He frowned after a brief examination in the dressing room. “I recommend bleeding, blisters, and purging, in that order.”
Juliet listened in dismay, images of widowhood gathering round her. “What medicines can be given?”
“A sleeping draught of diacodium would be best.”
A wan Loveday appeared in the doorway. At Juliet’s questioning glance, she said, “Derived from poppies. I prefer it to bloodletting or purging, which weakens the patient.”
Leith’s eyes opened. “I’m nae patient.”
“You are—and a very feverish one,” Juliet answered quietly.
“A lingering cough ... chest pain,” he murmured, closing his eyes again.
“Pneumonia, likely,” replied the doctor. “The first order of treatment is to remove Mr. Buchanan to a proper bed.”
Juliet already had the covers turned back and the pillows bunched to keep Leith upright and help his breathing. With a cabin boy’s help, the doctor undressed him and put him to bed, something of an ordeal as Leith coughed throughout. When the miniature slipped out of his pocket, Juliet picked it up, tears in her eyes. Slipping it into her own pocket, she returned to the matter at hand.
“A tincture of opium might be more beneficial than diacodium,” Loveday said, despite the doctor’s obvious disapproval. “Four grains of laudanum, to be exact. Sleep is a great restorative, and he must be kept well watered.”
“Have you a medical degree, Miss—?”
“Catesby. And I do not, as women are denied that privilege.”
“Midwifery would be the best pursuit, then,” he said briskly.
But Loveday was undeterred, staying by Leith’s side opposite the doctor.
Despite an occasional protest, Leith gave them little trouble as the medicine was given, confirming how very ill he was. Juliet vowed to stay near, though the ship’s surgeon would return as needed.
Left alone with Leith, Juliet tried to tamp down her alarm as she cooled his fevered face with a wet linen cloth. The rattle in his chest signaled danger, but what more could be done?
As the night deepened, she faced her greatest fear. Even if she arrived in Scotland without him, nothing must deter her. Loveday’s future was her foremost concern. If Juliet couldn’t find happiness, Loveday could. And Juliet would call upon the Buchanan name and fortune to help that happen if she could. Still...
Lord, I want to be a wife, not a widow.
The moment held a keen lonesomeness. It cast her back to the night her mother died and how grief had met them, frightful and irreversible. If Leith were to die, it would be a slower death, his grave the Atlantic.
A sennight passed, the longest of her life. Tending him nearly round the clock except to sleep in snatches, Juliet became heartily sick of the sea and the wicked insecurity of it all, though the Atlantic stayed blessedly calm.
Back on her feet, Loveday spelled her, though Juliet rarely left Leith’s side. It begot a strange, one-sided intimacy.
She now knew by heart every angle and contour of his face. The slight scar on his left temple. The faint stubble on his jaw that grew into a beard, even more roguish black than his hair. The sweep of his lashes, as long as her own but still manly. And the slightly indented left cheek she’d not noticed before—but then, he seldom smiled, as Loveday had once said.
He was wasting away before her eyes, his robust frame diminishing day by day. But he remained one of those uncanny individuals who maintained a presence even in illness. She took off the too-large signet ring he’d placed on her finger the night they’d wed. Gently, she returned it to his own finger lest she lose it, as if it might restore him to the man of strength he’d been before.
Silently she pleaded for his life, snatches of Scripture threading her thoughts, though one seemed gilded.Beloved,I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul prospereth.This she prayed over him aloud, though it was naught but a recurring whisper. Sometimes she laid her head upon his chest when his lungs seemed especially labored and willed his heart to keep beating.
And then came the golden hour. As the mantel clock struck midnight, when it was just the two of them in the cabin, Leith rallied.
34
His descent was like nightfall.
Homer
Leith’s indigo eyes shone with sudden clarity, though his voice seemed rusty with disuse. “Why is my signet ring back on my finger?”
Juliet sat beside him, stunned by his recovery, the water she’d been trickling down his throat a sheen upon his lips. “’Tis too large and I don’t want to lose it,” she said quickly, sensing he mistook her action as an affront, another rejection.
