Violet was relieved that she had not said much about the place to him. Not that there was much to say these days that was any secret. But there were some things that no one could ever know. Secrets about the day that Squire Wentworth had died.
Violet saw Moses carrying a lantern at the end of a pole with his dog beside him when she broke out of the woods onto the curved drive. The watchman raised a hand and waved to her as the dog turned and wagged her tail. Two of a kind, Violet thought. As gentle as lambs. She turned her steps toward him.
“Your clothes are not dirty. You are not sad.”
“No, I’m not sad.” She smiled, leaning down and patting the dog on the head.
“No moon now, Violet. The nights are dark. You want someone to walk with at night?”
She shook her head and smiled up at the man. “I am fine, Moses. Thank you, but you have an important job here. You and your dog need to keep Melbury Hall safe.”
He nodded slowly, then looked toward the stables. “I made a basket for you.”
“Did you?”
He looked back at her. “I can go get it, if you wait. I soaked rushes I had from last summer and used a leather strap for a handle. Maybe you can wrap some of your pretty ribbons around it and use it when you go to the village, Violet. Wait until I get it?”
She nodded at him, feeling better. “I’ll wait right here. I’ll even hold the lantern until you get back.”
Watching the old man go off to the stables, his dog on his heels, Violet took a deep breath of the night air. She would never reveal the secrets of Melbury Hall. Most of all, she thought, no one must ever know that Moses had been the one who really killed Squire Wentworth.
CHAPTER 9
She felt more like a soldier leaving a battlefield than a woman leaving her ailing husband’s bedroom. When Gibbs arrived not long after dawn, Millicent gestured for him to follow her out into the corridor.
“Please help his lordship bathe and change once he is awake,” she said in a weary voice. “Offer him breakfast, but give him no medicine until you fetch me. I shall have some sweet cider and some water sent up if he wants something to drink. Give him no spirits.” She looked in past the partially closed door. “Oh. The bedding needs to be changed. And also a few spills on the rug need to be cleaned. I shall speak to Mrs. Page about that. And there might be a few pieces of broken dishes under and around the bed.”
“Sounds like ye had quite a night, m’lady.”
“Aye, Mr. Gibbs. Quite a night. Have you eaten anything this morning?”
“Aye, mum. Thank ye for asking.”
“Very well,” she said, turning to go.
“I hope ye are not already discouraged, mum.”
The tall man’s softly spoken words made Millicent pause. She turned to him. “No, Mr. Gibbs. I was asking a great deal of him for one night. I deserved what I received.”
“No one deserves that trouble.” He glanced over his shoulder. “But I want ye to know that his lordship was not always like this.”
“I shouldn’t think so.” She spoke honestly, though there had been moments last night when she might have seriously doubted it. “You have been with him a long time.”
“I have, m’lady. And that’s why I’ve not given up hope like the rest of them. His lordship has had his share of bad luck these past few years. But the way I see it, with him being here at Melbury Hall and with you looking after him, his luck might just be turning again…and for the better.”
Millicent nodded, appreciating the man’s confidence. “Please call me if you need me, Mr. Gibbs.”
“Aye, m’lady.”
As she moved off, her legs wobbled slightly, but Millicent paid no attention. She considered her own luck. Perhaps hers would change now as well, with Lord Aytoun as her husband. But first she had to learn to handle his temperament.
After what felt like a mile of walking, she made it to her own room. Inside, she eyed the bed, which looked like some heavenly cloud. Without removing her clothes, she simply stretched out on it.
Last night had truly been a test of her strength. Whatever assistance the dowager had offered her for marrying her son, there had been moments when Millicent had wished she had asked for double or triple the amount. Lyon Pennington was absolutely the most arrogant, difficult, and stubborn person she had ever crossed paths with in her life. And not having the use of his legs or his arm didn’t hinder his virulent behavior in the slightest. On more than a few occasions during the night, she had wished he’d lost the use of his venomous tongue along the way as well. But then she remembered what Gibbs had said in the corridor. He had not always been like this. Perhaps there was hope.
Millicent pulled the covers on top of her and closed her eyes, hoping for a few hours of rest. Lyon had fallen asleep for the first time only moments before she had left the room. She was certain that he had to be even more exhausted than she.
When the knock on the door came, it took Millicent a few moments to realize where she was and to rouse herself. Glancing at the clock on the fireplace mantel, she realized she had been sleeping for only half an hour. Will’s voice was hesitant, but his message was clear: Mr. Gibbs wanted her ladyship to know that his lordship was fully awake and in as foul a mood as could be.
And he wanted his medicine now.
*****
Ohenewaa sat quietly on a bench in the corner of the kitchen, listening to the worried conversation between the two servants. One was Violet, Millicent’s personal maid, the other a young black servant named Bess. The two were about the same age, barely more than girls. They sat side by side on the settle close to the fire. She did not move—her eyes mere slits and her hands resting on the skirts of blue muslin Amina had given her. If anyone were to look at her, she knew, they would think she was an old woman sleeping contentedly.
“They say he’s like a madman, cursing and shouting when he’s awake, and fretting and feverish when he’s asleep.” The black woman’s voice dropped low. “But she’s still holding her ground about not giving him any of the medicine. Stubborn as can be.”
“’Tis not stubbornness but common sense, if you ask me,” Violet answered. I saw him same as you the first day that they brought him into the house. He didn’t know who he was or where he was. This morning when I took a tray of food upstairs, his lordship was as mean as a starving dog, but he had no trouble recognizing anybody.”
“I’ve been lucky not to be called up there myself, but I heard Mrs. Page say the mistress don’t look too good.”
“That’s true,” Violet agreed. “The mistress is starting to look more poorly than Lord Aytoun himself. And who’d blame her? She’s spent nearly two nights and days now at his bedside with not a moment away.”
The two women continued to talk, but Ohenewaa rose to her feet and moved away. The household was already accustomed to her quiet presence, to her silent comings and goings, and these two barely gave her a second glance as she got up to go. In the servants’ hall she found Amina.
“Come to my room at the noon hour. I will have a tea ready for the angry man upstairs.”
“He is not drinking tea, Ohenewaa. He is not taking any food. If ‘twas not for the mistress forcing him to drink water drawn straight from the spring, I don’t know how he could have survived this long.”
“Very well. Then we will mix it with his drinking water. It has very little taste.”
“’Tis good that you have decided to help her.” Amina nodded gratefully. “How much should I tell the mistress to give him?”
“You will take what he needs the first day. After that we will watch to see how he does and then give him less and less each day. In a week or two, he’ll be needing no more of it.”
Doubt clouded Amina’s features. “What happens if someone else or the mistress by mistake drinks some of it herself?”
The old woman nearly smiled. “She’ll have a couple of hours of peaceful rest.”
“Her ladyship is very distrustful of medicine, even English me
dicine.”
Ohenewaa nodded reassuringly. “I understand her distrust. She will accept this from me. She might even be expecting it.”
****
The edge of the feather bed sank beneath her weight. Millicent used a small towel to wipe the beads of sweat from Lyon’s forehead. He had fallen asleep about one o’clock, but here it was not even an hour later, and he was caught in some type of nightmare.
She pulled the towel away as he jerked his head from side to side on the pillow. The words he mumbled in his sleep were gibberish. More glistening beads of sweat ran down his face and disappeared into his dark beard. He called something aloud that resembled a shout of warning.
Millicent pressed a hand to the side of his neck, checking for fever. As she started to draw back, he reached up with his left hand and trapped her arm against his chest.
She sat motionless on the edge of the bed, considering the battles this man constantly waged, even in his sleep. Her fingers were splayed on his chest, and the feel of his heart pounding within overwhelmed her.
“No!” His hand clutched tight, squeezing her arm painfully. “No! You cannot!”
“It is only a dream, m’lord.” She leaned over him, caressing his face with her free hand, pushing the strands of wet hair off his brow, and talking to him reassuringly.
“Do not ever--!”
“Wake up, Lyon. You’re having a dream.”
“Emma…do not…no…!”
Millicent drew her hand away as if burned. Emma. On his face, tears were mixed with sweat. She pushed away from the bed and found Will standing in the doorway.
“Stay with his lordship,” she whispered to the valet. “Please come and get me when he awakens.”
Leaving the bedroom and heading downstairs, Millicent tried to push Emma’s name out of her mind. The woman had been Aytoun’s wife—perhaps the most important person of his life. She could not allow the name to become a nightmare to her.
Instead, Millicent thought of Ohenewaa’s medicine. The drink had worked. In less than an hour after giving it to him, her husband was sleeping, albeit restlessly. She had to watch this closely, make certain how his mood was when he was awake.
Downstairs, a servant hurried to her, carrying a letter. A messenger had just brought it from Jasper Hyde. Millicent felt every nerve in her body go taut as she tore into the letter. Again it concerned Ohenewaa.
“Please ask Ohenewaa to come to me in the library,” she told the servant.
Sitting by a window in the library, Millicent read the contents of it again. It angered her that Hyde was not giving up. There were no more liens, no promissory notes, nothing to give him any control over her, but he continued to persist. She could not understand the man’s obsession about getting hold of the old woman.
When Ohenewaa walked in few minutes later, Millicent decided to not let her own feelings affect the healer’s decision.
“Mr. Jasper Hyde has written to me, requesting a meeting with you. He states that he writes with no dishonorable intentions. He would prefer a London location, but if that is not satisfactory, he would even consider coming down to Hertfordshire.”
As Millicent put the letter down on her desk, Ohenewaa stared at it with contempt.
“This is a most unusual request,” Millicent continued. “My first reaction was to answer it with an abrupt no. But then I realized that it is not completely my decision, since the correspondence concerns you.”
The young woman’s tired face and gray eyes were disturbed when they looked up. “Before you give me your reply, though, I also want you to know that Mr. Hyde’s lawyer has been in contact with Sir Oliver Birch half a dozen times in the past fortnight. Each time his offers and discussions have had something to do with you.”
Though Millicent didn’t voice it, the unspoken question hung in the room: Why does he want you?
Ohenewaa walked to the window and stared out at the dreary day and the gray, hunchbacked Chiltern Hills. She had been on one of the slave ships with Dombey when the rebellion erupted on Jamaica in 1760. It had been bloody, though, that she knew. The slaves of several plantations, fed up with the brutality of the masters and fooled by some old men into believing certain spells could make them invulnerable, had risen up and killed anyone who got in their way.
The revolt had been put down quickly and brutally, and she had seen the bloody aftermath. The years of cruelty that followed, fueled by fear of further uprisings, had become even more repressive. Wentworth and Jasper Hyde and his father and others like them had a free rein then, and in their hands the whip was wielded more viciously than ever. For over ten years the lash continued to fall without mercy.
“Jasper Hyde wants me because I have seen the fruits of his labors. I saw his ways when he took over Wentworth’s plantations. I saw his calm disdain for the suffering of human beings. I saw the scars grow like the branches of trees on the backs of innocent men and women from the lash and the cane. I saw the rape of those who could not fight back.”
Droplets of rain began to beat hard against the window, spreading over the cold glass and blearing the view of the hills.
“I, too, am branded. I, too, have felt the whip’s sting. And now I am like the old mother of days gone by, suspected of witchcraft. Jasper Hyde would burn me alive if he could. He wants me because he believes I cursed him for what he has done. He believes in punishing the body to break the spirit. And he believes I am punishing his body to achieve the same end.”
Ohenewaa turned back to the room. Millicent’s face showed the pain that she was feeling for the suffering of all those enslaved workers.
“Hyde says his intentions are not dishonorable. That is true, because he feels there is nothing dishonorable in burning a witch with dry wood while her own people look on. He believes there is no dishonor in vengeance. But before he sees me die, he wants me to undo the curse that plagues him and release him from his sins. But that I cannot do.”
****
Jasper Hyde knew that the doctor could do nothing to help him. But that was not why he had asked Parker to come and look at him anyway. He knew the only cure for his condition lay in what they could accomplish together.
“You have an unusually loud palpitation of the heart, Mr. Hyde, though I can see nothing physically wrong with you.” The physician motioned to his assistant to pack up the instruments and leave the room. “Nonetheless, it is critical that you should start taking a few necessary precautions. There is always the possibility that a certain disease might be in its early stages, and we shall try to be ready for it when it surfaces. So before my next visit, I would like you to avoid all sources of unnecessary excitement. The meals should be taken at regular intervals, and should be very light. No violent exercise, and we should begin a series of regular bleedings.”
Hyde watched until the physician’s servant had left the room before interrupting Parker. “I am grateful that you were able to see me on such short notice. When I heard you are the chosen physician of the Earl of Aytoun, I knew you were the man for me.”
“I see. Are you a friend of his lordship?”
“Not exactly. Just one who was greatly disappointed to see him thrown into the clutches of such an opportunistic woman.”
The man’s bushy eyebrows went up. “Then you are acquainted with the new countess?”
“’Tis somewhat indelicate to speak of it, but I was her creditor until the lady’s marriage to his lordship.”
Parker’s interest showed. “She was deeply in debt to you, sir…if you don’t mind my asking?”
“Her first husband owed me a great deal, and she owed me more. I would have been forced to take possession of Melbury Hall in a couple of months’ time, if she hadn’t married. Like all women, she is a victim of her own poor judgment and is quite frivolous in her spending. I feel truly sorry for Lord Aytoun, finding himself in such an unpleasant situation.”
The physician removed the spectacles from his nose and folded them. “Well, perhaps you don’t know, but
the wretched man had little choice.”
“So when, Dr. Parker, are you going back to visit his lordship again?”
“I…well…” He cleared his throat. “I may not be going back. I find that Melbury Hall is too far from London, and I have many clients who demand my time here.”
“She did not dismiss you, did she?” Hyde asked, feigning great surprise and concern. At least his informants in Hertfordshire had provided one useful piece of information.
“Lady Aytoun sent a letter indicating that it might be easier for everyone involved if she searched out a more local doctor for his lordship.”
Jasper Hyde pushed himself to his feet. “You cannot believe that, sir. This is all part of her scheme. First she buys that black witch who killed Dr. Dombey, and takes her to Melbury Hall. Next, she marries into that fortune and takes Lord Aytoun back to the country, away from everyone he knows. Now I find that she has dismissed you.”
“Well, I shouldn’t call it ‘dismissed’ exactly, Mr. Hyde.”
“How convenient! What an easy way to kill another husband.”
“Kill her husband?” Parker said, suddenly alarmed as the words began to sink in. “What witch? Who is this Dombey? You must clarify this business, sir.”
“Indeed, Dr. Parker. I believe you are correct. Won’t you please sit down, and I shall tell you my fears. I believe, sir, that you may be the only man who can stop this whole affair.”
“I…?”
“First sit down, and I shall tell you what I know about Lady Aytoun’s lack of character. Then you must promise me that you will refuse her request to resign the commission Lord Aytoun’s family bestowed upon you. You must save his lordship from this black widow’s deadly venom. I’m certain, sir, that his family will be entirely grateful.”
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