Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
Once again he didn’t come. Only a fool would have expected him to.
John, the footman, arrived with the news just as her maid, frustrated by her mistress’s uncharacteristic indecision about what dress to wear for a simple dinner, dissolved into tears.
Georgiana waved the maid away, snatched the note, and stalked about the small chamber in her dressing gown. This time he wouldn’t come.
“He regrets? What does that mean? Who brought this? Does he wait for a reply?”
“His man, my lady. The man seemed somewhat anxious to return. I might catch him below stairs if—”
“Hurry! Stop him. I wish to speak with him. Go, man. Hurry!”
Georgiana tossed her dressing gown aside.
“Mary, dry your tears. It wasn’t your fault.” She grabbed the nearest dress as she spoke and pulled it over her head. “Do me up quickly. Truly, it wasn’t your fault. There’s a good girl.”
Five minutes later she opened the door to the public salon and found Charles Harley, impatient to be gone.
“I understand that you need to return to your master, but I wish you to clarify.”
“It ain’t my place to clarify,” the sullen little man snarled.
“What nonsense is this?” She waved the note in the air. “What does he mean by ‘I regret that I am unable to keep our engagement’?”
Harley clamped his jaws shut.
“He prays his ‘change of circumstances’ doesn’t cause me hardship. What circumstances? What is the nature of these circumstances, Mr.—Harley, is it?”
Harley’s sullen face and his determined answer, “Not for me to say,” revealed nothing.
Georgiana stood very still. The authority she mustered would have made her mother proud. “Of course not,” Georgiana said, “and it is to your credit that you know it. I last saw Mr. Mallet on his way to a surgeon’s premises. He is an old family friend about whom I am understandably concerned.”
Stony silence.
“Come, come, man. Sooner told, sooner over. If you wish to get back to Mr. Mallet soon I suggest you answer my questions.” She raised her Hayden shoulders and glared down her aristocratic nose.
He shook his head wryly. He was laughing. Cheeky creature!
“He isn’t well. Told you before. Leg bothers him awful most of the time. That surgeon may do him good in time, but yesterday he just wore him out. Had to be carried back in the sedan chair, and he hates it.”
The man looked her in the eyes while he spoke. What kind of servant makes eye contact? Not a well-trained one. Georgiana could see truth in Harley’s eyes, though, and loyalty to Andrew. She could also see the moment he came to a decision.
“The surgeon thinks he can fix the problem somewhat. He may never walk without th’ limp, but he can get some of the pressure off ‘the nerves’ as he calls it. There’s still metal shot in the hip he says, and it has to come out. Won’t be pretty, but if he can survive the surgery...”
He said those last words deliberately, eyes locked on hers. Georgiana paled but held her ground.
“If he survives, he’ll be able to walk about without coming to grief every time. He’s to stay off it until day after tomorrow.”
“Mr. Peabody is the surgeon?”
Harley nodded.
That much relieved her. “He will do surgery in two days?”
Another nod.
Georgiana caught her lip between her teeth. Peabody’s presence reassured her, but Harley’s words didn’t. If he survives the surgery—
“Won’t take help,” Harley broke in. “Likely to shy if you try it. Won’t take help from his friends in London.”
“No, I don’t expect he would.” She realized that Richard knew but chose not to tell her. Her thoughts raced.
“You may tell Mr. Mallet that I accept his gracious apology and will expect him to keep his word at a later date.”
Harley took a half step. Her hand darted out to keep him from leaving. “He doesn’t need to know he’s being helped,” she said. “You will tell me when he needs something—anything at all.” Empresses gave orders with less command.
Harley’s impudence didn’t hide his shrewdness. He weighed her words. “Oh, yes, Milady, that I will.” By the time he left, Lady Georgiana knew every detail of the proposed operation.
“You will most certainly keep me informed, Mr. Harley, whether you wish to or not,” she said to the empty room. “We will make sure Mr. Mallet gets the best of care and then, Mr. Mallet, oh yes, then you and I will do business.”
* * *
“Cheeky bastard,” Andrew grumbled under his breath. He glared at Harley.
He kept one servant and that one reluctantly.
Andrew knew Harley to be strong, capable, and loyal, but the man didn't know his place. Harley did what he pleased. In the three weeks since the hellish procedure in Peabody’s surgery, Harley became a miracle worker as well. "Cheeky bastard," Andrew repeated.
Peabody deemed Andrew’s own house, with its bedroom above stairs, inadequate for recuperation, so Harley found rented space on the first level of a private home very close to Magdalene College and, more importantly, Peabody’s premises.
Peabody ordered round-the-clock care for several days, so Harley found two excellent women and a kindly lad to help him.
Since boredom threatened to make Mallet unbearable, Harley brought reading matter but was unable to explain how he found books and journals so well suited to Mallet’s interests.
When he was not eating well, improved food and tempting dishes appeared. When he wished for fruit, there were oranges in winter from someone’s succession houses.
Andrew confronted him only once. “You can’t expect me to believe that you’ve done all this yourself, and in our budget.”
Harley did his best to look affronted.
“You were given explicit orders not to accept help from the Marquess of Glenaire.”
Harley swore convincingly. “Never spoke to the Marquess. I know my orders.”
Andrew could think of no other explanation. Damn Richard for corrupting my servant. Powerless in his weakness, he let it drop.
Andrew endured the regime for two weeks before he exploded during Mr. Peabody’s daily visit. “You can’t expect me to get better here. Let me at least take to my own bed.”
It took another week and Andrew’s promise to stay in bed to convince Mr. Peabody to move him.
“You don’t need me every day. Healing nicely. Stay down until I tell you and you can go.”
Harley arrived with a well-sprung carriage, its plush interior converted to an ingeniously constructed bed. Andrew sunk into the mattress without questioning the source of his miraculous conveyance.
He endured a blessedly brief, if not pain-free, journey home. The carriage bounced down the cobbles of Little Saint Mary’s Lane and rattled to a welcome stop.
“You may tell Glenaire that we used his damned help well at least,” Andrew spat at Harley when he yanked open the door.
“Told you, I never took help from the Marquess, just like you ordered.” Harley spoke while he unbuckled the pallet, avoiding his master’s eyes.
Questions that sprang to Andrew’s lips died in discomfort and confusion when two young men reached in to lift his pallet out. They handed him down, turned, and carried him head first through the narrow door to his house.
A bustle of activity greeted him. Strange servants carried linen and porcelain jars up the stairs. Noises and the delicious smell of food baking emanated from his kitchen. “Harley, he growled, “Who—” A woman walked toward him from the kitchen.
“Bloody hell,” he swore.
“Quite,” the woman said. Lady Georgiana stared back at him, assessing his condition.
Her eyes slid over his face and down his chest. They rendered him incapable of breath or speech. He could only gape at her eyes, her stunning body, and the expression on her strong, intelligent face.
She leaned over to examine the dressings on his leg.
“Damn!” He pulled at the sheet and belatedly covered his lower body. He felt pale, weak, and disheveled with travel. He hated being seen like that.
Her eyes returned to his, but she didn’t speak. He spared her the trouble. “Have you applied some new cosmetic to your nose, my lady? White powder covers it.”
She put her hand to her face without breaking eye contact, puzzlement in her expressive eyes.
He began to laugh. “Now you’ve done it. Your cheeks are covered.” She looked down at her hands and smiled.
“Flour. I didn’t know flour was so difficult to manage.”
“What is Lady Georgiana Hayden doing with flour in my kitchen?”
“Tarts. Raspberry. I couldn’t risk losing the best French chef in Cambridgeshire by ordering him to your little kitchen. I came myself.”
He could only laugh.
“Do you think I’m not capable?” She stretched her shoulders upward in outrage.
“Oh, I believe you’re capable of a great many things.” Pain returned and fogged his sight. He shut his eyes in resignation. “Now remove yourself and your little army from my house.”
A sharp command sounded, and he felt himself lifted to the stairs. A voice at his side broke through his discomfort.
“Told you I weren’t taking help from the Marquess.”
* * *
Andrew never looked so vulnerable or so pale. He had never looked lovelier to her. When he laughed at her, the sound of it resonated inside her; the sensation created a flicker of warmth.
When he looked at her, she melted inside and the warmth began to spread throughout her body. His eyes said more than most men’s words, at least they did to her. He was tired. He hated being carried. He didn’t want to see her, and he particularly hated having her see him as an invalid.
Georgiana took a moment to realize their conversation exhausted the last of his energy. She vented her frustration with herself on the servants, barking orders to get Mr. Mallet above stairs to his rest.
Before she could move, his long-fingered hand gripped hers and brought her to a sudden, silent stop. She couldn’t have spoken to save her life. His melodic baritone voice, whispered through cracked lips, broke into her hypnotic state. “Go home, Georgiana. Leave me.”
Deflated, she stood back and watched her servants lift and carry him, grim-faced, step by step. Harley spoke to him, something impudent no doubt, but Andrew made no reply.