by Karen Harper
The band started in again with “Land of Hope and Glory.” Many of the villagers sang along and then went right into “God Save the King.” Though I still didn’t much like the idea of war, a short one would be good.
The four of us sat on a tree stump, bum to bum while Penny and Johnnie chatted. She was so good with him, as kind as George but without the high-flying ideas. Such a dear girl. Johnnie had told me just the other day that he liked her as much as he did the “girls in cloud dresses,” for somehow, his memories of the tsar’s daughters were as vivid as were mine. The good deed I’d done for their former nanny, Margaretta Eager, had gotten me a friend in her, though we corresponded more than we saw each other. How upset she would be that the tsar was taking his country to war too.
“Any word from the Prince of Wales?” Chad asked me over the increasing noise of yet another patriotic song.
“He still writes on occasion, though less and less. I believe,” I told him with a wink, “I can read between the lines that he has found some females much more exciting than his old nanny to confide in. But he did write that he’s miffed that his father has enlisted him in the King’s Guard for ceremonies at Buck House, since he thinks he should go to sea after all that naval training. Now that there’s to be war, he’ll really be champing at the bit. But I think he’s mostly fretting that at five feet seven inches tall he’ll be a pygmy, as he put it, since the regulations for the King’s Company is six feet.”
“Then,” Chad said, “they will have to get him a very tall bearskin hat. Besides, doesn’t being a prince and the heir add immediate height?”
“I like bearskin hats,” Johnnie put in. “I’d like to have one, if the bear wouldn’t come looking for it.”
Penny made a face and growled at Johnnie, which he thought was hilarious. I just looked at Chad, smiling despite my worries over the war, lost in his steady gaze amidst the brass music and the cheers.
He mouthed to me “Meet me outside at nine?”
I nodded. Suddenly, in my head, my own band played, and in my heart, I cheered.
THOUGH A NURSEMAID or even a nanny could be dismissed for having “a follower at the door,” Chad and I did meet to walk and talk sometimes after I tucked Johnnie up and one of the maids sat with him a while. Our days were so busy, Chad was so busy during the day and I too, but this was our time, when Johnnie was safe in bed and Penny was with her aunt Winnie.
I had told Chad’s sister more than once not to curtsy to me, but she still bobbed me a quick one now and again, as if the fairy dust of royalty had rubbed off on me like in that new book I read Johnnie called Peter and Wendy. I liked it well enough but it was annoying that a nanny had let those children fly away to Neverland. I had to continually explain to Johnnie that children could fly only in books.
Sometimes in the evening, Chad and I strolled through the gardens of the Big House. Queen Alexandra and her daughter Toria still lived there, as the former queen seemed quite unwilling to give it up, which King George allowed for his “Mother dearest.” If it was chilly, Chad and I stepped into the glasshouse to keep warm, but we never went down the aisles that Millie used to tend or where I had turned down his proposal years ago. We just hovered inside the door, kissed, and whispered as if the plants had ears.
But this was late August with a warm breeze and slice of moon in the sky like a slanted smile. It almost made me believe that war did not exist—at least that it would never take Chad and the other men away, nor touch these places and people I had loved for so long. I could not believe this man would be leaving. I fervently wished that he would not.
“I don’t know when we’ll be billeted out or where we’ll be sent,” he told me, tucking my arm through the crook of his and keeping it close to his ribs. “But I’d like to know you will be right here when I get back. Well, you’ll hardly run off with Hansell, since I hear he’s enlisting too,” he teased, suddenly sounding nervous.
“Yes, poor man. He was never really happy here. When he tried to take on Johnnie, it was the last straw, but I’m working with my boy to write a good cursive hand, even though his reading will never be as it should.”
“You’ve been a godsend for him, especially with his fits.”
“More and more of them, worse and worse. But so far never at night when he sleeps, thank God. That would mean the poor child would have peace nowhere. Still, it scares me that the king hints at sending him away from the family, and I could not abide—could not allow—that. Still, just knowing about his seizures upsets the other children. His Majesty fears it would hurt the royals if the public knew Johnnie had fits, as if he was an imbecile, and that’s so unfair because he isn’t! Chad, I couldn’t bear it if he tried to have him put in some sort of asylum.”
We stopped before going in the door. He hugged me and whispered against my ear, “Shhh. Let’s talk of happier things. Let’s talk about us. Speaking of a commitment for life, we both get on well with His Majesty. Do you think we could make him see the wisdom of not sending Johnnie away—at least not far away—but of appointing you, of course—and maybe me—as his guardians, so that you and I could make a commitment—I mean to each other when this war is over?”
He was almost speaking as jerkily as Bertie did sometimes to keep from stammering. We stood, gazing into each other’s eyes in the pale moonlight near the spot where he had snagged me with a net so long ago and we had rolled on the ground, kissing, which is just what I wanted right now.
“All that sounds wonderful to me,” I said.
“Better late than never, as they say.”
I smiled up at him through my happy tears. “Righto, Chad Reaver, for I have loved you for years, I vow I have.”
“Then, God willing, there are vows in our future and—”
But to my utter amazement, Chad’s head jerked, and he thrust me away hard and shouted, “Run! Go!”
What? A man leaped from the darkness with a raised pitchfork. Chad jumped back, then tried to kick the long tines away, but the attacker stabbed him with it, twice, before I could even react.
Chapter 30
I screamed. Screamed again. In the night, black blood—Chad’s blood—splattered and spurted over the grass and my skirts.
Chad had said to run, but I could not leave him, not like that. The man—Barker Lee, I knew who he was even in the sparse moonlight—merely scowled at me. He must have decided I was worth nothing, that he wanted to finish off Chad, who, groaning, tried to roll away on the ground.
I picked up a rock, big as both my hands, that sometimes propped open the glasshouse door. It was heavy, but I threw it. It hit the man hard in the back of the head. He turned toward me, cursing, holding the pitchfork in Chad’s leg, pinning him down. I lifted and heaved a clay pot at him from the stack of them, then another. But the rock had done its duty. He staggered toward me, crumpled to his knees, then fell onto his face about five feet away. Was he dead? It didn’t matter because Chad lay stabbed and bleeding. I pulled the pitchfork from his leg and cast it away. I kneeled and bent over him. Had I made a mistake to pull it from him? He was bleeding worse.
“Go . . . for help,” he said. But in his shock and agony, he gripped my hand so hard I could not run if I’d wanted to.
“You’re bleeding too hard—your leg. I have to stop the bleeding first. I’ll scream. Someone will hear.”
“My belt . . . round my leg.”
Like a madwoman, screaming, “Murder! Murder! Help! Help!” I tugged my hand from his grasp, then unbuckled and struggled to pull the belt from under his weight. Slippery with blood—grass, belt, my hands. The bleeding punctures—tears in his trousers—seemed high, near his hip. Stop the blood, stop his lifeblood.
I thought I heard someone coming but didn’t look up. At least Barker Lee lay still. God forgive me, I hoped he was dead. He had maimed Chad’s leg and hip horribly.
“Chad, you asked me to wait for you,” I told him as I tightened his belt around his thigh. “Now you have to wait for me . . . for Penny.
Stay with me here. Don’t you give up!”
“Too late. Love you—tell her . . .” was so faint and then I think he passed out. Or worse.
But, thank God, footsteps came close. Someone from the Big House—Mabel and two men.
“Barker Lee stabbed Chad with a pitchfork!” I shouted. “Get Queen Alexandra’s doctor! He’s losing blood, too much. I don’t want to move him!”
That sent the men running, but Mabel stayed with me, kneeling, helping me hold the belt tight while I pressed my right hand flat and hard over his thigh wounds. When Barker Lee groaned and moved, she took off her apron and with its ties bound Barker Lee’s wrists. The doctor came at a run, carrying his satchel, then Hansell arrived with others I knew. But everything except Chad was a fading blur, even when Penny’s Uncle Fred, Winnie’s husband, bent over us to ask what happened, but when he saw, he kneeled and prayed.
The constable came, more people he kept back, while I still knelt there, holding Chad’s limp hand. His blood soaked my skirts, warm, then cold, stiffening the material while the doctor worked on the unconscious man—my unconscious man.
Finally, the doctor spoke. “His pulse is stronger now, but that leg will have to come off, I fear. I think your tourniquet saved him, but we shall see. Men, bring that stretcher, for we’ll have to move him to Sandringham House. Pray he stays unconscious. A real blessing you found him out here,” he added to me in a quiet voice and, blood-splattered himself, stood to supervise the men who would lift Chad.
I too rose at last, stiff, sore, heartbroken. And angry. Furious with the monster who had tried to murder him. I watched as the constable took Barker Lee away, conscious now. I began to tremble and felt so very cold.
If Chad had not been looking so intently into my eyes when that demon struck, wouldn’t I have seen or sensed him? Had I answered that I would marry Chad? Had I imagined some of what he’d said and would I ever know that if he’d died? I had feared he’d die in the war, but this . . .
Mabel walked on one side of me and Mrs. Wentworth on the other, holding me up between them, steering me back toward York Cottage. I fought fear and grief, but at least I had not run, even when he’d told me to. I had stayed and fought for him, for us.
TWO DAYS LATER, dry-eyed but feeling fragile and broken, I sat in the king’s study, being questioned by Sandringham’s Constable Markwood, with King George present. Barker Lee had died of a blood clot to the brain after they’d taken him from the scene of the attack. No doubt, the rock I threw had killed him. So the wretch’s blood had clotted while Chad bled. So far, my dear love was still alive, fighting for his life in a bed, instead of on a battlefield for England in the grand war as he had planned. Queen Alexandra’s doctor had considered something called a blood transfusion, but decided it was too risky since Chad was “holding his own.” How I wished that he was holding me.
Constable Markwood continued questioning me about Barker Lee’s demise. “Mrs. Bill, the point is, this ruffian Lee had several blows to his head and body. Was Chadwick Reaver able to fight back?”
“Chad was taken by surprise and went down under the initial stabbing blows to his leg,” I said. “I’m sure that man was aiming for his chest or head, but Chad leaped back after he thrust me away. Mr. Lee seemed quite demented, and he came out of the dark—out of nowhere. I believe he must have been planning more thievery on the estate, but he went far beyond that this time—obviously.”
My voice sounded flat and hollow, but I’d hardly slept since the attack. The king hovered, perhaps thinking I would faint again as I nearly had under duress and questioning long ago in this very place—and over the same villain too.
“My point is, Mrs. Bill,” Constable Markwood said, “who struck the blows on him with the rock and crockery that did him in?”
“He looked at me, then went back to stabbing Chad, and then I—”
“In other words,” the king interrupted, “self-defense or the bastard would have tried to kill her too as well as my estate manager. Just write down self-defense and be done with it, Markwood. The man got what he deserved for longtime poaching and destroying wildlife and property. He threatened my daughter, Mary, years ago. His well-deserved demise has saved Sandringham and Norfolk a good deal of expense and time for a trial when we have larger trials than that looming.”
I thought the constable would argue or continue his questions, but he put his paper and pen in his jacket pocket. “That’s exactly what I’d surmised, Your Majesty. Just tidying things up since the deceased could not make a statement of his own. I just pray your estate manager lives.”
“As do we all,” the king said as he showed him out and closed the door just as I started to rise.
“Stay a moment, Lala,” he said. He came back and perched on the arm of his old worn sofa and looked down at me. “Did you stumble on Chad or were you out and about with him?”
I raised my chin. I would not fudge about or lie to the king. “Out with him, sir. Walking. He was leaving soon with your regiment. I’m sorry if you don’t approve.”
“I didn’t say that. I realize the two of you have been friends—honorable friends—for years. Lala, I need to rush back to London, but I want you to visit Chad. If he is conscious, tell him I have commanded that he remain here during the war to oversee this estate, the sooner the better he can get back on his f— that is, manage with a false leg or whatever it takes. Tell him he will be serving his king in that way, for he knows I love Sandringham even as he does. Do what you can to comfort and console him. The queen and I do not know what we would do without your caring for Johnnie—and though it is different—for Chad too.”
“You won’t send Johnnie away from York Cottage, sir? He’s sheltered here.”
He rose and put the chair back into its place by his desk. “Decisions must be made, even ones with far-reaching consequences.” His usually stentorian voice quavered. “I must do what I think best. I don’t know. There is so much I don’t know in these terrible times.”
WHEN I HEADED toward the Big House the next day to see Chad, who was still being cared for in a guest room there after his leg had been amputated three days ago, I approached Winnie and Penny on the path as they walked toward me. Winnie nodded—her latest rendition of a curtsy.
“We could only see him for a few minutes,” she told me. “But he opened his eyes and moved his hand when Penny talked to him, held her hand and talked a bit to us.”
“I’m sure that gave him strength,” I told them, but my voice was shaky. I put my arm around Penny’s shoulders. The poor girl was trembling, and I hugged her to my side.
“Lala, they had to cut off his leg!” the girl blurted and sucked in a deep breath. “To save him because it was going green and bad. But I told him he’s still my whole papa.”
Tears blurred my vision of her sweet face. “That was a wonderful thing to say, my dear.”
“Did you tell Johnnie?”
“I told him his friend Chad was hurt, and he said he was going to write him a nice note. I’ve been teaching him to write letters in cursive. He’s going to put some flowers with it.”
The child nodded. There seemed nothing else to say. I took a deep breath and told them, “The good news is that the king has asked me to tell your papa he is to be the estate manager here when he is well. He is depending on him to help in that way.”
“Oh, thank the Lord,” Winnie said as her posture seemed to deflate with her sigh. “Of course, we would take Penny but their house—his birds—so we’re over the moon about that kind offer from the king, right, Penny?”
“Righto,” she said with a smile despite the tears tracking down her flushed cheeks.
I stooped to hug her again, and she held to me. “Don’t be afraid,” I told her. “Your papa is a strong man.”
But when I saw him lying there, under a sheet with but one leg, his left one, his hip bandaged hugely, outlined nearly from his hip on down, I hesitated at the door. God forgive me for the thought, but so much of him seemed mi
ssing. The medical nurse sitting there nodded to me, then got up and left us alone. So pale. My ruddy man was so pale. He looked to be asleep, but he moved an arm and opened one black-and-blue, swollen eyelid.
“I don’t want you to see me like this,” he whispered. His voice was rough, not his own.
“Well, I am seeing you and grateful for it, my love. Besides, you cannot ask me to leave because I come bearing a message from the king.” I went closer but didn’t sit in the chair the nurse had vacated. I stood, leaning over him a bit on his . . . his side with the leg—taking his hand in mine. He seemed a bit cold, though the day and room were warm. “Don’t you want to know what the king said?” I asked, fighting my impulse to burst into tears.
“That I failed to stop that bastard. That I can hardly do my duties anymore with one leg, so he’s retiring me, replacing me?”
I leaned closer. “Just the opposite. He expects you to get your strength back as soon as you can so you can run this estate while he’s so busy. Nothing has changed, here at Sandringham, that is.”
“Charlotte . . . sweetheart,” he choked out as if it hurt him even to speak, “everything has changed. For me, for us—”
“No! I will not let you—”
“Just listen. Can you see me leading a hunt party or tramping through the marsh grass after pheasants or grouse? And what we were beginning to believe could come true—impossible.”
“It isn’t.”
“It’s enough you wear yourself out taking care of Johnnie. You don’t need another difficult case on your hands. Now, don’t argue as I can’t bear it. I’m tired, so go on now. Take care of your boy, and the doctor and nurse will take care of me. Don’t come again to see me like this, because . . . because I didn’t see him coming and I couldn’t even protect you, let alone myself. I’m exhausted and heartsick. Go.”
“Chadwick Reaver! Is this the way you would treat me if that blackguard had stabbed me and nearly killed me? You have a new war to fight now, and I—and His Majesty—expect you to fight it. Now you’d better get some sleep because I think you are delirious, and you are going to need your strength.”