Windrush E-Book

Malcolm Archibald

• Herausgeber: Next Chapter
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

Burmese War, 1852. Unable to join the famous Royal Malverns, Jack Windrush is commissioned into the despised 113th Foot.

Determined to rise in the ranks and make a name for himself, he is sent with the 113th to join the British expedition. But when they get involved in the attack of Rangoon, Jack realizes that war on the fringes of the Empire is not as honorable and glorious as he expected.

After a chance meeting with a renegade British soldier, Jack witnesses the true terrors of war, and begins to question the whole framework in which he has grown up.

Leseprobe

Windrush

Jack Windrush Series – Book I

Malcolm Archibald

Copyright (C) 2016 Malcolm Archibald

Layout design and Copyright (C) 2019 Next Chapter

Published 2019 by Next Chapter

Edited by D.S. Williams

Cover art by http://www.thecovercollection.com/

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the author's permission.

For Cathy.

Prelude

Chillianwala, River Jhelum, India, 14 January 1849

'Are your men ready, Sir John?'

'All ready, Sir Hugh.' Colonel Murphy scanned the ranks of the 113th. They stood at attention along the fringes of the scrubby jungle, listened to the batter and howl of the artillery and tried not to flinch as the occasional Sikh round-shot landed in front of their position.

'It's their first action, isn't it?' General Sir Hugh Gough glanced to his right and left, where his army was preparing for the battle ahead. He had 12,000 men, tired after a three-day march through the Punjab heat, while Shere Singh commanded at least 32,000 Sikhs, well dug in and supported by sixty-two pieces of artillery.

'Yes, sir; we are a new regiment, and this is our first time outside England.' Murphy felt that familiar flutter of excitement as a bugle called far to his right. He hid his smile.

'Not your first, though, eh?' Gough controlled his skittish horse as the Sikh artillery probed for the range. 'You knew the Peninsula, I believe.'

'Yes, Sir Hugh; Talavera and Salamanca, and Kabul in Afghanistan more recently.'

Gough nodded. 'Well good luck, Sir John; blood the men well and bring honour to the flag.' With his white fighting coat, distinctive in that array of scarlet British and Indian soldiers and set against the dark green and dun of India, Gough kicked in his heels and moved to speak to the colonel of the 24th Foot. A score of vultures circled above them, waiting to feast on the carnage to come.

'Blasted birds always know when there's to be a battle,' Major Snodgrass grumbled. 'They are a harbinger of death.' He withdrew a silver flask from inside his jacket and sipped at the contents. 'I hate them.'

'Put the spirits away, Snodgrass,' Murphy ordered. 'The men will be nervous enough without seeing their officers' tippling.'

'The brandy helps.' Snodgrass took another pull before he obeyed. 'Here we go then.'

The 113th was in three lines, – eight hundred fighting men in formation, with their sergeants placed with each section and the officers leading from the front. In the centre, hanging limply in the appalling heat, the Queen's Colours and the Regimental Colours acted as a talisman and rallying point, as British colours had done in a hundred battles in India in the past and would in a hundred battles in the future. A puff of air as hot as any blast furnace ruffled the regimental colour, so the number '113' was partially displayed against a virgin yellow-buff field.

'Time to put a battle honour on our colours,' Murphy roared out to his regiment. 'Heads up lads: the Sikh Khalsa has a reputation for being brave and resourceful warriors, but he has never met us before! Keep together, keep in step, never mind the noise and win glory for yourselves, the regiment and the Queen. Come on the 113th!'

Most of the men looked to their front, as required by discipline and tradition. Others slid their eyes sideways to their colonel; some swallowed hard, a few chewed tobacco or sucked on a stone to combat the ever-present thirst of India. One man was praying, the words a low mutter underneath the grumble and roar of the guns.

In front, the 24th marched bravely forward, flanked on one side by the sepoys of the 25th Native Infantry and on the other by their colleagues of the 45th. The mid-afternoon sun was like brass above, bringing thick beads of sweat to faces not yet accustomed to the Indian heat. The red coats vanished into the scrubby jungle.

'Keep the distance!' Murphy roared. He looked across the ranks of his regiment. 'Show them your Colours, 113th!'

'Only the bayonet!' Senior officers passed the words to junior officer who snarled the orders to sergeants and the private soldiers, 'General Gough's orders are no firing; only use the bayonet.'

Murphy looked at Major Snodgrass and raised bushy eyebrows. He made no adverse comment about his senior officer, but he looked at his inexperienced infantry and wondered how they would cope. The Sikhs had proved to be the toughest enemy the British had ever faced in India, and General Gough had now further handicapped the already outnumbered and tired British soldiers.

The nearest men to Murphy were marching steadily with their muskets at the correct angle and boots thumping on the brick-hard ground. Sweat glistened on red faces that peeled with sunburn, while their uniforms constricted their bodies in tight swathes of red serge. They looked uncomfortable, hot and nervous as they marched forward to face the enemies of the Honourable East India Company and, by association, enemies of the Queen.

'Will the Sikhs fight?' Snodgrass asked. He reached for his flask again but withdrew his hand when Murphy frowned. 'We've fought and beaten them so often that surely they must know they haven't a chance?'

'They are the Khalsa,' Murphy paused, nodding approval as a sergeant roared to get his section to straighten the line. 'The Sikh Army is the finest native fighting force in India, tough professionals with European training, artillery as good as ours and an unbroken history of victory. They also outnumber us and are in a strong defensive position. Yes, they will fight.'

As they entered the jungle, the British had to break formation to negotiate tangled bush and dense thickets of trees and undergrowth. From ahead there was a sharp outburst of musketry and again the deeper, savage boom of artillery.

'It's begun,' Murphy said. 'Steady the 113th! Onward to victory!'

There was a surge of cheering as the British made contact with the enemy, and the cannonade increased. The acrid smell of powder smoke drifted through the scrub, faint but stronger with each step they took.

'That's the Sikh infantry firing on the 24th,' Snodgrass said. 'The 24th might need our support soon.'

'Quicken the pace, boys!' Murphy ordered. 'We don't want to meet the Khalsa in penny packets.' He looked right and left. In the confines of the scrub, he could only see a fraction of his regiment at any one time, but it appeared to be steady enough, despite some sections dropping back as they became entangled in the undergrowth.

The cheering from the right and ahead mingled with screaming, and still, the Sikh artillery roared. There was regular volley fire from the Sikh muskets, a sure sign of well-disciplined infantry.

'The 24th is getting a pounding, 'Murphy said and nodded as a glistening-faced messenger approached.

'General Gough's compliment's sir, and could you move the 113th to support the 24th as quickly as the occasion permits.'

Murphy nodded. 'Thank you, my boy, and please tell the general that the 113th will be in support directly. He has my word on it.' He watched as the ensign turned about and vanished into the bush. The boy could not be more than seventeen, the same age as Murphy had been when he first went to war forty years ago.

'Come on, men! The 24th need us!' Dismounting, Murphy ran forward to lead his regiment. He drew his sword and lifted it high in the air, then swung it in the direction of the enemy. 'Quick march the 113th!'

He heard movement behind him as he strode toward the Sikh lines. His men were following; one of the only two regiments in the British Army that had no battle honours on its colours. The hundred and thirteen virgins, the Baby Butchers, his men; the 113th Foot was advancing into battle.

Murphy hacked at an overhanging creeper and emerged in a large, sun-dappled clearing. He saw uniformed men ahead, drawn up in a tight formation. They wore the yellow turbans of Sikh gunners, and they stood behind a row of cannon. As the 113th emerged from the jungle in dribs and drabs, a section here and a company there, the Sikh officers barked orders, and the gunners crouched to their cannon.

A shiver ran through the scattered 113th; men stared at the wicked mouths of the waiting artillery in alarm or glanced over their shoulders at the concealment of the jungle.

'Forward lads!' Murphy encouraged. 'There's no going back now; take the bayonets to them, capture these guns!' He led the charge, knowing his regiment supported him, knowing that British infantry always reacted best when the danger was at its height.

The clearing, the maidan, stretched before him, with the Sikhs waiting in disciplined lines, matches smoking at the locks of their cannon, bearded faces smudged in the late afternoon sun. Murphy brandished his sword and ran into the heat. He no longer shouted; he hadn't the energy or the breath.

The Sikh officers waited until they had a sufficiently large target before they gave the order to fire. Their line exploded in a succession of orange muzzle flares, and gushing white smoke followed instantaneously by a volley of twelve and eighteen- pound cannonballs that raced toward the disorganised 113th. Men fell in ones and twos and entire sections, but Murphy remained untouched.

He took a deep breath of smoke tainted air. 'Take the bayonet to them, men!'

The Sikhs fired again, grapeshot and canister this time; lead balls that spread and butchered men by the dozen. Murphy felt a feather tickle his left arm. He shouted again, 'Charge!' and stepped forward, but his legs would not answer.

He looked down; the ground was rising to meet him as he fell soft beneath his face. He turned to watch his men win their glory. 'Come on the 113th' he tried to shout, but the words emerged as a meaningless ramble. 'Where are my men? Where is my regiment? Where are my darling boys?'

He saw only bodies on the ground and the screaming, writhing wounded; that and the backs of the 113th as they turned and ran back into the jungle. He saw Snodgrass standing with tears pouring down his crumpled face and the brandy flask held in a trembling hand.

'My regiment,' Murphy said. 'My brave boys, my 113th and then there was only blackness.

Chapter One

Malvern Hills, England, Winter 1851

Grey clouds smeared the sky, bellying downwards and depressing the already sombre mood of the funeral procession that wound in the shadow of the hills. Black horses walked slowly, heads bowed and plumes nodding as they dragged the hearse along the bumpy, rutted road. A procession of mourners followed; some in black draped carriages, most on foot and only the occasional scarlet uniform added a splash of colour. In front, walking with head bared and shoulders hunched, a drummer tapped a beat slow to accompany the steady tramp of two hundred feet.

Nobody spoke. Nobody heeded the thin rain that descended, damp and insidiously miserable, to seep through woollen cloaks and turn the road into a ribbon of sticky mud under the surrounding wooded slopes. Nobody sobbed or wept as the long column eased between leaning lichen-stained gate posts and entered a graveyard where grey tombstones sheltered beneath weeping trees. Bare branches thrust to the sky as if clutching forgiveness from an uncompromising God.

With a creak that sounded like a cry of despair, the hearse stopped. The horses stood silently in their traces, and the mourners shuffled to a halt, standing unmoving under the steadily increasing rain. Only the drummer continued with his repetitive, unending tap.

A man emerged from the hearse, his face set into professional solemnity as rain dripped from his tall black hat. Stepping slowly to the rear of the carriage, he called for the pallbearers to step forward.

'That's us,' Jack whispered to his brothers, aware that every eye was on him. Taking his place, he slipped his shoulder under the coffin and took the strain. His brothers filed into place behind him, silent save for the swish of boots through muddy grass. There were six pallbearers; the three sons of General William Windrush and three officers of his regiment. They moved forward in unison as the drummer continued his slow, rhythmic tapping and the priest, erect and slim with his black cloak sweeping the ground, held his Bible as if his soul depended on it.

As they manoeuvred around a dismal yew tree, Jack looked at his surroundings, from the mist that dragged across the long ridge of the Malvern Hills to the ancient graveyard centred on a church whose walls were slowly crumbling back into the soil. Gravestones protruded from the ground like despairing hands, some decorated with skulls and bones, others surmounted by weeping angels, but most indecipherable as years and weather removed all traces of the names and pious statements that long-dead hands had carved there. In this parish, there were only a handful of names, but none of the stones bore the appellation Windrush. The masters of Wychwood Manor boasted a seperate crypt, and it was to this that the mourners made their slow way.

“Windrush” The name erupted from the marble slab that surmounted the pillars at the entrance. The letters were bold, uncompromising, and when the iron gates between the pillars opened, lamplight highlighted seven steps leading downward into chilling darkness. Unhesitating, Jack moved on, unheeding of the weight of the coffin that dug into his right shoulder.

Beyond the steps, the ground was stone-flagged, the air chill and damp. The light cast weird shadows, highlighting a host of names. Unconsciously he repeated them to himself:

Colonel William Windrush killed at Malplaquet. Major Adam Windrush died of wounds in Germany. General Adam Windrush died of fever in India. Colonel William Windrush lost at sea.

Nearly every Christian name was William or Adam. Jack wondered as he had often before, why he had been named differently, breaking centuries of tradition. Ever since the Glorious Revolution, the oldest son had always been William, with any succeeding male being Adam, and then George. His name was an anomaly, but his mother had ignored any questions he had asked.

The stone lid was open, the tomb waiting to enclose the latest Windrush to die for the Regiment and in the service of the country. The dark space was friendly somehow, welcoming a Windrush home rather than confining him to eternity. This crypt was where every male Windrush hoped to repose; this was where Jack would end in ten, twenty if he were lucky or maybe even thirty years. With hardly a pause, he helped ease the coffin down as the mourners filed inside, their numbers crowding the crypt, their breathing echoing from the stones, their feet shuffling in soft harmony.

At a signal from the priest, the drummer lifted his drumsticks and stood at attention. Silence crushed them like a thick blanket. Jack fidgeted, looking to his brothers; William ignored him as usual, but Adam gave a nervous half-grin and mouthed something until the priest began the service. The sonorous words growled around the crypt, penetrating each corner, rebounding from the hard stone, reaching every silent mourner with their reminder of inevitable mortality. Jack listened unmoved. He knew his destiny; he would follow his father into the Regiment and die in the service of his country. Every firstborn Windrush male joined the Regiment and very few retired back home; he would be no different. That was what Windrushes did; it was as fixed as the stars in the firmament, as unchanging as the tides. It was the destiny for which he had prepared since he was old enough to walk.

At last, the priest stopped speaking, and one by one, the Windrush males moved forward to give their final farewell.

'Well, father,' Jack looked down at the lid of the coffin, already closed and screwed down. 'I hardly met you, but now I must take your place. I would have liked to have served under you, but that was not to be. I'll carry the family name and honour forward as you would have wished.'

There was no more to say. Jack's father had done his duty, and he would do his.

His brothers came next, murmuring their goodbyes to a man they had never known, and then the officers of the Regiment filtered forward. The brave scarlet uniforms contrasted with the grey stone and the black of mourning, as the officers spoke crisply, following their duty to a man of their regiment, their caste and their breed. There was no emotion.

'Well, young Windrush.' Major Welland stood erect, balancing his sword against his hip as he held Jack's eye. 'Are you ready to join the regiment?'

'I am, sir.' Only the solemnity of the occasion prevented Jack from smiling. 'I've waited all my life to be a Royal.'

'Good; it's a fine career and the best regiment in the British Army.' Welland nodded. 'We'll speak again later, once you have attended to the formalities.' He paused and added as an afterthought , 'Oh, I'm sorry about your father. He was a fine man.'

'So I've been told, sir.' Jack agreed. 'He insisted I complete my education before I joined.' He hesitated for a second, 'there was mention of Sandhurst, sir.'

'No need for that, young Windrush. The Regiment will teach you all you need to know.' Welland nodded. 'We'll be seeing you in the Mess shortly, and you'd better not be long. The Royals are not the same without a Windrush.' Tall and dark-haired, Welland's face was weathered, with only the tracing of a white scar spoiling his regular features.

Jack gave a small bow. 'I'll try not to be, sir.'

Welland lowered his voice slightly. 'Is there a young lady in your life, Windrush?'

'Not yet, sir,.' Jack wondered what was coming next.

'Good,' Welland seemed satisfied with the reply. 'Keep it that way if you are serious about your profession. Don't even think about marriage, youngster, not until you are at least a major and you have to keep the family line alive. Women are for procreation, not recreation; they will only distract you.'

Jack nodded. 'Yes, sir.'

There is little possibility of any woman distracting me, Major Welland.

With the General safe in his crypt, the mourners made their separate ways home, with only the private carriage of the Windrushes rolling to Wychwood Manor, the ancient ancestral home of the family. Snug beneath the Malvern peaks, it was a sprawling place, centred on a fourteenth-century manor house but with additions from half a score of builders and owners, marking the passage of architectural time. Lawns rolled green and smooth on either side of the entrance door, while centuries of English weather had all but obliterated the Windrush arms carved in the limestone arch above the main door.

As grooms ran to attend to the horses, Jack stood in the outer hall with its soaring Corinthian columns and oak panelling. He glanced at the array of portraits and pictures that virtually related the story of his family over the past hundred and fifty years. Grim-faced or solemn; his ancestors stared at him from above the scarlet uniform of the Royals. Some were alone, others painted against a backdrop of battle, but every man had polished the Windrush lustre.

'Uncle George's still hidden.' Adam pointed to the black curtain that concealed one of the portraits. 'I'd have thought Mother would have released him by this time.'

Despite the gravity of the day, Jack grinned. 'Poor old Uncle George; always condemned to be the black sheep of the family.' He glanced behind him to ensure his mother wasn't present and carefully eased back a corner of the curtain. George Windrush stared out, resplendent in his regimentals and with a devil-damn-your-hide glint in his eyes that Jack had rather admired as a youth.

'Best not let Mother catch you,' Adam advised. He tried to force the curtain shut again, but Jack pushed his hand away for a more extended look.

'Imagine joining John Company and marrying a native woman.' William pushed in. He sounded aghast at the audacity of his uncle.

'Terrible.' Jack shook his head in mock horror. 'It's just as well that he drowned at sea.'

'He was a blight on the family.' William snatched shut the curtain. 'Better his portrait is burned rather than just covered up.'

'Oh, indeed.' Jack fought to keep the mockery from his voice.

'Here's mother now.' William stepped back from the portrait in case its very proximity should contaminate him.

'Well, thank God that ordeal is over.' Mrs Windrush rolled off her black gloves and dropped them on the hallstand for a servant to put away. 'Funerals are such tiresome affairs.' Tall, slim and handsome despite her years, she stood erect and calm as she surveyed her sons. 'All right boys,' she said quietly. 'We have family business to execute. Meet me in the library in five minutes, if you please.'

The library was the holy of holies, a room in which mother undertook only the most critical decisions, and a room which Jack had visited only a score of times in his life. He felt his heart begin to pound as he mounted the stairs with the nearly invisible servants shrinking from him as he passed. The forthcoming business must be vital, and he guessed what it was. His mother was calling them into the library to hand him his commission papers; there could be no other reason. By this time tomorrow, he would be an ensign in the Royal Malverns; by this time tomorrow, he would be a man following his destiny.

The room was broad and chill, with two tall windows overlooking the Herefordshire Beacon that thrust its terraced slopes through the low-lying mist. Glass fronted bookcases lined two walls and crept into part of the third, while a large writing desk sat square in the centre of the room. Mrs Windrush lit the three candles that stood to attention in their brass candlesticks and waited until the light pooled increased. Saying nothing, she pulled back the leather chair and sat solidly behind the desk while her children stood in a row in front of her. Jack noted the determined thrust of her chin and the strange, nearly triumphant light in her eyes and knew she was about to announce something portentous. Save for the ticking of a longcase clock in the landing below, and the occasional distant bleat of a sheep that sounded through the cracked-open window, there was silence as Mrs Windrush opened the top drawer of the desk and pulled out a small pile of papers.

Jack felt his heart beating like the thunder of martial drums. He could see what looked like an official seal on the top document and guessed that it came from the Royals. That would be his ensign's commission, which would open up his real life. Tomorrow he would catch the mail coach to London to purchase his uniform, and within a couple of weeks he would take ship for his new home; the only real home he would ever know – the Royals.

'Stand still boys,' Mrs Windrush commanded and waited for only a second until they obeyed. 'With the death of your father, some things need to be said, and some matters must be addressed.' She allowed the last word to hang in the air for a few moments, sitting upright in the chair as she slowly pushed the top document to one side and opened the others, one by one. She placed them in a neat row in front of her.

'Now, boys; your father has left me instructions for each of you, but I fear that certain circumstances force me to modify them a little.' When she looked directly at him, Jack felt his heartbeat increase further, the drums rattling the charge rather than a quick march. Modify them? What the deuce does that mean? He thought there was something nearly malicious in the glitter of her eyes, a hint of satisfaction that he had witnessed and dreaded on each occasion she had announced he was due for punishment. He jerked his attention back to his mother's face. She was watching him, and he knew she understood every thought that crossed his mind.

'I will begin with your father's intentions,' Mrs Windrush said and lifted the sheet of paper closest to her. 'You, Jack, were due for a commission in the army; in your father's regiment. William, your father intended that you care for the family estate. You, Adam, were either to enter the army or to pursue a career in law. Neither your father nor I intended that any of you become a gentleman of leisure.'

Jack permitted himself a small smile. He could not imagine his mother ever allowing one of her sons, or anybody else in her power, the luxury of leisure.

'However,' Mrs Windrush continued, 'I have had to make some alterations.' Her voice hardened as she lifted the next sheet, looking directly at each of her sons in turn as she proclaimed their fate.

'Jack, you will still enter the army, but not in your famous Royals.' She spoke the last word as if it was a curse. 'Instead, you will be commissioned into a different regiment.' There was triumph in her eyes.

'What? Why is that, Mother, pray?' Jack felt the shock strike like a hammer to his heart. There was only one family regiment; no other held any appeal.

'Kindly permit me to finish.' Mrs Windrush chilled him to silence with a single look. He felt all his childhood fears return, although the threat of physical correction was long past. 'William, you are now destined for the army. I have ordered the family lawyer to purchase a commission for you in the Royals.'

William bowed slightly from the waist, while his eyes flicked sideways to meet Jack's, before slowly sliding away. 'Yes, mother.' He accepted the alteration in his fortune so quickly that Jack guessed he had known about the decision in advance.

'Mother!' Jack stepped forward, so he was touching the desk. 'How can this be?'

'Silence!' That single word cracked like a huntsman's whip. 'Adam; you will now take over William's duties in the estate.'

With a glance of mixed apology and sympathy to Jack, Adam bowed his acceptance. 'Yes, mother.'

'Now you may speak, Jack,' Mrs Windrush allowed. She leaned back slightly in her chair, placed her elbows on the desk and pressed the fingers of both hands together. Her eyes were unyielding as ice-covered granite.

'Mother, I have to join the Royals. The eldest son has been commissioned into the Royals for two centuries; why should I be in a different regiment while the second son is in the Royals?' He glanced toward William, who stood with an expression of smug foreknowledge that Jack found extremely disturbing.

'You made one valid point there, Jack, and asked one question, but both are intimately connected.' Save for the deep grooves around her eyes, Mrs Windrush appeared quite relaxed. 'Your point was nearly correct when you said that the eldest son in this family had been commissioned into the Royals for two hundred years. You would have been more accurate to say that the eldest legitimate son has always been commissioned into the Royals.'

For a moment, Jack could only stare at his mother. 'Legitimate?'

Mrs Windrush's smile contained only malice. 'And in this family, the eldest, or more correctly, the elder, legitimate son is William, who we have indeed commissioned into the Royals.'

'But, mother…' Jack was unsure what to say as his world collapsed around him.

'I am not your mother.' The smile was tighter now, the gleam of triumph shattering the ice around the granite eyes. 'And you are not my son. Your mother was a kitchen maid or some such, and you are merely the by-blow of your father's youthful indiscretion.' The smile broadened as if this woman was, at last, revealing something that she had concealed for many years. 'You are an accidental child, Jack, born on the wrong side of the blanket. In short, you are an unwanted little bastard.'

A bastard?

Jack gasped at the disgrace. Five minutes previously, he had expected an honourable career with the finest line regiment in the British Army. He had thought of himself as the eldest son and the heir of one of England's most ancient and honourable families, but now he was merely the bastard son of a kitchen maid, and his future lay in utter tatters.

'As a bastard, of course,' his stepmother was talking again, relishing the roll of her voice around the dishonourable name, her words controlled but her tone full of justified satisfaction, 'as a bastard, you cannot be commissioned into the Royals, or indeed into any decent regiment.' She permitted herself a short snort of derision. 'No gentleman would agree to serve with you.' She paused for a meaningful glance at her elder son. 'However, I did promise your father that I would see you commissioned, so I have purchased you a commission as an ensign into one of the few, one of the very few, regiments that would accept you.'

Shocked at this downturn in his fortunes, Jack waited, saying nothing. Already he felt something alter within him, and he wanted to give no more satisfaction to this woman who no longer acted like his mother. He felt sick; his legs were shaking so much he grabbed hold of the desk to steady himself.

'Don't you want to know which distinguished regiment agreed to have you?' That was deliberate cruelty as Mrs Windrush watched him suffer.

'Yes, mother; if you please.'

'Don't call me mother, Jack. With the death of my husband, your father, we have no remaining relationship. Madam would be better, but Mrs Windrush might be acceptable.'

'But mother…' Jack saw the slight, sneering smile slide onto his step mother's mouth and forced himself to stand upright. 'My apologies, Madam.' Determined to give this suddenly cold stranger as little satisfaction as possible, he gave a formal bow. 'I would be obliged if you could inform me of which regiment my father's money has purchased me a commission.'

The smile vanished. Lifting the still-sealed document from the desk, Mrs Windrush threw it contemptuously across to him. 'There is your commission, sir. My husband's money has bought you the necessary uniforms, and my generosity had added a one-off sum of two hundred guineas. That is all. This family has cared for you for the past eighteen years, but this is the last, and very generous, act of kindness we will do for you. From this minute, you are on your own.'

Lifting the commission, Jack deliberately didn't open it. He had to strike back, for if he left like this, with his tail between his legs, he could no longer look in the mirror. 'This will be a terrible scandal, of course, once it is known.' He allowed the words to hang in the air. He knew there was nothing his step mother dreaded more than a slur on her family name. 'People will talk, and your friends will close their doors once they learn how your husband cuckolded you.'

He felt his stepmother's anger as she half rose from her seat. 'The scandal will rebound on you,' she said softly.

'I have less to lose,' Jack reminded. 'I am only a dishonourable bastard. But if I had, say, a thousand guineas a year in perpetuity, I would certainly have no reason to speak.'

'That's blackmail.' Mrs Windrush sat down again.

Jack lifted the commission. 'You have deliberately twisted the promise of my deceased father, which is as dishonourable an act as I can conceive.'

'Two hundred guineas a year and you promise never to return.'

'Seven hundred and fifty guineas deposited on the first day of February every year and I will never return to Wychwood Manor in your lifetime.' Jack faced her across the width of the desk, forcing himself to act with a strength he did not feel. 'Do we have a contract?'

'The second you resign your commission or set foot on Windrush land again, your money stops.'

'And the first time you fail to pay my money, I will be back.'

Rising from her seat, Mrs Windrush pointed to him, her finger trembling in anger. 'Show this bastard out of our house, William, if you please. We will not see him again.'

'I'll pack my things first.' Jack kept his voice cool-as-you-please. 'And take my money. When I have an address, you can send the rest of my belongings along.' He gave a slight, mocking bow. 'Good day to you, madam, and I hope you can keep your next husband more faithful than your last.'

It was a telling parting shot that did nothing to assuage the sick despair that engulfed him.

Chapter Two

Herefordshire, England, February 1851

Gripping the commission in hands that seemed to have turned to claws, Jack squared his shoulders and stalked from the room. He ignored the stares of the servants and the scornful face of his stepbrother as he gathered such of his possessions as were readily accessible, swept a handful of gold and silver coins into his pocketbook and swept through the entrance hall with its portraits and pillars, its memories and solid grandeur.

Wychwood Manor had been the home of his ancestors for centuries, but now it was lost to him. He was as much a stranger here as any inhabitant of China or Hindustan or the South Sea Islands. The tears began to prickle at the back of his eyes, but he forced them away, for he had no desire to allow his mother or William the satisfaction of knowing how deeply he was hurt.

It was hard to step through the front door beneath the worn Windrush coat of arms, hard to walk down the sweeping entrance stairway for the last time, hard to put on a swagger when all he wanted to do was huddle into his despair. At the end of the driveway he turned for a last long look at the scythe-shorn lawns, the turrets and towers that told of his history, but William stood in the doorway, master of Wychwood Manor, sneering at him over an uncrossable bridge of birth and blood. The sun had eased through the clouds, reflecting on two score windows and highlighting the ancient stonework of his one-time home.

His father's amorous adventures had closed that door, and he was no longer welcome. It would be no good to run screaming back, to beg forgiveness for a sin he had never committed, to plead and cry and grovel, for his stepmother was as bound by convention as she was by law. As a bastard, he was not the legitimate heir, and that was unalterable.

And then it was the sad walk out of the estate and on to the high road that led toward Hereford, with the Malvern Hills greenly familiar behind him and the countryside unfolding for mile after fertile mile. His landscape no longer – he had no place with the one-time tenants of his father's small estate, he would no longer fish the Cradley Brook, no longer sit on the green heights and dream of glory, no longer gallop his horse across the hills or shoot pheasants or wildfowl in the pleasant woods. His past was gone, and his future written in the piece of simply-sealed paper he gripped far too tightly.

After half an hour, the commission was burning a hole in his hand; he had to discover which regiment he was destined to join; he had to know where his future lay. If the famous Royals did not want him, perhaps he was destined for the Buffs or the Rifles; maybe the 24th Foot, a regiment known for hard fighting. They would suit. He must find out, but not here. If he stopped near the Malverns then sure as death somebody would recognise him and ask what he was about; he couldn't face the shame. He would wait until he reached Hereford, many miles away.

The inn was on Church Street, a few scores yards from Hereford Cathedral. Its creaking signboard proclaimed it to be The Gwynne Arms and the black and white exterior was as inviting as the pleasant sounds of men and women talking together. Jack hesitated for only a second; his mother would not approve of him entering such a place. By God, that is as good a reason as any to go in. He pushed open the door. The noise enveloped him like a loving arm, and he eased into a seat in a dusty corner and examined the seal of his commission. It was a simple red blob of wax without even an official crest when he had expected something much grander. Evidently, an ensign counted for less than he had thought, or perhaps some petty clerk could not be concerned to finish his work properly. Breaking the seal, he unfolded the parchment.

At sixteen inches by ten, it was also much smaller than he had expected, and when he read the contents, he felt once more the sick slide of despair. Skipping over the heading that stated that 'the Commander in Chief of the Army reposed special trust and confidence in his loyalty,' he came to the 'do by these presents constitute and appoint you Jack Baird Windrush to take rank and post as Ensign in the 113th Regiment of Foot.'

The 113th Foot.

Jack stared at the fateful number and swore quietly to himself. 'I'm going into the 113th Foot Oh good God in heaven; the Baby Butchers, the lowest of the low.'

The 113th Foot was the regiment that nobody wanted to join. There had been other regiments that bore the same number; the 113th Highlanders who had lasted for two years before being disbanded in 1764, and a later infantry regiment that had been raised and disbanded in 1794. Both these regiments had been excellent, honourable units with no stigma attached; this latest incarnation was not. If his stepmother had wanted her revenge on his illegitimacy to be both hurtful and shameful, she had succeeded. Jack knew little about the 113th , but their nickname of the “Baby Butchers”, was enough to make his heart sink. Leaning back against the plaster wall of the inn, he once again fought the tears that threatened to unman him.

Gaining the seven hundred and fifty guineas a year had been a tiny victory in a day of catastrophic defeat. From being a landowner and officer in one of the finest regiments in the British Army and an income of ten thousand a year, he had descended to an unwanted bastard with a commission in the most inferior of all formations and barely enough money to scrape along as a junior officer, let alone a gentleman. His mother had barred him from his home and the only way of life he knew, and with such a meagre allowance, he would never be able to purchase his way into a decent regiment.

113th Foot!

He heard the song through his gloom, the words familiar from his youth.

'Squire Percy well mounted, away he did ride

James careless with hounds coupled close by his side

Then off to St Margaret's park did repair

For Reynard long time had been harbouring there.'

'And what's the matter with you?'

'I beg your pardon?' Jack looked up. The speaker had been female, with a broad Herefordshire accent; it was the voice of a countrywoman. Jack shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

'I asked what the matter was.' She was dark-headed and perhaps seventeen, with an attractive plumpness that would probably turn to fat within a few years, but which suited her very well at present.

Jack first inclination was to ignore such a personal question from a girl so obviously below him socially, but her smile was friendly, and he needed to talk to somebody. 'I have just lost my family, my status and my life,' he told her. He edged further away when she perched herself on the wooden bench at his side. Her scent of grease and soap and cooking was not unpleasant.

Her sympathy was obvious. 'Was it the fever that killed them?' He flinched as she placed a warm hand on his arm. Her blue eyes prepared to fill with tears on his behalf.

About to explain what had happened, Jack shook his head. He was duty-bound not to speak of his misadventures. 'I'd prefer not to talk about it.'

She patted his arm and snuggled even closer. 'I understand; losing your family is too painful.' Her eyes were soft with sympathy. 'And you sound like a gentleman, too.'

Jack said nothing to that; at that moment, he was unsure exactly what he was. The edge of the bench foiled his attempts to pull away.

'Not talking? Poor little man.' She was smiling again, rubbing her hand along his arm in a very familiar manner. 'They call me Ruth.' Her smile was broader than ever.

'And I am Jack.'

Her kiss took him by surprise; he recoiled and put a hand to his cheek.

'What was that for?'

'Because you needed it,' Ruth told him seriously. 'If somebody needs something, and it's in our power to give it, we should do so. That's in the Bible.' She tried to kiss him again, but he moved aside.

Used to the reserved girls of his class, or shrinking and respectful servants, Jack was unsure how to react. He recoiled slightly until the innkeeper asked if he wanted anything.

'Two tankards of ale, please,' he said, paid with the loose change in his waistcoat pocket and watched Ruth hold the tankard with all the aplomb of a man.

'So you have no family left.' Ruth smiled over the rim of the pot.

'None left now,' Jack agreed. He held up the commission. 'And 'And I'm in the 113th, not the Royals.'

Ruth frowned. 'You're going to be a soldier?'

'An ensign in the 113th.' Jack looked for sympathy but found none.

'You're going to be an officer?' Ruth recoiled slightly as her eyes widened. 'So you've no responsibilities for anybody, and you're going to be an officer? What are you complaining about?' She pulled further away, her smile fading. 'Once you get promoted to a general, you'll have all the money in the world.'

'It's not as easy as that.'

'Life is never easy,' Ruth told him. Her frown made her look older than her years. 'How is it not easy?'

'You have to buy your way up,' Jack began to explain the system.

In common with every officer and potential officer, Jack knew exactly how the system worked. A British Army officer would purchase his commission as an ensign in the infantry or cornet in the cavalry, and then systematically buy his way rank-by-rank until he was in command of a regiment. It was a system that produced men such as Wellington, but one which favoured the wealthy, whether inefficient or not, while even the best of the poor were condemned to fill the most junior ranks unless by some freak of foolhardy bravery they caught the eye of an influential superior.

Jack realised that Ruth was listening intently to him.

'I have not got enough money. I might manage to purchase one step, from ensign to lieutenant in a fourth-rate regiment, but no more. I have to be known.'

'So the toffs have it all their own way then.' Ruth's tone betrayed her opinion of the upper classes. 'Ordinary officers can't get on at all then.'

'Only if they are fortunate and are seen being stupidly brave.'

Those words led Jack to his next logical step. Courage was every bit as important as money to an officer, but here again the wealthy, the aristocracy, held all the advantages. They were brought up to danger in the hunt and hardship at public school; it was part of life. While a private soldier, a sergeant or an unknown officer may spend a lifetime of hardship and courageous acts, he was doomed to be unreported and unknown while every action of an aristocratic officer was gloried over and exalted. The son of General Windrush would be known; Jack's illigitimacy condemned him to anonymity.

Jack heard his words trail away. He was saying far too much to this unknown girl.

It's all the fault of my blasted stepmother!

In some ways, Jack could not blame his stepmother for her attitude. She had, after all, kept her dislike of him nearly hidden for eighteen years when every time she saw him must have been a reminder of her husband's infidelity, but still, he felt sick, discarded and bewildered. He closed his eyes against the shameful tears.

Ruth's voice had a hard edge. 'Look around you, Jack, and tell me what you see.'

He did so. The room was full of weavers and small farmers, a shepherd or two, a group of hirsute Welsh drovers with silver belt buckles and a huddle of women and children. All the people in the inn huddled together in small groups, some eating, some drinking, but all wearing work-worn clothing and with faces bearing traces of hardship and hunger.

'And how many have a chance, even the smallest of chances, of doing what you do? None,' she answered her own question. 'They are born into poverty, live a few reckless years of youth and then grow old toward pauperism.'