* * *
She was waiting for him at the dock in London two days later when his ship came into port with the tide.
Alyssa’s teeth chattered as she stood in the cold, early morning breeze, flanked on one side by Lord and Lady Weymouth and the Prince of Wales and on the other side by Viscount Grantham and the prime minister. Directly behind Alyssa stood her mother and father, her sisters and their husbands. Behind them were the relatives and friends of the other men aboard HMS Semaphore.
Griffin’s ship was supposed to have been met only by the family and friends of the men aboard it, but the Prince of Wales’s and the prime minister’s appearance at the wharf had dashed that possibility.
It seemed that much of London had turned out to witness the arrival of England’s new hero. She glanced over her shoulder as the sailors aboard HMS Semaphore prepared to lower the gangway.
A crowd of well-wishers and onlookers stood behind the wooden barricades. The barricades were in place because the Prince Regent, like all royals since the revolution in France, had a fear of crowds and mobs. He had made it a practice wherever he went to have barricades erected and to use the Horse Guards to keep the crowd at bay.
The crowd gathered at the docks this morning didn’t appear to pose a danger to the regent, but the barricades kept the people behind them from rushing forward to greet the disembarking passengers.
The noise of the crowd alerted her. Alyssa looked up as the soldiers and sailors began disembarking from the ship. Viscount Grantham reached down and gave her gloved hand a reassuring squeeze.
The ambulatory passengers were the first to leave, followed by those who required assistance, the bedridden, and finally, the gravely wounded.
Griffin was among the last of the ambulatory passengers to make his way down the gangway. Lord Shepherdston and Eastman closely followed him.
He was easy to recognize. His height set him apart from most of the other passengers, and Griffin wore the distinctive dress uniform of His Majesty’s own Eleventh Blues.
He hadn’t yet spotted them, and Alyssa took the opportunity to feast upon the sight of him and take careful note of the changes.
The sun had burnished his face and neck, but Alyssa could see that he was pale and thin. His coat hung on his muscular frame, clearly marking the loss of a stone or more of weight. His right arm was confined to a sling. He held a cane in his left hand, using it to support his weight as he inched his way down the ramp. His lush lower lip was compressed into a firm, determined line. He struggled valiantly to hide it, but anyone who knew Griffin could see that he was clearly suffering from the pain of his wounds and fighting the effects of overexertion.
“Jesus!” Colin breathed, squeezing Alyssa’s hand once again, but this time more to comfort himself than to comfort her. “He looks as if he’s aged five years.”
Alyssa agreed. Griffin was still one of the most handsome men she had ever seen, but he bore little physical resemblance to the man who had left for the Peninsula fourteen months earlier.
This Griffin was leaner, harder, and the look in his eyes was that of an old man, one who had lost .the sweet innocence of youth and desperately needed to recapture a glimpse of it. Alyssa shivered at the look of guilty anguish she saw on his face.
Lady Weymouth began to cry.
“Griffin!” Lord Weymouth called to his son as he patted his wife on the shoulder in a heartfelt gesture of comfort.
Refusing to greet him with tears in her eyes, Alyssa blinked them back and welcomed him with a smile.
Recognizing the sound of his father’s voice above the noise of the crowd, Griffin turned his head sharply to his left and scanned the faces of the people below. “Where are they?” he demanded, squinting into the morning sun. “I can’t see them.”
“There!” Jarrod pointed. “A bit farther to the left at the end of the red carpet beside Prime Minister Sir Spencer Perceval and the Prince of Wales.”
Griffin recognized the dandily dressed and increasingly corpulent form of the Prince Regent first and then fixed his gaze on his parents, who were standing beside him. “She’s crying,” he said softly. “I have become a hero, and my mother is crying—and in the presence of His Royal Highness.”
“Of course she’s crying,” Jarrod replied in a tone of voice just above a whisper. “I’d cry, too, if I had to stand beside His Highness. Good Lord! Look at his breeches. That shade of green is enough to make anyone cry. Especially a woman of your mother’s exceptional taste.” Jarrod smiled at Griffin and was rewarded, for a split second, by a ghost of his friend’s old smile.
Behind them, Eastman coughed to keep from snickering. Jarrod turned to face his friend. “Those are tears of relief, you big oaf. Your mother missed you something fierce, and she’s terribly grateful to have you home safe and sound.”
“And only a little bit worse for wear.” Griffin said the right thing, but his voice was tight with strain, and his smile was patently artificial. Looking back down at his parents, he caught sight of Alyssa shivering in the cold and sucked in a breath.
“I feel much better,” Jarrod remarked dryly.
“You feel better?” Griffin challenged.
“Yes, indeed,” Jarrod retorted. “Now, I know you’re still alive.”
Griffin shot his friend a nasty look.
Jarrod ignored it. “I was beginning to wonder. It’s about time you took notice of your bride.”
“I didn’t expect her,” Griffin said. “I thought she’d be waiting at the manor where I left her.” The way I left her. He recalled the way Alyssa had looked lying in bed with her hair fanned out across the pillows, the rosy tip of one breast peeking out from beneath the sheets.
“Nearly all of London turns out for your arrival home, and you think your wife is going to wait in the country? Not likely,” Jarrod said.
“I haven’t written in weeks,” Griffin admitted. “Not since…” He took a deep breath. “I didn’t ask her to meet me. I didn’t know when I was coming home or if she—”
“You didn’t write to tell her you were coming home?” Griffin shook his head.
“You would have left her at the manor?”
Griff nodded.
“Then it’s a bloody good thing your father sent for her. You’re a hero, Griff. I know you didn’t want a wife before you left, but you got one, whether you wanted one or not. And since you’ve got one, do yourself a favor and remember that a woman will forgive you just about anything so long as you don’t do anything to embarrass or humiliate her in public. If you had allowed her to miss all of this”—Jarrod waved his arm to encompass the celebratory crowd— “you would have publicly humiliated her.”
“Who made you a bloody authority on wives?” Griffin retorted, suddenly ashamed of himself for being so caught up in his own feelings that he’d forgotten about Alyssa’s.
“I’m not a bloody authority on wives,” Jarrod replied. “I’m a bloody authority on women. And on that point, they’re all alike from the lowest whore to the highest born lady. There’s a great deal of truth to that woman-scorned proverb. Don’t ever humiliate or embarrass them in front of their friends, family, or peers.”
“I didn’t think…” Griff broke off, drinking in the sight of her. Her deep-brimmed bonnet hid most of her face from view, but there was no hiding her form as the brisk wind plastered her cloak against her body, outlining its curves. “Damn, but she’s beautiful!”
“She is that,” Jarrod agreed.
Griffin shot him another nasty look.
“But she is out of reach. She’s married you know,” Jarrod continued as if Griffin hadn’t just warned him about poaching. “To a friend of mine. And no matter how beautiful the gardener or how ripe the temptation, or how big the arse that owns it, I don’t tend my friends’ gardens.” He returned Griffin’s nasty look. “I can admire without wanting, Griff. And there’s everything to admire about Lady Abernathy.” He gave Griffin a little push as they reached the bottom of the gangway. “Go to
her.”
Griffin limped toward Alyssa as a cheer went up from the crowd.
“Do you think that’s wise, sir?” Eastman leaned close to Jarrod.
Griffin’s valet had been with him nearly every moment since he’d recovered him from the battlefield at Fuentes de Oñoro. He knew the damage Griffin had suffered and knew the extent of his physical wounds and knew that while the physical wounds were well on the way to mending, the emotional wounds he’d suffered were far from healed.
Jarrod hadn’t been privy to all of Griffin’s suffering, but he’d seen enough to recognize that at the moment, Griffin was hanging on to his composure by sheer force of will. There had been times during the crossing from Spain that Jarrod had thought Griffin’s reason had left him. “I honestly don’t know,” Jarrod said. “But if she can’t help heal him, no one can.”
Alyssa watched, unable to take her gaze off him, as Griffin limped toward her. She wanted to run into his arms, but her feet stayed firmly rooted in place.
“Go on,” Colin urged quietly, placing his hand at the small of her back. “Go to him. He needs you.”
She gave Grantham a grateful smile, then moved toward Griffin.
But the Prince of Wales stepped forward at the same time. “Welcome home, Lord Abernathy, our brave and true hero, our most beloved right trusty cousin.” The Prince Regent embraced Griffin, kissing him on both cheeks after the Continental fashion.
The crowd roared its approval as the regent embraced the hero of Fuentes de Oñoro.
Griffin looked over the prince’s shoulder to where Alyssa stood behind him. He’d been within a few feet of having his wife in his arms once again and ended up being embraced by the Prince of Wales. “Highness.” Griffin bowed.
The prince released Griffin, then clapped his hands together in delight. “We’ve arranged a small dinner party in your honor, Lord Abernathy. Tonight at Carlton House. You and Lady Abernathy, your parents and Lady Abernathy’s parents are to be our guests at tonight’s celebration.”
“Sir, I’m deeply honored—” Griffin began.
“No more honored than we are to welcome England’s newest hero to our home.” The prince stepped back, then beckoned Alyssa forward.
She curtsied before the regent.
He took her hand and raised her to her feet, then kissed her cheeks. “We shall be most honored to welcome you and your dear husband to Carlton House tonight, Lady Abernathy.”
“Thank you for your gracious invitation, sir,” she answered.
“Your Highness,” Griffin tried again. “I had hoped to convalesce in the country.”
The Prince of Wales grinned. “Nonsense, sir! We are in the midst of the season, and everyone shall want to see you. You must stay in London until we arrange the ceremony of the awarding of the Order of the Garter.”
Griffin bit his tongue to keep from groaning aloud. “As you wish, Your Royal Highness.”
“We shall expect you at ten of the clock this evening,” the prince said.
Alyssa curtsied once more, then stepped back, making way so that the prince might present Sir Spencer Perceval to Griffin, then speak to Lord and Lady Weymouth, and to her parents, to Eastman, Shepherdston, and Grantham.
When he was done, the Horse Guards cleared a path through the crowd for the Prince Regent and the prime minister to follow back to Pall Mall.
“Alyssa…” Griffin held out his hand as he breathed her name.
“Griffin…” She responded in kind.
His fingers brushed hers, and a spark of electricity shot through them.
Lord Weymouth walked over and cleared his throat. “Plenty of time for that once we get you home and completely recovered. No need to provide a spectacle for the crowd.”
Lady Weymouth joined her husband, then reached up and embraced her son.
“Let’s go home,” Lord Weymouth said. “You need your rest, son.” He frowned. “For you’ve received a royal summons to appear at Carlton House for dinner.”
Heaving a heavy sigh, Lady Weymouth linked one of her arms through Griffin’s and linked her other arm through Alyssa’s, drawing them close to her. “I was hoping for a quiet evening spent with our immediate family,” Lady Weymouth said, making eye contact with Jarrod and Colin, automatically including them as immediate family. “But it appears that we’re going to be joined by two or three hundred of our closest friends and enemies. Come, children, we’ll all need time to prepare for the evening ahead.”
Chapter Twenty-nine
“I worry that I shall never see a crowd of people without recalling the hours I lay helpless on a battlefield in a small village on the Spanish and Portuguese border.”
—Griffin, Lord Abernathy, journal entry, 04 July 1811