The Duchess of Stafford. He knew the name, though he’d certainly never met her. But from where? Ah. He had it. “Did you ever get your Renault?”

Her hands stilled, and her brows lifted as she looked down at him again. “Are we acquainted, Lieutenant? Forgive me, if so—I don’t recall how or when.”

“No.” He shook his head but then regretted it. Though how a simple action like moving his neck could make pain light up in his stomach he just didn’t know. Still, he forced a smile. “Visited friends in the Cotswolds a few years ago. Had a meal with one of your drivers.”

“Ah.” Her smile reappeared, and she positioned a tray over his legs. “A new car seemed a waste in times like these. But I broke the new stallion. And when this dratted war’s over, I’m going to make my ace of a husband teach me to fly a plane.”

The duke was a pilot? Somehow that was just as shocking as learning that his wife was a nurse. “In the RNAS?” It had to be either the Royal Naval Air Service or the Royal Flying Corp.

“The RFC—he was one of the first to sign up, fool man, and no one could talk him out of it.” Pride saturated her voice though, not irritation. “Stationed at Northolt, though, not on the front—which is why the boys and I are in London. We still get to see him several times a week. We’re lucky.” She moved a bowl of not-steaming broth onto his tray. “Shall I?”

For the first time since he’d arrived here this morning, he actually looked around the ward. There were two rows of cots on each of the walls, facing each other. Almost all were filled with soldiers. White bandages everywhere, stumps where limbs should have been, some chaps with faces as pale as the sheets they lay on.

He swallowed and ignored the throbbing that hadn’t yet ebbed from the effort of sitting up. Or waking up. Or just being, perhaps. “I can manage, I think. Thank you, Your Grace.”

She sighed. “Another hopelessly proper patient, I see. Very well then, Lieutenant. Your sidearm.” She handed him a spoon. “And your bayonet.” A knife, presumably to butter the bread she also slid onto his tray. “Use them wisely, or I shall strip you of them and submit you to the humiliation of being fed by a woman.”

It was all he could do to force his lips into a smile and keep his face clear of the wince that wanted to overtake him when he lifted his arm.

This was going to be fun.