The Stranger From The Sea Read Free

possible!'
    Ross explained his presence.
    'Then should you not go at once to Wellington instead of frittering your time discovering an unimportant nephew? Go and see Old Douro and then when he is done with you, I shall be happy to talk!'
    Ross hesitated, unwilling to explain the precise nature of his presence here, uncomfortable indeed that, stated in a few sentences, it might not commend itself to his nephew at all.
    'Geoffrey Charles,' he said. 'I am sent here for the value of my observation rather than my communication, and I suspect General Wellington has not a little on his mind tonight. What I have to say to him will not help him win or lose the battle in the morning and can be as well said after as before.'
    'You are staying?'
    'Of course. Wouldn't miss it. Can you use another sharpshooter immediately under your command?' 'My command, mon Dieul C'est ne pas y c roire — 'Well, I see you are now a captain. And that, since I have so long been a civilian, gives you a seniority I'd be willing to accept.'
    Geoffrey Charles snorted. 'Uncle, you do yourself no sort of honour, since I understand you have been in and out of a number of scrapes during the last ten years! To say nothing of your membership of that talk-house in Westminsterl However, if you wish to be by my side in any little action which may take place to dissuade the French from climbing this escarpment. . . well, I'll be happy to accommodate you!'
    'Good, then that's settled.'
    'You've seen the French encamped below?'
    'Colonel McNeil gave me the opportunity.'
    'So you'll appreciate that there could be at least a chance of your never being able to deliver your message to Wellington?'
    'It's a risk my conscience will entitle me to take.'
    Ross was by no means sure that he would be welcomed by the General. He had a letter of authority. But Wellington had a very personal and clear line of communication with the Foreign Secretary, who happened just at the moment to be his brother, and he might well suspect this semi-military civilian unexpectedly visiting his headquarters of being here on behalf of other members of the Cabinet who thought less well of him. It was not far from the truth, though the thinking was not Ross's own.
    They had squatted together by now on the soft pine needles beneath the trees. A batman brought them a hot drink that passed for coffee, and they sat chatting easily together like old friends.
    They had not seen each other for four years, because Ross had been himself abroad when Geoffrey Charles returned after Corunna. Ross was startled at the change in his nephew. When he had last seen him Geoffrey Charles was a young cadet, eager, full of fun and high jinks, drinking and gambling his small allowance away, always in trouble and always in debt. Now he looked lean and hard, all the puppy fat gone, face sun-tanned and keen, handsome in a rather hard-mouthed way that only the army or fox-hunting can produce. A campaigner who by now had seen more war than Ross had ever seen. Not so much like his father as he had once given promise of becoming; perhaps the thin line of dark moustache made a difference, as indeed did the indentation in the jaw.
    'Well, well, my dear life and body, as Prudie would say! I should never have supposed you were so well disposed to me after our last meeting, Uncle! Are you rich? I doubt it.
    It was never in the character of a Poldark to become rich, however much fate might favour him. Yet you met my urgent needs like a lamb. And they were not small! You got me out of a scrape! Indeed, had you not so helped me I might never have seen Spain and Portugal but have been dismissed the army and spent salut ary years vegetating in Newgate! '
    'I doubt it,' said Ross. 'You might have suffered some loss of preferment; but in time of war even England cannot afford to let her young officers go to prison for the sake of a few guineas.'
    'Well, had the worst come to the worst I suppose I should have swallowed my pride and asked