Barbara glanced towards the bed; the Colonel was lying still at last, sunk in a heavy stupor. ‘Very well,’ she said in a deadened tone. ‘I will do as you wish.’
Judith led her away, with an arm round her waist. Barbara went unresistingly, but by the time they had reached her room such a fit of shuddering had seized her that Judith was alarmed. She forced her to sit down in a chair, while she ran to fetch her smelling-salts and the hartshorn. When she came back, the shudders had given place to dry sobs that seemed to convulse Barbara’s whole body. She contrived to make her swallow a dose of hartshorn and water, and got her upon the bed, and sat with her till she was a little calmer. Barbara gasped: ‘Oh, do not stay! Go back to him! This is nothing!’
‘Worth will send if he needs me. Only tell me where I may find your laudanum drops.’
‘Never! He did not like me to!’
‘In such a case as this he could have no objection!’
‘No, I tell you! See, I am better; I wish you to go back.’
Judith drew the quilt up over her shoulders. ‘I will go, if it will relieve your mind. There, my dear, do not look like that! He will recover, and you will both be so happy together!’ She bent, and kissed Barbara, and had the satisfaction of seeing the dreadful pallor grow less deathly. ‘I shall come back in a little while to see how you go on,’ she promised, and, setting the candle where its tongue of light would not worry Barbara’s eyes, went softly back to Colonel Audley’s room.
Barbara returned to the sick-room shortly after six o’clock. Judith came forward to meet her, saying in a low tone. ‘We think him better. The pulse is not so tumultuous. There has been a good deal of restlessness, but you see he is quiet now. Oh, my dear, such glorious news! Bonaparte has been utterly overthrown and the whole French Army put to rout! Worth sent round to Sir Charles Stuart’s an hour ago, and he had just himself heard from General Alten of our complete victory! You must know that Alten was brought in, severely wounded, very late last night, but had left instructions with one of his aides-de-camp to let him know the result of the battle at the earliest opportunity. The news reached him at three o’clock.’
‘The French Army routed!’ Barbara repeated. ‘Good God, is it possible? Oh, if anything can make Charles recover, it must be that news!’
‘You shall tell him when he wakes,’ Judith said. ‘I am going to bed for an hour or so. Worth has gone off to shave and change his clothes, but his man is just outside if you should need any assistance. But indeed, my dear, Charles is better.’
She went away. Barbara took her vacated chair by the bedside, and sat watching the Colonel. He lay quiet, except for the occasional twitching of his hand. She felt it softly, and found it, though still dry and hot, no longer burning to the touch. Satisfied, she folded her own hands in her lap, and sat without moving, waiting for him to awaken.
A few minutes after seven he stirred. A deep sigh broke the long silence; he opened his eyes, clouded with sleep, and gave a stifled groan. His hand moved; Barbara took it in hers and lifted it to her lips. He looked at her, blankly for a moment, then with recognition creeping into his eyes, and, with it, the ghost of his old smile. ‘Why Bab!’ he said, in a very faint voice. ‘You’ve come back to me!’
Tears hung on her lashes; she slipped to her knees, and laid her cheek against his. ‘You have come back to me, Charles. I shall never let you go again.’
He put his arm weakly around her, and turned his head on the pillow to kiss her.
Twenty-Six
For a minute everything was forgotten in the passing away of all bitterness and grief between them. Neither spoke: explanations were not needed; for each all that signified was that they were together again.
Barbara raised her head at last, and taking the Colonel’s face between her hands, looked deep into his eyes, her own more beautiful through the mist of tears that filled them than he had ever seen them. ‘My darling!?
?? she whispered.
He smiled wearily, but as fuller consciousness returned to him, his thoughts turned from her. ‘The battle? They were massing for an attack.’
‘It is over. The French have been overthrown: their whole Army is in full retreat.’
A flush of colour came into his drawn face. ‘Boney’s beat! Hurrah!’
She rose from her knees and moved away to measure out the medicine that the surgeon had left for him. When she came back to the bedside the Colonel was lying with his hand across his eyes, and his lips gripped tightly together. Her heart was wrung, but she said only: ‘Here is a horrid potion for you to swallow, dear love.’
He did not answer, but when she slid her arm under him to raise him, he moved his hand from his eyes, and said in a carefully matter-of-fact voice: ‘I remember now. I’ve lost my arm.’
‘Yes, dear.’
He drank the dose she was holding to his mouth, leaning against her shoulder. As she lowered him again on to the pillows, he said with an effort: ‘It’s a lucky thing it was only my left. It has been a most unfortunate member. I was wounded in it once before.’
‘In that case, we will say good riddance to it. Oh, my love, my love, does it hurt you very much?’
‘Oh no! Nothing to signify,’ he answered, lying gallantly.
He seemed as though he would sink back into the half-sleep, half-swoon which had held him for so long, but presently he opened his eyes, and turned them towards Barbara with an expression in them of painful anxiety. ‘Gordon? Have you heard?’
‘Only that he had been wounded.’
He was obliged to be satisfied, but she saw that although his eyes were closed again he was fully awake. She said, taking his hand between hers: ‘We shall know presently.’