“The ... the...?”
He grimaced as though he’d understood her. “I am afraid the coachman is dead. The harnesses snapped when the carriage fell and the horses ran free. The young man was not as fortunate.”
She pressed her eyes closed.Poor man, she thought. Though she didn’t really remember him.
“It’s not your fault, my lady. You mustn’t upset yourself.” He shook his head. “We saw the horses running wild, harnesses flapping, and that’s how we knew to look for the carriage in the first place. The crest confirmed who you were, though of course we were expecting you.” He patted her hand. “Now. You just rest, and Mrs. Parrish and I shall take care of you and your husband.”
Husband... She closed her eyes and pushed the uncomfortable thought away.
She lay, floating in and out of foggy wakefulness. The kind doctor had given her laudanum for the pain. A broken arm, he’d said. And a head wound—a gash and concussion. Nowand again, someone gently lifted her head and pressed sips of water or broth to her lips, but she had little sense of time passing.
The woman’s voice said, “Sir John is in a bad way indeed, and if he lasts the week I shall be very much surprised.”
A second woman hushed the first. “Shh. She’ll hear you.”
In spite of the distance between them, she would never have wished such harm to befall him.Poor Sir John, she thought.
Lying there with her eyes closed, she tried to recall his face. Her thoughts slowly wheeled back until scattered images flickered through her mind....
Sir John picking up a fire iron and poking at a log in frustration.
Sir John looking at her, jaw clenched. “What I want is a wife who will be faithful to me. Is that too much to ask?”
Another flicker. Another image. His usually stern face softened and stilled in her mind like a portrait, captured in oils and cobwebbed recollection. A handsome face, she thought, if her memory could be trusted. Grey-blue eyes and strong, masculine features framed by light brown hair...
She had admired him once, she realized. What had changed between them? Had they ever been happy?
She tried to recall their lives before—where they had come from. Bath, she thought. And before that, Bristol. Vaguely, she remembered when Sir John announced they were moving to Bath. She remembered feeling torn. Should she obey his wishes? Should she go?
He hadn’t wanted to, but in the end, he had taken them both. His wife and her companion. Just as he’d brought them both on this trip. Yes, she remembered Bath, the lovely house in Camden Place. And an ugly house in dreary Trim Street. Trim Street? What on earth would have taken her there...? She grimaced, trying to think. Yet her mind remained a muddle.
She must have uttered some agitated sound, for a woman’skind voice crooned, “There, there. It’s all right. You’re safe.” A gentle hand lifted her head. “Drink some of this now....”
A cup rim touched her lips and she sipped.
“That’s it,” the woman said. “Very good, my dear.”
The warm broth soothed her aching throat. The warm words soothed her troubled soul.
She knew it was a dream, yet couldn’t awaken. She dreamt she’d left a helpless baby in a basket on the shore of the Bristol Channel. She’d meant to return for the child directly, but instead she lay there as though paralyzed, unable to force her frozen body to move. The tide was coming in. Closer and closer, licking at the sides of the basket. A hand reached toward it—a woman’s hand. The woman was in the water, the tide pulling her, dragging her away, her waterlogged gown and cloak weighing her down.
She grasped the woman’s hand, trying to save her, but the wet fingers slipped through hers. Remembering the child, she turned, but it was too late. The basket was already floating away across the channel....
With a start, she sucked in a breath and opened her eyes. She blinked at her surroundings. The half tester bed was not hers. The lace-trimmed dressing table was unfamiliar.
She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to think. Where was she? What had happened? The carriage crash, that was it. They were not in Bath any longer. Nor in Bristol. Somewhere in the West Country, she believed, but had no idea where. Oh, what was wrong with her? Why could she not remember? It felt like a dark, warm blanket lay over her mind’s eye, blocking her memory, hindering clear thought.
One thing she knew with panicked certainty. She was forgetting something. Something important.
The door opened and the kind woman entered with a basinof water and folded cloths. “Good morning, my lady,” she greeted warmly. She set the basin on a side table, then stepped to the washstand for soap.
“Good morning, Mrs.... I’m sorry, I forgot your name.”
“That’s all right. I often forget names myself. I’m Mrs. Turrill, the housekeeper.”
The woman was perhaps in her early sixties, evidenced by the many lines creasing her long, pleasant face. Her hair was still brown, though its center part was considerably wider than a younger woman’s would be.
Mrs. Turrill helped her wash her face and hands and clean her teeth. Then she opened the wardrobe and extracted a fresh nightdress. “What a blessing all your gowns were not spoilt in the accident, my lady. Your trunk must have been thrown clear.”
