“Sent her away? But that is insane. You have lost her even more surely than if she was married and living next door.”
“Nevertheless, that is what I have done. You’ll not have access to her and will soon grow tired of waiting. Your kind always does.”
Leighton studied the pale face, intense with hatred. “You—you haven’t hurt her?”
“I have put her beyond your reach.”
For a moment Leighton had some notion that Westlake had murdered Maddie. The very thought stunned him but he pushed it aside. The man might be mad but that did not make him a murderer. “But why? Why am I not acceptable?”
“You come here with that face and have the gall to ask me that question?” Westlake reached out and grasped Leighton’s chin in his hand to better scrutinize the marks. Leighton jerked his head away.
“It was a cat, old Mrs. Horwith’s cat.”
“The one that died yesterday? A likely story!”
“But it is the truth. He is not dead.”
“Out!”
Leighton left and walked back around the house with the summer flowers nodding in the breeze, mocking his unhappiness. His worst day in Spain he had never felt as incompetent as this. He glanced up at Maddie’s window and felt empty. If she was in the house she would give him some sign. Had her father actually done her some harm?
The mock orange bush outside the back door was so laden with fragrant flowers the limbs curved down to the ground. He could remember retreating under there with Maddie when his father had given him some puzzle to solve. She had been a great help to him and he had sorely missed her advice all these years. Usually Mrs. Westlake would bring them fresh gingerbread and milk. How could such a warm and loving person have married such a cold man? And how could Leighton win him over?
It was simple. He could not. When he found Maddie, he would just have to convince her of that. He met the garden boy near the toolshed but the lad only gawked at Leighton’s questions about where Maddie had gone.
Then he rode into Longton village and discovered that the vicar’s gig had delivered Maddie to the single inn the previous afternoon, where Westlake had hired a groom to drive her to Hereford. There she might take the stage for Worcester, Tewkesbury, Gloucester or any number of other places. But the vicar had driven her only as far as the village and not stayed. Even if he hired someone to escort her the rest of the journey, surely she could have evaded them, if not before Hereford, then at least there.
On the surface it seemed a simple matter to Leighton. He would have acquired a horse and ridden back to Longbridge Keep. But Maddie was a woman and one who had probably spent every bit of money he had given her feeding the poor. She might have no real choice but to go where her father had sent her. Leighton’s task was to discover where that was. It should not be a difficult puzzle. At least she was alive and she knew he loved her. If it took the rest of his life, he would find her.
He rode home through a drenching rain and hardly noticed it except that he found himself comparing it to the day Maddie’s mother had been buried. Westlake had presided but with little to say then and no one had remarked it. He had just lost his wife.
Westlake’s coldness to him could no longer be ignored or put down to the grief of a widower. He was contemptuous of the whole Stone family, even though he derived his living from them. Leighton would not take that away, for revenge was not in his style. Besides, he would marry Maddie wherever he found her and Westlake would have to accept him, like it or not.
* * * * *
Maddie looked out the window of the coach, straining to see if Leighton might be coming yet. She had stayed the night in Hereford at the same inn as the old hostler who was in charge of her trip. She had written a quick note to Leighton and given it to the innkeeper to post but the hostler had caught her at it. Probably he told the innkeeper they were trying to prevent an elopement, so she wouldn’t give much for Leighton’s chances of getting the letter. She could have escaped the inn but could never have walked the whole way to Longbridge Keep. She had considered it but she might have missed Leighton if he came cross-country. Besides, she still hated the idea of begging for refuge.
The hostler had bought her ticket this morning and waited to put her on the stage to Gloucester. At the last minute he had put a few coins into her hand, possibly enough to feed her until she got to her sister’s house in Bath but not enough to get back to Leighton.
The steps were put up, the door closed and the team started forward, slamming her against the seat. She felt powerless to stop what was happening to her and she hated that. Whatever the outcome she would never let her father have control of her again. If he ever wrote Patience that she was to come home again, she would refuse and if he came to wrest her away, she would leave. By then she would have been able to communicate with Leighton or find a position for herself.
She realized with a start that she had already doubted Leighton, that she did not absolutely believe he would find her. She pondered for a time if it was worse to know that he loved her and then have that snatched away rather than never know. She had to agree with the storybooks on this one. His declaration of love, however incongruously delivered in a grave, was precious to her and she had to nurture it and not lose hope.
If he had started out after her at one o’clock yesterday he could not possibly be to Hereford by now, even if he rode his horse to death. And she certainly did not want that. Perhaps he would overtake her at Gloucester.
* * * * *
The downpour through that day and the next gave Leighton plenty of time to pace the study and speculate on where Maddie had been sent. He couldn’t take either of his beasts out in this weather, though he had ridden in such drenchings often enough in the Peninsula. Maddie had a sister near York and one in Bath. It would make more sense if the vicar had sent her to York, since Faith lived in the country and might be hard to locate but Bath was no more than two days ride. It would be foolish not to try to see if she were staying with Patience. As soon as Ross returned to take care of things and the weather cleared he would saddle Chandros and follow her.
Then it hit him that he had seen Nat ride out on one of the plough horses just after Amy and Ross had arrived for dinner that first night. Had his mother sent a note to warn Westlake that Leighton meant to call? Perhaps she had more to do with the blatant refusal than the vicar. Most such men would have been glad to see a daughter so well married. It would be something to task his mother with when she blew up over him getting the chimneys cleaned.
Leighton hit his fist on the desk. Would it never stop raining? He could ride as far as Hereford and take a coach to Bath but he hated to leave the place unattended. With Ross gone and the weather so uncertain, anything might happen to the tenants and someone had to be here to make decisions.
Over the next few days the downpour turned the fields into quagmires and the roads into torture traps. They had gotten all the herds and flocks under shelter and were feeding them the remains of last year’s hay. The sheep had already been shorn but if they couldn’t get them dry, they would have wool maggot, hoof rot, or some equally disgusting malady among them. The men were hugging the firesides, not looking forward to replanting what the wretched weather was rotting in the field, when the boy set to watch the river brought word that the stone bridge had washed away.
Leighton had Chandros saddled. Instead of the romp the horse was expecting, Leighton rode him to the river in the early dawn to assess the damage. He would have to lay a new bridge and speedily. There would be no getting to or from the village until the work was done. At least he did not have to prepare a new site. The stone pillars on either bank were sound. It was the one in the middle that had given way.
He decided they would have to construct the crane on the other bank while all the teams that could be mustered dragged the beams into place. But to get material across in this flood, someone would have to cross with the first rope.
The next day the wood and ropes for the crane had been dragged
to the bank. It was still misting but not so badly that they could not work in it. The men urged him to ride across but he would not risk Chandros or Jasper in such a current. Even if Leighton was swept downstream during his swim, he would have the end of the rope. So he took off his boots, stripped to his breeches, tied the rope about himself and leaped out, grateful for all the swimming practice as a boy.
He had been prepared for a strong current but this one caught him and had him at its mercy. As he had calculated, the sweep of the river around the bend drove him against the other bank and he was only a hundred yards downstream when he climbed out. A cheer went up and he felt grander than he ever had in the Peninsula. At least this was constructive work.
He oversaw operations himself. After pulling across a block and tackle he was able to winch over a boat with three men. Then they pulled across the wood for the crane and he started them on the assembly of that as he oversaw the dragging of the beams to the river with all those attendant difficulties. Both tasks took days because of the rain and unexpected cold.
Each night they had to make their work secure and get everyone back across. He fed them in the large kitchen at the keep where they dried their clothes before carrying provisions home for their families. He had to admit he enjoyed the camaraderie but he would have relished this first big project more if only he was not so worried about Maddie.
The rain let up after a week but the river ran high another day and a half as he tested and improved the crane. With the beams parked at the edge of the bank, the workers began winching the end of the first one across. When its weight levered off the opposite bank, it looked as if it would slide into the raging torrent but the crane held and they winched the end across and into place as slick as you please. He really thought they all believed it was a happy accident until the second one slipped into place just as easily. Then they cheered. But they set to work again and nailed the braces and planking into place. The work went faster now even through the rain returned intermittently.
Leighton had dispatched one express to Ross, now begging him to keep the ladies in town as long as possible since there would be no way to get them home without a long detour on very bad roads. There was every chance that some other bridge or ford would be impassible and they could not make it at all.
In his mind he kept going over Maddie’s possible route. It had only just started to rain when she left, so if she were bound for Bath she should have been safe enough but possibly not if she were traveling the whole way to York.
Then it occurred to him he should have sent a lad into the village, even if he had to walk, to see if Maddie had sent a letter. Well, in another day he could go himself. But why hadn’t he put her first? Possibly because he was a man of duty and he knew she would understand since she was a creature of duty herself. Still, he should have thought of it, even though he was so tired each night he was asleep as soon as he stretched out in bed.
Chapter Five
It was nearly dark and the men were dumping the last loads of gravel and stone for the new approaches to the bridge when the Longbridge carriage pulled by job horses came into sight.
His mother leaned out the window to assess the situation and shouted for Leighton to get inside before he caught his death. He shook his head no and rode ahead of them toward the house. He had to tell Cook the men would be coming in early to eat and he wanted her to get the servants to bundle up extra food for them. Besides, he had to get their pay ready for them. They had more than earned it.
Only Susan and his mother were in the coach, which meant they had left Ross’ family at their home. How like his mother to ignore flood and devastation, to have no word of admiration for their quite remarkable feat but only to worry about him catching cold. Well, he would probably satisfy her on that score, for he had inhaled a bit of water in his swim and had not been able to get his lungs clear this whole week.
Worst of all, he had not been able to pursue Maddie. What if her coach had broken down? She could have been stranded anywhere in this weather. He had put his duty to Longbridge ahead of her welfare, just as he had always put his war duties ahead of her. If she had reached Bath safely, surely she would have sent him word. Of course, with the bridge out, no mail could have come until today. But he would find out tomorrow when he rode to the village.
“Soaked to the skin!” his mother chanted as she invaded Leighton’s bedroom later. “Malcolm, how could you allow this?”
“He’s your butler, Mother,” Leighton croaked, “Not my keeper.”
“And well you have need of a keeper. More hot water, Malcolm and be quick about it. Someone start a fire.”
“I am a grown man,” Leighton said nasally, then coughed. “And I want no fire in this room. The smoke will kill me.”
“With as little sense as a boy. Do you not recall how subject you are to inflammation of the lungs?”
“Vividly,” Leighton replied, toweling his hair dry, “but I have not had a single case of it since I left home.”
“You may have killed yourself over a stupid bridge. All so that we could get home again.” His mother then burst into tears and Leighton regretted arguing with her. He embraced her even though he was getting her terribly wet.
“Were the roads very bad?”
“Very.” She looked up at him with tired, reddened eyes, clutching the damp lapels of his coat. “We should have stayed in London but I was worried about you, what you might be doing and I was right to worry. You were engaged in just such stupid behavior as will be your death.”
“Someone had to manage the construction.”
“Someone else could have.”
“Actually, no.” Leighton released her and smiled into her worried face, glad that she cared so much about him, even if she had an odd way of showing it. “These men are willing and courageous but they have not the knowledge to plan such a project. We worked well together. Did you see how proud they were that they had finished just in time for you to drive across it?”
“Yes, I saw. But it will cost you dear.”
“You seem to forget. I spent years away at school in unheated rooms without taking the slightest harm, not so much as a sniffle and I almost never need a fire in my London lodgings. And when I was in—”
She looked at him expectantly but he could not tell her, not while she was this distraught.
“I do not believe you, Leighton. I think you almost died many times these past years and are too stubborn to tell me.”
He forced a smile to his face. “You worry about me too much. Now go and see to your baggage. I am sure you have bought ells of material and if it has got wet, you will have to dry it.”
“Don’t you realize how important you are?”
Leighton laughed and stripped off his wet coat. “In the great scheme of things, I am not that important.”
“Nothing must happen to you.”
Leighton hesitated, then began to unbutton his wet shirt. “Why not?”
“If you die, we lose Longbridge Keep. It goes to some relative we do not even know.”
Leighton felt his jaw clench and a shiver run through him that had nothing to do with his illness. “Yes. How could I have forgotten that. Much does depend on me.”
She did go away then, without even realizing how she had hurt him. He could feel the fever mounting as he changed into dry clothes, then went to the kitchen to count out the money for his work crew. He overpaid all of them, for not one had let him down. Then he told them to report to Ross on the morrow since he had a trip to make. He tried not to cough, not to let them see his weakness and they left after their meal happy and victorious. He needed sleep more than anything so he crawled up to bed.
His mother returned later to add another coverlet to the pile that seemed to be crushing Leighton’s chest. When she woke him he discovered Malcolm had started a smoky fire in the fireplace even though Leighton told him not to. He drank the tea they gave him but knew it was doing no good. He had spent many a night as a boy sitting up sleep
ing to try to keep his lungs clear and he did not look forward to the experience.
As soon as his mother and Malcolm left him alone, he escaped the laden bed and flung open the window for some cool air. This, of course, made the fireplace in his room smoke even more now that it could finally draw through the window, so he put on his robe and made his way to the kitchen. Cook was sitting up, as he knew she would be.
“What do you want to try? Horehound or mint?” she asked as she went to the fireplace.
“Mix them and make it strong, Cook. I’ll need all the help I can get to fight this off.”
“They never listen to you,” she said as she picked up the kettle of hot water with the tail of her apron. “I have some licorice root here as well.” She poured boiling water into the teapot and Leighton thought he could smell the mint brewing already.
“And I never listen to them. It’s a fair exchange, I suppose.” Leighton coughed from deep in his chest.
“I’ve warned them about the chimneys but your mother won’t have them cleaned. Too much dust, she says in the spring. Then in the fall, it’s we’ll wait until spring.”
“I’ll see to it…when I can. You did great work yourself, cooking for so many these past days.”
“It was a joy seeing them all work together. You have a way with people. Your father had it and so do you. That’s one thing your mother cannot take from you.”
“Cook?”
“Aye?”
“You’ve known Vicar Westlake all his life.”
“Aye. I’ll not say aught against a man of the cloth.” She swirled a spoon through the tea and sniffed it before pouring it through a strainer into a pewter tankard.
Leighton watched her attentively. “He always seemed a good sort but have you ever doubted his reason?”
“He may pass as a vicar but as a man—he was like a dog over a bone with his poor wife and treated the girls little better. The man would be more suited to be a jailer.”
“Why did no one ever tell me?”
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