This Side of Heaven

by Karen Robards

  “John can’t be more than ten years old. He shouldn’t have to be tough.”

  “Everyone in this world needs to be tough to survive—and John’s nine.”

  “He’s very tall for his age. But thin.”

  “Aye. But then, so was Matt as a boy. So were we all. I must have been about ten or eleven when I first met Elizabeth—I’m six years Matt’s junior—and I remember that she laughed at me for being, as she said, nothing more than a collection of long bones.”

  It was the first time Caroline had heard anyone mention Elizabeth in an unguarded way. By the tone of Daniel’s voice, the memory was not a fond one.

  “You didn’t like Elizabeth, did you? Won’t you tell me why? You must know that I can remember scarcely anything about her.”

  Daniel’s expression was suddenly inscrutable. Clearly he regretted saying as much as he had.

  “If you want to know about Elizabeth, you must ask Matt. When he recovers, that is.”

  “I would not like to revive his grief by speaking of her to him.”

  Daniel laughed, the sound harsh. “I think you need have no fear of that.”

  “Are you implying that he feels no grief?”

  “I am implying nothing. As I said, you must ask Matt.” Daniel turned away abruptly. “If you need me for anything, you have only to call. I’m a light sleeper.” His eyes glimmered back over his shoulder at her. “Another Mathieson trait.”

  Then he was gone, back along the hall to his own chamber. Caroline frowned, listening to the opening and closing of his bedroom door. There was something very wrong here, about Elizabeth. The matter would not be allowed to rest until she discovered what.

  Caroline sensed rather than saw Matt’s awakening. When she glanced down she found his head half-lifted from the pillow. His body was rigid, his eyes open and vividly blue. There was a wild kind of fear in the cerulean depths as they stared, not at her but at a point just beyond her.

  “Matt …” she began, instinctively glancing around to discover for herself the cause of that terror-stricken look.

  Before she could say more he began to scream.

  17

  His cries were hoarse and panicked, his fight to escape whatever he imagined threatened him desperate. He beat at the mattress, kicked with his unbroken leg, and floundered about until fie nearly succeeded in throwing himself off the bed.

  “Matt, stop it! You’ll hurt yourself!” she cried, and flung herself atop him in an effort to prevent him from doing himself an injury. “Daniel! Daniel, help!”

  Instead of heaving himself toward the floor Matt was now struggling with her, shoving at her shoulders and back and hips as he fought to be free of her, landing blows that hurt despite their glancing nature. Afraid of his strength, Caroline nevertheless hung on, wrapping her arms around his neck and her legs around his good leg and clinging like a limpet. Her head was buried in the hollow of his neck as she sought to hide her face from the punches she feared must surely fall at any moment. He could easily do her an injury—and yet she could not let go and thus let him do harm to himself.

  “Fire! Fire!” It was a hoarse scream. He beat at the mattress again, the pounding of his fists frantic. It was clear that in his delirium he imagined the bed was aflame.

  “Matt, it’s all right! There’s no fire! Please don’t!” Her voice was muffled by the skin of his throat as he bucked to throw her off. She smelled the acrid scent of his feverish body, felt the burning heat of his skin, the softness of his chest hairs against the underside of her chin, the enormous strength in his work-tempered muscles as he thrashed against the terror that threatened him. Her weight alone would not have been nearly enough to hold him down. But coupled with the immobility of his splinted leg and the excruciating pain he must be causing himself with his frenzied movements, it was sufficient to keep him on the bed for those few minutes before Daniel came.

  “What in the name of all that’s holy …? Matt, for God’s sake! Matt!”

  As Caroline rolled out of the way, Daniel grappled with his brother. But even Daniel alone was no match for Matt’s maddened strength. Fortunately Thomas, followed by Robert, ran into the room, and the three of them managed to subdue their brother.

  Matt was still thrashing as Caroline poured a large portion of the sleeping draught down his throat. She stood by, trembling, for what seemed like an eon waiting for the medicine to take effect. It took all three of his brothers to hold him on the bed. Finally his struggles grew feeble and then quieted altogether. Still his brothers let him go only with a great deal of caution and stood by the bed frowning down at him. It was clear from their expressions that they feared for their brother’s life!

  “What did you do to him?” Thomas turned on her, his eyes flashing. Only then did Caroline register that he was naked. She recoiled, her gaze hastily shifting elsewhere. It took a moment for her to concentrate on the accusation he was making.

  “Do to him!” she gasped when his charge sank in, and barely kept her gaze from snapping back to him. She fixed her gaze firmly on the small table to his left and opened her mouth to blister his ears. But before she could let fly, Daniel intervened. Having apparently been given just enough time to remove his shirt, Daniel was clad in breeches only. Robert had had the forethought to grab a quilt, which he held wrapped around his waist. Surrounded by a bevy of naked and nearly naked men, Caroline still managed to seethe.

  “Of course Caroline did nothing to him.” Daniel seemed to see Thomas’s nakedness for the first time. His eyes widened as they swept over his brother. “For heaven’s sake, Thom, there’s a lady present! Cover yourself!”

  Thomas looked down at himself, his cheeks reddening as he was made aware of his state. He grabbed a corner of Robert’s quilt to wrap around his own waist, throwing his brother off-balance as he did so. Robert staggered and nearly lost his grip on his own modesty. Only a quick snatch saved his portion of the quilt, and his cheeks turned as red as Thomas’s as he gave Caroline a furtive glance to see if she had noticed.

  Though Robert glared at his brother, he didn’t try to recover full use of the quilt. Much of Caroline’s anger was dissipated as she watched the pair of them knocking shoulders and exchanging scowls as they came together in the middle of the coverlet. That bit of ire enough to permit her to bite back the words with which she would have annihilated Thomas. Matt’s sickroom was no place for a bitter quarrel, though if either of them said such to her again she might speedily whistle that notion down the wind.

  Once his brother was decent, Daniel turned his attention back to Caroline. “Suppose you tell us just what did happen.”

  “I hardly know.” Ignoring the other two, who were still struggling over who would have the largest portion of quilt, Caroline spoke to Daniel. “When you left, he woke up. He was staring at something behind me, and he looked—frightened. I checked, but there wasn’t anything there, at least nothing that I could see. Then he started to yell, and fight, and I thought he would do himself harm. So I tried to hold him still until you could arrive to help. Oh, and he seemed to think the mattress was burning. He kept beating at it, and twice he yelled Tire!’ ”

  There was a sudden heavy silence among her listeners. Thomas and Robert left off their shoving, and the three brothers glanced at one another, their eyes pregnant with knowledge that Caroline was not privy to.

  “What is it?” she asked sharply.

  Still, though they looked at her instead of each other, they said nothing.

  “You must tell me. If I don’t know the cause of his upset, how can I prevent it happening again?”

  This provoked another exchange of glances. Then Daniel, his eyes clearly conveying a silent warning to his brothers, spoke.

  “Matt was burned, severely burned, years ago. ’Tis how he was lamed, and how he came by the scar on his face. Since then he has had an understandable aversion to flames. He has always eschewed having a fire in his chamber, and likes those in the rest of the house kept as small as possible.
You’ll notice that he never builds them himself, nor tends them, nor draws too near. He must have opened his eyes and seen the fire in the hearth. He was groggy, and the sight brought the memory of when he was burned back to him. ’Tis perfectly understandable that he panicked. Fire is anathema to him.”

  “Why did no one warn me?” Caroline looked over at the hearth where flames danced merrily among a veritable mountain of logs. Her gaze returned to Matt, rendered unconscious by, she hoped, her draught. His chest was heaving and his fingers were twitching as if, even in sleep, he fought to escape his particular terror.

  Daniel’s eyes shifted momentarily to his brothers, then returned to her. “None of us thought to, I suppose. Besides, he needs to be kept warm. Under the circumstances, a fire in his chamber is a necessity.”

  “It can be hidden from his sight.” There was a certain tartness to her voice as she moved to pull from a corner the dressing screen that, from the accumulation of dust that afflicted it, had obviously been long unused. It was lightweight, and she dragged it to stand between the bed and the fire. Daniel moved to help her position it, and in moments the deed was done.

  “Is there anything else I should know? Anything else that might upset him?”

  “The only thing that Matt fears besides fire is God, and He’s hardly likely to trouble you.” Daniel gave her a faint smile. “Why don’t you go on to bed, and let us take turns sitting with him? You’re no match for his strength, should he wake again.”

  Caroline glanced at Matt, who lay motionless now except for the occasional twitching of his fingers. The bed he slept in was a large one, but he filled it, his shoulders covering over half the width of the mattress and his toes stretching clear down to the foot of the bed. His skin looked very dark against the white sheet, and his hair as it waved and curled back from his broad brow was the color of a starling’s wing. Even the blue-black bristle that covered his jaw and the scar on his cheek contributed to his handsomeness and to the impression he gave of overwhelming masculinity. By rights Caroline knew that she should have been frightened to death of him. But she was not. He was not a soft man, nor one given to gentle words or gestures, but instinctively she knew that he was, at heart, a man on whom one could rely. Already she had started to feel safe in his household, to take root here and make it her home.

  Had he been another sort of man, the kind from whom she had fled in England, what would she have done? The thought made her shiver.

  She would take the skills learned from her mother and use them to repay him for that which he had given her. She would save his life, and his leg, if it possibly could be done.

  Looking up, Caroline met Daniel’s eyes. “ ’Tis best that I stay with him, at least until the fever breaks. If a crisis is to occur, I would recognize it right away, whereas you or your brothers might not.”

  “Crisis?” asked Robert, frowning at her.

  Caroline fixed him with an unblinking gaze. “The fever must break soon, or it must be broken.”

  “And if it does not?” Thomas stood very quiet now, still wound close to bis brother but no longer competing with him for space.

  “If it does not, he’ll die,” Caroline said and was repaid for her bluntness by the graying of all their faces.

  “Should we get Williams back out here?” Robert addressed Daniel.

  “I doubt he’d consent to come.” Thomas’s interjection was dry, his eyes moving pointedly to Caroline, leaving little doubt as to the reason for his skepticism.

  “He’ll only bleed him again, because that’s the accepted treatment for fever. Much more blood loss will kill your brother as surely as the heat in his body.” Caroline spoke to Daniel now, her tone urgent. It was Daniel who would make the decision, and for Matt’s sake it had to be the right one.

  “Do you know anything better to do?” Thomas said scathingly to Caroline.

  “Yes. I do.”

  “Pray enlighten us, then.”

  The sarcasm in Thomas’s voice made Caroline’s eyes snap, but there was too much at stake to afford her the luxury of losing her temper. Ignoring Thomas, she looked again at Daniel. “If he does not start to sweat on his own, and thereby lower his temperature, then we must lower it for him. The best method is to wrap him in cold wet sheets.”

  “And thereby kill him with the ague rather than the fever!” Thomas gave an angry snort.

  “That’s ridiculous!” She glared at him.

  “Hold, now.” Daniel sounded impatient as he mediated. He looked at Thomas, then at Robert. “We all know that Williams is no doctor. The question is, can Caroline do better by Matt?” He looked at Caroline, and held her gaze. “Can you? Our brother is very important to us, remember.”

  “If he dies because of what you do to him, we’ll string you up!”

  “Thomas!” Daniel’s reproof was sharp. His gaze swung back to Caroline. “Well?”

  “I cannot guarantee that he will live, whatever cure is employed on him,” she said slowly, wanting to be as honest as she could in the face of Daniel’s trust. “But I am sure that what I will do for him will have a better chance of success than getting that awful man out here to bleed him again.”

  “Mr. Williams is a godly member of our church,” Robert interjected. “Whereas you—we know nothing about you. Except that you are Elizabeth’s sister.”

  From his tone, this was far from a compliment. All three brothers stared at her as if the statement was well worth considering.

  “Your brother is the father of my nephews, and has given me a home. You may be sure I’ll do my best for him.”

  If ever there was an understatement, this was it. Her cool response gave no inkling of the complex state of her feelings for Matt. He aggravated her, it was true, but the solid strength of his character and the capacity for tenderness that she sensed lay at its core drew her bruised spirit as a flame might a moth. Her father had been charming and amusing and had loved her as much as he was capable of loving anyone, but she had been the strong one of the pair. It was she who had pretended, the last few years, to be well content with the life he had chosen for her when her very soul hankered after respectability, so as not to hurt his pride. It was she who had managed their money when they were flush, prudently tucking aside enough to get them through the hard patch that inevitably came. When winnings were sparse, it was she who had dickered with coachmen and innkeepers for better prices on transportation, food, and lodging. At the end, when her father lay so terribly ill, it was she who had borne the burden of caring for him. But Matt was a different breed from her gay, feckless father. For all his sometimes less than polished manners, he had carved out a stable home for himself and his family from the raw material of this harsh new land. It was he who held the boisterous group together, and he whom everyone turned to instinctively as the family’s head. He was clearly deeply loved by his sons and brothers alike, and deservedly so. She felt a greedy longing to envelop herself in the security he represented, and she admired and respected him too. But none of that would she tell his brothers. It was all she could do to admit it to herself.

  They looked at her, Robert and Thomas wary, Daniel thoughtful. Caroline held her ground, jaw set, head high. Should they object to her ministrations to their grovel for the right to try to save his life. And besides, even if Williams were to be summoned and bled Matt again, it was always possible that Matt had the kind of constitution that would simply refuse to die.

  Please God that he did!

  Daniel was frowning, his arms crossed over his chest. She was almost sure that he was going to tell one of his brothers to fetch Mr. Williams. She held her breath while silently she prayed. Which was noteworthy in and of itself. Prayer was not something she turned to easily or often. Then Daniel nodded curtly at her, and she breathed again.

  “We will leave Matt’s care in your hands. For the nonce, at any rate.” His eyes shifted to his brothers. “If need be, we can always summon Williams later.”

  And on that note of confidence, the th
ree of them left her.

  18

  By midmorning it was clear the crisis was at hand. Matt was unconscious, muttering restlessly, his head tossing against the pillow, his skin burning up. He constantly kicked the quilt off, and Caroline had finally stopped replacing it. To preserve his modesty, she had draped a linen towel over his hips. But as his feverish movements grew more frenzied, the towel was off as much as it was on. After an initial period of clenching her teeth and averting her eyes whenever his male parts popped into view, Caroline could now treat his nudity with equanimity. To her surprise and relief, the sick revulsion that such a sight should have engendered in her did not materialize. Apparently even her instincts realized that Matt, desperately ill and unaware even of her presence, was not a threat.

  Daniel had sent John and David on to school, despite both boys’ protests. Caroline was glad they were out of the way as Matt started to gasp for air. Daniel and Thomas—he, she supposed, to keep an eye on her—were already in the room. Robert, who had gone outside to chop some wood for the fire, was recalled with a shout. Caroline was thankful that they had elected to remain near at hand despite her assurances that she would summon them if and when needed. The crisis had come on far more swiftly than she had anticipated.

  “I need buckets of water, the coldest water you can obtain. Quickly!” she said to the three of them as she sought to quiet Matt. Robert and Thomas rushed to do her bidding, while Daniel stayed at her side. When Robert and Thomas returned with four buckets of icy spring water, Caroline was ready. With Daniel’s help, she plunged sheets into the buckets, soaking them. Robert and Thomas lifted and turned Matt—a difficult procedure because of his splinted leg—while she and Daniel wrapped him in the dripping sheets. As soon as the raging heat of Matt’s body took the chill from the cloth, the sheet was replaced with a freshly soaked one. During it all, Matt muttered and thrashed about.