Guns of the Dawn Read Online Free Page B

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 any of them: standing tall and straight in that red jacket, the brass buttons shining like the gold
braid at his cuffs. His knee boots were polished to any sergeant’s satisfaction and he carried his gleaming helm in the crook of his arm, as if to balance the brass powder flask on the other
side.
    He looks like a general or a prince.
Emily stepped back, and back further as Rodric descended, as though his neat brightness would scorch her. There was a set, determined look to his
face. He had worn the same serious expression when he was learning his algebra or Classics. It was the look of someone taking care to avoid making mistakes.
    When they saw him, a little cheer went around the young recruits gathered there, and Emily saw then that Rodric would be a hero to them: the young gentleman not afraid to take up a musket and
defend the King. He would be a splendid soldier, an officer, a great man.
    And she wished he did not have to go.
    At the foot of the stairs he nodded to his fellows, saluted the sergeant. Cook bustled over to him with his breakfast, and he laid his helmet