An Independent Miss (19 page)

He looked at the torches, with
their dark plumes of smoke rising into the night, their glow lining the low
balcony and pathways. “Which way shall we go?”

“Over there, shall we?” She angled
to the left, were the light of the torches tapered into shadow. He hesitated,
slowed their pace as Lady Jane continued to warble on, a tendency of the Upton
women. So much so, Upton himself claimed he didn’t even listen, just let them
chatter away.

“She’s been welcomed back into
society. Well done of you.”

Andover managed to catch that
sentence. “You expected less of me?”

She laughed, a delightful sound,
easy and light. “No, you silly goose. No one ever expects less of you.”

“Why, thank you.” He listened to
the crunch of pea gravel beneath their feet, as the followed a path, not
dissimilar to the one he’d traversed with Felicity only an hour or so earlier.
Except this path was lit. The other was not. Which made him wonder if Lady
Westhaven actually did see him with Felicity.

They had been in shadows, though in
her direct line of sight. He’d assumed she’d seen them, though there’d been no
hint of it, when they returned to Lord and Lady Westhaven in the salon.

“You’ve done what you needed to do,
you know.” Jane rattled on, snaring his attention once more. “You can’t be
expected to do more than ease her back into polite society. Give it time, now.
The gossip will subside and then, I’m certain, you can convince her to let you
go. Simple, really.” Her smile lit her face. “No reason for the doldrums.”

She made it sound so easy, as
though he chose Felicity for no particular reason. That his chosen did not pull
at his senses. The troubling thing was, she did pull at his senses. He’d rather
she didn’t. He’d rather not be drawn to jealousy, a foolish thing, or hunger
for her smile, let alone deep dark kisses.

He could not afford to feel so
deeply.

“And what would become of her if we
were to…” He scowled, disliking the slant of the conversation, but curious
anyone would think the situation so smoothly navigated. “…drift apart?”

“Oh, that.” Lady Jane stopped,
faced him at the darkest point between two torches. The sort of place a seducer
would lead a foolish lass.

He was no foolish lass and yet he
allowed her hands on his chest. An unwarranted closeness.

“I wouldn’t worry about her.” Lady
Jane’s whisper lowered to a deep provocative brush. He removed her hands,
though didn’t know how to let go of them without being insufferably cold.

He was not a prude. Neither was he
a seducer of young women

She continued, clasping the hold.
“Lady Felicity has always been most pleased with her own company. Odd sort,
don’t you think? Prefers country life.”

He lowered their hands, loosening
his hold so hers could slide free, and offered his arm to lead her back into
the ballroom, as the music had ended.

“Shall we return?” he asked, and
looked up to see, for the second time that evening, a figure in the doorway.
No, not a figure but two, Felicity and her brother.

The light behind them so much
stronger than the torch light, obliterated any chance of determining
expression.

Would they have seen him standing
there with Lady Jane? If not, had her mother, in that spill of light from the
house, witnessed a passionate kiss halfway down a dark garden path?

Then, a part of him intended it to
be so. The other part of him, drawn by far more elemental forces, didn’t really
intend anything, but to feed his hunger for her.

The die was cast. No room for
alternatives, even if Felicity thought so.

Felicity. Reeling him in, despite
her fascination with all he abhorred.

His grandmother had the right of
it. Like a witch, drawing him to danger.

Peace and calm, two things he
sought in marriage. Lady Felicity offered neither.

****

She felt like Cinderella requesting
the carriage long before dawn.

“If that is what you wish.” Andover
obliged her and, contrarily, she wished he tried harder to dissuade, even as he
turned, stern-faced, to a footman.

“I’m terribly sorry,” she
apologized, as he guided her through the throng, her apology weak. Her real
reason for leaving enough to have him leave her there, in the center of the
room, alone.

Lord Richardson caught his arm,
bowed to Lady Felicity and mumbled something about seeing Andover at the club,
later, which relieved Felicity to no end, knowing Andover would be out until
dawn, at least, if not later. This also meant he would not be with Lady Jane.

She should leave him with Lady
Jane.

Once he heard, found out what his
future bride was up to this very night, he would reject her for someone more
like Lady Jane.

Felicity tripped over nothing.

“My apologies,” Andover offered,
catching her before she fell into a group of ladies. “I’ll get you through this
mess.”

“Thank you,” she replied,
disappointed by his rush to have her gone. If only she didn’t need his escort,
but he’d brought her and her parents…her parents! “Oh, I forgot, how will
Mother and Father…”

“I’ve sent a message to them.
They’ll meet us in the foyer.”

“Of course.” He would see to
everything, and he did, getting them to the entrance before her parents found
them.

“There!” he exclaimed, when they
were free of the mass of guests, out in the entrance to the grand house. He
faced Felicity, all grave concern, as he traced her cheek with his gloved hand.
The soft texture rippling down, deep inside. “You’ve done it, my sweet, made it
through the battle and won the war.”

“Oh,” she said, willing some
intelligence to rise through the sensation of that one touch. “You led the
fight. Quite the champion.”

“Was I?” He quirked an eyebrow.
“Let us hope it is true, that I can be your champion, always.”

Her mother took that moment to rush
up to them, Lord Westhaven in her wake. “Oh, Felicity, are you all right?” she
fussed, scowling. “No doubt all the excitement,” she exclaimed to Andover as
her husband went to get the women’s wraps. “Felicity never weakens, not so much
as a headache, even after sitting up, night after night…”

Ill-considered words, opening
avenues of discussion best left closed. No, she wouldn’t—
couldn’t
—divulge that bit of
information.

“Tired, I expect,” Felicity offered,
relieved the night was at an end.

“I will see her home.” He bowed,
but her mother shushed him.

“Westhaven and I have seen enough
of the night and you’ve only just returned to town. No doubt you have catching
up to do. If you allow us the use of your carriage, we will see it turned back
well before you will be ready to move on.”

“I will ride with you.”

“There’s no need,” Felicity added.
His eyebrow raised. “My parents can see me home.” She touched his arm,
assurance he had no part in her leaving. She was tired. Truly. It had nothing
to do with Lady Jane’s hand on his chest, as though a simple gesture of no
consequence.

How life had changed. Only a few
weeks ago, when Andover proposed, Andover had pressed her hand between his palm
and his chest, so startling her by the intimacy of that touch, she’d failed to
hear his proposal.

She’d been terribly naïve. So very
terribly naïve.

“Enjoy yourself.” She told him.
“It’s been a year since you’ve seen your friends, and now you will be free of a
Lady tagging along by your side.”

“I hope never to be free of that.”
He bent over her hand, lifted it to his fingers, turning it at the last minute to
kiss the inside of her wrist, his lips touching bare flesh, where the wrist
button had popped free. “Allow me to visit you tomorrow afternoon. We could go
for a ride.”

“I would like that,” she scrambled,
thinking of her commitments at the convalescent home. “Later, if we may?
There’s much to be done,” she fudged.

“Nonsense, you can go at the
fashionable hour, Felicity,” her mother snapped.

“If that isn’t convenient…”

“No.” Lady Westhaven patted his
arm, eyeing Felicity. “Perfectly convenient. Can we expect your mama?”

He stilled, Felicity held her
breath. “No, I think not.”

“Well,” Lady Westhaven soldiered
on. “Perhaps it would be better if we paid a call on her in a day or two.”

“Her health is still fragile.”
Unknowingly, relieving Felicity of the need to face her duplicity.

Mrs. Comfrey.

Would she tell Lady Andover
tonight? Perhaps not. It might not come to that. They truly wouldn’t suit and,
if they didn’t, Felicity would not be out in society. There may never be a need
for Lady Andover to know who she was

An hour later, Felicity stood on
her bedroom window ledge, looking down at the balcony one floor below.

She studied the Gibb’s window
surround, blocks spaced and prominent enough to be scaled. Or so she hoped.
She’d never considered climbing down a building’s façade before. The most
prudent path as the floor, outside her rooms and her parent’s chamber, creaked
loudly with every step.

Her plan seemed so easy. She would
use the surround to climb down to the lower story balcony and climb in the
window of the family dining room. She’d already made certain those doors were
open.

From there, she would make her way
through the house. Getting back up would be trickier, but by then her parents
should be well and truly asleep, allowing her to get to her room by normal
means.

At least, that was her plan. So
well thought out this evening.

She looked back down at the
balcony, further away than she remembered. She looked over at the stones
framing the outside of her window. Far narrower than she pictured.

Still, she had to go. She’d sent a
message. Lady Andover would be expecting her.

Hoisting her satchel over her
shoulders, she pulled the back hem of her old work skirt between her legs and
up, fixing it under a belt at her waist. She dared one more look down. Better
not to focus in that direction. No room for fear. She faced the narrow
treacherous edge of the window’s surround, lodged her foot sideways as deeply
onto the edge of the stone as she could without going through it, grasped the
stone above and refused to think.

Nerves and touch would get her
through this.

Clinging to the stone, arms
stretched above, feet down below, she couldn’t figure out how to move down. She
risked another look, grabbed the edge of the windowsill and swung back into
her room.

No hope for it. She leaned over the
sill feet first, wiggled herself out backward. The belt buckle dug into her
belly. She’d be bruised. Her arms scraped the rough stone until she’d reached
the point of no return, hanging by her hands, her feet dangling down.

There was a balcony below her.
Calculating her height, the drop, she figured it would be a good six feet. She
let go and landed in a heap on the stone, winded, but not hurt.

The things one must do in the name
of healing.

Felicity brushed her hands against each
other, ignoring the sting. As she moved through the house, she planned her
route to Andover’s, only two blocks away. She’d have to stick to the alleyways.

The easy part done, she now faced
the risk of Andover returning home early. This would be the dangerous part of
the night, and well she knew it.

Jack’s bed stood empty, stripped of
sheets and covers, the bedside table bare. Felicity grabbed the divider frame,
a meager separation of bed space in the convalescent home. She held it, afraid
she might faint. She, the stout hearted girl who had developed the habit of
sneaking into homes in the middle of the night had come to this, weak at the
knees over sadly ordinary consequences of a hospital.

“No,” the soldier with a head wound
whispered from the other side of the screen. “He’s not gone. Though he isn’t
doing well.”

Felicity looked over. “Where is
he?”

“They’ve moved him to another room,
with three others who’ve lost limbs, like him. Quieter, down the hall. His
family is here.”

That’s when she heard the silence,
noted the empty bed the screams had come from.

“Oh.” They’d listened to what
happened once gangrene set in. She searched for him, praying the lack of
screams meant the infection had lessened. For if it hadn’t, Jack would be gone
from them, soon.

She found him down the hall, in a
smaller chamber with only four beds. No more screaming, but low groans from the
other beds. One man rolled over, waking himself with a shout of pain.

Robbie sat beside a silent Jack,
both looking up as Felicity approached.

“Your parents are in town?” she
whispered.

Robbie nodded. “They traveled all
day yesterday, stayed the night with Jack. I told them to get some sleep.”

“Hello, Cissy,” Jack said. “Good of
you to come.”

“Of course I will come to see you.”
She kissed his cheek, as she took his wrist, finding the same uneven pulse of
the day before. “Let’s see that tongue.”

Matt, the soldier Robbie hired to
tend Jack, leaned in, a questioning look for Felicity. She smiled back, but
didn’t offer any comments. She would explain everything to him later.

She did ask him, “Have you started
the treatment?”

Robbie upended his chair in his
rush to stand. “I need to get some exercise.” He mumbled, backing out of the
room.

“Oh, Robbie,” She followed him out
into the hall. “He’s not worsened.”

“He’s not better, either.” Robbie
grated, so clearly uncomfortable.

“No,” She agreed and returned to
the soldier, who waited by the side of the bed, as eager as Robbie was
reluctant.

“He’s got the pouch on now, m’lady
but it’s due for a change. Waited for you.”

“Ah.” Awake, more alert than
expected, Jack watched them. “Do you want more of your medicine?” she asked,
though they both knew she couldn’t free him of the pain, only dull it.

He didn’t answer, though he took
the laudanum Matt poured, without complaint.

They waited for it to dull his
gaze, ease his breathing, which had grown far too rapid, before she bent to the
task of studying the efficacy of the treatment.

Matt as intent as Felicity, both
leaned in close, ignoring the stench made worse when uncovered.

“You counted them?” she asked.

“Yes, m’lady.”

“Good. Let’s count them as we
remove them. Then wash the limb as we have been doing,” she worked as she
spoke, “and cover it with another pouch and some fresh little buggers.” And
smiled, as she remembered the nurse, to find Matt staring at her.

“Is it going to work?” he
whispered.

“I don’t know.” She kept at her
job, pulling maggots, keeping track of how many they had, wishing she knew
enough to tell him for sure this unconventional treatment was a certain thing.
“But I believe his pain seems better.” She looked to her patient, “Is it
better, Jack?” she asked, but he had gone somewhere else, away from the stench
and the pain and this place of wounded soldiers.

“The others—” Matt nodded to
the other three beds beyond the screen they worked within, “—want you to
try it on them.”

“Let’s see how this goes first.” It
was all she could say, thinking of the notes she’d written in her book just
that morning. She’d not put in her conclusions.

Leaving Matt to tend to the wound,
Felicity found Robbie having a cheroot on the front stoop. The smell of coal
dust and horse dung proved surprisingly refreshing after the odor of Jack’s
ward.

“We know he isn’t likely to
survive. A part of me just wishes it would end, so he can be free of this
suffering.” Robbie flicked the end of his cheroot away.

Felicity hugged herself. “Don’t
lose hope yet, Robbie.”

He kicked the column’s base, a mess
of wound-up energy and nowhere to take it. He looked to the sky before turning
to Felicity. “Hope? You think maggots will save my brother?”

“It’s worth a try.”

Robbie snorted. “And he’s
determined to do anything you want. Anything. Even the ignominy of having
maggots crawling around his leg like he’s already a carcass!”

She looked away from his glitter of
tears.

“Last night, when I asked if you
would do me a favor, you said anything.”

“I did, and I meant it.”

He studied the street, as though
far horizons drew him rather than a dismal little thoroughfare and rows of
houses slipping far from their genteel beginnings. “I wonder…I know it sounds
daft, half-baked, but I’m not so removed I haven’t heard the rumors, of the way
society is treating you.”

“Oh, Robbie, that’s not your
worry.”

“We’re friends, so it is my worry
and I’ve a thought. If you were to…” He dropped off, slapped at that poor
abused column.

“To what, Robbie?” She encouraged.

“Promise to marry Jack before he
dies.”

She stared then, despite the drying
tears on his cheeks. A twisted idea born of torment and she knew him to be
tormented, having sat there day after day with screams and shouts ringing
around them. An awful place to watch a loved one sink further and further away.

So she softened her response,
gentling her tone. “To what purpose, Robbie? What good could come of it?”

He whirled on her, took her
shoulders in a hard grip, spilling a frantic rush of words. “Jack has been in
love with you his whole life. Have you not seen it? How he was over at your
house whenever he could be? Discussing plants and earth? Your love of plants
and all.” Yes, he would visit Ansley Park and ask for Felicity.

A ruse to see Caro, for Caro was
too young for a suitor.

A ruse Robbie believed.

“He always returned in a lovesick
haze, immune to my teasing. To be promised to you would give him a taste of
joy. Joy! When he is so full of pain.”

Felicity could barely think. Of all
the promises imagined, this she would never have anticipated.

“It is not me Jack loves, Robbie,
not in that way.” Not me, but Caro. A secret until Caro’s come-out, next year.
But Felicity dared not tell him, lest he send for her sister in his harebrained
scheme.

“He does, he has, he always will,
for whatever is left of his life. I believe he would have courted you before he
joined the army, but didn’t want you held to him if something like this should
happen.”

“No, not me, Robbie.” If only life
were that simple. Caro would be the one to truly mourn a love lost.

Robbie waited, but she had no
words.

“He deserves to feel loved before
he dies.”

She placed a calming hand on his
arm. “He does feel loved, by you, your family, all of us.”

“That is not enough.”

She thought of the tear-stained
letter she’d read to Jack the day before. Caro saying good-bye, even as she
wished him to live.

Caro’s memories free of Jack as a
man wasted by pain, so thin a child could lift him. Free of the stench, the
awful smell of a gangrenous wound.

No, she did not want Robbie riding
through the night to steal Caro from her school, creating a whole new scandal
and forcing her sister to remember Jack like this. Robbie would, in his
desperation, he would.

Thank God he didn’t realize which
sister Jack loved.

“I never expected you to be so
hardhearted to refuse this, when he will be dead soon.” His eyes glittered with
angry tears.

“Robbie, this is no small promise
you ask. I’m betrothed,” she argued, even as the image of Andover with Lady
Jane’s hands upon his chest snapped into her mind’s eye. She shook it off.

“Betrothed to a man who left you to
face ruin on your own? A man who is repulsed by what you do?” Hatred narrowed
his eyes. “He doesn’t deserve to kiss your feet.”

“You don’t understand,” she
pleaded.

“You said
anything
,” he prodded, so full of anger at his helplessness he
punished even as he appealed. “What do you say, Felicity? Once the screaming
starts, it will only be a few days before he’s gone.” Bitterness rode on his
words. “No one need know. I will explain to my parents. It would be a gift for
them, as well, you know, to see some small measure of joy in his eyes. Please,
Felicity.”

Finally, he turned his attention
from the street below them, tears in his eyes. “It would only be for a few
days. And then you would be free of him, of all those shallow people who could
never appreciate you. Let them think you were meant to marry Jack and go home,
to your stillroom. Be a woman who saves lives. Free from a man who can only
hate you for who you are.”

“You know nothing about it,” she
fought back, but he did. In his rantings, he’d touched the quick.

He snorted. “The whole of the county
knows of it. He thinks you’re a witch of some sort. Devil take him! He doesn’t
deserve you!” And he stormed back up to watch his brother die.

****

The first time Andover surprised
the Redmond household with a visit, Lady Westhaven informed him Felicity had
joined Bea in a trip to the park, to paint. Lord Westhaven rather thought the
cousins went to the lending library. Andover saw Upton and Bea riding toward
the park on his way over.

He would not challenge the
Westhavens, but rather worried they didn’t know where their daughter got off to
in the mornings. Still, the visit proved fruitful. All agreed, as special
license freed them from the church’s mandate for morning nuptials, an evening
wedding would suit.

He would put the idea to Felicity.

Their wedding.

Early tomorrow evening.

A small affair. Family only, with
the exception of Upton. Any more guests would be too much for his mother. He’d
not do anything to confuse her further.

Lady Westhaven set straight into
planning the event, speaking of menus and rooms for Lady Andover, for surely
the newly married couple would want the house to themselves for a day or two.
Andover was not to fret, for his mother would do very nicely with the
Westhavens. They would take the knocker off the door and keep the household to
a quiet level.

All planned, yet not a foregone
conclusion. Everything hinged on Felicity’s agreement.

And so, once again, he stood in the
vestibule of the Westhaven house, unexpected this time as well, for he’d made
arrangements to ride with Felicity much later in the day. Two purposes drew him
this time. His mother and curiosity. Would Felicity’s parents need to make
excuses all over again?

Would she be off to a destination
so secret, not even her parents knew its whereabouts?

Prepared to hear she was out and
about again, the butler surprised him by saying. “Lady Felicity is on the lawn,
with her siblings, my Lord.”

“Is she? Ah, good.” Here amongst
her siblings, no doubt in lovely disarray. Intelligent active scamps, the
absolutely delightful Redmond children thrived on chaos.

“I can find my own way,” he
decided, not wanting to give Felicity the time to change the tangle of her
hair, the smudges of grass on an older dress. He rather liked that about her,
her uninhibited play with children. Any other lady would be quite putout
discovered in anything less than her best, but Felicity was not any other lady.

He headed through the blue salon,
oblivious to the various seating arrangements and tables, all done in the
latest of styles with spindly legs and clawed feet. He often doubted the
reliability of those delicately framed chairs to hold a full grown man, but
that was not one of his concerns now. He had a goal.

Yet, even as he breezed through the
room, intent on reaching his prospective bride, his attention snagged on the
round library table and its burden. An old, leather bound book with thick
vellum pages, still opened wide.

Inviting, like a wicked siren’s
call.

He had every intention of passing
it by. Fisted his hand when he hesitated, yet morbid interest won. Sidetracked
from common sense, he stood over the open page, to find something far more
ominous than comfrey.

Gangrenous gas, pus-burdened
wounds.

He recoiled. The illustrations more
horrifying than any nightmare, yet a macabre fascination drew him back. He
forced his eyes away from the sickening drawings to the neat, tidy script.
Felicity’s script, so practical and clear, next to such gothically hideous
drawings. She wrote of herbs and washes, which was better, a poultice versus a
rinse. Things he knew nothing of, but now understood a physician, herbalist had
choices at hand. Terrible decisions of life and death.

Squeamish, horrific alternatives,
unfit for a lady’s mind.

Yet his Felicity filled hers with
such things.

And remained calm, unflappable,
gentle.

How many choices had his family’s
attending physicians discarded? Were his brothers, his father, lost to him by a
fluke of options? How many errors need be made for one path to become the
standard? How many poor decisions had Felicity made in the quest for knowledge?
Could he make room in his life for such risks?

A bark of laughter escaped. He
looked up, relieved to see he remained alone, with his fanciful memories. A
younger, inebriated self, ranting to any who would listen, the foolishness of
marrying a bluestocking. A pact made among lads, never to do such a terrible
thing. They wrote a ditty, to the joys of a simple maid, the evil of a
sharp-edged literate.