The Dangerous Mr. Ryder

‘Oh, good. Breakfast.’ She rubbed her eyes, then, suddenly completely awake, stared at him. ‘What?’

‘Stay here.’ He got to his feet, checking the knife was still in his boot top and picking up the pistol that had lain by the makeshift pillow all night.

Outside the day was sodden and chill. The ground was soaked, the heavy clay turned to mud by the torrential downpours of the night before. Jack scanned the field in front of him, but it was empty, the wisps of misty steam already rising as the faint early sun, struggling through the grey clouds, struck the moisture.

He slid round the corner of the barn and made his way up the slope. Beyond the hedge that formed the northern boundary the land rose for perhaps fifty yards, then dropped away. What lay beyond was invisible, but smoke rose in a myriad of thin trickles. Camp fires. The breeze shifted, bringing with it the smell of cooking again and, faintly, the sound of many voices and of barked orders. Troops.

‘What is it? The French?’ Eva, was at his elbow.

‘I don’t know, I can’t see. And I told you to stay put.’

‘I needed to find a bush, so I had to come out,’ she said with dignity. ‘Are we going to find out who it is, then?’

Ordering her to remain behind was probably futile. How he had ever imagined he could compel any obedience from this woman he had no idea. ‘Watch my back from here.’ Jack put the pistol into her hand. ‘Don’t use that unless it is absolutely necessary or we will have two armies down on our heads.’

‘I can do that better if I follow you,’ she said stubbornly, taking the pistol.

‘You will be safer here. Will you do as I tell you? Please!’ He felt his voice rising and lowered it hurriedly.

‘I know it is your job to keep me in cotton wool, but, Jack, don’t you see—’

Something snapped. He yanked her into his arms without conscious thought, heedless of the pistol that ended up pressed against his ribs. ‘I see that I almost lost you in that damn river,’ he snarled, heedless of her white-faced shock. ‘I see that I almost lost you yesterday. Can’t you see, you pig-headed, independent, bloody-minded woman, that I—’ Some sense returned, from somewhere, God knew where. ‘Can you not see,’ he finished more moderately, ‘that you are more than a job to me? And if I get you killed or captured, I will punish myself for it for the rest of my life?’

Those soft, red lips parted in a little gasp, but the colour was coming back into her face. Jack tightened his grip on her upper arms and lifted her bodily against him, his mouth taking hers in an uncompromising kiss. His tongue plunged into the warm sweet moistness: mastery, ownership, desperation. Then he set her down roughly on her feet again. ‘Now, damn well stay here.’

‘Yes, Jack.’ Her shocked whisper just reached him as he ducked through a gap in the hedge and, crouching, made his way up the slope. Training and discipline kept him focused on what he was doing and not on who he had left behind, or what he had almost told her. Heedless of the mud, he dropped to the ground and squirmed forward on elbows and knees until he could see down the slope in front of him.

Dark blue uniforms covered the ground below and to the right of the continuation of the road they had left the night before. In the bottom of the valley he could see a crossroads and beyond it a small farm-like château with red coats around it. Beyond that, on the crest that he knew hid the hamlet of Mont St Jean, he could see more red coats.

So, the French were between them and the Allied army and the road to Brussels. Jack slid further forward. There was artillery below and to his left, the guns trained out over the Allied flank, but most of the troops were to the right. It was a scene of an anthill from this distance: hundreds of tiny figures, some grouped around campfires, some with horses, others moving guns or clustering around officers.

The light was good, despite the cloud. Why then, he wondered, had the fighting not begun? He realised why not as he watched a horse team struggling to move a gun limber stuck in the mud. Bonaparte needed to manoeuvre his artillery and he couldn’t do it in these conditions. How long would it take for the ground to drain?

Long enough, if they started now, for them to get to the Allied lines before the firing began. Jack studied the slope to the left, then eased back from the edge and ran back down to the barn.

Eva had found a spot where she could watch both the field and the road. ‘I’ve seen no one,’ she reported. He saw her take in his mud-soaked clothes, but she did not comment, nor did she make any reference to how they had just parted. He should apologise, he knew, but not now.

‘The French are drawn up below us, all along this scarp. The Allies are on the opposite ridge, and they are also holding a farm, half a mile below in the valley. If we can get down there, we can make our way up through the lines to the Brussels road.’

‘Right.’ He saw her throat move convulsively as she swallowed, but Eva showed no fear, only determination. ‘What do we do?’

Fifteen minutes later they were trotting steadily to the west, away from the French, the Allied flank still visible on the ridge to their right. Eva clung on grimly, determined not to complain at the jolting.

‘Ah!’ At Jack’s sigh of satisfaction she leaned round the side of him and saw what he had been looking for. Ahead was a small farm and a track led down from it into the valley. ‘See—’ Jack pointed ‘—we can cross the road down there and take the track into that farm in the valley with the Allied troops around it.’

‘More of a small château,’ Eva said, squinting in an effort to make out detail. ‘I can see why the Allies want to hold it, it gives a good command of the valley floor.’

Jack turned the gelding’s head downhill and, screened by a thick hedge, they made their way to the valley bottom. ‘Get down, Eva.’ He helped her slide down, then, to her surprise, stayed where he was, reaching down for her. ‘Come on, up in front of me.’

Puzzled, she let herself be pulled up, swung a leg over the horse’s neck and found herself settled on Jack’s lap. Then, as he urged the gelding forwards again, pulling her back tight against himself, she realised what he was doing. If there was a sniper with them in his sights, it was now Jack’s broad back that would take the bullet.

‘Have you got anything white we can wave as we approach?’ Jack wrapped his arms round her waist and sorted the reins out.

‘Only my shirt,’ she retorted tartly, ‘And if you imagine I am going to go cantering up to companies of soldiers half-naked, you have another think coming, Mr Ryder.’ They were cantering, and she was still fuming before she realised what they were doing and then it was too late to be scared. ‘You wretch,’ she shouted, above the sound of the hooves. ‘You are trying to distract me.’

‘True.’ He sounded smug. ‘It worked, too.’

‘Can we gallop now, please?’ she demanded, trying to keep the shake out of her voice.