Dubious Allegiance by Don Gutteridge Read Free Book Online Page B

the wagon carrying the severely wounded. Marc peered over the still form of Rick Hilliard and saw that the bundle of blankets next to him had suddenly produced a head and an arm. Marc swung down off his mount and began to walk alongside the wagon. He found himself face-to-face withthe young cavalryman he had rescued from under his dying horse. He was propped up on one elbow and smiling.
    â€œIs it night, or is this Hell?”
    â€œBoth,” Marc said. “You’ve been asleep for hours. How are you feeling?”
    â€œWell, I’ve got a splint on my best leg, which is throbbing like a dozen toothaches, and I got bruises on my bruises. But I’m alive.”
    â€œAnd if the sawbones has set your break well, you’ll live to ride another horse.”
    â€œBut he won’t be Prince.”
    â€œI’m sorry about that.”
    â€œIt was my brother’s horse. I promised to keep him out of harm’s way.”
    â€œThere’s no such place in a war. Which is what we’ve started, I’m afraid.”
    â€œDid we beat them?”
    â€œThey beat the piss out of us. We’re on the run.”
    â€œAh . . .”
    â€œYou don’t sound too disappointed.”
    â€œI didn’t think when I joined up that we’d be shootin’ up a bunch of farmers with pitchforks and old geezers with rickety muskets.”
    Marc said nothing to that, but thought much. “I’m only halfway through my pipe; why don’t you finish it for me.”
    â€œThanks. And thanks for what you—”
    â€œYou’d better take a drink before you start.” Marc put his canteen to the lad’s lips, and after a tentative sip he gulped down several mouthfuls.
    â€œMy name’s Eugene Yates.”
    â€œLieutenant Marc Edwards.”
    For the next minute or so Marc walked silently beside the wagon while Corporal Yates drew in lungful after lungful of smoke from Marc’s clay pipe.
    â€œI’m a bit of a farmer myself,” he said to Marc, resting his head back on an improvised pillow and returning the pipe. “I grew up in Montreal, where my father is a merchant. But my older brother Stephen married a girl from New York State and moved to her family’s farm just outside the village of Waddington. A pretty little farm that runs right down to the St. Lawrence. When Callie’s dad died, she and Stephen took over the place, and they asked me to come down and join them when I turned eighteen.”
    â€œThat was some time ago.”
    â€œAlmost two years.”
    â€œAnd you took to farming?”
    â€œI took to horses, mainly. So when I heard about the troubles up here in Quebec, I talked my father into outfittin’ me for the cavalry unit that assembled in Montreal.”
    â€œStephen supplied the horse?”
    There was a pause, and Marc thought that the corporal must have drifted into unconsciousness again. But then he said, as if to himself, “How am I gonna tell him Prince died in a battle we lost?”
    â€œI’m sure he would be a lot unhappier if you had died in a battle we’d won.”
    â€œI’ll have some story to tell, though, won’t I?”
    â€œYou will. And you’re also out of the fighting, which we’veonly begun. You’ve done your duty. And don’t forget to tell Stephen that your unit’s bold gambit saved a number of lives.”
    â€œCan I quote you?”
    â€œWord for word. Now I think you should rest. We’ve still got two or three hours to go before Sorel.”
    â€œAll right. But I want you to know that my brother is goin’ to hear the whole story. And if you’re ever anywhere near Waddington, just ask for the Yates place. We’ll roll out the welcome mat.”
    â€œI’ll remember that. Thank you.”
    â€œWe’ll share a pipe, eh?”
    Marc smiled. It was the last thing Corporal Yates saw before he fell into a deep, seemingly painless