by Liz Carlyle
“I believe I must not be country bred,” said Edward, none of this sounding familiar to him. “But I should apologize. I have detained you, and it looks as though you were busy.”
“Oh, yes!” Wrinkling her nose, Miss Wentworth stirred from the door, and made a dramatic gesture with her duster. “Desperate duty calls!”
“Desperate? How so?”
A look of exasperation dashed over Miss Wentworth’s face. “My mother, Aurélie, is coming to visit,” she said, “so we’re scrubbing the place crown to baseboard, and turning out all the guest rooms. Everyone pitches in.”
He laughed. “How many guest rooms does she need?”
“Heavens, who knows?” She threw her arms wide, nearly catching a vase with her duster. “That’s half the problem. She’ll say four, and a baker’s dozen will turn up. Once she came with eight carriages and twenty servants in tow—she dislikes trains excessively—but her gentlemen friends inevitably must shoot, and Aurélie never stirs without an entourage.”
“Impressive,” he said. “But your mother does not reside here?”
“No, she finds it too bleak by the moors. She spends the Season in London, and the winter in France.”
“And you do not go with her?”
Miss Wentworth lifted one shoulder. “No,” she said, “and our aunt Louisa says that Aurélie hasn’t the patience—or, frankly, the reputation—to bring out a debutante, which I very nearly am.”
“Hmm,” he said. “And what is this dashing lady’s full name?”
“Mrs. James Wentworth,” said the girl, “but she has been a widow some years now.”
Edward didn’t recognize the name, but then, he hardly recognized his own. “So you’re to have a country house party descend upon you shortly. I must get myself well and out of your way.”
“Oh, by no means! We’ve twenty-three guest chambers, and even Mamma cannot fill up so many as that.” Her nose wrinkled again. “Still, those in the south tower are a little tatty.”
Edward remembered Lady d’Allenay’s remark about what she could not afford. But he had no opportunity to explore the topic further—not that it was his place to do so.
The footman returned with a tray and Miss Wentworth stepped out. “Oh, by the way, Edward,” she called back, as Jasper lifted off the cover of a plate of a warm omelet, “your things have been pressed and hung in the wardrobe, and your luggage stowed in the coffer.”
“The coffer?”
With her duster, she pointed at the medieval chest that sat at the foot of his bed. “Mind the lid,” she warned. “It was made frightfully heavy—to keep Viking marauders from carrying off our silver, I collect.”
“Thank you,” he said again.
Then Miss Wentworth vanished along with her duster. Edward ate with gusto, then surprised himself by promptly falling back asleep.
AS AUTUMN SETTLED more certainly over Bellecombe Castle, one day turned to three and Edward’s bruises turned from red to ugly shades of purplish-yellow. Dr. Fitch came again, pronouncing his patient as well as could be expected, and Richard Burnham came to offer his prayers.
Kate came to regret ever having seen the man all but naked, for the vision of that solid chest and its dark, tempting trail of hair had begun to torment her nights.
“How is our invalid?” asked Nancy at dinner that evening.
“Resting comfortably.” Kate looked at her across a forkful of parsnips. “Which you would know, perhaps, had you not chosen to spend the whole of the afternoon at St. Michael’s.”
“Heavens,” said Nancy lightly. “Was ever a person more chided for spending too much time at church?”
“Well, it must be the tidiest church in Christendom, what with you and Mrs. Burnham at it six days a week.”
At that, Nancy took insult. “I’ll have you know Peppie and I turned out four bedchambers in the south tower this morning,” she retorted, “whilst you were reading the Eclectic Review to Edward.”
“I thought reading from a London magazine might jog a memory,” said Kate evenly. “How bad was it?”
“How bad was what?”
“The south tower.”
Nancy lifted one shoulder. “Not as bad as I’d feared,” she admitted. “Now that we can afford fresh mattresses and new glazing, the musty smell is gone. Well, that and the fact that Peppie had all the draperies washed.”
“Washed?” said Kate incredulously.
Nancy went to the sideboard and returned with a decanter of wine. “They were beyond being beaten and aired,” she said, refilling their glasses. “It was wash them, or burn them.”
Kate flicked up an anxious glance. “Did they survive?”
“Passably.” Nancy sighed. “Kate, it’s a castle. Those rooms were built in the sixteenth century. No one expects luxury; the bedchambers will do now if needed. The Mongol horde descends shortly.”
Kate felt her mouth twist. “Then let us pray we do not have to put any of our horde in the south tower.”
“I’d sooner put the whole lot of them in it,” said Nancy. “It’s about time for a good, sharp frost, and a frozen rime on that new glazing might send them all packing again.”
“Heavens, poor Richard!” Kate shook her head. “To wish for a wife so lacking in Christian charity!”
Nancy just shot her a dark scowl. “No one needs a practical wife more than a softhearted parish priest,” she replied. “Besides, you don’t want Aurélie’s horde here any better than I do. But that does beg the question, Kate—what are we to do with Edward?”
It was a topic that had weighed on Kate. Her houseguest had grown increasingly impatient during his recovery, and would not remain abed much longer. It was one thing to house a man too ill to go elsewhere. But once he was up and around—once his injuries were more unseen than apparent—it might not be thought entirely proper for him to remain at Bellecombe.
But where to send him?
It scarcely mattered, for Kate could not bear the thought of his leaving Bellecombe until he was entirely well again, and able to pick up the threads of the life she had so recklessly arrested. Yes, the guilt weighed on her. And if there was a little part of her that was faintly fascinated by the man … well, that didn’t bear thinking of just now.
She had spoken sharply to him, of course, about getting out of bed. And ever since, he had been … well, if not a model patient, at least an obedient one. Indeed, he had declared himself determined to please her, claiming that he had much sooner look at her than at Jasper.
It had been said with a wink, too; one that made her stomach do that odd little flip-flop again. This was followed by his shockingly rakish grin; a grin that seemed, on further consideration, entirely out of place on a countenance that was otherwise so stern.
“Kate,” said her sister impatiently, “what are we to do with Edward?”
“There’s nothing we can do until he’s himself again,” Kate answered. “Besides, Aurélie will think it a great lark.”
“She will,” Nancy agreed, “and all her gossiping friends will, too. And Aurélie hasn’t enough sense to think how unfortunate rumors might reflect on us.”
Kate sighed, and crushed her napkin in her lap. “No, she’ll simply flirt with the poor man outrageously, and convince herself it’s all in a good cause—bucking up his spirits, and all that rot.”
But Nancy had set her chin in her palm almost morosely. “Sometimes I marvel,” she said, “that Richard is willing to take me on at all, given my bloodlines.”
Kate had no reply to that. Instead, she motioned for their plates to be removed, and tried not to think of the coming storm.
CHAPTER 5
Jasper’s Perfidy
Three or four days after his accident, Edward woke to see the afternoon sun dappling the wall opposite his bed, the pattern shifting with the trees outside. The footman had fallen into another deep drowse, his chair cocked back against the wall in a remarkable feat of physics.
Edward shook off the last vestiges of a st
range dream, and fumbled on the table for his pocket watch. But his vision still seemed off, and even with a squint, he could not make sense of the dial. Impatiently, he glanced over his shoulder at the angle of the light streaming in through the tiny, diamond-shaped panes. Yes, very low indeed.
He had slept away another day. And he was just about done with doing so. It was one thing to lie here and listen to the goddess’s perfectly modulated, almost sensuous contralto as she read to him from the Times, or regaled him with one of her glib stories about life on the home farm, while his gaze trailed lazily down her porcelain skin, her swanlike throat, and all the way down to what looked like a pair of small, perfect breasts.
But to sit here and stare at Jasper’s overbite as he snored?
At least Edward’s headache had entirely left him. But his right ankle still hurt like the devil and besides the stitches in his head, he had a nasty bruise from the small of his back halfway down the thigh. Worse, the tedium was making him crotchety.
He needed distraction. Damn it, he needed action. He was not a man who could simply lie about like this; even absent his memory, Edward knew that much. And with his body beginning to stir almost frustratingly to Kate’s presence, he knew, too, that he was far from death.
He scrubbed a hand around his stubbled face, then cleared his throat a little sharply. The footman came awake at once, the front legs of his chair clacking hard upon the planked floor.
“Yes, s-sir?” he stuttered, quite literally jerked awake.
For an instant, Edward considered the situation. He got out of bed on legs that were reasonably steady, and pulled on the butler’s robe. “Jasper,” he finally said, “are you by chance a married man?”
Jasper shook his head a little too emphatically. “Indeed not, sir.”
“Have you a mother, then?”
“Yes, sir. In Nether Stowey, sir.”
Edward figured Nether Stowey to be a small crook in the road. “Well, doubtless she tries to smother you with kindness and wool sweaters,” he said, “and you probably came to work here in part to be your own man. To get off the farm and out from under the cat’s paw—not that it isn’t a kindly meant paw, mind.”
Jasper smiled, revealing his overbite again. “ ’Twas a little like that, sir.”
“Women are all like that.” It was another of his mysteriously known facts. “In fact, Lady d’Allenay is, I daresay, a little like that?”
Jasper’s eyes widened. “I’m sure I’d not know, sir.”
Edward hardened his jaw. “It’s like this, Jasper,” he said. “She’s got me wrapped in cotton wool, but I must have a bath. And a proper shave. Could you arrange such a thing, do you imagine?”
Jasper’s eyes widened further as he declared he did not know.
“Isn’t drawing a bath something you would ordinarily do at the request of any houseguest?” Edward suggested. “Moreover, have you been forbidden to draw me a bath?”
Jasper shook his head. “Not … exactly.”
“Then kindly do so at once,” said Edward. “I know you fear Lady d’Allenay will scold you, and if she does, I’ll make it plain I gave you no choice. I’m done with being washed in a saucer of warm water.”
Jasper’s eyes just shot to the door, as if looking for assistance.
“Damn it, man, I’ve lain in that bed hours unending, and I’m fit company for neither man nor beast,” he said. “Now take yourself downstairs and come back with some hot water whilst I pull out that old slipper tub.”
At that, Jasper leapt into action. “No, sir,” he said firmly. “You just sit yourself back on that bed, sir. I’ll pull out the tub.”
KATE WAS ENJOYING tea with Nancy, Mrs. Burnham, and the wife of a local squire when Mrs. Peppin began to hover outside the wide double doors. The entire conversation had centered around the identity of Bellecombe’s mysterious guest.
Mrs. Cockram, the squire’s wife, opined as how he might be a French spy come creeping up from the Channel. The facts that Bellecombe was too far inland to be worth reconnoitering, and that the entire nation of France was still occupied with the aftermath of their most recent revolution could not dissuade the good lady from this theory.
Mrs. Burnham, herself a vicar’s widow, suggested that this was an uncharitable view of a gentleman too ill to defend himself. Kate didn’t imagine her houseguest to be remotely incapable of defending himself, but she held her tongue and began to worry more about the urgent look on the housekeeper’s face.
She was somehow sure that look had to do with her obstinate patient, and rose with a rueful smile.
“I believe our guest must require my attention,” she said, not entirely disappointed to be called away. “I beg you will excuse me. Nancy, do pour again.”
But the ladies both rose with her, declaring that it looked like rain, and that they had overstayed their welcome—which was not quite true.
“Still, it is such a distressing thing,” said Mrs. Cockram, drifting toward the drawing room door, “that two unwed ladies must harbor a man of unknown character. I vow, I wonder if you oughtn’t send him to Mr. Cockram and me at the Hall?”
“Well, if anyone is to have the poor gentleman,” interjected the rector’s mother, “he must come to the rectory. Would that not be the very thing?”
“It would not.” Kate folded her hands firmly before her. “Thank you, ladies, but I assure you we are managing perfectly well. And he cannot be moved from his bed. He’s extremely frail.”
“Then Richard must come again to minister to his spiritual nee—”
Mrs. Burnham let her words fall away, for a massive shadow had just fallen across the threshold. As Mrs. Cockram’s eyes widened almost comically, Kate slowly turned, praying she was not about to see what she very much feared.
But it was precisely what she feared. Her wayward houseguest stood bracketed in the doorway attired in his elegant black coat and a burgundy brocade waistcoat that practically sculpted the lean turn of his waist. And he was much taller—and altogether too male—seen standing, as opposed to lying in a heap, or reclining on a pile of pillows.
“Edward!” she managed. “What on earth—?”
Freshly shaved—and smelling very unlike a man at death’s door—he was dressed for riding in his tall boots and snug breeches. Then again, Kate remembered, he had nothing else to wear.
But this fact being unknown to Mrs. Cockram and Mrs. Burnham, the good Christian ladies were glancing from Edward to Kate in a way that made it clear they doubted her veracity.
“Good afternoon,” he said a little tentatively.
“Edward, you are not to be up!” Nancy had jerked into action, and yanked out a chair. “Do sit down, sir, before you fall down.”
But Edward didn’t look at the chair. Instead, he looked faintly mortified. “I do beg your pardon,” he said stiffly. “I had no idea you were entertaining, my lady, and thought merely to take a little exercise.”
He was, at least, bearing a bit of his weight onto a brass-knobbed walking stick she recognized as Stephen’s, to save Kate from looking a complete liar. And his wet, golden hair was slicked back off his forehead, starkly revealing the mottled, stitched-up wound.
“A little exercise?” she echoed. “Without Dr. Fitch‘s permission?”
“He didn’t tell me I mightn’t move,” Edward countered. “He said I must rest, avoid bright light, and not think.”
“Indeed, sir, you do look much better this afternoon,” said Nancy with a little curtsy. “It is something like a miracle, to be sure! But if you will excuse me, I was just escorting Mrs. Burnham and Mrs. Cockram to the door.”
Here, the good ladies seemed suddenly to regret their notion of leaving. But nothing by way of encouragement being offered by their hostess, the good ladies lingered only a little. After simpering over introductions, they duly presented their hands to the handsome invalid, fluttering and blushing as if he were the prince himself, then wished him a speedy recovery.
But Kate could not
miss the speculative looks they cast at her as they parted.
Edward watched them go, then turned to her. “I have the most appalling fear I should apologize,” he said. “Did I behave wrongly?”
Her temper yielding in the face of his earnestness, Kate threw up her hands on a laugh. “I was just being gently chided for harboring a man of unknown character beneath my roof,” she said. “I reassured them you were so deathly ill as to be perfectly harmless, and—oh! Now you begin to look unsteady!”
And he was. Abruptly, Kate slipped a hand under his elbow, and urged him into a chair near the table.
“I beg your pardon,” he said again when he’d settled himself, and set the walking stick away. “This blasted leg, you see, is half my trouble.”
Kate resisted the urge to kneel down and examine it. “Is it worse?”
“I think I didn’t grasp how thoroughly I’d wrenched the ankle.”
“Nor did I.” Kate had begun to pace the room. “Did Fitch examine it properly, do you recall?” she added fretfully. “Could it be broken?”
“Yes, he did, and no, it could not,” said Edward. “Kindly sit, Lady d’Allenay. You will give me mal de mer with all that striding about. I’m in a weakened state, you know.”
Regarding him warily, she did sit, carefully sweeping her full skirts aside. “There,” she said, “now kindly tell me which of my servants conspired against me and toted up your bathwater?”
“It was Jasper,” Edward confessed, “but I had to chase him down and flog him unmercifully first.”
Kate lifted one eyebrow. “On that leg?”
“Yes. Remarkably slow, poor lad.”
“Hmm. Well, I will say no more. As I may have mentioned, I know your type.”
At that, he grinned hugely. “You did say, didn’t you?” he agreed. “Let that be a lesson to you.”
“A lesson?”
“Yes, the next time you mean to run down some poor, unsuspecting fellow, pick a more biddable sort of chap.” He paused long enough to peer at the tray. “Is that tea, by any chance?”
