by Lily George
Bunting showed them into the library, where everything was set up as usual, awaiting Harriet’s arrival. Mrs. Crossley and Brookes sat before the fire. Brookes read a book, and Mrs. Crossley knitted her same interminable shawl.
Brookes thumped the book on a table, starting out of his chair. Peering closely at it, Harriet recognized the volume of Donne she borrowed weeks before. She turned her eyes back to his face. Judging by the quick lift of his brows, Sophie’s arrival surprised him. She dove into the social graces without delay, hoping to smooth over his shock. “Captain, my sister wanted to come along today. She hasn’t made your aunt’s acquaintance, and I speak of Mrs. Crossley so often and so highly, that she simply had to meet her. Mrs. Crossley, may I present my sister, Miss Sophie Handley?”
Mrs. Crossley rose, inclining her head toward Sophie. “A pleasure to meet you, my dear.”
Sophie bobbed a curtsy. “I am most grateful to meet you, ma’am.”
For a brief second, Harriet didn’t know what to do. She knew she needed to broach the subject of work with the captain, but it seemed rude to begin talking about the war with Sophie there. Her mere presence made it a social call rather than an opportunity to learn.
Mrs. Crossley entered the fray, motioning for Sophie to join her on the settee. “Now, my dear, you and I shall sit here and discuss lovely frivolous things, while those two labor away on Harriet’s book. I am sure our chatter will interrupt the muse, though. Perhaps, Brookes, you should take Harriet for a walk around the estate, and you two can discuss the war. That way, you won’t be disturbed by my chat with pretty Miss Sophie.”
Harriet peered at Mrs. Crossley, who had taken up the social reins smoothly and gracefully, manipulating everything to suit her needs. Even Sophie was disarmed by the flattery, and appeared to think nothing of Harriet leaving with Brookes—though her entire purpose in coming was to spend time with him. Harriet smiled in gratitude. She might have a chance to start bridging the gap today after all.
Brookes nodded, and offered Harriet his elbow. Mrs. Crossley called after them, “Brookes, take Miss Harriet to the hot spring—it’s an ideal setting for working on the book. You will find the peace and quiet there you need.”
Chapter Fourteen
A steady cool breeze blew across the hills, ruffling the long grass. Brookes paused for a moment, drinking in the sweet smell of drying hay. The scent of summer reminded him of the long months he spent swimming in the spring, climbing trees in the park, or riding horses with Henry. He snapped off a piece of moor grass and twisted it in his fingers, releasing its musty scent. He stole a sidelong glance at Harriet, who delicately picked her way through the field, skirts slightly raised. “It’s up ahead, not much farther,” he said, waving the grass at a squat, gray stone building that gave the appearance of springing up from the meadow.
Harriet uttered a surprised cry. “I knew you had a spring, but I never expected to see a proper bathhouse.”
“My grandfather built it many years ago. The waters are nice and warm, not burning hot like you find in Matlock Bath. My brother and I often swam here, not only in the summer, but the whole year ’round.”
“Have you taken the waters since your return?”
An innocent question, but it put his hackles up immediately. How well might his leg fare with swimming? But then, he hated the sight of the ravaged stump by daylight. “No.” He winced at the curt reply. More gently, he added, “I haven’t had time, you see.”
“Oh.” She fell silent.
He tossed the grass away with an irritated flick of the wrist, and motioned for her to follow. The bathhouse had a single oaken door that the family never bothered to lock, but it often swelled and stuck with the humidity. Grasping the latch, he leveraged the door open with his shoulder. It creaked in protest as he swung it open. Turning back to Harriet, he offered his hand. “Come inside, it’s quite nice.”
She grasped his hand. A tingle shot through his being, elicited by her mere touch. He glanced around briefly to make sure no animals had made the bathhouse their permanent habitat during his few years away. Fortunately, it seemed deserted. A fine layer of dust covered the gray stone floor, and a layer of grime muted the daylight streaming in through the windows. Brookes made a mental note to send the servants out to give it a good scrubbing. But the dirt wouldn’t prevent their work, and the spring water gave the air a pleasantly sour odor. Other than the layer of grime, the bathhouse remained as pleasurable as he remembered. Harriet’s mouth had dropped open in amazement and he smiled.
“It’s wonderful. If I had a bathhouse like this, I would swim every day.” She brushed past him, striding into the main room that housed the spring.
“Careful, the stones become slick with the damp,” he cautioned.
She nodded, slowing her steps. “May I sit here on this bench?”
“Sit with care, Harriet. Sometimes the benches are wet, too.” He opened a chest that stood inside the vestibule, and drew out a few rough hemp towels. “Here, allow me.” He joined her in the main room and draped them over the stone bench. “This will keep out some of the damp.”
“Thank you.” She sank down on the bench and peered around. The unnatural echo of their voices accompanied the hissing of the spring in the bathhouse. Warmth cocooned them, sheltering them both from the outside world. Brookes sat beside Harriet, scuffing his boots along the gritty stone floor to make some kind of sound, anything to break the spell.
Harriet sighed. “I wonder if something like this would do my mother good.”
Brookes tilted his head at her. “What do you mean?”
“Mama is suffering from what Dr. Wallace calls nervous hysteria. He has her on laudanum.” She paused. “I am not sure if it’s helping… She sleeps all the time.” The words rushed out of her in a torrent, as though she were finally allowing a dam to break. “I wonder if something else could be more help. Taking the waters somewhere—anything to strengthen her constitution.”
Brookes’s eyebrows lifted slightly in surprise. Harriet never mentioned her troubles before. From outward appearances, he surmised that her family lost their fortune but pulled through the ordeal with no great trouble. But her voice held a slight tremor, and the way she allowed the words to pour out caught his attention. Life at Tansley Cottage was not at all rosy.
He cleared his throat. “I’m very sorry to hear it, Harriet. You could bring your mother here to take the waters. It’s not as far a journey as Matlock Bath, and no one would even know you were here.”
She whipped her head around, smiling as if he had offered the moon. “Oh, thank you, Captain. I would try that, if I may.”
A burning desire to hear her speak his given name seized Brookes. “It seems unfair that I can call you Harriet, but you always refer to me as Captain or Sir. Please, do call me John.”
“Thank you, John.” Her voice hushed, and her head bowed.
He had never thought much of his given name, but from her lips it sounded honeyed, sweet, almost cherished. He shook his head. It was a name. No call to get all starry-eyed about it.
“The collapse of my father’s affairs has proven too much for my mother,” Harriet continued in an even tone. “You see, we had no idea how far his debts reached until after he died. And then, when we discovered how badly things were, there was nothing more that could be done. We had to retrench to Tansley Cottage.”
“Why didn’t any of your father’s family come to your assistance?”
Harriet’s eyes clouded over and she swallowed. Brookes sensed that she measured how much to tell him. “Perhaps you don’t know this, but my parents’ marriage is considered something of a misalliance. Papa was a knight, you know, and my mother was a commoner.”
“But that sort of thing happens all the time.” Brookes quirked an eyebrow at her. Dislike of his future extended family
left a bitter taste in his mouth. The Handleys sounded like a prejudiced and priggish lot. “It seems most ungenerous of them.”
“Well, if you must know the truth, Mama was an actress before she married Papa.” Harriet turned and faced him as though she faced down a lion in his den. “Below a commoner, you might say.”
He ran his eyes over her face, trying to understand why she told him all this. After all, he could have been the sort of man to cut ties and run after hearing such a tale. An actress in the family—many men would shy away from the possibility of such relations. Her honesty and trust humbled him.
Harriet sat ramrod-straight save her bowed head. He knew the defensive position well. “It’s a relief to tell someone,” she whispered, keeping her eyes fixed on the floor.
“Thank you for telling me.” He stared into the pool, watching the bubbles rise to the surface. “I appreciate your trust in me.”
“Thank you for allowing me to confess. I feel better talking about it with someone.” She rose from her seat and circled the pool, gazing into it. “May I ask you something?”
His defenses rose, unsure of what she wanted to know. He watched her cagily, trying to guess what she would say. “Yes.”
From the opposite end of the pool, she turned to face him. “Does your leg hurt?”
He exhaled slowly through his nostrils. “No. It’s strange because sometimes I get a pain in my foot or feel an itch on my calf, but my leg is no longer there. But it doesn’t hurt. I think—” he surprised himself, not knowing if he should continue or not “—I think the nightmares are infinitely more disturbing.”
“You have nightmares?” She turned and wandered back to the bench, stepping carefully over the slick stones.
“Every night since Waterloo. I hate the thought of sleeping, because I know it’s only a matter of time until I begin reliving that night on the battlefield.”
He hesitated, waiting for her to press him for further details. But instead, she joined him back on the bench, admitting, “I had nightmares for a long time, too.”
“About what?” He turned to face her, studying her expression.
“The day the duns took our home away. They went through everything. It was like a plague of locusts.” A shudder ran through her body. “It was the most savage invasion of privacy I ever experienced. They even took the quilt from my bed. A part of me died that day. I know it sounds dramatic to say it, but it’s true. While the duns went through Handley Hall with a fine-tooth comb, I burned every manuscript I had ever written.”
His mouth dropped open. She may well have told him she cut herself with a knife, her revelation was so shocking. “Why would you do such a thing?”
“Because writing about people who never existed seemed like a frivolous thing to do when my world was collapsing around me.” A single tear ran down her cheeks.
The urge to embrace her overcame him and he stood up to fight it. He wanted to protect her from any more of life’s fierce storms, giving her the security and love she so desperately wanted and deserved. Stepping away from the bench, he paced halfway around the pool and back, handing her his handkerchief. “I am so sorry. I know that’s not much to say, but I am.”
“No, I have to apologize. I don’t know what came over me. I’ve never cried about it before.” She blew her nose and clutched the handkerchief in both hands, twisting it into a little rope.
They sat in silence for a moment. Brookes crossed his arms over his chest, attempting to overpower his desire to reach out to Harriet. Why had Harriet’s father allowed his situation to deteriorate so badly, without retrenching sooner? It seemed a wretched folly on his part. More than ever, he admired Harriet for all she was attempting to do to save her little family. Neither her mother, drowsy with laudanum, nor her sister, preening about the village, were making the same decisive strides to improve the family’s fortunes.
Harriet sniffed a few times. “I feel better now. Thank you.”
“Not at all.”
“I wish there were something I could do to help you.” She looked up at him, her eyes and the tip of her nose slightly—and adorably—reddened.
He quirked one corner of his mouth into a little smile. “No need. Talking with you about the book is most helpful.”
She looked at him with a purposeful expression, her introspective gaze sizing up his deepest needs and wants. “I think you should go for a swim.”
Harriet could have bitten her tongue out the moment those words escaped her lips. Why did she blurt it out, without even thinking? The blood pounded in her ears when he swiveled around to face her squarely.
“Swim in the spring? Why?”
She clutched her hands together, willing them to stop shaking. “I don’t know. I don’t see how it could do any harm. A bath might help the restlessness and the strange feelings in your leg.” She raised her eyebrows in an attempt to sound nonchalant. “You have this bathhouse here at your disposal. Why not use it?”
An awful silence descended over the bathhouse, broken only by the hissing of the hot spring. Harriet’s heart plummeted to her half boots, and she turned her gaze to the floor. She could not see his face, but his silence told her she overstepped a boundary.
“Perhaps I will,” he replied slowly. “I shall take the waters this evening, after my work is done.”
“I think you should.” Harriet paused, seeking a way to remedy the situation, lighten the mood—anything to break the tension her words had caused. “May I try it? Just dip my toes in?”
His eyebrows shot up in surprise, but a smile broke across his face. “Of course, if you wish.”
She turned briskly on the bench, efficiently removing her boots and stockings while keeping her legs covered. Picking her way over the damp stones, she bunched her skirts in her fists. Then she found a reasonably dry patch near the edge of the pool, sat on the edge and dipped her legs in.
The water was warm and caressing. She smiled. It was wonderful. She relaxed for a moment, and then half turned to look at Brookes. “I am sure a bath will do you good, sir. The water feels lovely.”
He smiled in return. “Is it invigorating? Are you glad you gave it a try?”
“Yes.” She kept her skirt tucked around her knees and her legs modestly submerged, so no part of her bare flesh peeked above the foaming water. “But I shouldn’t stay long. We should be going back to the house.”
Brookes nodded and took one of the scratchy hemp towels from the bench. Harriet scooted back from the edge of the pool, making sure that her skirts still covered her legs. She reached out a hand for the towel, but Brookes sank down beside her instead.
“Allow me.” He reached for her foot, rubbing first one foot, then the other briskly with the rough fabric.
Harriet’s heart pounded in her chest, but she kept her countenance impassive. He was just being a gentleman. If she started acting missish now, she would seem ridiculous. On the other hand, both feet were now thoroughly dry. She reached behind her for her stockings, but Brookes grabbed her right foot, tracing the arch with his forefinger. Harriet’s breath caught in her throat and she jerked, attempting to draw it away.
He ignored the small struggle. “Your foot is so little,” he said with a wondrous air, as though he had never beheld something as perfect as Harriet’s foot. He ran his finger over her arch once more.
Alarm coursed through Harriet, and this time she jerked free. “We should be going,” she gasped, her throat tightening in shock.
He looked up at her, his eyes reflecting the dark gray of the stone walls. With the kind of precision that he might have used to issue orders, he snapped, “Yes. Yes, we should.”
Chapter Fifteen
Brookes rolled over, yawning, and then bolted upright with a start. What happened? He stared around his bedroom, noting the sunlight s
treaming in through the windows. Judging by the pale sunlight slanting through the curtains, it was midmorning. Brookes rubbed his eyes with the heel of one hand. His back pressed not against the hard arm of his settee, but against the soft pillows that stacked in fluffy piles against the headboard of his bed. He fell asleep last night in his bed. Not only that, but he slept through the night without nightmares, for the first time since Waterloo. The shock of these twin revelations washed over him, leaving him giddy. With a knock, Stoames entered, bearing a heavy breakfast tray.
“Sleep well, Captain?” He placed the tray on the corner of the bed, and reached behind Brookes to push the pillows into a more comfortable fit for sitting up.
Brookes waved him away and regarded the tray with a wary eye. “What is that?”
“It’s a bit past ten. Cook sent up some rashers of bacon and eggs.” Stoames removed the cover of the dish with a flourish.
“I can’t believe I slept this late. I haven’t slept in past five o’clock in years.” Brookes sat up, the wonder of it still clouding his reason.
“Well, I think it’s a good thing, Captain. You’ve needed it.” Stoames carefully balanced the tray over Brookes lap.
“I didn’t have any nightmares, either, Stoames.” Brookes reached gratefully for his coffee.
“Another good thing, Captain.” Stoames gave him a measured look. From their many years’ acquaintance, Brookes recognized that expression. Stoames was trying to think of what to say. “Enjoy your breakfast. I’ll be back in a bit.”
