“We were chasing a rabbit,” Leighton said, thinking that an adequate defense.
“What the devil are you doing here?” Patience demanded. “If you came for Maddie…”
Leighton managed what he thought was a convincing coughing attack while shaking his head no. “Fell in the river and caught a cold. Thought I would come to try the waters.”
“Oh, so you are here by accident?” Maddie demanded.
“Yes, how amazing.” He winked at Maddie. “I had no notion you were paying Patience a visit.”
“Cut line, Leighton,” Patience said. “I know why you are here.”
Maddie sent him a pained look and he shrugged, feeling more like a foolish schoolboy than ever.
“Then let me and Maddie have a quiet talk and we shall be able to settle all.”
“I am not convinced that would be in her best interest,” Patience said, glaring at his face.
He raised a hand to the slight scars, nodded and scowled.
“May I say something?” Maddie asked.
“Not if you are going to disagree with me,” Patience remarked.
“I am almost twenty-one. In a few weeks you cannot stop me from marrying Leighton…if I wish to. And if you prevent our meeting, then how will I ever know?”
Leighton’s head snapped back toward Maddie. “If you wish to?” he asked weakly.
“Shut up, Leighton,” his true love said quite brutally. “If Leighton never has a chance to give me a disgust of him, I might elope with him out of sheer desperation, just as you did with George. And it would be all your fault.”
“We did not elope,” Patience said with a defensive look.
“Go on,” Leighton said, rolling his hand as he remembered now how logical Maddie could be.
“Whereas if you let us meet to test out our newfound attraction, to be sure Leighton will do something foolish and I will wash my hands of him.”
Leighton watched the wheels turn in the older woman’s head and a final look of disgust cross her face.
“You are making game of me, the both of you. Now come, Maddie, or I will be the one to wash my hands of you,” Patience said.
“Nothing would be more to my purpose,” Leighton replied, taking Maddie’s arm.
Patience turned again and put her hands on her hips. “Very well. As long as Maddie is staying with me, you may call from one to two in the afternoon—and at no other time.”
“See you tomorrow,” Maddie said as she followed her sister. She winked at him and Leighton found himself smiling foolishly until a thought hit him.
“Wait. I don’t know where you live.”
Patience smiled fiendishly as she led her sister away.
Leighton thought of following them at a distance but a portly gentleman blocked his path.
“That was an interesting way to get an introduction to the most beautiful girl in Bath,” the man said with the slightest of accents. He was of middle age and meaty but powerful.
“Do I know you?” Leighton asked, starting to step around the man but hesitating at the familiar tone.
“Actually you do. I was attached to the Surgeon-General’s staff in Lisbon, Dr. Murray.”
“Yes, now I remember.” Leighton shook his hand but listened to the doctor with only half his attention as he looked wistfully after the departing women.
“As I recall, I extracted a ball from between your ribs. How is the wound?”
“Fine. Oh, the occasional twinge but—could you excuse me? I really must—”
“Royal Crescent.”
Leighton’s eyes snapped back to the man’s florid face. “What?”
“She lives at Number 6 Royal Crescent.”
“Thank you. I did not mean to be rude but…”
“Say no more. I believe you are staying at Prad’s Hotel. I thought I saw you in the lobby.”
“Yes, I am.”
“Perhaps we can have dinner together.”
“That would be delightful,” Leighton said, thinking it would be anything but if this man started to chat about Peninsular days. “Ah, could I ask that you not mention meeting me in Lisbon? It’s a bit of a long story but the upshot is my family have no idea I ever left the country, so I would be in the suds if they found out.”
Murray regarded him appraisingly. “Say no more. In my profession I know how to be discreet. How about tonight?”
“Tonight?”
“Dinner?”
“Yes, of course. Say eight o’clock.”
“Capital. Come to my room. It’s the first one overlooking the courtyard on the second floor.”
At first Leighton thought it strange that he should run into the doctor here but there were, at one time or another, probably a hundred thousand Englishmen engaged in the fighting in Spain. Perhaps it was not so odd to run into one of them in Bath. Certainly it was a lucrative setting for a doctor.
He paused on the street and pulled out his notebook to jot down the address. He saw his scribbling from the afternoon and began to hum the tune over in his head. He wondered how Maddie would like it. Now that his chief worry was over, he could spare some time for things like composition. With Maddie for inspiration, music would be easy to write.
Chapter Seven
Maddie was sitting in the garden behind her sister’s town house, relieved that Leighton really cared. He had not seemed all that smitten but he had come and with that wretched cold. If only she could talk to him without Patience glaring at them over her spectacles. She was wondering if it would be possible to slip out and see him but realized she had no idea where he was staying. Then she heard him, counting out loud as he had used to do when teaching her music. When his voice got to six he stopped and began to fiddle with the catch on the neighbor’s back gate.
Maddie stood on the bench by the boxwood hedge and spotted Leighton glancing up at the neighbor’s windows. “Leighton,” she hissed, “what are you doing?”
“Breaking into your sister’s garden.”
“Well, you miscounted and if you rouse Mr. Glasden’s pug you will be sorry. Wait there.” She ran to the back gate, undid the latch, pushed it open and shut it behind her before her sister’s dog could wake up from its nap. Leighton tossed his hat aside, reached for Maddie and drew her into an embrace and kiss that stilled her doubts even as it made her heart race.
“God, I missed you,” he said, then stepped back to look at her. His hungry gaze caressed her in a way that made her breath catch in her throat. Perhaps it was the new gown and hair ribbons but he actually made her feel attractive.
“Why did it take you so long to come?” It was not what she had meant to say but his delay did require some sort of explanation. She searched his face and saw the tiredness in it.
“Well, I had a flood on my hands. The bridge washed away and I had to build a new one.” He shook his head and ran one hand through his deep chestnut hair. “Damn it, Maddie, I’ve had a rough two weeks of it.”
She looked up at him with concern. “A flood? But if the bridge is gone, no one can get to old Mrs. Peterson’s house.”
“I sent a boy to check on her and she is fine.”
“But Leighton, if you are here, who is taking care of all your dependents?”
“Amy and Ross. I should have saddled them with the responsibility from the beginning, not you.”
“But I was glad to do it, to be some use. No one thought it odd of me.”
“They all thought you were doing it because I planned for you to be mistress of Longbridge someday.”
“So you always meant to marry me?” She stepped back from him in confusion. He had never given her any hint of this.
“That was my plan if things worked out.”
Leighton reached for her again but she stepped away from him.
“I think you might have mentioned it to me. For someone who spent all his time clerking, you are not at all good at communication. You never answered a single letter since I’ve been here.”
Leighton sighed. �
�Did I not just tell you the bridge was out? Nat brought a sack of mail back from the village while I was packing but Susan said there was nothing from you. I especially asked her.”
Maddie blew out an impatient breath. It had been as she’d feared. “But who actually sorted through it? Susan?”
Leighton looked stricken. “I don’t know, only that Susan came to say there was nothing for me except bills.”
Maddie turned away. “Nothing your mother wanted you to open, at any rate.”
Leighton smacked his palm to his forehead. “Oh, God. I would have known you were safe instead of just guessing where you were.” He swept her into his arms again. “When I get home…”
“Forget her. I do not care what she did now that you are here. But I have had to take so much on faith.”
“I offered to marry you.” He kissed the top of her head. “Surely you knew I would come for you.”
She glanced down at her new cream dress. “I hoped you would come.”
She saw he was ready to protest his faithfulness but she pressed her fingers to his lips and said slowly, so that even a dolt could understand, “Just tell me this. Do you really love me?”
He cupped her fingers in his rough hand and kissed them, pulling a sigh from her. “Yes and I want you for my wife.”
“Then I will let nothing stop us, even if it means a runaway match, even if Patience hates me forever.”
Leighton hugged her again and sighed, feeling the soft ringlets of her hair entangling his fingers, just as her smile had ensnared his heart. “Why don’t they want us together? Have you any clue?”
She froze in his arms. “No, it seems very odd. When I mentioned you to Patience, I was sure she knew more than she was telling but you cannot get anything out of her when she is on her guard.”
“Well, at least she is going to let me call. Will she stand up with us? I can get a license tomorrow.”
“Without Papa’s permission, we still have to wait until I am of age.”
He caressed her cheek with his knuckles. “That is only two weeks. We have been waiting for each other for years without knowing it.”
“Yes, what is two weeks in the grand scheme of things?” Maddie looked up at him. “How long have you known?”
“That I loved you?” Leighton held her face in his hands. “I think since I was a boy.”
“But you never said anything, not even in your letters. So you could not really have known until that day in the lane.”
“The war…was in the way. I always meant to marry you. I was just afraid something would happen to prevent it.” He thought about telling her about Spain but knew it was the wrong moment.
“Such as your mother,” she said.
“I shall take care of Mother. You are not to mind anything she says that might be rude or cutting, for she treats everyone the same.”
“I know.”
She toyed with his lapels, giving Leighton a strange sense of her ownership of him. He had all this time been thinking of Maddie as his wife, as the dependent one, when actually he suspected she would be the one in charge of their marriage. Yes, he was sure of it. And no, he did not mind a bit.
“I just wonder what would have happened if we had not met that day,” she said softly.
“The very same.” He smoothed back a ringlet of hair that had escaped her ribbon. “I was on my way to see you.”
“So that was your intention, to ask me to marry you?” She scanned his face.
“Yes, why are you so worried?”
“I thought it might have been some sort of…gallant whim.”
He chuckled. “No, before I had any idea what marriage was all about, I pictured us together.”
“I did as well.” Maddie drew closer and he kissed her tentatively at first, then with more ardor, his hands encircling her waist as she twined her arms around his neck.
Maddie gasped when she heard Patience calling her. “I must go. See you tomorrow at one.”
“I shall be here.” Leighton remembered to duck when Patience came out to find Maddie.
He was glad he had come to see her now rather than wait for tomorrow. He had always thought he was the one who was not sure of himself but she had been grieving because he had not come for her sooner. He should have let the bridge go and put Maddie first. He would not make the same mistake again.
* * * * *
He went back to the hotel and left word at the desk to send someone to awaken him at seven. Then he went upstairs and stretched out on the bed.
As it turned out, the footman who came to awaken him was Raymond.
“Mrs. Patience Carter lives at 6 Royal Crescent.”
“Thank you, Raymond. Excellent.” He gave the man a guinea. It would never have occurred to Leighton to tell the man he had found the information out by other means.
“She’s a widow but I saw her. If you don’t mind my saying so, sir—not your type.”
“No but her sister is.”
“Ah.” Raymond gave a nod of understanding and helped Leighton back into his coat before he left. Leighton went to Dr. Murray’s rooms as arranged, content to renew his acquaintance with the man now that he was sure he had an understanding with Maddie.
“I hope you do not mind that I already ordered our meal,” Murray said as he supervised the laying of the first course on a round table in the middle of the sitting room.
“Not at all. I have been so caught up in my quest, I have not given much thought to food lately.”
They seated themselves and the doctor carved the duck for them.
“Quite a change from the fare in Portugal or Spain,” Murray said as he served him a slice of fowl, crisp and juicy.
“I remember eating while I was there but I have no clear idea now what it was.”
“You youngsters, more appetite for fighting than food.”
Leighton stared at him, trying to assess his purpose. Was it just to talk over old times, or something more? “Not in my case.” Leighton sensed the doctor wanted more conversation from him, at least, for the elaborate dinner, the favor of the address. But the man was not ready yet to tell him what.
The doctor raised an eyebrow but before he could speak, Leighton said. “I cannot place your accent. I keep thinking Prussian but it’s not that.”
“I am Flemish.”
“Ah, that explains it.” Leighton took a bite of duck. “Excellent.”
“I joined the English at Wagram but I am retired now. You, on the other hand, were never in the regular army.”
“No, I was not,” Leighton said, breaking a piece of bread. He could be just as evasive.
“That did not keep the French sniper from getting you, did it?”
“Why he chose me, I have no idea.”
“They knew there was something special about a man not in uniform. Not a common soldier, possibly an officer. He knew you were someone important.”
Leighton put on his most charming smile. “But I was not important. Just had a curiosity to visit the front.”
Murray had drunk two glasses of wine already and swung his head toward Leighton, casting him a dubious look. “Five years running?”
And he thought he’d kept a low profile. Leighton swallowed and licked his lips. “I have a lot of curiosity.”
“I saw you with Scoville. You are the one they call the music master. Yes, you played for their balls and entertainments but you were there to help Scoville with the codes.”
Leighton felt a creeping shiver but waited until he had finished. There was only one way to handle such sure knowledge of his vocation. “Oh, that,” he said lightly. “It was an amusing pastime. I am not sure how much help I was.”
“Hah, you are a cool one. Any other man would have parlayed that work into a diplomatic appointment. Instead you disappear.”
“But I have not disappeared, merely resumed my normal life, part of which will be to marry.”
“The young lady in question. Constance Westlake.” Murray raised his glass in
a toast.
Leighton tapped his glass to the other lightly. “Maddie, my childhood friend.”
Murray resumed his meal, chewing like a ruminating cow. “Does she know what you did during the war?”
“No, I told you, nor does my family. Of course, I would prefer to keep it that way.”
“There should be no big secret about it now. Why so modest?”
“I am not exactly sure.” Leighton took another bite and chewed even more slowly than the doctor. “Perhaps I have come to enjoy their disapproval of me. It is a way of being bad that requires no real effort.”
The doctor laughed. “You are an odd one. I knew it when I dug that ball out of your side. You just looked at me as though to say get on with it. I says to myself, here is a lad who is used to pain, used to the thought of death waiting around the corner for him. Now how comes this to be? I have always been a curious man myself.”
“So, that is why you invited me here,” Leighton blurted out, making the doctor laugh again.
“Yes, my avocation is to study people, to find out what makes them work. I always do figure them out but you have remained a question mark all these years.”
“Perhaps I can satisfy your curiosity.” Leighton refilled their wineglasses. “What do you want to know?”
“I have seen men hardened by war. You were not one of those. You were shot the day you arrived.”
“The day before. We encountered a French frigate and a sniper in the rigging got me. But we were so far away the ball was mostly spent when it got to me.”
“So you carried that in your side for a day. But you knew your life was in no danger from it?”
“On the contrary, I had the gravest concerns about encountering an incompetent surgeon.”
Murray raised an eyebrow and was about to reply when the waiters arrived with the second course. Leighton feigned an interest in the dishes this time, engaging the serving men in some discussion of the standing rack of lamb. He could see Murray’s impatience building.
“What were we talking about?” Leighton asked as the doctor sliced off a portion of the chops and placed them on his plate.
Murray raised an eyebrow, still holding the carving knife. “You were speaking about your fear of an incompetent surgeon.”
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