by Laura London
“I recollect at the time Mama said that she didn’t think that Lesley would ever be forced into matrimony unless he fell in love. Then you said that if only Linden would choose someone and wed her, you would accept the girl, even if she were a barmaid. Grandmère, I think Lesley may have found his barmaid.” Drew smiled seraphically at his grandmother, blew her a quick, saucy kiss and made a hasty retreat from the breakfast parlor.
Day had barely peaked into evening when Katie finally struggled from the laudanum-induced net that had enveloped her. A heavy soreness had settled into the wounded shoulder that sent stinging tendrils throughout her body. She hadn’t moved much in her drugged slumbers; a dull, gnawing stiffness added to her misery.
She was aware of a mobcapped motherly lady uttering soothing monosyllables and spooning something into her mouth—a warm, tasty liquid that she swallowed instinctively.
The bedroom in which she lay, Katie had seen last night, though she had been too pained and frightened to appreciate its panelled walls of carved oak, painted white and pale blue. Clear dusk light sank into the room from windows hung in blue camlet, and lit upon delicate furnishings upholstered in striped silk. Katie saw a chandelier of gilt bronze and enameled metal above her, its design based on the Montgolfier air balloon that she had seen pictured in periodicals. By the time the mobcapped lady had washed Katie’s face and brushed the red curls into smooth clusters, Katie was well on the way to full consciousness.
A short girl in a well-cut black mourning gown entered the room and Katie recognized her as Linden’s cousin, Lady Suzanne. Katie shrank back against the pillows, fearful that this exalted young woman had come to berate her for her unwelcome intrusion to Lady Brixton’s august mansion.
Suzanne came to stand right by Katie’s bedside and lifted one of Katie’s trembling hands, patting it kindly.
“There, there, Katie, you mustn’t be shy of me,” said Lady Suzanne, with one of her tender smiles. “I’m the most humdrum of creatures, I promise you. You must feel quite in the doleful dumps; I know I should if I were ill and placed among a motley group of strangers. How awful it’s been for you! You have my every sympathy! I should tell you at once that Lord Linden has confided the whole of your trials to us—you needn’t be afraid a single word of it will be repeated, of course. How vexed I was with Lesley for not bringing you to us at once, instead of lodging you with one of his horrid… well, I’ll say no more on that head. Only that you have borne a great deal! Please don’t hesitate to tell me if there is any way that I can be of service to you.”
“No, no,” protested Katie feebly, almost undone by so much benevolence. “I stand greatly in your debt already.”
“What nonsense is this? It’s my pleasure to have you here—though I’m sorry that it took such a dreadful accident to accomplish it. You must know that—ah, well, that I am most eager to meet you. Linden’s never had the least love for women, you know.”
“Oh, no,” said Katie, surprised that Lady Suzanne should have such a mistaken idea of Linden’s character, “he loves women all the time. In fact, Laurel told me that he can love…”
“Katie! Uh, perhaps I could fluff your pillow for you?” interrupted Lady Suzanne, readily able to perceive the rather alarming trend of these naive confidences. “There, that’s better, isn’t it? I must tell you that I was referring to another sort of love.”
“Another sort of love?”
“Yes. But you’ve taken me quite off the subject. What I had begun to say was that Lord Linden seems very fond of you, which is the oddest thing in him. Oh, dear, not that I mean to imply that it’s odd that he’s fond of you. I mean it’s odd that he’s fond of anyone. A very self-contained man, you know, and not at all given to philanthropy.”
“Well,” said Katie, “Lord Linden’s been very kind to me, but he’s not in the least fond of me. To give you the truth without honey on it, he says that I’m a great trouble to him, that I’m an idiot, and that I make him wish he’d been born eighty and impotent.”
“Those things,” said Suzanne wisely, “you needn’t regard. Lesley has said far worse things to me in a temper. In fact, when I think it over, I recall that he’s said far worse things to me, even when he’s not in a temper. Ours is a very… fiery family, you see, except for me, and perhaps Drew, though sometimes even he can be… ah, well, that’s neither here nor there. But there’s so much kindness in Lesley, I know. Why, animals always love him—that shows I” Suzanne refrained from adding that Lady Brixton had always ascribed this particular trait of his to what she described as the ability of animals to recognize one of their own.
Katie wriggled her toes, watching the bedclothes wrinkle slightly above them. “You see,” she said, looking down at her hands, “he pities me.”
Suzanne was daunted but pursued gamely, “Katie, recall the words of John Dryden: ‘pity melts the mind to love.’”
Katie digested the quote. “I don’t think Mr. Dryden could have been referring to Lord Linden, do you?”
“Of course he wasn’t! He’s been dead for more than a hundred years,” Suzanne giggled.
“I thought so!” said Katie triumphantly, “A dead person! The vicar back in Essex was forever quoting them—and they say the queerest things, too. I never place too much credence in dead people. Pity, in Lord Linden’s case, is more likely to move his mind to irritation. However much I wish it might be otherwise,” she added wistfully.
Suzanne sighed and looked cast down. “I fear you are right. How melancholy.” She thought a moment and then brightened. “But Drew thinks as I do. We talked about it last night. And in general, Drew knows Lesley better than anyone. We shall see! Anyway, I should not exhaust you with my bibble-babble. Let me give you another draught of sleeping powder—a lighter one, though. Dr. Carr was in to see you this afternoon while you were still asleep; he says that you’ll do very well but you must have mounds of rest before you’re fit for fishing. And no visitors, either, until you’ve got more of your strength back.” Suzanne measured out a spoonful of the syrup and carried it to Katie with one hand cupped below to catch any wayward drops. “Nasty, is it? Have some lemonade? It will take away the bad taste, I think. Oh, I forgot to tell you—we’ve had your clothes brought from that horrible house that your cousin took you to. Lesley thought they might be there so we dispatched the coachman this morning and sure enough, he found your valise.”
“Did you—did you look in the valise? I’m afraid you must have been shocked. Those dresses have not, I think, been conceived to benefit female virtue.”
“No,” admitted Suzanne, “they were perhaps a thought dashing, but Katie, I’m coming to the opinion that modest females would do more to prevent vice if they dressed themselves more like ladies of questionable morals. Then the gentlemen would be happy without visiting their light ladies and that would benefit female virtue!”
Katie slept most of the next two days. Each time she awoke, she could feel herself gaining in strength; but after her hair had been brushed and she was bathed and fed by Lady Suzanne or Nurse, she felt drained and ready to sleep once more. For the first time in her life, Katie had every comfort, every kindness, and the problems and worries of the past and future receded to some distant gray area behind Lady Suzanne’s warm smile and Nurse’s gentle touch.
On her third afternoon at Brixton House, Katie woke from a nap feeling hot under her blankets, and kicked them away fretfully. Then, delighted with the vigor of her legs, which had felt leaden that morning, she pummeled the covers repeatedly with her small feet until they were a tangled lump at the footboard. Dr. Carr had set tomorrow as the first day Katie might rise from her sickbed, but Katie felt ready now. Heartened by her defeat of the bedcovers, she pulled herself to her feet with the help of one carved bedpost, and made her way to the window. Katie pulled back the curtain to get a long deferred glimpse of the yew trees and trimmed shrubbery on this side of the mansion when she heard a door open behind her, and the airy murmur of skirts. A woman had entered the
room.
“So,” came that woman’s voice. “You took a bullet in your breast three days past and now you’re up on your feet like a peasant after childbirth. It isn’t decent, girl, get back to bed!” Katie turned to see a striking elderly woman dressed in a modish gown of regal red. “Ha! I can see you know who I am! Linden’s grandma. No, don’t try to curtsey to me, you nitwit. Are you trying to give yourself the faints? Come, let me take your arm. Back to your rest… That’s the trick! Wait, I’ll punch up your pillow so you can sit up to talk to me instead of lying flat as a friar. There. Comfortable, are you?”
“Y-yes, Madame,” said Katie.
Lady Brixton regarded Katie with irritation. “You needn’t go calling me ‘Madame’ as though I was some damned procuress. ‘Your Grace’ will do. Well. Linden says you’re an innocent. I’m not saying the boy’s a liar, but it doesn’t seem so damned innocent to me to stride through the capital in breeches and hobnob with young roués like my grandson.”
“He only says I’m innocent because I wouldn’t let him make love to me,” said Katie, determined not to present herself to the duchess in a false light. “I… I’m sorry if you don’t like my being here, though I like it very much. I never imagined that Lord Linden would impose on you so.”
“Humph! Then you haven’t got much, imagination. Linden would impose on me up Mount Vesuvius and down again if it suited him, and don’t you forget it! Selfish as a spinning spider, always has been and always will be. Spoiled by that mother of his. French, she is,” said Grandmère darkly. She pulled forward a small chair, its back carved in lions’ masks, and sat down close to Katie.
“Yes,” said Katie. “Lord Linden talks French a lot; at least I think it’s French, because I don’t understand it.”
Grandmother looked at her with approval. “I don’t either. Don’t know why the young people these days have to blather along in a foreign tongue when they’ve got a perfectly good language of their own. Damned unpatriotic. But that’s neither here nor there. Fact is, I’ve got something I want to discuss with you.”
“You don’t like me?” said Katie meekly.
“Well,” said the duchess, taken aback. “No call for you to look so crushed, girl. Thing is, don’t know you. But Drew likes you. Nurse likes you. Suzanne likes you. And Linden must like you, because he never walked across the street to help anyone he didn’t like. So I daresay I’ll like you well enough when I get to know you. But that isn’t what I wanted to say to you. It’s this; that giddy Suzanne and little Drew are whispering of bridals—take my advice and don’t gild your dreams with that illusion, my girl. Anyone with eyes can see why Linden would want you, but my warning is that you’ll get any ring you want out of him but not a wedding band. His warmer feelings might lead you to a pretty peppy evening, but they won’t lead him down the aisle.”
The skin over Katie’s cheekbones grew taut, and the slight shadows under her eyes deepened as though the light in the room had suddenly dimmed. “I never thought so,” said Katie in utter sincerity. “Never.”
Lady Brixton began to understand the spell Katie had cast over the household. She found herself leaning over to pat Katie’s cold cheek. “There, there. No need to sink your boat. Only meant to warn you. That grandson of mine’s broken more hearts than I’m able to count. If it’s any comfort to you though, if you ever did bring the thing off, you won’t find me raising objections. Linden’s been indulged since the day he was born; the family’s always given him everything he wants, and if he decided he wanted you, so be it. In any case, you’ll find I’ll stand your friend.” Which was the last thing that Lady Brixton had expected to say when she walked into the room.
Next afternoon, when Lady Suzanne came in to arrange an oversized bouquet of sunny pompon dahlias in a crystal urn by Katie’s bedside, she found her young guest awake. She stayed on to help Katie into a becoming bedjacket of crocus gold Thai silk and arranged a white rose with thick, satiny petals over Katie’s ear.
“Would you like me to read to you for a while, Katie?” she asked. “Nothing heavy, mind you, merely entertaining. Where do your tastes in literature run?”
“I’m not terribly particular, so long as it’s lurid. Do you have a story with a dragon in it? I’m partial to those. Also, I like… I can’t remember their names, but they have a woman’s head and all the rest is lion. That’s what Laurel has, but Lord Linden doesn’t like it.”
“I should think not!” Suzanne giggled. “You mean sphinxes, don’t you? And I collect they are motifs in her furniture? ‘Tis very fashionable, you know, but Lesley is rather a connoisseur of such things, so I daresay he finds imitations sadly bloodless. I’ll tell you what, though. I have a story with both dragons and sphinxes, or at least one sphinx, and I shall bring it directly.”
Happily the story proved eerie enough to satisfy the most jaded palate and Suzanne read for over an hour as the shadows lengthened and the day crept warily into dusk. Lady Suzanne had opened the windows to admit the furtive evening breezes, which stole around the room like sullen gypsies, fingering the frilly table scarves and their tasseled fringes. At infrequent intervals the air currents would change direction and the crisp camlet drapes would be sucked outward, hitting the window’s edge with a decisive smack, startling the ladies. They would look at each other, smile nervously, and plunge blissfully into the penny dreadful once more. A chorus of summer frogs began a rhythmic, sinister chanting in the reaches of the night.
Finally, Lady Suzanne looked over, found Katie had fallen asleep, and with a smile, closed and marked the book. Then she departed, leaving the door partly open.
Which was why half an hour later, Drew was able to glance in, in passing, to see Katie deep in sleep, the fantastic auburn beauty of her hair stark against the pillows. She looked like something in a fantasy, a dream. He was drawn further into the blue bedroom. Drew studied the thick, downy eyelashes, the plush cream of her skin, and the ruby velvet lips. On impulse, he rested his hands on the pillow beside her shoulders, and leaned forward to brush the lips with his own. It stirred him more than he had thought possible, and he continued the kiss until he felt her lips parting sweetly under his, and heard her soft moan.
“Lord Linden?” she breathed, opening her eyes to focus on Drew who was gazing at her, enchanted. Her lovely eyes widened with confused astonishment.
“Don’t be afraid,” said Drew, his voice very gentle. “I was playing Sleeping Beauty.”
“Oh. Was it you that kissed me?”
“Yes.” He smiled. “Poor Peaches, how disappointed you look. I’m sorry that I’m not Lesley. Wish I were.” Drew sat on the bed beside her. “Suzanne says you are stronger today?”
“Yes. I was up most of the morning, walking steadily. Lady Brixton says that it’s most unladylike of me to recover so quickly. She told me that if she’s ever had the good fortune to get shot, she’d have made capital off it for a month.”
“That’s nothing on m’mother,” said Drew. “She turned her ankle ten years ago and still thinks she must have someone to support her up the steps. What else do you and Grandmère talk about when she visits you?”
Katie wrapped an auburn curl thoughtfully around one finger. “Well… we talked about Laurel a bit. And about what her house looks like inside. Lady Brixton has never been there, you know.”
“I should hope not! What else?”
“Freckles,” responded Katie promptly. “This morning Her Grace said that I might have been a pretty girl but it was a shame about the freckles. I told her that Lord Linden said he liked them, but your grandmother said, ‘That’s just the kind of thing a man will say when he wants up your skirts, my girl. Men would admire your bunions if they thought it’d get ‘em anywhere.’”
Drew gave a gasp of laughter. “Oh, dear. Were you very shocked?”
“Not at all,” replied Katie candidly. “In fact, it sounded very much like something that my father would have said.”
“As well for you that you weren’t,” said
Drew. “Grandmère always holds anyone in contempt that she can shock. Lesley’s the same. He’s coming to talk to you tonight, did Suzanne tell you?”
“No!” Katie hadn’t seen Linden since the night he had brought her here and the thought of seeing him again sent the petal lips curling into an excited smile. She tried to jerk herself into a sitting position, but as she did, her vision began to narrow until the room about her seemed to be at the far end of a long, dimming tunnel. She could hear Drew’s sharp exclamation through the crackling hum that overlaid her hearing. A moment passed and then a second male voice filtered through to her.
“You’re all right, little one. Rest now.”
“My lord?” said Katie fuzzily. She sensed rather than felt the comfort of his arms.
“Yes,” came Linden’s calm voice. “Don’t panic, Drew. She’s only lightheaded from trying to sit up too fast. She’ll find herself again in a minute.”
Katie shook her head slightly to focus her washed-out field of vision. “Yes, I will. I’m sorry to make such an exhibition of myself.” She tilted her head back until she was able to smile welcomingly into Linden’s eyes. “I was just so happy to hear you were coming to see me. It’s been three days.” Her voice made it sound like an eternity.
Keeping one arm around her shoulders, Linden stacked the pillows into a smooth heap and laid her back against them; his fingers rehooked her bedjacket’s top button, which had slid out of its silk buttonhole.
“I can see,” drawled Linden, “that you haven’t lost your delightful knack of tumbling out of your clothing. How’s the shoulder?”
“Like new,” lied Katie.
A frown came into Linden’s coffee eyes. “Like hell,” he said. “Little liar.” He caressed her curving cheekbone lightly with his thumb; the pale skin deepened in color under his hand and grew warm. Abruptly, he removed his hand and rose from the bed. He hesitated a moment, then dragged forward an armchair and sat down. Drew looked at him questioningly and perched on the chair’s arm.