The Marriage Bargain (5 page)

She called to Susan, “The soap, please.”

Mrs. Cobbett entered the room, her arms piled high. “More linens.” At her heels was more water and still more towels.

Placing towels around him to catch the water and keep the bedding dry, Emma started at Spence’s head, washing and rinsing his hair as best she could. Without being asked, Blakewell began at his feet and legs. He saved her the embarrassment of washing the private parts by reaching them first.

As they finished drying him and replacing the bed linens for clean ones, Spence groaned and his eyelids fluttered.

“Mrs. Cobbett, have Cook make some broth or tea or something.” After the housekeeper left, Emma murmured, “I wish we had some nightclothes for him.”

Tolley said, “I will find some.”

By the time Mr. Price, the surgeon, arrived, a clean Spence dressed in clean nightclothes lay in a clean bed. Reuben came to the door with him. Emma had completely forgotten that he’d come with them to the house.

With a worried frown, he walked over to her while the surgeon performed his examination. “How is he?”

“Quite feverish.” Emma kept her eyes on her husband. “He falls in and out of consciousness.”

When Mr. Price finished he had four people in the room and several servants hovering outside, all waiting for his word. He gestured for Emma. “I will have to probe the wound to remove any remnants of cloth pushed in by the pistol’s ball, but it looks fairly clean. The infection is of prime concern, and, of course, whether he’ll regain his wits after that nasty blow to the head.”

“Blow to the head?” Wolfe piped up. “We know nothing of a blow to his head.”

The surgeon gave him a stern look. “You did not know he was alive, I hear.”

Wolfe clenched his fists and wore a thunderous expression. “That drunken sot of a surgeon said nothing about a blow to the head.”

Blakewell calmly interjected, “It must have happened when he fell. We tried to find a pulse, sir, and the surgeon in attendance declared him dead. We thought only to bring him home.”

Mr. Price pursed his lips and tucked his chin against his neck so he could gaze at Blakewell above his spectacles. “He has a knot near the base of his skull. A blow to the head sufficient to cause such a wound could also cause unconsciousness. Likely it suppressed all signs of life as well. But I would not have been so precipitous to pronounce death in such an instance.” He appeared absorbed in thought. “Ah, well, he is not out of danger yet. Much will depend on the next few days.”

“What must I do?” asked Emma.

“I have some powders to help with the fever and an ointment for the wound. Change the bandage daily.” He shrugged. “Give him broth. Other than that, we simply hope for the best.”

He reached for his bag and took out a long, thin set of pincers. “I need you gentlemen to hold him still. This may rouse him.”

Only Blakewell and Wolfe responded to the request. Reuben stepped out of the way and averted his gaze. The surgeon inserted the instrument into the wound and Spence cried out. Writhing and struggling, he tried to escape the pain, pain Emma fancied she felt herself.

Finally the surgeon finished and the worried servants returned to their tasks. Spence lay insensible again as the surgeon dressed the wound front and back. He promised to come the next day or sooner should Emma require it. Emma walked him to the bedchamber door, where Mr. Hale waited to escort him down the stairs.

After Mr. Price left, Emma suddenly realized her dress was soaked through and stained with mud and blood. “Gentlemen, if you do not mind, please leave me. I wish to change clothes.”

Reuben nodded vigorously and hurried to the door. Blakewell and Wolfe hesitated a moment before joining him, but Blakewell turned and walked back to her.

He bowed and addressed her in a hushed, but emotional tone. “Thank you, my lady.”

After washing herself and changing into a clean dress, Emma dismissed Susan and was alone at last with Spence. He was propped up on pillows on her bed, his eyelids fluttering as if he were trying to wake. She felt his forehead, still burning hot. He was conscious enough for her to spoon a little broth into his mouth. When she bathed his face with a cool cloth, for a fleeting moment he smiled.

Later she would have the master bedchamber next to hers aired, cleaned, and readied for him, but for now she was content to have him in her bed. She stepped back and watched him, all the memories of three years ago flooding back, like a happy dream. How she wished he were that man of her girlish fancy! To see him lying, almost peaceful, she could not make herself feel otherwise. She’d battle to save the Spencer Keenan she’d wished him to be, even though she might wind up with quite a different man if he did recover.

He became more restless. His eyes opened and darted across the room.

She came to his side again, sitting in a chair next to the bed, stroking his face. “Quiet now, Spence,” she soothed. “Quiet now.”

He looked at her, but his eyes were not focused. “Must tell them,” he mumbled. “Must tell them.”

“You may tell them later,” she reassured.

“No time. No time.” He tried to sit up, but she put her hands on his chest to stop him. He finally collapsed against the pillows, whispering, “Forgive me, Emma. Forgive me, Emma.”

Emma gaped at him, open-mouthed. In a rush, her fatigue, hunger, and all the anxieties of the last three years enveloped her. She rested her head on his pillow and let the tears finally flow.

Stephen?

Stephen was there! Spence could see him in the distance, smiling, teeth as brilliant as the white light that surrounded him. Spence raced toward him, but his brother put up his hand and backed farther and farther away.

“Don’t leave,” Spence begged. “Let me come with you.”

His brother smiled again, a peaceful smile. His voice, no louder than a whisper, easily reached Spence’s ears. “Go home, Spence. Go home.”

The white light enveloped Stephen and he vanished. Spence plummeted into darkness and pain and nightmares.

The dreams were relentless. He stood on the battlefield, his soldiers formed in a square while the French cavalry rode straight for him. Or he saw glimpses of Blake and Wolfe fighting hand to hand with an enemy whose faces turned into those of their old schoolmates, the older, cruel ones who’d made their lives hell.

Or he rode in the phaeton with Stephen, racing down Kellworth’s roads, laughing while the breeze caught his hat and sent it sailing and Stephen shouted at him to slow down. Again they rounded the bend, and again the phaeton toppled over and broke into pieces. Again Stephen went flying. Again Spence leaned over his brother’s broken body and heard Stephen whisper his name before choking on blood, unable to draw another breath.

Horrible as the dreams were, Spence preferred them to the darkness, which was as terrifying as when he’d been a small boy and he’d known his mother and father would never return to comfort him.

Not all the dreams were horrible. Sometimes angels appeared, including one whose voice soothed him and whose caresses made him feel safe again. A beautiful angel.

Sometimes the angel would disappear and in her place he’d see Emma in her bridal dress, but she was always too far away for him to see clearly. Whenever he came closer, she disappeared and his uncle’s visage, large and threatening, filled the dream. Then the angel took on Emma’s face, but altered, ethereal.

Sometimes Spence swore he heard Wolfe and Blake talking. He wanted to answer them, but their faces swam in front of him and disappeared as quickly as Emma’s had.

The angel was less fleeting. She appeared when he felt lonely, fed him when he was hungry, gave him drink when he was thirsty. When he shivered with cold, she wrapped him in blankets. When he thought he would burn up, she bathed his face in cool water. But even she could not stop the cycle of nightmares.

Spence opened his eyes, but this time images did not fly into his vision, only to disappear. He was in a room. Its walls remained solid, and sunlight streamed through sparkling windows. Chairs and tables remained on the floor. Familiar chairs and tables, but he could not place where he had seen them before. He heard movement, but his left shoulder ached too much for him to turn toward the sound. He tried turning just his head.

The angel sat in a chair near the window closest to his bed. As ethereal as ever, her head bowed over some sewing, her fingers dainty and graceful as she pulled the needle through the fabric. Her brown hair, loosely piled on top of her head, glistened with gold where the sunlight played upon it, and her profile was worthy of an Italian cameo.

He feasted on this chance to observe her, for now she had become as stable as the walls and chairs. She had the same color hair as Emma, the same full, lush lips, but her figure was more womanly, with high, full breasts and the suggestion of a thin waist and long legs beneath her plain gray dress.

A plain gray dress? He blinked, but she did not disappear. He was awake, he must be. He tried to sit up.

Emma stifled a yawn, trying to concentrate on her sewing and keep from dozing in the chair. She heard the rustle of bedcovers and glanced over to see Spence struggling in the bed. Dropping her sewing on the chair, she hurried to his side, placing her hand on his forehead.

“I believe your fever is gone. Are you in need of something?”

He again strained to move. “Sit up,” he said, his voice rasping.

She put one arm around him to help him sit and stuffed the pillows behind his back. “There. Does that feel better?”

He nodded. “Water?”

She poured from a pitcher by the bed and held the glass for him to drink. The effort seemed to exhaust him.

Emma looked upon him with relief. He’d been feverish and delirious for three excruciatingly long days and nights, and she had remained at his side nearly the whole time. The fever had finally broken when the full moon shone high in the sky and Emma had wept again, this time out of sheer exhaustion.

His eyes scanned her, lucid now. “What is this place?”

“This is Kellworth.”

“Kellworth?” He looked around the room and leaned his head back against the pillows. “My brother’s room.”

His brother had been dead almost a decade. “It once was your brother’s room.”

“Before,” he agreed. “How did I get here?”

Emma’s heart slowed to a normal rate. He sounded sensible. “Your friends brought you here.”

“Blake and Wolfe.” He smiled as he spoke their names.

He
was
lucid. Emma felt like laughing with relief.

He continued to stare at her. “Who are you?”

She stiffened. “You do not know me?”

“In my dream—” he began. “You look like . . .” He stopped himself. “Angel.”

He did not remember her. He remembered his friends well enough, but not his wife. Emma took a step backward. “Shall I summon your friends, my lord?”

He brightened. “They are here?”

“I shall send them directly.” She walked stiffly to the door and opened it.

“Wait,” he called. “You did not tell—”

Emma did not tarry to hear the end of his sentence, but hurried out of the room. She located Blakewell and Wolfe in the drawing room and announced to them that Spence’s fever had broken and he was awake. They ran out to visit him.

Emma stood alone in the room.

He had not recognized her. He had forgotten her that completely. Even when enraged at his neglect, Emma had recalled every plane of his face, every line on his brow, every wayward strand of hair. She felt like weeping again.

She thought she’d learned not to weep. Tears did nothing to feed the estate families or to plant the crops or tend the animals. When Mr. Larkin, the estate manager, brought requests for necessary funds, tears did not help. Money was what was required. Instead of turning into a watering pot, Emma sold something. First she sold the few pieces of jewelry she owned; later she sold items from the house—plate, china, whatever she thought would not be missed. Reuben assisted her, facilitating the sale through a dealer in London.

Tears would do nothing now as well, except embarrass her. She refused to let him know the wound he inflicted—above all the other wounds—by not even remembering her.

She balled her hands into fists and strode out the door. The garden must need tending. She’d not been out of doors for three days. Hurrying to the back of the house where her worn half-boots, gloves, and hat would be waiting, she planned to yank out of the earth as many weeds as dared grow among her vegetables.

The door of the bedchamber creaked, and Spence opened his eyes.

“Spence!” Wolfe rushed over to him and clasped his hand. “Thank God!”

Spence gave Blake a puzzled glance.

“You were very ill, my friend.” Blake put a hand on the shoulder that did not pain him.

“We did not know—” began Wolfe.

“—if you would pull through.” Blake finished for him. “You gave us some tense moments, I assure you.”

Wolfe nodded to Blake and let go of Spence’s hand.

“How long?” Spence managed.

Blake sat in the chair next to the bed. “Five days, but for two of those you were insensible.”

Spence shook his head. “Don’t remember.”

Blake tossed a swift glance to Wolfe and back to Spence. “That is no surprise,” he said in a consoling tone.

The effort to talk tired Spence more than he could have imagined. How sick had he been? He could remember nothing of it except the dreams and the darkness and pain. “Why here?”

“Why did we bring you here to Kellworth?” Blake asked.

Spence nodded.

His two friends again exchanged glances, but he was too fatigued to ask them what the devil was going on.

Blake gave him his charming smile, the sort that always hid what he was really about. “Seemed the best place for you to recover, and believe me you’ve been well-tended here.”

By the angel, Spence thought. “The angel,” he said, laboring to get the words out.

“By God, he’s addled!” cried Wolfe.

“He’s not addled,” shot back Blake, whose eyes flashed at Wolfe, but turned soft when looking at Spence. “You must mean Lady Kellworth,” Blake said in a matter-of-fact tone. “Your wife.”