A Match of Wits

by Jen Turano

  Hamilton considered his brother for a moment. “Quite a bit, but I suppose the information that’s going to annoy you the most is that Eliza and I have a new daughter. Her name is Viola—and before you ask, I didn’t send you a telegram telling you of her birth because I didn’t want guilt to be the reason you returned home.”

  Instead of turning the anger that was now evident in his eyes on Hamilton, Zayne directed it straight at Agatha. “This is exactly why I didn’t want to come home.”

  “I’m afraid I’m not following you.”

  “I’m going to be smothered with coddling.”

  “Families are supposed to coddle, Zayne,” she said slowly.

  “And pitied,” he added with a grunt of clear disgust.

  Agatha bit her lip as understanding settled in. Here it was—the real reason Zayne had distanced himself from the people he loved.

  He detested the very thought of anyone pitying him, would apparently rather stay by himself than experience it. But . . . what in the world was she supposed to do with this newly discovered knowledge?

  She’d known he was damaged but hadn’t realized the extent of his emotional distress. Here she’d blithely decided she was going to help him recover his former self without even considering how extremely difficult the task she’d set for herself was going to be.

  Closing her eyes, she turned to God, hoping He would be able to send her the assistance she so desperately needed. She prayed for guidance and then prayed for healing for Zayne. When she was done, she opened her eyes and found Zayne watching her.

  “What?”

  Some of the temper left his eyes. “I forgot you make a habit of doing that.”

  “Praying?”

  He nodded.

  “You used to make a habit of it as well, but—”

  “I don’t need a lecture, Agatha.”

  Snapping her mouth shut, Agatha turned toward the window and ignored the fact another silence had descended over them. Finally, after what felt like forever, the carriage began to slow, and Agatha felt a sharp sense of relief when she caught sight of her home. Four stories of a white stone façade rose up to greet her gaze, and if she wasn’t much mistaken, one of the curtains on the second floor gave a telling twitch, as if her mother had been watching for her arrival.

  As soon as the carriage came to a stop, she wrenched open the door and jumped out, not bothering to wait for the groom. “I’ll go get Gloria for you,” she said with a nod to Zayne as she reached back into the carriage to fetch Matilda, who was trying to hide under Drusilla’s skirt.

  “I’ll walk you to the door,” Zayne said.

  Struggling to pull Matilda out of her hiding spot, she lifted her head. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “Don’t you be ridiculous,” he countered. “I haven’t seen your mother for over two years. She’ll find it rude if I don’t pay her proper respect.”

  “I’m sure she’ll understand, given the condition you’re . . .”

  “I’m coming with you.” Zayne pushed off from the seat and hovered at the carriage door, forcing her to abandon her attempt to fetch Matilda and move aside. He stepped to the ground, wobbled for a moment, and nodded. The odd thought sprang to mind that she should have asked God for a huge dose of patience while she’d been praying.

  Making a silent vow to pray for that later, she held out her arm, which Zayne surprisingly enough took. They made it all of three feet before Matilda let out a high-pitched squeal, launched herself from the carriage, and began running directly toward the middle of the busy street.

  “Matilda, stop!” Agatha yelled, dropping her hold on Zayne as she ran after her pig.

  The traffic on Fifth Avenue seemed to confuse Matilda and caused her to dash around in clear panic. Continuing to call for her little pet in what she hoped was a soothing tone, although, even to her ears it sounded frantic, Agatha dashed around the carriages. Most of them pulled off to the side as she waved her hands to draw their attention.

  “Agatha, look out!” Zayne yelled.

  Looking up, Agatha froze on the spot when she caught sight of a carriage barreling her way. She began waving her arms again, but to her horror, the coachman didn’t seem to see her, perhaps because his hat was pulled low over his face. For a split second, she thought the man had lost control of the carriage, but then he turned the horses ever so slightly and sent them directly at her.

  A hard shove had her flying through the air and falling to the ground, rolling instinctively away from the wheels that missed her by inches. Mr. Blackheart’s face suddenly came into focus as he bent over her, but then a loud scream split the air, sending chills down her spine.

  Mr. Blackheart jumped to his feet, and she did the same a second later. Sheer horror caused a scream of her own to erupt out of her mouth when she caught sight of Zayne’s body lying motionless on the ground.

  7

  Floating through a pool of darkness, Zayne smiled, enjoying the quiet—and the fact that for the first time in forever, his leg wasn’t causing him pain. His body was cushioned against something that felt remarkably like a soft cloud, but then panic stole the very breath from him when he tried to shift his position and realized he couldn’t move.

  Forcing his eyes open, he winced when light blinded him for a moment, and then a room swam into focus.

  It was a nice room, decorated in a masculine style, but . . . nothing looked familiar. Not the dark blue canopy draped over his head or the painting of a battle scene over the marble fireplace, or . . . the bearded man sitting in a chair by that fireplace reading a book.

  His eyes snapped shut as his jumbled thoughts rolled around in his mind.

  Where was he, and what had happened to him?

  An image of an out-of-control carriage flashed beneath his lids.

  Frowning, he concentrated on that carriage. It had been in front of Agatha’s house, but she’d been right in the path of it, and . . . His eyes flashed open. “Agatha.”

  “Yes?”

  His attention darted to the bearded man setting aside his book as he got to his feet, but . . . he was wearing a dress and sounded remarkably like Agatha.

  It was a very strange sight to see.

  “Who are you?” he rasped out of a mouth that felt as if it were filled with cotton.

  The gentleman reached the bed and peered down at him. “I’m Agatha, of course.” Then he reached out a hand and smoothed it over Zayne’s forehead, a hand that seemed entirely too soft to belong to a man. “How are you feeling?”

  “Peculiar.”

  The gentleman smiled. “I’m not surprised, given all the medicine you’ve been given to keep you sedated over the past few days.”

  “Does that medicine make me hallucinate?”

  “I’m not sure, but it might. Why do you ask?”

  “Because you sound just like Agatha, but . . . you have a beard.”

  A delightful peal of laughter rang out. “Good heavens, Zayne, I do beg your pardon. I completely forgot I was experimenting with whiskers earlier. It’s no wonder you’re confused, what with waking up and seeing a bearded lady first thing.”

  From any other woman, that statement might have seemed somewhat unusual, but coming from Agatha, well, it was perfectly normal. “And why are you experimenting with whiskers?”

  Agatha gave an airy wave of her hand. “Oh, just passing the time. I ran out of good books until Arabella stopped by a while ago and stocked me up on some romances, even though I will admit they’re really not my cup of tea.” She smiled, the action causing her whiskers to twitch, but he couldn’t help but notice that the smile didn’t quite reach her eyes. “But speaking of tea, I’m sure you’d love a cup right about now.”

  She turned and began walking to the door, looking back at him over her shoulder. “I’ll be right back. I’ll order you some tea and toast, but more importantly, I need to tell your mother you’re awake. She’s been dying to talk to you.” With that, Agatha hurried out of the room, leaving him with the disti
nct smell of violets in his nose but without any answers to the millions of questions he had.

  Shaking his head to clear the slight fuzziness that lingered in his brain, a result no doubt of the medicine Agatha had said he’d been given, he glanced around the room again. Relief had his lips curling when he finally realized he was lying in his boyhood room, although it looked nothing at all like how he’d kept it when he’d lived under his mother’s roof.

  Gone were the collections of dead bugs he’d kept on a shelf, as were the pictures he’d drawn of horses, replaced with obviously priceless works of art, none of which he thought possessed the charm of his horrible attempts at sketching, but . . . he was sure his mother probably had those sketches in a memory book somewhere.

  She’d always been sentimental about things like that.

  A distinct feeling of guilt began to gnaw at him.

  He’d been careless with his mother, with his entire family, now that he thought about it, but—

  “Zayne, my darling boy, you’ve come back to me.”

  The sound of heels tapping rapidly against the floor came to him first, and then his mother was leaning down and smothering his face with kisses, just as she’d done when he’d been all of five years old and had skinned a knee.

  He felt the old desire to protest, just like he’d always done when he was five, but then he remembered the grief he’d caused her over the past year and, instead of resisting her mothering, allowed himself to relish it. She finally pulled back and swiped a hand over eyes dripping with tears.

  An ache settled in his heart at that sight.

  “You’ve scared a good few years off my life, young man,” Gloria said in a wobbly voice.

  “I’m sorry about that, Mother.”

  She brushed his apology aside. “There’s nothing for you to be sorry about, darling. It’s not like it was your fault that carriage almost ran you over, and Agatha as well.”

  “So I was run over by a carriage?”

  “Almost.”

  He glanced past his mother and found Agatha standing by the foot of the bed, evidently unconcerned that she still had a reddish beard attached to her face. His lips curved into a smile as he looked her over. Her delicate face was almost completely covered by the beard, and if he wasn’t much mistaken, she’d added mutton chops as well, but they weren’t in the right place, since they covered her ears. Her hair was gathered in a messy knot on top of her head, numerous tendrils of it sticking out all over the place, their distinct blackness at complete odds with the red of the beard. A lovely yellow dress trimmed in purple only added to her strange appearance.

  “I ordered you some tea and toast, and a maid promised to deliver it shortly,” she said, moving to stand by his head. She smiled down at him, her whiskers twitching again. “Would you like me to help you sit up? It might be hard to drink tea in that position, and . . . why are you looking at me like that?”

  “I can’t seem to help myself. Your whiskers are somewhat distracting.”

  “Oh dear, I forgot all about them.” She began peeling the hair off her face, wincing every other second. She walked over to a large and battered black case, dropped the whiskers into it, and firmly shut the lid before she turned. “Better?”

  “Your face is quite red now, but yes.”

  “At least I didn’t use much adhesive. Do you remember the time when I couldn’t get my whiskers off after our jaunt to the opium den?”

  “I seem to recall you broke out in hives after the remedy you were forced to use to get them off didn’t work out as planned.”

  Agatha grinned. “That was a nightmare, especially since I had to go to your going-away ball covered in unsightly bumps when I wanted so much to look nice for . . .” Eyes widening, she snapped her mouth shut and began inspecting the sleeve of her gown. “Well, now is hardly the moment to dig up ancient memories. We need to get you settled, give you some tea, and I’m sure you have questions, especially about your leg.”

  He’d forgotten all about his leg, what with all the whiskers, memories, and Agatha looking somewhat adorable at the moment, something he didn’t want to notice but didn’t seem to have any control over.

  The scent of violets tickled his nose again, pulling him back to the situation at hand as Agatha put her arms around him and, in a surprisingly strong move, hauled him upright before she plumped up a pillow behind him. “There, that should be more comfortable. Are you ready to hear about your leg?”

  He tried to move the limb in question but found it impossible because something heavy seemed to be weighing it down. Swallowing, he nodded. “How bad is it?”

  She took hold of the blanket covering him, and when he realized she was about to yank it off, he grabbed her arm. “Maybe you should leave the room and I’ll do this with my mother.”

  Agatha rolled her eyes. “Really, Zayne, do you think I’d strip this sheet from you if you weren’t decently clothed, especially with your mother standing right next to me?”

  Sometimes it was downright eerie how she seemed able to read his mind.

  “Good point,” he muttered, shooting a glance to his mother, who was grinning back at him. He caught Agatha’s eye. “But out of sheer curiosity, would you have pulled down that sheet if I wasn’t decent and my mother wasn’t here?”

  A snort slipped out of Agatha’s mouth even as she rolled her eyes again. “Don’t be ridiculous, and . . . you’re stalling.”

  Taking a deep breath, he slowly released it and braced himself as Agatha pulled back the covers. He forced his attention downward and frowned. He was wearing a pair of large trousers with one of the legs cut off, probably to accommodate the huge something or other that seemed to be wrapped around his leg—a something that was the size of a large log. “What is that, and . . . is my leg still in there?”

  Gloria stepped closer to him and patted his cheek. “Of course your leg is still there, darling, and that’s simply a cast, albeit an unusually large one. Dr. Gessler wanted to be certain your leg would be held perfectly still, especially when you kept thrashing around the first day after the accident.”

  Zayne’s tongue passed over lips that had suddenly gone bone dry. “But . . . what’s wrong with it?”

  Agatha pulled up a chair, took a seat and gestured Gloria into the chair right beside her. Apprehension stole over him when both ladies began beaming back at him, their actions causing sweat to bead his forehead.

  “How bad am I?”

  “Well, I’m sure you’ve been better,” Agatha began. “Especially since Dr. Gessler’s been feeding you laudanum to keep you sedated. I’ve heard that can make a person queasy.”

  “I’m not queasy, and you’re not telling me something. What happened to my leg?”

  “It didn’t get run over by a carriage, if that’s your concern.”

  He looked Agatha up and down. “You don’t look like you got run over either.”

  “Mr. Blackheart pushed me out of the way, but you, my foolish friend, should never have tried to come after me, not given the poor condition of your leg. If Drusilla hadn’t leaped out of the carriage and shoved you out of the way, you’d be dead right now.”

  Agatha’s eyes turned suspiciously bright, but then she blinked and squared her shoulders. “And speaking of Drusilla, you’re going to have to make certain she knows you don’t hold her responsible for the condition of your leg. She saved your life, but in the process you fell and . . . rebroke your leg.”

  “Drusilla broke my leg?”

  “Drusilla saved your life.”

  “I’ll never walk again, will I.”

  Agatha sat forward, reached out and stroked his arm. “Here’s the good news.”

  “I’m alive?”

  “No, we’ve already covered that. The good news is that, according to Dr. Gessler, your leg broke in exactly the same place it broke before, and because you were under the care of an incredibly proficient doctor this time, your leg has been reset . . . perfectly.” Agatha smiled at him. “Dr. Gessler b
elieves you’re going to make a complete recovery. He doesn’t even think you’ll suffer any recurring pain except for, perhaps, an occasional ache when it rains.”

  Zayne could only stare at Agatha, not really comprehending what she’d just said.

  “I don’t think I fully understand. . . .”

  “You’re going to be fine,” Gloria said right before fresh tears began flowing freely down her cheeks. “I’ve been beside myself ever since you had your accident, been praying to God for a miracle, and He finally gave me one—you, back home and with a happy and healthy future waiting for you.” She sniffed and turned to Agatha. “You were instrumental in helping this miracle along, my darling, darling girl. You got Zayne home. What with the dynamite and all, it was a rather odd way to go about it, but . . . I’ll be forever in your debt.”

  Agatha muttered something under her breath, and Zayne noticed that she was not looking pleased by what his mother had said but disturbed. She opened her mouth, but a maid walked into the room, pushing a cart. Whatever Agatha had been about to say was lost when his mother got up, helped the maid with the tea, and then sat with him as he drank it and ate some toast.

  His mother kept traveling back to the topic of God and how He’d answered her prayers, but strangely enough, even though Zayne had pushed God firmly away from him over the past year, his mother’s words didn’t bother him in the least.

  He’d been so angry with God for allowing his accident in the first place, but now he was on his way to recovering and he couldn’t imagine that God hadn’t had anything to do with that. Why, in all likelihood, God might just have led Agatha to him and—

  “Well, I must be off,” Gloria said, drawing him out of his thoughts.

  “You’re leaving me?” he asked.

  “Not for long, dear, but I feel the distinct urge to go to church. After God has blessed me by getting you home and keeping you alive, well, I need to give thanks and . . . a large donation.” Gloria nodded to Agatha. “You’ll stay with him?”