by Sheila Walsh
She stood for a long time ‒ or so it seemed ‒ looking out across the herb gardens which ran along the side of the house. Here there was only moonlight and the mingled perfumes that rose with pungent sweetness on the air. She drank them in greedily, and they acted like balm, stilling her disordered senses. Midsummer madness ‒ was that all it was? Combined of the magic and the moment? She had certainly never felt that way before. Her fingers stole to her face as she remembered how shamefully she had abandoned herself ‒ whatever must Benedict have thought? How could she face him again?
A sound penetrated her agonised reflections. As she listened, it came again from somewhere close by in the shadows at the corner of the building ‒ half cough, half groan, and in spite of there being so many people close at hand, Theo found the hairs on her neck lifting.
‘Who is there?’ she said in a soft calm voice, mastering an urge to flee.
There was a moment of skin-crawling, breath-holding silence, followed by a despairing sob.
‘Cousin Theo! Can it indeed … be you?’
‘Aubrey!’ She ran swiftly to where the shadows concealed a deeper shadow ‒ one that shivered with faint movement.
A hand, trembling violently, came out to touch her. ‘It is you …’ he sighed. ‘I’m … not raving.’
Theo caught him as he half-fell towards her, a gasp of pain wrung from him.
‘Oh, my poor boy ‒ you need help!’
‘No!’ He ground the word out. ‘You know … what will happen!’
‘But I can’t just do nothing!’
Aubrey’s teeth were chattering, though the night was still warm, and she saw that one shoulder was stiffly held. ‘See ‒ put your good arm round my neck so that I can support you.’ Slim as he was, he was almost a dead weight as they staggered upright. ‘Can you walk a little way, do you think?’ she urged. ‘Manage a few steps?’
‘I’ll try,’ he muttered through his teeth.
‘There is a small pagoda just below here,’ she explained. ‘If you can make it as far as that, at least you will be under cover while I consider what to do next!’
Theo saw that the mask he had used in the holdup was still hanging about his neck. She managed to work it back up into place.
‘There! Now, if anyone sees us, we are but a couple of revellers under the influence of a little too much wine!’ She tried a few experimental steps and was much encouraged. ‘Perhaps we might even contrive to sing a little. Do you know “Cherry Ripe”?’
Aubrey sank his head on to her shoulder. ‘Oh, Cousin Theo … I did so hope that I should find you!’ he sobbed, and it was like the cry of a lost child.
‘Well, now you have,’ she said in a matter-of-fact voice, swallowing the lump in her throat. ‘Come along now … together ‒ “Cherry ripe, cherry ripe ‒ r-ipe …” ’
They staggered along the terrace, Aubrey’s voice little more than a croak, and half-fell down the steps. ‘Whoops!’ she exclaimed, laughing as they almost bumped into a couple coming the other way. They laughed in return.
‘Only a minute more and we are there,’ she urged, for Aubrey was growing so heavy that she feared he must be losing consciousness. ‘Don’t ‒ oh, please don’t faint!’
Somehow she got him inside the pagoda, then paused, out of breath, to take a look round. The light from the garden illuminated the interior, picking out the little bamboo sofas and chairs and spindly tables ‒ and towards the far corner a delicately worked bamboo screen. After a moment’s consideration, this was where she made for, and as she lowered Aubrey to the ground, he slumped against the wall in a most alarming fashion. She looked closer and saw that his eyes were still open, though barely focusing.
‘They … left me …’ he was muttering in a puzzled way. ‘Wouldn’t wait. I … didn’t know what to … where to go … followed the way you’d gone …’
‘Don’t try to talk! All that isn’t important now.’ Theo bent close. ‘Listen, Aubrey ‒ I have to leave you for a few minutes.’
His head lifted. ‘Mama ain’t here?’
‘No,’ she said, troubled. ‘No, I’m afraid not.’
‘Good. Don’t … want her to know … go all to pieces!’
‘Yes,’ Theo agreed, surprised by his perspicacity. ‘But hush now!’ She put a hand over his mouth. ‘I mean to see if I can find some brandy, and something with which to bind up your shoulder. Listen ‒ it’s just possible that someone may come in, so I shall put this screen around you. But you must be very quiet! Do you hear me?’
‘Very quiet …’ He slurred the words, and she could only hope that he understood.
She arranged the bamboo screen, and after a last anxious look, turned and sped back across the lawns and into the house, making at once for the supper room, whence came the muted strains of the Pantheon Pipes hired for the entertainment of the supper guests. With any luck, the room might by now be thin of people.
‘Miss Radlett! There you are.’
It was Lord Alverton. Theo could have screamed with vexation.
‘I could not think where you had vanished to,’ he chided with a fond familiarity that sounded suddenly irksome. ‘The dancing is to begin again soon. I hope you will honour me with the first quadrille?’
‘Well, I’m not sure …’ Thankful for the concealment of the mask, she put a hand to her head as though she might thereby be granted divine inspiration.
He at once exclaimed in some distress: ‘My dear ma’am, you have injured yourself! No doubt you are feeling faint! Pray sit down!’
She looked, and saw with horror that her hand was liberally smeared with Aubrey’s blood. Oh, good God! What to do now ‒ what to say? She muttered something incoherent about having slipped.
But fortunately he was not interested in explanations for the present.
‘You must allow me to call someone ‒ Mrs Elliott. Yes, she will know just what to do ‒ where to procure bandages …’
Theo protested that it was not at all necessary … a mere scratch! A handkerchief would suffice.
He at once produced his own ‒ large, sensible and, he assured her, quite unused.
‘And a little brandy, perhaps? Do let me persuade you to take a little brandy? Ladies do not in general care for it, I know, but I do assure you that its effect can only be beneficial!’
Brandy was certainly one of the things she had come for, but if he should wish to stand over her while she drank it …?
‘Yes, brandy ‒ the very thing, Alverton. I should fetch it on the instant. My cousin is looking distinctly faint!’
It was Benedict, of course ‒ his sardonic voice calm, practical, immensely reassuring. Quite the old Benedict, in fact. Had he forgotten so soon what had happened in the garden? Perhaps for him what had happened was an everyday occurrence! She subdued a sudden sick feeling ‒ no time now to think of that ‒ no time to think of anything except Aubrey, and how best to help him.
As Lord Alverton hurried away, Benedict said urgently, ‘Right ‒ where do you have him hidden?’
She looked up, startled, her mind racing. Was he omniscient? If only she could be sure how he would act. What was it he’d said? If the boy plays dangerous games, he must take the consequences … but surely he couldn’t have meant … She tried to gauge his expression, cursing the stupid masks they wore. She said: ‘I don’t know what you mean.’
‘Yes, you do.’ His mouth curled. ‘You were seen, my dear ‒ in the dubious company of a drunken highwayman, singing bawdy songs!’
‘ “Cherry Ripe” isn’t bawdy!’ she protested, and knew she had given herself away.
Lord Alverton returned with the brandy and a large white napkin.
‘Splendid,’ said Benedict, taking them from him and putting one hand firmly under Theo’s arm, inexorably lifting her to her feet. ‘My thanks to you. I am taking my cousin outside. She is feeling a trifle faint ‒ the sight of blood, you know ‒ but with a breath of fresh air she will soon feel much more the thing. Come, Theo!’
�
��Oh, but I …’Alverton began, and found that he was talking to himself.
‘I am not squeamish!’ Theo protested as she was bundled willy-nilly out on to the terrace. ‘How dare you take such liberties!’
‘Would you sooner I had told the truth?’ Benedict said harshly. ‘That you are harbouring the man who robbed his family? Now then, quickly ‒ where is he?’
Theo hung back. ‘You won’t give him up to the law?’
‘You do have a charming opinion of me,’ he drawled, and she immediately wished the words unsaid.
‘I only thought …’ she began miserably. ‘But of course you wouldn’t do such a thing! I’m sorry.’
She led him quickly to the pagoda, and called softly to Aubrey. There was no reply. Benedict put the brandy and the napkin on a table and moved the screen aside. Aubrey lay slumped in a heap, motionless.
‘Oh, dear God!’ she whispered. ‘I shouldn’t have left him. Is he …?’
Benedict was already on his knees, feeling for a pulse. ‘It’s not too good, but I expect he’s lost a lot of blood. Look ‒ if I lift him up, can you get his coat off?’
Between them, the task was soon accomplished and the wound was exposed, still seeping blood steadily.
‘Devil take this poor light! I can’t tell whether the bullet is still in, but with any luck, it’s too high to have touched any fatal spot. Pass me that napkin and I’ll bind it up as best I can.’
Theo didn’t move at once. Unbidden, the memory of her father came back, the bullet lodged in a place where it could not be removed … the agony and heartbreak that had followed. Her head began to swim.
‘Theo!’ Benedict’s voice was like a whiplash. ‘Pull yourself together, for God’s sake! The napkin …’
‘Sorry.’ She stumbled to the table and passed him the cloth. ‘It was just … remembering …’
He uttered a soft curse. ‘You’d better drink the brandy yourself,’ he said tersely. ‘The boy has no use for it at present.’
‘I’m all right now,’ she insisted, but she took a sip just the same.
Benedict ripped the lining out of Aubrey’s coat to bind the napkin in place and stood up.
‘Look ‒ I’m going to get him into the curricle and drive back to London with him as quickly as possible. He’ll need a doctor.’
‘He doesn’t want Selina to know,’ Theo said quickly. ‘He’s afraid she’ll panic.’
‘I’d no idea the boy had so much sense,’ said Benedict approvingly. ‘I shall take him to my rooms for the present, until we see how things go. I doubt Selina will even miss him!’
‘I ought to come with you,’ Theo said distractedly. ‘He’ll get awfully shaken up.’
Benedict got to his feet. ‘Don’t cast aspersions on my driving, young lady!’ He took her face in his hands. ‘It’s your job to go back and join the merriment as though nothing had happened.’
‘Oh, but I couldn’t!’
‘Oh, but you must! And we don’t want to arouse any suspicion, so keep that hankerchief tied round your wrist, and I’ll get rid of this coat of Aubrey’s somewhere along the way.’ As she looked up at him uncertainly, he dropped a kiss lightly on her forehead. ‘You know I’m right, sweet coz. I shall not be missed, but you most certainly would be!’
Chapter Thirteen
It was now three days since the masquerade, and not a word from Benedict other than a brief enigmatic note from him on the first morning stating that their mutual friend had arrived safely and was in good hands.
Theo told herself repeatedly that if anything had gone wrong he would have contrived to let her know, but worry still overshadowed all she did, and her state of mind was not improved by a visit from Lord Alverton, who had refused to take her behaviour at the masquerade seriously and came to make a formal offer for her hand. It grieved her to reject him, the more so since she was aware that she had perhaps been guilty of encouraging his attentions more than she ought.
‘You have been looking decidedly peaky ever since that night in Richmond,’ said the Duchess, all unknowing, and eyeing her with a troubled frown. ‘Of course, there was that alarming business on the road ‒ Lord Shadley is determined that something shall be done about it, you know ‒ and indeed it was enough to set anyone’s nerves all on end.’ Her glance fell upon the bandage which Theo still wore on her wrist, more to conceal what was not there than what was. ‘You are sure that scratch is not paining you, my love?’
Theo, consumed with guilt, said hastily that it was not. But her grace’s somewhat ghoulish fears were not so easily lulled to rest.
‘I cannot help but wonder whether we should not have had Dr Baillie to look at it … one does occasionally hear of seemingly trivial injuries turning quite putrid, with the most dreadful consequences!’
‘My dear ma’am, there is no such danger in this case, I promise you!’ Theo exclaimed, not knowing where to look. ‘But, in truth, I am a trifle tired, and if you would not mind, I think I will not come with you to the musical soirée this evening.’
‘Very sensible, my love,’ approved the Duchess. ‘An early night will not come amiss. And you must recruit your strength for our own ball, which is not more than a week away!’
Theo had not expected that it would be so easy to dupe the Duchess, and guilt once more threatened, but the prospect of having a whole evening to herself quite lifted her spirits, which had suffered a reverse thanks to a letter that morning from her grandfather which had been full of splenetic utterances.
He had, he said, been obliged to suffer a visit from Beau ‒ driven from Town by the duns and expecting me to go bail for him, scrawled the crabby hand. But I vowed I’d not do so ever again, though almost anything is preferable to having him about the place like a damned parasite! There followed a whole string of querulous complaints so that she could almost see him sitting before her, shoulders hunched and head thrust aggressively forward. A feeling of homesickness overwhelmed her. This Frenchie you’re so taken up with ‒ sounds a deuced havey-cavey character! Got a damned unhealthy obsession with that necklace, seems to me ‒ can’t think what that great-nevvy of mine’s about, letting the fellow sit in your pocket, and so I shall tell him when I see him …
Oh well, she thought. At least I tried. The Comte would have to be told, but she didn’t feel like going out of her way to do so just now.
The doctor took his leave, and Benedict stood for a moment in frowning thought. The report had been satisfactory, more so than might have been hoped for, in fact ‒ but then Aubrey did have youth on his side, and once the bullet had been removed there had been no complications barring a little fever and the weakness caused by his loss of blood.
With the doctor’s parting words still fresh in his ears, Benedict concluded his meditation and walked briskly through to his dressing room, which had served as Aubrey’s bedroom for the past three days. His man, Robinson, was quietly clearing away the soiled dressings and scraps of lint left by the doctor, but at a nod he collected them together and left the room.
Benedict went across to the bed and looked down at the patient. Aubrey was lying propped against the pillows, his pallor rather more marked than usual as a result of the recent ministrations of the sawbones. And from the set of his mouth, he was probably in considerable discomfort, though he had more bottom than Benedict would ever have suspected.
‘Mauled you about a bit, did he?’ he asked sympathetically.
‘I shall do,’ came the terse, ungracious response.
Benedict smiled faintly and settled himself in the chair beside the bed, stretched out his legs, and folded his arms across his chest.‘
‘Of course you will. In fact, my boy, I’m told that you are making excellent progress.’
Aubrey eyed him warily. When Benedict used that smooth-tongued approach, it was usually a prelude to something damnably unpleasant.
‘I still feel weak as a cat, though,’ he muttered, hastily back-tracking.
‘Yes, well, that’s only to be expected.
But the doctor assured me that talking wouldn’t tire you too much.’
There was a palpable silence. Aubrey looked down at his hands until he could bear it no longer. He met Benedict’s eyes and found them not hostile, but quite implacable.
‘We do have to talk, you know.’
‘Yes. I daresay I haven’t … that is, I am aware that I owe you a great deal … my life, most probably …’
‘I am flattered that you should think it,’ drawled Benedict with extreme dryness. ‘But I fear my part has been a modest one. Theo and Sir James are due the greatest share ‒ Theo most of all, for without her prompt action you would most assuredly be dead by now, or in prison ‒ or both.’
Aubrey flushed. ‘Yes, well, I am grateful! I know that what happened … what I did must seem …’ He was groping for words.
‘Lunk-headed?’ suggested Benedict succinctly. His voice hardened. ‘Or criminally stupid?’
‘It wasn’t meant to be!’ said the boy miserably. ‘We just thought it would b-be a bit of a lark … like boxing the watch, you know … p-pick on a lone coach, relieve the revellers of their jewels. It d-didn’t seem like stealing … they said we’d return the booty later …’
‘How very magnanimous of you! What a pity your victims weren’t privy to your exceeding generosity of purpose. The ladies in particular would not then have been frightened half out of their wits!’
‘I d-didn’t think …’
‘Didn’t think, or didn’t care,’ said Benedict harshly.
‘No!’ It was an indignant cry. ‘Only … talking about it beforehand, there d-didn’t seem to be any harm in it!’
‘No harm?’
As though cornered, Aubrey moved on the pillows and winced. ‘Well, you know! I thought you of all people might understand!’
Benedict sat forward suddenly, his voice softly cutting. ‘You know, I sometimes get a little tired of having my past thrown up at me. I did some rackety things in my youth, and had my hair combed for them in no uncertain manner, but by God! I stopped short of going on the High Toby!’