The Silent Cry - Anne Perry [99]
Attempting to adapt to the life of a single woman rather past the best age for marriage, not possessed of the sort of family connections to make her sought after, nor the money to provide for herself or a handsome dowry, and unfortunately not of great natural beauty or winning ways, had made the task extremely difficult. She was also not of a docile disposition.
She had read the fearful stories and heard accounts of starvation and massacre, but she had not known anyone who had been affected personally.
“It is hard to imagine such atrocity,” Sylvestra said thoughtfully. “I am beginning to realize how very little I know. It is disturbing …” She hesitated, her hands idle, the linen held up but quite still. “And yet there is something not unlike exhilaration in it also. Amalia wrote to me of the most extraordinary incident.” She shook her head, her face troubled, eyes far away. “It seems that the siege of Cawnpore was particularly brutal. The women and children were starved for three weeks, then the survivors were taken to the river and placed upon boats, where the native soldiers—sepoys, I believe they are called—fell upon them. Those hundred and twenty-five or so who still survived even that were taken to a building known as the Bibighar, and after a further eighteen days were slaughtered—by butchers brought in from the bazaar for the purpose.”
Hester did not interrupt.
“It seems when the Highland Regiment relieved Cawnpore, they found the hacked-up bodies and exacted a fearful revenge, killing every one of the sepoys there. What I wanted to mention was the tale Amalia wrote me of one soldier’s wife, named Bridget Widdowson, who during the siege was sent to guard eleven mutineers, because at that time there were no men available. This she accomplished perfectly, marching up and down in front of them all day, terrifying them immobile, and it was only when she was finally relieved by a regular soldier that they all escaped. Is that not remarkable?”
“Indeed it is,” Hester agreed wholeheartedly. She saw the wonder and the amazed admiration in Sylvestra’s eyes. There was something stirring in her which was going to find the loneliness of this house without her husband, the restrictions of society widowhood and her enforced idleness as a kind of imprisonment. Rhys’s dependency would only add to it, in time. “But the heat and the endemic disease are things I should find very trying,” she said to counter it.
“Would you?” It was a genuine question, not an idle remark. “Why did you go out to the Crimea, Miss Latterly?”
Hester was startled.
“Oh, forgive me,” Sylvestra apologized immediately. “That was an intrusive question. You may have had all manner of private reasons which are none of my concern. I do beg your pardon.”
Hester knew what she was thinking. She laughed outright. “It was not a broken affair of the heart, I promise you. I wanted the adventure, the freedom to use such brains and talents as I have where I would be sufficiently needed that necessity would remove prejudices against women’s initiative.”
“I imagine you succeeded?” There was vivid interest in Sylvestra’s face.
Hester smiled. “Most assuredly.”
“My husband would have admired that,” Sylvestra said with certainty. “He loved courage and the fire to be different, inventive.” She looked rueful. “I sometimes wonder if he would have liked to have gone somewhere like India, or perhaps Africa. Amalia’s letters would thrill him, but I had a feeling they also awoke a restlessness in him, even a kind of envy. He would have loved new frontiers, the challenge of discovery, the chance of great leadership. He was an outstanding man, Miss Latterly. He had a most remarkable mind. Amalia gets her courage from him, and Constance too.”
“And Rhys?” Hester said quietly.
The shadow returned to Sylvestra’s face. “Yes … Rhys too. He wanted so much for Rhys. Is it terrible of me to say that there is a kind of way in which I am glad he did not