Anna smiled, resolutely pushing away the image of the woman next to his shaving mirror. The wife he’d loved. ‘I believe you,’ she said simply. ‘We’ll take our time.’
Another kiss, and then a laugh. He whispered in her ear, ‘If you turn around slowly, you’ll see that we are being watched.’
‘I earnestly hope not,’ she whispered back, then turned, started, stared and laughed. ‘That is a monkey! One, two, three of them.’
‘Rock apes,’ he said. ‘I hope they were entertained.’
He led her to a raw-looking cemetery, and stopped at the entrance. ‘Our Admiral says it will be called Trafalgar Cemetery.’ He looked down. ‘Too many good men gone. Some day I predict it will be green, with flowers. What a battle that was!’
She kissed his hand, realising something more about her husband:No matter how long I know him, I will never know how terrible that day was. She glanced at his face.He will never tell me all of it. I will not pry.
She saw bare graves of heaped-up dirt, and here and there a headstone. ‘These are some of our Trafalgar dead, and those who survived the battle, only to die later, like your William.’ He looked across the rows, seeing something beyond her vision.
Down one row, and then another. He held her hand in a firm grip, keeping her close. She knew who he was looking for, and thanked the Almighty again that John Beattie had pounded on her door in Plymouth that cold night.
‘Here he is,’ he said reverently. ‘I could not bring myself to consign Will to the deep. We were so close to Gibraltar, so close.’ He removed his hat. ‘I gave Mr Marsing funds for a marker, and told him what I wanted cut into the stone. I had no idea at the time how…how true the words would be.’
Anna put her arm around her husband, this stalwart captain made of iron, like all the other men in the fleet. She knew him now as he really was, a man with doubts and fears of his own.
‘Lieutenant William Fontaine, RN. 1772-1805,’ she read out loud. Only thirty-three years? Too short, too short. ‘Exemplary Officer. Devoted Brother. Friend.’ She faltered, then continued. ‘Greater love hath no man than this…’
This had been such a day of surprise and revelation. Now, looking at this memorial to her brother, who lay close by, she knew that other special love of family.
‘I will miss you, Will,’ she said softly. ‘We could easily have grown old together, dear brother.’
War had changed all that. She patted the headstone, deeply aware that she had so much more than a watery grave known only by its latitude and longitude; Will washere. This rough cemetery would grow in size as war dragged on, but also in beauty, as mourners honoured their dead. She owed the man beside her, who had brought her brother to shore.
‘Captain, I know you did not have to bring him here,’ she said. ‘I will be forever in your debt that you did.’
‘He was an excellent first officer and a good friend,’ John replied. She heard all the strain and took his hand. ‘I had no idea at the time how you would figure in my life, Mrs Beattie.’
Call me Anna again, she wanted to tell him, but refrained, thinking of that lovely picture of Cathy in his quarters.
She had her own surprise for him, earlier doubting the wisdom of it, but confirmed now in this sacred place. She thought again of Cathy, but knew this washerchoice and hermoment. From her reticule, Anna pulled out the ring box found among Will’s effects. She opened it and they both looked at the intricate filigreed golden mesh, intended for an unknown person. She held it out to her husband.
‘I think this is the perfect place and the perfect ring. Do you?’
He took it from her, his tears unmistakable, then acknowledged her emotion. ‘Two watering pots. Will would have laughed at us.’ He held up the ring. ‘This is right, I agree. Thank you, my dear. And thank you, Will Fontaine.’
He slid it onto her finger, saying again those timeless words from their wedding. ‘With this ring I thee wed, with my body I thee worship, and with all my worldly goods I thee endow.’
She let him pull her to his body, his hand on her hair. She closed her eyes with the pleasure of something that simple. Her arms went around him, aware as never before of herself bound to another in every way possible, no matter what lay ahead.
Dear man, she thought,I could quite possiblylove you some day. Stranger things have happened. Could you ever love me, too?
She shivered suddenly, as a cool breeze swirled around them. His arm tightened around her, but this time, for some unaccountable reason, she wasn’t comforted.Love takes time, she thought, and heard the gods of war laughing at her.Did they laugh at you, too, Cathy?
Chapter Twenty-Five
With this ring, I thee wed.
John’s own words seemed to resound in his heart that night aboard theSwallow, ship resupplied and ready to sail. They rested in his sleeping platform on the floor, exhausted in a pleasing fashion after another round of mutual satisfaction, he who had lain for years on a fallow field, she relishing the newness.
‘Moderation, moderation,’ his Presbyterian minister had preached in faraway Kirkcudbright, his ancestral home. ‘The Lord God Almighty loves effort and hard work. Pleasures are fleeting.’
After this night with Anna in his arms, he couldn’t disagree more. Pleasure was here to stay, and high time. How could he ever explain to this dear creature, sleeping beside him, that he had been so tired since Trafalgar? It was exhaustion of the soul, made worse on shore by the guilt of finding his son nearly abandoned.
His thoughts turned melancholy.What if I hadn’t knocked on her door?he asked himself. No, it was best to dismiss that thought. He knew how, and he tried it, with Anna so close,her leg thrown over his. He put his hands over his own eyes, something done before to him, years ago.
