He was readingTom Jones, Abigail could see. He was returning his attention to it as she withdrew to give the order for tea to be brought up. Another little fact was added to the bank of her knowledge about him. He had learned to read at a village school. He did not often read but considered it a privilege to be able to do so. He was not a fast reader.
The neighbors, as Lieutenant Colonel Bennington had predicted, came during the days after the family left. The vicar and his wife were first, as promised, and they were soon followed by others, most of whom came to pay their respects to Harry, to see for themselves that he was recovering his health and to assure themselves that he intended to remain here, at least for the foreseeable future. They came to inform him that he—and Miss Abigail, of course—would be invited to tea and to dinner and to informal parties and assemblies as soon as he was well enough and strong enough to go about. A few of the men who had been his particular friends while he was growing up, most of them now established farmers with wives and even children, promised to come again and stay longer. They hinted at fishing and shooting parties as soon as Harry was feeling up to it.
Some of Abigail’s old friends came specifically to callupon her, though most of them looked in upon Harry too, the unmarried ones perhaps to see if he was as handsome as he had given promise of being as a very young man. They were interested in the lieutenant colonel too, of course, having heard about him from the men who had met him at the tavern. But men never could remember the truly important details, they observed to Abigail. Men could never remember if a stranger was young or tall or handsome or charming or in possession of some sort of fortune.
“I was quite determined to discover that he is gorgeous,” one friend said. She was sitting in the conservatory with Abigail and another mutual friend, looking out upon rain. “Especially after the Reverend Jenkins told Mama and Papa that he is a lieutenant colonel and assured Mama he must be a single gentleman since he is apparently staying here for some length of time. I would not exactly call himgorgeous, though, now that I have seen him for myself.”
“Whatwouldyou call him, then?” the other friend asked.
“He actually looks a bit frightening,” the first said. “If I were an enemy soldier, I would not want to see him coming at me with a sword. Would you?”
“I would not want to seeanyonecoming at me with a sword,” the other said with a deliberate shudder. “But to be perfectly frank I would not mind at all if I saw Lieutenant Colonel Bennington coming toward me to... ask me to dance, perhaps. What doyouthink of him, Abigail?”
“I think he is a good friend to Harry,” Abigail said. “And that is really all that matters.”
It irked her that she had somehow been drawn during their walk after the picnic into saying things she did not say to many people, or toanyother people, in fact. She had never before openly discussed her reluctance to wed, her fear that she would never find that one special man whowould want to marry her, not because of who she was or despite who she was, but because she was... well,herself.
And who is that?he had asked her.
She had been unable to answer. She still could not. It was a little disturbing not to know who one was deep down inside oneself. But perhaps it was not so much that she did not know as that she could find no words, even inside her head, with which to describe it.
She justwas. That was all.
But how could one explain that to another person? How could she expect ever to find a man who would want to marry her just because shewas? It was absurd. And she would have to return the compliment, would she not? She could not expect any man to love her that deeply if she did not also understand thathesimplywas, and that hiswasnessorisnessmade him forever the love of her heart. The love of her life.
Now her head was in a spin. She needed another language. The language of love, perhaps?
Her friends had looked at each other, at her, and back at each other.
“She likes him,” they said in unison, and laughed so infectiously that Abigail joined them. Let them think what they would.
Lieutenant Colonel Bennington spoke at the breakfast table one morning about his need for a horse of his own. Yes, it was all very well for Harry to invite him to take any of the horses from the stable at any time, but...
“I understand, Gil,” Harry said after raising one hand. “None of the horses here are really meant for riding. Besides, a man needs a horse of his own. You will not find anything suitable in the village, but it is a mere ten-mile drive to the closest market town. Why do we not go andhave a look? I am itching for an outing that will take me farther than the church or the tavern. We can take the gig.”
“Perhaps,” his friend said, looking across the table at Abigail, “Miss Westcott would care for the outing too.”
Oh, she would. When she had come from London, she had brought with her neither her embroidery nor her knitting, and she was desperately missing both.
They ended up taking the old carriage that had been used for years when they were living here. It had been kept in good repair during the more than three years since Abigail had lived here last.
There was not a great deal of conversation during the journey. They were all reasonably comfortable in one another’s company, and there was always something to watch beyond the windows. But Abigail gave in to curiosity when her eyes inadvertently met those of the lieutenant colonel, who was sitting on the seat facing hers.
“What happened?” she asked, indicating her own right cheek while she looked at his. It was an abrupt and impertinent question, and she fully expected that he would dismiss it with an answer along the lines ofwar happened.
“What happened,” he said, “was that my officer, a young boy who ought still to have been in leading strings, took fright in his first battle when enemy cavalry decided to charge our part of the line. He ordered us to run for our lives and he put the spurs to his horse to lead the way. He was the only one with a horse.”
Harry grimaced. “Some officers are an embarrassment to themselves and a danger to the rest of us,” he said.
“Was it not good advice, then?” Abigail asked.
“A man on foot can never outrun a horse,” the lieutenant colonel explained. “What a foot regiment in line must always do to counter a cavalry charge is form a hollow,outward-facing square of men two deep, the front row kneeling with their bayonets pointing outward, the back row firing their guns over their heads. It works every time. Horses will not charge a wall of bayonets, and men get killed by the volleys when they urge their mounts too close.”
“Horse sense,” Harry murmured.
“I bellowed at my men to form a square,” Lieutenant Colonel Bennington said. “I was their sergeant. Eventually they did, but not before far too many of them had been killed or horribly wounded. Cavalrymen stab many fleeing soldiers in the back. But what they like best is to ride past them and slash back with their great cavalry swords, blinding and maiming and killing that way.”
“That is what happened to you,” Abigail said.
