The next morning Vevina dressed warmly in a heavy black velvet gown with woollen cloak and hood, and her heavy army boots that had served her so well through her travels. She checked her weapons, and made sure they were all loaded.
Colonel Olivier insisted he would accompany them on his horse as far as Burgos, held securely by the French, before turning back to resume his own post at San Sebastian. He rode part of the way in the coach with Vevina, and they reached Burgos three days later, early in the morning.
“I will take leave of you here, my dear Vevina, but I shall not say farewell, only, until we meet again. Please give this letter to my brother Vincent when you see him, and I hope all goes well with you. But if it doesn’t, promise me you’ll come back to San Sebastian, and I will protect you.”
“Goodbye, Andre, and thank you for all your help.”
“One last thing, Vevina. I drew this sketch for you, of myself. You wear a locket. Will you consent to put this in it as a token of my esteem?” Andre pleaded softly, his dark eyes passionate.
He pressed the pen and ink drawing in her hand, and she hadn’t the heart to refuse.
Andre opened the locket for her with trembling fingers, and placed it inside, then he clicked it closed, and kissed Vevina before she had a chance to say another word.
Then she felt herself lifted back into the carriage. She looked out the window to wave goodbye as the vehicle rolled down the dusty road towards Valladolid.
Andre smiled back tightly, and raised his hand in a final salute.
Chapter Twenty-nine
Another three days of hectic travelling saw Vevina and her party in Valladolid. Though the country was crawling with French, the Chevalier's coat of arms on the side of the carriage ensured that they were not disturbed. Vevina showed their papers at the road-blocks, and went on their way.
But from Valladolid to Salamanca, the country became wilder, and of course, since their defeat at Cuidad Roderigo nearly three months before, the French control over the area had begun to slip.
As the coach hit a particularly nasty rut, Vevina was flung from side to side, and suddenly glimpsed horsemen heading down from one of the larger hills. She grabbed Francis’ arm and pointed.
“I’ll warn the coachmen,” he stated.
He climbed out of the opposite window and onto the top of the waiting coach. Vevina fingered her pistol underneath her book, and felt in her boot for her small silver knife.
Jeanne hung the swathes of black material over the coats of arms, and they waited. The coachmen whipped the horses frantically, but the mysterious horsemen were gaining on them. Vevina could see they were going to ride to the front and rein in the horses, so she decided to brazen it out.
“We can’t afford to risk losing the team, or overturning the coach,” she called in French. “Stop the coach. Francis, stay up there, with the weapons. Give two pistols each to the coachmen. They might not have seen you climb up there.”
There were ten horsemen approaching, and Francis handed down two more loaded pistols and a sabre to Jeanne.
“Can you shoot, Jeanne?”
“Jeanne was trembling. "No, Miss.”
“Then hand it to me, or just point it, and if they grab you, just put it up against someone’s stomach and pull the trigger.”
The coach halted, and an evil-looking and worse-smelling Spaniard galloped up on a horse that appeared as though it were fit only to be fed to the hounds.
Vevina demanded boldly in fluent Spanish, “Why are you stopping us? We're on our way to Cuidad Roderigo to join the British garrison there. I have urgent messages for Wellington. We are Irish, cousins of his.”
“We were wondering why the messages are so heavy,” the Spaniard said with an obvious leer. “Your coach leaves huge ruts in the track. Could it be you have something valuable here, which you are bringing for the partisans?”
“Nothing other than my clothes and some food, which you are welcome to,” Vevina said coolly, throwing out some skins of wine and loaves of bread which the men fell upon greedily.
Then she looked the group leader straight in the eye. “But I am sure you are not partisans, you are merely outlaws taking advantage of the confusion in your country to rob anyone who comes this way, and then escape into the hills,” Vevina guessed accurately.
“So we are riding on to see Wellington. You might as well eat the food I've given you and count yourself lucky, because you're not going to get anything else.”
The furious Spaniard pointed a pistol at her, and said angrily, “You will get out of the coach so we can search it, and if you please me well when I take you, I shall let you live as my woman until I grow tired of you. Now, get down.”
The bandits got off their horses menacingly. Vevina had no choice but to step down. Her pistols were concealed in the folds of her skirt, and her knife up her sleeve.
The leader grabbed the throat of her gown and yanked it hard, baring her bosom, so that the rest of the men pressed closer to watch. There were five men on her side of the coach, she noted quickly, with the other five outlaws behind. The door of the coach was open, the sabre within reach.
“I’ll give in, but don’t harm my maid or the others,” she said in a loud voice. Then she brought up her weapons and killed the leader and the man closest to him. Jeanne, cowering on the floor of the coach, pressed the next pistol into her hand, and she killed another Spaniard, then heard rifles and pistols firing behind her.
The five bandits on her side were dead, and she scrambled back into the coach to go out the other door with her sabre. Vevina saw one man pressed up against the door to avoid the shots Francis was firing from above. She slit his throat with her knife, then sent the body flying by pushing open the door. Another man was knocked over, and she finished him off with the knife. Rising from her knees she slashed her sabre with her left hand, and then the threat of robbery was over.
Vevina cleaned the blood off her sword and got back into the coach.
“Francis, reload all these weapons while you’re up there, and let’s go. I want to be in Cuidad Roderigo within the next two days,” Vevina said firmly.
Jeanne sat up, white faced, and began to stitch up the bosom of Vevina’s damaged gown as the coach moved on. She stared at Vevina wide-eyed for hours after.
The small group took turns riding throughout the night, and even Vevina and Jeanne drove during the day so the men could get some sleep. Jeanne enjoyed the fresh air and sunshine, and proved to have a natural way with horses.
Vevina was still feeling very well most of the time, and on the morning of the second day, she began to sing some of the old tunes she remembered from Ireland with Francis for Jeanne’s benefit, so pleased was Vevina that she was reaching what she thought to be her journey’s end.
Vevina’s heart thumped in her chest as the fort of Cuidad Roderigo came into sight at about four that evening. As they rode up to the city gates, she jumped down from the coach and insisted on speaking to Major Fitzgerald or Captain James.
The coach was brought inside the walls, and Francis and Jeanne waited by it patiently, while the coachmen looked after their animals.
Finally she caught sight of a bright shock of hair, and Wilfred caught her to him. “Vevina, my God, I was beginning to give up hope of ever seeing you again. Look at the state you’re in! What happened?”
“I’ve been to Grenoble and back, but I'm here now and safe, and Samuel is no longer any danger to us,” she announced proudly, after kissing him a dozen times.
“Your gown! This coach! Come into my room and tell me all about it.”
“Oh please, Will, can I tell you and Stewart at the same time, and see the others, Bob, the Becketts, Mitchell?” Vevina asked with a happy smile.
He shook his head. “I’m sorry Viv, they’re not here. It’s just me and Ensign Parks, holding the fort in case the French try to retake it.”
“Stewart’s gone?” Vevina gasped. “Gone where?”
“They marched off to a pla
ce called Badajoz, the southern route to Lisbon, still held by the French.”
“How long ago was that?”
“About six weeks. There’s rumour the French will try to reinforce it. Have you seen any French troop movements from Madrid?”
She shook her head quickly. “I didn’t come from Madrid, I came from San Sebastian and Burgos. They were full of French, but I couldn’t see any movement.”
“Well, maybe the French haven’t realized yet that Wellington is trying to press his advantage quickly,” Wilfred speculated with a frown, before he looked at his sister again and said more cheerfully, “But I bore you. Come inside, have some food, and I am sure Ensign Parks, my acting aide-de-camp, can find you some comfortable quarters.”
Ensign Parks was delighted to see Vevina again, and kissed her hand in spite of her appalling grubbiness.
But Vevina refused to sit, and demanded, “Where is Wellington?”
“At Badajoz as well, so far as I can gather from his most recent messages.”
“Then I must go there, see him,” she asserted firmly.
Her brother attempted to dissuade her, but finally Wilfred gave in with a sigh. “This burning urge to go to Badajoz wouldn’t have something to do with a certain Major you’d like to see again, now would it?”
Then, as he looked at her more closely, he exclaimed, “Good God, Vevina, are you with child?”
“I was waiting for you to notice, Will, but you always were a bit absent-minded,” Vevina teased. “Now tell me, how far is it to this place Badajoz?”
“About one hundred and forty miles on the main roads. But there will be French blockades everywhere. It’s too risky for you and a couple of horsemen to ride there on your own.”
“Then we’ll take the carriage. It’s got a French coat of arms.”
Wilfred shook his head vehemently. “They won’t let you through. Before a big battle, they will look for anything suspicious.”
“Give me a map of the area, and show me the route Stewart and the others took,” Vevina begged.
“All right, if you really want to see Wellington and Stewart so badly, I’ll help. If you can go the width of Spain and France and come back safely, another one hundred and forty miles won’t make much difference,” Wilfred said. “But before you go, I want you to promise me something.”
“What is it?”
“Firstly, that you’ll say hello to all our friends when you get there, and secondly, that you go to Lisbon, and stay there. I don’t want you being a camp follower any more. Our fortunes are improving all the time, and it’s wrong for you, a high born lady, to have to put up with such indignities, especially with a baby coming.”
She cupped his cheek affectionately, and sighed. “I can’t make any promises, Will, not yet. First of all, I have to be sure Wellington has all the proof he needs of our innocence. Then I need to see Stewart before I can make any decisions about the future of myself and the baby.
"And let's be honest with each other. If the battle down there is going to be as fierce as you seem to think, I may find him only to lose him when the fighting starts. I must go to him before I do anything else.”
“Right, then, Stewart and the South Warwickshires went to Salamanca first, for supplies, and then headed south. But if you take this small road down through Hoyos, you will save some time, and join the main road at Canaveral. It might be in the hands of the French, I don’t know.
"Then onto Caceres, and while Stewart’s men went for more supplies through Merida, there is a smaller road to the east which will take you directly to Badajoz. You’ll need to take your own supplies with you. It’s a wasteland along that road. But with any luck, the French won’t have taken much trouble with it for that very reason,” Wilfred instructed.
“Can I help myself to your stores, Captain?”
“Of course, Lady Vevina. ADC Parks will help you.”
They loaded the carriage hastily, with enough food for eight people for several days, plus fodder for the horses. Wilfred insisted on providing three privates as escort in the carriage, and several more men on horseback who could at least see them safely to Canaveral. After that they would be on their own to brave the French.
They waited until nightfall, so that if any spies in the area had seen the coach enter the British-controlled fort, they would be caught off guard by its emergence so late at night.
Vevina kissed her brother, and said, “I’ll see you again, I’m sure of it.”
“I know, Vevina, but remember, I want you to go to Lisbon if you can. Take this money, and send me word here of where you are. Parks will make sure that the message finds me.”
She pushed the purse back in his hand. “I have money from the Oliviers and the Chevalier. Keep it for yourself, in case of emergencies. Goodbye, Will, and good luck!”
The coach and escort thundered out of the gates of Cuidad Roderigo, and Vevina slept as they rode throughout the night. The British soldiers were wearing French tunics, and Vevina was grateful for her own foresight, for as they entered Hoyos, and then Coria, the next day, she could see more and more French troops amassed.
After they had passed Coria, Vevina instructed the horsemen to return over the open countryside back to Hoyos, and tell Wilfred back at Cuidad Roderigo all they had seen. She was afraid the French might be mustering forces in order to attempt to besiege, or even retake the gateway to Northern Portugal.
“Tell him to gather stores and supplies, and send to Guarda for reinforcements,” she ordered.
Then the coach moved onwards to Canaveral, where the French guards stopped the coach, and listened with interest to her story of Captain Olivier being held to ransom at Badajoz.
After an interminable wait, her story was confirmed, and they were allowed to continue down the road, the kind Major even providing a French escort for the carriage.
Vevina was nervous, for her three soldiers in French uniform did not have the best French, and she was afraid they might give the game away. But they managed to talk of the action they had seen at Cuidad Roderigo in a convincing way, and the escort waved cheerfully, and wished them well as they road back to camp.
Vevina and Jeanne drove the coach on the third day, while the exhausted men slumbered inside. Vevina was impelled by her desire to see Stewart again to continue onwards despite all the hardships the group had to endure. Wilfred’s information about a huge battle impending caused her to ride the horses hard.
She decided to stop in Caceres and buy the best new team that money could buy, and then they would have to go the rest of the way to Badajoz with no chance of supplies or fresh animals.
Eventually she found a Spanish nobleman with some splendid carriage horses, and she left her own animals and paid him handsomely out of the purse the Chevalier had given her for a team of ten and several huge bales of fodder which they tied onto the back and top of the coach.
That evening they left the city, and pretended to take the road for Merida, but then doubled back, and headed south-west. The road was fairly easy, being mostly downhill, and they made excellent progress. Vevina sat in the carriage, and for want of anything else to do, began to cut up the beautiful petticoats she had been given into bandages.
Jeanne exclaimed over the terrible waste, but Vevina said, “I’ve been in battle before, and I can tell you know, these will save many lives. Who cares about vanity?”
She worked on as the carriage jolted up and down, until her eyes felt heavy and she eventually fell asleep, propped up against the solid comfort of Francis Baines.
She slept on most of the day, and when she awoke with a start, Francis said, “Well, you had a good rest, miss. We’ll be there by tonight if we press on. Would you like some wine and food?”
“Have you eaten yet, all of you?” Vevina asked, as she pushed her curls out of her face, and sat up straight.
“Not yet, we were waiting for you.”
They stopped the carriage, and Vevina helped tend to the horses first, before sitting down on
the dusty ground and eating her bread, meat and cheese. She drank the wine thirstily, and then stood up and stretched in the glorious mid-April sunshine.
After their meal, Vevina looked over the horses, and helped unharness the team. “Those ones at the back, put them up at the front. They seem weaker than the others, and we may have to get rid of them easily,” she observed. The coachmen nodded, and then she and Francis looked over the weapons.
“If the French are on the road, we may have to fight our way through,” she warned the young secretary.
“I’d say that’s certain, miss. The French have lost Cuidad Roderigo, so it is essential they hang on to the southern road if they ever want to stop the British and reach Lisbon.”
“With the safe conduct provided for us by Colonel Olivier, they might let us through,” Vevina pointed out hopefully.
Scars Upon Her Heart (The Scars of The Heart Series) Page 26