Once a Rake (Drake's Rakes) (18 page)

Picking up one of the boards where it lay in the trampled dirt, Mr. Hicks scratched his grizzled head and spit on the ground.

“Sawed,” he growled. “Almost clean through.”

Straightening from where she was laying out tools, Sarah stared at him.

He waved the board in her face like a sword. “Sawed!”

Sarah looked at the obvious saw marks, then at the condemning light in the old man’s eyes. She sat suddenly on the stile. “Who would…?”

Mr. Hicks spit again and threw the board away. Sarah looked up at him, wanting him to say he’d made a mistake. That he had jumped to conclusions.

“Pardon my sayin’ so, m’lady. But you know damnall who would.” He pointed at the board. “This were malicious business. I got a good suspicion who did it, and I think as maybe he’s done it before.”

Sarah looked around, as if an explanation would be forthcoming.

No. Not that. Not now.

But it was. She knew it as surely as she knew the culprit’s name. She was suddenly disgusted that she hadn’t suspected it long since. Mr. Hicks was right. It had been a harder summer than usual. Surprise deaths, inexplicable damage that had cost money she didn’t have. And who else but Martin Clarke would profit? According to the entail, he was the only heir.

Had she wrongly blamed Willoughby for all the times he had gotten loose? Could human hands have clogged the stream that had ruined part of her wheat crop? And her chickens. A fox was the logical assumption. What if the predator had possessed only two legs? Could Martin Clarke truly be that malicious?

She felt sick. Why hadn’t she seen it? What could she do about it? She couldn’t patrol her entire estate. She couldn’t even patrol her henhouse. How was she to stop vandalism? How was she to prove it? If it was Martin behind this, he had the resources to stay a step ahead of her.

By the time she reached the cellars late that evening, a jug of hot coffee and another poultice in hand, she was distracted and impatient and long past exhausted. She shouldn’t be spending all this time with Ian. She should be protecting her little farm.

One look at him, sitting hunched on the side of his cot, made her feel guilty even for thinking of it. Pale as a specter, he looked even more exhausted than she. She thought he had lost another stone in weight, which carved hollows out of his bristly cheeks. It should have diminished him, sapped his power. Somehow, even shivering and weak, it did nothing of the kind. Sarah was hit by the force of him even before he spoke.

“Has a letter arrived?” he asked, just as he did every time she came down.

She set down her supplies. “And here I thought you were anxious to see me because of my clever badinage.”

His grin was macabre. “Och, lass, how can ye question it?” Straightening, he pulled up his shirt so she could check the wound. “How many days has it been?”

She poured him a cup of coffee and passed it over, brushing against his hand for its unintended warmth. “Four. I don’t think it’s enough time for a letter.”

“Probably not.” He cradled the mug in his hand. “Thank you. Still . . .”

She peeked beneath the bandage to find improvement. “I need to return to Lyme Regis in a few more days. Mother Clarke’s mummy will be arriving.”

Ian swung his head toward her. “Her what?”

Sarah found she could still smile. “Egyptian Mummy. A color in her palate for painting butterflies. The Lulworth Skipper, to be precise.”

“And it’s called Egyptian Mummy because?”

She grinned. “Because it is. Ground up, of course.”

Ian just gave his head a mournful shake. “You live a far more interesting life than I do, Sarah Clarke. Any more visits from Stricker and his troop?”

“Yes,” she said, working as she spoke. “They stopped by yesterday, but once I informed them they would be waking Lady Clarke, the visit was amazingly brief.”

Ian managed a grin. “I think I’d like to meet your husband’s mother,” he said. “She sounds a formidable woman.”

“You have no idea. She caught Willoughby sitting in Boswell’s arbor today and almost turned him into slabs of bacon. I haven’t heard that pig squeal so loudly since he got caught in the fence with the squire’s mare on the other side.”

“Boswell’s arbor?”

She blinked, for some reason startled by his question. Surprised, somehow, that he didn’t already know everything about Boswell. About her. As if all her time down in this cave holding onto him as he sweated and shouted had created an intimacy that didn’t really exist.

Frozen, new linen clutched in her hand as she battled an incomprehensible need to make that intimacy real. To tell him not just of Boswell’s arbor, but Boswell himself. Of Boswell and her. If anyone might understand, shouldn’t it be this man? Might he not be able to grant both Boswell and her absolution?

Ian must have recognized her hesitation, because his head lifted, his sky blue eyes gentler than she’d ever seen. Gentle enough to kindle a flare of grief in her chest, of loneliness. Of guilt.

No,
she thought, seeing the pall of illness weigh him down, the burden of old nightmares and new fears.
Not now. Not ever, no matter how much I want to.

“You might have seen the arbor on your way in here the other day,” she said, forcing her voice past the knot of regret in her throat. “A little garden at the top of the rise with a view of the ocean where my husband planted his prize roses.”

He must have seen something in her expression. “You don’t like roses?”

She could at least tell this truth. “The ocean. Too big and unpredictable.”

“I assume your husband liked it to plant his roses there.”

She shrugged. “He never actually said. But he did love to sit there for hours. I always asked him what he thought about for so long. He said he wasn’t thinking at all. Just smelling roses.”

“Sounds rather nice.”

“He w…is.” Giving her skirts a quick swipe, she made to stand.

“Tell me about him,” Ian said, his hands still wrapped around the hot mug.

Sarah froze. “Who? Boswell?”

“What is he like?”

She couldn’t breathe, so strongly did the urge resurrect to tell him. She had no right. And yet she found herself sitting again, searching his eyes for something.

“Nice,” she said, finally looking away. “Too nice. Too simple for the life he inherited. All he wanted to do was putter about.” Wearing belcher ties and gleaming tasseled boots. Another costume that hadn’t fit. “Raise roses, ride his horse.”

“Harvey?”

“Oh, no.” She smiled, knowing there was no humor in it. “Apollo, an old gray breakdown of the squire’s.” She shook her head. “Poor old thing. The day of Waterloo, he simply laid down in his stall and died. The locals took it as a portent. Lady Clarke called them ignorant savages.”

“What do you think?”

“I think the horse’s heart was broken. Boswell had never left him behind before. But he refused to take him into battle.”

The rest of the memories rushed in and drove her to her feet.
Not here. Not him.

But oh, she wanted to.

“You might as well get some more rest,” she said, retrieving her mugs. “It is the best thing for you right now. Besides, there is nothing you can do until you hear from Lord Drake. Did you give him your direction?”

He nodded. “He is to contact me through Lyme post. As Tom Frane. Old George says he has frequent correspondence from London that comes addressed to that name.”

“Yes. He has many grateful customers.” And no one in the village would admit to recognizing the name if asked. It was a brilliant solution.

Gathering her things, Sarah took another close look at Ian. The fever was beginning to soar again; his skin was dry and flushed, his hands trembling. Closing his eyes, he laid his head into his hands. She clenched the scissors in her hand; she wanted to reach out. To ease him. To stroke away the weariness and cool the heat. The knot of anxiety that had taken up residence in her chest thickened and hardened. She had begun to hate this time of day; she was helpless to stop his suffering, to banish his nightmares. And being away from him was even worse. She fretted and paced, her chest tight and her hands clenched to keep from reaching for the kitchen door. She would be so glad when he left. She would be able to rest then.

No,
she thought, thinking how hard she ached for him. That wasn’t true. She wouldn’t be glad when he left. The pain would be worse. It would never end.

Even so, she reached out. “Ian?”

For a second he didn’t answer. She knelt, as if it could help ease his distress. As if it could ease hers.

“I can’t rest,” he finally said, never looking up. “I can’t face what waits.”

She swore her heart twisted in her chest. Oh, God, she couldn’t bear this. “If you don’t try, you will never get past this fever.” Gently she laid her hand on his knee. “I think we’ve begun to turn the tide. A day or two more. Please. I’ll stay if you want.”

“You can’t keep stayin’ here with me, lass. Won’t someone miss you?”

She brushed his hair off his forehead. “Not after dinner. They’re all too afraid I’ll put them to work.”

Finally he lifted his ravaged face; Sarah all but flinched at the stark despair in his eyes. “They wait in the dark,” he whispered.

She didn’t even realize she had dropped her supplies until she found herself already kneeling, holding his hands when she wanted to wrap her arms around him and singlehandedly fight the phantoms away. “Then I’ll face them with you.”

Ian’s didn’t even smile. “I don’t even want to face them. How can you?”

Her heart seized. She felt the harsh burn of tears in the back of her throat. How could she? He didn’t want to know.

“They’re not my nightmares,” she said instead. “Now, lie down.” Reaching out, she cupped his ragged, weary face in her hands. “I will be here, Ian.”

Her heart, so newly vulnerable, wept in grief. And then, because pragmatism was her best defense, she helped Ian rest back on the cot and spent the rest of the night futilely trying to keep his fever down.

Just as he had feared, that night was the worst. Sarah wasn’t certain whether it was her fault or his, but by naming his ghosts, he called up the very worst. At first she wasn’t certain what they were. It wasn’t a battle, she knew. When he saw carnage before him, when his men died around him, he seemed to grow larger, harder, his pain a living, writhing thing. When he began to mutter this time, deep in the dark early hours, the lantern light illuminated eyes that widened in shock. Confusion. Growing terror.

“Nae here?” he rasped, reaching out. “Of course they’re here. They must be.”

She took hold of his hand, thinking to calm him. He grabbed it so hard she thought he would crush it. “I left them
here,
” he snarled. “You know that. Where would Fiona and Mairead go if they aren’t here? They’re only twelve!”

Oh, sweet God,
she thought, holding on tight.
He is searching for his sisters.

“They are,” she said, wanting only to stop this nightmare. She didn’t want to know what it had cost him to find them beneath that bridge. “They’re just not here now.”

He yanked on her hand, as if to punish her lie. “Nae! Nae, I left them here. They were…they were safe. I made sure they were safe, even if we lost our mam.”

“They
are
safe, Ian. I promise you.”

But he didn’t hear her. He heard other voices. Saw other realities, his open eyes blind to all but the old scene playing out before him.

He argued and searched and called in Gaelic, the words spilling like a rill through the room. Tears rose in his eyes and spilled over. Sarah heard the raw anguish in his voice, the tearing guilt. The dogged determination to change the truth.

“Have you seen them?” he began asking. “Two girls, about twelve. Redheads, like me.
Please.
You must have come across them.”

She could almost see him trudging through the raw damp of winter as he followed the trail deeper and deeper into the Edinburgh slums. She saw his heart fracture a little more each time he was told he was too late, and her heart crumbled alongside.

“Ian, please,” she kept saying, wiping the tears from his gaunt cheeks. “They’re safe. Fiona and Mairead are safe.”

He never heard her.

Sarah had been able to bear the battle scenes, the loss of his men. This was different. Not merely because she knew even better than Ian what Fiona and Mairead had suffered in the fetid darkness under that bridge, two twelve-year-old girls abandoned by everyone but each other. It was worse because now Sarah knew Ian. Without meaning to, Ian had shattered the protective shell Sarah had constructed as if it had been thin ice, and she suddenly found herself, not in hell, but confoundingly enough, in a place teeming with life, with possibilities, with pain and joy and wonder. Trembling, terrified, exultant, alive. Perched atop a perilous height with no hold except Ian’s hand.

She didn’t know what to do, how to grasp this intimacy, how to force it into a familiar shape. It was too new, too terrifying. She wanted it gone, and yet she wanted to embrace it even more closely. It hurt too much, both the grief of it and the joy of it. She wanted to be the one Ian always came to in pain. She wanted to help him carry it.

“How can I stay with you?” she echoed his earlier question, her tears mingling with his, her answer only for herself. “How can I not? I love you.”