The Spanish Bride by Georgette Heyer Page B

everything.’
    Kincaid, aghast, thought it time to call a halt. He touched Harry’s arm, saying in English: ‘Harry, what the devil are you about? She can’t stay with you! A child—a lady!’ ‘She’s not a child. Oh, in years—!’
    ‘But you crazy fool, you can’t keep her with you! A gently-born girl, reared in a convent, thrown upon your generosity—’
    ‘Yes I can.’
    ‘Harry, will you listen to reason? This won’t do! She’s of the true hidalgo class! What can you do with such a girl? She’s not—’
    ‘Do with her? I’m going to marry her!’ replied Brigade-Major Smith.
     
    Chapter Two. ‘A Treasure Invaluable’
     
    Marry her he did. He would listen to no argument; he snapped his fingers at every impediment. The same ardent spirit which sent him headlong into the thickest part of any battle drove him headlong into marriage. To look at Juana was to love her, said Kincaid, adding, years later, with his twisted, rueful smile: ‘And I did love her, but I never told my love, and in the meantime another and a more impudent fellow stepped in and won her.’ But Juana did not think Harry impudent. A kindred spirit in her had leapt to meet his. Kincaid, offering protection to her sister, had scarcely made an impression upon her; half-fainting, his pleasant voice had had no power to rouse her from her state of terror. If he was good to look at, she did not know it. Sunk in the chair he had set for her, shrinking within the shelter of her sister’s arm, she had become aware of Harry, intently watching her. Though he had not been able to see her face through the mesh of her mantilla, she had seen his, deeply tanned, with a close-gripped mouth, a masterful, aquiline nose, and bright almond-shaped eyes, tremendously alive under their rather heavy lids. He was fined down to bone and muscle; the line of his jaw stood out sharply; there were clefts running from his nose to the upward-tilting corners of his mouth. His hands seemed all sinew; his slight frame a small, tough thing, compact of energy. Not a handsome man, Harry Smith: he would improve with age, like his Commander-in-chief; not a big man, nor one to use many graces in his dealings with his fellow-men; but a vivid, vital creature, instinct with a force, far removed from mere charm, which was a strong magnetism: the quality which made him, in spite of his impetuosity, his quick temper, and his flaming impatience, a born leader of men. There was something fierce about Harry, the look of a hawk in his eyes: a similar spirit in Juana, the daughter of a long line of hidalgos, responded to it. They were made for each other, and were simple and direct enough, both of them, Kincaid reflected to know it at a glance.
    After his first astonishment, he refrained from expostulation. Harry, held for those initial moments in a trance of wonder, awoke soon to a fit of whirlwind energy. Arrangements had to be made for the marriage, for the sister’s safe conduct through the lines, for Juana’s comfort, for both ladies’ lodging for the night. He might have escorted them to Elvas, but he would not let this treasure he had found out of his sight. She and her sister must be accommodated in his tent; he sent his batman, Joe Kitchen, providentially returned in a moderately sober condition from Badajos, to beg, borrow, or steal a mattress for his love. He wrested a pillow from Stewart, a blanket from Jack Molloy, and would not stay to listen to their arguments against his hasty, ruinous marriage.
    The sister, blinking at Juana’s amazing lover, demurred at his autocratic decree that they should take possession of his tent. Having seen the British troops in Badajos, she placed small dependence on the protection of canvas walls. ‘Shall we be safe? Will not the soldiers break in?’ she asked nervously.
    Harry stared at her in astonishment. ‘Break in?’ he repeated, even his swift brain finding it hard to assimilate the enormity of her suggestion. ‘The men break