Gil put the blame for his friend’s deplorable condition squarely upon his physicians and surgeons in Paris. Their idea of treating a man who had lain in a near coma for six months, horribly wounded, and who had needed surgery not long after that was to feed him soft, tasteless foods forever after and keep him in bed or confined to a deep chair in an airless room with curtains drawn tight across the windows. Their idea to fight the fevers he still suffered was to bleed him. And their plan to rebuild his strength was to limit his exercise to the daily walk to the dining room to eat his jellies and watery mashed potatoes and soups so thin they might as well have been dishwater. Their theory appeared to be that any exertion on his part would use energy that needed to be stored until he was full enough of it again to resume normal life. Most of them spoke of that day in the way they might have spoken of the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. As something that was an impossibility, in other words.
The doctors were idiots, the pack of them. Gil resumed his self-appointed task and chopped through one particularly hard, thick log as though it were butter. He turned one portion of it on edge to reduce it to smaller pieces. He had rescued Harry from all that when he had agreed to bring his friend home. Home here to Hinsford, not to London. Now, having done so, Gil must stay, overseeing his friend’s recovery until Harry did not need him any longer. He could wait out the visiting family. After a few days, or a week at the longest, they would surely grow bored with cooing and clucking over their invalid and return to their balls and routs in London before the Season was over.
Andthat womanwould go with them. It could not be soon enough for him.
His axe made short work of the segment of log and he lifted another to take its place on the block.
Several minutes later he straightened in order to stretch his back and roll his shoulders. He wondered if Harry would insist upon introducing him to his newly arrived family members and expect him to dine with them. But of course he would. Gil was, after all,Lieutenant ColonelBennington, a gentleman’s title even if he was not a gentleman.
It was time, he decided, to go indoors, preferably through a side door, and wash up. He cleaned the axe and hung it in its usual place in the tackle room before gathering up his shirt and coat while Beauty wagged her tail and looked hopeful.
Beauty had her way.
Before Gil had taken one step in the direction of the house, his ears picked up the sound of another carriage approaching along the drive. He cursed aloud, pulled on his shirt and coat in a manner that would have given any self-respecting valet a fit of the vapors, and took his dog for a walk.
Three
Abigail was sitting in the drawing room, her stepsister Estelle on one side of her, her cousin Jessica on the other. Abigail and Jessica had grown up as the closest of friends. Although it had always been likely that Abigail would make her come-out first, as she was one year older than her cousin, they had nevertheless dreamed of doing it together and taking thetonby storm. They had dreamed of making brilliant love matches and bringing up their children in close proximity to each other and living happily ever after, forever in love with their spouses and forever closer than sisters with each other. Those girlish dreams had come crashing to an end prematurely, of course, when it had become obvious that Abigail could not expect a come-out Season at all. Ever. For the hautetondid not admit to its ranks the bastard offspring of even the highest ranking of its members.
Jessica, lovely, charming, and brilliantly eligible though she was as the daughter and sister of dukes of Netherby,was still unwed at the age of twenty-three. She went dutifully to London each spring with her mother, Abigail’s aunt Louise, but claimed to derive no real joy from all the glittering social events of the Season. She had a large court of faithful admirers long after most young ladies would have been considered firmly on the shelf. But she treated them all with careless indifference.
Abigail sometimes thought it was as though she felt guilty that the doors of thetonwere wide open to her while they were shut to her cousin. And that in turn madeAbigailfeel guilty, for she did not want anyone to shoulder her burdens. Any suffering that arose from the sudden shift in her status six years ago was hers alone to bear and hers alone to deal with in her own way and her own time. She had never looked to others for either pity or reassurance—not even to her mother or her sister or brother. She had cultivated an outer dignity of manner in the vain hope of being left to find her own way forward.
This spring had been especially difficult. For her mother and Marcel had finally persuaded his daughter, Estelle, at the age of twenty-one, to make her come-out in London during the Season. The fact that Bertrand, Estelle’s twin, had just moved there after completing his studies at Oxford had no doubt affected her decision. Abigail put up no fight about going along with them too. It would have been mean-spirited to insist upon remaining alone at Redcliffe.
The Westcott family had, of course, welcomed her with renewed hope and all sorts of schemes and plans to gain entrée for her at a number of respectable parties and routs and even balls. There was scarcely a one of them without a title. They all had considerable influence. So did Marcel, Marquess of Dorchester, who was adamant in his willingness to use it on behalf of his stepdaughter.
It had been endearing and horrible and exhausting. For Abigail had neither the wish nor the intention of slipping in through the back door where she was not welcome at the front. She did not want to be restored, slightly tarnished, to the world of theton. She did not want a respectable husband who would be prepared to overlook the tarnish in return for a hefty dowry and a connection to the influential Westcotts.
It would be lovely, Abigail thought now as she looked about the drawing room, in which those who had already arrived were gathering before dinner, to be able to escape. Not to have to return to London to resist again all the family’s efforts to force her into enjoying herself. It also seemed a disloyal thought. For she was dearly loved, and love was not to be scorned. She didnotscorn it. But she just wished theyunderstood.Or thatsomeonedid.
As Jessica and Estelle chatted and laughed over some minor scandal that had erupted during a ball they had both attended last week, Abigail thought again of the plan of escape that had leapt to her mind yesterday. It seemed even more realistic today, for Harry was surely not fit enough to be here alone, even with a houseful of servants to cater to his needs. When everyone returned to London, as everyone must, including her mother, who would need to be there for Estelle’s sake, Harry would need company and nurturing. Not necessarily professional care, as her aunts had advocated last evening. For his wounds were all healed, and he suffered from no definite illness. He just needed space and time and peace and... company.
He was sitting beside the fire now, a rug drawn over his knees, though he had not put it there himself. Mama had. Abigail had fully expected that he would push it away impatiently. He had not done so, though he had looked a trifleirritated and had grimaced slightly as his eyes caught Abigail’s across the room. It was an expression she recognized from the old Harry.Mama is fussing again, it seemed to say to her,but I cannot hurt her feelings by complaining.
No, he did not need doctors and nurses. Neither did he need to be coddled. He needed someone who would always be here with him without being intrusive. He needed someone who would encourage him to walk and talk and take some air and exercise even if it was only a drive around the park in the gig, but someone who would also leave him alone at times. He needed someone to reminisce with and laugh with—and even someone to laughathim when necessary. He needed someone who would give him the chance to restore his soul.
And oh dear me, she needed all those things too.
She needed to be with someone who was not forever looking at her with loving concern. Someone who was not constantly trying to plan a better life for her without knowing what she would considerbetter. Someone who would not be hurt because she could not seem to respond to his well-meaning efforts. Someone to laugh atheroccasionally. Someone to talk and reminisce with her and not fuss over her. Someone who would respect her silences and her gravity. Someone who would make her laugh.
Someone to understand.
But all this was not primarily about her. Indeed, she was in danger of falling into self-pity. This was about Harry, at whom even now she could scarcely bear to look. There was something almost...grayabout him, as though death, cheated for almost two years since Waterloo, still hovered hopefully over him. But he wasnotill, only not well. There was a difference.
She would stay with him when everyone else returned toLondon. That was what had leapt into her mind yesterday. She would persuade him that she really wanted to stay, that there was no element of martyrdom in her decision. This was home, after all, the place she had longed to be ever since her mother’s marriage, kind as Marcel had always been to her and affectionate as Estelle and Bertrand had been from the start. Hinsford was comfort and security.
It was where she needed to be, for the present anyway. And Harry’s return here had made it possible.
“Dinner is served, sir,” the butler announced from the doorway.
“Oh good,” Bertrand said, getting immediately to his feet and rubbing his hands together. “I am starved.” Then he smiled ruefully down at Anna and Alexander, with whom he had been conversing, and grimaced across the room at his father. “I do beg your pardon. That was not the best-mannered response, was it?”
“I like the enthusiasm of youth,” Aunt Louise, Jessica’s mother, said with a laugh. “You may lead me into the dining room, young man, and tell me what you plan to do with your life now that your studies have been completed.”
“Would you like a tray brought in here, Harry?” Mama suggested. “I will have one brought for myself too if you wish.”
“I dashed well would not,” Harry said with a flash of his old spirit. “I will eat in the dining room with everyone else. But where is Gil?”
