Julie Anne Long

by The Runaway Duke

  Lady Tremaine heaved a sigh and rolled her eyes heavenward with relief.

  “The pleasure is mine, Sir Henry,” Cordelia said kindly.

  Cordelia was relieved that the Lord and Lady Tremaine had swallowed and digested the Scotland tale. She had been concerned that they would become restive and decide to take matters regarding Rebecca into their own hands if she did not give them some information, however fabricated. In truth, after their last encounter with the highwaymen, both Rebecca Tremaine and Roarke Blackburn seemed to have disappeared somewhere into the godforsaken land near the Scottish border. But she would find them. Or rather her assistants would find them. Hutchins had called back to London the bumbling pair who had been twice thrashed by Roarke Blackburn, and engaged a few others to watch the roads and harbors in that part of the country. But all of the assistants had been promised great monetary rewards if they could bring proof to her of Roarke Blackburn’s death.

  She just needed a little more time. And she needed the Tremaines to refrain from asking questions. For now, it appeared they would be docilely cooperative.

  Once again, a title had proved all the credibility needed.

  Cordelia intended to protect that title at any cost.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Rebecca perused her surroundings frankly. Along the walls of Leonora’s tent, a number of chests were stacked neatly and a few blankets were rolled into tight cylinders, as though the tent’s occupants had either just arrived or were just packing to leave. Most curiously, a long chest against the far wall of the tent supported several rows of jars and boxes, each labeled carefully with a word or two in black ink. Some of the jars were filled with what appeared to be dried herbs and flowers; others were even more intriguing, filled with liquid and dark bobbing objects.

  Rebecca’s eyes went to her hostesses; she wondered whether they spoke English, whether she could speak to them before they spoke to her. The older woman, who was lean and swarthy and had a head of dark hair threaded with silver, gazed back at her with kind dark eyes. The younger woman, who seemed to be comprised of soft round parts—a blunt little nose, a rosy plump mouth, a full round bosom, a head full of loose dark curls—also stared at Rebecca, with a pair of eyes as round and amber as two harvest moons. But her expression was something other than placid. It was . . . baldly assessing. And definitely disconcerting.

  Perhaps she has a blinking disorder, Rebecca thought. Perhaps she had only appeared to be staring at Connor earlier.

  “I am Leonora Heron, and Martha is my daughter, Rebecca,” the older woman said at last. “Would ye like some water? A bit o’ something to eat?”

  “Leonora?” Rebecca asked, as though she hadn’t heard Leonora’s polite question. She’d had the most delicious suspicion from the moment she entered the tent. And though she realized she was being hopelessly rude, she couldn’t wait another moment for the answer.

  “Yes?” Leonora apparently didn’t know or didn’t care that Rebecca was being hopelessly rude.

  “What do you keep in those jars?”

  “Herbs, Rebecca,” Leonora said. “I am a healer for our compania.”

  Rebecca’s heart skipped a beat. “You are . . . a doctor?”

  The Gypsy woman snorted. “I am a healer. Which is more than I can say for most Gorgio doctors. I am known far and wide among the Rom for healing.” The pride and absolute assurance in her voice thrilled Rebecca strangely. She could not imagine her mother sending for this woman in a time of sickness. Though nearly every woman in the English countryside had a receipt or two for special draughts and salves, and though midwives were still called to birthings at least as often as doctors, Rebecca could not imagine any English woman being lauded or admired throughout the land for her skill in healing. Women did not attend physicians’ college. Women held the basin that caught the blood of their loved ones while doctors bled them, women cleaned the vomit, fetched the clean linen.

  “What are the names of the herbs in your jars?” Rebecca bit her lip, but she could not seem to stop asking questions.

  “There is adder’s-tongue,” Leonora said, “for dressing wounds. And coltsfoot, for troubles of the lungs, and also to hasten the healing of wounds. There is feverfew, for ailments of the digestion, and henbane—”

  “—for pain,” Rebecca said eagerly.

  “Yes, but not too much, just a very weak infusion, or your patient will feel no pain forever.”

  The two women surprised each other by sharing a dark laugh.

  Martha had finally peeled her eyes away from Rebecca, and now her full-moon gaze was idly roaming the tent.

  “And?” Rebecca urged Leonora to continue.

  Leonora obliged. “Elder bark, for . . .” Like a teacher, she waited for Rebecca to complete her sentence.

  “Rheumatism?” Rebecca guessed.

  “Yes, and it is good for boils, as well, and many other things,” Leonora said approvingly. “And I’ve bettony . . .”

  “Good for . . . bites and stings.” Rebecca knew this from her Herbal. “You make a poultice of it.”

  “Yes, and it is good for the farting, too,” Leonora reminded her. “When ye make a draught of it.”

  Martha’s face, Rebecca noted, had taken on a distinctly sour cast.

  “You’ve an interest in healing, little Gadji?” Leonora asked.

  “Oh,” Rebecca said reverently. “Oh, yes. I think it’s wonderful.” She could hardly believe an adult woman, somebody’s mother, had asked her that question in all seriousness.

  Leonora laughed, pleased with her answer. “What a fine thing, little Gadji. I wish Martha cared for it as much. Martha thinks young Gypsy men are more worthy of her time than healing.”

  I have a feeling she thinks Connor is worthy of her time, too, Rebecca thought, eyeing Martha cagily.

  Something on the ceiling of the tent seemed to have captured Martha’s attention. Rebecca felt a little twinge of sympathy: ceiling gazing, after all, was a time-honored way to ignore one’s mother. Substitute “mucking about in the stables” for “young Gypsy men” and “pianoforte” for “healing” and it was the same conversation she’d had with her own mother dozens of times. Still . . . to be encouraged to learn to be a healer, and not to want it! It defied belief.

  “Ye must be thirsty and hungry, Rebecca. I’ll fetch ye some breakfast. Perhaps we can talk more of healing whilst ye stay wi’ us.” With a smile, Leonora slipped out of the tent.

  Martha’s amber eyes were immediately back, unblinkingly, on Rebecca. Bracing herself, Rebecca returned her gaze.

  “Your hair is loud,” Martha said at last, sadly, as though it pained her to think of someone having hair that was any less beautiful than her own. She twirled one of her loose dusky curls languidly over her finger.

  “Yes, I suppose it is,” Rebecca said. There seemed to be no point in disputing something that was patently true.

  “It is not . . . Gypsy hair,” Martha said regretfully. To emphasize her point, she gave a head toss that sent her bountiful mane bouncing over one shoulder.

  “Perhaps,” Rebecca said slowly, struggling to rein in the sarcasm, “it is because I am not a Gypsy.”

  Martha smiled faintly and tilted her head, gazing at Rebecca with eyes brimming with pity.

  “The man ye travel with—he is your brother, yes?”

  “Er . . . no . . .” Rebecca felt her face grow warm. Would Martha be shocked to learn that she, an unmarried woman, was traveling alone with a young man?

  “Because,” Martha continued, as though Rebecca had not spoken at all, “he looked at you as one would look at a sister.”

  It was Rebecca’s turn to stare, flabbergasted.

  Martha gazed back, her expression almost entirely neutral. Almost. There was a definite gleam of something in the depths of her eyes.

  “I . . . he . . .” Rebecca spluttered. She drew herself up proudly. “Connor is my fiancé. We are to be married. And he rather likes my hair.” Rebecca winced at the childish tone s
he heard in her own voice. Still, she couldn’t seem to help it. Who was this creature?

  “Oh,” Martha said, her expression faintly troubled. “Well, I suppose that could be true.”

  “You what?”

  Leonora reentered the tent, carrying a bowl of steaming, heavenly smelling stew and a flagon of water.

  “Eat, little Gadji, and then rest. We will be leaving camp very soon.”

  “Where is Connor?” Rebecca asked, her eyes darting to Martha. Brother, indeed.

  “He is still with Raphael, Rebecca. The two of you will be traveling with us.”

  Rebecca was silent, wishing she’d heard those words from Connor. Why was the man being so bloody reticent?

  “Of course,” she said, smiling weakly. “Thank you.” She accepted a spoon and the bowl of stew and tucked into it. It tasted as heavenly as it smelled.

  “Martha, ye’re needed to help break down camp. We shall let the little Gadji sleep a bit.”

  Rebecca was about to protest that she wasn’t sleepy, that she would like to help break down camp, too, but on a moment’s reflection she decided that would be a lie: her full belly combined with her unexpectedly early morning made her outrageously sleepy; it was growing difficult to keep her eyelids aloft.

  Leonora unfurled a blanket for her, and with pleasure Rebecca lay back against it on the floor of the tent and watched her hostesses leave. She had to admit, as she nodded off, that she was very happy to see the back of Martha, at least for now.

  Connor told the harrowing tale of the past few days to Raphael in bursts, because Raphael occasionally needed to step away to shout orders or supervise the packing and loading of various Gypsy carts.

  “Of course ye can ride wi’ us as far as the Cambridge Horse Fair,” Raphael said when Connor was finished with the story. “Ride wi’ us as long as pleases ye. Ye’ll be safer wi’ us; the boro dom engroes, the highwaymen, will no doubt be seeking two riders alone.”

  “My thanks, Raphael.”

  Just then, a Gypsy girl flounced past the two of them, leaving Connor with a general impression of bobbing roundness and a cloud of dark hair.

  “And then what will ye do once we’ve come to the fair . . . ?” Raphael prompted.

  “I’ll ride to London. Try to arrange a meeting with the ‘duchess’ through Melbers, I suppose. Frighten her—with any luck, my sudden appearance ought to do the trick, since she’s been trying to kill me—and threaten her with exposure and humiliation unless she leaves the continent immediately, that very moment, simply vanishes without a trace. I’ll escort her to the docks, if necessary. And then I’ll see that Melbers discreetly bestows several thousand pounds on the villagers near Keighley Park. After that, I’ll disappear with Rebecca, forever, to America, and no one will be the wiser. With no heirs and no one else to claim it, the Dunbrooke title and fortune will revert to the crown. Good riddance to it, I say. Prinny can do with it what he will.”

  Raphael nodded once, thoughtfully, as though Connor had just recited his itinerary for a trip to the shore.

  The Gypsy girl flounced past again, this time from the opposite direction.

  “Ye’ve thought it through, have ye?” Raphael mused.

  “Aye. I’ve thought it through.”

  “Does she know?”

  “No. Rebecca knows nothing—about the duchess being my mistress, about my being the Dunbrooke heir, about any of it. And I never want her to know—God knows what she’d think of me then.”

  “But she’ll wonder why the two of ye must go to London, aye?”

  “That’s just it: I cannot take her with me to London. The danger—to our lives, of discovery—is simply too great. I would rather die than expose Rebecca to that kind of risk again. And her family is no doubt in London at this very moment, and we might be seen, and . . . no, I cannot take her. I need to deal with this on my own, as the trouble is all of my own making. I rather hoped she could stay here with you while I am gone.”

  Raphael shrugged. “’Twould be our pleasure to look after ’er, Connor. But tell me this: what will ye tell ’er when ye go?”

  Connor, all of a sudden, felt cornered.

  “I . . . well . . . I thought perhaps I would not tell her I was going. She’ll ask questions that I simply am not prepared to answer, and I don’t want to lie to her if I can avoid it. I’ll simply go, and return. No doubt she’ll hardly miss me at all.”

  Raphael nodded thoughtfully, and a little skeptically.

  “So, ye’re quite certain ye’ve thought this through?”

  Connor nodded again, somewhat warily.

  “For, ye see, ’tis no easy thing to think clearly where a woman is concerned.”

  “Rebecca needn’t ever learn anything about my former life, Raphael, if I do this properly,” Connor insisted. “I want her to be my wife, but I find my conscience will not let me start a new life with her without first addressing my past.”

  The Gypsy girl flounced past again.

  “Pesky things, consciences,” Raphael said.

  “And how would you know?”

  “I’ve heard stories.”

  Connor laughed.

  “Martha.” Raphael, irritated, interrupted her midflounce. “Have ye no work to do? Bring our guest some stew.”

  Martha twirled away in a graceful flourish of skirts.

  “Perhaps you’d like America, too, Raphael.”

  “A wild country, ain’t it? Filled with savages and the like?”

  Martha returned with a steaming bowl and held it out to Connor, smiling beatifically, as though bestowing a blessing. Connor took the bowl with barely a glance at her and dipped the spoon in enthusiastically.

  Martha’s smile dimmed a little, but she remained planted in front of Connor.

  “Wild country, yes, but alive with opportunity,” Connor said to Raphael, between bites.

  “Martha, why are you standing there staring at our guest like a looby?” Raphael made an exasperated shooing gesture. “Go help Leonora.”

  Martha’s brows dove to form an angry “V” between her eyes. She glanced at Connor, who was entirely focused on his stew.

  “Go,” Raphael commanded, and Martha flounced away a final time, muttering something that may well have been a Gypsy curse under her breath. Raphael shook his head and muttered something of his own in Rom that made Connor raise his eyebrows.

  Raphael returned to his conversation with Connor. “Aye, but I warrant there’s little silver plate to be had in a country as new and wild as that. I dinna mind workin’ for my bread, but no ’arder than I needs to, ye ken. I wasna bred to be a farmer.” He grinned at Connor unapologetically.

  “Aye, well, I’ll miss knowing we’re on the same continent when it comes to that, Raphael.”

  “As ye should, ’elpless sod that ye are.”

  Connor smiled at him. They were silent together for a moment.

  “I was right,” Raphael said softly. “’Twas a woman.”

  Connor’s shoulders went back. “Shouldn’t we be moving on soon?”

  Raphael laughed and clapped him on the back.

  “Oh, dinna take on so! Ye wouldna be the first, my friend. But I’ve news for ye: ye canna share a tent wi’ ’er whilst ye stay wi’ us, as ye’re not yet wed. ’Tis the way of the Rom, and well ye know.”

  Connor went still. “Can’t we just agree to lie about it?” he asked desperately.

  “Aye, that may well ’ave been a good plan, but Rebecca, honest girl that she is, ruined it: she told Martha the pair of ye were engaged, not wed, and Martha told all the women in the camp. And I willna ’ave a scandal, no’ even for you, my friend. ’Tis trial enough t’ keep the young in line. Ye’ll sleep in my tent, and Rebecca can stay wi’ Leonora, and we’ll . . .”

  Raphael stopped talking when he noticed that Connor’s attention was concentrated elsewhere. He followed Connor’s gaze.

  Rebecca was now standing, awake and blinking in the sunlight, at the entrance to Leonora’s tent. She was
back in her brown muslin dress and wearing a bonnet, which made Connor smile; perhaps Leonora had coaxed her into them in a nod to proprieties. He had become so accustomed to Rebecca bareheaded or covered in a boy’s cap that the bonnet seemed faintly silly.

  Raphael saw the expression on Connor’s face, the wonder and possessiveness.

  “Oh, how will ye survive?” he said in mock sympathy.

  Connor snarled something profane in Rom, and strode away from him toward Rebecca.

  “Did you have a good rest?”

  It was strange, Rebecca thought, to stand so close to Connor and not touch him. That had been one of the luxuries of the past few days: touching him whenever she pleased, as he had touched her; so casually, so often, it almost seemed as if their hands never left each other. A lock of hair lifted from a cheek, a brush of fingers against an arm, a touch on the thigh, soft kisses freely and extravagantly bestowed, kisses that turned into . . . her face went warm at the thought.

  But she took her cues from Connor, and Connor’s hands were at his sides, his fingers restlessly drumming his thighs. And now he was asking her, as politely as if he were a stranger, if she’d slept well.

  “Good enough, thank you,” she replied tersely.

  Connor lifted an eyebrow at her tone and lowered his voice. “What is it, wee Becca? Can you not sleep when I am not next to you? I would think it was the first decent rest you’d have had in a day or two.” He leered charmingly.

  She rolled her eyes, and he stifled a laugh.

  “Connor, where are we going? What are we doing here? Did you know Leonora is a healer? Is she married to Raphael?”

  “Which question shall I answer first?”

  “Answer all of them, in that order, and quickly.”

  “Very well, then. Wee Becca, I have some final business to conduct before we can go to Scotland. We will be safer traveling with the Gypsies for a few days, much more so than if the two of us went on alone. And yes, I knew Leonora was a healer, which I thought would please you to no end. And no, Leonora and Raphael are not married. Leonora is a widow, and Raphael is a widower. They are cousins.”