Nicola Cornick (20 page)

‘I fear I cannot help your enquiries, sir. You may have rather more success looking for Sir William at his own house, Challen Court, of course. Now it is late, and you will oblige me by leaving.’

A faint tinge of colour crept back into Captain Harvard’s face at her tone. He was clearly annoyed at the cool way Annabella appeared to be taking the news and he chose to ignore her instruction.

‘How well do you know Sir William, ma’am?’ he challenged. ‘When did you last see him?’

Annabella moved towards the door. ‘As I have said, Sir, Sir William is an acquaintance of my family,’ she said with chilly courtesy, ‘and I last saw him earlier today when he passed on his way to dinner in Lambourn.’

‘You are certain,’ Harvard persisted, ‘that he has not been here this evening?’

Annabella raised a haughty eyebrow. ‘Captain Harvard, do you think that I do not know the comings and goings of my own household? To my certain knowledge, Sir William has not called by here this evening.’

Harvard’s chill grey eyes rested on her face. It was clear that he disbelieved her, even suspected her of hiding his quarry. Annabella faced him out bravely.

‘I suggest you concentrate your search elsewhere, sir. You are wasting your time here.’ She opened the door and stood politely to one side to allow him egress.

‘And, sir, if you have any further questions for me,
you may return in daylight to ask them. It is late and I am for my bed. I bid you goodnight!’

Annabella was unsure how she preserved her calm whilst the disgruntled Captain marshalled his men and took them off into the night. By this time, the entire house was in uproar. Frank was giving a greatly exaggerated account of his involvement to the wide-eyed kitchenmaid whilst Miss Frensham was wringing her hands and showing all signs of giving way to the vapours. After a worried glance at Annabella, Susan led the companion tenderly back to her bed with murmured promises of hot milk laced with a sleeping draught. Annabella sat down nervelessly on the bottom step and put her head in her hands. She wanted to run out into the night to find Will. She wanted to hurry to Oxenham to seek help. Neither course of action would be profitable. She needed to think…

The door was still ajar, for Frank had neglected his duties to seek consolation in the kitchen and could be heard exchanging sweet nothings with the maid as she put the milk on the hob. Wearily, Annabella got to her feet and reached for the door. It swung inwards before she could touch it.

‘Will you help me then, Annabella, in spite of everything you have heard tonight?’ Will Weston asked softly, stepping over the threshold.

Paradoxically, Annabella found that she was angry, rather than pleased to see him. Having sustained the shock of Harvard’s words and successfully concealed her desperate concern, she found that the sight of Will alive and well was curiously irritating.

‘Will!’ Her words came out with rather more fe
rocity than she had intended. ‘What on earth is the meaning of this?’

Will tried to smile at her fierceness but the effort was rather strained and it was only when Annabella had had a few more moments to consider the rather greyish pallor of his face and the tight lines of pain about his mouth that she realised that he was hurt after all. His boots were covered in mud, his jacket torn and stained and he held his left arm stiffly, cradled by his other hand.

‘You’re injured—’ she began, anger melting swiftly into concern as she stepped forward instinctively to take a grip on his good arm.

‘The veriest scratch to my shoulder, but it has bled overmuch.’ Will sounded weary and strangely detached. He swayed a little, leaning briefly against her. Annabella tightened her grip.

‘Bandages, perhaps…’ there was a trace of rueful amusement in his voice ‘…and do I ask too much for some food and wine? I am sorry to trouble you this way—’ the blue eyes, clouded with pain, searched Annabella’s face ‘—particularly when I am a fugitive.’

‘Don’t be foolish,’ Annabella said shortly. ‘Of course we will help you! You must come upstairs—’

‘No!’ Will’s gaze narrowed with the effort of concentration, of holding off the faintness that threatened him. ‘The servants—’

‘Can be trusted.’ As Annabella spoke, she heard Susan’s footsteps on the stair and looking up, saw the maid leaning over the banisters. ‘Quickly, Susan, to me! I think he is like to swoon…’

Susan asked no questions. With her help, Annabella
managed to help the semi-conscious Will up the stairs, then paused on the landing.

‘Best put him in your own room, ma’am,’ Susan said practically. ‘The other bed is not aired and Sir William looks in dire need of rest. Here—’ she helped Annabella steer Will into the bedroom ‘—I will go and fetch some food—do you go to Miss Frensham’s closet and bring bandages and some of that revolting ointment she keeps…’ She saw Annabella’s look of alarm and added, ‘Never fear, ma’am, Miss Frensham is already asleep. Just the mention of a sleeping-draught was enough to do it! No need for her to trouble herself any more this night…’

Miss Frensham was a confirmed hypochondriac and had a whole collection of bandages, dusting powders and ointments in her closet. Annabella trod softly up to her door and scratched quietly on the panels. A muffled snore was the only response. Tiptoeing into the darkened room, Annabella paused only briefly to check her companion’s unconscious figure, bundled up in severe gingham with the huge lace bedcap perched atop her head and her curling papers rustling beneath it. Miss Frensham wheezed again. Reassured, Annabella started to take a vast amount of pots and potions from the cupboard, Miss Frensham’s regular snuffling her only accompaniment. She backed out of the room and bumped into Susan again on the landing. The maid had her arms full of blankets and a pitcher of water held precariously in one hand. She ran a careful eye over Annabella’s haul of medicines and nodded with approval, holding out her own load.

‘Take these to Sir William, ma’am,’ she ordered. ‘I’ll go to the kitchens and get him some food.’ And, giving no time for Annabella to wonder at her complicity, she hurried off downstairs.

A
nnabella found that Will had managed to prop himself against the pillows, but his eyes were closed and his colour bad, giving the lie to his earlier claims that he was not much hurt. There was dried blood on his sleeve, and a fresh, bright stain on his chest. As Annabella touched his hand, he opened those very blue eyes and tried to smile.

‘Annabella…Thank God…’

Annabella poured some water with hands that shook a little, and helped Will into a more upright position so that he could drink. His head rested against the curve of her shoulder and, as she watched him, she felt a great wave of fear and tenderness overcome her. She brushed the tumbled hair back from his forehead with gentle fingers.

‘I have bandages and some blankets,’ she said a little gruffly, to cover her emotion, ‘and Susan is bringing some food for you. I think, perhaps, that it would be a good idea to bind up that wound first…’

Will looked down and seemed vaguely surprised that the wound was still bleeding.

‘Damnation…’ He moved uncomfortably. ‘Will you help me off with this shirt? A strange request to a lady, I know—’ despite his pain, his blue gaze mocked her ‘—but we shall do better without it.’

Annabella was annoyed to find herself colouring up fierily. She slipped his jacket off and started on the shirt buttons with fingers which slipped slightly. The wound was to his shoulder, a deep gash that looked clean but was still bleeding slowly. Further down his arm was another, a smaller laceration that was nevertheless an angry red. Annabella’s breath caught on a small gasp. She had never seen such injuries before, let alone had to dress them. She had not the first idea where to start.

‘Annabella,’ Will said patiently, after several minutes had elapsed, ‘I would as lief not lie here forever! If you wash the wound, dust it with that powder and bind it up, I shall do well enough. The other is a mere scratch that will heal on its own given time.’

His matter-of-fact tone steadied Annabella, as it had been intended to do. She reached a little uncertainly for the cloth and dipped it in the bowl of water, dabbing gently at the gash until it was clean. She heard Will catch his breath and bit her lip in wordless sympathy, but though his face had paled visibly, he said nothing and made no further sound. The pale yellow powder from Miss Frensham’s collection of medicines looked horrible, but once Will had reassured her again that it was perfectly safe to use, she dusted the wound and started to try to bind it up. Here she got herself into a considerable tangle, and it was Will who, having tended to plenty of men injured in action, took the end of the bandage and showed her how to wind
it around him securely. Halfway through, Annabella became inexplicably distracted by the smooth, bronze skin of his chest beneath her fingers. She could feel the warmth emanating from him, smell the scent of his skin. She dropped the bandage, reached clumsily to pick it up again, and found her hand caught and held by his.

There was a light in those blue eyes, at once tender and demanding, which held her captive. He raised her hand slowly to his lips and kissed her fingers.

‘Thank you,’ he said huskily. ‘You have been very kind.’

Annabella freed herself reluctantly and managed to finish tying the bandage. She found she could not meet his eyes. This sudden shyness was extraordinary, after the passion of earlier in the day. But that seemed like another world now. She busied herself in tidying up, pouring him another mug of water and fussing with his blankets.

‘We will have some food for you shortly. You must be hungry…’

‘Thank you,’ Will said again, softly. He was still watching her with that odd mixture of tenderness and speculation. Then his expression changed. ‘Annabella, I owe you an explanation. I heard what Harvard said tonight—or the majority of it, at least. I was outside…But—’ the bitterness crept in ‘—you had heard the rumours about Lake Champlain already, of course.’

‘Yes, and I never believed them!’ Annabella was vehement in her need to reassure Will that she had never doubted him. ‘When I heard them in Somerset I counted them as spiteful malice and nothing more. And now I have no more reason to believe them than
I did before!’ She hesitated. ‘The only thing I do not understand, Will…’ her voice wavered, but she was determined to continue ‘…is why you did not agree to go with Harvard to clear your name. Surely you have nothing to fear? Surely you could establish your innocence beyond all doubt!’

A faint, rueful smile touched Will’s mouth. ‘You are more generous to me than I deserve, my love! What you should be saying is that a man who resists arrest rightly forfeits the claim to be treated as a gentleman and may expect to be thrown into chains! My actions suggest I have something to hide…that I must indeed be guilty! No doubt that is what Harvard will say! And all my acquaintance would expect me to have surrendered to him tonight, to be dealt with justly and considerately, escorted to London to explain myself to the Admiralty, perhaps, but not hunted as a criminal!’ He turned his head away and closed his eyes for a moment.

‘Then…’ Annabella began, uncertainly, ‘why did you choose—?’

Will’s eyes opened again. They looked shadowed and very tired. ‘Oh, yes, Annabella, you are right in that I could have cleared my name had I been given a chance. But that choice was never mine. Harvard did not challenge me as he claims. He shot me without warning. Oh, I do not doubt that, now he has lost me, he will tell everyone I ran from arrest. But the truth is that he tried to kill me and now he wants me dead!’

Annabella put a hand to a head that was spinning. She wondered fleetingly whether Will was delirious, but though he was clearly in pain, there was no real fever—not yet. But even so…

‘You think I have run mad,’ Will observed, reading her thoughts all too accurately. ‘I assure you that it is true. Harvard never identified himself to me, never challenged me to stop…’ He sighed. ‘I had been dining with the Linleys over in Lambourn, as you know, and it was later than I expected when I rode back. It was dark, but I saw two men riding towards me. As I say, there was no challenge—they shot at me without warning. The first shot grazed my arm and, naturally enough, I rode off, thinking they were footpads. I had a pistol with me and could have taken them on, but it was dark and I could see no point in taking the risk…Then the second shot took me in the shoulder.’ He shook his head. ‘I fell off my horse, which was terrified and took off down the road as though the hounds of hell were after it. But I managed to scramble into cover, and in the darkness they could not find me. It was then that I heard them talking.’

The lines of anger and bitterness set deeper in his face. ‘Harvard was swearing violently because they had lost me. He said that they had to find me, that I could not be allowed to live and tell the tale. I recognised his voice, for they were standing a bare twenty yards from me. And he addressed Hawes by name, which gave me pause for thought. Hawes was the Master at Arms on my last ship, but before that—and after—he was Harvard’s man.’

‘Then you are saying that it was quite deliberate,’ Annabella said slowly, and Will nodded.

‘Oh, yes, there can be no mistake. They set out to take me—and not alive, either. The tale that I was running from arrest was made up afterwards, to dis
credit me in case I came forward to claim Harvard had tried to kill me.’

There was a silence. The candle flame guttered. ‘But why should Harvard do such a thing?’ Annabella asked slowly. ‘It is not that I disbelieve you, Will, but—’

Will shrugged a little irritably as though his wound pained him. ‘That’s the devil of it! I do not know! His original orders must have been to take me in, they can hardly have been to shoot me! And Harvard and I were never close friends, but I had no notion he bore me such a grudge! Damnation, I cannot think straight! I have spent the best part of the night since it happened trying to understand why he would do this to me!’

Annabella put a soothing hand to his forehead, concerned that it was starting to burn with a feverish heat. ‘Try to sleep a little,’ she counselled. ‘Doubtless much will fall into place when you have a clear head! Now is not the time to puzzle yourself with this!’

Will gave her another faint smile. ‘You speak much sense, sweetheart!’ A shadow touched his face and he plucked a little fretfully at the blankets. ‘But I should not stay here, bringing you into danger—’

‘I am your future wife,’ Annabella said strongly. ‘Who should have a better right to look after you? Now go to sleep. You are feverish…’

She heard him laugh softly. ‘So I am, but not the sort that you mean! I have been burning for you, Annabella, for a long time!’ He caught her hand again. ‘For a long time I have been afraid of what I would do, for I wanted you so much, and now here I am in
your bed, but not in the sense I would have envisaged!’

‘You
are
feverish,’ Annabella reproved, trying not to smile.

She wrapped him in the blanket and left the water within reach. It seemed that Susan’s food would not be needed, for Will seemed to be falling asleep before her eyes, and no doubt it was for the best. She stood for a moment, looking down on him, filled with love and tenderness as she considered the curve of his cheek, the silky thickness of those dark eyelashes, the determined line of his jaw, somehow softened now that he was so vulnerable. A faint knock at the door broke her reverie, and Susan slipped into the room.

‘Sorry I was so long, ma’am. One of them oafish sailors came back asking some questions, but I sent him off with a flea in his ear!’ She saw Annabella’s look of alarm. ‘No cause to worry, ma’am! Now, I’ll sit with Sir William, for you look done up and no mistake!’ She was shepherding Annabella towards the door as she spoke. ‘Owen will be setting off to market early tomorrow and will get a message to Oxenham—I was thinking you’d be wanting them to help…And don’t worry, ma’am—we’ll take good care of Sir William, seeing as you’re sweet on him!’

Annabella slept late, completely exhausted, and only awoke when Susan pulled back the bed curtains and put her cup of morning chocolate carefully down on the bedside table.

‘He’s proper feverish today, ma’am, I’m afraid,’ she said, in answer to Annabella’s enquiry about Will’s health. ‘Frank sat with him through most of the
night. I’ve changed the dressing on his wound and it’s starting to heal, but he’s very hot and he hasn’t woken. If you’re going in to see him, ma’am, try to give him some more of that draught. It looks nasty, but it works well.’

Annabella dressed hurriedly and slipped quietly out of the spare room and across the landing. Though the entire household appeared to know of Will’s presence and accept it with silent connivance, Annabella had no wish for Miss Frensham to stumble on a wanted man in her bedroom. The consequences of that would be too difficult to deal with. She abandoned the challenge of thinking up ways to distract her companion for the day, and pushed open the door of her room a little apprehensively.

Will had thrown back his covers and was tossing and turning restlessly. His forehead was hot and damp with fever, and he was murmuring a little in his dreams. Annabella bathed his face gently, but he did not wake, and after a moment she sat down on the edge of the bed beside him, just holding his hand in hers.

He woke suddenly a few minutes later. The blue eyes, glittering now with pain and delirium, raked Annabella’s face but she was not sure if he knew who she was. She gave him some water, then the noxious black draught, which he tried half-heartedly to push away, before swallowing a small mouthful.

‘Where am I…?’ Will’s voice was a whisper, his gaze narrowed with the effort of concentration. ‘Annabella? Then it is true…’ He tried to sit up and fell back with a groan, closing his eyes.

‘Keep still.’ Annabella pressed a soothing hand to
his cheek. ‘You are quite safe, and soon you will be well again.’

Will smiled a little, his eyes still closed. ‘Safe…A ministering angel…’ Suddenly his eyes opened wide again and fixed on her face. ‘Do you love me, Annabella? Tell me!’ His hand was gripping her arm with surprising strength for one so ill, and his tone demanded an answer. A small chill touched Annabella’s heart. Surely he could not have forgotten their betrothal so quickly? But then, with a fever, one might forget many things…

‘Yes,’ Annabella whispered, ‘I love you very much, Will. I have done for a long time.’

Will relaxed almost at once, his eyes closing like those of a sleepy child reassured by her words. His hand slid from her arm and his breathing deepened into what seemed to be normal sleep. Annabella watched him, feeling her love for him uncurl inside her and expand until it felt as though it filled her whole being. No consideration of the crime of which he was accused could alter her feelings for him. But how they were to untangle this knot was less clear.

The door opened softly and Susan stuck her head around it.

‘You must take some breakfast, ma’am,’ she chided gently. ‘Miss Frensham has just woken and is in a very delicate state this morning. I have persuaded her to stay in her room for the time being.’

Annabella sighed. Miss Frensham’s delicate state, no doubt induced by the shocks of the previous night, was another trying circumstance to contend with whilst she tried to see her way clear to helping Will.
She stood up and went downstairs, her footsteps slow, her mind dogged with anxiety.

The day dragged by. Annabella, torn between worrying over Will’s condition and puzzling over his allegations towards Captain Harvard, moped about the house, spent half an hour desultorily cutting roses in the garden, and watched the hands of the clock drag themselves round towards the afternoon. A hasty council of war between herself, Frank and Susan had led to the decision to move Will across to Lark Farm, where they felt he would be safer from both the attentions of Captain Harvard and any unexpected forays Miss Frensham might make into Annabella’s bedroom.