A Mistress for Major Bartlett (Brides of Waterloo)

‘With a nose like this I suspect Paris would have had me carved into a figurehead on one of those ships,’ she said waspishly. ‘You do talk nonsense.’

‘If not Helen, what, then?’

She thought for a minute, and then looked as though she’d come to a decision. ‘Do you know, if I had a choice, I rather think I should like to be called Elizabeth.’

So. She wasn’t any more keen to face up to the truth, either, or she would have told him, in that brisk, no-nonsense voice she’d used when he’d been rambling in his fever, who she really was.

‘Lizzy,’ he corrected her. ‘Elizabeth is far too formal for the situation in which we find ourselves.’

‘No,’ she said firmly. ‘Elizabeth. And you may as well know that I choose the name because she ruled the whole land without ever letting anyone force her into marriage.’

‘The Virgin Queen,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘Yes. That does suit a girl who shudders at the prospect of a man’s kiss. For no man is fit to so much as kiss the hem of your jewelled gown.’ He certainly wasn’t. That was what made this situation so piquant.

Catching the direction of his gaze, she ran her hands over the elegantly simple gown she wore.

‘This gown is hardly practical for nursing a wounded soldier, is it? Though I didn’t know I was going to be doing any such thing when I ordered it. Which was before we all fled to Antwerp...’ She faltered to a halt, pleating a section of her skirt between her fingers. ‘I suppose that sounds as if I think of nothing but clothes, but it was no joke, I can assure you, arriving here without a clean stitch to put on.’

‘I am a soldier, your Majesty. Of course I know what it is like to lose baggage when I’m on the march.’

‘Oh, but you haven’t! That is, I mean, two of your men brought your things round. So you can have a clean shirt whenever you want one.’

Was she hinting she wanted him to cover himself up? He supposed he really ought to. Men didn’t loll about, shirtless, when a woman was in the room, not unless that woman had no morals to speak of.

‘I hated not having clean clothes of my own,’ she said, as though it was a crime. ‘People say I’m terribly vain, you know. And I do spend a lot of time shopping. But can I tell you something? You won’t tell anyone else?’

‘My Queen, I am your loyal subject. I shall regard your confidence as though it were a state secret,’ he said, dipping his head in a mock bow. Then wincing at the hammer blow that rang through his skull.

‘Idiot,’ she said with a concerned frown. ‘Lie still! And listen. My secret is when I dress well, I feel as though it takes attention away from how very plain I am.’

‘Plain?’ He studied her face. To him, at that moment, it looked like the most adorable face in the world. He supposed it must be because he felt he owed her his life or something, because, in all honesty, her nose was just a touch too prominent for a female. And her lips too prim. And her hair—it was a beautiful colour, but looked as though she’d stiffened it with some sort of lotion so that she could curl it. And those curls were now sort of fraying round the edges. But her eyes...

‘You have the most remarkable eyes,’ he told her. ‘That blue, it’s quite lovely.’

‘They are my best feature,’ she admitted. ‘I do try to emphasise them. But—’ she shrugged ‘—there’s no getting past the nose.’

‘That nose,’ he said on a burst of inspiration, ‘is the kind of nose born to rule. And you said you wanted to be a queen, did you not? Therefore, it suits you perfectly.’

‘No wonder you’re so popular with the ladies,’ she said with a shake of her head.

‘Am I?’ A flash of shame made him look as confused as he was trying to convince her he felt. He had never once thought his reputation as a prolific lover would make him uncomfortable. What was it about Lady Sarah that made him wish he’d lived a more respectable life?

Instantly she looked contrite. ‘Oh, I am sorry. I shouldn’t remind you of...well, we’d agreed, hadn’t we, that just for now, we can be whoever we want to be.’

His heart did a funny sort of skip in his chest. Because what she’d just said meant she wanted to be with him, just as much as he wanted to be with her.

Even though they both knew it couldn’t last.

‘So. You have chosen to be the Virgin Queen,’ he said, settling himself more comfortably against the pillows. Which was apt, given the fact she was a lady of unimpeachable virtue.

‘Because, you say, you don’t want to be forced into a marriage you cannot stomach. Is there any danger of that?’

She sighed. ‘Mama has been very patient with what she calls my crotchets, so far. She hasn’t put any pressure on me to accept any of the offers made for my hand. But she never gives up hope. She says she wants me to be happy in marriage. But—’ another one of those frowns flitted across her forehead ‘—I don’t see how she can even use the word happy, in the same sentence as marriage, without a blush. Not when her own has made her so utterly miserable. Papa was a rake, you see.’

She gave him a considering look. One which it took every ounce of his meagre strength to hold without hanging his head.

‘Mama,’ she said tartly, ‘was expected to turn a blind eye to his many infidelities. Which took a great deal of resolution, given that Chalfont Magna’s littered with his natural children. He took great pleasure, I think, in conducting his affairs right under her nose. In humiliating her.’ Her lips flattened into a grim line. ‘It wasn’t even as if he needed to prove his virility, particularly, since he repeatedly got her with child, as well. She presented him with two sets of twins, and two girls as well as his heir, not counting the many miscarriages in between,’ she ended speaking on a shudder. ‘Can you blame me for hoping I never get married?’

Absolutely not. Not when she put it like that. ‘You do make it sound unpleasant,’ he admitted. ‘But not all men are like that.’