt, he supposed. In the middle of horror, Julia had behaved with courage, resource and intelligence, and it was his fault she had had to. Now she would find herself married to a man who had no idea what to do with a well-bred virgin, let alone a wife, and who was mired in a feud he only half under stood.
He scrubbed his left hand over his face, shocked at the growth of beard. How long since he had shaved? Four days?
‘George, can you shave me?’
‘Aye, Major. I’ll go and heat some water.’
‘Enough for a wash,’ Julia called after the groom. ‘Not that you aren’t clean enough already,’ she commented, turning back. ‘We’ve been sponging you all night to keep the fever down.’
‘We?’ Hal tried to sit up, realized he couldn’t and fell back with a curse. ‘You have?’ Then he remembered: she had un dressed him as well.
‘Shocking, isn’t it,’ Julia said, shaking out a linen towel. ‘Just imagine, I’ve seen a naked man. Heaps of bodies, and bits of men and disembowelled horses—not shocking at all. But a naked man, and one I’m going to marry! In truth, I am ready to sink, just thinking about it.’ The corner of her mouth was twitching in an effort not to smile.
Hal tried to decide whether he was more shocked or offended. He had, he admitted, expected the sight of his body to have had rather more effect on a sheltered virgin than mere amusement. Perhaps it would make things easier when they did, finally, go to bed together. When—if—he ever worked out how to make love to a virgin; all he was used to was women of very considerable experience.
But now was definitely the time to change the subject.
Food, coffee, a shave and the ability to sit up and watch what was going on had wrought wonders, Julia decided, studying Hal’s face from the shadows while George put away his shaving tackle. Hal was young, fit, tough—he would heal well, even though she doubted it would be fast enough for his impatient spirit.
She did love him so much: his courage and his humour and his kindness. And his beauty. She blushed a little, thinking about that, then smiled at the recollection of his shocked reaction to the realization that she had seen him naked. Bless him, like a poacher turned game keeper, he was becoming positively prudish where she was concerned.
Did he secretly hate the idea of their marrying so very much? Now that the fever had gone, he was guarding his tongue and she knew she would not hear the truth, even if she asked him directly.
Chapter Sixteen
‘Will you bring me the things George stripped off that trooper, please?’
Julia jumped, brought out of her reverie by the un conscious note of command in Hal’s voice. He might have remembered to say please but he was back to being an officer.