by May Burnett
She set the willow bark steeping in a large tin cup that she held over the candles on the mantelpiece with a cloth round the handle. After some minutes she set the cup down next to the candles, and went back to rubbing cool water over his face. The neck was hot, too – and that woollen nightshirt looked far too warm. She unbuttoned it as far as possible and held the cloth away from the burning skin with one hand, as she rubbed his chest and shoulders with the water-soaked cloth. It seemed so little, so futile.
“Please don’t let him die, Lord,” she found herself saying. She had not prayed when Max died, had even taken solace in the possibility that there might be no hell where he would burn forever after his desperate action, as the tenets of her religion taught.
But now, in the face of this cursed fever, she could not bear the helplessness. It mattered far more, because all was not lost yet. A long happy life might still be in store for the young man who tossed so feverishly on his bed. “Oh, Lord, please give him another chance,” she pled. She would feel guilty for the rest of her life if Jonathan succumbed to this fever caused by their argument; but that was unimportant, as unimportant as the fact that she would likely never see him again like this, all alone, if he survived. He had to live; then he could wed another and have ten children with her blessing. Only let him survive this night….
Leaving Jonathan’s burning body as uncovered as possible, she went back to the willow bark, slowly steeping in the warm water, and held it over the candles for a few more minutes.
Prune and Patch would be shocked indeed could they see her now, all alone with a half-clad man in his bedroom in a common inn. She could not bring herself to care.
When she judged the willow bark to have steeped long enough, she let it cool to room temperature, and stuck the straw he had already used earlier into the cup.
She put her hand on Jonathan’s bare shoulder and shook it.
“Wake up, you must take more medicine! Please, please, wake up!”
After a minute of prodding, he finally opened his eyes, and looked at her. “Sophia,” he said. “I’m c-cold.” Indeed he was shivering. “Where is my sister?”
“I have no idea.” Was he delirious now? “She will come soon. Here, Jonathan, you must drink this.” She raised his head a little, pushing a tightly stuffed bolster from the armchair behind it, and placed the straw between his lips.
“Drink, this will make you feel better.”
He swallowed obediently but stopped after the first sip.”Grr. Bitter.”
“I know. Drink it to please me.”
“Anything for you.” He squeezed his eyes shut and got all the liquid down.
“Here, take some barley water to wash away the bitter taste.” He swallowed a little, before turning his face sideways, like a child.
“Now you really ought to rest, Jonathan.”
“Promise you’ll stay with me.” His hot hand clasped hers with desperate force. Such agitation could not be good for him.
“Very well. Until morning.” She had told the maid to bring her a breakfast at six, and planned to slip out of the inn in her veil, before anyone was the wiser.
Presently he fell into a restless sleep again, still clasping her hand. Eventually Cherry pulled it away, to resume the rubbing with water. Was the skin slightly less heated? She prayed again.
When she saw that at last he was sleeping more quietly, she sat back in the armchair for a few minutes. It was long after midnight, so it was only natural to feel fatigue too. Just another minute, to rest her own eyes …
***
“Good heavens! What are you doing here?”
Cherry woke up and blinked in bleary confusion. Jonathan, whose nightshirt had somehow become twisted up around his waist, was also stirring. She hastily averted her eyes from his naked legs.
Paul Selbington had entered the room, followed by Matthew and a tall, elegant young man who looked vaguely familiar. All three were looking from Jonathan to her in the armchair with varying expressions of deep shock and outrage.
“Here,” Paul said, and hastily draped the coverlet over Jonathan’s exposed body. He put his palm on Jonathan’s brow. “The fever is much lower, thank God. But this –!”
“Hello,” Jonathan said, looking blankly from the three men to her. He appeared confused, but not nearly as feverish as he had been in the evening. God had come through. Cherry sighed. A good thing that she was a widow and not an unmarried young lady, who might be ruined in such a situation. Since she was already ruined through Max’s suicide and bankruptcy, there was little damage after all. And she would be going away soon.
The elegant young man made Cherry a shallow bow. “Ma’am, I remember seeing you in church in younger years. I am Pell.”
“How do you do,” Cherry mumbled. Did she have to face a Marquess in a crumpled dress that had been unbecoming at the best of times, and with her hair every which way, after sleeping in a chair?
“I am c-certain that only Christian charity inspired your p-presence here,” Matt was saying to her, “But without any chaperone, what were you th-thinking?”
“I see only one remedy,” Lord Pell announced. “This is Mr. Durwent?” He looked at Jonathan with a severity that belied his youth.
“Yes, as I told you,” Paul said.
“You are single?”
Jonathan frowned. “What business it is of yours?”
“It is the business of any gentleman who discovers a lady he admires in such a compromising situation. There is only one possible outcome, if the man involved has the least pretension to honour. You must marry.”
What?
“Wait,” Cherry protested. “That might be necessary if I were a young unmarried lady, but I am a recent widow. I cannot marry anyone four months into my mourning year. It is absurd.”
All three men ignored her words and looked at Jonathan expectantly.
“She is a widow?” he said, shaking his head as though trying to clear it. “You want me to marry her?” He sounded so nonplussed, her foolish heart went out to him.
“You will marry her, or never show your face in Bellington or London again,” Pell said sternly. Cherry felt an unseemly urge to giggle. The Marquess had to be younger than Jonathan.
“I am afraid it is the only way,” Selbington added, and Matt, the traitor, nodded in support of the mad notion.
“The idea has its attractions, but I don’t understand.” Jonathan was looking at her questioningly. “Why do you have dark hair today?”
“Don’t try to evade the issue with irrelevancies,” Pell said. “Are you a gentleman, or a cad?”
“Shouldn’t we ascertain the wishes of the lady first?” Jonathan asked, proving, as far as Cherry was concerned, that he was the only sensible man in the room. “How did this situation come about?”
“You had a dangerous, sudden fever,” Paul explained. “For reasons I cannot understand, this morning I find you all alone and in an advanced state of undress with this young lady, who is very nearly a member of my family. It does not matter what her wishes are; by coming here she has forfeited any right to refuse your offer of marriage – which I suggest you make now, without further ado.”
“I’m sorry,” Cherry said to Jonathan. “I never wanted to compromise you. We can sort out the whole muddle later.”
“Yes, when you are married,” Pell said. “Well?”
Jonathan closed his eyes for a moment, as though hoping that the whole lot of them would go away, but when he reopened them, there was resignation on his face. “Ma’am, will you do me the honour to marry me?”
Cherry remained stubbornly silent.
“Yes, she will,” Pell said, and Paul said to her, “You have no choice. You are old enough to know that one must pay the price for foolish actions. Besides, if you are the new mistress of Lobbock Manor, it will all work out for the best. Your family will be happy to have you so close.”
“You might as well agree,” Jonathan said. “Maybe afterwards we will have a chance to discus
s what just happened here.”
“Oh, all right.” Cherry said snappishly, her nerves near to fraying. “Engaged is not married yet, mind.”
“Your gracious acceptance will be one of my happiest memories, Sophia,” Jonathan said ironically.
“Sophia?” Pell asked blankly. “Her name is Charity.”
Cherry, who had been watching Jonathan, saw him blanch and recoil.
“Charity Randolph?”
“Your affianced wife, Durwent. Don’t try to slip away. We know where to find you.” Did Pell think his title and positon gave him the right to ride roughshod over the lives of other mortals? Where did he get off, being so officious at his young age? But Paul and Matthew, the traitors, were all in favour of the match.
“Charity, we need to talk,” Jonathan said grimly. “With your other sisters as well.” He did not look like a lover now, he looked almost sick once again.
She nodded dumbly, and slipped out of the door even as the men were congratulating Jonathan on his recovery and engagement, slapping him on his shoulder, as though they had not just ruined his life and deprived him of the prospect of children.
It was too humiliating. As she hurried downstairs, she met the maid. “Oh Ma’am, is your cousin better? I’m so sorry I overslept.“
Cherry made her escape without vouchsafing an answer. It would not have been ladylike.
Drat!
Chapter 19
Jonathan could not remember such a strange morning in his life. When Sophia – no, Charity - had left, Matt followed after her, leaving him with Paul Selbington and that irritating Marquess, Lady Amberley’s brother. There he was on his bed in this sweat-soaked, crumpled nightshirt, while the two others were looking down at him fully dressed and in Pell’s case, extremely elegant. Even so, he was not going to stand for any more lectures on gentlemanly behaviour.
“Your fever seems to have broken overnight,” Selbington said. “I own I am most relieved. The physician sounded much less certain of your recovery than I could like.”
“I don’t understand,” Jonathan said, “I have not been sick, or caught a fever, in the last fifteen years. A little rainwater should not have had such an effect.”
“Dr Wentworth is coming back to check on you this morning,” Selbington said cheerfully, “you can ask him yourself. I am looking forward to your wedding to Cherry, by the way. She is a wonderful girl – woman, now – you don’t seem to realise what a lucky man you are. She had dozens of men chasing after her even as a young girl.”
“Yes,” Pell said reminiscently, “I was just a stripling, but I used to watch her in church whenever we were at Adlingham in my youth. And she has not changed all that much. It was calf love and has long since passed, but you will understand why I feel so strongly that no man must take advantage of her.”
“Such was not in my thoughts at all, I was ill,” Jonathan protested, though he felt guilty at recalling his nightly fantasies, in this very bed. His thoughts and intentions had not been nearly as pure as he claimed. Remembering those fantasies, he felt queasy. Could she really be his sister?
“Are you still buying Lobbock Manor?” Selbington enquired with a touch of anxiety.
“Yes, of course. I’m sorry I missed our meeting yesterday. Please convey my regrets to your sisters.”
“They know why you didn’t turn up, and send their best wishes for your recovery.”
“What I don’t understand,” he began, and broke off. Whether she was his sister or his fiancée, he could not betray Charity’s masquerade as the red-headed Mrs. Jones to these censorious young men. “Never mind.” He would get the story out of Charity herself. “You called her Cherry?”
“Yes, the three sisters hate their pious names. From childhood they called each other Patch, Cherry and Prune.”
“Cherry,” he said tentatively. “It suits her.” Those lips… they put him in mind of an old song, Cherry-ripe. Would these cherries turn out to be forbidden to him?
Selbington frowned. “You did not even know her name? Then what was she doing here in your room?”
Jonathan had enough, and his headache was coming back. “I think I’ll wait for that physician and a talk with Charity – Cherry – before discussing it further. You two have done quite enough mischief for one day.” He closed his eyes, and after a couple of minutes they went away at last.
The headache was not helping, as his horrified mind was grappling with the new situation. Sophia - Mrs. Jones - was Charity Randolph. He should have been suspicious when he found her inside the Lobbock estate – didn’t her house have a back gate not far from the place where she’d been picking strawberries? He was a fool, not to have guessed. She’d had the air of playing a role from the outset: the ladylike speech contrasting with the simple dress, the slight hesitation when she gave the name…
So he was engaged to a habitual liar. Unless she was his twin sister. Which would be worse, having her turn out to be his sister, or being obliged to marry a woman without aristocratic background, and most likely infertile?
He immediately rejected the solution his reason presented. He did not want Cherry to be his sister. Not at all. She could not be – surely he’d have guessed somehow? How could he have shared those delicious kisses with her, in that case?
If she was his twin sister there was nothing compromising about her presence at his sickbed, and nobody could force them to marry. Then why did his whole being reject that option so vehemently?
If she was not his sister, he might as well call the banns now. He should feel shattered, horrified at this threat to all he had worked and striven for over all those years. Maybe he was too sick and weak to muster indignation and unhappiness, and these emotions would arrive later.
Nonsense. The prospect of having Cherry – please God, not his sister – in his bed and at his side for the rest of his life was too exhilarating, lies and disguises notwithstanding. So maybe he would not be able to found a dynasty. Had he died of his sudden fever, it would not have happened either. He had had to regroup and change direction in business often enough; he could do it once again, since fate clearly had other plans for him.
With this conclusion, the headache miraculously abated, and he finally got some rest.
The physician arrived an hour later, and pronounced himself well satisfied with Jonathan’s quick recovery, “but you had better stay in bed for the rest of the day, and to be on the safe side, tomorrow as well. You have been very lucky, but it does not do to underestimate such chills. It might well have carried you off.”
“Why should I have been struck down by illness here, when I have not had anything like that in the last ten years or more? I have been wet every now and then, even in cold winter weather, without catching anything worse than a stuffy nose.”
The physician rubbed his chin, looking him over thoughtfully. “Have you been spending long hours at work, neglecting exercise and fresh air?”
“Maybe,” Jonathan admitted, “but I have been doing that for years and years, and never fallen sick.”
“Sometimes a holiday or change of scene, as healthy as these may be in general, causes a weakening of the body’s defences. I have a patient who works very hard all week, and every Sunday, his only free day, he suffers from a persistent and terrible headache.”
“Poor man,” Jonathan said. “You ordered a tincture, and then there was a bitter liquid, that helped more, I think.”
The physician sniffed at the cup. “Willow bark, a traditional remedy I do not put much stock in. I had not prescribed it. Who gave it to you?”
“I don’t remember,” Jonathan said, unwilling to expose Cherry to the physician’s curiosity. “It seems to have been efficacious, though as a layman I cannot tell how much of my recovery is due to the tea, or to your tincture. I am very obliged that you came so promptly. What do I owe you?”
He added a handsome bonus to the physician’s moderate fee, which prompted the medical man to enumerate various recommendations how to avoid such incid
ents in future. A healthful, moderate diet, regular exercise, and shorter working hours were the main points.
A breakfast of gruel and barley water was presently offered to him, which Jonathan rejected, ordering toast and scrambled eggs instead. The boot boy helped him change into a clean shirt. He was running out of those, and reluctantly entrusted his washing to the inn. What choice did he have? At the rate he was going, it might be weeks until he could leave Bellington.
***
Cherry was not long alone in the old house. Within the hour Prune, Matt, Patch and Paul all converged on her, and not one of them had thought to bring any breakfast. She felt a headache coming on, possibly from hunger.
They were all determined to carry her back to Spalding Hall, and to underline that they would not take no for an answer, had brought along the Spalding barouche.
“Now that you are engaged to Mr. Durwent, you cannot possibly stay here,” Prune said. She was elated at the news, relayed by Matt. “He seems to be very rich, even richer than Max! Just imagine, with you living here in Lobbock Manor, and Patch married to Paul, we’ll all be together again. Just like old times, only better.”
It went against the grain to destroy her sister’s optimism, but Cherry obstinately shook her head. “He never wanted to be engaged to me. It is absurd – I am a widow! Widows are allowed to visit a man now and then! This concern for my reputation is mere hypocrisy.”
“How can you say that?” Paul asked reproachfully. “And if you didn’t want Durwent, why were you there with him, in such a compromising situation?”
“Yes, Cherry, do explain that part,” Patch added ominously. Cherry suppressed a groan. They were already working as a team.
“I had to check on him because it was my fault he was sick in the first place. I had an argument with Mr. Durwent, and sent him away in the heavy rain.”
“If he had an argument with a lady, he is even more at fault,” Paul said. “What was it about?”
“I prefer not to say. It is nobody’s business. Of course I never expected a hale-looking young man like Durwent to succumb to a fever because of a little rain.”
