Ravishing the Heiress (10 page)

He’d never ailed so badly. For the first time in his life, pure physical misery drove everything else from his thoughts—except the lovely amber-hued nectar for which he yearned so desperately. He prayed to be given a glass of it, an inch, a sip. It didn’t need to be top quality whisky: brandy would do, as would rum, vodka, absinthe, or even a dram of common gin, the kind adulterated with turpentine for flavor.

Not a drop of distilled spirit sallied forth to his aid. But from time to time he’d vaguely realize that he was not alone. Someone gave him water to drink, wiped away the beads of sweat from his face, and might have even spread open clean sheets beneath him.

At some point he fell into a trouble sleep, his dreams full of thrashing monsters and forced good-byes. Several times he jerked awake, his heart pounding, convinced he’d just fallen from a great height. Each time there would come soothing murmurs at his ear, lulling him back to sleep.

He opened his eyes again to a dim room, feeling as if he’d
just recovered from a raging fever: His tongue was bitter, his muscles feeble, and his head annihilated. Sheets had been tacked to the window, making it difficult to judge the time of day. A kerosene lamp cast a dark orange glow on the walls. And was that—he blinked his sore, crusted eyes—a large bouquet of daisies in an earthenware pitcher? Yes, it was, small daisies, with crisp white petals and yellow centers as vivid as the sun.

Behind the daisies dozed his wife on a footstool, her sandy hair in a simple braid that hung over her shoulder.

Pushing himself up to a sitting position, he saw that next to his pallet on the floor was a tray with a fat-bellied teapot, slices of buttered toast, a bowl of grapes, and two boiled eggs, already peeled, covered under a pristine, white handkerchief.

“I’m afraid the tea is quite cold,” came her voice as he reached for the teapot.

The tea was quite cold. But he was so thirsty it barely mattered. And he was hungry enough that his queasiness didn’t prevent him from eating everything in sight.

“How did you manage to make tea?” A lady might pour tea in her drawing room for her callers, but she never boiled the water herself. And certainly she would not know how to build a fire for her kettle.

“There is a spirit lamp and I’ve learned to use it.” She came forward, lifted the empty tray from his lap, and looked at him a moment, as if he were a shipwrecked stranger who’d washed up before her. “I’ll let you rest.”

She was on her way out when he remembered to ask, “What are the daisies doing here?”

“The chamomiles?” She glanced back at the riotous bunch. “I’ve heard chamomile tea helps one fall asleep. I’ve
no idea how to make chamomile tea, so I hope you like looking at them.”

The chamomiles were so bright they hurt his eyes. “I can’t say I do, but thank you.”

She nodded and left him alone.

N
ight was falling—without quite knowing it, Fitz had slept most of the day away. It was too late to set out, find the village, and secure himself a new supply of whisky. But even if he had plenty of daylight left, he was still far too depleted to make the trip on foot.

Although, had he known that his second night would be as wretched as the night before, he might have made an attempt. The headaches roared back; tremors, palpitations, and roiling nausea, too, returned en masse. An eternity passed before exhaustion overtook him. He slept, holding on to someone’s hand.

His third night was far better, his slumber deep and dreamless. And when he awakened, more or less clearheaded, it was morning, not afternoon or evening as it had been lately.

The sheet still blocked the window. With one hand shielding his eyes, he yanked it off and let light stream into the room. What the sun illuminated was not pretty. All the walls were splattered with gouge marks, some large, some larger, as if a rabid beast with spikes and yard-long tusks had been penned in, desperate to get out. He rubbed his fingers against some of the rougher gouge marks, vaguely surprised that he’d been capable of such violence.

The chamomiles, droopy but no less cheerful, were still there; his wife was not. She had, however, left behind
another pot of tea that had gone cold. Since he was well enough to move about on his own, he went out of his self-made prison cell to look for the spirit lamp that she’d mentioned.

He found it, but it had run out of the methylated spirits used as fuel. So he started a fire in the grate, pumped water into the kettle from the pump outside, and put it to boil—the first thing a junior boy learned at Eton was how to make tea, scramble eggs, and fry sausages for his seniors. While the water heated, he set chunks of bread on a toasting fork.

When he had tea and toast both ready, Lady Fitzhugh was still nowhere to be seen.

He found her in bed, fully dressed—walking boots included—sleeping facedown on top of the covers, her arms at her side, as if she’d reached the edge of the bed and simply pitched forward into it.

He hadn’t meant to spy, but as he turned to leave, his gaze fell on an unfinished letter on her desk. It was addressed to his sisters.

With the exception of his intention to write—he hadn’t even known they’d been receiving letters—she’d managed not to lie, no mean feat when this honeymoon must have been some of the grimmest days she’d ever known.

He glanced back at her and noticed that her left hand bore several deep scratches. Alarmed, he approached the bed and lifted her hand for a closer look.

She stirred and opened her eyes.

“What happened to your hand? I hope I didn’t—” He couldn’t imagine he’d harm a woman, drunk or not. But there were some gaps in his memory.

“No, not at all. I cut myself a few times when I was learning how to use the tin opener.”

He’d opened tins for her in the beginning, when he opened tins for himself. But lately, bedridden, he’d forgotten that task altogether.

“I’m sorry,” he said, ashamed.

“It was nothing at all.” She pushed herself off the bed. “Are you better?”

He was still tired and sore, but it was a cleansing fatigue. “I’m all right. I came to tell you breakfast is ready if you want it.”

She nodded, this girl who’d seen him at his very worst, who’d
remained a rock of sanity and good sense when he’d nearly given in to a self-indulgent wretchedness. “Good. I’m hungry.”

Over breakfast, he read the accumulated letters, three from his sisters, two from Colonel Clements, two from Hastings, and a half dozen from other classmates. “You replied to all of them?”

“I’m not quite finished with the latest letter to your sisters, but the other ones, yes.” She glanced at him. “Don’t worry, I didn’t say you were deliriously happy.”

There was a mutable quality to her face. Every time he looked at her he was disconcerted: She never quite looked like what he thought she looked like.

“They wouldn’t have believed you anyway.”

“Yes, I know,” she said, her tone calm, matter-of-fact.

Something about her composure defused tension, even when the subject was highly flammable.

“Are
you
all right?” he asked.

“Me?” His question surprised her. “Yes, I’m well—well enough at least.”

“Why aren’t you crying over your fellow?”

“My what?”

“The one you had to give up to marry me.”

She added another spoonful of milk powder to her tea—they were out of fresh cream. “It’s different for me. We did not have any history—it was largely wishful thinking on my part.”

“But you love him?”

She looked down into her cup. “Yes, I love him.”

The pain that had been dulled by an excess of whisky came roaring back. “We are in the same boat, then—neither of us can have the one we want.”

“It would seem so,” she said, blinking rapidly.

It was a shock to realize she was holding back tears, even as he adjusted his opinion of her from bland deference to quiet strength: When he’d lost all his bearings, she’d been the one to guide him back from the wilderness.

“You’ve conducted yourself far better than I have,” he said, his words awkward and tentative, at least in his own ears. “I don’t know how you do it, putting up with me when it has been just as difficult for you.”

She bit her lip. “Don’t tell anyone else, but I am secretly a laudanum fiend behind your back.”

It took him a moment to realize she spoke in jest. He felt himself smiling faintly. The sensation was strange: He couldn’t remember the last time he’d smiled.

She rose. “I’d better finish the letter before Mr. Holt from the village arrives. He will be”—she hesitated—“he will be coming with whisky.”

M
illie would have liked to decline the whisky for her husband. But she had told him the day she poured out every bottle—the aggressiveness of her action still astonished her—that the choice was his.

So it must be.

She took delivery of milk, bread, eggs, butter, fruit, and salading. There was a box of tinned sardines, potted meat, and tinned plum pudding—everything manufactured by Cresswell & Graves. And there was the whisky.

“The spirits are no longer needed,” said Lord Fitzhugh.

Millie had become accustomed to the bearded, wild-haired, slovenly drunkard. The young man who stood before the cabin was clean-shaven and sharply dressed.
He was still too gaunt and too pale—behind his eyes was a grief as old as love itself. But Millie had to force herself to tear her gaze away: He had never been more striking, more magnetic.

“Very good, sir,” said Mr. Holt. “I’ll carry the rest inside. And—I almost forgot—there is a cable for you.”

Lord Fitzhugh took the cable and opened it. His expression changed instantly. “There is no need to unload anything. If you could wait half an hour or so and take us down to Woodsmere, I’d be grateful.”

Mr. Holt touched the brim of his hat. “Anything, milord.”

Millie followed him back into the house. “What’s the matter? Who sent the cable?”

“Helena. Venetia’s husband has passed away.”

“Of what?” Millie was incredulous. Surely her kind, beautiful sister-in-law could not have been made a widow so young. Mr. Townsend had been in perfect health at the wedding. And in Mrs. Townsend’s recent letters there had been no mention of any illnesses on his part.

“Helena didn’t give the cause of death, only that Venetia is devastated. We must go back and help with the arrange-ments.”

We
. It was the first time he’d referred to the two of them as one unit. She couldn’t help a leap of her heart. “Of course. I’ll start packing right now.”

Twenty minutes later, they were on their way. The lurching and swaying of the cart couldn’t be easy on his still fragile person, but he endured the discomforts without complaint.

In some ways, they were not too unalike. They both put duty first. They were both reserved by nature. And they
both had a greater capacity to bear private pain than either had suspected.

“Thank you,” he said when they were still a mile from the village. “If you hadn’t disposed of the whisky when you did, I’d be in no shape to be of any use to my sister. I’m glad you had the resolve and the fortitude.”

The pleasure she derived at his compliment was frightful. She looked down at her hands, so as to not betray her emotions. “I was afraid you might do mortal harm to yourself.”

“That would probably need more than a few weeks of drinking.”

She almost could not bring herself to speak of it. “I was talking about the rifle.”

He looked genuinely puzzled. “What rifle?”

“You were staring into the barrel of a shotgun.”

“You mean the dummy rifle I found in the shed?”

Her jaw dropped. “It was a
dummy
?”

“Very much. A child’s toy.” He laughed. “Perhaps we should introduce you to some proper firearms, so you can tell the difference next time.”

Her face heated. “This is terribly embarrassing, isn’t it?”

Now that he was sober, his eyes were an unearthly blue. “It is, for
me
: that I should have behaved in such a way as to cause anyone to doubt my will to live.”

“You’d endured a terrible loss.”

“Nothing others—including yourself—haven’t endured.”

He was inclined to gloss over heartbreak and affliction—again, like her.

The road turned. A gorgeous vista opened before them: a wide, oval lake, as green as the emerald peaks that
framed it. All along the banks, late summer flowers bloomed, their reflections, white and mauve, like a string of pearls around the lake. On the distant shore stood a pretty village with ivy-covered cottages, their window boxes still aflame with geraniums and cyclamens.

“Well,” she said, “at least the honeymoon is over.”

“Yes.” He tilted his face to the sky, as if marveling at the sensation of sunlight on his skin. “Thank God.”

1896

F
itz stood outside Isabelle’s house.

The day before, he’d hesitated in front of her door because he’d needed to cope with both an exorbitant hope and an equally strong fear of disappointment. But that was yesterday, before they’d committed themselves to a future together, a future once thought to be lost. Today he should enter her home with a spring in his step and no uncertainties whatsoever.