None Can Foresee His Arising Ever Again. For He Will Lose the Best Part of His Strength That W
It is a cruel occupation,he wrote, and God aid me, if I am no hero, I am damned good at information technology. You understand, I remember, for I know you are the same.
The quill had left marks on his fingers, so tightly as he'd gripped it. He laid it downwards briefly, rubbing his hand, then took it up again.
God help me further,he wrote, more than slowly. I am afraid.
Afraid of what?
Some arsehole panicked….
I am afraid of everything. Agape of what I may have done, unknowing—of what I might practise. I am afraid of death, of mutilation, incapacity—but whatsoever soldier fears these things, and fights regardless. I have washed it, and—
He wished to write firmly, and will do it again.Instead, the words formed beneath his quill as they formed in his mind; he could not aid merely write them.
I am afraid that I might find myself unable. Non only unable to fight, merely to control.He looked at that for a moment, and put pen tentatively to the paper again.
Have y'all known this fright, I wonder? I cannot remember it, from your outward aspect.
That outward aspect was vivid in his mind; Fraser was a man who would never pass unnoticed. Even during their nearly relaxed and cordial moments, Fraser had never lost his air of command, and when Grey had watched the Scottish prisoners at their work, it was evidently that they regarded Fraser equally their natural leader, all turning to him every bit a matter of course.
And and then, there had been the thing of the fleck of tartan. He felt hot blood wash through him and his stomach clench with shame and anger. Felt the startling thud of a cat-o'-nine-tails on bare flesh, felt it in the pit of his breadbasket, searing the pare between his shoulders.
He close his eyes in reflex, fingers clenching then tightly on the quill that information technology cracked and aptitude. He dropped the ruined feather and sat still a moment, breathing, then opened his optics and reached for some other.
Forgive me,he wrote. And then, hardly pausing, And notwithstanding why should I beg your forgiveness? God knows that information technology was your doing, equally much every bit mine. Betwixt your actions and my duty…But Fraser, too, had acted from duty, even if there was more to the affair. He sighed, crossed out the final bit, and put a period subsequently the words Forgive me.
We are soldiers, you and I. Despite what has lain betwixt united states of america in the by, I trust that…
That we understand one another.The words spoke themselves in his heed, only what he saw was not the understanding of the burdens of command, nor yet a sharing of the unspoken fears that haunted him, sharp every bit the sliver of metallic side by side his heart.
What he saw was that 1 frightful glimpse of nakedness he had surprised in Fraser's face, naked in a way he would wish to see no homo naked, let alone a man such as this.
"I sympathise," he said softly, the audio of the words surprising him. "I wish it were non and so."
He looked downward at the muddled mess of newspaper before him, blotched and crumpled, marked with spider blots of defoliation and regret. It reminded him of that terse annotation, written with a burnt stick. Despite everything, Fraser had given him help when he asked it.
Might he always run across Jamie Fraser again? There was a skillful chance he would not. If hazard did non kill him, cowardice might.
The mania of confession was on him; best brand the most of information technology. His quill had dried; he did not dip it over again.
I honey y'all,he wrote, the strokes light and fast, making scarcely a mark upon the paper, with no ink. I wish information technology were not so.
Then he rose, scooped up the scribbled papers, and, burdensome them into a brawl, threw them into the burn.
Hdue east was unfortunately notdead when he woke in the morning, but wished he were. Every muscle in his body ached, and the ghastly residue of everything he had drunk clung similar dusty fur to the inside of his throbbing head.
Tom Byrd brought him a tray, paused to view the remains, and shook his head in a resigned manner, but said nothing.
Oddly plenty, his hands did not milk shake. Still, he clasped them carefully round his teacup and raised information technology cautiously to his lips. As he did so, he noticed a letter on the tray, sealed with a blob of cherry-red wax, in which the initials SC were incised. Simon Coles.
He sat up, narrowly avoiding spilling the tea, and fumbled open the missive, which proved to contain a cursory note from the lawyer and a sail of paper containing several drawings, with penciled descriptions written tidily beneath. Descriptions of the bits of jewelry that Anne Thackeray had taken with her when she eloped with Philip Lister.
"Tom," Grey croaked.
"Aye, me lord?"
"Go tell the stable lad to fix the horses, then pack. We'll get out in an hour."
Both Tom'southward eyebrows lifted, but he bowed.
"Very good, me lord."
He had hoped to escape from Blackthorn Hall unnoticed, and was in the act of depositing a gracious note of cheers—pleading urgent business concern every bit excuse for his sharp removal—on Edgar'southward desk-bound, when a vocalization spoke suddenly backside him.
"John!"
He whirled, guilt stamped upon his features, to find Maude in the doorway, a garden trug over one arm, filled with what looked similar onions simply were probably daffodil bulbs or something agricultural of the sort.
"Oh. Maude. How pleased I am to see you lot. I idea I should have to accept my leave without expressing my cheers for your kindness. How fortunate—"
"Y'all're leaving us, John? So soon?"
She was a alpine woman, and handsome, her nighttime expert looks a proper friction match for Edgar's. Maude'southward eyes, nevertheless, were non those of a poetess. Something more than in the nature of a gorgon'due south, he had ever felt; riveting the attention of her auditors, even though all instinct bade them flee.
"I…yep. Yes. I received a letter—" He had Coles's note with him, and flourished it equally evidence. "I must—"
"Oh, from Mr. Coles, of course. The butler told me he had brought y'all a note, when he brought me mine."
She was looking at him with a most unaccustomed fondness, which gave him a pocket-size chill up the dorsum. This increased when she moved suddenly toward him, setting bated her trug, and cupped a manus behind his head, looking searchingly into his eyes. Her breath was warm on his cheek, smelling of fried egg.
"Are you certain you are quite well enough to travel, my dear?"
"Ahh…yes," he said. "Quite. Quite sure." God in heaven, did she mean to buss him?
Thank God, she did not. After examining his face feature by characteristic, she released him.
"Yous should have told us, yous know," she said reproachfully.
He managed a vaguely interrogative noise in respond to this, and she nodded toward the desk. Where, he now saw, the newspaper cut referring to him every bit the Hero of Crefeld was displayed in all its celebrity, forth with a notation in Simon Coles'due south handwriting.
"Oh," he said. "Ah. That. It really—"
"We had not the slightest idea," she said, looking at him with what in a bottom woman would have passed for doe-eyed respect. "You are and so modest, John! To think of all you have suffered—it shows so clearly upon your haggard eyebrow—and to say not a word, even to your family!"
Information technology was a cold day and the library fire had not been lit, but he was get-go to experience very warm. He coughed.
"There is, of course, a certain caste of exaggeration—"
"Nonsense, nonsense. But of course, your natural nobility of character causes you to shun public acclaim, I understand entirely."
"I knew you would," Grey said, giving upward. They beamed at each other for a few seconds; then he coughed again and made purposefully to pass her.
Source: https://litlife.club/books/171204/read?page=53
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