Elisabeth Kidd (5 page)

She was even hungrier when she got out to dry herself off in the sunshine. She insisted on putting the shift back on, telling Rose that she was perfectly comfortable in it. Rose shook her head, but allowed her this whim.

Impulsively, Sabina bent down to kiss the leathered old cheek. Rose laughed and called her a minx, which somehow put the two of them in perfect harmony, so that when they returned to the bow of the boat to find James laying a table in the shade of a large willow tree protruding from the canal bank, they had their arms awkwardly but affectionately around each other’s waists.

Rose went off to finish the cooking, while James sat Sabina down and poured her a large cup of coffee from a tin pot. She took it gratefully, added some warm milk, and devoured three slices of toast before Rose came back with a tray loaded down with eggs, more toast, half-a-dozen rashers of bacon, two freshly fried trout, a pot of jam, a basket of strawberries, and a pitcher of milk.

Sabina attacked this simple but generous repast with no coy exclamations about its being far too much for her, and James watched with appreciative amusement as she worked her way through it. He polished off most of the bacon and two of the eggs himself, but Sabina paid no attention to his depredations into her feast. When she had finished, she sat back in her wooden chair with a contented sigh.

“I’ve never tasted anything so delicious in my life,” she said, closing her eyes and turning her face up to the sun. But when James had made no response to her remark after a few minutes, she opened them again and looked at him.

“Yes, I know—I don’t remember any other meals.”

She supposed she ought to show more concern about that, but almost—here in the morning sunshine, with a light breeze blowing off the water and James Owen sitting across from her—she felt so at home that nothing but the present seemed to matter. She almost wished she
could
forget her past. Here she felt new-born, without past or family or impossible decisions to concern herself with. Her skin positively tingled with happiness.

This blissful state could not last, of course, and even if she tried to prolong it, someone would discover, sooner or later, what had happened to her. She sighed and resigned herself to the inevitable. She knew, too, that it would be better if she controlled when and how this charming idyll would end.

But not just yet.

“You haven’t even asked your own name,” James said, with laughter—and sympathy, too, she thought—glinting in his blue eyes. “Do you remember it?”

She thought for a moment. She ought to take some small step toward her “recovery,” but if she told him her name, he would send for her family, and that would be the end of her holiday. She screwed up her face as if she were trying very hard to remember and said finally, “No.”

He moved his large, sun-browned hand to encase her smaller one in it. The gesture made Sabina feel oddly fragile and in need of his protection, although she ordinarily would not consider herself anything of the sort. Indeed, she had always prided herself on her ability to take care of her own affairs.

“Never mind,” he said. “It will come to you. Doubtless you will remember everything very soon if you do not try too hard to do so.”

She smiled weakly at him. “But you must call me something in the meanwhile.” Rose had called her ‘deary’, but that would never do, much as she would have liked to suggest it.

“What about Elaine?” he said. “Just for now.”

“Mallory’s Fair Maid of Astolat? She came to a tragic end, as I recall, although I daresay she did so very romantically. I had as well be Ophelia, who also had a passion for floating on streams.”

He laughed and looked a little abashed. “Well, at least you remember your reading! But that was an unfortunate suggestion. Let me try again—what about Miranda, who was shipwrecked but found a brave new world?”

“Miranda I shall be then.”

Oh, dear, she had almost given herself away by her lamentably thorough education. This was going to be more difficult than she had anticipated. What ought she to “remember” and what would she not have known in any case? She thought it would be credible if she remembered distant events—such as her early reading—rather than the recent past. It would be still better to make him tell her about himself; she would be less likely to be caught out in an error that way. In any case, she liked the comforting idea of James Owen taking care of her far too much to let her mind be occupied by any other thoughts for now.

“Whose boat is this?” she asked, steering the conversation to their more immediate surroundings. “Yours?”

“No, it belongs to Rose and her husband, George Theak. I’m the lockkeeper at Inverley, on the main canal. You were on the boat with them when the accident happened. George and his son Bill are at the lock now, minding it for me while I help Rose look after you.”

Sabina accepted this as likely; she had supposed he must be connected with the canal, and a lockkeeper was at least a step up from a boatman. She repeated the names he had mentioned aloud, then shook her head and expressed regret that none of them had any association for her. She noticed that Rose had quietly disappeared, leaving her alone with James Owen, which was possibly indiscreet of her, but she could not help feeling grateful.

She looked around at the boat and at the tollpath along the bank. Just beyond that lay the road to Bromleigh Hall. Someone she knew could come along at any moment and see her on deck. She smiled to herself. She would, for once in her life, think only of the present moment.

“Tell me about yourself,” she invited him boldly. “Were you born in this part of the county? Who were your family?”

He hesitated, pouring out another cup of coffee for them both, then clearing away the remains of their breakfast feast before sitting down opposite her again. Sabina waited as patiently as she could.

He did not look directly at her when he spoke, letting his gaze drift instead over the sun-dappled water, as if he were apprehensive about her reaction to his tale. She tried to look eager and accepting.

“I was born in Ashtonbury village,” he said. “But I’ve not been home in some years. Both my parents died when I was a boy, and I’ve been in the Army since I was twenty.”

He paused then, and it occurred to her that he was oddly reluctant to reveal himself to her. Could he have guessed that she came from one of the great estates nearby?

“How long have you been a lockkeeper?” she asked, hoping that was neutral ground.

He smiled and said, rather ruefully, “Not very long. I’m afraid I’m rather clumsy at the work. If not for George’s advice, I’d make a proper muddle of it.”

“It must be satisfying work.”

“Yes, I’ve always liked working with my hands and having something to show for it in the end.”

She realized for the first time that she had never acquired any useful skills. She could not even set a straight seam or muddle through a tune on the pianoforte without a wrong note or two. She wondered if Rose would teach her to cook, although she could not imagine ever having a need to do so for herself. Of course, if she lived at Carling…

But she would not think about that yet.

“Have you known Rose and George all your life?” she asked.

“Nearly,” he said, but did not elaborate. Sabina tried not to ask any more questions; perhaps he was one of those men who found nothing more exasperating than an inquisitive female. Indeed, he raised his hand to run his long fingers through his hair in an impatient gesture.

This drew her attention to something, and she remarked without thinking, “You are not wearing your signet ring.”

Chapter 4

This was going to be more difficult than he had anticipated.

But how could he have anticipated that she would remember the ring he had been wearing that first day? What else might he have done or said to give himself away?

“It belonged to a friend,” he said at last. “He was killed in Spain.”

She lowered her eyes and said hesitantly, “I’m sorry. It must have been terrible for you, seeing your friends…”

“Yes.”

In fact, the ring had belonged to Peter Ogilvey, and her loss was surely greater than his in that regard. Did she perhaps remember that at some unconscious level? But this was not a part of her memory he ought to probe too closely.

There was a moment’s awkward silence before she said, “I’m so sorry. I do not mean to probe, but…well, everything is new to me and…”

“And you hope to find something that will stir your own memory. That’s only to be expected, and you must pardon me for seeming to be so unforthcoming. I did not wish to startle you into remembering something unpleasant.”

She smiled shakily, and he had the sense of a curtain falling between them. A conversation that had been easy and enjoyable moments before had become awkward and strained. He must end it for now, much as he disliked tearing himself away.

He rose to his feet and said, “Forgive me, but I must go and relieve Bill at the lock.”

“No!” She rose with him and clasped his hand. “I mean, please stay—or let me go with you.”

He could not stay, of course, even if he wanted to, since Bill and George were minding “his” lock for him and it would seem odd if he did not return to his duty occasionally. Bill had assured him that they had more than enough work to keep them occupied, for now that the lock was open once more to traffic, there was still the lockkeeper’s house to be swept out and put in order for the family’s use. They could not live on the boat forever, Bill had reminded him.

He ought to go home occasionally, as well. His sister-in-law had begun asking pointed questions as to where he was spending all his time. Richard, of course, preoccupied with his own pursuits, had scarcely noted his brother’s absence from home except when his wife prodded him to enquire. The difficulty was that Robert did not want to go home. He wanted to watch over this enchanting creature he had captured, like some exotic water sprite, to be sure she did not fly away.

More practically, he wanted to be there when she regained her memory. Yet, every moment they spent together held the potential for disaster. What if she regained her memory all at once? Would she recognize him? He did not think it likely, yet he could not be sure. And how would he explain the Canterbury tale he had told her at the start about her falling off the boat when she was never on it. He had thought it better not to frighten her with a reminder that she might have drowned had he and the Theaks not been nearby, but that now seemed a feeble rationalization.

He wanted to prolong their closeness, yet the closer they came to each other, the further away she might run when she realized the deception he had perpetrated on her. Would her heart remember, too, and forgive? Would it perhaps be better if he told her? But he could not bear to see that lovely warm look leave her eyes any sooner than it must. He would not tell her. Not just yet.

“You must not tire yourself, Miranda,” he said. “I’ll be back soon, I promise.”

She smiled more easily at his use of the name. “When? Tonight?”

He smiled and raised her hand to kiss it lightly. “Well, perhaps not that soon. Tomorrow morning.”

She sighed and replied in a lighter tone that told him he was forgiven, “I shall find in my soul some drop of patience.”

He tried not to look back as he walked over the gangplank to the canal bank, then started up the towpath. But before it curved around a bend, he could not help turning to see if she were still in the same place. She was. She saw him and waved her hand. He returned the wave.

That gesture was somehow reassuring, although he was perfectly aware that matters could not be at a worse pass. Whatever had possessed him to lie to her? He knew the answer to that, of course—he had wanted to prolong the intimacy of their fortuitous encounter. He had thought, foolishly no doubt, that even when she regained her memory, she would remember their companionable talks and be more ready to forgive him his deception. She might even—although he knew it was too much to ask heaven for—be far enough along the road to loving him that even a setback would not make the end of the journey unachievable. But at the same time, common sense told him that the longer he persisted in keeping her in the dark, the less likely such an outcome would be.

When Sabina had tumbled back into his life, his first thought had been to inform her family, but his second thought—to keep her to himself for even a short time—followed so closely on the first that he had decided almost at once to keep his own identity from her. He only did it in order not to shock her into awareness, he explained to Rose, who looked at him as if she thought his wits had gone begging. She did not attempt to change his mind, however, only saying that he must find some way of reassuring her family until he decided to give up his play-acting.

There was no question of whom he would inform of the full circumstances of Sabina’s accident. Only Dulcie Bromley would understand.

Dulcie and Robert had become fast friends during the period when she was being courted by his brother, and simply because she had decided not to marry Richard after all was no reason, in Robert’s view, to cut the acquaintance. Indeed, they had become, in a manner of speaking, spies in each other’s camp, and both harbored the same urge to reconcile The Quarrel that had moved the old earl to amend his will as he had. Robert suspected that Dulcie had always been aware of his feelings for Sabina, although he had been careful not to reveal them in great detail. There was too much to be lost.

He had—luckily, as he now realized—last encountered Dulcie the day before Sabina’s accident when he had just received a summons from the family solicitor, a Mr. Quigley. That “a matter much to Captain Ashton’s interest” awaited his attention was as much as the solicitor’s brief letter had said, but Dulcie informed him of what precisely this was when Robert encountered her alighting from her carriage outside the milliner’s in Ashtonbury village. She was, happily, alone but for her maid—whom she promptly sent on an errand—and she invited him to walk along with her for a moment.