by Lynsay Sands
Mary can fix my hair in a trice, Maggie thought with relief, standing and heading for the door. If it is Mary, she considered with a sudden frown. It could be that young Charlie had eaten too many sweets and one of his other sisters had returned with him. That would be all right, though; both Joan and Nora knew how to do hair, each of them had stepped in to take their older sister’s place as lady’s maid a time or two. They practiced on each other and were quite skilled.
Or, she considered as she stepped out into the hall, if it was old Banks, weary and returning early alone, she would even be willing to let him have a go. Which showed the degree of her panic and frustration, she thought with amusement as she reached the landing and peered down into the dark and silent foyer below. There was no sign of movement or activity that she could see, but the servants would most likely stick to the kitchens or their own rooms. They would probably assume she had already left.
In fact, she decided as she noted the fact that night was falling, leaving the house shrouded in gloom, it appeared late enough that she should have already left. Lady Barlow and James were late. Picking up a three-tiered candelabra from the table at the top of the stairs, she lifted her skirt slightly and headed down. One of her servants had returned early; she had only to find out which.
Reaching the bottom of the stairs, Maggie walked along the hall toward the kitchen, her concentration taken up with doing her best to prevent the candles she carried from going out and leaving her in the dark. With her hand and arm out to shield their delicate flames, she opened the door to the kitchens by pushing against it with her hip. The action stirred a slight breeze that threatened to damp her candles, and, distracted by this concern, Maggie stepped into the kitchen before realizing that the room was in near darkness. Seeing that fact, she knew at once that no one had returned from the fair. Building a kitchen fire would have been the first act of any of her servants.
She stood, stymied for a moment by the realization, then stiffened. The hair at the nape of her neck was suddenly standing on end, prickles of electricity racing over her skin. Turning instinctively, she gaped in surprise as her candles illuminated a figure standing behind the door that had just swung shut.
Both of them froze for a moment as if posing for a portrait, the man blinking as his eyes strained to adjust to the candlelight splashing over him, and Maggie’s breath catching in her throat as she absorbed the details of the intruder. He was tall and bulky, with wide shoulders and thick, strong arms. His hair was long and dark, his smile cruel, and a square and puckered scar deformed his cheek. She took all that in, then felt horror race along her nerves as he started forward.
Crying out, Maggie rushed backward, but she jarred her hip against the table Cook used to prepare food. Instinctively she swung the candelabra at her attacker. The makeshift mace made a satisfying impact as it struck her assailant’s head, stopping him briefly and sending the candles flying. Two of them flickered out as they fell, but one managed to remain lit as it rolled across the floor. Still, the room descended into the gloom of dusk, and Maggie spun away, stumbling through the near-darkness, knocking against unidentifiable objects as she sought escape.
She was in a panic at that point, her only thought to flee and get help. Maggie knew without a doubt that this man was the one who had nearly run her down with the wagon, and the one the hack driver had said had pushed her out before his carriage. There was no longer any possibility to deny that someone was after her. James’s voice rang through her head, telling her not to go anywhere alone, to be sure that the servants always locked the doors.
Maggie cursed herself roundly for sending the servants off and leaving herself alone and vulnerable. She hadn’t given a single thought to his warnings, so sure she was that no one could be out to harm her. I am an idiot and deserve whatever I get, she thought viciously as she slammed into a counter, her hands knocking several items to the ground. A hand caught the back of her gown briefly as she tried to straighten, then released its hold to grasp her neck. Fingers closed around her throat from behind, squeezing viciously and cutting off her air.
Maggie’s first instinct was to score the hands at her throat with her nails. When it had no effect, except to have the man slam her into the counter, his body pressing along the back of her own, she gave that up. Eyes closed and gasping for air, she felt frantically around for something, anything, to use as a weapon. Stars were starting to explode behind her eyelids when her hand fell on something hard. Fighting off the unconsciousness threatening to overwhelm her, she closed her fingers desperately around the handle of the heavy item—a pan, she thought—and, using all the strength she could muster, she swung it behind her, slamming it into her attacker.
A grunt by her ear and the loosening of the man’s fingers told Maggie that she had hit her mark. Coughing and sucking in air, she staggered blindly away, but managed only to take a very few steps before she was again grabbed. This time the man caught her by the shoulder. He whirled her around.
Maggie opened her eyes in time to see the room explode; a heavy object slammed into the side of her face. The world seemed to tip inside her head, and she knew she was falling. Something caught her temple as she fell—the corner of a table, perhaps? Maggie cried out at the sharp pain, but hardly felt the impact of the floor when she hit it.
Moaning at the agony in her head, she let it fall weakly to the side and found herself staring at the flames in the fireplace. At least, that was what she’d at first thought they were. Her eyes had started to close when some part of her brain told her she’d made a mistake. Forcing herself back to consciousness, she stared at the dancing flames, frowning when her attacker suddenly knelt before them. He picked something up, and Maggie frowned as she realized that the flames came from a candle. What she was looking at wasn’t a fire in the fireplace at all. One of the candles from her candelabra, the only one that had stayed lit, had rolled up against a sack of grain that Cook had left out and set it ablaze. Her house was now on fire, she realized.
Her attacker moved around the table and out of sight.
Alarm bells started tolling inside her head, and Maggie summoned strength enough to respond to them. Gasping in pain, she struggled to her hands and knees, swallowing the bile that rose in her throat as she did.
Getting to her feet seemed an insurmountable task, but she grabbed at the edge of the table beside her and managed to pull herself to her feet; her only clear thought was that she needed to find something with which to put out the fire. Water, she thought muzzily, leaning against the table. A sound drew her eyes to the opposite side of the room and her attacker. She frowned slightly, not sure at first what he was doing. He stood with his back to her, fiddling with something. Then light bloomed around him and he turned, a lit lamp in hand. The man seemed surprised to find her standing; then his mouth twisted and he hurled the lamp forward.
Crying out, Maggie threw herself to the side, tumbling to the floor as the lamp sailed past. She heard it smash against the wall, and a whooshing sound made her glance weakly over to see that oil had sprayed everywhere. The fire was quickly following.
The flames seemed alive, like fingers of some monster hungry to consume her. Her last thought before darkness claimed her was that she was going to die.
“We are late.”
Lady Barlow peered at her nephew through the growing gloom inside the carriage and bit her lip to keep from smiling. The man was quite put out. He had arrived at her town house a good hour ago, earlier than she’d expected, and she hadn’t been ready. Neither was she ready by the appointed hour, and she had left James cooling his heels in her salon while her maid had fussed over her. By the time she had made her grand entrance into the salon, the man was seething.
Far from being impressed with all the work her maid had put into her appearance, James had turned from his pacing with relief, snatched his aunt’s hand, and nearly dragged her out of the house without her cloak or gloves. She had rebuked him quite firmly for the unseemly behavior, taken her t
ime donning the items, then walked out to the carriage at a dignified pace. The whole while he’d pranced about her, almost begging her to move quicker.
Vivian had nearly burst into laughter at his antics, but she hadn’t thought he would appreciate her amusement. She’d managed to stifle it behind a stern expression.
The boy was terribly eager to collect little Lady Margaret, which Vivian saw as terribly encouraging. James hadn’t shown the least bit of interest in any of the other available ladies of the ton in years. She had despaired of his ever settling down and presenting her with a little grandniece or grandnephew.
She sighed to herself at the thought. Babies. She did love babies. Unfortunately she had not been blessed with any of her own. It had been both a tragedy and a blessing when her dear sister had died at sea and left her young children in Vivian’s care. As much as she had grieved the loss of her sibling and brother-in-law, she had taken James and his sister to her bosom with love and devotion, treating them as her own. Without those two to look after and chase, she felt sure she would have grown into a bitter old woman. Any babies either child produced would be a further blessing. And now Vivian was becoming rather hopeful that Lady Margaret might be the one to lure James to the altar and begin producing such added wonders.
Her gaze slid to her nephew, and she smiled a little slyly at the normally calm and dignified man’s fidgeting. Then, forcing her expression to a more serious mien, she murmured, “This shall be good for Margaret. Having the child at the opera with us should raise a lot of curiosity about her, and then the Willans always have a lot of eligible bachelors at their balls. Perhaps we can find her some suitable husband material.”
She was not disappointed at the sharp way James glanced at her. “What?”
“Well,” she murmured comfortably, “her brother did die saving your life. It does behoove us to find her a good, strong, well-set husband to take care of her.”
“She doesn’t need a husband,” he protested at once, looking put out by the idea. “She can take care of herself.”
“Nonsense. Once she is married she can give up writing those dangerous articles. She is taking too many chances, as it is.”
James stared at her in horror for a moment. It had obviously not occurred to him that his aunt might take it into her head to see the girl settled. It was also obvious he didn’t like the idea. At all. Good, she thought as she watched him shift. There was no reason for him not to want to marry the girl off unless he was interested himself. Oh, yes, she would see the stubborn cur married by the end of season, or her name wasn’t Lady Vivian Jean Barlow.
“Dammit! I told Crowch to drive quickly. What is he doing?” James grumbled, drawing her attention. She glanced at him in time to see his head disappear out the window to address the driver. “Crowch? What is the holdup here? We are nearly at a standstill.”
“Sorry, m’lord. There appears to be some problem up ahead. A fire, I think. There is smoke filling the road, and gawkers are holding up traffic.”
“A fire?” Vivian asked, catching the man’s explanation and leaning curiously toward the window.
Her nephew went as stiff as a board. “Can you see where it seems to be coming from?” he asked.
Vivian felt anxiety strike her at the dread in James’s voice.
“I’m not sure, m’lord. It looks to be coming from somewhere near Lady Wentworth’s. It could be one of her neighbor’s homes, or hers. . . . I can’t tell from here.”
James was out of the carriage before Vivian had even digested Crowch’s words. Leaning out the window of the door her nephew had just pushed closed, she peered up the street in concern. A black cloud of smoke was billowing up into the darkening sky.
James ran. He ran so fast his heart was thumping violently and loudly in his chest, deafening him to the startled gasps and complaints of the people he was pushing and shoving past in his desperate effort to reach Maggie. The fire couldn’t be at the Wentworth town house. It couldn’t be. But even as he tried to reassure himself, he knew that he was wrong, and cursed himself for not preventing this somehow—for not doing more about the danger she was in and seeing her safe.
He stumbled through the last of the onlookers, crashing against the gate separating the town house from the street. His hands clenched on the pointed metal spears as he gaped in horror at the burning building. Smoke was billowing out of several broken windows in the house and rising to merge into one large cloud that blackened the already inky sky.
“Maggie,” he said under his breath. He had already started to pull the gate open when a hand settled on his shoulder.
“M’lord?”
James started to shake the hand off, but the man’s next words made him pause.
“She ain’t in there, m’lord. She’s all right.”
Turning sharply, James stared at the speaker, not recognizing him for a moment. “Johnstone?”
“Aye, m’lord.” The man’s expression showed some concern.
“Where is she?” he asked sharply, grabbing the man’s coatfront in agitation.
“My man got her out.” When James looked blank, the runner raised a soothing hand. “Ye remember? Ye said to put a man on her until we discovered whether someone were after her or not.” His gaze slid grimly to the burning house and the brigade working to put it out. “Well, it looks like someone is after her after all.”
“Where is she?” James repeated, his voice harsh. He didn’t care about anything else at that point but seeing for himself that Maggie was safe. Seeming to finally realize that, Johnstone tugged free and started to lead his employer back through the crowd.
“This way, m’lord.”
“James?” a voice called.
He hesitated in the street, then paused to rush back to meet his aunt. She was hurrying breathlessly through the crowd toward him. Frowning up the road, he saw that his carriage was still some distance back, and realized that his aunt had followed him on foot.
“Perhaps you should go back and wait in the carriage, Aunt Viv,” he suggested as he reached her side.
“Is Maggie all right? Is that her town house?”
“Yes, it is hers.”
“Is she all right?” his aunt asked again with growing alarm. James hesitated. He wanted to insist that his aunt return to his carriage and wait there, but he knew she would merely argue and delay him. Unwilling to waste time convincing her, he took her arm and hurried over to where Johnstone now stood leaning into a hack.
Reaching the runner’s side, James released his aunt to step up and peer past the shorter man’s shoulders into the carriage. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the dark interior. When they did, he found himself staring at a crumpled female form in the arms of a large, dark shadow.
“Jack says she was unconscious when he found and dragged her out of the house. He sent a lad to fetch me at the office and waited with her on the front lawn until the fire got too hot. When I got here, I had him get her in the carriage. I was going to take her to yer town house, but by that time the gawkers had clogged the road. We couldn’t get out of here,” Johnstone told him apologetically, stepping aside to allow James to fill the open door. Then he added, “She hasn’t regained consciousness yet.”
James didn’t hesitate. Leaning into the hack, he lifted Maggie out of the other man’s arms, then straightened with her. “Come,” was all he said. It was enough; his aunt, Johnstone, and the man named Jack all trailed obediently back along the street to his carriage.
“Can you get us out of here, Crowch?” James asked grimly as the driver leaped down from his bench to open the carriage door.
The coachman hesitated, his gaze moving over the vehicles now ahead of and behind them, then he considered the empty half of the road where carriages should have been traveling in the opposite direction, but weren’t. He nodded determinedly. “Aye, m’lord.”
“Good man,” James said. “Take us back home.”
“Your home or Lady Barlow’s?” the driver asked.
>
“My home,” his aunt promptly answered. When James frowned, she explained, “It is closer.”
James’s gaze dropped to the pale, smoke-smudged face of the woman he held; then he nodded and stepped up into his carriage. His aunt followed, settling on the bench seat across from him. James settled Maggie carefully in his lap, her head against his chest, her lower legs and feet taking up the rest of the seat. Johnstone paused long enough to order his man to join Crowch on the driver’s bench, then clambered in as well, murmuring apologies as he settled next to Lady Barlow.
They were all silent as Crowch maneuvered the vehicle’s horses, turned it on the lane, and headed them back the way they had come.
It was a very short ride back to his aunt’s house, and James leaped out of the carriage—Maggie cradled to his chest—as soon as Crowch opened the door. He was grateful to see that Johnstone’s man had already rushed ahead to announce their arrival. Meeks opened the door just as James reached the house, his eyes goggling at the sight of Lady Wentworth in James’s arms.
“Another accident, my lord?” he asked in alarm, quickly stepping out of the way so that everyone could enter.
“Another one?” Lady Barlow echoed sharply.
James grimaced, but shook his head. “Not an accident, Meeks, and we will be needing a doctor this time. Send someone for Lord Mullin.”
“Are you sure he is back?” Aunt Vivian asked with concern.
James nodded. “He returned yesterday,” he responded, then breathed a heartfelt, “Thank God.”
Robert had always been fascinated by medicine. That fascination had led the younger man to train in the field despite there being no necessity for him to work for a living. That training had been put to use when he was called to war. Robert had been the medic for their platoon, and James had watched him save many men he’d been sure were lost. James would trust no one else with Maggie’s life.