Dukes Prefer Blondes (17 page)

Well aware that their watch would be a long one, he left Davis to her work, and went downstairs to make peace with Lady Exton.

R
adford found the countess pacing what had once been her husband's study. The decor told him she'd eradicated all traces of the late earl.

“It
is
the typhus, isn't it?” she said when Radford entered. “Dr. Marler tells me it's nonsense, but he went away in a great hurry. He said he'd send a colleague, since he was not to your liking, and Clara was rude to him the first time he came.”

“What good sense she has,” he said.

“He wanted to bleed her, but she said it was a doctor bleeding Lord Byron who killed him, not fever. And she would not consent to his touching her with his filthy scalpel. She didn't know where it had been, she said.” Lady Exton's mouth trembled. “She was so like her grandmother—­haughty and despotic even from her ­sickbed—­I had all I could do to keep in countenance, for all I was so worried.”

She was anxious, and chattering in the way women often did when confronting one ugliness or another. Radford foresaw at least an hour of time wasted with her talking. His usual caustic remedy, he understood, would do nothing to effect a truce. The opposite, rather.

For Clara's sake, he made a furious mental struggle for a tactful approach. He was a barrister, he reminded himself. He could argue a case from any of a hundred different angles. Dealing with this lady would require the gentler language he'd use with judges of tremulous disposition and slow understanding.

When Lady Exton paused for breath, he said, “Refusing to be bled may well have saved her life, and I applaud your ladyship for so wisely taking her side. I know this has been a worrisome time for you. My bursting in, in all my dirt and incivility, was not likely to soothe. I do beg your pardon. But I must counsel your ladyship to be seated. There's no need to wear yourself out.”

The ruffled feathers began to smooth, and the lady sat, inviting him to take a chair as well. She sat ramrod straight, her hands folded in her lap. Only a slight tremor of her fingers betrayed her agitation.

“I can't say absolutely that Lady Clara suffers from typhus,” he said. “Experienced physicians can't always be certain. But I see all the signs, and I'd rather not risk her health by assuming it's a more benign ailment.”

She inhaled sharply.

“However, Davis has done all that I would have done had I been on the spot when her ladyship first fell ill,” he said. “Lady Clara is a strong young woman, mentally and physically. We've reason to be optimistic. But we've three weeks or more ahead of us—­”

“Three weeks!”

“Three weeks until we're certain she's safe.”

He watched her take this in, and control herself, as some ladies could do as well or better than men. “In other words,” she said after a moment, “she might die at any time in three weeks.”

“I won't let her,” he said.

She looked away, toward the writing desk. “I must inform her parents. I've avoided it, not wanting Lady Warford to fall among us in hysteria.”

“Lady Clara needs quiet,” he said. “She needs rest. She needs constant attention. What she doesn't need is her whole blasted family descending on her at once, which you know will happen. And then what? While we've done all we can to minimize the risk of contagion, I can't assure you unequivocally that another, weaker, person won't contract the ailment.”

He reminded her ladyship that Lady Clara's sister-­in-­law, Lady Longmore, might well be in a family way. Furthermore, Lady Longmore's sister carried the Duke of Clevedon's child. Would she endanger these women and their unborn children?

Lady Exton was not a stupid woman. Presented with evidence, various examples he produced from personal experience in Yorkshire, and himself and his father as Exhibits A and B, the one-­woman jury reached the intelligent verdict.

“Very well,” she said. “One must write to them or they'll wonder at the silence. I shall simply write in the ordinary way, though telling lies.” She rose and he rose with her. “As to you, sir, I'll have one of the guest rooms made up for you. Then I must contrive more lies to explain your presence here.”

“I'm a lawyer,” he said. “Why else would I be here but on legal business?”

 

Chapter Nine

Typhus, after it has reached a certain stage, will proceed onwards in its course (a few rare in­stances excepted), in spite of every obstacle medicine has yet devised to check its career.

—­Richard Millar,
Clinical Lectures on the Contagious Typhus, Epidemic in Glasgow, and the Vicinity
, 1833

A
fter sending a message to Westcott for fresh clothes and other items, Radford returned to Lady Clara's room. Davis sat by the bed, knitting.

The bed was a modern one in the Grecian style, with bare-­breasted females supporting the bedposts. Apt enough. Lady Clara ought to have a pair of caryatids at the foot of the bed, guarding the goddess's temple. Other Grecian-­style articles looked on from the mantelpiece. An elaborate urn clock dominated the center. Cupid stood on its pedestal, pointing to the time on the revolving band encircling the urn. More usual Grecian urns stood on either side of the clock and a row of familiar figures from classical myth posed next to the urns.

Having had the maids draw back the blue curtains to let air circulate, he saw the disordered bedclothes as soon as he entered. In one of her more feverish states, the patient must have flung them away . . . to offer an unobstructed view of her nightgown from the waist up. A plain, virginal affair, with no lace and only a few ruffles, the garment left nothing to distract from her beauty. Even pale and ill, she put the goddesses and nymphs in the room to shame.

Nothing concealed one fact, either: Her undergarments had not created her figure. All they'd done was support it.

Radford did nothing so nonsensical as tell himself he oughtn't to think about her figure at a time like this. Firstly, he was a man of acute powers of observation. Secondly, he was a man.

Not to mention, she wasn't in any danger from him at present. All the danger was the contagion inside her.

Though the evidence pointed to her having been restless earlier, she seemed to sleep peacefully enough now.

He moved to the bed and gently took her wrist. Her eyes fluttered open.

“It isn't you,” she said.

“Of course it is,” he said. “Your pulse is strong.”

“You're holding my hand,” she said. And smiled.

He brought her hand down to the bedclothes and released it. This wasn't what he wanted to do. He wanted to hold on and keep her alive through sheer force of will. He was, in truth, afraid to let go, lest she slip away from him forever.

But that was illogical, superstitious thinking. He had to remain detached. Emotion led to panic, which led to mistakes in judgment.

“Tell me how you feel,” he said.

“I'm dreaming,” she said.

“That's the laudanum.” It wasn't the ideal medicine at this stage of the illness, but it was the only relatively safe way Davis had of relieving the pain.

“Do you really think so?” Clara said. “I don't feel so sick now. Was I disgusting?”

“Entirely repellent,” he said. “I couldn't bear it. I ran out of the room, and vowed to find another, less revolting girl to look after.”

“Are you looking after me?”

“No one else wanted the job,” he said. “Especially the doctor.”

He heard a shadow of a laugh.

“Are you hungry?” he said.

She started to shake her head, then winced and stopped. “No.”

“I'm going to send for more broth,” he said. Typhus caused severe dyspepsia, among other symptoms. He knew she wouldn't want to eat or drink anything, but he needed to get something into her, or the disease would weaken her fatally.

“I'll see to it,” Davis said. She set aside her knitting, rose, and went out of the room.

After a moment's hesitation, he took the maid's chair. “You must try to take nourishment,” he told his patient. “You must do exactly as I say, and get well, because I've promised you would and if you don't, I shall be disgraced, and then—­”

“I know. Your career will be
ruined
. You're so charming.”

“Everybody says that,” he said.

“No, they don't. Never. No one has ever said that about you in all your life, I'll wager anything.”

“Perhaps they did not exactly say
charming
,” he said. “Perhaps . . . Yes, now I recollect, the phrase was ‘tolerable in very small doses.' ”

“And yet I missed you,” she said. “Fancy that.”

She made it so difficult to stay detached. At this moment, it was impossible. He couldn't stop his other self from getting a word in. “I missed you, too,” he said gruffly.

“Of course you did,” she said. “Because I'm so lovable.”

“You are not lovable,” he said. “You are excessively annoying. And managing. But I'm accustomed to hardened criminals and half-­witted judges, and being with you reminds me of home at the Old Bailey.”

Such a smile, then, more like her usual one.

He hadn't realized how leaden his heart had become until now, when the weight lifted, though not fully. Now he knew the weight would be with him until she was well and going her own obstinate way, challenging him and driving him more than a little mad.

“Only you would say that,” she said. “I read about ravens. They're so clever. Even when we don't see them, they see us. The best way to watch a raven is to lie flat on your back.”

“Well done,” he said. “Though you could be a little flatter.”

“He never comes straight on, but by maneuvers, and he's nearly impossible to catch.” Her eyelids drooped. “I'm tired, Raven.”

“You're talking too much,” he said. “You won't have the strength to take your pitiful spoonful of broth.”

She closed her eyes. “Yes. So clever of me.”

He sat by her while she slept, until Davis returned.

Then he moved away, to a far corner of the room, and looked out into the garden while he listened to the maid coaxing her charge to sip: “A small taste, my lady. Come. Another drop. Yes. A little more. You can. You'll feel better, I promise.”

It washed over him all at once, an ocean of weariness. The worry and missed meals and missed sleep took hold of him, and he sank under the weight. He dropped into the nearest chair and was asleep in an instant.

D
avis woke him.

He didn't know how long he'd slept. Hours, it must have been. The windows were dark. Only one candle burned, light being painful to the patient.

“She was better for a time, sir,” Davis said softly. “But then she had a bad pain in her stomach. I fear to give her more laudanum. It quiets the pain and helps her sleep, but I know it cramps the bowels.”

Radford went to the bed.

He laid his hand over Clara's forehead. It was hot. Clara lifted her hand and laid it over his and pressed. Her hand was hot as well. The fever was climbing.

She said something he couldn't understand.

“Your head?” he said. He bent his head, to bring his ear close to her mouth. Her voice was so weak and listless.

“Cut if off, please,” she said.

“Does your back ache?” he said.

“Take that, too.”

“Legs?”

“Those as well.”

He had only a confused recollection of his own miseries during his bout with typhus. His father's sufferings, however, were sharp in his memory. Impossible to find a comfortable position. Every motion so painful.

Though George Radford never complained, he hadn't been able to conceal the evidence of his distress. Radford retained a powerful memory of the aged face, so taut and white, the tightly compressed mouth, and the deep lines radiating from his eyes. Radford remembered as well what he'd felt as he watched: his insides so cold and hollow with the fear of losing him.

“She needs to sleep,” he told Davis. “So do you. You've been up with her, I don't doubt, since the minute she fell ill, and if you've had a wink of sleep that's all you've had.”

“I can't rest while my lady lies so ill,” she said.

“Tell me what good you'll be to her if you're too weary to think or even see properly,” he said. “I've had rest. I can do what needs to be done. I've nursed before, and I'm not squeamish. Has Westcott sent my things?”

They were close by, she told him, much to his surprise. He'd expected to be exiled to one of the cell-­like rooms on the upper floors, where hostesses customarily crammed low-­ranking bachelors. Instead Lady Exton had given him the next room but one. Doubtless she'd bestowed the privilege because George Radford had won her difficult theft case. He'd called it “quite a pretty puzzle,” which meant the average barrister would have deemed it unwinnable.

Radford did not for a minute believe his apology had won her heart. His apologies, Westcott had told him repeatedly, rarely came close to meeting the definition.

Furthermore, Radford had never bothered to learn the art of ingratiating himself.

No, his convenient quarters had nothing to do with his limited grasp of polite address. His father had to be the reason her ladyship hadn't had a brace of footmen throw him out bodily.

But he couldn't think about Father now. Mother was a good and loving nurse. Not to mention he'd seemed in slightly better spirits this last time. Or such was Radford's impression. He'd rushed in and rushed away, giving only the briefest explanation of his errand to Kensington, and he might have only imagined his father brightening up.

Never mind. He'd think about his family later.

The present, critical task was keeping Lady Clara from sinking too far to be brought back.

“Kindly have someone bring me the medicine case,” he told the maid. “And sleep now, while you can. I'll need you later.”

She did go out, though she paused for a moment at the sickbed, and stroked Lady Clara's forehead.

Before the door closed behind Davis, he heard her murmur to somebody. Within minutes, the young footman William appeared with the medicine case.

“I'm a step away in the corridor, sir,” he said. “Anything you need for her ladyship, I'll be pleased and grateful to help. I stay until daybreak. Then Tom comes. Miss Davis said somebody must always be within easy call.”

Thanking him, Radford took the medicine chest his father had taught him to carry whenever he traveled. He set up his traveling tea-­making kit at the fire, and brewed a dose of willow bark tea. For once he used his pocket watch, to time it exactly.

When he returned to Clara's bedside, her eyes were closed, but her breathing and her hands' restless movements over the bedclothes told him she wasn't asleep.

“I've a delicious treat for you,” he said.

Her eyelids came up halfway. “Nothing is delicious,” she said.

“I see,” he said. “You've arrived at the surly phase of the program.”

“I think you should go away,” she said.

“Normally, my ears tingle to hear your opinions,” he said. “They're so amusing. But that one's boring. I reject it as immaterial. I've made you willow bark tea with my own dainty hands, and you will drink it. There isn't the remotest chance of my going away until you're well. Since you're not well, you haven't the strength to make me go away.”

She turned her head away.

“Clara.”

She turned back to glare at him, a flash in the blue eyes of the combative girl he knew. “
Lady
Clara to you. Or my lady. Or your ladyship,
Mr.
Radford.”

He bit back laughter. He remembered the first day he'd seen her all grown up. The demented hat. The dress resembling a French chef's delirious idea of a cake. The haughty air with which she ordered him to summon a constable.

He wanted that Clara back.

“If you want respect, you must take your medicine like a brave aristocrat,” he said. “Think of the French nobles who walked to the guillotine, double chins aloft.”

Her mouth quivered.

“Actually, I had my not-­at-­all-­French cousin's chins in mind,” he said. “Did you ever see that old Gillray caricature of the Prince of Wales? ‘A Voluptuary under the horrors of Digestion,' it's titled. It was done in your grandmother's time. My father has a framed print on his study wall. The prince slumps back in his chair, picking his teeth with a fork. His belly is so big, his breeches can't cover it, and half the buttons are unfastened. His waistcoat gapes, too, stretched so far, only one button is buttoned. Behind him we see an over-­filled chamber pot. Behind that a table heaped with sweets. Empty bottles under his feet. That's what my cousin put me in mind of, last time I saw him.”

“Cousin? Do you mean Beastly Bernard?” She looked more alert.

“I won't tell you any of his ridiculous story unless you take your medicine,” Radford said.

Her chin went up, and though her head, covered in a wrinkled nightcap, lay on the pillow, the arrogant-­aristocrat effect wasn't altogether lost.

“Very well,” she said. “You're boring me witless and you won't go away. You might as well poison me. It'll make for a change.”

He set the tea on the bed table. Then he hesitated.

He knew what to do and how to do it properly. He'd had to help his father move to a sitting position time and again, in order to feed him. He knew he could do it while causing as little pain as possible. But she wasn't his father.

She was a vulnerable young woman dressed in nothing more than a nightgown. And he, of all ­people, was suddenly shy.

Suddenly insane was more like it.

She was ill. He'd chased away everybody except her maid and put himself in charge of her care. He'd made himself both nurse and doctor because he didn't trust anybody else not to kill her with good intentions. Before the disease ran its course, he'd probably undertake many, more intimate actions.

It wasn't as though he'd never seen a woman in a state of undress. It certainly wasn't as though he'd never touched this woman before. He'd held her in his arms. On his lap . . .