Web of Love

by Mary Balogh

  Dominic had been brought in earlier that morning, Mrs. Simpson had scrawled. He had a chest wound that she had not yet examined, though it had been tended on the field. He was in a high fever, but was safe and warm in a bed in her rooms. Nothing else. No indication of whether he would live or die. Madeline surprised the servant by laughing suddenly. How could one tell if any of these men would live or die? Two had died in this very house the day before, and one of those had walked inside without assistance. And there were a dozen at least for whom it was a miracle that this day had dawned. If it had dawned. She had been sleeping for five hours and had not yet checked on them.

  “Tell Mrs. Simpson that I will be there as soon as I am able,” she said, folding the note carefully. She was surprised to find that her hands were quite steady.

  She turned and walked into the salon, and was greeted by a chorus of requests for water. She was soon so busy that she abandoned her plan to ask Lady Andrea if she might be excused for an hour. How could she leave when there were so few hands to help? Dom was as safe as he could possibly be. Mrs. Simpson would care for him.

  Before approaching the final silent bundle by the window, she opened the door and yelled at a servant who happened to be passing through the hallway to run up to her room and bring all the pillows and blankets from her bed and the cushions from the daybed. Then she turned back to him. She knew he was not dead; his hand was twitching. But his head and one side of his face were swathed in fresh bandages, and the single blanket draped over his body was flat to the floor where his right leg should have been.

  She knelt beside him and took his hand in hers. “I shall have a pillow for your head and another blanket for you in a moment,” she said gently. “Would you like a drink?”

  His one uncovered eye was closed. He did not answer her. But he clawed weakly at her hand. She turned and lifted the cup she had set on the floor beside her and slid her free arm beneath his head to raise it slightly so that he might drink. And as he did so and some of the water dribbled from the sides of his mouth and down his neck, she realized that he was Lieutenant Penworth. That vigorous, eager boy.

  “Here,” she said as the servant picked her way over to her side, her arms laden, “I shall put a pillow beneath your head. And an extra blanket over you. You are shivering. It is Madeline Raine, Lieutenant. You are safe now. And will be more comfortable than you have been, I think.”

  She touched the backs of her fingers lightly to his cheek and turned to look at the men about her and to decide which were most in need of the single pillow, two frilled cushions, and two blankets still piled in the servant’s arms.

  Dominic was forgotten about. Or at least pushed to the back of her mind. There were more pressing concerns to occupy her for the moment.

  THE DOOR THAT SEPARATED Ellen’s rooms from the rest of the house remained open as she and the other occupants shared the care of the wounded. But she did not go out into the streets again. She felt no more need to do so, and the house was as full as it could be. No one else that she knew came to the house until Lady Madeline Raine came that evening. But then, she was expecting no one she knew. No one at all.

  Lord Eden was delirious with a high fever by afternoon and had not been quite rational even when they had carried him in. But he was right about that one thing. No one else came at all. And she felt that he was right. She had not doubted it from the moment he had told her. There was no lingering hope, no part of her that listened for footsteps even against reason.

  She was not expecting anyone else. And it did not matter. She would not think of it. She had plenty to do. More than enough. The boy, though not nearly as highly fevered as he, was fretful. She had to make frequent calls on him to soothe him, to give him drinks and set his blankets straight, to smooth back his hair and kiss his brow.

  And late in the morning she sat with the other man, the one who always watched her with his eyes though he showed no other sign of consciousness or of life. She held his hand and smiled at him and said a prayer over him and told him that he was safe with her, together with a dozen other murmured consolations, until he died. And she closed his eyes, covered him with the sheet, and sent a manservant to find someone whose job it was to take away the dead.

  But it was he who drew her constantly. Lord Eden. Dominic. She was frightened, but she would not admit to her fear. He was going to die. The fever raged in him. He did not sleep, but he knew nothing. He did not know her. She changed his bandage when the boy had sunk into an uneasy sleep and the other man had been taken away. And she winced at sight of the wound and the purple-and-green bruising around the broken ribs. And her hands trembled slightly when he began to groan with every labored breath.

  “I will have a clean bandage on you in a moment, my dear,” she said. “Bear with me for one minute more. Soon you shall rest again.”

  She sat with him whenever she could and bathed his face with a cool cloth.

  No surgeon came all day long, though they had sent for one the day before, and again that morning.

  Lady Madeline came in the evening, a shawl thrown over her hair, her dress crumpled and none too clean.

  “Where is he?” she asked as soon as she set eyes on Ellen. “I could not get away before now. Is he…?”

  “He is in my room.” Ellen took her visitor’s arm and guided her in the right direction. “He is still alive.”

  “Still?” Madeline’s voice sharpened. “You did not expect him to be? Oh, but how foolish. I know how it is. Was ever anything more dreadful? Is it always like this, or is this worse? Oh, Dom!”

  She was into the room and across it and bending over the bed without even thinking to wait for an answer.

  Ellen stood in the doorway and watched the other woman take up his hand and hold it to her cheek and talk to him. But although his eyes were open and bright, he did not know his twin. His breathing was labored.

  “He needs a surgeon,” Ellen said quietly, “but I am afraid they are all far too busy to come. I have changed his bandage and tried to get him to drink. There is precious little else I can do.”

  “I know.” Madeline straightened up, though she continued to gaze down at her brother. “I know. One is so helpless. Dom, you must not die. Do you hear me? You fought out there. Now you must fight in here too. You must. You mustn’t die. I don’t want to be the elder twin, Dom.”

  She set his hand down gently at his side eventually and turned to Ellen. “It was kind of you to send,” she said. “And I can see that you have been giving him the best of care. He is clean. I cannot stay. It would be selfish of me to move here merely because my brother is here. There are so many thousands…and so many in Lady Andrea’s house, and so few to tend to them all. Lieutenant Penworth is there. He has lost a leg. And an eye. I must go back.”

  She was surprised to hear the sob in her throat. She had thought herself past feeling.

  “Yes, you must,” Ellen agreed. “I have help here in the rest of the house. And I will care for him, you know. He has been like part of my own family for the past three years.”

  “Yes,” Madeline said. And then, as she took one agonized look back at her brother and pulled her shawl over her head again: “Your husband? Have you heard? Apparently they are all gathering at Nivelles and pushing on to Paris.”

  “Is the battle over, then?” Ellen asked. “Yes, I have heard. Lord Eden brought word. He is gone.”

  “To Par—?” But Madeline had looked into Ellen’s face. “Oh, no. I…”

  “Don’t!” Ellen spoke sharply. “You must go now. Lady Andrea will be looking for your help. And I have a boy in the other room who will have kicked his blankets into knots by now. He is just a child. A frightened, hurt child. I am going to fight the surgeon when he comes, for his arm is swollen, you know, and they are bound to want to take it off. But it is clean, and I am sure the swelling will go down. I am going to fight for his arm.” She laughed. “Do you think I should have a sword to wield?”

  Madeline had turned very pale.
But she drew back her shoulders and smiled in return. “A pair of scissors perhaps?” she said. “And a very ferocious frown.”

  “I will try it,” Ellen said, standing in the doorway to watch her guest run lightly down the stairs. “I shall send word if there is any change, you may be assured.”

  The boy was sleeping, she saw. She did not disturb him even though the blankets were twisted awkwardly about him.

  She stood beside Lord Eden’s bed and smiled into his fevered eyes that were turned on her.

  “I am here, my dear,” she said softly. “I will bathe your face and turn your pillow for you. Perhaps you will be more comfortable then.”

  He closed his eyes when she had finished and sat down beside his bed. He seemed a little quieter. Ellen fell into a doze.

  A SURGEON ARRIVED during the afternoon of the following day. He was an army man, a hearty, loud-voiced soldier who appeared to believe that by talking loudly he would penetrate the fever and pain of his patients.

  And yet he was not ungentle. He removed the bandage carefully from the boy’s arm, talking and laughing in an apparent attempt to distract the youth’s attention. But the boy was terrified. He clung unashamedly to Ellen’s hand and gazed at the doctor with eyes like saucers.

  “Hm,” the surgeon said, prodding and poking at the swollen arm until the boy squirmed and Ellen began to change her mind about his gentleness. “Nasty enough. Well, lad, it’s not putrid, but it well might be soon. We’ll have the arm off, shall we, and be done with it? I’ll have someone come for you.”

  “No,” Ellen said quietly. “If amputation is not yet necessary, we will wait. I shall keep the wound clean and covered and hope for the best. His fever has already subsided considerably.”

  The surgeon frowned. “Are you family, ma’am?” he asked.

  “No,” she said. “But he is in my home, and for the time being I stand in place of his mother.”

  The man threw back his head and roared with mirth. “Oh, mothers!” he said. “Enough said. I am wiser than to fight against a mother. Why do you think I am with the army, ma’am? The lad is going to wait, is he? He might be sorry.”

  “Perhaps,” she said. And she turned to tuck the blankets around the boy while the surgeon bandaged his arm again. He looked up at her with wide, panicked eyes. She smiled and even winked at him.

  The surgeon shook his head when he looked at Lord Eden. He removed the bandage gently enough and peered closely at the wound.

  “Abscess forming,” he said, and shook his head again. “Well, we can’t amputate this one, can we, ma’am? So we have no cause to quarrel.” He laughed heartily at his own joke. “Nasty fever. I’ll have to bleed him.”

  “Has he not lost enough blood?” she asked.

  “Apparently not,” he said. “Or he wouldn’t have such a raging fever. Here, you can hold the bowl for me.”

  Lord Eden did indeed seem more restful after the bleeding was finished. But it was a rest of extreme weakness, Ellen thought. She had no time to worry about it. She had performed her task so unflinchingly, it appeared, that the surgeon soon sent for her from the other part of the house to take the bowl from a trembling maid’s hands while he bled most of his patients there.

  He would be back the next day if he could, he said as he left the house and hurried along to another. He would bleed those patients again and see how that arm was looking.

  The boy was calling for her as she reached the doorway into her own rooms.

  LORD EDEN CLUNG to life. Sometimes it would have been easier to let go. Sometimes he wanted to claw at the heat and the pain, to climb outside them, to run away, to be free. Something in his chest felt as if it were swelling and swelling until it must burst and fling him in a thousand directions. And sometimes he forgot who he was and where he was and why he was there.

  Only one thing kept him pinned to life. Only one person. Sometimes when he came to himself she was not there. He would try to close his eyes, to lie quietly until she came. Sometimes he lost himself again while he waited. Sometimes she came hurrying, a look of concern on her face, and he knew that he must have called out. Sometimes he could not remember who she was.

  In fact, most of the time he could not remember who she was. He could not put a name to her face. But it did not matter. He was safe when she was there. He was at peace. Sometimes when he came back to himself she was sitting beside the bed sewing or holding his hand. And always smiling. Not with merriment. But with gentle affection, as if he were someone very special.

  Was he special? To her? Who was she? He could not remember. But it did not matter.

  The ceiling did not move down toward him when she was there. The furniture did not move about.

  “Everything will stay still now,” she assured him, her cool fingers smoothing through his hair. “I am here. I am going to stay with you for a time.”

  He could close his eyes and perhaps sleep for a while. If only someone would lift the great weight from his chest. Was it too heavy for her to remove? She was only a slender woman. It was hard for him to breathe with that weight on him. He was going to suffocate.

  “I will wash you off with a cool cloth above and below the bandage,” she said, folding back the blanket. “That will help lessen the weight. Does that feel better?”

  And it always did. The weight was still there—it must be too heavy for her—but some of the heat had gone. He thought he might sleep.

  Sometimes there was a lamp burning in the room. It must be nighttime. He listened. There was no sound at all except for a clock ticking somewhere. She was asleep in the chair beside his bed, her head fallen awkwardly to the side. She should be lying in a bed. She must be tired. He was thirsty. But he must say nothing. She would jump up and fetch him a drink. But she was sleeping. He lay and watched her. He was comforted by her presence. Was it a live coal that was on his chest?

  Sometimes he knew who she was. She was Madeline. She was telling him that he would be proud of her if he could only see her all day long nursing the wounded.

  “And I haven’t had a fit of the vapors even once, Dom,” she said. “Poor Lieutenant Penworth does not have the will to live, I think. But I will nurse him back to health despite himself. You have the will to live, Dom. I can see it. And you are going to win too. I know. Oh, I know, you horrid pestiliential man, you! How dare you put me through this! I hate you.”

  He felt a grin, but there was too much effort involved in transferring it to his face.

  Nursing what wounded?

  Sometimes she wasn’t Madeline. And he didn’t always want her to be. She was more peaceful than Madeline. She never cried, as his sister had cried when raging against him. She soothed him. She fed him cold water and…What? Toast? And she came with the cooling cloths and the comforting words and the gentle hands. Even when she hurt his chest, he learned to grit his teeth and endure. For he always felt better afterward.

  “I will be finished in a moment,” she would say quietly. “One minute more, and then you can rest again.”

  And it was always true. He could trust her word. And everything stayed still around him when she was there.

  “Put out the fire.”

  “I will open the door wider,” she would say, “and bathe your forehead. You will feel cooler.”

  “Take off some blankets.”

  “I will fold it back to your waist,” she would say. “Is that better, my dear?”

  “Can’t you find someone to lift this weight off me?”

  “I will bathe your shoulders and your arms with cool water,” she would say. “Perhaps that will help.”

  “You are tired. Do you never sleep? Do I keep you up? Is it nighttime? You should go to bed.”

  “I shall sit beside you here and rest,” she would say. “The chair is very comfortable. Don’t worry about me, my dear. Try to sleep.”

  He was on fire. It must be a red-hot coal. But he would not say anything to her. She was doing too much. Always busy. Always cheerful. Always smiling. />
  Who was she? He could not remember.

  He clung to life for her. She made life bearable despite all. Despite the heat and the weight and the feeling that his chest must explode.

  And sometimes there was Madeline.

  But always there was her.

  The surgeon bled him four times in ten days despite Ellen’s tight-lipped disapproval. The fever raged and he weakened. He was almost constantly delirious. All he had eaten was toast dipped in weak tea.

  After two weeks the abscess burst and the matter within it flowed. Ellen was with him at the time. She called to one of the servants in the house and sent him running for the surgeon—if only the man could be found. And she bit hard on her lower lip as she cleaned the wound. He was moaning with each breath.

  It had happened at last. His chest had exploded, and the pain knifed and knifed at him, robbing him of breath and of all power to think or even to see.

  But the weight was lifting too. She was bending over him, and she was taking the weight away. And she must have put out the fire and taken off all the smothering blankets. He felt light and cool, pinned in place only by the searing pain.

  “Mrs. Simpson?” he said.

  She lifted her head sharply from what she was doing and looked into his face. “You know me?” she said. She put a cool hand against his brow. “The fever has broken. It has gone with the abscess.”

  “I was wounded,” he said. “How did I get here?”

  “You rode here,” she said. “With some help.”

  “How long ago?” Where had he been? The last thing he could remember was trudging along a muddy road with his men. There had been jokes about Hyde Park soldiers.

  “You have been here for two weeks,” she said.

  Two weeks? The pain was like a knife. But such a lightness. He could breathe despite the pain.