Remember Me - Regency Brides 03 (16 page)

Her eyes returned to North's, and she sauntered over to him. "Are you acknowledging my presence?" North asked teasingly, repeating Sam's words.

"Yes, but throw any more rocks at me, and I just may throw some back."

North laughed again as he helped her gather the remaining picnic supplies and then headed back to the plantation.

~

A few days later, North was told to go to the bedside of John Paul Hughes, a young man who was a member of his church and the son-in-law of Silas Hill of the Hil plantation. He'd been accidental y shot while hunting, and the doctor was unsure whether he would live or die.

For two days, North did nothing but stay by that young man's bedside, read his Bible, and pray. It was a true test of his faith, as the time seemed to stretch endlessly for himself as wel as for the young man's family. He prayed he was saying the right things to them and doing al he needed to do in comforting them. Finally John Paul's fever broke, and he awoke at the end of the second day. Once the doctor told everyone that his wound had no infection and it seemed he would live, North made his way home with Dr. Giles.

On the way there, North broached the subject of memory loss and asked if the doctor knew anything about it, mostly how long it usual y lasted. The doctor, however, told him he knew very little but had known one man who never regained his memory after fal ing off his roof. It was not the encouraging news North wanted. He chose to believe instead that God would bring his memory back in His time.

Once he arrived home, as he was turning the corner at the church, the first thing he noticed was Helen sitting on his front porch with Josie and Pierre. It was the most welcoming sight in North's recent memory, and probably in his life, that he'd ever witnessed.

Helen waiting for him to come home.

He didn't even think as he began to jog toward his house. He leaped up the steps taking them two and three at a time, and walked right up to Helen. North pul ed her up from the chair and enveloped her in an embrace.

He felt her hesitate, but only for a second. Her arms were quick to circle his waist and begin patting his back in a comforting gesture.

They stood there for a moment as he slowly let al his tension and anxiety drain away and al owed himself to be rejuvenated by her embrace.

It overwhelmed North sometimes to realize how much he actual y loved Helen and how he needed her in his life. He wanted to spend the rest of his days making her happy and showing her how much he loved and adored her.

Josie's giggle, then Pierre's discreet cough brought him back to the reality that there were other people around them. He, too, began to become conscious of just how inappropriate his actions were.

He backed away from Helen, giving her and the others a sheepish half grin.

Huh, I'm sorry, but I feel I'm not myself this afternoon. I've not had any sleep since Wednesday."

They may not have total y believed his excuse, but they were wil ing to give him the benefit of the doubt. Helen quickly took his arm and directed him into the house. "You poor dear! Come and sit down, and Pierre wil get you a bowl of soup."

"Yes, of course!" Pierre responded quickly, going to the fireplace, where a huge black pot fil ed with soup was slowly boiling over a low fire. "You wil eat and go right to bed," he instructed North sternly.

North grinned tiredly as he sat down. "You'l get no arguments from me."

Josie slid into the chair beside him and put a comforting hand on his arm.

"Shal I go and fluff your pil ows and turn back your bed?" she offered, concern clearly written on her smal features.

"That would be nice, Josie," he answered, leaning forward to give her a kiss on the forehead.

The younger girl giggled and jumped up to go do the task.

He couldn't help but reach for Helen's hand as she sat by him, looking at him with concern brimming in her eyes. “Have you been here al day?"

She squeezed his hand gently. She began searching his face as if making sure he was al right. "Yes," she answered. "Josie and I wanted to help Pierre clean your house and do some of your chores before you got home. How is John Paul faring?”

"The doctor said he should be fine. But a few times they weren't sure he'd pul through." He stared at her a moment, hoping to convey the feelings he'd felt the last few days. "For the first time, Helen, I final y experienced being comfortable with my occupation. The family needed my strength to lean on and my prayers. I wish I could tel you what peace I felt, as if I were doing something I'd done many times before, performing the deed that God had made me for ministering to the hurting."

He was about to say more, but Pierre chose that moment to set the bowl of soup in front of him. "We'l talk more about this tomorrow," he whispered before he exchanged a smile with her. He squeezed her hand once more, then let it go to take hold of his spoon.

"Oh, let me get you a slice of bread to eat with that," Helen told him as she got up from her seat to walk over to the counter.

' Just cut a smal slice. I'm too tired to eat a lot tonight," he mentioned, then took a bit of the soup, closing his eyes from the warmth and the tantalizing taste of it.

"Yes, Your Grace." North's eyes widened at Helen's words, and he noticed she, too, seemed frozen, no longer cutting at the bread.

"Your Grace"…What did that mean? Why was it familiar, and why in the world did
Helen say it?

Perhaps he hadn't heard just right. "I'm sorry, did you say?"

Helen whirled around from the counter, and North was perplexed to see panic flashing in her wide eyes. "Yes! Yes, I was about to quote my favorite verse in the Bible!" she said just a little too brightly.

She is quoting a verse? Now?

"'Your grace is sufficient for me.'" She misquoted, which North noted.

"Uh, I believe it is a part of a scripture that actual y reads, 'My grace is sufficient for thee,” he corrected, stil unable to get rid of the feeling there was something important connected with the words and Helen knew it.

' You know, I believe you're right!" she said, her smile just a little off kilter and forced. She placed the bread in front of him on a smal dish.

"You know, I just realized how late the hour has grown!" Helen exclaimed unnatural y loudly. "We'd better get Pierre to drive us home and let you get some rest."

"Helen, are you al right?" North asked, but his question was ignored as she flew to his bedroom to get Josie.

North rubbed his eyes wearily as the words
Your Grace
kept ringing in his head, only it was different voices than Helen's saying them.

"Perhaps you should get into bed, monsieur. I'l be back ~n a moment to finish cleaning the kitchen," Pierre told him, and North wearily agreed as ~e watched Helen fly out of his bedroom, towing a reluctant and confused Josie behind her.

"Maybe I do need some sleep," he murmured, thinking that possibly everything would make sense in the morning.

Indeed, everything did make sense the next morning when North opened his eyes from a restful sleep. The sun appeared to be shining brightly as beams of light pushed through the openings of his curtains. He listened and thought to himself that even the birds seemed a little more cheerful as they whistled and chirped like never before.

In fact, the whole world seemed to be a much brighter and certainly a much
clearer
place to live on that particular morning.

And it was al due to the fact that North woke up knowing
exactly
who he was.

And it wasn't Hamish Campbel .

Every last memory North had ever col ected and remembered was there for him to pull up at will. Suddenly everything made sense, from his il -fitting clothes and his being unfamiliar with simple chores, to his feeling at odds with his profession and not being comfortable with public peaking.

The only thing that made no sense at al was why Helen played along with everyone's wrong assumption that he was their long - lost preacher.

Propping his hands behind his head, North thought back to their first encounter in Golden Bay and how shocked she'd been when he hadn't remembered her.

Suddenly al the guilty expressions that had flashed on her pretty face and the reluctance she exhibited for tel ing him any information about his life made complete sense.

The little minx.
She actual y al owed and even encouraged him to believe he was someone else! Suddenly he laughed as he realized the length at which she'd gone to keep the truth from him.

Was it done so that she might have a chance with him?

It made him smile even more. Of course she would have thought that way. Helen had no idea he'd spent night after night thinking of some way to convince his family to al ow him to marry someone several classes beneath him. He'd never been the sort of person to rebel against his position or want to cause dissension in any way; so when be realized he had feelings for Helen Nichols, a poor farmer's daughter, be didn't know how to tel his mother, friends, or peers.

He'd even tried to tel Nicholas, who had himself married a woman who was a vicar's daughter, but Nicholas had laughed off his feelings, tel ing him he'd get over his infatuation.

But he hadn't. In fact, North had grown more in love with Helen each time he was with her, and he was sure she felt the same way.

He'd made excuses to postpone his voyage to America and had been glad when the war helped to delay the trip. He just hadn't wanted to be away from Helen that long.

Final y he had found a way to go to America
and
make a way to ask Helen to marry him while being away from his peers and immediate family. After speaking with Claudia Baumgartner, Josie's older sister, about her search for a companion for Josie, he persuaded her to seek out Helen for the position.

He reasoned that once he arrived at the Kent plantation, he would make contact with her and convince her to marry him. He had a feeling that Helen took the position because she knew
he
was coming to Louisiana. How sad it was they'd both gone to such great lengths to be together. Especial y Helen, since she had had no idea how he felt about her.

North sat up in his bed as he thought a moment about all Helen had told him.

She'd said she had always wanted to better herself. Even Christina, her best friend, had told him that Helen knew everything about the aristocracy and longed to be a part of that world.

He stil loved Helen, no matter how much she had tried to deceive him into thinking he was someone else. She had done it because she loved him. That he had no doubts about.

But he wondered if she would love him without al the riches and the titles in front of his name. What if he truly were Hamish Campbel ? Could she live the life of a poor minister's wife?

As North slowly got out of bed, he found it hard to concentrate on anything, much less reason out Helen's feelings for him. He found it a bit difficult to merge his old memories with the new ones because he felt like such a different person than he used to be.

In al honesty, he could remain Hamish Campbel for the rest of his life and be completely happy with that choice.

But he had other people to consider besides himself. He had four large estates that depended on him. If his cousin Wilfred, his next of kin, got hold of them, they would be run to ruins because of his excessive gambling habits.

Then there was his mother, who was the epitome of the proper noblewoman and embraced al of what the ton stood for in style and behavior. But although she could be an extreme snob and terribly bossy, he loved her-even if she did urge him constantly to marry and to marry wel .

She would not be happy once he brought Helen home as his wife. But hopefully, after they gave her a grandchild or two, she would forgive him.

As he thought of his family, he tried to imagine what his cousins at the Kent plantation must have been going through. They had probably gotten word he was missing or even dead.

He wondered again if the real Hamish had somehow made it ashore. The man had seemed so calmly resolute in his belief that he would soon die. Perhaps God had prepared him and given him peace. North truly hoped so.

But somebody had to tel his sister! He realized that since Helen had taken the letter they had written to her, it probably would never be mailed. She must have taken it because she had planned to write a new one, tel ing Hamish's sister that her brother had been lost at sea.

Poor Helen. The more North thought of the situation that Helen had created and how she must have felt when it grew to be more and more complicated, he real y felt sorry for her. But it also made him feel humbled she'd done it al for him. If she’d only known he had planned to court her anyway and to declare his love to her, she wouldn't have had to go to so much trouble.

He began to dress himself, pul ing on his simply made clothes, and he realized he would actual y miss dressing in the simple garments. His usual suit consisted of so many layers and had to be buttoned, tied, and ironed just so, or a person might find his name gossiped about al over London for not knowing how to properly dress. He did hope his own trunks, bearing his fine garments, had been taken to the Kent plantation. Once he told everyone who he real y was, he'd be expected to dress appropriately.

Pul ing on Hamish's brown coat, he walked to the window and pul ed back the curtain. As he looked out to the little white church in his view, he had a moment of regret that he would not get to enjoy being the town's pastor for very long. He knew it wasn't his cal ing, but he felt the work so much more worthwhile than anything he'd done before.

He stayed at the window a little longer as he tried to decide his next course of action. The one thing that kept ringing in his head was that he didn't want everything to come to an end just yet. Once Helen knew his memory had returned, she might start treating him differently, and so would everyone else.

They would have to become adjusted to his being a duke again, and that would take al the fun and excitement out of their fresh, new relationship.