by Abby Ayles
Joanna stayed with Amy through the night, picking fitfully at the meat pie and pickled vegetables that Cook had served up.
It was a good pie – as always – but Joanna had no appetite. She watched nervously for every movement of Amy’s small body, and each groan or whimper that issued from the child seemed to pierce right into her heart.
When the night had fully set in, the sound of hooves clattering across the stones outside the house made Joanna rise to her feet and peer down.
She could see nothing that would make out who was there – only the small glow of a lantern near the doorway, too far to reveal who dismounted from his horse.
Could it be Edmund? It had to be!
With one last check that Amy was unchanged, Joanna rushed out of the door. She clutched at the balustrade for support as she neared the stairs, watching the main hall to see who would enter.
“I’m afraid not,” Christopher was saying, as he walked in, turning his head to Jenkins.
Next to Joanna, Mary rushed to her side. “Is it our lord?” she asked, breathlessly.
“I’m sorry to disappoint you,” Christopher called up to them. For once, he seemed genuinely full of regret.
“I could not find him. I found no sign of his horse, either. Tomorrow I’ll ride east. The driver will join the search on one of the spare horses, going north. If we do not find him then, it only leaves south.”
Joanna found that she was gasping for breath, stricken by panic. She held a hand over her mouth to stop desperate cries from leaking out of it.
“They’ll find him, Miss,” Mary said, patting her shoulder. “They will. I know it. He won’t stay from home too long.”
“I only hope he is found – alive,” Joanna said, retreating to Amy’s side where she could cry without being seen by anyone awake.
The next day dawned the same.
Jenkins had forced Joanna to get some rest in the latter part of the night, though she insisted in sleeping in Amy’s room, setting up her own blankets on the floor.
When she woke, the stern butler demanded that she eat a full breakfast before she was allowed to return to her tasks.
“We cannot lose you as well, Miss Warrick,” he said gruffly. “You know I will not force you to retire. Your help is appreciated. But you must look to your own self. If you are too unwell, you must allow us to tend you as well.”
Joanna nodded in agreement, though privately she knew that she would do no such thing.
There were only four of them – Jenkins, Cook, Mary, and herself – to tend to the children as it was. If she should retire, then the others would be stretched so thin as not to be able to eat or sleep themselves. She could not leave them in this way.
Horse hooves woke Joanna late at night, as she dozed while Cook watched over Amy.
They were both on their feet in an instant, though Joanna found herself needing to hold onto the bedframe for support until the room stopped spinning.
They all gathered at the top of the stairs again, unwilling to go too far from the sick rooms but desperate to know what news came.
“Did you find him?” Samuel called from the doorway.
He stood shivering in the night air, still dressed as for day. He had been sleeping downstairs in the sitting room, and Joanna felt a pang at seeing him. He, too, must have been despairing for any kind of hope.
“No,” Christopher said, his voice low and dull as he entered the house. “I’m sorry, Sam. Not today either.”
“Why not?” Samuel demanded.
It was the kind of question only a boy would think to ask, but Christopher seemed to take it to heart. He closed his eyes for a moment.
“We looked as hard as we could. I pray that he has found shelter at some neighbour’s home. We rode all day. I thrashed the horse so that we could go to the south as well, as far as we dared with the night coming in. We could not find any trace of him.”
“You’re giving up?” Samuel asked, dismayed.
Joanna felt her heart sink, too.
If they had searched in all directions and Edmund was not to be found, where was he? Could he have come to harm?
“I have to,” Christopher said, sighing and rubbing a hand across his eyes.
“Listen, Sam. We’ll hope and pray that Edmund went to visit someone. But for now I am needed here. I must help tend your sisters. We pray that Edmund will return tomorrow, unaware that anything has been happening.”
“No,” Samuel said, beginning to cry.
Christopher knelt down and embraced his younger brother roughly, cradling Samuel’s head against his shoulder.
As one, Joanna, Cook, and Jenkins moved away from the balustrade and back to the girls’ rooms. They had no wish to impede upon a private moment.
***
The next day was different. Joanna woke a little past dawn to find not Cook, but Christopher sitting beside Amy’s bed.
The bright flare of the sun through the window had her squinting her eyes, and she could barely make out his features for a long moment after awakening.
“Does she improve?” Joanna asked, raising her head hopefully.
“No,” Christopher said, and sighed. “But she is no worse.”
“That is mercy at least,” Joanna said, joining him to reach out and touch Amy’s forehead.
She was hot still, and showed no sign of cooling off despite the water they mopped her brow with day and night.
“The doctor refuses to visit us,” Christopher said, sounding as if he were talking from a long distance away.
“He says we know how to treat the sickness, and it is too contagious to risk spreading it around the rest of the countryside. He bade us stay inside the house until it is passed, all of us. I did not tell him that we stayed out searching for Edmund.”
“Was there really no sign?” Joanna asked. She harboured a small fear that perhaps Christopher had lied to save the others, when in truth Edmund’s body had been discovered cold and lifeless in a ditch.
“None,” Christopher shook his head. “I truly suspect he is with some friend. Though which friend, I wish I knew. I did not even know that Edmund had any.”
“That is cruel,” Joanna said, before she thought to stop herself. “He has much responsibility.”
“You are right,” Christopher said, glancing at her. He looked at Amy, then back at Joanna, more closely this time. “Are you feeling well, yourself?”
“I am fine,” Joanna said, batting his concern away. “It’s just a little too warm.”
“You look as though you may be coming down with the sickness,” Christopher said, reaching out to touch her forehead.
Joanna dodged backwards, out of his range. “I already have it,” she said, quietly.
Christopher started. “What? You mean to say…”
“I think I may even have been the first,” she said. “I fainted after Edmund left.”
“Why do you not rest?” Christopher admonished. “You could be making yourself worse. You should get to bed!”
“I cannot,” Joanna said. “The children.”
“The children need a living governess,” Christopher told her fiercely.
“There are so few of us to tend them,” Joanna protested.
“I am not leaving their side,” Christopher said. “I cannot lose both my parents and my sisters too. I will not allow it. Wherever Edmund is, damn him, he will need to stay there or return on his own steam. The coach driver aids us with carrying water and letting us sleep in shifts. We are enough, now.”
“I am strong enough,” Joanna said. “Please. Let me stay.”
Christopher eyed her crossly. “You’re a stubborn woman, Miss Warrick,” he said. “I find myself rather glad not to have to battle you on a marital field.”
“You have had a lucky escape, Lieutenant,” Joanna said, giving him a weak smile.
“Then at least fetch us some breakfast. I will wait with Amy. Cook is preparing trays for us all.”
“I will,” Joanna said, ris
ing to her feet.
She stepped towards the centre of the room, but the fireplace was so hot that she had to stagger back from it.
“Are you sure you are well?” Christopher asked, watching her. His words seemed to come to her as if from the other end of a tunnel. “Miss Warrick, you are dripping with sweat.”
“It is nothing,” Joanna said, moving onwards again towards the door. She was determined to show him that he was wrong, that she could manage.
The thing of it was that the door was moving further away from her no matter how hard she tried to chase it, and before she knew it, there was no door before her at all – only a familiar blackness which, at last, allowed her the chance to feel a cool touch on her skin.
Chapter 34
Edmund knew that he was possibly being childish.
It had been a few days since he rode away from the house, and he had left no word of his plans. Indeed, he had not known them himself when he set off.
It was pure chance that threw him in the direction of the Haverham estate. He had not even known he would go there until his horse snorted and blew at the sight of a herd of deer roaming within a fence, and then he was hailed by Lord Haverham himself.
It was growing dark already by the time he was drawn in for a brandy in the sitting room, and then they would not hear of him riding home through the night.
They insisted that he should stay with them and rest, rather than risk his stallion turning a hoof in the dark and ending up lame – or worse. Besides which, a storm had begun to blow, and the wind was hammering mightily at the windows.
Lord Haverham, in particular, was keen indeed to make Edmund’s acquaintance more closely.
Edmund soon came to realise that the motive lay in his third son, Edward, the red-headed lad who had seen fit to dance with Patience at the ball. It seemed that he wanted more than dancing, and was seeking to court Patience in the next season.
At first the idea was strange to Edmund: he had been given to thinking, all the while that he was growing up, that Patience and Amy would marry well. Very well, in fact. Particularly Patience, who was to be the first daughter married off, and would thus no doubt get a large dowry.
But, of course, things had shifted and changed when his father died. Now he, Edmund, was the Earl, not his father; and subsequently, Patience was no longer the daughter of an Earl, but rather sister to one.
Put in that context, he soon came to see that the third son of a well-respected lord was not as badly matched as he had first thought.
Edmund had intended to ride away on the next morning, to return home – hoping that he would find Miss Warrick already abandoned her position, and perhaps even gone away to stay with relatives until she could be married to Christopher.
That was his intention, but it was not to be granted by Lady Haverham, who had designs on his time already.
She insisted that he join the family for a lengthy stroll around their grounds and a discussion of the neighbouring estate, which they also owned.
Since their second son was set to join the priesthood, Edmund took it to be their intimation that this might be Patience’s future home if she were to marry their third.
He dined with them that night, having worked up a great appetite from their exertion, which had taken them right to the far-flung reaches of the Haverham estate.
The next day he felt at ease, revelling in the unexpected and unaccustomed feeling of having nothing at all to do. Still, by the time the afternoon came around, he was growing tired of it. He had been a busy man for too long already to be able to rest for long.
“Now, then, I thank you greatly for your hospitality, Lady Haverham,” Edmund said. “However, I ought really to be returning home. They should be expecting me there.”
“Oh, but my dear Lord Kelt!” Lady Haverham exclaimed, her delicately freckled features falling into a mask of dismay. “You were to be our guest of honour at tonight’s dinner. Do say you will stay – I have asked our kitchen to prepare something special.”
Edmund shot a glance towards the horizon, over which his home lay.
There was work to be done, surely, and he had no doubt that there might be some gossip about where he had gone.
But he was due a day off, wasn’t he? More than that. He had ever been the studious son, right up until the moment when he was forced to be the responsible man of the house.
They would survive without him one more day – all of them would. He hired men for this very purpose, to keep the office ticking over.
And he had a staff who were quite capable – not to mention that Christopher was at home, and it would do him good to assume some responsibility for once.
All things considered, there was nothing he could possibly stand to lose by having dinner with the Haverhams.
Besides, if they were truly serious about making a pitch for Patience’s hand, he felt he ought to spend more time with this Edward, and find out what he was all about.
The next step after this would be inviting the young lad and perhaps a few of his siblings or friends to visit Hardwicke Hall. In that sense, it was perhaps essential that Edmund get the measure of him – and decide whether it was better that Christopher be home or away at the time the guests arrived.
“Do you suppose you will go abroad this summer, Lord Kelt?” Lady Haverham asked at the table, clearly trying to get a handle on his social calendar.
“No, Lady Haverham,” Edmund replied, with some amusement. “Did you hear that I had injured my arm? Some short months ago, I had a fall from my horse.”
“Nothing serious, I hope,” Lord Haverham mumbled.
Edmund felt sure that he would have heard through their business connections, but he explained all the same.
“A break,” he said. “I am only just out of the sling. Thus, any social plans we had made were quite put off for some time, and I was even kept away from the office. I must make up the time, so there will be no travel for us.”
“Your youngest brother, Mr. Samuel – I hear he is not at school,” the elder Haverham son piped up, earning a stern look from his mother.
“That is not your business, Henry,” she warned.
“It is quite alright,” Edmund said, shaking his head. “Samuel learns from our governess. He was laid quite low by the sickness that took our parents and is still yet to fully recover. He is most eager to rejoin his classmates, however.”
“I heard rumour that the sickness is back in the county again,” Edward said, sipping from his glass. “They were talking of it at the ball last week. A neighbour of ours has not been seen for weeks, and a messenger dispatched there found the house shut in quarantine.”
Edmund started in his chair. Could it really be true?
“Which neighbour?” he asked quickly, setting down his own glass to focus on the young man.
“I’m not sure,” Edward shrugged sheepishly. “I do apologise. I was not paying full attention. To the west, I think. Whoever is renting Mossford Park this year.”
“How ghastly,” Lady Haverham said with a shudder. “I do not know if this is an appropriate topic for the dinner table.”
“Sorry, Mother,” the boy said, pushing a half-cut carrot around his plate so as to avoid meeting her gaze.
“I think I should go back to my own hall,” Edmund said, feeling a growing sense of uneasiness.
Perhaps the rumour was only a rumour, but it had reminded him of one thing very clearly: what was important to him.
And that was his family, above all else. He should be with them.
“In the morning, surely, dear Lord Kelt,” Lady Haverham said. “You mustn’t ride this late. It should be full dark before you were even out of our gates.”
“My lady is quite right,” Lord Haverham said, his voice low and rumbling. “We’ll set you loose with some provisions tomorrow, so that you don’t get hungry on the journey.”
“I thank you for that,” Edmund said, inclining his head.
The delay made his feet itch, but
they were right. It was foolhardy to ride this late into the evening. There was enough distance between here and his home that it would be gone midnight when he arrived, and without the lanterns of the carriage to light the way, it would be treacherous going.
He had little appetite left, however. The reminder of his family’s great tragedy had seen to that.
He made his excuses and left the room, retiring to the guest chamber the Haverhams had been kind enough to prepare for him.
