He had stopped three steps from the bottom, his customary little pulpit from which he ordered the other servants. The station gave him a curiously sombre look, like a minister conducting a funeral. Emily and Mary exchanged a look of shared strength.
There was a knock on the door, and Emily knew that nobody else would open it. The task was left to her.
And there they were as she opened the door to them. Behind them, horses steamed and stamped in the cold and dark and, when the glow of the lanterns from the kitchen fell across them, it was as though they had not seen warmth or light for a long time. Here were a dozen serious-faced men on the move before the sun was, with pack-straps cinching their cloaks, and their crested helms tipped back. In that light, with only the night behind them, they could have been of any age, or from any time. They were soldiers only, with everything else stripped from them.
But closer study of each face in turn showed her many things. She saw eyes that were wide, a lip that trembled, pale faces, and all of them so young. Had any of them used a razor more than once? Had they sweethearts, these lads, or had the woman that kissed each goodbye been a mother, watching her son recede into the darkness?
In the lead was an older man, squat and unshaven in stark contrast to his charges. She recognized his face from two weeks before, preaching to these same young faces in Chalcaster Square.
‘Miss?’ he said. ‘All ready, miss? We need to be going.’
‘Won’t you come in for just a few minutes, Sergeant Pallwide? We’ve some porridge warmed up, and some bread, and you and your men have a long way to go. I’m sure a second breakfast won’t keep the uniforms from fitting.’ It was a well-rehearsed speech, and her smile no less. A few more minutes was all it meant. Just a few more minutes.
The sergeant’s face split wide in a grin. ‘Well, that’s mighty kind of you, Miss Marshwic. Mighty kind. That’s the sort of kindness that puts fight in a soldier’s belly when he needs reminding of what he’s fighting for. Hear that, lads? You’ll remember this place when you’ve a Denlander in front of you.’
He was first into the kitchen with a jaunty step and a too familiar nod at Alice, but he was too old and too plain for her, with his stubble and his lines. She was already looking beyond him at his recruits.
Emily could name about half of them: field labourers and farmers’ sons, the second children of tradesmen, lads whose hands had been trained and apprenticed for peacetime. They looked awkward and clumsy in their uniforms, gangling and unfinished, fruit picked before its time. They filed in, half grateful and half embarrassed. None had seen the inside of a fine old house like Grammaine, unless while running errands or making deliveries. They murmured ‘Miss Marshwic’ to her and ‘Miss Marshwic’, more warmly, to the preening Alice, and ‘Mrs Salander’ to Mary. They bobbed their heads in automatic respect and stood in the kitchen as though they had no idea what they were doing there.
And how true that is. ‘Come . . . come along, Cook.’ Emily felt her voice quiver as she spoke, suddenly on public display. ‘We mustn’t keep Sergeant Pallwide or his men waiting.’
They were not men, of course; would not be for two years or more. Cook began serving them with bowls of porridge, thick slices of buttered bread, mugs of hot broth. The sergeant gave her a smile.
‘Mind if I light up, now we’ve settled, miss?’ he asked.
It would have been churlish to refuse, and so she watched him take out a well-used clay pipe and stoke it with weed one-handed. She wondered if that was a skill he had learned with a gun in his other hand. Soon the sweet, fragrant scent was shouldering the aroma of the bread and porridge out. Emily caught Mary’s look, and knew that her sister was remembering the last time anyone had smoked inside Grammaine, while their father still lived.
There was a footstep above her, at the top of the stairs, and Poldry moved down into the crowded kitchen to allow room. Emily caught her breath as her brother Rodric came down the stairs, one careful step at a time.
How handsome he looks, was her first thought. He wore the uniform well, better than