Aleksey's Kingdom (A Royal Affair #2)(38)

“Ack, since when did you actually take charge? You’ve been playing with it, Niko, to spare Major Parkinson’s feelings. Do not think I have not noticed. You boss me around more in five minutes than you have told him what to do once.”

I leaned against him for a moment—one soldier to another and nothing anyone could suspect. Then we pulled apart. I gave him a considered look. “Are you all right?”

He nodded. “I loved him. He is gone. I do not see that there is much more to say. The rest stays in my heart. What are we going to do about this horrible situation now?”




WE DID what we should have done in the first place: we disabused the officers of their opinion of Mary Wright’s virtue. Clearly this was not an easy thing to do. No man likes to impugn a virtuous young woman or hear of one being so denounced, and I suspected they would not like it either. I did not need to nominate Aleksey to be the bearer of such news—he volunteered. Swift to assess the various personalities of the other men, he picked Rochester to approach. Win him over and the others would follow.

“Sir. A word.”

The captain was attempting to release the swaying ropes from the tree branch and naturally was not in the mood for conversation. Aleksey waited politely for him to complete his task and then laid a hand upon his arm.

I never appreciated other men admiring Aleksey, viewing such approaches as a starving man might a hand moving toward his plate of food, but in this case, I was glad the officer was smitten. He acquiesced to being pulled a little away from our companions where we could speak privately.

“Mrs. Wright approached me a few nights ago and offered herself to me in a wanton and brazen manner.” I was almost too astonished by this blatant lie to hear the rest of Aleksey’s speech, but just as suddenly it occurred to me that in all particulars it was not a lie, and that in the urgency of the moment, Aleksey had sacrificed his own sense of honor, his absolute adherence to the truth, in favor of expediency. If I had told the tale of spurning Mary Wright’s advances, my lack of familiarity with this man would have slowed his acceptance of the story. Aleksey’s word was unimpeachable. I loved him all the more for this sacrifice. “When I rebuffed her, she attempted to claim to my colleague, Doctor Hartmann, who came across us, that I had approached her in a lewd and ungodly manner. Doctor, is this not so?” I nodded. It was all I could do. Fluency of tongue such as Aleksey had just displayed was beyond me.

The captain eyed us both for a moment. “Why the devil would she do such a thing? If what you say is true, then—” Poor man. It had clearly just occurred to him that he had hung two innocent men.

Aleksey nodded sadly, as if the failings of a mere woman were a mystery to him. This seemed to accord with the officer’s view and knowledge of the species, and we all stood for a moment, heads bowed, contemplating the weaker sex. As it seemed an appropriate moment to do so, I murmured, “She did not come to the Colonies aboard the recent resupply ship, sir. She lied about her history in this too. I have seen the marks of a severe lashing upon her back, indication perhaps of a practiced deceiver.” I hoped he took the slight comfort I offered—that it had probably been beyond his power to see through the tangle of lies she had spun, and that thus his part in this horrible affair was somewhat mitigated.

He did seem to relax fractionally. “I must inform Major Parkinson. I am at a loss how we should proceed. Should we accuse her of falseness? Of, as you say, lewd and unwomanly behavior? We are not in authority over her, and yet—”

Aleksey replaced his hand upon the man’s uniform sleeve. “I told you only to make you vigilant, sir. There is the matter of the child—his role in this as her witness.”

“Good God, yes. He confirmed all his mother had said, and using such words as I did not think it seemly for her to hear despite her being the—”

“Our wolf did not attack the child, John. The boy attempted to blind the doctor’s horse. I do not think he is quite of sound mind. Of normal mind, anyhow.”

Rochester paled, beyond the normal coloring of a man in the cold with inadequate clothing. “It would have been better had you told us this earlier, Your Highness. Forgive my blunt speech.”

Aleksey nodded, the pain this obvious statement gave him etched upon his features.

Rochester relented and patted the hand upon his arm. “Only a fool harps upon what cannot be changed and ignores what needs to be done. Come, I will tell the major what has transpired here, and we must then hold counsel.”

The three officers stood in a huddle in the cold, their breath mingling as their words came softly. We listened to the discussion from a little way away, conscious of the shapes beneath the canvas at our feet. The poor soldiers appeared as if they joined in the debate. If they did, their evidence apparently swayed the major.




FOR, OF course, our words told of a very different tale to the one he had believed. The one he had hung two young men for. That was very hard for him to absorb and accept. But accept it he had to. If he did not believe his second-in-command, if my contention that she had never actually been upon the ship from England did not sway him, he believed Aleksey. He had known him far longer than he had known Mary Wright. Major Parkinson had introduced Aleksey to his mother, and nothing, apparently, was greater proof of the good man’s approbation of Aleksey’s character.

Gradually, therefore, the truth of our assertions became so obvious to him that he made the next leap himself—he saw the nature of the child.