My Lord Viking (9 page)

     
Linnea tried to keep her own steps to a sedate pace as she walked out of the parlor and toward the stairs.
 
Her hopes of reaching the kitchen without delay vanished, however, when her sister burst out of a room on the other side of the gallery.
 

     
Dinah rushed to her and clasped her hands.
 
“Can I congratulate you
now
, Linnea?”

     
“Not yet.”

     
Rolling her eyes, Dinah sighed.
 
“Linnea, Lord Tuthill is clearly devoted to you.
 
Anyone can see that he simply adores you.
 
How can you let him linger on and on without giving him your answer?”

     
“I believe Mama has enough to fret about with
your
wedding.
 
She might have apoplexy if she had to plan two at the same time.”
 
She edged toward the stairs before her sister guessed that her thoughts were not on
Randolph
but on another man.
 
Her hand clenched on the railing along the edge of the gallery.
 
Thinking so much of Nils Bjornsson was absurd.
 
Certainly once her curiosity was soothed about him and how he had come to be here in such poor condition, she would be able to put him from her mind.
 

     
Dinah frowned.
 
“Linnea, you know that is not the reason you delay.”

     
“And what do you believe is the reason?”

     
“Linnea!” her sister gasped.

     
Realizing that her tone had been too harsh with her impatience, Linnea let her shoulders ease from their inflexible line.
 
“Forgive me, Dinah.
 
I did not mean to put the question to you like that.
 
I am a bit disconcerted.”

     
“By
Randolph
?”

     
“Yes.”
 
That was not false, for
Randolph
’s call had led to this uncomfortable conversation.
 

     
“If you do not wish for him to court you—”

     
“I did not say that.”

     
“No, but I suspect you wish to.
 
Once you were so excited each time he came to call. Are you having second thoughts about this match?”

     
Linnea wanted to focus on one problem at a time.
 
“You are right that I am having second thoughts.”
 
She did not admit that they were the same as her first thoughts.
 
Wishing she could take her sister into her confidence now, but fearing what might be amiss in the water garden pavilion, she soothed her sister’s disquiet quickly.
 

     
She went down the stairs at the swiftest pace that would not call attention to her.
 
Hearing barking as she neared the kitchen at the far left wing of the house, she was not surprised when Scamp came running toward her.
 
She smiled weakly when she bent and took her missing slipper from his mouth.

     
“Thank you, Scamp,” she said, patting his silken head.
 
She raised her head and saw Jack watching from the stillroom door.
 
She came to her feet, her smile gone, because his face was somber.
 

     
The collection of aromas from within the small room reached out to draw her past the door.
 
When Jack closed it behind her, she was not surprised.
 
The tension that tightened every motion he made warned that something was terribly wrong.
 
Leaning back on the table where Cook made preserves and distilled potions and possets from the herbs in the kitchen garden, she asked, “What is it, Jack?”

     
“‘Tis him, Lady Linnea.”

     
“Mr. Bjornsson?”
 
There would be no other reason for Jack to wear such a grim expression.
 

     
“Aye, he was thrashing something terrible in his sleep.
 
Olive is worried that he would hurt himself or go mad.
 
Then—”

     
“I shall go right out there.”
 
She glanced toward the door.
 
“Thank you for saying nothing in front of
Randolph
.”

     
Jack scratched the side of his nose.
 
“I did not know if you had told his lordship about what you had found, so I did not want to say anything in his hearing.”

     
“That was a good decision.”
 

     
He cleared his throat.
 
“Begging your pardon, my lady, but there is more.”

     
“More?”
 

     
“Olive and I both had to leave him alone—”

     
“I thought you understood that you should not leave him by himself.”

     
“Aye, but ‘twas just a moment, and he was asleep and...”
 
He motioned for her to come closer.
 
In a whisper, he added, “I don’t know how anyone in his poor condition could wreck everything in the water pavilion.”

     
“Wreck?”

     
“The bench is in pieces, and the pallet torn.”
 
He swallowed roughly.
 
“There was blood on the floor.”

     
“Mr. Bjornsson?”

     
“Don’t know.
 
Can you come now, my lady?”
 
Again he hesitated, shuffling his feet, then asked, “What did Lord Sutherland have to say about Mr. Bjornsson?”

     
“I have not had a chance to speak with Papa.”

     
“An alert should be sounded.”

     
“Papa is on his way to town.
 
I will speak to him after I come with you to see the pavilion.
 
By then, he should have returned.” She shivered, trying not to imagine what she might find there.
 
She pulled on her broken bonnet, stuffing her hair beneath it.
 
She glanced around the stillroom.
 
Once she determined how Nils was hurt, she would come here and get what she must to ease his pain.
 

     
A fine mist was rolling in off the sea as she hurried with Jack toward the water garden.
 
Skipping across the stones on the driveway, for she had left her other slipper in the parlor upstairs, she hurried after him.
 
Jack’s shoulders were still as rigid as the branches of the trees edging the steps down toward the pool.
 

     
Linnea did not pause as she went down the stone stairs to the garden or up the stone risers in the pavilion overlooking the water.
 
Untying her bonnet ribbons, she grimaced when a piece of the brim fell off in her hands.
 
She tossed it into her bonnet and set it on the newel post at the top of the steps.
 

     
In horror, she stared at the destruction.
 
The bench was in pieces on the floor as if someone had taken an ax to it.
 
Two of the shutters had broken slats.
 
She tried not to think of how they looked as if someone had been shoved viciously against them.
 
Feathers from the pallet rested everywhere, and two blankets were torn into shreds.
 
The canisters had been burst, and water pooled in every low spot on the floor.
 
Her stomach cramped when she saw the pinkish shade of one pool.
 

     
Olive rushed to her.
 
“He just woke, my lady.”
 

     
“Just woke?”
 
She grasped Olive’s hands.
 
“Then who did this?”
 

     
“I am not sure.”

     
“But how can he be awake already?
 
I thought you put a tincture of opium in his water.”

     
“I did, but I must have misjudged the amount.
 
He is a brawny man.”
 
She sighed.
 
“I was not certain he would wake when he seemed to be so lost in his own world.”

     
“What do you mean?”

     
“He spoke strangely.
 
I could not understand anything he said.”

     
Linnea clasped her own taut hands together.
 
“That is because English is not his customary language.
 
He speaks another.”

     
“Oh.”
 
Olive’s eyes grew round, and Linnea guessed her maid had never given that idea even a thought.
 

     
“How long did you leave him alone?”

     
“Just moments, my lady.
 
I went out to call after Jack to bring more bandaging from the stable.
 
I don’t know how anyone could have slipped past me.
 
When I came back...”
 
Olive shuddered and wrung her hands in her apron.

     
“Lady Linnea!”
 
The command rang against the roof of the water pavilion.
 
“I will speak with you now.”

     
Sending Jack back to the stillroom with a list of supplies, including hops that she could put in a tea to bring sleep to Nils, Linnea skirted the puddles to go to where Nils was struggling to free himself from the blankets that had become tangled around him.
 
“What happened?”

     
“Do you need to ask?” he spat back.
 
Grasping the knife he had kept by his side, he held it up.
 
The tip was stained crimson.
 
“I told you Kortsson was near.”
 

     
“But no one saw him enter the pavilion.”
 

     
“He was here.”
 

     
“Mayhap you
thought
you saw him here.”
 

     
“And attacked a shadow of my mind?”
 
He laughed coldly.
 
“Do you think I could do this damage when you have me bound up like a swaddling babe with all these bandages?”
 

     
“You are badly hurt.”
 
She frowned as she tried to loosen the blanket from around his hurt shoulder.
  
He must have been tossing about like a small ship on a wild sea.
 
That suggested he had been in the midst of a brain fever.
 
Yet, he seemed quite sane now.
 
“Be still.
 
You are making things worse.”

     
“Things cannot be worse,” he growled.

     
“You could be dead.”

     
“Then I would not be here.
 
I would be—”
 
His hand fisted on the floor when she drew the blanket from around his broken arm.
 

     
“I am sorry.
 
I do not mean to hurt you more.”