A Regency Captain's Prize. Margaret McPhee

must you despise me so much?’ she yelled.

      ‘It is not you whom I despise,’ he said quietly.

      ‘But my father,’ she finished for him. ‘You killed him and you are glad of it.’

      ‘I am.’ And all of the brooding menace was there again in his eyes.

      ‘Why? What did my father ever do to you, save defend his life and the lives of his men?’

      He looked into the girl’s eyes, the same clear blue eyes that had looked out from Lieutenant Colonel Mallington’s face as he lay dying, and said quietly. ‘Your father was a villain and a scoundrel.’

      ‘No!’ The denial was swift and sore.

      ‘You do not know?’ For the first time it struck him that perhaps she was ignorant of the truth, that she really thought her father a wondrous hero.

      ‘No,’ she said again, more quietly.

      All that was raw and bloody and aching deep within Dammartin urged him to tell her. And it seemed if he could destroy this last falsehood the Lieutenant Colonel had woven, if he could let his daughter know the truth of the man, then perhaps he, Dammartin, would be free. Yet still he hesitated. Indeed, even then, he would not have told her. It was Mademoiselle Mallington herself with her very next words that settled the matter.

      ‘Tell me, Captain Dammartin, for I would know this grudge that you hold against my father.’

      The devil sowed temptation, and Pierre Dammartin could no longer resist the harvest. ‘You ask, mademoiselle, and so I will answer.’

      Dammartin’s gaze did not falter. He looked directly into Josephine Mallington’s eyes, and he told her.

      ‘My father was a prisoner of the famous Lieutenant Colonel Mallington after the Battle of Oporto last year. Mallington gave him his parole, let him think he was being released. He never made it a mile outside the British camp before he was murdered by your father’s own hand. So, mademoiselle, now you have the answer to your question, and I will warrant that you do not like it.’

      She shook her head, incredulity creasing her face. ‘You are lying!’

      ‘I swear on my father’s memory, that it is the truth. It is not an oath that I take lightly.’

      ‘It cannot be true. It is not possible.’

      ‘I assure you that it is.’

      ‘My father would never do such a thing. He was a man to whom honour was everything.’

      ‘Were you there, mademoiselle, at Oporto?’ The question he had been so longing to ask of her. ‘In May of last year?’

      She shook her head. ‘My father sent me back to England in April.’

      He felt the stab of disappointment. ‘Then you really do not know the truth of what your father did.’

      ‘My father was a good and decent man. He would never have killed a paroled officer.’

      ‘You are mistaken, mademoiselle.’

      ‘Never!’ she cried. ‘I tell you, he would not!’

      He moved back slowly, seeing the hurt and disbelief well in her face, knowing that he had put it there. He said no more. He did not need to. The pain in her eyes smote him so hard that he caught his breath.

      ‘What do you seek with such lies? To break me? To make me answer your wretched questions?’

      And something in her voice made him want to catch back every word and stuff them back deep within him.

      She walked past him, her small figure striding across the ragged hilltop in the little light that remained, and as the last of the sky was swallowed up in darkness Pierre Dammartin knew finally that there was no relief to be found in revenge. The pain that had gnawed at him since learning the truth of his father’s unworthy death was no better. If anything, it hurt worse than ever, and he knew that he had been wrong to tell her.

      He stood alone on the hill in the darkness and listened to the quiet burr of the camp below and the steady beat of a sore and jealous heart.

       Chapter Six

      Josie avoided both Lieutenant Molyneux and Sergeant Lamont and headed straight for her tent. The smell of dinner filled the air, but Josie was not hungry. Indeed, her stomach tightened against the thought of eating. She sat in the darkness and thought of what Captain Dammartin had said, thought of the absurdity of his accusation and the certainty of his conviction. His words whirled round in her head until she thought it would explode. He never made it a mile outside the camp before he was murdered by your father’s own hand. She squeezed her eyes shut. Not Papa, not her own dear papa. He would not murder a man in cold blood.

      Josie knew full well that her father, as a ruthless commander in Wellington’s army, had been responsible for the deaths of many men, but that was on a battlefield, that was war, and there was a world of difference between that and killing a man who had been given his parole.

      Josie could think of nothing else. She did not move, just sat as still as a small statue, hunched in her misery within the tent.

      A voice sounded from the flap. ‘Mademoiselle.’ It was Lieutenant Molyneux.

      ‘Please, sir, I am tired and wish to be left alone.’

      ‘But you have not eaten, mademoiselle.’

      ‘I am not hungry.’

      ‘You must eat something.’

      ‘Perhaps later,’ she said, wishing that the Lieutenant would go away, and then, feeling ungracious, added, ‘but I thank you, sir, for your concern.’

      He did not reply, but she knew he had not moved away.

      ‘Mademoiselle,’ he said softly, ‘has the Captain upset you?’

      She paused, unwilling to reveal the extent to which Dammartin had hurt her. Then finally she said, ‘No, I am just tired, that is all.’

      ‘He does not mean to be so…’ Molyneux searched for the right word in English and failed to find it. ‘He is a good man, really. He just never got over the death of his father.’

      Something twisted in her stomach at his words. Slowly she moved to the front of the tent, pulling back the flap that she might see Lieutenant Molyneux.

      He smiled and held out the mess tin of stew that he had collected for her.

      ‘Thank you.’ She took it, but did not eat. ‘What happened to Captain Dammartin’s father?’ she asked, and inside her heart was thumping hard and fast.

      The smile fled Molyneux’s face. ‘Major Dammartin was a prisoner of war,’ he said quietly.

      She waited for his next words.

      He flushed and shifted uncomfortably. ‘It was a dishonourable affair.’ He cleared his throat and glanced away.

      ‘What happened?’ she prompted.

      He did not look at her. ‘He was killed by his English captors.’

      ‘No,’ she said softly.

      ‘Unfortunately, yes, mademoiselle. It is a story famous throughout France. Major Dammartin was a very great war hero, you see.’

      ‘Do you know who held him? Which regiment?’

      He looked at her then and she could see the pity in his eyes. And she knew.

      But Molyneux was much more of a gentleman than Dammartin and he would not say it. ‘I cannot recall,’ he said. He gave a small smile. ‘You should eat your dinner, mademoiselle, before it grows cold.’