by Sophia Nash
“I would advise an unhasty departure, my lord,” Dr. Kittridge said, as he walked to stand beside him. “It is doubtful His Grace will survive the spring if he continues in this fashion. But I think you are aware of that.” Dr. Kittridge peered around to engage Nicholas’s attention. “If you will pardon me for saying so, I would make arrangements to sell out soonest. You will be needed here. Your father needs you here.”
“An intelligent suggestion, sir, but… I will be rejoining my regiment. You will be answerable to my brother. Although, I will, of course, make the recommendation that you remain here. The people of the village and the neighboring countryside are fortunate you agreed to come here,” Nicholas said, then turned to face him. “I do hope you will stay.”
Dr. Kittridge wrinkled his brow in confusion. Nicholas knew the older man would not condescend to ask for clarification. In any event, Nicholas had no desire to explain what long ago had been decided by all parties. If only his leg would heal faster. Blast it all.
It was past the hour she was supposed to be at the abbey, Charlotte thought, as she bustled into the cramped hallway of the cottage after her visit to a neighbor suffering from an inflamed joint. Doro buzzed around her collecting her basket, helping Charlotte untie her apron, even dusting a smudge of dirt from her hot cheeks.
“The good doctor has not yet left for the great house, miss,” Doro said, as she took Charlotte’s soiled gloves. “He be in the front sitting room with a genleman .with his lordship.”
Doro must be mistaken. It must be another lord visiting. More and more patients arrived on their doorstep each week. Most had ailments so mild that they came on foot, on horseback, or in vehicles of varying importance. They had little patience for waiting for the doctor to call on them. She had learned a long time ago that those who complained longest and loudest were usually the least ill.
Charlotte had met so many of them in the last month. It was the standard fare—the stomach ailments, the toothaches. For the rich it was almost always the gout, or for the ladies, their nerves. Charlotte listened patiently to them all and made sure that her father saw the more serious cases between his visits to the abbey.
“Best steep two pots of the herbs this morning, Doro. Please add this willow bark to the usual other leaves.” Charlotte pointed to the herbs she had picked from the expanding herb plot near the cottage.
“Yes, miss.”
After straightening her gown, Charlotte knocked on the sitting room door. The faint voice of her father bade her to enter. The broad form and stark gaze of Lord Huntington made her catch her breath when she entered and curtsied. “My lord,” she said.
“Miss Kittridge,” he responded, nodding.
Her stomach tightened as she moved closer. She was keenly aware that she made no impression on him.
She remembered and tried to relive his kiss every day, especially each night, as she lay sleepless in her narrow bed. He was saying some inconsequential civilities to her father, and she knew without a doubt that the kiss she treasured was of no consequence to him at all.
But she yearned to help him, despite his station, and despite her embarrassment. It all seemed quite absurd and impossible. And who was she to suggest her ideas to the heir to a dukedom? She took her bold decision. She would speak to him.
“Father, the pots will be ready in a quarter hour. I shall bring them to the abbey directly.”
“All right, then.” Dr. Kittridge looked toward his lordship, and left after realizing Lord Huntington would not precede him out the door. He was too high in the instep for her father to insist that he leave for propriety’s sake.
On the heels of her father’s departure, Charlotte was tongue-tied. What had she been thinking?
“You have something to say to me?” he asked quietly.
“Yes, my lord,” she murmured, desperate for another topic. “The mare. I have not had a chance to see her in many days. How does she fare?”
“Very well, considering.”
“I shall have to stop into the stable again to see her.”
“Hmmm,” he replied.
Silence. Loud, oppressive silence. She looked up from the floor to see him gazing at her in expectation, not a smile in sight. She was a coward. How could she have ever thought to impose her views on this man? He would order her out of the cottage with great fury and pride. And he would be right to do so. She looked toward the door and planned her escape. He took one step toward her, using his shiny black cane.
“Is there nothing else, then? I had the distinct impression you wanted a word.” He hesitated. “We have never discussed my bold actions of more than a fortnight ago. I fear I embarrassed you. I must apologize.”
“Oh, no, my lord. I.… I am sure I have quite forgotten it.”
“It was unpardonable. I was out of line taking advantage of you after all the long hours you spent nursing me with such gentleness and care.”
The seeds of an idea took root. “It is not that,” she continued, “I knew it meant nothing. It is just that… of course, I would not presume to… But, I thought,” she rushed through the words, then stopped abruptly.
“Yes, my dear? What may I do for you to show regret for my actions? Name it and it shall be yours.”
“No. No, sir, it will not do. Forgive my interference. It is not my place to—”
“Come, come, Miss Kittridge. This is unlike you. There is no need to fear me. You have seen me at my very worst, I do assure you. You have never failed to tell me what is on your mind, nor to listen to my ramblings. A refreshing attribute here in Wiltshire, if I do say so,” he said with a slow smile.
He smiled so little. She hated knowing it would fade if she told him her idea. She closed her eyes. “Lord Huntington… it occurred to me that I could perhaps offer, or rather give, you a book I was looking at yesterday.”
His smile disappeared. He looked away from her, out the window. The loss of his intense gaze allowed her to breathe again. “Let me explain—”
“No, I thought I had explained it to you,” he interrupted in his deep, mellow baritone. “Miss Kittridge, I have no use for books, as you know.” He moved toward the door behind her.
Charlotte presumed to stop him with her hand on his sleeve and he looked down at her, his green eyes filled with furious anger. “I must return to the abbey, Miss Kittridge. Please remove your hand.” He snatched his arm away.
“No, please wait. Allow me to—”
“No.”
“Please,” she said in a low tone.
He was looking at her, waiting, she realized when she dared to raise her gaze to his. “Well?” he said, his irritation thinly veiled.
“Well, I thought you might enjoy looking at a book I have about birds. You were well-informed of the cuckoo’s nature. You could look at the exquisite engravings and I could read the descriptions to you. And perhaps, just perhaps you could try—”
“Are you proposing to teach me how to read, Miss Kittridge?” he interrupted again.
“Well… Yes.”
“And do you not think that every known method has been applied during my youth? Do you not think that over the course of the years five scholars were brought in to attempt the impossible?”
“No, you misunder—” she jumped in.
“Do not interrupt me, Miss Kittridge,” he said, and continued above her plea. “Do you not think that I was sent off to Eton at the age of seven, returned at nine, along with a note saying that I was without doubt an ‘ignorant, incapable of reading the written word, incapable of learning, incapable of anything save bashing the heads of those who mocked me’? Do you not now think that I and my father have tried everything in the power of a dukedom to try to learn how to read? It is impossible,” he said, his dark green eyes flashing. “And you have the audacity and presumption to think that you will find a solution? Do you believe that one of your miraculous potions will cure me of a tendency toward stupidity, a nodding toward the nod-cock, a, a, a… Ah, there, you have forced me to betra
y my weakness in vocabulary, Miss Kittridge. Enough said.”
She wanted to sink into the floor. She would really be grateful if she could just have one good swoon, say like Mrs. Bennett in Pride and Prejudice. But she had never swooned in her life.
“I believe you would enjoy the book, my lord.” She looked him in the eye, determined to disarm him with her resolve. “And I believe you owe me, my lord.”
Oppressive silence again permeated the walls of the room. It was emotional blackmail, it was. And she was sure Nicholas knew it as well. He had probably not thought her capable of it. But then, he had underestimated her spirit.
“Are you blackmailing me because I had the audacity to kiss you or because you have nursed me back to health?”
She wouldn’t blink. She wouldn’t blush. She would gain her point in whatever fashion necessary. “Which reason would force you to take the book, my lord?”
“You are playing most unfairly, my dear.”
“Playing fair did not seem to be working very well in this case, Lord Huntington.”
“Ah, the old ‘ends justify the means’ tactic,” he said, with just the hint of a smile. “Blackmailer.”
“Coward,” she said, bracing for a barrage of curses.
He almost laughed.
“You would like me very much to look at it,” he said, not committing himself.
“Yes.”
“For what purpose?”
What could she say? Nay, what would she dare to admit? That she loved him? Not in a lifetime of repressed longing. “The engravings are exquisite. We could—we could discuss any of the birds that are not familiar to you.”
He said nothing for a long moment.
“Where might this paragon of information on the beaked and feathered world be found?”
She rushed to the nearest stack of books behind the settee and retrieved a volume. Charlotte placed it into his outstretched hand. “It is precious to me.”
“I shall endeavor not to tear it to shreds in frustration, Miss Kittridge.”
“I did not mean to suggest—”
“I understood you very well. Have no fear.”
The male sex. She would never understand them. This one in particular. His mood changed from anger to teasing in a moment. It was very hard to follow along. On the one hand she felt she must be deferential to his station, but on the other, she had seen him for an entire month—in his bed, in his nightshirt, in a fever, in a temper when awake, in blind terror when he slept. She did not feel at all deferential to this man, she felt protective. And so much more… A feeling she dared not decipher. A feeling she dared not nurture.
“Thank you, Miss Kittridge, for your kindness—your many kindnesses,” he said dryly, fingering the title on the book’s cover. “Shall we meet again then the day after tomorrow? To discuss the book, my dear Miss Blackmailer?”
“That would be pleasant, my lord.”
“So be it,” he said, tipping his head and walking to the door.
She held her breath as she listened to the muffled voice of Lord Huntington on the other side of the door asking Doro to arrange for his horse to be returned to the abbey’s stables. She exhaled all at once as she moved to the side of the window. She watched his powerful broad back covered by his worn green Rifleman’s uniform move away from the cottage. Something about the way he held erect his wide shoulders which then narrowed down to his slim hips and muscled legs made her shiver. He was limping badly, leaning on a cane rather than the crutch she had brought to the abbey. But she knew better than to have argued the point. Charlotte knew to choose her battles wisely with the stronger sex. She was amazed he had capitulated earlier.
He stopped just before coming to the end of the walkway and turned, looking toward something in the distance. Charlotte studied his noble profile. He looked like the statues found within the pages of her art and sculpture books. The proud brow, the strong nose, the full lips, and noble chin. A breeze ruffled his hair before he set his hat on his head. Suddenly, he turned and looked at her in the window. She did not have time to duck into the folds of the curtain. He stared at her for the longest moment, and she could not look away. And then he was gone, without a smile or a tilt of the head.
He did not know what to make of it, he thought, as he limped up the slope, moving at a snail’s pace, away from the cottage. Why had she forced a book on him? He had long ago given up any hopes of reading, and had been grateful when his very last tutor of a string of them had convinced his father to stop torturing him. He had been fifteen then.
Henceforth, he had spent twelve hours of every four and twenty in the outdoor world, longer in the summer months. He had loved the camaraderie of working alongside the laborers, the shepherds, and the horses, and also the hours spent surrounded by nature’s tranquility.
Those two years had been the sole period of any sort of true happiness until the day Her Grace had insisted he’d grown too wild. That day he had asked his father to buy him a commission and falsify his abilities. After listening to Nicholas’s plea, his father had consented without argument or pause. His family had been glad to be rid of him—except Rosamunde, of course. And Nicholas had been glad to go.
He cursed his ill fortune as the grade of the hill increased in time to the ache in his thigh. He would be damned if he would restrict himself to a “turn about the garden.” He had a hankering for a long walk. And a long walk it would be— to the lake. Nicholas stuffed the cursed volume into his breast pocket and forced himself to increase his pace.
He made his way through the woodlands of birch and oak, over the decaying fence, to the vast lake past the crumbling folly. The sun’s rays burned through his many layers of clothing. Out of breath, Nicholas stopped at the water’s edge, threw down his cane, and shrugged out of his uniform. He didn’t even stop to think, just peeled off all of it after unwinding the bandages and shucking off his boots. The lake appeared dark green and cool, the sun bouncing off the little wavelets.
He made a shallow dive, avoiding the murky algae of the deeper water. The shock of the cold made his stroke quicken through the water. He felt powerful again, for the first time in a long while, as he let his upper body do almost all the work of propelling him forward. He swam all the way to the center of the lake, to the small island where he once collected duck eggs in the summer months. Cook had always spoiled him with omelettes when he had managed not to crack any on his return. A few geese honked their displeasure at his intrusion. Nicholas searched the favorite nesting areas and found caches of eggs.
“Have no fear, I shall not rob you of your treasure,” he said to the ducks. And then with mock severity, “This time.”
The opposite shore looked twice as far from this vantage point, and he was tired. He lay down on the grassy bank, under the dappled sunlight of a small tree, and dozed with one arm flung over his eyes.
Why had she forced the book on him? He understood little of the female mind. During his thirteen years as an officer with the 95th Rifleman, he’d had little opportunity to converse with gently bred females other than the bighearted wives, of military men, who refused to be left behind. Oh, he was no saint, he had slaked his thirst with one or two very willing women who followed the drum, but the acts had not banished his loneliness, and he’d taken a private oath of abstinence.
Why was she trying to help him? He feared she might have taken a liking to him, the complete idiot that he was. Perhaps that gentle kiss had been her first. He would have to take care not to encourage her. In the past, it had been so easy. His days in the army had kept him from all matrimonially minded ladies.
Miss Kittridge did not know he would never search the marriage mart. He must be careful not to bruise her heart. She had been kind to him and he was grateful. He liked her. She was a heady combination of childlike vulnerability and high intelligence that he found hard to resist. But he could never forget that his supreme failings were her strengths and her passion.
Remembering her dazed expression and open a
nd full lips the morning he had dared to kiss her, he closed his eyes and cursed. What had possessed him to complicate matters? He knew very well that Charlotte Kittridge was the type of female ripe for heartbreak. He must take care to rein in his appetite. He was unworthy of her and would not hurt her for the world.
The sun was halfway into its descent to the west when he opened his eyes. Nicholas took the coward’s way this time, inching into the chilly lake water, feeling the mud and moss between his toes before plunging in. Pulling himself up on the outer bank, he tripped over an imbedded rock, the same rock that had caused countless skinned knees in childhood. Without warning a great surge of anger and frustration over all things that could not be named took hold. Nicholas grasped the prominent edge of the dark rock and pulled using all his back muscles. His wounded leg pounding, knees shaking, he triumphantly pulled the offending element from its niche. A conquering yell surged past his lips, and he felt like one of those naked Indians he had heard inhabited the colonies. Nicholas laughed out loud at his absurd behavior, then hurried into his uniform.
Chapter Six
“I do not pretend to set people right, but I do see that they are often wrong.”
—Mansfield Park
THE sun had pierced the darkness of early morning and bore down on Nicholas’s head and shoulders. It was a perfect day to make hay. A group of laborers, using the new scythes Nicholas had brought back with him from Spain, were already halfway through the first field.
As he dismounted, he spotted Owen, who was not as hale and hearty now as he had been at fifteen. They had met up as often as Nicholas’s elder friend had been allowed to quit the fields early. Owen’s blond hair had thinned, and he looked older than his years.