Patricia Veryan - [Sanguinet Saga 07] - Married Past Redemption (44 page)

"He'll pick up once Best comes with the midwife," he evaded.
But,
seeing how frantically those great dark eyes searched his face, he
could not deceive her and admitted sadly, "I have never seen the master
become so very ill quite this fast before, ma'am." He looked down at
Strand, his own eyes clouding. "I'd give everything I have, if—if only—"

"Good God!" said Norman indignantly. "He ain't dead yet! Don't
you
turn into a watering pot, Green!"

Green's answering smile was bright, if rather lopsided.

Trembling and stricken, Lisette rallied her forces. With a
calm that
astounded both men, she said, "Norman, please bring me a bowl of water
and a cloth, and ask Denise for my lavender cologne. And she will have
to prepare some barley water or lemonade for Justin. I'm afraid I must
ask you to see what you can do about dinner, Green."

He regarded her uneasily. "Gladly, ma'am. But perhaps I should
stay
with the master. When he becomes violent it's all I can do to hold him.
And you've had a long journey. You should rest."

"No." Her chin went up. "My place is beside my husband. If he
becomes violent we shall just have to tie him down. Hurry, please."

They both left. Drawing up the chair from the writing table,
Lisette
sat close beside the bed and leaned over to gently stroke back the
tumbled fair hair. Strand's head tossed, and he stared at her without
recognition. To see his forceful vitality reduced to this total
helplessness was shattering. She blinked tears away and prayed, "Please
God, let the midwife come quickly."

The afternoon slipped away, however, and Best did not come.
When
darkness fell, the steady beat of the rain increased until it was a
driving downpour, while the wind became ever more forceful, the gusts
rattling the windows and sending smoke puffing down the chimneys. By
nine o'clock Lisette was forced to accept the fact that the roads must
be totally impassable, and that whatever was to be done for the sick
man would only be achieved by those already gathered in what was left
of the old house.

The battle that followed was one she would never be able to
forget.
Strand's fever seemed to mount hourly, his outbursts of delirium
accompanied by wild thrashing and attempts to get out of bed that
sometimes required both Norman and Green to hold him, the threat that
he would severely overtax his strength terrifying Lisette. Soon after
two o'clock, he fell into a motionless silence that petrified
them all,
but by the expedient of holding a small mirror to his lips, Green
discovered he was still breathing.

"Must be exhausted, poor devil," said Norman, himself
owly-eyed from
the combined effects of the long journey and this ghastly night. "Come,
Lisette, to your bed. I'll wake Denise and she can watch Justin for a
while."

The respite was brief. Barely an hour later, the abigail shook
Lisette awake, sobbing that the master was raving and she must come at
once. She found Strand sitting up, Green's arms wrapped about him,
while the sick man again fought his duel with Bolster, shouting
anguished curses because of his friend's duplicity. Running to him,
Lisette soothed, "It is all right now, dearest. I'm here with you. Lie
back, Justin. Please, dear, lie back."

For a moment there was no change. Then he sank down, and she
sat
beside him once more, bathing his face gently. She glanced up to find
Green waiting, his drawn features filled with an expression of despair.
"Green," she whispered, "I am so afraid. Is there nothing—no medicine
we can give him?"

He wrung his hands. "Mrs. Rousell—the midwife, ma'am— has
some. Dr.
Bellows left it with her last time Mr. Justin was taken ill. It is made
from the bark of a tree." He knit his brow. "Something 'ona.' Brincona,
or Vincona… oh! Cinchona, that's it! They call it quinine. Dr. Bellows
told Miss Charity it would mean the difference between life and death
for Mr. Justin was he to suffer another attack. If
only
Mrs. Rousell would come!"

Neither of them had heard the door open softly. Norman stood
with
his hand on the latch, listening to them. His eyes were on Strand,
still now, save for the endless plucking of his long nervous fingers at
the eiderdown. It was devilish, the boy thought miserably, that in so
short a space of time one could become so attached to a man that should
he die the hole left in one's life would be unthinkable. And what it
would do to Lisette…! As quietly as he had come, he closed the door.

In the sickroom, hour succeeded weary hour. Sometimes Strand
was
quiet for a long interval, sometimes he tossed and moaned, crying out
half-finished sentences in English or Tamil, or striving to
sit up,
fighting Green's efforts to restrain him. But always, running through
his delirium like a continuing thread was one name, and whether it was
whispered or shouted, the tone was always the same—a yearning
disillusionment that wrung the hearts of those who heard him: "Lisette…
Lisette…"

By dawn he was perceptibly weaker, his eyes still holding the
feverish glitter, but his movements less violent, and his voice almost
inaudible. Green, who had slept for several hours in the chair beside
the fireplace, awoke to find Lisette holding a glass of barley water to
her husband's cracked lips, while Denise propped his shoulders. Coming
swiftly to aid them, the valet murmured, "Mrs. Strand, you
must
get some rest. We'll have you ill yourself if you keep on like this. We
should take turns. Perhaps, if Mr. Norman could sit with him now… ?"

"He is gone," vouchsafed Denise. "He leave the note for
madame. He
have to the village go to try and find the medicine for monsieur.''

Her heart warmed, Lisette thought that the rain seemed a
little
lighter, and the wind was definitely less furious than yesterday's
gale. If anyone could get through, it was Norman. Once the boy set his
mind to something, he was just as doggedly determined as was her
husband. She looked down at Strand, and his face seemed to ripple
before her eyes. Capitulating, she stumbled to her bed, murmuring a
demand to Denise that she be awakened if there was the slightest change
in her husband's condition, but falling asleep before she could
complete her sentence.

When she returned to the sickroom shortly after noon, she
found an
unexpected change. Strand was now as cold as he had been hot yesterday.
He lay there shivering convulsively, his teeth chattering. She thought
at first that he was rational, but when she approached, he sat up,
shouting, "Do not… walk on the carpet! Are you addled? Got to… get new…
carpet!" She eased him down on his pillows and took up his hand and he
turned blurred blue eyes to gaze at her. "Must let her go," he muttered
between shudders. "Have to—let her go… only decent thing…"

And their battle began all over again. She did what she might
to
keep him warm, prayed for Norman's return, and talked gently to the
sick man whenever it seemed that he might hear her.

At three o'clock Green came upstairs. He had shaved and
changed his
rumpled clothes, and he looked refreshed. He brought with him a tray,
which he placed on the table by the windows, and proceeded to pour a
cup of coffee, the aroma drawing Lisette despite her intital avowal
that she did not want anything. She was, she found, ravenous, and
eating toast and marmalade while she kept one eye on Strand, she asked
in the low tone they all employed in the sickroom, "Will the medicine
the doctor left still be potent, do you suppose? How long ago was it
that my husband suffered an attack?"

Green hesitated a moment, then, pouring more coffee into her
cup,
said, "Why, it was when you first were wed, ma'am. Mr. Justin knew he
was ill before the ceremony. I begged him to delay, but he would not."

Incredulous, Lisette gasped, "He—he was
ill
?
But I thought— Oh! Why on
earth
did he not tell
me?"

"He'll have my ears for telling you now, ma'am," Green sighed.
"The
thing is—well, I've been with him these four years, and—and I—"

"You love him," she nodded gravely. "I am well aware."

He reddened. "Why, he took me up, ma'am, when no one else
would. God
knows what would have become of me, else. I'd been cast off without a
character by a very powerful gentleman high up in the East India
Company, because I'd chanced to see him in—well, doing something he'd
no business doing. Mr. Justin risked the ruination of everything he'd
half killed himself to build up when he hired me. But he did it and
earned the respect of a lot of gentlemen who had cause to dislike my
former master. Still, it was a dreadful chance he took; you'd know how
very dreadful if you knew how he longed to come home. The climate
didn't suit him, and every day he was breaking his heart for England.
I'll never forget it, ma'am. And that's why I—I suppose I take an
interest in—in anything having to do with him."

Lisette smiled. "I understand, and indeed am grateful for your
loyalty. But what I
cannot
understand is, why he did not postpone the ceremony. I remember
noticing how hot his hand was when he put the ring on my finger, but—"
She remembered also the interpretation she had placed on his heated
touch, and on the glitter in his eyes, and she felt sick and ashamed
and was silent.

"If you will forgive me for speaking plain," Green said
hesitantly,
"Mr. Justin dared not postpone the wedding. Oh, he never spoke of it to
me, but I knew, because Lord Bolster kept at him to change the date,
and one day he rounded on him, and said it was more than he dare do.
Mr. Garvey was courting you also, and the master was deadly afraid of
losing you. Afterwards, well, you see how it is when the fever really
has him in its grip. He couldn't bear you to see him like this—and on
your wedding night." He looked at her pleadingly. "You can scarcely
blame him, ma'am."

A soaring joy was lifting Lisette's heavy heart. She said, "So
he came down here, and this—Mrs. Rousell nursed him?"

"No, ma'am. Mostly, it was Miss Charity."

"Miss Charity?"
Lisette gave a rather
hysterical little
trill of laughter, and Green stared his astonishment. "Charity!" she
exclaimed again. So the blond paramour she had so resented all this
while did not even exist! Strand had left her, not because he loved
another woman, but because he did not wish her to see him racked by
this dreadful fever. "Oh!" she said in a half-sob, her eyes bright with
unshed tears. "Oh! If
only
I had—"

"Oliver… ? Are you here? Is—is
anyone
here… ?"

Fighting the impulse to run to the bed in response to that
feeble
call, Lisette rose and went swiftly to bend over the invalid. "Hello,
my dear tyrant," she said gently. "Are you—"

She had quite forgotten the circumstances under which they had
parted, and was shocked to see his eyes widen in horror. "No!" Strand
gasped. "No! Go away from me! I do not want you here! No!"

Sinking to her knees beside the bed, she implored, "Stop!
Justin, I
beg you—it was all a ruse, my darling. Garvey planned it, hoping you
would call out Tristram. Dearest, please listen to me! I went to see
Charity arid Rachel, it is not what you—"

But it was useless. As rapid had been his return to normalcy
was his
relapse into delirium. This time, however, his frenzied ravings swiftly
grew feebler, his strength so obviously failing that Lisette was
distracted with fear and scarcely dared leave his side for a moment
without dreading what she might find upon her return. She prayed as she
had never prayed in her life that Norman would come, but the hours
crept past, and the afternoon was waning when at length Strand's faint
voice again asked lucidly, "Are you still here… Lisette?"

She had been sitting close beside the bed, a hand over her
eyes, and
at once, fearful of the possible response, said timidly, "Yes, Justin.
I am here.".

He peered at her uncertainly. "Did—did I dream… ? You
said—Garvey… ?"

With a muffled sob, she knelt and, nursing his hand to her
cheek,
said a tremulous, "Yes. Oh, yes. Justin, I did not betray you. My
dearest, I never shall."

He smiled in a faint shadow of his mischievous grin. "You are…
very
kind. And—and I'm glad you—Jeremy!" The sunken eyes opened wide. "Is
Bolster dead?"

"No. Very much alive. And with Amanda's promise to wed him.
You did not shoot him, love. It was Garvey. Beatrice told us."

He sighed, "Now, thank God!" and closed his eyes wearily, but
after
a moment peered at her again. With an ineffably tender smile, he
whispered, "I think, my dear… that you will not be burdened… with your
tyrannical husband, much… longer. I wish you would kiss me… just one
last—"

"No!"
With a wail of anguish she, leapt
up. "You
shall not!
Not now!" She climbed onto the bed and lay down beside him, sliding an
arm beneath his shoulders, totally uncaring that Green, tears streaking
his cheeks, stood by the fire as if rooted to the spot. "You are not
trying
to live!" she accused fiercely. "Wretched, wretched man! I will not
let
you leave me!" She turned his pale, surprised face towards her and
began to kiss his brow, his lean cheeks, his eyelids, between kisses
whispering she knew not what terms of endearment and pledges of
devotion, interspersed with scolding and demands that he make an effort
to cling to life, for her sake. How long she held him thus, how much
she said, she could not afterwards have told, but when Norman crept in
later, the precious medicine bottle clutched in his hand, he found them
both asleep, Strand's head cradled on his wife's shoulder, her cheek
against his tumbled hair, her arms fast about him.

"Dashed if ever I saw such a scaly set-out!"
Norman proclaimed, his
indignant tone belied by the twinkle in his dark eyes. "What I went
through! Soaked to the skin; fording raging floods; slogging through
mud up to my knees; tossed onto my head when my blasted animal balked
at a puddle he could have stepped over! I was forced to detour fifteen
miles out of my way because two stupid bridges had been washed away! A
lesser man would have given up, eh? But no, I persisted, got to the
village, and sought out that cantankerous old midwife. I had to roust
her out of a room where a lady was shrieking her head off because she—"