Chapter 5
CAPTAIN JOHN CALDER
It hurt to open my eyes.
I tried it experimentally and then thought better of it.
The rain had stopped. Or was I inside somewhere? Had Scout made it to a village? I tested my limbs. They were shaky and weak, and my arms and back were bare and pressed against a hard stone floor.
I forced myself to crack open one eye. I was in a small, empty room.
Warmth came from a fireplace only a few feet to my left, even though most of the fire had gone out.
Light shone through the window in front of me and I winced.
How far had I made it? This wasn’t Applewood.
I hadn’t made it home. The distance would have been impossible in that storm.
I must have found a place during the fevered stage of my relapse. Thank the heavens.
Had I taken care of Scout? Was he still saddled and sore? I forced my head up and turned to look for a door, and I found it.
But that was not all.
Sitting on the ground with her legs folded into her body and her arms wrapped around her legs was a young woman in a white nightdress. Her dark hair was loose, tumbling down her shoulders to her waist. Her eyes—gray as the sky through the window—were fixed on mine, but she said nothing.
I squeezed my eyes shut, thinking she had to be an apparition, a leftover vision from my episode, but when I opened them, she was still there, clothed in white like an angel. I was alive, wasn’t I? People who died couldn’t be this thirsty and weak.
She inspected me thoroughly, perhaps even more thoroughly than I was inspecting her. Had she just stumbled upon me in the cottage? In those clothes? Certainly not.
What was this young lady doing here alone?
The shelter was bare, with nothing to indicate she or anyone else lived here.
There wasn’t even a door in the frame. Perhaps she lived at a farm nearby?
Had I been found and cared for by a young farmer’s daughter?
And if so, where the devil were her clothes?
I glanced around again, certain someone else must be here as well, perhaps outside, when I saw both a dress, a fine one it seemed, and my coat, shirt, waistcoat, and overcoat spread out behind me near the fire.
What the devil had happened?
I closed my eyes again, this time with a groan.
My head was hurting too much to solve this riddle.
But unconsciousness didn’t overtake me, and so I opened my eyes once again, this time examining the fabric resting atop my chest. It wasn’t a blanket, but had the ties and shape of a dressing gown.
I swallowed hard, even though it made my throat scream for water.
This was her dressing gown. And the deep green velvet was quality.
It wasn’t the dressing gown of a milkmaid or a farmer’s daughter.
“Are you awake?” the young woman asked, as if she wasn’t certain. “Truly awake?”
I took a slow, steady breath. She watched the motion with those stormy eyes of hers. I’d never had a woman look at me with such bold and undisguised interest. I nodded.
“Do you know where you are?”
“No,” I managed.
“We are in an abandoned shepherd’s croft. Perhaps five miles east of Alexandria.”
“Scout?” Had I really left him outside without caring for him at all?
“Your horse?”
I nodded, and the movement felt so wrong, so casual when I was not only wearing her clothing but lying down while speaking to her.
A storm of emotions ran through me. I should be standing, I should be properly clothed—how had I become improperly clothed in the first place?
The longer I stayed awake, the worse my situation seemed.
I was alive, and no longer fevered, but at what cost?
And specifically, at what cost to the young lady sitting across the room from me?
“I checked on him before dawn, after the worst of your fever subsided. He wasn’t tethered, but you’d somehow managed to remove his saddle before stumbling into the croft. He is safe and well.”
“I must owe you a debt of gratitude.” Her dressing gown was dusty and even caked in mud in a few places. I’d had enough bouts with the Walcheren strain of the ague to know I had terrible fits when going through the hot stage. “And perhaps a dressing gown.”
She wrinkled her nose, and it was such a decidedly unangelic gesture, I wanted to shake my head to clear it. Who was she?
“I think it would be wise for us to not consider debts. It is bad enough that the two of us spent the night alone together. I don’t think buying me a dressing gown would improve our situation. Especially not with your wife.”
My wife? I blinked hard. How long had I blacked out? I didn’t have a wife. I hoped to have one soon, but I highly doubted I’d managed to marry Harriet while in the throes of fever.
“True,” I answered carefully.
She looked so small, huddled into the corner like that.
She was probably freezing without her dressing gown and yet I couldn’t give it to her—I didn’t even have a shirt on.
Of course, she was probably the one who had removed it in the first place.
I grimaced. Or had I managed that on my own as I had Scout’s saddle? I dared not ask.
“But perhaps I can ease your mind on one small point. I don’t have a wife, so you need not worry about that.”
She straightened against the wall and her gaze snapped to mine. “You don’t have a wife?”
I shook my head. It was a mistake. It still hurt like the devil.
“Not yet.”
“But you . . . ” She trailed off. What had I done to make her think I was married? My face grew hot. I must have said something in my delirium. It wouldn’t be the first time. Lieutenant Brookhouse had witnessed that embarrassment more than once when I’d first come down with the fever.
My mouth burned with thirst, and my thoughts were so muddled it was as though I was still living in that blasted storm. But I didn’t feel capable of asking her for any more help, not even for my clothes.
“My father will be here soon. He, my mother and brother spent the night in our carriage when the road became unpassable.”
Definitely not a farmer’s daughter then.
And her father would be here at any moment.
I needed my clothes and I needed to leave as soon as possible.
Otherwise the two of us would be caught in a very compromising situation—one that, from the looks of the way she huddled so far from me, she would not want to be caught in.
I was going to need to ask for my clothes after all.
“I am weak, but as soon as I have my clothing, I can ride out. The rain has stopped.”
Her eyes widened. “You mean to leave? Now?”
Did she want me to stay? When she was expecting her father?
It would mean a marriage. It should mean a marriage.
Was she so desperate she would tie herself to a man she barely knew?
She couldn’t be. Her nightgown was dirtied and her hair tousled and unkempt, but she was a beauty, regardless.
With a carriage and such fine clothing, marriage to a stranger she knew nothing about wouldn’t be appealing.
Not to mention she thought I was married only a moment ago.
But after caring for me all night, it would be her due if she asked for it. “Nothing good could come from me staying. If your father finds us together, I will have no choice but to offer for your hand.”
She shook her head violently. “That would never happen.” Horror put a grimace on her face.
It was, of course, a good reaction, all things considered.
I was practically engaged to another and Harriet had been the most patient of saints while I worked my way up into a position where I could afford to restore Applewood and bring home a wife.
But still, a reaction like that wasn’t good for a man’s confidence.
“Then I should leave.”
She shook her head again. “You don’t know my father. He is reasonable and you did nothing untoward . . . ”
Nothing untoward? We spent the night together. Was she being purposely obtuse? “What I did or didn’t do has no bearing on our situation. If found together like this, it will be a scandal of epic proportions.”
“Caring for the sick is a Christian duty, is it not? He will understand and you are too ill to saddle your horse, let alone ride him.” She lifted her hands in exasperation, and that was the moment I saw the gun.
This woman—whom I’d first assumed was an angel, then a farmer’s daughter, and now a lady of some rank—was holding a pistol in her right hand and was so comfortable with it she could use it for emphasis while speaking, all while keeping it expertly trained on the floor.
Once again, who exactly had come to my rescue?
I made certain her dressing gown was secure around my shoulders and pushed myself up.
The room swam, and the young lady leaned forward as if she was prepared to dash across the room and catch me if I fell.
Thankfully, my vision settled and her services weren’t needed.
She and her gun and her lack of dressing gown could stay safely across the room.
“I think our best course of action is for me to leave. I will marry you if that is what you want, but if not—”
“I don’t want to marry you, but . . . ” She threw her hands down in exasperation, still being careful with the barrel of the pistol.
Her gaze sharpened, and she looked, while still beautiful, slightly dangerous—or rather, even more dangerous than she had since I first noticed the gun.
“I thought you were dying last night. I was certain of it. And now you think you are well enough to simply leave without more care?” Her eyes flashed with .
. . anger? “What if you die along the road?”
I straightened as well as I could under the circumstances. “I will not die. I’ve had a bout of the ague fever. It isn’t my first, and it probably won’t be my last. I will be weak today and will need to be dry and warm as soon as possible, but I will recover. I always have before.”