Chapter 22
ANNABEL WAS LODGED BETWEEN A ROCK AND A HARD PLACE.
IF Cassie wasn’t well enough to leave by tomorrow breakfast, the Lackingtons would out them as the imposters they were, and all hope of any future, for any of them, would be dashed, if they weren’t cast out altogether.
That was the rock, but the hard place was the soft thing inside Annabel that swelled whenever D’Evercy was near.
The plan to not feel her feelings crumbled every time.
Harriet had been right about one thing: The man was a paragon of virtue, male beauty and strength, kindness, and concern.
The reassuring timbre of his voice, the way he tipped his chin when he listened, his sometimes stillness—a thoughtful, faraway look—even the simplest gestures did her in without fail.
Both Lackingtons, mother and daughter, could smell her desire; Annabel knew it.
She didn’t doubt their determination to bring them all to ruin because of it. It was up to her to save them.
She retreated from breakfast to wash her face and fix her hair best she could while she tried to think what to do.
D’Evercy, apparently, had taken it upon himself to have a dress sent to her room—a very low-cut silk robe à l’anglaise with tiny green flowers—and a light lace shawl to go with it, along with a note—Apologies that this is somewhat out of fashion.
It was part of my mother’s trousseau, from Paris, when she was as young as you, and newly married.
That’s why he had all these beautiful clothes.
She was glad she hadn’t doubted him, but it only made her long for him more when she ought to be plotting their escape from Mrs. Lackington’s clutches.
Annabel was grateful for the change of dress, which fit her exactly.
A commotion at the front of the house drew her to the bedroom window, with a view of the Gidding-Wedmore’s carriage rolling away down the long drive.
Harriet and her mother, below, were being chased to their own waiting carriage by the small terrier who’d stolen her shoe, now yapping and nipping at their skirts.
“I doubt Alice will give us any trouble,” Mrs. Lackington said.
“Alice likes nothing better than to talk. And talk she will,” Harriet added.
Mrs. Lackington finally gave the yipping dog a swift kick and harrumphed as it whimpered away. Annabel winced, feeling the kick herself. But who were they talking about? She couldn’t recall meeting an Alice.
“I’ve had quite enough of these Americans,” said Mrs. Lackington, looking back at the house. “Especially the younger Miss Blake.”
“To think I gave her a Hepplewhite,” said Harriet.
“Oh, when Ellesmere is ours, we shall have all the Hepplewhites one needs.”
When they were handed into their carriage, Annabel rushed to open her door, where she found Billy, about to knock.
“Billy!” she said. “Who is Alice?”
“Mary is.”
“What?” said Annabel, now in full panic. “Mary is Alice?”
“And before that she was a Betsy! Or was she Alice first? Anyway, everyone just changes her name whenever they want.”
“Well, the Lackingtons are on their way now, no doubt to get Mary-Betsy-Alice to tell them everything!”
“We have to try to stop them!” he said.
It wasn’t like Billy to panic, but he seemed to feel the gravity of their situation. “Maybe I can still find James. He didn’t seem in a hurry to go.”
Annabel agreed it was their only hope of heading off the Lackingtons before they reached Kidlington. Maybe James would know a shorter way. Billy was game to try and hurried off.
Meanwhile, Annabel would do her best to avoid D’Evercy, not add fuel to her own fire.
At least he had “other matters to attend to” for the day; it wouldn’t be hard to keep her distance.
She wanted to hew to her sister’s side anyway, in hopes of seeing some improvement, so she could convey the urgency of their leaving.
Cassie was stuffy and miserable, had no appetite, slept fitfully, her cheeks rosy and warm.
D’Evercy had a servant send up warm compresses and an inhalation of steaming water with thyme and mint, but nothing eased her discomfort.
Annabel took lunch in Cassie’s room but didn’t eat. Tried to work on her chapter but couldn’t find the words. There was a letter from Warnaby asking after Cassie, but she didn’t know what to write back. Lieutenant Revell, she was told, paid a visit but had been sent away.
When Cassie fell into a snoring sleep in the late afternoon, Annabel draped the lace shawl around her shoulders and slipped out for a walk on the grounds—thirty-three acres of the most beautiful parkland and gardens, an apple orchard, a small stone parish church, a guest house, an old stable.
She needed the air, and how fresh it was against her skin.
It was the first time she could breathe freely since they’d arrived at Ellesmere, a fleeting sense that no one could hurt her here, away from time, from people, only nature to keep her company—nature, which didn’t care who she happened to be, what year it was, or who was asking.
When she passed back by the stable, she stopped to stroke the nose of an old gray horse in an outer pen but, hearing a commotion inside, couldn’t help peering in.
A very pregnant mare was lying on her side, in distress, her breathing rapid and shallow.
The mare whinnied weakly and squealed, flagging her tail.
A groom and three stable hands gathered around, tense, watching D’Evercy on his knees, his hands fast on her womb.
“The foal’s breach. We’ve got to turn it right away, or we’ll lose them both.”
His voice was calm, but the others sprang to action: water, rags, some crude version of forceps, she supposed, with a set of handles and straps.
D’Evercy turned the sleeves of his white shirt tight to his elbows, taking charge of the delivery himself.
But then he did the most remarkable thing.
He walked around and kneeled to the ground by the mare’s head.
Her eyes were wide and scared, her neck and flanks sweating.
Annabel couldn’t hear what he said to her, but he stroked her head while he spoke.
The mare softened to his touch; her tail stopped twitching.
He stayed there until it seemed he’d earned her trust. The rest was all doing, his hands carefully reaching inside her, finding the legs of the foal in the birth canal, coaxing them gently to the right position.
The mare groaned but didn’t protest; he talked to her all the way through.
And then, finally, the spill of the new foal onto the spread of hay.
D’Evercy’s relief was palpable, but so was his joy.
“We’ve got a girl!” he said. “What a fine job you’ve done, Daisy. Fine job.”
When he finally surrendered the rest of the work to his groom, a stable hand poured water from a bucket onto his hands and gave him a clean rag to wipe them.
There was blood on his shirt, but he rolled down his sleeves and fastened them quick at his wrists, same as if he was dressing for the day, put his light coat on over it.
The atmosphere was congratulatory and contagious.
He shook hands and thanked each of them by name.
Annabel had to look away. The scene touched her, took her deeper into knowing him, which was exactly what she’d wanted to avoid.
With no awareness of her presence, he had showed her who he was in the world and with the world, without pretense of any kind.
The tenderness he showed Daisy in her distress, the steady calm in a crisis, the gratitude he showed the other men.
He wasn’t too good to be true, he was better than she’d ever dared dream.
She started back to the house, walking fast, then picked up her skirts and ran, tears trailing down her cheeks all the way.
Annabel stopped to wipe her eyes before she opened the door of her sister’s bedroom.
She wanted to hide her heartache, but it didn’t matter.
Cassie was burning up. Her hair was stringy and wet across the pillow; she’d soaked through her nightgown.
She moaned, tossed and turned, talked in her sleep.
Annabel threw off her shawl and asked for a change of clothes and bed linens for Cassie, a bowl of ice water, and a cloth to press against her forehead.
Maybe she’d made a mistake refusing a doctor.
No one dies of a trifling cold, she’d said, but of course people died all the time in this world, of everything.
She moved her chair close to Cassie’s bedside and watched her labored breathing.
How she wished they were back home in their own childhood bedrooms—that she’d never come at all.
Cassie wouldn’t have followed her here, to Kidlington, nor Billy.
She never would have met D’Evercy, been so undone by him.
She wouldn’t even know he was possible. None of them would be here, in this intractable mess they were in.
Cassie was right, it wasn’t a comedy at all.
***
Annabel refused dinner with a note to Henry explaining that Cassandra had taken a turn for the worse and she wanted to keep watch through the night.
A servant brought her some food on a tray.
There was a single-stem vase with a damask rose and a note back from him expressing his worry and his willingness to call for a doctor at any time—whatever she thought necessary.