A Lady's Perfect Match: A Historical Regency Romance Book

by Bridget Barton

  "Pardon me?" she asked. "Is there something I can do to help you, miss?"

  Emelia cast around the room, but other than the three beds with patients, she saw no one. "I'm sorry," she said. "I was hoping to speak with Dr. Shaw. Is he here today?"

  "He is," the woman said curtly, looking back at the notes she'd been scribbling. After a long pause, she looked up again. "May I ask who's looking for him?"

  "Emelia Wells."

  "Ah." Recognition lit the woman's face. "You’re a Wells. Naturally, you've come to the clinic to steal away the doctor for a personal home visit. Do you see that?" she pointed to the full beds. "We can't help the people waiting outside until we finish helping the people in here. It's a busy day—a bad case of something has everyone in town clamoring for treatment, and me with only one doctor to help them all."

  Emelia felt a stab of guilt, knowing that she had indeed come to steal Montgomery away from whatever task he'd set himself to complete. She hadn't thought about those people who needed him here at the clinic. Then she remembered Aggie, and she shook her head as though to clear it.

  "I'll wait, then," she said. "Until he's available."

  "You'll be waiting a fine long bit of time," the woman sniffed. "He's upstairs in surgery right now with our only nurse, and they'll be there for some time stitching up a nasty cut a farmer came in with less than an hour ago."

  Emelia resisted the urge to hold a handkerchief to her nose. The smell in the room was overpowering. What was that? It was more than just sweat and dirt; it was something more potent. She sniffed, and cringed when the woman behind the desk noticed.

  "That's the liniment," she said gruffly. "It's got a strong smell if you're not used to it."

  Emelia heard a sudden cry from one end of the room and realised with a start that one of the shapes in the cot was a child.

  "Water," the young one cried again. The woman at the desk busied herself with her task and Emelia looked at her, waiting to see what the woman would do. After a moment, as though feeling Emelia's eyes on her, the other woman raised her head in annoyance.

  "I just gave the lad a drink a bit ago," she said curtly. "Usually they'll stop calling out if you wait. He's got the fevers, and he'll fall asleep soon enough."

  Emelia, knowing this woman was showing more care for the poor and ill than she ever had simply by showing up at the clinic to offer aid, bit back the judgmental thoughts that raced to the surface. Instead, she asked tentatively, "Would you mind if I busied myself until Dr. Shaw is available?"

  "You could just leave a message with me," the woman sniffed. "I'll tell him to come on over when he's finished."

  Emelia shook her head. "I'll wait." She wasn't entirely certain that this woman would alert Montgomery to Aggie's plight in the first place, and besides that she couldn't shake the pitiful sound of the child asking for a drink.

  She waited for direction, but the woman behind the desk seemed to think her duty fulfilled and had gone back to scribbling on a sheet of paper.

  Emelia took that as a dismissal and walked across the room, looking as she did so at the people in the cots. The child was the farthest away, but near her was a woman and a man both lying quite still, their foreheads damp with sweat, their shabby clothes soaked through in parts.

  There was medicine and a glass of water beside each bed, and as she passed, Emelia remembered what Montgomery had told her when the disastrous tea had laid up so many of her guests.

  Hydration and rest. She moved on to the child, who looked to be about eight or nine years of age; a lad with blue eyes and pinched little face. She sat down on the side of the bed and poured a glass full from the pitcher. The water seemed murky, and she wondered if the nurse had added anything to the drink to aid in the healing.

  "Do you need a drink?" she asked kindly, reaching to help the boy sat up.

  His eyes opened a little wider, and he looked over her dress and fine apparel as though startled. "Who are ye?" he asked in a thick country accent.

  "Call me Emmy," she said kindly. "Drink a bit of this water, and then you can tell me your name."

  The boy complied, sipping weakly and then dropping his head back on the pillow afterwards. "I'm Richard," he said. "Papa says it's a big name for a lad like me."

  "Well, Richard, I'm sure you'll be a big enough lad one day." Emelia set aside the drink and stood to go. As she did so, the little boy's hand shot out and took a fistful of her skirt.

  "Please, miss, would you sing a song? Mama and Papa can't be here to stay—they've got to bring in the livestock and tend to the youngens."

  He didn't say it in so many words, but Emelia could see that the boy was lonely and a little frightened in this great new place with the sickness eating away at his insides. She smiled, searching for a song in her head and landing at last on one she used to sing to Hannah.

  "Close your eyes while I sing," she said gently. The boy did so. "'There once was a ribbon of river on the hill,'" she began in a soft tone. "'And you'd see it wheree'er you went/ But then came shepherd from under the hill/ and he drank up the river of silt.'" She went on to sing about the monstrous shepherd whose thirst was only quenched by the great lakes in the north, and how when he travelled there he drank a lake clean dry so that the selkie there was forced to flee to the sea. "'And still today if you seek out her face/ she'll tell you no countenance be / like the shepherd who stole her sweet home away / and sent her off to the sea.'"

  "I think he's asleep." Montgomery's voice, close at hand, made Emelia jump. She hadn't realised he'd been standing there behind her. She looked down at the boy, who was indeed breathing regularly after the long little tale she'd sung.

  "How long have you been here?" she asked, standing and stretching her stiff limbs.

  "Long enough to hear the saddest children's lullaby known to man." Montgomery winked, but Emelia could see a certain weariness in his countenance. She glanced down at his hands and saw blood there, light and streaked. He was wringing them in a cloth tied to an apron around his body. She tried not to think about where that blood had originated, and how the person upstairs might be faring now. He seemed to read her thoughts in part, for he said abruptly, "This is no place for a lady, Emelia. Why have you come?"

  "I'm sorry to intrude." She cleared her throat. "It's just that—"

  "Dr. Shaw." The woman behind the desk looked up and waved her hand. "The man at the end has the shakes."

  Montgomery held up his hand to Emelia, motioning for her to follow him as he moved down the line of cots to the end. "I saw some people outside," he said to the woman. "You should tell them to come in. Even if we don't have beds, we can tend to them by laying up clothes on the floor. It's best for them to be out of the elements, whichever way you cut it."

  A man walked downstairs, and Emelia guessed from his clothes that he was the nurse the woman had been speaking about before. He was older, attired in a threadbare uniform, and had a tired bent in his shoulders. Montgomery was already pulling a blanket up under his patient's chin and feeling for the man's pulse, but he glanced up at the nurse and nodded towards the door.

  "Paul, would you help Beth bring in the people on the stoop? Set them up by the fireside so they're warm, and see if any need immediate attention. I'll be with you in a moment."

  The man did as he was asked immediately, and Montgomery went on talking to Emelia as he worked, juggling everything that was happening as calmly as if he was at a tea party carrying on a conversation in an elegant parlor.

  "Why did you come?" he asked again.

  "Aggie's sick," Emelia said, wasting no time. "She's doing very poorly, and although I'm in no position to diagnose anyone, I can tell you she's presenting symptoms very similar to what I'm seeing here. She has a fever and exhaustion and looks very pale."

  Montgomery looked at Emelia, and his face clouded with concern. "Is anyone else in your family feeling poorly?"

  "No, but Aggie's very ill."

  Montgomery nodded and went back to work, pulling a
bottle of medicine from the apron pocket and giving it to his patient in a silver spoon. "I will come over to the house once I've settled here for the night. It's not usually this busy, but I sent a note to the doctor telling him to return—I think we'll need to take shifts until the outbreak is a little bit more under control. I think it might be a strain of typhus, although it's not one I've seen before."

  Typhus. Emelia had heard of this, but never in communities like her own where the estates were large and the water clean. She thought of their corner of the county as a rich and elegant arrangement, but when she turned her gaze to the cots and looked at the tattered clothes, she could see how blind she'd been. There were poor here—more than she'd known—and they needed help.

  "What can I do in the meantime?" she asked.

  "Keep her cool and try to keep other people away from her in the house. Make sure you boil the water before you give it to her to drink, and I'll be there as soon as the other doctor returns. I'll see how I can help her."

  Emelia nodded, looking around the room. Paul and Beth had brought the other sick people in by now and were busying themselves making them comfortable. "Can I help you?" she asked tentatively. "I didn't realise how much help was needed. I didn't know." She met Montgomery's gaze, and for the briefest of moments he paused in what he was doing to look at her; really look at her. There was a knowing in those eyes that made Emelia feel simultaneously at ease and guilty. How had all this been happening under her nose without her giving any assistance before now?

  "Emelia," Montgomery said softly, lowering his voice. "This really isn't a place for a lady. I'll be given a break soon, and I'll come your way, but for now you should go. Take care of Aggie, but don't put yourself in danger, alright? I will bring my aid as soon as I can." He paused for a moment, and then looked over at little Richard sleeping peacefully in the bed. "I'm glad you were able to give the boy some comfort."

  Emelia felt torn. She wanted to return to Aggie's bedside and give her cook whatever care she could, but she could also see the lines of exhaustion and worry on Montgomery's face. She wanted to stay to offer whatever help she could, to make that worry go away. Montgomery made the decision for her, motioning to Paul.

  "Paul, leave them for a moment. I'll be over shortly to diagnose them. Would you please walk Miss Emelia out safely to her carriage?"

  "I don't need an escort!" Emelia blushed with embarrassment. "I know you're busy."

  "Paul needs a bit of fresh air," Montgomery said, waving her worries away. "Stop protesting and let him get a breather."

  She swallowed hard and followed the older man outside, feeling the disparity between her life and the lives of those languishing inside more sharply than she had ever known.

  Chapter 23

  Paul, it turned out, was a sturdy man despite his advanced years and Emelia had to walk quickly to keep up with his stride down the hill to where her carriage and driver waited. As they left the clinic, Emelia took a deep breath of fresh air. Paul didn't miss this, and smiled a little to himself when she did so.

  "That's my carriage," Emelia said, pointing to where her horse was tethered by two other wagons.

  "I know," the older man said simply, shrugging. "It is in good repair."

  "What do you mean?" Emelia asked. She wasn't asking what he meant by 'good repair,' she was asking what was at the root of his tone; the way he rolled the words off his tongue as though they were a condemnation.

  Paul seemed to understand the question behind her question, and he paused a little bit away from her driver to explain.

  "This clinic is on the edge of town," he said, "but it's not so very far away after all. There's a main road that goes by the orphanage, and I see good carriages rolling by every day. I recognise yours—you're from the Wells' estate, are you not?"

  Emelia nodded, and the man continued.

  "I've only seen one wealthy carriage ever stop here, before yours today—and that was Dr. Shaw's."

  Emelia felt a twinge of guilt, and yet she wasn't sure Paul had meant to critique her. He was poor, clearly, and though he gave his time and energy to the clinic she doubted that he had someone to give him the same care when he left his work outside the home. He was just sharing things the way that they were, not prescribing a change.

  "I've often wondered what it would be like if one of these rich carriages were to pull up outside the clinic and let off the wealthy people for a checkup. It would probably mean donations to improve the service, or perhaps at the very least a few extra cots."

  "Or help," Emelia said softly. "You could use more hands working."

  The old man looked at her as though seeing her for the first time. "Oh, I wouldn't imagine anyone from the estates actually nursing; that feels a bit extreme."

  Why? Emelia wondered to herself. Why did it feel extreme? She could here in the old man's voice the same doubt she'd heard in Montgomery's voice the day that he'd helped her tend to her sickened guests; when she'd offered to help and he'd thought there was no work for her.

  This old man clearly couldn't have imagined Emelia as she'd looked that day, running up and down the stairs emptying chamber pots. That's what Montgomery had meant, after all, when he said that the clinic was "no place for a lady."

  Emelia almost turned around then and went back inside. She would show him that she had a heart the same as him and had a desire to help—but then she thought of Aggie and knew that to go back to the clinic now would be as selfish as staying away from it had been in years past. She would only be doing it to prove something to Montgomery, and Aggie would suffer as a result.

  "Perhaps you are right." Emelia kept her voice quiet, subdued. "It's hard to make changes when you've been raised to think that proper living looks like a quiet and well-groomed estate. I would like to offer my assistance in the future, however."

  "I'm not sure the doctors will agree to letting a lady such as yourself work here."

  Emelia smiled. "I can be convincing, and not just in the choosing of the right place." She'd meant to poke fun at Paul's preconceptions about her, but after she spoke she could see that he truly believed that was her only experience in swaying opinion one way or the other. She cleared her throat awkwardly. "Thank you for walking me to my carriage, Paul. You are quite the gentleman, and you have given me much to think about."

  She stepped up to climb into the back of the vehicle and paused with her hand on the door sash. "May I ask you a question?"

  "Yes, my lady."

  "What are the things that occupy your mind ever day—the things that you're worried about, or excited about?" She paused when she saw the older man's face flush with confusion. "I know it's a strange thing to ask, but I'm curious nonetheless."

  "Do you mean the basic things, like where you're going to eat and sleep and the like? Or more complicated things like how to care for your mother when she's older or what to do when the weather's too dry and your crops don't come up in time?"

  Emelia swallowed hard. He'd answered her question already. "Both, I suppose."

  The old man smiled and gave a little bobbing bow. "I suppose everyone thinks about different things, right, my lady?"

  "I'm certain." She stepped inside and pulled the door of the carriage closed, tapping against the outside to get it rolling again down the road. As she looked out and watched Paul's figure growing smaller behind her, she thought about his answer.

  If she'd had to tell people what things were filling her mind and concerning her at that moment, she might have said Aggie, or her sister's relationship with Brody, or perhaps even the long list of failed social engagements she'd thrown during her short lifetime. She would never have thought of food or a roof over her head as prerequisites to happiness: she just took those things for granted.