With as much momentum as I can gain from my slow speed, I leap. If I miss, the sodden murk hiding beneath the guise of vegetation will gladly pull me in, and I will be stuck. There is no telling how deep the swampy water is beneath the thick layer of muck.
Thankfully, my heels dig into a hump of solid ground. I flail my arms to keep from pitching forward. For now, I am safe—and trapped twenty paces inside a quaking bog with Malcolm nowhere to be seen.
Overhead, fluffy clouds amble by, ignoring my plight. Would that I could reach up and ride one all the way home. It is too far to jump to the solid ground from whence I came. Even now, my footsteps disappear as the waterlogged grasses close around them. I should’ve listened to Dobbs. Walked the road a ways or strolled along the river instead of coming out here. Will I forever be doomed to act without thinking? And yet if I stand here thinking for the next day and a half, my thoughts will not get me out of this predicament.
God, You have rescued me before. Will You do so again?
Slowly, I pivot, searching every possible route. Behind me, another tussock is close enough to jump to without a running start—but farther away from the edge of the bog than I am now. So, it is of no use. Unless… I narrow my eyes. Past that is another hump, and another, slowly arcing towards solid ground. The distance is farther than going back the way I came, but it is a sounder wager.
Working up my courage, I roll my shoulders, then leap—and land on the next mound. There. Not so bad.
I crouch and spring again, making the following one as well. Three to go. This isn’t as hard as I imagined. On the contrary, my blood races with the exhilaration of it. Another hop and triumph is close at hand.
But as I fly through the air once more, I fall short. My forward foot breaks through the tentative layer of vegetation and sinks. A great slurping noise combines with my scream—and my whole leg disappears beneath the deceptive layer of grass. As I continue to plummet, I spread my arms and grasp the edge of the tussock. Between this and my other leg that is still on the surface, I stop myself from further immersion. A putrid odour arises. I turn aside my face and gasp, but fresh air is only a dream. My disturbance releases marsh gasses of a most hideous sort.
“Help!”
Tall grass and gusty wind squelch any hope of the men I’d seen earlier hearing me. I am on my own. With one leg yet free, I kick with all my strength and attempt to swim through the muck. No good. My sodden skirts weigh me down.
I dig my fingers into the mound of grass and pull until my arms shake, moving me an inch—maybe—and loosening a great tuft so that my left hand loses purchase. I scramble to grasp a new hold yet grab nothing but stinking mud.
No! Will I die here with no one to know how I met my end? Unacceptable. Unfair. Fetid water rises up my neck. How painful will it be when it seeps into my lungs?
God, is this it? Am I done hiding? Is the running over?
Just then a glorious sound rings out. Barking. Never again will I scold Malcolm for such a wonderful deep-throated noise.
“Here, boy! Over here!” I holler again and again, until my voice turns shrill. He cannot see me, nor I him, so tall is the grass where I lie. But no matter. He would not let a sheep go under, and I am the only sheep he has. The thought slams into me, and I suck in a breath despite the stench. How like my great Saviour, rescuing me time and again though I cannot see Him.
Soon, my furry friend thuds onto the mound nearest me. His nose nuzzles my hand. Oh sweet heavens. What if he thinks this is a game?
“No, boy. Pull! Get me out!”
He continues to rub against my hand—and then my fingers feel his collar. I understand his method. “Good boy, Malcolm. Good dog.” I shove my whole hand beneath the leather strip and immediately he pulls. My shoulder wrenches from the strain. Pain burns along my arm. But ever so slowly, I ease out of the mire, until at last I stagger to my feet.
Malcolm leaps to the next—and last—tussock before the end of the bog, then looks back at me. Expectant. Waiting. It is close, closer than the others, but now my gown is lead and my muscles quiver.
Malcolm barks an encouragement. He believes in me, this dog. I dearly hope his faith is not misplaced.
I wring out my skirt the best I can and retie the hem, freeing my legs. Both are covered in black slime. Even so, I lift a prayer and leap. Malcolm springs at the same time. I land on the tussock, Malcolm on the moor. He sits and cocks his head, one brow lifting.
I cannot help but smile, and before I lose my nerve, I take my last jump. My feet hit the ground next to him, and he barrels into me. We roll to the ground—the blessedly solid ground—and despite my fright and angst and anger at him for running off in the first place, I laugh.
“What an adventure, eh boy?”
I rise, not bothering to brush off the dirt from our tumble, and turn my face towards home. Nora will not be happy with me. La! I can barely stand the reek of myself. My poor maid will have to work long and hard to rid my gown of the malodour clinging to the fabric.
As I draw closer to Morden Hall, I scheme how to avoid Nora until I can wash at least some of the sludge off the fabric. At times like this her muteness is a blessing, for I can only imagine the terse words I should rightfully receive. Her scowl will be punishment enough.
I shiver the rest of the way home. The cold from my sodden skirts leaches into my bones. It is not soon enough when I finally hike down the small rise leading into the backyard.
Near the kitchen door, I shove my hand close to Malcolm’s face, palm up, indicating he must wait for me. He’s as filthy as I. “Stay, boy.”
He drops to his haunches. I ease open the back door, thankful when the hinges don’t squeak, and slip into the kitchen.
Then freeze.
Nora stands near the worktable, gripping the edge, white-faced and with a wild glaze to her eyes. She is as disheveled as I. No, worse.
For it is blood that coats her hands, her arms, and smears in murderous swipes across her apron.
Chapter Four
“Are you hurt?” I rush to Nora’s side and circle her. Her hem is ripped ragged, and though she’s not as soaked as I, the bottom of her gown is wet. But no cuts mar her skin. No abrasions graze her flesh. My prim little maid doesn’t appear to be injured at all.
I stop my crazed circling. “What has happened?”
Nora grabs my hand, compelling me to follow. Her cold fingers are steel, unrelenting in their grip. Never has she touched me so forcefully. Alarm rises, rushing as fast as the blood pumping through my veins. Even more disconcerting, Nora doesn’t lead me out the back door. She pulls me through the house, heedless of the trail left by my muddied skirts, a trail she’ll have to clean up later.
My first thought is that Dobbs has been hurt—until I remember he left hours ago… unless he’s returned? Taken a fall from his horse, perhaps? Maybe he even now lies in a heap near the gate. Nora shoves open the front door, and I brace myself for the sight.
The drive is empty. The gate stands open. No tragedy stains the sunshiny brilliance of the glorious March afternoon. Nora drops my hand and beckons me to follow, then hikes her skirts and takes off at a brisk clip.
I catch up to her as she turns onto the road. Casting her a sideways glance, I begin a round of our guessing game—the only way Nora communicates save for writing.
“Are we going far?”
She shakes her head.
“Is someone you know hurt?”
She shakes her head again. That rules out Dobbs.
“But someone is hurt, correct?”
Her wide eyes turn to me. Fear etches her brow. It is answer enough—one that frustrates. Did she not have sufficient work to mind her time at home that she must go seeking trouble?
“Why were you out on the road? Why did you leave the house?”
Nora scowls.
Drat. In my haste, I’ve broken a cardinal rule of the game. Only questions that can be answered by yes or no are allowed. I touch her arm. “Sorry. Clearly something obliged you to le
ave. Something important, no doubt. Am I right?”
She nods, then turns off the road and hikes a route through flattened grass. Hoofprints churn up the ground at regular intervals. Ahh. No wonder my maid ventured this far.
“Black Jack got out again, didn’t he?”
Nora nods over her shoulder.
Naughty pony. Too smart for his own good. I sidestep a pile of manure and huff a sigh. I’d once seen an escape artist work his way out of leg irons and wrist cuffs, all while submerged in a great glass case filled with water. Black Jack could’ve beat the man’s time.
“You followed,” I think out loud, “hoping to bring him back, and came across someone who needed help. A woman?”
Her white cap shakes along with her head.
So, a man then. Of course. Who else would bring such a difficulty into my life?
The path widens, opening onto a strip of cotton grass and milkwort that follows the edges of the river Lyd. As I pull up next to Nora, she lifts her arm and points downstream.
Twenty paces away, Black Jack nibbles at fresh shoots where they’re greenest at the water’s edge—not far from where a body lies deathly still on the bank.
“Oh dear.” I rush ahead and drop to my knees on one side of the man. The pony rips grass and munches as if a human soul isn’t about to depart into eternity.
A strip of cloth is tied around the man’s head, explaining Nora’s torn gown. Blood saturates the material and oozes out above the fellow’s left eye. His legs are yet in the water. Long legs. He is a strapping man—leastwise, he might’ve been once. For now, his cheekbones stick out sharply. Mud covers half his face, matting in clumps on the dark growth of his beard. Raven hair, long and unruly, clings to his brow. His eyes are closed, but thankfully, his chest rises and falls.
“Sir?” I nudge his shoulder. “Sir!”
He doesn’t stir. Nora’s worried gaze meets mine, looking to me to make a decision.
I sink back on my heels. What am I to do? I cannot take a strange man into my home, even if Dobbs were present. Too risky. Too dangerous in too many ways. I’ve worked overly hard to protect my anonymity. I cannot lose it now.
But neither can I leave a man to spill out his lifeblood on the riverbank. He’ll die. Someone will find him. People will question, and questions will exhume all I’ve sought to bury these past nine months.
Oh God, what do I do?
The prayer lifts gooseflesh on my arms, for it rises from the grave of nearly a year ago. It is the same plea I whispered the night I left my former life behind.
A chill breeze sweeps in off the end of the moor, just beyond the river. I shiver. The man groans. Nora pleads with her eyes. The price may be high, but I cannot leave the stranger here.
I fix my gaze on Black Jack. His jaws work, his halter strap riding along with the movement as he chews. I toy with the idea of getting the man onto the pony’s back—then discard the notion. There is no way my petite maid and I can lift such a broad-shouldered man, malnourished or not.
There’s nothing to be done for it, then. It’s up to Nora and me alone. I shall have to send her back for the pony later. “Take off your apron.”
Nora’s lips ripple as if she questions my sanity, yet she complies. Once the fabric is free, I scoot behind the man and plant my feet, then look to Nora. “I’ll shore him up. You wrap your apron around him, supporting his back, and hike the straps through each armpit. I don’t think the straps are long enough to tie him to Black Jack, and Dobbs never did finish fixing that dogcart, so you and I will have to drag him back to the house, using your apron as a litter.”
One eyebrow arches, and the same question rises in me. Are we strong enough to haul him from the river, through the grass, along the road, and finally into the house?
My lips twist. We shall soon find out.
“Ready? Go.” I speak with more enthusiasm than I feel, then shove the upper half of the man off the ground. He smells of moss, muck, sweat, and blood. I can only wonder how long he’s lain here. How long he’s been in the elements.
Nora snaps into action, trussing him with all the gusto she uses to twine up a goose for the oven. Once she’s finished, I ease the man back to the ground and rise. I gather one end of the sash, Nora the other.
Then I meet her gaze. “On three. One. Two. Heave!”
I tug with all my body weight. So does Nora. The fabric strains, but it holds. Slowly, we work the man up from the bank, then pause to catch our breath where the ground straightens out. His head lolls to one side, but he appears no worse off than lying in a bloody heap on the banks of the brook.
And so a pattern begins. We heave. We drag. We pause. We breathe. Bit by bit, we get him to the house. With shaky arms and the last of our strength, we heft him onto the sofa in the sitting room, both of us too weary to care about the resulting stains to the upholstery. I drop into the adjacent chair, breathing hard.
“Go change your clothes, Nora. You’ll catch your death. I’ll wait here in case the man rouses, then when you are able to attend him, I shall remove my wet things.”
She hesitates, but I shoo her off with a flick of my fingers. “Go. I’ll be fine.”
Nora disappears into the corridor, and I swing my gaze to the stranger on the sofa. Uneasiness prickles the hairs at the nape of my neck. I don’t think I have seen him before, yet in an uncanny way, he is familiar. My throat closes with an unsettling premonition.
Is this the beginning of the end for me?
Chapter Five
There were two things Oliver Ward couldn’t tolerate. No, three. Helplessness. Hopelessness. And the pungent stink of an egg poultice. Currently, he suffered them all without even opening his eyes. Better he were dead… unless, perchance, he was?
He blinked—then winced. Blast! How could such a small movement hurt so much? Groaning, he turned his head, willing the double shapes to stop spinning and meld into solid forms. A hard enough task were it daylight, but, judging by the dark shadows just beyond the reach of firelight, night was well advanced.
Several deep breaths later, he scanned the room from wall to wall, focus sharpening. It was a cozy space, rather homely, one that harboured a dog, a woman, chairs near the hearth, a table with a tea set, and a rug. A sitting room, then. But where? And how?
Skirts swished. The dark-haired woman lowered to his side, concern etched into her brow. A pretty face, but one to appreciate later. His gaze swung to the beast anchored at her side. The hackles on her dog’s back stood at attention. White teeth glistened in the lamplight. No wonder the woman didn’t fear to come so near a stranger.
“You are awake.” The woman’s voice, while quiet, filled the room like a song. This was no harsh fishwife. “I was beginning to wonder if you would rouse at all.”
“Where am I?” His own voice rasped in comparison.
“Morden Hall. End of the moor.” She bent closer, the fine fabric of her black gown rustling. “How do you feel?”
Like death. He cleared his throat. “I’ve been better.”
“No doubt.” She crossed to the table, the dog never leaving her side, then circled back and knelt once again. This time she held a cup to his mouth. “Here, drink this.”
One swallow of the tepid liquid was enough. The foul concoction would be better used to fertilize the woman’s garden. He turned away his head. “No more.”
Disapproval flattened her lips, but she nodded and set the cup aside. “Very well.”
In the brief moment her gaze was not upon him, he studied her closely—or tried to. A man might get lost in those doe-brown eyes of hers. How many had? She was a beauty, her movements cultured. A lifetime ago he’d encountered many such women at London dinners and soirees. What the deuce was a woman like that doing out here in the wilds?
He angled his head for a better look, then grimaced as pain seared across his temple. “Who are you?”
“I might ask the same of you.” Like the flash of a spring tempest, the brown in her eyes darkened, then s
uddenly faded. “But let us talk in the morning. You need rest. Your injuries are severe, and I fear you could still develop a fever. How long were you out on the moor?”
Too long. Barrow’s dogged pursuit had made sure of that. The man had nearly caught up when he’d paused shortly after escaping to scavenge a change of clothes and a decrepit pair of boots from a shepherd’s caravan.
He shifted his shoulders against the cushion and clenched his jaw, biting back a groan. “Days, maybe,” he answered. Or was it weeks? “I don’t know.” Hang it! He sounded like a babbling idiot. He clamped his mouth shut before he could shame himself further.
The woman angled her head, lamplight riding the curious tilt. “I suppose it is no wonder you are confused. You must’ve slipped crossing the brook and cracked your head on a rock. The wound was fresh as of this afternoon when my maid found you. She’s since stitched it up.”
Carefully, he lifted a finger and probed a fat wad of bandaging wrapped around his crown. Bulky but serviceable, and entirely necessary. He owed the woman, both of them, his life. Only God knew what would’ve happened had anyone else found him.
“Thank you—and her.” He lowered his hand, then grunted as his arm hit the side of the sofa. Sweet mercy! He’d forgotten about that wound, such was the distraction of the banging in his skull.
“Take care.” She needn’t have pointed at it, but her slim finger aimed at his bicep anyway. “I don’t know how or when you managed such an awful abrasion, but by the looks of it, it’s not healing well.”
He glanced at his arm, and for the first time noticed his shirt sleeve had been cut at the shoulder seam, where a poultice pressed tight against his skin. That explained the stench. Though Whimpole’s bullet had only grazed him, it still might be his death.
Discarding her advice, Oliver pushed up to sit. “I appreciate your accommodation, but I must go.”
She leaned forward, planting her hands on his shoulders, and shoved him gently—yet forcefully—back. “You’ll do nothing of the sort. As much as you and I both desire you be on your way, you won’t get far on that ankle of yours.”
The House at the End of the Moor Page 3