The Primrose Path (21 page)

“I’ll carry her. She’s only skin and bones under all this fur. The poor mite must have been wandering for days without proper food. Look, her eyes are shutting. The laudanum must be working, so we can move her now.”

Angelina thought the dog must be lapsing into blessed unconsciousness. She’d let the viscount carry her toward the cottage, where someone could come dig a grave.

“No, we’ll take her to the Castle. It’s closer.” He took off his coat and handed it to Angelina, then slid his hands under the dog. “Come on, Sunshine.”

“Sunshine?”

“The sun will rise again tomorrow.”

So they carried the half-dead dog back to Knowle Castle, through the briers, through the woods. By the time they reached the drive to the castle, his lordship was damp with perspiration, covered with blood and grime, and limping badly. Angelina was looking as if she’d been dragged through a thicket backward, which she had been. Her skirts were trailing, her bodice was ripped, and her cheek had a large scratch down it, which matched the bruise on Lord Knowle’s chin. He had an unconscious dog, she had a blunderbuss, and Miss Melissa Wyte, stepping out of her carriage, had a fainting spell.

Chapter Twenty-three

Thank goodness his cousin Nigel was there to catch the chit, Corin thought, since his own hands were full and filthy. Then he wondered what the deuce Nigel Truesdale was doing there in the first place.

It made no never mind, for there was nothing Corin could do at the moment about any of it: his screaming sister, the swooning miss, or her upset sire. He hadn’t carried this pathetic bundle all the way home just to have it die on his doorstep. His sister could see to the guests when she was done having palpitations.

His bewigged butler came down the front steps, frowning his disapproval of such indecorous proceedings at a gentleman’s residence. Bradshaw thought he would relieve his lordship of whatever noxious burden he carried, send the ramshackle female with him to the rightabout, and restore Knowle Castle to its proper dignity for greeting guests. He took one look at his lordship’s burden, then a better look at his draggle-tailed companion. Lady Sophie’s protégée. Of course. Bradshaw shuddered, did an about-face, and marched back up the front steps.

Angelina wanted to giggle, right after she dug a hole to jump in.

“Don’t you get missish on me now,” Corin warned, thinking she was about to get hysterical finally, in reaction to the sights and sounds and smells. Lud knew every other female of his experience would have needed burned feathers and smelling salts hours ago. He doubted Angelina Armstead even possessed a vinaigrette.

“I am never missish, my lord,” she confirmed, “but I don’t think we should be standing here.”

“Right, we’ll go to the stables.” He made a half bow toward the convoy of carriages in his drive, then turned his back on the woman who would be his bride—if she ever recovered from her swoon—and headed around the side of the castle.

Angelina ran ahead to warn the grooms that they’d need water and blankets and bandages. Most of the stable hands had gone to help with the guests’ carriages, however, and the remaining three young lads were trying to get a fractious cream-colored horse into a stall. The Arabian was the most beautiful mare Angelina had ever seen, with long, dainty legs, a narrow, tapered head, and a flowing mane and tail. She was also biting, kicking, rearing, and making a dangerous nuisance of herself. The smell of blood around Angelina didn’t help matters. Without stopping to think, Angelina tossed his lordship’s coat, still in her hands, over the horse’s head. The mare stilled instantly, long enough for the boys to drag her into the double stall reserved for her.

No, his Angel wasn’t missish at all, Corin thought, coming through the stable doors with the dog in his arms. She was shouting to his lads, directing them to spread fresh hay and blankets. Corin placed the dog on the soft bed as gently as he could, then checked to make sure that the dog was still breathing.

“Send for Ben,” he ordered one of the grooms, then told Angelina, “He knows everything there is to know about horses. He’ll be able to help.”

Ben shook his head when they’d unwrapped the wound. “Horses don’t go around getting shot, milord. You needs a doctor.”

Angelina snorted. “That puff-guts won’t leave his posh practice for a farmer’s child; he surely won’t bestir himself for a stray dog.”

“We’ll find one who will, I promise,” Corin said, swearing to himself, Angelina, and the dog. “But that bullet has to come out now.”

The woman and the head groom just looked at him. Angel’s face had lost all color, and Ben was holding out his clumsy, arthritic fingers. Oh, lud.

The dog stayed asleep—unconscious or scratching on Death’s door, Corin couldn’t tell—during the operation. His own surgery on the Peninsula hadn’t been this awful, he thought, wishing he were back in Spain.

Angelina was glad she hadn’t stopped for breakfast this morning, but she didn’t faint and her hands didn’t tremble too badly to thread the needle or cut the matted hair away from the bullet hole.

“Good girl,” Corin said, and she didn’t feel so weak-kneed anymore. They spread basilicum powder on the wound, then put fresh bandages over it, just as Sunshine started to stir. “Good girl,” he said again, this time for the dog. Angelina didn’t feel quite so proud.

“It’s early days, but I reckon how it’s not only cats what has nine lives,” Ben commented as the dog moaned, stopping as soon as Corin put his hand on her shaggy head. “Sure knows who saved her, too.”

“She does like me, doesn’t she?”

Angelina was biting her lip again. “I cannot carry her back to the cottage, my lord. I know your people are busy with all the extra horses and such”—she waved her hand at the bustle in the stables that they hadn’t noticed before—”but do you think someone could drive us in a wagon?”

“What, and destroy all my handiwork at the first bump? No, Angel, the dog stays here, where my staff had better not be too busy to look after her. Zeus knows there’s enough of them, and you have enough in your dish without adding a sick dog that’s going to need constant attention.”

“That’s very kind of you,” she said, adding “my lord,” for Ben’s eager ears. “But she’ll have to come to the cottage eventually, not that I mean to add her to the count of Lady Sophie’s dogs, of course. She can be the first dog at the Remington place, the first dog offered for adoption once she has recovered.”

“No. Sunshine stays here.”

“But your sister, your guests—”

“Sunshine is my dog. That’s final.”

Angelina wasn’t about to argue. If his lordship wanted this pitiful mélange of mixed parentage, he was welcome to it. Angelina hated seeing the dogs sick or distressed. “Then I had better be going. Lady Hathaway will be wondering what became of me.” She picked up the blunderbuss and bobbed a curtsy. “Thank you for your help, my lord. I could not have managed without you.”

“You
could have, Angel, it’s the dog who couldn’t have.” He was wiping his arms and hands on a towel Ben had brought. “But no matter how intrepid you are, Miss Armstead, you are not going home without me. Until we find out who shot the dog, the woods are too dangerous. Besides, you’ve had an exhausting morning.”

“But your sister, the guests—”

“Dash it all, I know who is staying at my house! For once, Angel, cease the argumentation and get in my curricle!”

“But one of the grooms could drive me, I’m sure.”

“I’m sure he could, too, but I happen to have an errand at the gatehouse that won’t keep, don’t you know.”

She handed him the blunderbuss.

Corin did not enter Primrose Cottage with Angelina, citing the state of his clothes and his mood. Eager to be gone, he did promise to send word of the dog’s condition.

After a much-needed bath and a change of clothes, Angelina joined the older ladies—Lady Hathaway older in years, Mercedes Lavalier older in experience—in the morning room for luncheon. Elizabeth was taking her meal upstairs with Robinet.

Angelina hadn’t thought she could eat after the harrowing morning, but discovered she was famished when Penn brought out Cook’s steak and kidney pie. Between bites, Angelina related the day’s events. She told how the viscount would not let her shoot the injured animal, after all his protestations that dogs were worthless creatures, every one.

“I would have returned an hour ago,” Angelina told her guests, “except Lord Knowle insisted on driving me home, and he couldn’t bear to part with the dog. He spent an age giving directions to the stable hands, making sure Sunshine had beef broth and chopped meat when she awoke, lanterns and warmed blankets, and a boy to sit by her side ready to fetch the viscount if the wound started bleeding again. It’s a wonder Corin didn’t decide to spend the day in that stall with the dog.”

“But that’s what you would have done, isn’t it?” Lady Hathaway asked.

Angelina buttered a slice of fresh bread while she considered her next words. “But his lordship never seemed to care. This one dog, this bedraggled stray, changed everything with one lick of his hand.” She smiled. “Now Corin will have to believe in love and loyalty, trust and responsibility.”

Lady Hathaway smiled, too. “I think he always believed in love, he just didn’t know he did.”

Mercedes disagreed. “
Mon
cher
Knolly always knew his duty, but it takes a good woman to teach a man how to love.”

Or a good dog.

* * * *

The soldiers at the gatehouse never saw a dog, never heard a dog, and certainly never shot a dog, they all swore. Corin swore he’d shoot them all if he found otherwise. Without proof, there was not much else he could do except make threats.

Dissatisfied, he was in an even worse temper when he drove home and found his cousin Nigel in the stable, inspecting the dog through his quizzing glass. “Leave her alone, she needs her rest.”

“Just looking, cuz, to see what was so important you snubbed Midas Micah Wyte.”

Corin walked past Nigel and knelt by the dog’s side. She gave one feeble tail wag, which he took to be a good sign. The boy delegated to keep watch said she’d taken some broth, and Corin held the bowl so she could drink some more. The dog was going to live, by Jupiter! He’d done the right thing. Without looking up, he said, “I didn’t exactly snub Wyte, and he arrived hours early, confound it.”

“To find you in deshabille with the little lass down the path. My, my, how convenient, cuz, but how indiscreet! And Aunt Sophie’s companion? You’re a braver man than
I, Knolly, or you don’t believe in the hereafter. The old girl will have your head for washing, my friend.”

“I don’t believe in blood being thicker than water, Nigel, so be careful how you speak of Miss Armstead. She is a lady, and I would not hear otherwise from your lips.”

“Sensitive subject, eh, cuz?”

Nigel was as sharp-tongued as ever, and as badly dressed. Corin might look a mess now, but Nigel wore yellow cossack trousers, a puce-striped waistcoat, a lavender frock coat, and periwinkle blue slippers. On purpose. Corin winced. The battered dog looked better.

Noticing his cousin’s scrutiny, Nigel puffed out his chest. “In honor of spring, don’t you know.”

“What, you decided to look like a pouter pigeon in mating plumage?” Corin was positive the shoulders of Nigel’s coat were stuffed with buckram wadding, and that creaking sound had to be a corset. “What the devil are you doing here anyway?”

“Why, Cousin Florencia invited me, of course, to even the numbers. It seemed courteous to offer my escort to Miss Wyte and her father.”

“And cheaper than hiring your own rig.” Corin knew his cousin never had the dibs in tune, and he was actually glad someone had been on hand to do the pretty for the Diamond.

“Besides,” Nigel continued, “I had to consult with my client, Miss Armstead, and there was a note concerning Lady Hathaway possibly requiring my services.”

“Do you ever actually find anyone for your poor gulls, or do you just take the flats’ money?”

Nigel brushed a speck off his sleeve. “You wound me, cuz, honestly you do. I charge only for expenses unless and until I am able to solve the case.”

“Well, I’ll wound you worse if you upset Miss Armstead.”

“So the wind really does sit in that corner. I’m surprised, cuz. I thought you more fastidious than to be interested in such a harum-scarum miss.”

“I am and she’s not. Angel—Miss Armstead is a lady. I feel somewhat responsible for her, thus I do not wish to see her upset. She really believes she is going to find that sister of hers.”

“I do my best, you know, and I actually am quite good at it. Found Lord Cranshank’s gold watch last week. My years of visiting the pawnshops are finally paying off, don’t you know. Of course, Miss Armstead wants me to find something that was purposely hidden, and ages ago to boot, but I have a few leads.”

“Just see that you don’t get up to your usual tricks and lead her astray.”

“Miss Armstead? I didn’t think it was possible, if you couldn’t.”

“Dash it, I told you, she is a lady. If you’re looking for the sister, you ought to know she is Kirkbridge’s granddaughter. Leave her alone, Nigel, that’s all.”

“My, my, how vehement. But don’t worry, Knolly, your little neighbor is safe from me. She’s not rich enough, for one, and all those dog hairs, for another.” He shuddered delicately. “I don’t know how you stand it. Then again, judging from your current appearance, one more dog hair or two wouldn’t matter.” He polished his looking glass and used it to survey his cousin’s ruined boots, filthy shirt, and torn coat. “My, my.”

For once Corin agreed with his cousin. “If you are so good at finding things, I’ll pay you fifty pounds to find me a valet before dinnertime.”

“For fifty pounds you can have mine, Knolly. Excellent chap, has a way with a curling iron.”

“No, I’d pay you the blunt to drown anyone responsible for your ensemble and hairstyle,” Corin stated, pushing his own untrimmed hair back out of his eyes.

“Fine, but I am not the one trying to impress my future father-in-law. Is that a bruise I see on your chin, cuz?”