George Washington's Ghost

“If she is,” she said, her voice a hoarse whisper, “then it has to stay our secret, Hen. Forever.”

Belatedly, Henrietta had already worked that out for herself.

“So…”

“If you adopt him it works perfectly,” Melody concluded, relieved that at last they seemed to be getting somewhere.

Walking on, Henrietta tried to join up the pieces; although, not very successfully because she was still a little shaken by the notion that Pedro might actually, be the secret love child of the Queen of Spain… and its potentially terrible ramifications

“So, what happens if you marry Alonso?” She asked stupidly.

“Me!” Melody yelped in alarm.

Pedro looked up, possibly aware for the first time of the very, very strange mood his two ‘Mamas’ were in today.

“Of course, you,” Henrietta insisted, mulishly stubborn now. “Don’t tell me you aren’t crazy about him.”

“It would never work, Hen!”

“Why not?”

“Even Queen Sophie knows it wouldn’t work,” Melody insisted doggedly.

“How could she possibly know that?”

“She was the Queen of Spain; she knows a lot of stuff!”

Melody coloured in embarrassment.

Did I really say that?

She tried a second time.

“I don’t know, Hen. I really don’t. But think about it. I’m nearly forty, I’m pretty self-obsessed, selfish actually. I’m driven, never really satisfied with anything. And,” she sighed, “even if I wanted to have babies it is too late and I can’t anyway. I’m Alonso’s mistress, that’s all I ever was. Maybe, I’ll always be his mistress but I certainly don’t want to ruin his life by marrying the poor man!”

Henrietta’s face was a picture of baffled hopefulness.

Melody leaned towards her and planted a kiss on her mouth, which was reciprocated, unhurriedly.

“So,” the younger woman sighed, at a loss, “that means that we’re back at square one, aren’t we?”

“No,” Melody said patiently, acknowledging that there was no tactful way of wrapping this up. She gathered her courage. “The sensible thing to do,” she began, hesitated, “is for you to marry Alonso, make lots of beautiful brothers and sisters for Pedro, and to live happily ever after.”

Melody suspected her lover was going to claim that she only liked ‘girls’ but neither of them actually believed that for a minute. She put a finger to Henrietta’s lips.

Suddenly, she was giggling.

They were both giggling.

Pedro, somewhat mystified looked from one Mama to the other, beginning to get a little miffed that he was so obviously, not the primary centre of attention.

He stamped his small feet.

Both women dropped to their haunches and started tickling him, still giggling, tears running down their cheeks now, and a moment later each hugging him between them.

And Pedro knew he was in the safest place he had ever been…

Chapter 28

Saturday 6th May

HMS Perseus, 235 nautical miles NNE of Anguilla

In the knowledge that two fleet oilers had been pre-positioned out to the east, lost in the vastness of the Atlantic with their escorting destroyers, Task Force 5.1 had battered south at twenty-five knots almost from the moment it passed out of sight of land and turned to the east-south-east. Shortly after dawn it had rendezvoused with Perseus’s sister ship, the Hermes, and her escorting cruisers and destroyers, and soon afterwards Perseus had started flying off the fifteen extra Goshawk IV scouts and fourteen Sea Eagle II dive bombers stowed on her flight deck.

Once those aircraft had successfully landed on the Hermes, the two carriers would boast a combined strike force of sixty-three scouts, thirty-five torpedo bombers and forty-nine dive bombers.

The Hermes had crept out of her home port, Pembroke Dock in South Wales the previous weekend, rendezvousing with her escorts in the approaches to the Bristol Channel, six nights ago, supposedly to exercise in the Western Approaches with the 3rd Battle Squadron of the Home Fleet. Instead, operating under conditions of complete radio silence she and her consorts had disappeared into the fastness of the North Atlantic, worked up to twenty-three knots and steered south west to meet up with Task Force 5.1.

By now the Spanish would know that Perseus had left Hampton Roads; and the enemy high command would be worrying about a single big carrier at sea, possibly about to launch an attack somewhere…

If all went well the Triple Alliance would have no idea what had hit it when the combined Air Wings of two of the new super carriers struck!