Ambrosia could not meet her eyes. ‘’Yes,’’ she whispered.
She walked on in silence with Lily at her side. She paused beneath the drooping boughs of a willow tree, staring at the neat carpet of heart-shaped leaves, all that remained of the violets that had bloomed early in the spring. Lily noticed then that tears were slipping quickly over her cheeks. ‘’Ambrosia?’’ She stretched a comforting hand toward her, but it was too late. With a tiny muffled sob, Ambrosia whirled and ran into the house.
That very same evening, Drayton returned from the city in time for dinner for the first time in days. He had almost finished his meal and was bringing Lily up to date on the scheduled factory openings when he realized that she wasn’t even listening.
“...and we hired enough workers to operate the new grinders, and are training them for the remainder of the week to-’’ He stopped in midsentence and frowned with annoyance. Lily was toying with her food, her eyes glazed and distant. “Lily, are you listening to me?”
Her face was blank and she continued to play with her food.
“Lily!”
She started to attention. “Hm? What? What did you say?”
“I said, ‘Lily!’ “ he repeated with a half-amused grin.
She gave him a weak smile. “I heard that much.”
“But not a word more. You haven’t eaten a bite of your food, either.” Lily gnawed her lip and stared guiltily at her untouched plate. “What is it, Lily?” he demanded. “Out with it.”
She sighed nervously and began to play with her fork. “You aren’t going to like what I have to say.”
“At least I’m listening.”
“Yes, I suppose you are,” she mumbled. She drew a deep breath and placed the fork to the side of her plate. “I don’t approve of what you are doing to Ambrosia. It’s cruel to lock her away as you’ve done, and I cannot bear to see it continue.” She lifted a shaking hand to stop his protest and went on firmly. “I know that she tried to leave here, that you acted for the sake of her safety as much as out of anger. But I do not think she would at tempt such a thing again. She must have come to realize the dangers to herself and the child. And there has been...’’ She frowned, searching for the right words. “There has been a change in her, Drayton. A change that goes very, very deep. I could see it today when I spoke with her. It-It frightened me.”
Drayton’s eyes were hard. “You don’t know her, Lily.”
“And neither do you, Drayton.”
The accusation caused a startled pair of blue eyes to meet hers, telling her just how accurate her guess had been. He let out his breath and pressed a hand to his brow.
“I’m sorry, Drayton. Perhaps I ought not to have spoken so honestly. But today, when I saw her in the garden, she was so different, so much like...like a lost child. She was crying, though she tried to keep me from seeing that. She is not a woman who cries easily.” She shook her head. ‘’I cannot get the picture out of my mind. ‘’ Her blue eyes sought her nephew’s. “And I am beginning to wonder if you keep her locked away still because you could not bear to face the change in her, either. ‘’
“That’s unfair. Lily.”
“Is it?” she shot back. “As I see it, there is no more justification for keeping her locked in that attic room than there is for chaining her to an iron post. You’ve hired a guard to keep constant watch over her. Isn’t that enough?”
“She brought it upon herself, Lily! I gave her fair warning. ‘’
“And you have given her ample punishment.”
He was furious for a moment. He rose from his seat and began pacing the floor with quick, angry strides. But his anger was swiftly overtaken by guilt and doubt. The changes in Ambrosia had haunted him too, these past weeks. In spite of everything, a part of him still cared enough to worry about what was happening to her. “Perhaps you ‘re right, Lily,” he admitted softly, turning to face her, almost wishing that he had remained in town that night and allowed her to escape, rather than face the fact that, after everything she’d done, he still loved her. Lily stretched her hand toward him, and he came to take it in his own. “I know I am,’’ she told him gently.
He sighed, squeezing her hand tightly, then letting it go and turning his back to pace again. “Could you speak with Bessie about preparing my old room?’’ he asked her a few moments later.
“Your room?”
He nodded. “I shall be moving my things there tonight. I spend much of my time in town these days anyway, so it won’t matter to me. Ambrosia can move into the master suite, where there’s ample space for a spare bed in the sitting room. That way, Miss Wilcox will be able to stay with her at all times.’’
Lily nodded, but was more than a little disappointed by his decision to move his wife into the room with the Englishwoman rather than remaining with her himself. And the reminder that he was gone so much of the time bothered her further.
“Won’t you stay and have coffee with me?” Lily pleaded as he came to kiss her cheek.
He shook his head. “I have some papers I need to go over tonight. And I’ll need to be up early, to speak with Ambrosia about changing rooms...” He sighed, planting a brief kiss on her cheek and forcing a small smile before he left the room.
It was still very early when Drayton spoke with Miss Wilcox, showing her the room where Ambrosia would be staying from now on, explaining that she would be staying in the adjoining room. Miss Wilcox seemed indifferent to the new arrangement, raising her left brow and nodding as she handed Drayton his wife’s breakfast tray. Without making a single comment, she went to move her own things from a small servant’s room near the foot of the attic stairs. Drayton fixed a closed expression on his face as he mounted the steps to the attic. He settled the tray on a single arm and knocked at the door, then unlocked it and pocketed the key. On entering the room, he set the tray on the table and glanced about. Ambrosia appeared to be still asleep. He approached the bed and laid a hand on her shoulder. He was surprised to find it trembling and tense. Almost at once, he was aware of her labored, uneven breathing. He called her name, his voice shaking with concern.
She turned toward him, her cheeks pale, her lips almost white. Small beads of sweat covered her brow. She gave a little cry and her fists twisted tightly about the bed linens, her face reflecting the rising strength of a contraction. For what seemed an eternity, she lay there, holding her breath, clenching her teeth against the pain. And then it was easing, and she was gasping for air like a drowning man, drifting into a near-sleep that prepared her body for the next contraction. Drayton’s hand smoothed the tiny wisps of hair from her moist brow. ‘’How long have you had the pains?”
“Last night...I woke with them...” she whispered weakly. “I don’t know exactly wh-ah-” Her voice broke off as she clutched at his shirtfront, her mouth becoming a thin, colorless line. The cramping was intense, agonizing. It eased only when she was certain she could endure no more. Her head fell back in exhaustion, her hands dropped limply from his shirt.
He slipped an arm beneath her knees and another just above her waist and lifted her from the bed. “Miss Wilcox!” His voice thundered through the otherwise quiet house. “Miss Wilcox!”
He was nearly down the stairs when Ambrosia began to tense again, her face contorting with the pain, her hands groping in panic for something to hold on to. Drayton’s face whitened as he all but ran to the master bedroom. “It won’t be too much longer, “ he told her softly . He laid her on the bed and hurried to moisten a towel with cool water and press it to her brow. ‘”You’ve gone through much of the worst of it,’’ he said aloud, as much to himself as to her.
Miss Wilcox finally appeared, her thin face creased with obvious irritation. “I was doing exactly what you-’’
“The baby is coming.” he broke in.
The irritation abruptly left the woman’s face, and she was swiftly at Drayton’s si
de. “I shall take care of everything, sir,” she told him firmly. “You send up one of the servant girls to help. “
Without a single word of protest Drayton left the room, sending Bessie to help Miss Wilcox before he closed himself i n the parlor and went to work emptying a bottle of whiskey. The sight of Ambrosia struggling against the pain of giving birth had triggered something in him. An icy sweat broke over his brow as the ghosts of the past rose to haunt him. Kathryn…lying limp in his arms, her face burnt beyond recognition. The tiny whimpers of pain before she died. The child, still moving inside her, still alive. The last part of her that was alive...Oh, God, no! He couldn’t remember that-he couldn’t!
He filled a glass to the top with straight whiskey, desperately seeking the only relief he knew, desperately seeking to forget. He drank it quickly and was pouring a second when Lily burst in on him, her blue eyes ablaze with disbelief. “Is it true?” she cried breathlessly. “The baby’s coming? It’s early, isn’t it?”
“Yes.” He looked away and drained the glass. “But only a few weeks.”
“Then what the devil do you think you’re doing?”
He made an attempt at nonchalance. ‘’I’m getting drunk.’’ His hands trembled so violently as he filled his glass that Lily almost laughed at him.
“You’d allow that woman-a stranger-to bring your child into this world?”
“She’s a qualified midwife, Lily.” He hurriedly swallowed a good bit of the glass’s contents as Lily stepped forward to confront him.
“And you are a doctor,” she reminded him angrily.
“She won’t need a doctor,” he said with as much bravado as he could force. “She’ll be fine.”
Lily gave a derisive snort and in a gesture totally at odds with her nature, knocked the glass from her nephew’s hand. He stared at her in stunned disbelief. “You are the worst kind of coward, Drayton Rambert! The kind that’s afraid of himself!”
He straightened abruptly, his face fully reflecting the impact of her words. A tremor of realization went through her, and her lip began to tremble almost immediately with remorse. “I-I’m sorry, Drayton.” She touched her fingers to his cheek. “I-I didn’t mean-’’
He pulled away from her, his eyes hard. For a long moment their gazes locked, and then he spun about and left the parlor. A few moments later, Lily watched helplessly through tear-filled eyes as he galloped off on his stallion in a mad escape from the house.
Chapter 35
The baby was born just after one o’clock in the afternoon, following six hours of difficult labor. For nearly four of those hours Lily sat at Ambrosia’s bedside, ignoring Miss Wilcox’s constant suggestions that she leave, holding Ambrosia’s hand, speaking words of encouragement and comfort, mopping the moisture from her face with a cool compress. When the child was born it was Lily who squeezed Ambrosia’s hand and tearfully told her how brave she had been, how proud she had a right to be. And Ambrosia, grasping tightly to the older woman’s hand, knew that a bond of deep affection had been forged during those hours, a friendship that eased part of the loneliness she’d felt for so long.
The baby was bathed, the soiled linens replaced with fresh ones, and Ambrosia was helped into a clean nightdress. She accepted the tiny, screaming bundle from Miss Wilcox then and shyly allowed the baby to find her breast. At the first sight of her daughter, at the sound of her first cry, Ambrosia felt a mother’s love that far surpassed anything she had ever thought she could feel. Her eyes filled with tears as her fingers played lightly over the feather-soft, thick black hair that covered her head; smoothed the down-covered shoulders; and traced the tiny, squared jaw. There was already so much of Drayton in the baby’s face that it astonished her.
Lily peered at the baby over her shoulder, her blue eyes holding much the same look of wonder. “She resembles her father,” she said, letting the baby’s wee fist encircle her shaking finger.
Ambrosia’s eyes met hers and they exchanged a smile. “Where is he?”
The smile faded from Lily’s face, though she tried her best to keep it there. “He-he had to leave the house…on business,” she lied.
Ambrosia’s face fell. “Oh.”
“He’ll be back soon,” Lily forced brightly. “And he will be so proud!”
Ambrosia nodded, wondering why she felt such a deep disappointment in his absence. She bent to touch her lips affectionately to the baby’s head. A few moments later, exhaustion overcame her and both she and the baby were fast asleep.
Lily nodded quietly in a nearby chair until darkness fell, then left Ambrosia and sought out Debbs, the liveryman, who regretfully shook his head when she asked if her nephew had mentioned when he would be coming home. “He went out of here in a devil of a temper, though,” Debbs added, stroking his chin. “And I’ve a strong inkling where he might have been headed.’’
“Barlow’s tavern?” she asked with a distasteful frown.
He gave a small shrug. ‘’Or one of the others nearby. He spent a lot of time in all of them after Miss Kathryn died.”
Lily sighed. “Yes, I know.” She lifted her chin. “I want you to bring him home, Debbs.”
“He might not be of a mind to come, Miss Lily. “ “Undoubtedly not. But do what you must. He’s no match for you when he’s in his cups.”
Debbs threw back his shoulders and tucked his thumbs beneath his coarse suspenders. “He’s still a whelp to me, Miss Lily. But maybe I’d better hitch up the wagon, just in case,” he added.
Lily’s face showed a trace of uncertainty. “Try not to do too much damage, will you, Debbs?”
It was after midnight when they finally returned. Drayton had been loaded onto the back of the wagon, stone drunk, though he had sobered somewhat by the time he met Lily at the door. Still fully dressed, she shook her head ruefully and almost began to lecture him. But when she assessed his condition more closely, she decided to hold her tongue, forcing him instead to drink several cups of coffee, strong and black, before she would even give him the news.
“You have a daughter,” she said finally, when his eyes had cleared a bit and he seemed half sober.
‘’A daughter...’’ he repeated softly, his eyes misting with emotion.
“A fine, perfect, healthy daughter who looks very much like her Aunt Lily,’’ she teased. ‘’And a little like her father. “
He looked at Lily with sudden anxiety. ‘’Ambrosia? Is she-’’
“She was wonderful,” Lily sighed, pleased at Drayton’s concern. “She has a lot of spunk, that girl. Nary a word of complaint, or a single tear...’’ Her smile faded a bit as she said that, and she noticed that Drayton had fixed a sullen stare on his empty cup. It was wrong that Ambrosia kept such a tight rein on her emotions, Lily thought. And it was wrong that Drayton had left her this morning, to face the pain of childbirth with a cold, uncaring stranger. It was all very wrong. And yet it seemed that neither could change the way they were, as if each was a helpless victim to something deep within, something Lily didn’t really understand at all. She sighed and placed her hand on her nephew’s. “Drayton, about this morning...I-I’m sorry. I should not have said what I did. “
He pulled his hand away to knead at the tension at his brow. “I’m tired, Lily,” he said with a weary sigh.
“I’m sure you are. But you’ve enough energy to come upstairs with me and see your daughter. “
“It’s after midnight. We’ll wake her, and Ambrosia too.”
Lily nodded happily. “I’d like to see the baby again.”
“But Ambrosia must be exhausted.”
“Yes, the poor dear. But I have the feeling that she won’t mind the intrusion, considering. She’s been asking for you.”
His frown was skeptical. “Since when?”
“Since she saw that the child looks exactly like her father. Come along.”
Drayton found it
difficult to take the stairs one at a time, and almost torture to assist Lily in her slow, laborious ascent. Several times he was tempted to pick her up and carry her, or rush past her, but he knew very well she would never forgive him for doing either. For all his excitement, when they finally reached the doors, Drayton hesitated. Lily reached forward to open them. He stopped her. “Perhaps we ought to wait until morning.”
She gave him a look of exasperation. “After you nearly dragged me up those stairs?” She pushed him aside and opened the doors.
Miss Wilcox, clad in a plain, white nightdress and cap, bolted upright from her bed and began an indignant string of protests aimed at Lily for interrupting her sleep. But the moment she noticed Drayton, she stopped short, straightening, gaping, then hurriedly defending her modesty with the disheveled bed linens. Drayton followed Lily through the sitting room to where a lamp had been left burning low near the cradle, just beside Ambrosia’s bed. As he drew closer, the small, dark head of his daughter came into view. The baby’s eyes were closed in slumber, but she sucked insistently at her tiny fist and kicked a single foot at the blanket that covered her. At first glance Drayton felt his heart stop. As a doctor he had seen more newborns than he could count, each one a wonderful part of the ongoing miracle of creation. But nothing in his past had prepared him for the feelings that filled him now, knowing that he had had a part in the creation of this child. She was whole and real and beautiful as she slept peacefully in the cradle. Joy and pride flooded Drayton’s soul. Hardly daring to breathe, he slipped a hand beneath the baby and lifted her into his arms. She was incredibly tiny and soft and warm, so warm as she nestled close to his heart. She was his daughter, and the bond that began in the moment he touched her would last forever.
Ambrosia Page 36