Chapter 6
Too Late to Turn Back.
Izzy let out a shaky breath. She had cleaned the wound and put a fresh poultice in place, but there was no way to ignore the truth.
Boreas had a fever. He had been asleep when she’d come up to the attic.
It was late and her father was not yet home, for which she was grateful.
Everyone else had gone to bed, and she had waited until the house was quiet, creeping down to the kitchen to prepare the poultice and back up the stairs to the attic.
She’d known he’d worsened just looking at him.
His skin was flushed, pain etching lines of fatigue over his face.
His breathing was steady, though she worried it was a little quicker than before.
If she had hoped to tend him while he slept, she’d been disappointed.
His eyes flicked open, glassy and fever bright but still aware of who she was and what was happening.
He said nothing the entire time she tended to him, enduring her poking and prodding stoically.
Izzy tied the bandage back in place, wishing her hands did not tremble.
With her fingers numb from cold, she fumbled the knot but finally it was done.
She rubbed her hands together for warmth, sitting back with a sigh.
Her back ached, along with her head, but she did not dare go to bed and leave him, too afraid to turn her back on him for a moment. It would be a long and anxious night.
Though he’d been flushed and sweating when she began cleaning the wound, his skin had a pale, greyish quality now. He shivered, gooseflesh prickling over his bare flesh.
Izzy moved quickly, tucking the blankets around him.
“Thank you,” he said, though his voice was thready, the strength and vitality she had been drawn to from the first diminishing as the fever took hold.
“You can thank me by getting better,” she said, wishing she didn’t sound so cross. She had not meant to sound cross, only she was terrified. What if she could not do this? What if he died, and it was all her fault?
“Don’t look so vexed, Miss Honey. None of this is your fault.”
His words were kindly meant, she knew, but she turned and glared at him.
“Not my fault? And what if I’m not up to the task of looking after you? What if my tender care sends you to your grave?”
Her voice cracked as she spoke, tears stinging her eyes, and she could not bear to look at him, but jolted as his large hand reached for hers and held on tight. The rings sparkled as she looked down at them, the warm gold pressing into her fingers.
“If I die, it will be because every choice I’ve ever made has led me to this moment. All you have done is try your best to save me, to keep me out of harm’s way. Besides, I’m not dead yet. The devil won’t have me,” he added, chuckling.
Izzy found this neither amusing nor comforting. “I should send for the doctor.”
His expression hardened at once, and his grip on her hand tightened. “No. Not unless you want to see me hang. Is that it? Have you had enough of playing nursemaid? Hiding a criminal is not the romantic adventure you thought it might be, eh? The reality is too grim, perhaps?”
Izzy gasped, horrified by the accusation.
Hurt, too, that he would think her so craven as to give up on him.
“No! How dare you say that to me! Why on earth would I bring you here, only to hand you over to the law, you great oaf? But I am frightened, frightened that I will let you down. I could n-not bear it if… if…”
Izzy clamped her mouth shut as her throat tightened, but it was too late.
She could not contain everything she felt a moment longer and burst into tears.
She hated crying in front of him, when she had so wished him to think her brave and capable, but she was too terrified that she was neither of those things, too afraid that she was a very long way out of her depth, and that she might just drown both of them.
Ben stared at her in horror. The poor child was crying as if her heart was broken.
“Dammit, don’t cry! Ah… hell. Miss Honey… sweetheart, don’t. I’m a bad-tempered brute and I ought never to have said such a thing. Forgive me. Stop that now.”
She didn’t stop and he let out a breath of frustration, regret a weight in his chest as he stared at the girl kneeling beside him, her head bowed into her hands, shoulders trembling with emotion as she sobbed, over him of all men.
He did not deserve her tears, and she had certainly not deserved his snide accusations. Guilt stabbed through him.
He tried to reach for her, but pain ripped through his side with such ferocity that he gasped for breath.
His muscles seized, the world tilting as a cold sweat broke over his skin.
He collapsed back against the pillows, trembling, every ounce of strength draining from him as though his bones were made of glass, liable to shatter at any moment.
The weakness was terrifying—unnatural—leaving him barely more substantial than smoke.
“Don’t move, you stupid man!”
Ben huffed out a laugh as the pain subsided, gazing up to see her staring down at him, her beautiful blue eyes wide with concern.
Well, at least she’d stopped crying. Carefully he reached up, mindful to use his uninjured side as he cupped her cheek.
“Forgive me, sweet Miss Honey. I’m a sorry fellow who doesn’t deserve your kindness. ”
She sniffed, smiling a little and pushing her glasses back up her nose.
Her hand covered his, and she closed her eyes.
Ben started at the gesture, at the tenderness of it.
If he pretended, he could believe she cared for him, that she knew him and loved him regardless of everything he was, everything he’d done.
She said nothing, and the moment was perfect, and she was so sweet it made his heart ache.
It must be nice to be worthy of such a woman’s regard, to have her think well of you. To love you.
“I think you do deserve it,” she said, her voice quiet as she opened her eyes, looking down at him with such a solemn expression he struggled to hold her gaze, for he knew she was wrong.
“And I know the pain is very bad. I can hardly blame you for being out of temper. I shan’t call the doctor in, I promise.
But if things… if I don’t know what else to do, I might need to ask Mrs Mabbs—”
Ben shook his head, determined she heed his warning.
It was fatal to trust other people. He ought never to have trusted her, not because she was unworthy of it, but because he had put her in a terrible position.
He feared what would happen to her if he died, but the reverend would know what to do.
“The fewer people who know, the better. If the worst happens, you will only tell your father. No one else.”
She opened her mouth to protest, but he pressed a finger to her lips.
“That’s what I want. Now, you listen to me.
If anything should happen, if I’m discovered while I’m out of my head or…
or if I turn up my toes, you’re to say that I forced you to hide me.
Do you understand? I came to the vicarage, and you answered the door to me.
I held a gun on you and made you give me shelter. ”
A stubborn expression settled over her lovely face, a mutinous set to her jaw. Oh, she was no pushover, his Miss Honey.
He glowered at her. “I mean it. You’ll do as I say.”
She pursed her lips, considering. “No. I won’t. So, if you want to ensure that I don’t suffer for helping you, I suggest you get well quickly.”
Ben growled with frustration, but he didn’t have the energy to argue as exhaustion swept over him. He closed his eyes as the shivering began again. Perhaps he would just have a little nap, just a few minutes, and then he would tell Miss Honey precisely why she ought to do as he said.
The Vicarage, Little Valentine, 23rd January 1816
“Miss Izzy, have you heard a word I’ve said?”
Izzy jolted, almost upsetting the teacup she was holding as she dragged her thoughts from the attic and the man who lay up there, fighting for his life.
It had been a bad night, and she’d not dared to leave him.
She had changed the dressing on the wound every couple of hours, bathing it and praying to see some improvement.
He slept, but not peacefully, restless as his body swerved between fever that she feared might set fire to his skin, and bone-deep chills that racked him so hard his teeth chattered.
Barely sleeping herself, Izzy felt like she walked through a daze, an odd sense of unreality to her usual day, the effort of eating breakfast was quite beyond her. Now, she fixed her gaze on Mrs Mabbs, aware that the woman was awaiting some response.
“I beg your pardon, Mrs Mabbs, I was woolgathering.”
“And no wonder. You’re not sleeping, are you? Look at those dark circles under your eyes. You’re worn to a thread, and I know why. I know exactly what you’ve been up to, my girl, and don’t try to deny it.”
Izzy’s heart kicked in her chest as she gazed at the children’s nanny.
She had thought her father the only one perspicacious enough to see through her, but he had barely been home of late.
Thomas Bevin, a local farmer, had been taken ill and was not expected to live.
The family were in disarray, and the reverend had been spending his days with them, away from home in the early morning until long after Izzy usually went to bed.
An ill wind, she thought wryly, realising Caspar and little Daisy were watching the exchange between her and Mrs Mabbs silently, Caspar no doubt enjoying someone other than him getting a scold. Well, she had best face it.
“Y-You do?” Izzy asked, meeting the woman’s eyes. She wondered how on earth Mrs Mabbs knew she had a smuggler hidden in the rafters.