“Amanda,” she breathed quickly.
Many had speculated that George had married the widow Martha Custis for her money alone—there had been many more attractive and younger women available to him at the time. Amanda realized instantly what Washington had seen in the woman. As the older woman welcomed her with a kiss and hug, Amanda was enveloped by an overwhelming sense of warmth. There was a kindness in her light eyes that was unmistakable. She attracted just like the comforting heat of a fire.
“Damien, you rascal, you disappear and return with two beautiful young ladies!” Washington called. “Lady Geneva, welcome. Good God, Cameron, shouldn’t we have them in out of the cold. And you too, Monsieur Bisset. Do come on in. All that we have is yours, however meager that may be!”
“We’ve brought supplies from Cameron Hall,” Amanda said softly. She thought of the meat and grain and coffee and tobacco in the barrels and chests aboard the wagon, and she thought of the thousands of men here. It would hardly make a dent.
“Amanda?”
Eric reached out a hand to her at last, stepping forward. His fingers curled around hers and he drew her close, kissing her coolly upon the cheek. He asked her quickly about the twins and she said that they were well. Then he led her inside, and she instantly stiffened.
Anne Marie was there, standing by a coffeepot that heated over the hearth fire.
“Amanda!” Anne Marie came forward, kissing her swiftly on the cheek. Amanda tried to smile in return. Damien and Geneva and the Washingtons were entering, and it seemed that everyone was talking at once. Anne Marie hugged her.
“So you have been fighting this war with the men, have you?” Amanda asked sweetly.
“I’ve followed Father from the very beginning,” Anne Marie agreed. “I should say, since he decided to cast in with the patriots. I’d no real idea for the longest time just which way we were meant to go.”
“This is a horrible place to be,” Washington said suddenly, softly. “Horrible. I’ve eleven thousand men here. Of that number, almost three thousand are without shoes or are half naked, and Congress tells me there is nothing to be given my men, nothing to be done. Ah, ladies, you should not be here.”
“Oh, posh!” Mrs. Washington protested. “If I did not see you, Mr. Washington, in your winter quarters, why, then I should have no husband at all.”
“I wonder if I do have one at all,” Amanda said sweetly. The company about them laughed; Eric did not.
“Well, we’ve something of a stew to eat tonight,” Anne Marie said. “Please, everyone, sit. We’ll have something.”
Amanda felt acutely uncomfortable, a guest in her husband’s living quarters, while Anne Marie was the very comfortable hostess. She held tight to her temper, noting as she sat that a woman’s cloak was upon the crude peg by the door and that there seemed to be other signs of constant feminine occupation of the hut, such as the lace dusters on the table sills. The main room consisted of the hearth, a large raw center table, and some poorly crafted chairs. There was a doorway leading to a second room. It was cracked open and Amanda could see a rope bed within it, covered it by a thin green blanket. There were trunks and a desk within the bedroom too, but everything seemed sparse and empty and cold.
She caught Eric’s eyes. A trace of amusement flickered across them, as if he thought that she had surveyed her surroundings and found them entirely lacking. As if she were wishing that she had not come.
Well, she was not. Reckless and irritated, she tossed back a stray curl and bent her head to listen to General Washington as he spoke, assuring Damien had they had come from hard times before. “And curious pieces of luck have been ours, as if God does smile upon us now and then. Monsieur Bisset, did you know that we barely reached Trenton? We did so by a play of card, can you imagine? Colonel Johann Rail was playing poker on Christmas Eve, and was so engrossed that when a messenger handed him a warning that we were launching a surprise attack, he merely shoved it into his pocket. The note was discovered only after the attack, when the colonel lay dead.”
“One might say,” Damien joked, “General, that you were the one holding the full house.”
“Ah, yes. But how fickle is life, eh?”
“How fickle indeed,” Geneva murmured.
“You see,” Mrs. Washington said, rising to ladle out the stew, “God is on our side. We’ve only to wait and see!”
She was a determined woman, determined to make the night go smoothly. Baron Von Steuben, another volunteer to the American cause, arrived, and was fed, and explained some kind of a military tactic to the men. The hour grew late. Mrs. Washington told Geneva that they had an extra room where she might sleep while other arrangements were being made, and people began to leave. “I guess Jacques and I get the floor out here, eh, Lord Cameron?” Damien asked. There was still that edge to his voice.
“It’s the best I have to offer,” Eric replied, his tone cool in return.
“I must get back,” Anne Marie said.
“I will escort you,” Eric told her. He didn’t glance toward Amanda as he took his great cloak from the peg. Anne Marie said good-bye to Amanda, then walked out into the cold wind. It buffeted her. Amanda gritted her teeth as she saw Eric reach for the woman instantly, catching her arm.
What went on here? She wanted to be reasonable, and logical, but he spent years calling her a liar and traitor, while he had always had another woman right behind him while he went to war.
And now Jacques and Damien were both in the main room, and unless she chose to cast aside her pride totally and have an argument that would draw them all in, she had no choice but to smile and say good night sweetly and walk into her husband’s bedroom. She wanted to throw something—and preferably right at Eric!
She removed the blanket from his bed and sat down by the fire, drawing the blanket around her. Twenty minutes later she heard the door open and then slam closed, and then she heard Eric speaking softly with Jacques. She smiled, hoping that he imagined her eagerly awaiting him. He would find things far different.
But she never knew what he imagined. The door opened and he stood there, pulling off his gloves. His eyes fell upon her with little surprise. Coming in, he closed the door softly and leaned against it.
“So you rode in winter wind all this way to come and sleep upon a cold dirty hearth,” he said at last.
She rose to her knees, holding the blanket about her, nudging a log with a crude iron poker. “No, my lord Cameron. I did not come all this way to do so—but rather I arrived here and found it the expedient thing.”
He swore impatiently and crossed the floor to her, catching her hands and dragging her to her feet. “What are you talking about?” he demanded harshly.
“Anne Marie,” she said flatly.
His lip curled slightly. “Ah.”
“Ah! And that is all that you have to say?”
“What can I say? I’m sure that Damien has sliced me to ribbons on that matter, quite competently.”
Amanda jerked from his touch. Cold, she swallowed and forced herself to raise her chin. “You’ve nothing to say in defense.”
“I’ve much to say. I’ve never touched her—all right, that’s not exactly true. I kissed her once. When I had been told that you had sold out my inheritance and my marriage. And once again, quite innocently, before I left for France.” He leaned against the wall, crossing his arms over his chest, watching her. “Of anything else, I am innocent.”
“Damien—”
“Damien is ever loyal to you, and he has not forgiven me the first.”
Her knees were trembling. She was afraid that she would completely lose her temper, that she would cry out in frustration and anger and pain. She could not tell if he was telling the truth or not, she knew only that they had been apart again and he was not glad to see her. “I don’t believe you,” she whispered.
“Amanda, my God—” He took a step impatiently toward her. She raised a hand against him and despite herself, her voice was high and close
to tears.
“You’ve never believed me, Eric. Well, this time, my lord, I am afraid that I do not believe you! Don’t touch me.”
“Amanda—”
“I mean it, Eric!”
He went still, his eyes narrowing. “Am I to be punished then, dear wife? Denied your charms and my rights?”
“My lord Cameron, I’m well aware that your life was far from empty before I entered into it—”
“Regretfully entered into it.”
“You had an affair with Geneva!”
He seemed slightly surprised, but shrugged, and she felt ill and jealous and couldn’t help but imagine that he was lying. He and Sir Thomas had been partners, and he and Anne Marie …
“Amanda, I can hardly be blamed—”
“You had a wicked reputation, Eric!” she reminded him.
He laughed softly. “Amanda, my God, we are talking about years ago—”
“I don’t believe you!”
“Well, I will be damned! Amanda, come here!”
“No! I don’t want you touching me tonight!” she vowed heatedly.
She heard the grate of his teeth and then he smiled very slowly. “Ah, yes, I am supposed to take care because your cousin and your—because Damien and Jacques sleep outside the doorway. Well, Amanda, don’t fool yourself. If I wanted—if I chose, Amanda!—I would seize upon you here and now, and that would be that, and I would not give a damn if the whole of the camp was aware of it.”
He took two long steps toward her. A scream nearly tore from her as his hands landed firmly upon her and she was lifted up and tossed upon the narrow bunk. “Oh, you bastard!” she hissed to him.
But he backed away from her then and bowed deeply. “You may have the bed. And you shall have things, milady, just as you wish them. You needn’t sleep on the floor. I shall find another place to lay my head!”
With that he slammed out of the room. Amanda watched him, then she turned over and cried softly into the pillow. There would never be a good time for them, she thought. Never more than brief moments when passion drew them together. She could not even grasp at the straws anymore.…
She had come here. And she was alone.
Walking out in the cold snow, Eric quickly determined that he had been a fool. When he thought that Damien had sown the seeds of discontent and suspicion so thoroughly over such a rather sad incident, he felt fury fill him. And when she had pulled away from him, as if his touch made her shudder like something that crept and crawled upon the earth, he had known that he had to walk away. Walk away, when he had thought of nothing but lying down beside her, with her naked flesh beneath him.…
He groaned aloud and paused in the night, patting the nose of the packhorse that had drawn the cart from Cameron Hall. The horses had been unharnessed, but the crates still remained unpacked. He looked over the wagon and smiled. They were desperate at Valley Forge. They spent the days and nights drilling—and foraging for food. There were so many men to feed. They deserted daily. He did not blame them. He didn’t know how many times he had wanted to leave the bitter cold of Pennsylvania and ride back to the Tidewater where winter was ever so much milder. Where his home and children awaited him. Where a well-crafted fire and decent food could be had. Home, to Amanda, to a chance at their marriage.
And now she was here, and like an ass, he had walked away from her. His fingers wound into fists. Damn her! He had spent bitter-cold, lonely nights alone again and again. She had been in his dreams forever and ever, and now …
Now he was too proud to go back. “Damn her!” he whispered. And then he sobered. She thought that he had been cold. That he hadn’t wanted her, that he had, perhaps, been having an affair with Anne Marie.
She didn’t understand. There were many men who still did not trust her. Rumor from Virginia had reached the whole of the army, and Nigel Sterling’s daughter was still known as a Tory—whether she had truly changed her coat or not.
And that he did not know if he could believe himself.
He grated his teeth hard and swore out loud, his breath creating a mist upon the night. He wasn’t going back. Not until she asked him.
Or not until his slender hold upon sanity did break, and he swept her heedlessly into his arms.
A week later Amanda was working in the huge sickbay, bringing water to the countless men down with smallpox. It was terrifying just to see the men stretched out before her—there were so many men ill, thousands of them.
She wiped her brow, offered a Connecticut rifleman an encouraging smile, and moved on to the next bed. Hands suddenly slipped about her waist and a whisper touched her ear. “Well, cousin, he is not sleeping with the illustrious Anne Marie. Her father came home from his foraging expedition the same night that you arrived, and I know Sir Thomas Mabry very well. Nothing illicit is taking place in that hut!”
Amanda swung around in dismay. “Damien, I did not ask you—”
“Oh? You’re not curious as to where your husband is sleeping?”
“No, I’m not!” Amanda lied.
Damien made a tsking noise at her. She sighed impatiently, noted that one of her patients was burning up, and hurried back to the barrel to moisten a towel for his forehead. “Damien, I’m busy here.”
Damien leaned against a support pole. “Well, the last three days he has been out foraging. And I think that I know where he was before then.”
“Oh?”
“But then, you’re not interested.”
She kicked him as hard as she could in the shin. “Damien—”
“With Von Steuben. Von Steuben is brilliant—I think that he might whip us into a viable fighting force after all. Well, if enough of us live. But Eric knows Indians—and the Brits have half the Mohawk tribes on our tails. So they’ve much to talk about, you see.”
“I see,” she said, then she paused, because she knew where her husband was at that moment—standing just inside the doorway, watching her with Damien.
“Ah, Major General Lord Cameron!” Damien said quickly. He saluted sharply and disappeared through the sickbay. Amanda watched him, winding his way through the endless makeshift cots and the various women and doctors who moved about the room. Then she felt a rough hand upon her arm. She swung around once more to find that Eric had come to her, his expression was grim.
“What are you doing in here?”
“Why, I’m trying to help—” she began.
“These men have smallpox!” he reminded her.
She smiled. “I had it. Damien and I both had it as children, and they say that if you survive—” She paused. “What are you doing in here?”
“Trying to get you out.”
A man groaned on his pallet. “Lord Cameron! Eh, sir, we’re about ready to ride again, eh?”
The man was feverish; his eyes were bleary, but they had touched upon Eric with something like adoration. And Eric patted the man’s shoulder, heedless of disease, and assured him with a smile. “No, Roger, we’re not ready to ride. Not until spring. But Von Steuben is waiting for you, have no fear. He’ll drill you to the ground once you’re up and about. I promise you, lad.”
The sick man laughed. His eyes rolled, then fell shut. “My God, I think he’s died!” Amanda said miserably.
Eric felt the man’s heart, then touched his forehead. “No, he’s just breathing easy again. Von Steuben may get his hands on the boy yet.”
He straightened, staring at Amanda. She wanted to say something to him, anything to bring him back. But words would not come. She couldn’t apologize—he owed her the apologies, and he would never see it, and never admit it.
And he was standing in the smallpox ward!
“Get out of here, Eric!”
“Come with me. I want to talk to you.”
She sighed and looked around. There were many women in the room. Wives, sisters, daughters—and lovers and whores. The officers’ ladies, the poor privates’ women, some in velvet and lace, and some in homespun. Tears suddenly stung her eyes, and she
realized that in a way, that was what it was all about. The colonies had joined, and the people had joined. If the war was won, it would be a new land indeed, with a new society and new look at life. Here a man could aspire to greatness no matter his birth. A blacksmith could fight alongside the landed gentry. The country would belong to all of them, the wives, the sisters, the daughters, the lovers and the whores.
“Amanda?”
“I’m coming.” She untied her apron and hurried out of the sickbay with Eric. The weather had not improved. The wind came scurrying furiously about her and she shivered. Eric quickly swept his greatcoat about her and headed her toward the open stables. She felt his arm about her, her heart quickening as she walked.
He drew her into the stable. Not far from them a smithy’s fire burned and hammering could be heard as a harness was repaired. Amanda leaned against the rough wooden wall, watching Eric, waiting.
“What?” she demanded.
He smiled. “Do you know where Howe’s men are spending their winter?”
She stiffened. “In Philadelphia.”
“Mmm. Twenty-eight miles from here. Some of our men were discovered foraging and taken prisoner. God knows, maybe they’ll fare better with the Brits than they do here, but most men still count the cost of freedom high.”
“Why are you telling me this!” she exclaimed.
“Because someone is getting information through to the British.”
She gasped, astounded. She’d barely been away from the place, except to ride out with Damien one afternoon. Her voice was low and trembling with fury when she spoke. “I do not believe that you would dare to accuse me again!”
“Amanda—”
She shoved at his chest as hard as she could, feeling tears well behind her eyes. “Don’t! Don’t speak to me, don’t come near me, don’t you throw your foul accusation at me anymore! Damn you!”
She ran away from him, ignoring his voice as he shouted to her to come back. She didn’t care who saw them, she didn’t care who heard. She was certain that most of the camp knew that he spent his nights away from his wife anyway.
Gasping, she tore back to their hut. Jacques was within, sitting on a bench, cleaning muskets. He looked up sharply when she entered.