Chapter 19
The doctor had left shortly before midnight.
Madeline spent several hours after that in the nursery, cradling Adam and soothing him to sleep.
The baby had fallen asleep about an hour before.
His fever was gone, and his breathing seemed more ordinary.
There was still a rasp in his lungs, but it was nothing compared to what it had been, and Joan was confident that it would ease up with time.
“You should get some rest, Your Grace,” Joan murmured, slipping into the nursery with a pile of folded linens under one arm and a cup of tea in the other. “Let me take the baby until morning.”
Madeline wavered. “I should stay with him.”
Joan tutted, collecting the sleeping Adam from her arms. “You look as though you’re about to fall asleep yourself.
Now, the maids have long since cleaned your washroom, and I asked them to refill your bath with plenty of hot water and some lavender to soothe you.
It should be ready just about now, so why don’t you take yourself down there and relax before bed, hmm? ”
Madeline opened her mouth to argue, but found that she was too tired.
“You’re right,” she said at last, shaking her head. “I am so exhausted. I had better rest. Thank you, Joan.”
“It’s no trouble,” Joan responded with a smile, settling herself in the rocking chair, which they had dragged out of the washroom and carefully dried off. “You deserve to rest, Your Grace.”
Madeline pressed a light kiss to Adam’s sleeping forehead and slipped out of the nursery.
As she made her way to her room, she felt exhaustion slowly settle over her. Her limbs grew heavy, as if she were being pulled down toward the ground, and her eyelids seemed to be weighed down.
Her room was empty, and one of the maids was pouring the last bucket of hot water into the bath, smothering a yawn. She flashed a tired smile at Madeline.
“Your bath is just finished, Your Grace,” she said. “Shall I stay up to help you undress and get into your night things?”
“No, no, of course not,” Madeline responded. “It’s far too late. You must be tired. Did you stay up late simply to draw my bath?”
The maid flushed and nodded. “I don’t mind staying up, Your Grace.”
“Well, you mustn’t. Go to bed, and be sure to tell the housekeeper that you and any other of the maids who stayed up to fetch my bath should be allowed a long rest in the morning, is that clear?”
The maid brightened. “Thank you, Your Grace!”
The girl scampered off happily, and Madeline began to strip down for her bath.
She was grateful that she wore a gown she could get out of herself.
Some of her gowns, particularly her new ones, were laced or buttoned up at the back in such a way that she could not get in or out of them without assistance.
She left her clothes crumpled carelessly on the bedroom floor, a trail leading all the way to the washroom.
The steam was mostly gone from the washroom now, although the floor was still slick in places.
Madeline eyed the tub, full to the brim with hot, opaque water.
It smelled deliciously of lavender. She breathed deeply, closing her eyes.
After a moment, she slid out of her shift, the last layer of fabric covering her.
At once, goosebumps broke over her skin, but she stepped hastily into the bath, sliding down into the water.
It was delightful. The hot water was like silk on her skin, covering her up to her chin. Madeline closed her eyes, luxuriating. Steam coiled up from the water, and when she absently lifted her arm above the water, watching drops roll down her wrist, steam rose from her arm, too.
She breathed in and out, closing her eyes and shifting lower into the water. She could hear the thumping of her own blood in her ears, a soothing rhythm. She let her mind wander for the first time in what seemed like forever.
Adam would not die. She hadn’t let her friend down just yet.
But now, of course, all of this was about so much more than her promise to Betty.
Adam was his own little being; this tiny baby who relied so heavily on those around him.
He had wriggled his way into Madeline’s heart and stayed there.
If anything happened to him, she knew she wouldn’t simply be upset for the sake of his mother.
She’d be heartbroken, destroyed. She’d never recover.
That was a worrying thought.
I suppose all parents feel this way. Raising a child is stressful. We are always afraid that something will go wrong. But now, something has gone wrong, but it doesn’t matter. We managed it. Adam is safe. I am not a terrible guardian.
Whatever comes in the future, I am feeling more certain than ever that I can manage it.
She’d heard it said before that when it came to raising children, nobody ever really knew what they were doing. They figured it out as they went.
If other people can do it, why not me?
She smiled to herself as this thought swirled around her head. Already, Madeline was doing much better than she once had imagined. She could do this.
This being, of course, any number of things; raising Adam, enduring the gossip and stares of Society, and continuing to be married to a man who made her feel more strange than she could ever have imagined.
Madeline sank lower in the bathwater, almost up to her nose. She pressed her knees together, frowning.
Tristan was a mystery. Her own feelings for him were mysterious.
No, that’s not quite true, is it? I know exactly how I feel about him. I only worry that I should not be feeling that way.
“Heavens, what a mess. Don’t you ever fold your clothes, duchess?”
Madeline’s eyes flew open. She flinched involuntarily, sending a wave of bathwater streaming over the side of the bath.
There, standing in the doorway with her shift clutched in his hands, was Tristan. His smile widened wolfishly.
“I do apologize, I didn’t mean to give you such a start,” he drawled, tossing her shift to the side.
Madeline choked on her own bathwater.
“I thought you had gone to bed!” she managed.
He lifted an eyebrow. “You have not gone to bed. Why should I?”
It seemed wise to change tack. Horribly aware that she was, in fact, naked underneath her bathrobe, Madeline narrowed her eyes at him.
“Why are you here? You had better leave at once.”
He grinned, making no move at all to do so.
“I came to talk to you about Adam. I did knock. At the door to your bedroom, at least,” he added.
“And hearing no response, you chose to walk in, I suppose,” Madeline snapped. “And then wandered into my washroom, of all places. If you want to talk, you will have to wait until I am dressed. I certainly hope nobody saw you enter.”
He tutted. “Nobody is to see me enter your room? My dear duchess, we can’t have them all thinking I haven’t done my duty to you.”
“Hand me that drying sheet, and step out of the room at once while I dry off!” Madeline insisted.
He complied, chuckling, and handed her a drying sheet, which she extended one wet hand to take.
Of course, she made no attempt to get out of the bathwater until the wretched fellow had stepped out of the washroom.
He did not, she noticed to her chagrin, close the door; instead, he simply moved around behind the wall.
He did not appear to be peeping, though, so Madeline got up quickly, wrapping the drying sheet around herself.
Her hair was wet only at the ends, where it had dangled in the water, and she was soon reasonably dry.
That was when the second problem presented itself.
She had not brought a nightdress or robe into the washroom. Had she been alone when this happened, she would have hurried into her room, clothed in the drying sheet, but of course, this was no longer an option. Swallowing hard, she cleared her throat.
“Ahem. Tristan, I…”
She trailed off when his arm appeared in the doorway, holding a flowered robe.
“I thought you might require this, duchess,” he said, sounding as though he was trying not to laugh.
Madeline let out a ragged breath. “Thank you.”
She hurried over and tried to take the robe from his grasp. He hung on and appeared in the doorway. She flinched, backed away, and made sure that the sheet was firmly wrapped around herself.
“I will help you into this,” Tristan said firmly.
Madeline pressed her lips together. “No, thank you.”
“I can hardly insist, but think of it this way—it will be a test of your trust in me.”
Her eyebrows flew up. “Trust?”
“Exactly so. You do not trust me, my dear. So, I will close my eyes, you will divest yourself of the drying sheet, and slide your arms into this robe. I will not open my eyes until you are covered again, and then you will know that when I give you my word, it can be trusted.”
“How am I to know that you won’t simply open your eyes when my back is turned?”
Tristan pointed to a long mirror, half-steamed up, sitting in the corner of the washroom. “Well, you may watch me, if you like.”
“What if I refuse?”
He chuckled. “I am not going to tear away your covering and ravish you. I might be a devil, but I’m hardly a monster.
You can command me to go, and I will have to do just that.
But wouldn’t it be better to finally have a little trust between us?
You will know that I can be trusted, and I will know that you are willing to trust me.
We will both win. Well? What do you say? ”
There was a long silence before Madeline responded. She stared up at Tristan, trying to read his face.
The sensible answer, of course, was no. The obvious solution here was to politely but firmly request that he leave her room and not enter it again without her express consent.
What Madeline actually said, however, was, “Yes.”
Tristan blinked, and just for an instant, she thought that he seemed surprised.
“Well, go on, then,” she managed. “Close your eyes. And you had better not look.”