by Betina Krahn
The hire coach’s wheels were stuck in mud and their employer was shouting threats at the coachman and footman as they tried to push it into a less boggy rut in the road. The appearance of his retreating gang was enough to put his lordship into a full fury.
Hanging back in the coach doorway to avoid the downpour, he ordered his minions to dismount and help the driver right the vehicle. Their moment of hesitation brought him to the edge of sanity. He produced a gun and fired . . . right above their heads, making their horses nervous.
In short order, several of the men dismounted and waded into the sucking mud to add their shoulders to the effort. His lordship felt the coach move and resumed his seat in the vehicle, failing to see the angry looks his hirelings exchanged.
He’d held out the promise of hard coin in payment, but so far, they’d had only bitter ale, watered whiskey, and his lordship’s high-handed abuse. The farms he’d ordered them to raid had yielded next to nothing because he’d ordered them to leave the houses alone and the barns standing. He’d said he didn’t intend to take over a devastated and empty estate.
All of that changed when he got kicked by that demon horse and lay hurt for a day or two. He took the beast off to Betancourt, and when he came back, he was angry and didn’t seem to care anymore about leaving the place standing. He bought more kerosene and made plans to burn a path to the heart of the estate when he returned from London.
But his business in London took longer than expected. They had been ready for days and were tired of waiting. Now that he was back, nature had thrown a wet blanket—literally—on their plans. Fortune didn’t seem to be favoring his lordship’s quest for control of Betancourt.
The men had grumbled before, but now they began to make plans of their own.
* * *
The great house shuddered and the window panes shook under ear-splitting peals of thunder. The servants lighted the gas lamps and looked anxiously at the windows while opening guest rooms and planning for a larger than expected dinner. As the thunder receded, leaving simple, steady rain in its wake, there was an air of relief about the house. It seemed as if the storm had broken the last of the tension among its inhabitants.
Elizabeth had shooed the children to their rooms for stories and naps, while the men finished their brandy in the study and trailed Daisy and Red to the breakfast room to check on the brothers. Sarah had already examined the combatants for cracked or broken ribs and had bound areas on each that seemed to qualify.
“You’re a mess,” Ash said with a grin that clearly pained him.
“You look like a half-gnawed bone,” Arthur countered.
“Boys,” Sarah said in a dangerous tone.
They looked at each other with similar glints of defiance.
“Who’s the duke?” Arthur said, knowing he was treading on thin ice.
Ash laughed, holding his injured lip. “You are, you bastard.”
“Damned right I am.” Arthur laughed, too, then grabbed his ribs and groaned.
Sarah stared at the pair of them, shaking her head. Men.
When Daisy appeared, Sarah handed her sister a wet cloth for cleaning Ashton’s split lip and bloody knuckles, while she tended similar injuries on Arthur.
Red laid Ashton’s coat and vest over the back of a nearby chair, while Steig handed Arthur’s shirt to him and leaned close to study his tattoo.
“Nice work. Where’d you get it?” Steig asked, viewing from several directions the circular pattern that capped Arthur’s shoulder.
“An island. The East Indies.”
“What’d you do?” The big man planted his hands on his waist and looked like he wasn’t moving until he heard the story.
“A bit of swimming.” Arthur looked uncomfortable with the topic.
“Come on, guv. You don’t get honored just fer swimmin’—not in a place where folk are all practically born in the water.”
Sarah stepped back and narrowed her eyes. “What did you do? I think it’s time you told that story, since it left such a distinctive mark on you.”
Arthur shifted on his chair and glanced at his brother. Daisy abandoned tending her husband for a moment to see what they were talking about. Sarah didn’t especially like the admiration Daisy showed for Arthur’s tattoo . . . and possibly his muscular shoulders . . . and chest . . . and legs...
“I swam into some fish and pulled a kid to shore.” Arthur shrugged. “Turned out, it was the chief’s kid and he was grateful. They ‘honored’ me by pounding some ink into my skin.” He paused and gestured to his tattoo in a dismissive way. “It’s supposed to tell what I did, but . . . I can’t read it.”
Steig frowned. “What kind of fish?”
“Fish is fish.” Arthur flexed his hands to see if they were still bleeding.
“Not to those folk,” Steig persisted. “What kind of fish did you swim into?”
“I think I was drunk at the time,” Arthur said, trying to steer away from the subject. “They make a fermented coconut drink that can really—”
“What kind of fish?” Sarah sat down on a chair facing him, with a look that was straight out of Elizabeth’s inter-rogational repertoire.
Arthur studied her resolve, sighed, and gave up the answer.
“Sharks. It was a group of sharks.”
Sarah sat back with widened eyes. Steig hooted a laugh and gave him a slap on the back that made him wince with pain.
“I heard tell, that mark alone will get ye into Heaven, no matter what yer sins. Congratulations, guv, yer a saint—guaranteed.”
The look on Arthur’s face was priceless: a combination of uncertainty, embarrassment, and relief. “I never talked about it,” he said, rubbing his thighs as if they hurt. “I figured nobody would believe me.”
“Well, it helps that Steig here vouched for ye,” Red said with a grin. “But with what I’ve seen you do, I’d believe it.”
“Me too,” Sarah spoke up. When he looked at her she was smiling with a pride in her eyes that made him almost forget the aches in his body.
“Not only do you come back looking like a Greek god, you come back a certified hero—with a decoration for bravery inked into your skin,” Ash declared with amazement. “I hope you’ll put in a few more details when you tell that story to Little Red. I want him to hear all about his uncle’s adventures.”
There was a moment of congenial laughter.
“Stick around, Ash, and you may have your share of tales to tell,” Reynard said from his perch on a nearby sideboard.
“What do you mean?” Ash looked from his brother to Reynard and Red. Troubled looks gradually replaced their easy mood. “What’s happened?”
“Betancourt’s been struck by a gang of outlaws,” Reynard said. “Several times. Thieving, harassing the farmers, and recently they’ve taken to using fire—they burned down the old mill.”
“Our old mill? The one our great-great-great-grandfather built?”
“The very one,” Arthur said, watching Ash’s dismay. “And we believe they aren’t finished. We’ve been working on plans to stop them.”
Ashton focused on Arthur with dawning comprehension.
“There really is danger, then. I thought you were just poking my conscience.”
“Finally,” Arthur said with what looked like a wink, but might have been just a twitch of his swollen eye. “If I remember correctly, you were never one to miss out on a good fight.”
Ashton tried to grin, but grabbed his cracked lip with a wince.
“These days I make it a practice to inform my wife before I bash someone senseless... most of the time.” He looked at Daisy with what could only be called adoration. She rolled her eyes, and he looked back at Arthur. “Count me in, big brother.”
* * *
Dinner that evening was a bit chaotic, since Daisy insisted on having the children at table with the adults. The servants regarded Little Red with a jaundiced eye when he insisted on sitting by his “Unca Art-tur” and pestered the duke with questio
n after question that all began with the word why.
Arthur was the soul of patience and promised they’d find a pony among the riding stock for Little Red to practice his horsemanship. Elizabeth asked Daisy pointedly where the children’s nanny was. According to Daisy, the woman was terrified of boats and water and after some discussion, they decided to leave her in New York and manage on their own. Westerners excelled at self-sufficiency, after all. Elizabeth tsk-tsked in disapproval but said nothing more.
Later, in the parlor, Ash and Daisy talked Arthur into telling a story or two of his travels to the boys, to all of them. After some thought, he talked of seeing herds of zebras and antelopes and elephants that filled the horizon in Africa . . . being chased by a rhinoceros . . . sleeping in trees to avoid being eaten . . . butterflies so big they looked like birds. The children were awed and begged for more.
When he obliged, Sarah found herself imagining him on the African plains, the wind blowing his hair, his face alight with the joy of discovery. She loved the music in his voice as he told of his experiences and she wished she had asked him more questions about his travels before now.
After Daisy’s boys were ushered off to bed, he told one last story . . . of being abducted from his hotel and sold to a caliph in need of a man to read and write English. Unfortunately, while confined to the palace, he resorted to his old habit of walking walls to find some peace. One of the walls he chose happened to surround the caliph’s harem. He was spotted, arrested, and thrown into a dungeon.
After three months he escaped with the help of a lovesick jailor who agreed to help him if he composed poems to a lady the jailor wished to court.
“Fortunately, I recalled a few poems from English literature’s finest. The work I gave him, alas, was not original with me. In my defense I did have a pang of guilt over passing them off as mine. Literacy is a valuable skill in most parts of the world, but a dangerous knowledge to possess in a few.”
* * *
Later that night, as Sarah was making her final rounds, she saw Daisy leave her room and move a bit too quietly down the west wing hallway. Concerned, she followed and was soon trailing her sister up two flights of stairs to a familiar door. As Daisy entered the attic, Sarah hung back, trying to calm her racing heart and think rationally about what was happening. But there was only one reason Daisy would be climbing into the attic on such a wet and inhospitable night.
After a few minutes, she entered the attic herself and paused to let her eyes adjust. The hatch that opened onto the roof was thrown back, admitting enough light for her to navigate to the steps. She crept up them, listening, and finally peered out the opening to locate the source of the voices.
Her stomach felt like it dropped to her knees.
Arthur stood silhouetted against the night sky holding Daisy’s hand. Their words were mostly carried away on the breeze, but she caught snatches here and there. “Worried”, “happiness”, and “regret” came through clearly enough. He turned Daisy to point out landmarks to her, and the memory of him holding her in his arms, pointing out Betancourt’s features the same way, was so sharp in Sarah that she gasped and clamped a hand over her mouth. Drawing back into the shadows, she closed her eyes for a moment. She couldn’t resist one last peek before making her way back downstairs.
It was a mistake.
He was facing Daisy, taking her by the shoulders . . . leaning closer . . . It was a gentle, intimate moment, filled with such . . . oh, God . . . regret. She turned and felt her way to the door.
Later, she wasn’t sure how she had gotten to her room. She must have flown down the stairs. When the door was locked behind her, she stood for a moment while her body decided how to react to such a devastating blow. But there was nothing, no rage, no ache of betrayal, no tears or trembling.
She felt utterly empty.
The fear she harbored had been given form and substance before her eyes. He really did love Daisy. And that meant that in every touch, every caress, every kiss between them, she had stood as proxy for her sister.
Daisy was his first love and the reason he left Betancourt to see the world. While he was too honorable to try to compromise his brother’s wife, his heart was clearly hers.
Dearest Heaven. What was she to do? Leave Betancourt? Pretend she hadn’t seen that tender moment and go on as if nothing had happened? Neither seemed possible, since both required more strength and courage than she possessed at that moment.
She had believed when he called her precious, that he meant it. She sank onto the bench at the foot of the bed. How could she have let herself fall again into the very situation that she came to Betancourt to escape? Giving her heart and hopes to a man who would only . . .
No.
Some newly grounded part of her raised a fierce objection. She wasn’t the same bookish, impressionable young girl who mistook flattery for true regard. She had learned a great deal about people and purpose and reading the soul-traces visible in a person’s eyes. She had taken her fate into her own hands and come to Betancourt to do something good with her life.
Her knowledge of Arthur and her own stubborn sense of fairness refused to let her equate him with the self-absorbed young earl who had used her for his amusement. Arthur, she had to admit, was not driven by wealth or rank or status. He was not a man who treated people like pleasant trifles or disposable curiosities. She called up memory after memory, resurrected pleasures and confidences and feelings she had shared with him.
She was honest enough to reach past her own hurt to see the larger reality. His responses and words weren’t false or faithless. He truly did enjoy her company and the pleasure they had shared . . . which only made it that much harder to deal with. How could she ever separate his true feelings for her from the specter of his lingering feelings for Daisy?
It was a long time before she succumbed to sleep that night, and her dreams were almost as disturbing as the heartfelt conflict she experienced awake. She rose the next morning feeling tired and unsettled. But by the time her nephews banged on her door, begging her to show them the puppies she had mentioned, she had regained most of her self-possession.
Daisy stood a few steps away, watching, and followed them as she took the boys by the hands and led them out to the stable to see Nellie and her puppies. Sarah didn’t have much to say, except to caution the boys about handling Nellie’s babies gently. Little Red and Wild Bill glowed with excitement at the sight of the curious, bright-eyed puppies climbing out of the box to greet them.
The boys tried to pick them up, but the puppies were already quick at escape and enjoyed running. Sarah found herself smiling and then laughing at their antics and looked up to find Daisy’s eyes alight. It was hard, in the presence of all of that youthful joy and innocence, to hold on to hard feelings toward her sister. Being lovable was not something a body could control.
Clearly the puppies needed exercise, and at six weeks, they didn’t have to be carried out to the front lawn. Sarah led the parade and soon the boys were laughing and chasing the puppies all over an acre of grass still soggy from the previous day’s storm. Mud and water flew.
“They’re going to be filthy.” Daisy crossed her arms, but with a smile. “Mama is probably glued to a window somewhere, having a heart attack.”
“We have bathing rooms and hot water.” Sarah came to stand by her sister. “Boys and puppies are both washable.”
“Thank God.” Daisy chuckled.
“I just wish harsh words were as easy to wash away,” Sarah said.
Daisy turned her head to look at Sarah.
“He really didn’t leave because of me.” Daisy paused. “In fact, it was Arthur that convinced Ashton to marry me. Ash was determined to sacrifice his love for me so I could have what he thought I wanted. He knew I wanted to marry a duke and he knew why. You. And Frankie. And Cece. I was determined to make up for my mistakes and get you an entrance into society.
“The night that Arthur and Ash had it out . . . Uncle Red and I arrived j
ust in time to hear Ash and Arthur each demanding that the other marry me. ‘You marry her’—‘No, YOU marry her.’ Talk about humiliating. Arthur made it clear he had places to go and discoveries to make . . . that he didn’t want to marry . . . and certainly not me.” She gave a wry laugh. “He knew I loved Ash and that Ash was being a splendidly selfless ass.”
She turned to Sarah. “You were younger and I don’t know how much you overheard—Mama was frantic to avoid gossip. But surely you remember how they looked on our wedding day. Black eyes, swollen lips, bruises everywhere. It was a pure scandal. Arthur, we learned that week, had a lot more gumption than anyone guessed. And a wicked right hook.”
“Apparently, he still has,” Sarah said, sensing the earnestness in Daisy’s revelations. Why hadn’t she listened to Uncle Red? “I’m sorry for blaming you and acting like an idiot about the fight. It wasn’t your fault. I guess brothers have a different way of dealing with each other.”
“Yes. We sisters are so much more civilized,” Daisy said dryly.
Sarah opened her arms and Daisy walked into them. They hugged each other, and let the tension of the last day drain away. They didn’t even notice when three big dogs joined the fun, racing the puppies and boys and tossing up mud and grass. It was only when Nero and Nellie and Lancelot came to jump on them to get them to play that they realized what a mess the dogs and boys had made.
Elizabeth met them later in the entry hall with towel-wielding servants and a glare that could have cut steel girders.
“You and your dirty animals!” she declared, staring at them and the muddy streaks, paw prints, and handprints on their skirts and faces.
Sarah looked at Daisy, whose Wild Bill was joyfully patting her on the face with hands caked with mud. Little Red stood between them wet and covered with mud—holding tightly a wet, dirty puppy that was streaming what everyone hoped was water onto the floor.
Daisy looked at Sarah, who was holding wet and mud-spattered Nero and long-haired Nellie back by the collars . . . while they shook vigorously. Drops of water and mud were flying all over the entry hall.