“I said,” she smiled, “is that a doctor’s order or is that a husband’s order, Dr. Andrews?”
“I suppose ’tis not one or the other.”
She lost her smile and looked almost sad. She used both hands to lift up her long nightdress and walked to the bed that the maid had turned down and climbed in using the bed stairs, still almost having to hop at the end. She stayed sitting up but pulled the covers over her legs.
“I thought you might flirt with me a little, Alasdair.”
“I am sorry,” he said. “I dinnae ken how to.”
Her smile came back. “I will teach you. I am very good at it. Or at least I used to be.”
There were brief daggers of light in his field of vision again as he thought of the hypothetical other men with whom she might have flirted. And the very real one downstairs with whom she had almost certainly. He took a breath and attempted to calm himself.
“So if I were to flirt with ye, what would be the right answer to yer question?”
A knock again and it was a footman and two chambermaids. The footman carried a large tray with several covered dishes. He put it down on a table by the fire and bowed and left. The two chambermaids were giggling quite a bit, clearly amused by a husband in his wife’s room, and they carried more hot water and towels and a nightshirt and a banyan for Alasdair.
“Whose are these?” he said suspiciously. He did not want to wear Morpeth’s clothes and not just because they would have reminded him of how much larger the man was than he was.
Both chambermaids giggled and one said, “They belong to Andrews, I mean our Andrews, the butler Andrews, that is to say, Dr. Andrews.” After curtseying, the maids beat a hasty retreat.
The door closed. Alasdair put the nightshirt and the banyan down on a chair and went to the table. He started lifting covers from dishes. “What would ye like? Cake and two different tarts. A cream soup of some kind, codfish, I think. And roast pheasant with potatoes. And some beef. And some pickles. And some, perhaps flounder? What would ye like, Miss Lovelock?”
There was no answer.
He looked over. Arabella had fallen asleep sitting up against the pillows in the bed.
He covered the dishes back up. He went to the bed and, through the covers, he tugged on her legs so that she lay flat, with her head on a single pillow. He pulled the covers up to her chin. She did not move.
He went over to the fire and looked at it for a long time. Eventually, he took off his tailcoat and as he went to unbutton his waistcoat, he felt a bit of wool there. The bright-green tartan scarf that Arabella had made him that he had put between his waistcoat and shirt when they had come into Lord Morpeth’s house. He took it out now and held it to his face. It was soft against his jaw, his nose, his mouth. There was no scent of her on it; there had never been. But the fact that she had made it for him and its softness—he couldn’t help thinking how all parts of his face had touched all parts of her face in the carriage.
And the piece of wool itself. She had chosen it, clearly some time ago, knowing it was meant for someone of his name.
He still did not know what to make of that. He was afraid of construing something hopeful and romantic from something that might be merely coincidence. Or fondness for a color.
He laid the scarf down and finished taking off his waistcoat and his shirt, then boots and stockings. He went to the basin and poured the warm water into it and washed his face, his upper half, and finally his feet. He toweled himself dry quickly and went and put the scarf around his neck and donned the nightshirt and the banyan and sat down in a wing chair by the fire. He would leave his trousers on. In fact, he might have to put his thick stockings back on. It was cold.
“Cake, please.”
He jumped. He turned his head and Arabella was lying in the bed, in the same position that he had put her in, only with her eyes open.
“Only cake?” He wondered how long she had been awake and felt glad that he had never completely undressed.
“Well, that’s all I remember you saying.” She sat up and dozens of tendrils of her hair had escaped the plait and were surrounding her head like a golden nimbus, even though she could have been asleep for only a quarter of an hour. “Why don’t you bring it all over here and we’ll have a picnic?”
He brought the large tray over carefully and put it down on the center of the bed.
Arabella patted the mattress next to her.
He chose instead to sit at the bottom of the bed on the other side from her. He took all the covers off the dishes.
“What appeals, Miss Lovelock?”
She scooted down and over a little bit so she was only partially sitting up.
“Oh, it all looks lovely. I’ll have some of everything.”
But then she made no move to pick up a fork or a plate.
