Page 112
June had always wanted a brother or sister; asked Ma over and over when she was going to get one, until Ma had finally told her you could only have a baby if a husband gave you one. For a while afterward, June had thought babies were gifts from men to their wives, although where exactly the men found the babies had remained a mystery. A sort of baby shop or farm, she’d assumed.
Mad’s dark form loomed in front of her. He was asking her something, but it might as well have been a foreign language. Not a word of it made sense.
He was guiding her toward the stairwell. She went with him, unable to think of what else to do. They sat side by side on one of the lower steps.
As soon as the weight was off her feet, the tight coils of her nerves loosened, and the shaking started. Scary-hard rattling, like a boiling saucepan with a loose lid. Her bones were coming apart. Desperate for safety, she crawled into his lap, and he immediately moved to help her.
She was still wearing the apron, stained with blood and other things. The realization made her cringe. To think she’d once scorned and mocked him for being dirty. But he didn’t give a damn. Nothing bothered Mad; it was all fine with him.
“Don’t worry none,” he was saying. “It’s over now.”
“I want this off,” she told him through chattering teeth, fumbling with the apron. “Help me.”
Mad deftly unbuttoned the straps that crossed over her back, untied the waist, and pulled the apron away. After wadding the garment up with one hand, he pushed it to the side of the step. The feeling of his strong arms sliding around her was so comforting, it brought tears to her eyes.
During her worst moments of weakness, she’d always gone off somewhere to be alone, terrified for anyone to see her like this. But somehow she knew Mad would take care of her and wouldn’t think less of her afterward.
He held her securely, his voice deep and soothing. “There now . . . there now . . . you done your part, brave girl . . . hush-a-bye . . . you’re safe . . .”
It didn’t escape June that this was exactly the kind of thing she’d heard him say to Alan or the horses—and now she knew why they liked it so much. She settled deeper against him, shivering, breathing in rough sighs. The steady thump of his heartbeat beneath her ear lulled her, gradually bringing her back to herself.
Finally she was able to speak. “Don’t even think about scratching me behind the ears, you plonker.”
Mad looked down at her with a faint smile, his face close over hers. Such pretty gray eyes he had. She reached up to finger the satiny coal-black forelock that had fallen over his forehead. He was a fine-looking man—a handsome one. Had he always been? Maybe her feelings were coloring how she saw him?
“I heard the little ’un, kicking up a fuss,” Mad commented. “He turn out awright? Got all ’is parts in order?”
“I think so,” June said hesitantly. Her voice sounded like it had been pushed through a sieve. “He’s a little scrapper, looks like.” She was going to add something about Tuppence, but . . . she couldn’t. To say what she truly thought might make it come true, and she couldn’t bear that. Not yet.
His gaze held hers. He seemed to understand what was wrapped inside her silence. “What do you need, Junie?”
She thought of all the dishes and silver that had yet to be washed, and the mountain of soiled sheets and toweling, and the leftovers to be stored properly, and the fire that had to be banked in the kitchen range, and the lamps to be doused, and all the buckets and basins that needed emptying. It was overwhelming. All she wanted was to be away from it, all of it. She didn’t feel like seeing anyone, not even Reina. She wanted to walk out of the house and go somewhere, but there was nowhere to go. She wanted someone to take care of her, although she wasn’t precisely sure how.
“I’ll set the kitchen to rights,” Mad said. “No need for you to go back in there tonight.”
June was amazed that he’d been able to read her thoughts so accurately. Drowning in gratitude and some powerful feeling she couldn’t name, she curled an arm around his neck. “Mad,” she whispered, her face half hidden against his chest, “if I was of a mind to stay with you in the carriage house tonight . . . if I asked you to hold me like this ’til morning, but not . . . not do nothing . . . would you?”
She’d never been so wholly at someone’s mercy. Not even when Gil had tupped her in the hayloft. This was a hundred times more intimate than that.
He eased her head back until she was looking up at him. Softly he said, “I’ll be as gentle as if you was a little bird in me hands.”
***
Helplessly Reina stood in the doorway of the butler’s room and watched John carry Tuppence along the hallway. She had only a glimpse of Tuppence’s face, as bleached as the cotton sheets and blankets around her. Dr. Gibson and Mrs. Caswell followed close behind. The midwife was carrying the baby, its face a dab of pink amid swaths of white cloth and toweling.
Reina wished she’d had more of the whisky John had poured into her tea. She felt cold down to the marrow of her bones. Something was very wrong—she could see it on their faces. More telling than that was June’s absence. June had gone somewhere to hide, because she was even worse than Reina at dealing with painful feelings.
John caught her gaze just before turning into the housekeeper’s room. His lips formed a silent word. Come.
Reina followed, and paused in the sitting area, as the bedroom was too crowded for her to join them. Through the partially open doorway, she could see John settling Tuppence onto the bed, and Dr. Gibson drawing the covers up to her chest. Mrs. Caswell took the bedside chair, holding the baby.
They were all so very quiet.
Reina went to the settee and sat with her hands in her lap, fingers knitted together.
How could everything have changed so drastically since that morning? She’d awakened in a happy mood, looking forward to having William come for tea. Naïvely she’d thought it would be a pleasant visit, in which they would agree on the details of their business venture with the ease of good friends. Instead, William had done his level best to make her role in the bank irrelevant. In spite of all his professed admiration and faith in her, he still couldn’t bring himself to treat her as an equal.
Just as naïvely, Reina had underestimated the dangers of childbirth. She’d assumed that if Tuppence had difficulties in labor, they would simply send for a doctor, and modern medicine would solve any problem.
