Wickham

by Karen Aminadra

  That evening in the Red Lion in Scarborough, Wickham was not himself. His conversation with Lieutenant Jacques Dubois had left him feeling uncomfortable and with a bitter taste in his mouth. The young man’s story deeply touched his heart, and he pitied him. However, what he had then gone on to say disturbed him even more. Poynter and Turpin noticed he had things on his mind.

  “I say, Wickham, old chap, snap out of it, will you?” Poynter snapped at him as he filled Wickham’s mug with ale.

  He shook his head and tried to plant a smile on his face. “I’m sorry. I have something on my mind.”

  “Care to share it?” Turpin asked. Wickham shook his head. “But if you do not wish to share it, then forget about it.”

  Wickham snorted. “That, Tommy, is easier said than done.”

  “Not pining over the little lady, are we?” Poynter sneered.

  “Not at all, I assure you.”

  “Then what is it?” Poynter pressed.

  Wickham rose from his seat. “If you do not mind, I think I will return home.”

  Turpin protested. “What? I thought we were going to have a few rounds of cards and something to eat together.”

  Poynter’s eyes narrowed. “Wickham, this isn’t about Colonel Fitzwilliam again, is it?”

  Wickham laughed. “No. I assure you it is not about Colonel Fitzwilliam.”

  Tommy groaned and slapped Poynter’s arm with the back of his hand. “I know what this is all about.” He leant forward and looked directly up into Wickham’s face. “This is about that French idiot, Capitaine Lefebvre. You cannot let a rogue like him get to you, Wickham. The man is a purebred villain. He is merely provoking you. He takes great delight, I am sure, in watching you react to him.”

  Wickham did not want his friends to know what was truly bothering him. It was easier to let them believe that Capitaine Lefebvre was the reason he was out of sorts that evening. “Yes, you are right.”

  “Of course he is right,” Poynter agreed. “There is not one amongst us who would not like to give Lefebvre a right hook and knock him on his sanctimonious, aggressive backside.”

  Wickham chuckled at the very thought and had to admit he certainly would like to be the one to do such a thing.

  “But, as much as every single one of us would like to be that man who knocked him down a peg or two, it is just not worth the bother and aggravation that we will get into if we do,” Turpin said. “It is best to put the man out of your mind. We march for war on Monday: it is most likely you will never have to see that French dog again.”

  Wickham nodded. “Amen to that.”

  Poynter raised his mug. “Here’s to never seeing the ever-delightful Capitaine Lefebvre again!” All three of them laughed and joined in the toast. “Now, sit back down and relax, man,” Poynter said as he swallowed a mouthful of ale.

  Wickham reluctantly did as he was told. What he actually wanted was to go home, eat the meal the Mrs Marsh had prepared for him, and think deeply on what Lieutenant Jacques Dubois had said to him earlier that day. However, his friends would grow suspicious and they would want to know—nay, they would demand to know—what it was exactly he had on his mind. It was much better all-round if he kept his thoughts to himself and did as he was bid, even if it was just for a little while.

  He stayed in the Red Lion to drink, play cards, and laugh at all the jibes Poynter and Turpin made about Capitaine Lefebvre. However, he drew the line and said no to eating there; after all, Mrs Marsh had made him something back home. The sea mist was rolling in and engulfing the town of Scarborough by the time he made his way back to the cottage that night. Just as he expected, Mrs Marsh had made him something to eat. The wonderful odour assaulted his nose the moment he stepped through the front door. It was a scent to warm the heart, and he wished that he could come home to such an aroma every night.

  He made his way into the kitchen and immediately knew he would find his dinner in the oven. The heat filled the room and he decided that he would sit there, in the kitchen, and eat whatever delight Mrs Marsh had made for him. He grabbed a cloth from the back of one of the kitchen chairs and used it to protect his hand as he opened the oven door. He stepped back as the heat hit him in the face and grinned from ear to ear. Mrs Marsh had baked him a pie.

  With his mouth salivating, he carefully removed the pie from the oven and placed it on to the table. The woman had left cutlery and a glass of watered-down wine, with a cloth over the top, on the table. Wickham smiled to himself. “We should have employed this Mrs Marsh before. I hope Lydia will engage her when we finally return.”

  Eagerly, Wickham cut into the pie. He groaned with delight to see that it was filled with ham and vegetables. His desire to eat quickly was tempered only by how hot the pie was, and with every mouthful, his contentment increased.

  Once he had finished eating, he took what remained of the glass of wine into the parlour where, to his surprise, Mrs Marsh had lit a fire. He took off his red coat, loosened his cravat, and sat down in the chair opposite the fire. He pulled off his boots and warmed the soles of his feet. His mind naturally then turned to Jacques Dubois. Every word he said touched Wickham deeply. Nevertheless, the favour he asked him to do laid heavily on his heart. Morally, he was more than willing to do such a thing. However, it was dangerous, foolhardy, and could wind up getting him killed.

  Wickham put his head back and closed his eyes. What should he do? Jacques’ story was deeply touching. What the man asked was simple enough. All Wickham had to do was to get a message to Madame Estelle Bernard, Jacques’ sister, and simply inform her that her brother was alive and well in an English prison. Wickham snorted. It all sounded oh so easy. However, Wickham was no fool. He was aware that if he did indeed decide to endeavour to send a message to Estelle Bernard, it could quite possibly be the last thing he ever did.

  Despite being tired, the matter preyed on his mind and he knew he would find no sleep that night. He rose from the chair, went back into the kitchen, and rummaged around for the rest of the watered-down wine, and in so doing, found half a bottle of undiluted wine. He took the carafe and a bottle back to the parlour and sat back down in his chair by the fireside. The wine, he knew, would not help him think. What it would do, however, would make him sleep. He hoped that when he did finally fall asleep, he would find the answer therein to his dilemma.

  His mind churned with the thought of Jacques’ poor sister in that awful marriage, not knowing if her brother were alive or not. If he had a sister, Wickham knew he would never wish her to be in such a situation. Then, he realised, there was the predicament of finding the girl in such a vast country as France. Wickham laid his head back against the chair and laughed so hard he made himself cough. “Wickham, you daft fool!” he exclaimed. “What a blundering idiot you are! How on earth are you supposed to find Madame Bernard in a country the size of France?” He continued to laugh at himself. “Here you are…” He sloshed the bottle of wine around as he gestured to the room at large. “…losing sleep over the pitiful sister of Jacques Dubois, when you do not even know where the village of Vincy is.” The only scrap of information the French lieutenant had given him about the geographical location of Vincy was that it was near the market town of Aurnel, not far from the Belgian border. He shook his head at his own foolishness and closed his eyes with a sigh.

  Wickham did not realise he had fallen asleep. When he awoke, the fire had burned down and there were only embers in the grate. He stretched and rose from the chair, groaning at the stiffness in his body, and left the parlour, kicking over the empty wine bottle as he did so. He climbed the stairs and entered his bedroom, where, for the first time since their departure that morning, Wickham truly felt his wife and son’s absence. Feeling truly wretched, he pulled off his shirt, stockings, and britches, grabbed his nightshirt, and roughly pulled it over his head. He climbed into bed on Lydia’s side and pulled the covers up to his chin. He turned his face into the pillow and breathed deeply of her scent. “Oh, Lydia!” He sighed, closed
his eyes and fell, immediately, asleep.

  The next morning, Wickham arose and rushed off to the castle, knowing there was a lot to do that day. The new regiment would be arriving. Despite the fact that he, Poynter, and Turpin had looked forward to a little evening soirée once the new recruits arrived, Wickham new it would be nigh on impossible. They had a little over twenty-four hours before they marched to war. It would not do to get merry and drunk with their departure so imminent.

  That morning, a new consignment of ammunition was scheduled to arrive and Wickham was the officer in charge of checking that everything meant to be delivered was, indeed, delivered. As he approached the portcullis gates of the castle, he saw one consignment had arrived already. The driver stood beside the cart with his back leant against the wheel. He was smoking a pipe, which he waved in the air at Wickham as he saw him draw near.

  Wickham hallooed a greeting. “Will no one let you in?”

  “No.” The man shook his head solemnly. “They said I’m to wait here for a Lieutenant Wickham.”

  Wickham smiled disarmingly at the disgruntled man. “Well, you will have to wait no longer. I am he. And I sincerely hope you did not have to wait for very long.”

  The man shrugged. “I ain’t got no watch. Besides, I can’t tell the time, but I waited long enough to ’ave a smoke on me pipe.”

  “Ah, then, I’ll wager a guess that it was not too long indeed.” Wickham’s smile grew larger with relief. The last thing he wanted was to be responsible for having the man wait overly long. Wickham bellowed through the portcullis, “Open the gates.”

  The guards rushed forward at his barked command, reddening from not having seen a superior officer arrive, and hastened to open the gates. Little by little, the portcullis rose, and when it was high enough for the horses and the two men to begin their passage underneath, they walked forward. “The ammunition is kept this way,” Wickham said, indicating a storeroom to his left.

  The deliveryman led his horses and cart to a stop outside the building indicated, and awaited further instructions. Wickham looked around him for men to help him unload the goods. Luckily for him, just as he turned around to look for the second time—feeling desperate and like a fool—three men came out of one of the buildings to the right. “You three! I need these crates unloaded immediately.” Wickham had been in the army for long enough now to know that when he gave an order, it was obeyed; however, deep inside him, there always was a niggling feeling of doubt at whether they would do as he said or not. He relaxed immediately as they stood to attention, saluted, and answered, “Yes, sir.”

  One by one, they unloaded each crate and Wickham commanded them to prise them open. The only one amongst them to complain was the deliveryman. “It’s all there. There ain’t nothin’ missing.”

  Wickham grinned at the man. “I believe you. However, I would be remiss in my duties and in grave trouble with my superiors if I did not check the consignment.” He looked away from the man and nodded to the soldiers to carry the crate into the storeroom. “You understand that, I know.”

  “Aye.” The man sighed and went back to leaning against his cart, taking out his pipe again. The next crate down of the back of the cart was heavier than the others were, and the men groaned under its weight. “That’ll be the cannon balls, then.” The man chuckled, pointing his pipe at the struggling men.

  They had begun to draw a small crowd of unoccupied soldiers. “You, there, put your rifles down and help before we have an accident!” Wickham cried as he himself ran to help hold the tipping crate. Immediately, the men dropped their weapons and ran to help, and not a moment too soon, as the crate began to slip out of one of the men’s hands. “Careful, now!” Wickham panted, surprised at the weight. “I want none of you to end up in the infirmary.”

  The three newcomers aided Wickham and the other three to lower the crate carefully to the ground and then prised the lid open with an iron crowbar. When Wickham was convinced that the cannon balls it contained were of good quality, they, as one man, heaved the heavy load into the store, as they had with the other crates.

  Wickham sighed once the crate was carefully stowed and looked back to the cart. There were many more crates to unload and he hoped that not many more of them contained cannon balls.

  Slowly, the work was finished and Wickham’s stomach was growling its need to break the fast by the time they were all done and he dismissed the men. He thanked them and the deliveryman and saw him safely out of the castle before turning and marching as quickly as he could for the officers’ mess hall in desperation for food.

  As he stepped into the hall, he noticed Poynter and Turpin were there already and lounging about by the fire. “Nothing to do this morning, gentlemen?” he asked bitterly, noting the layer of sweat on his body and the splinters in his hands.

  “What is there to do?” Poynter yawned.

  Wickham shook his head. “I’ve just spent the last hour unloading a consignment of arms. I could have done with some help.” He rubbed at his palms.

  “Yes, we saw.” Turpin chuckled. “But it seemed you had everything under control.”

  Wickham swallowed down a bitter retort, walked over to the table, and sat down at the same time as the serving staff entered to serve the officers’ breakfast. Poynter and Turpin joined him, sitting on either side of him at the long table as the other officers arrived to enjoy the repast.

  “What has ruffled your feathers?” Poynter asked him.

  Wickham did not want an argument. He did not wish to point out that his friends had watched him labouring with the common soldiery to unload the armaments and had done nothing to aid him. He did not desire to tell them how angry that made him feel inside, and least of all, he had no intention of revealing that one of the reasons he felt testy that morning was because of what Lieutenant Jacques Dubois had asked him to do. How could he? Even when he thought about it himself, it sounded ridiculous and he knew it was wrong. All the same, deep inside him he felt he ought to do what Jacques asked. He shrugged at Poynter, who still awaited his response. “Nothing. It is nothing at all.”

  “Got out of the bed on the wrong side, eh?” Turpin smiled as he passed Wickham the platter of toasted bread.

  Wickham took two pieces and passed the platter to Poynter. “Hmm…” he muttered. “Something like that.”

  Turpin looked up and down the table. “A lot of the fellows here are beginning to feel that way.”

  Wickham looked at him and frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean that we are off to war in less than twenty-four hours. It is starting to hit home, and by the looks of the long faces up and down this table, it is hitting hard.”

  Wickham looked at the other officers seated around the table and saw that Turpin had a point. There was hardly a contented face amongst them, let alone a happy one. The realisation of war then hit Wickham hard and his stomach dropped. He looked again at each of the faces around him and wondered how many of them would be coming back home again. How many families would be left destitute by this war on foreign soil? How many more widows and orphans would there be in the coming months? He shuddered.

  “Yes,” Turpin continued, and Wickham realised he had seen him shiver. “It is a sobering thought.”

  Poynter, with a mouthful of bread, spoke up. “War is a bloody business, but someone has to do it.”

  “How can you be so blasé?” Turpin said, leaning back and looking at their friend behind Wickham.

  “I am not being blasé. I am being realistic. It is a bloody business, but someone has to stand against the tyranny of that French dictator.”

  Wickham nodded. He had to admit that Poynter had a point there. “And we took on the military life as a career. Surely, none of us thought we could do that without even encountering a battle of some sort.” Almost as soon as the words were out of his mouth, Wickham realised that might well have been the case as far as he was concerned. Some of the men at the table were second or third sons, with no inheritances of
their own. They had enlisted into the army as the Navy was not respectable enough, the law did not appeal to them, and the clergy was far too respectable. Wickham sighed. He himself had joined the military when no other occupation would suit. He needed the money. He needed respectable work and he found it in His Majesty’s Army. He was one of those men he just spoke out against—one of those who joined up with no notion of ever fighting a battle in the whole of his career. He shook his head. How foolish was he? The war against the tyrant Napoléon was already being waged when he chose to become a redcoat. Did he really believe the myth that officers led wars from the inside of tents many miles away from the melee? He thought about that for a moment and recognised that he was far more naïve than he ever knew before. He was shocked at himself.

  Turpin echoed his thoughts. “I am afraid the answer to that question is yes, Wickham.” He nodded solemnly. “I think there are many, if not most, men at this table who thought that very thing. I believe no one assumed they would be heading up the army, that they personally would lead the men into the fray.”

  At Turpin’s words, a silence descended upon them as each one sunk into his own thoughts. Wickham wondered if he ought to write a letter to Lydia, and one to Georgie. Was that being morbid? Was that thinking the worst outcome would happen? He wondered. Fear gripped his heart as he speculated if he would ever see his son again. He resolved that evening, when he arrived home, to write a letter to Lydia and one to Georgie also—he swallowed hard—to say goodbye.

  Lydia was not having a good time travelling south towards Hertfordshire. Their stopover for the night in Hornsea did not go well. The Bennets’ manservant could not procure lodgings for the night; therefore, tired, cold, hungry, and grumpy, they were forced to drive on until they could find an inn with room for all of them. Eventually, they stopped in the village of Skirlaugh and found lodgings. It was not to Lydia’s taste, however, and she complained loudly that she felt she was staying overnight in a hovel.