The Tempting of Thomas Carrick (8 page)

“The Forresters’. I’ll ride there—they’ll help.”

She nodded. “If I boil the water, I can use it to wash and clean. The youngest two—I can make them more comfortable, at least.”

He hesitated. “I’ll need to borrow the Forresters’ dray to bring back any decent amount of water. I’ll be an hour, possibly two. Will you be all right here on your own?”

She looked at him as if he was speaking in tongues, then she waved him away. “Go. I’ll be perfectly all right.”

He went.

Lucilla finished reassembling the second lamp. She lit the wick, turned it low, then left the lamp on the table beside the sofa. After checking Joy Burns and finding little change, she took the other lamp and explored the various small rooms off the kitchen and the wash house. After deciding what she could use for each task, she set to work hauling in water from the well, filling the copper, then building the fire beneath it. Once the water had boiled for ten full minutes, she doused the fire, ladled water into a pail, then set the lid back on the copper and got to work.

She scrubbed floors and replaced the used buckets. Despite the chill in the night air, she cracked open several windows, encouraging the cool drafts to clear the stench of sickness from the house.

That done, she fetched more of the boiled water, still warm, and used damp cloths to wash her patients’ hands and faces, all the while being especially careful not to allow any of the water, boiled or not, to touch anyone’s lips.

The youngest girl and younger boy awoke and remained awake, but all the others were still drifting in and out of sleep. Remembering the small canteen attached to her saddle, Lucilla wrapped a knitted shawl she found in the Bradshaws’ room about her head and shoulders, and went out to the barn to find it.

She was pleased to discover the canteen was full of pure, fresh water from Casphairn Manor’s well. She took a small sip, then returned to the house and poured small amounts of water into two glasses she took from the very back of a shelf. Those she gave to the girl and boy, then she found another glass, one she deemed safe enough, and took some water to Bradshaw.

He roused enough to drink it down, but immediately fell back, exhausted just by doing that much. Lucilla watched sleep reclaim him. She checked on his wife, then left them both sleeping.

Returning to the main room, she pulled a chair up to the sofa, sat, and, taking Joy Burns’s hand in hers, kept vigil.

She’d done this before, with Algaria, with others, and knew she would do so many more times in her life—holding the hand of the dying as they approached the veil.

The moments ticked past, then she bent her head and prayed.

The small clock on the mantelpiece chimed twelve times before she heard the distant rumble of an approaching dray.

She walked out to discover that Thomas had brought two full barrels of water.

He drew the rear of the dray as close as he could to the kitchen door. Stepping down, he nodded at the barrels. “The Forresters will be here as early as they can. Until then, we’ll have to work with the barrels where they are—I can’t lift them by myself.”

“No matter,” she said. “It’s untainted water, and that’s what counts.”

The next hours were busy. Thomas unhitched the Forresters’ horse and led it to the stable, while she set two different tisanes brewing. While they steeped, then cooled, she rinsed and dried glasses and bowls, using the precious untainted water sparingly. She didn’t know what had been put into the Bradshaws’ well, but boiling alone might not negate its effect; she wasn’t taking any chances.

Thomas had come back inside, looked in on the Bradshaws, and was sitting silently beside Joy when Lucilla carried a tray laden with doses of her tisane into the main room.

He rose and went to take the tray. Together, they went into each room and woke each Bradshaw. He helped them to sit while Lucilla helped them drink. Thomas was relieved by the improvement in the youngest children; color had started to return to their cheeks and they moved, albeit carefully, on their own.

“They should all be like that by morning,” Lucilla told him.

All the Bradshaws roused enough to recognize both him and her, which was also reassuring. When Mrs. Bradshaw, the weakest and still most affected, struggled to thank them, he hushed her. “Just rest and get better—that’s the best reward you can give us.”

Lucilla’s lips gently curved. She gave him an approving nod, then she lifted the tray with the empty glasses and led the way out of the room.

He picked up the lamp and followed. Pausing in the doorway, he glanced back, took in the clean floor, the clean, unused buckets left in case of need, and the other signs of order restored and neatness reimposed.

After closing the door, he followed Lucilla along the corridor. He hadn’t expected her—the granddaughter of a duchess—to scrub soiled floors in a farmhouse, yet the floors had been washed and scrubbed, and she had been the only able body there. Then again, he’d seen how she had worked when they’d been stranded in a crofter’s cottage ten years before, and she’d helped deliver the crofter’s babe. Granddaughter of a duchess she might be, but she’d never shied from doing whatever was required to aid those who needed and asked for her help.

Ducking under the low lintel of the archway, he stepped into the dimness of the main room. In the glow cast by the lamp set beside the sofa, he saw her, still carrying the tray, peering at the face of the small clock on the mantelpiece.

“We’ll need to dose them again at about four o’clock.”

He hesitated, then asked, “What is it you’re giving them?”

She glanced at him as if surprised by his interest, but answered, “What we’ve just given them is a blend of herbs that will ease the pain and settle their stomachs. At four o’clock, we’ll give them a half dose of the same thing, along with a half dose of a strengthening tonic. Later, when they’re ready to get on their feet, they should have more of the latter.” She started toward the kitchen. “They can sip that throughout the day as needed. I’ll make up a bigger batch to leave with them. By evening, I’ll be surprised if they aren’t all feeling a great deal better, although full recovery will take another day or so.” Pausing in the kitchen doorway, she glanced back. “The most important thing is to ensure they have no more of that tainted water.”

He nodded; when she continued into the kitchen, he ambled after her and set the lamp on the table. “The Forresters are near enough to supply them. Forrester’s already offered. I’ll arrange for the well to be tested, but that will take months.”

“The effect might pass. They can use the cats to check if the water’s still bad.” She paused, then said, “That reminds me.”

Leaving the tray on the table, she picked up the lamp, walked to the kitchen door, opened it, and went out. Curious, Thomas followed as far as the door. He propped one shoulder against the frame and watched as she went to the well, bent and picked up a bowl, then returned to the water barrels and filled the bowl from one.

She glanced at him. “As the barn cats were so instrumental in sounding the alarm, so to speak, the least we can do is see to them, too.”

He didn’t argue, just watched as she returned to the well, set down the bowl, then straightened and called, “Kit, kit, kit.”

One after another, the cats came out to investigate. Soon, the bowl was surrounded by furry heads, all lapping furiously.

When the cats were replete and sat back to groom their whiskers, Lucilla brought the bowl back to refill it. Still lounging, he asked, “Artemis and Apollo—are they still about?” By which he meant still alive; the pair would be just over ten years old, which was a very good age for a deerhound.

She nodded. “For years, they went everywhere with us, Marcus and me—at least, wherever we allowed. They used to come to the grove with us without fail, but now their legs aren’t up to the journey.” Her lips gently curved. “They usually laze about the manor in the best spot of sunshine they can find. Or if not that, they stretch before the fireplace that has the best fire—they move from hearthrug to hearthrug, depending on the state of the blazes.”

He humphed. He watched her take the refilled bowl back to the well. He remained where he was as she returned. When she halted before the door and arched an imperious brow at him, he met her gaze and simply said, “Thank you for coming and helping the Bradshaws.”

She shrugged lightly and waved him back.

Slowly straightening, he stepped back, and she stepped past—almost touching yet not, a teasing of his senses, one he hadn’t anticipated and therefore hadn’t guarded against. He clamped down on his instinctive reaction.

Apparently oblivious, she continued into the kitchen. “It’s my duty to help.” She glanced back at him. “As I did with the crofters—the Fields—all those years ago.”

Closing the door, he frowned. “I thought your duties, as such, were limited to the Vale.”

“The Lady considers these lands—the Carrick estate, all of it, it seems—to be part of her domain, too. Hence all the people on the estate are in her care, so if they need the sort of help I can give”—she spread her hands—“I’m here.”

Halting at the end of the kitchen table, he watched her sort through the various herbs she’d pulled from her saddlebag. After several moments, he shifted. “I’ll go and check on the Bradshaws.”

She nodded without looking up.

After confirming that all was quiet in the bedrooms, he sank into the chair beside the sofa. Resting his elbows on his thighs, linking his hands and propping his chin upon them, he watched Joy Burns. He wished she could rouse enough to tell him what had happened, whether her taking poison had been a terrible accident, or…

His mind balked at supplying the rest of that thought. Who would knowingly harm a healer, and why?

Yet coincidence, coincidence. One too many coincidences had brought him there, and now here was another.

Time passed, and Lucilla joined him. She’d turned the lamp in the kitchen low; the light was muted, shades of shadows and night, when she bent over Joy, felt for her pulse, then quietly murmured, “She’s sinking. It won’t be long now.”

He rose and drew up the other armchair. Lucilla sank into it, and he returned to the other.

Together, they sat and watched Joy Burns die.

Later, he carried Joy’s body to the wash house. Lucilla spread a sheet on the bench, and he laid Joy down. Lucilla straightened Joy’s limbs, her clothes, then drew another sheet over Joy’s empty shell.

They stood side by side for a moment, then turned and left, closing the door and returning to the house to continue caring for the living.

At four o’clock, they did their rounds, waking the sleeping Bradshaws and administering doses of Lucilla’s combined remedies.

By the time they’d tidied things away, set all ready for making breakfast, and Lucilla had put up her prepared tonic for later, the sun was lightening the eastern sky.

He found a cache of tea. Lucilla made a pot for the two of them. Taking his mug, he walked through the main room to the front door. He opened it and looked out, then he stepped out, tugged the door almost closed, and sat on the stone stoop. Cradling the mug between his hands, he sipped the strong tea and gazed out over Carrick lands, to where the sun was painting the skies with pale gray, blush pink, and soft orange.

Some time later, the door opened, and Lucilla stepped out. Like him, she’d brought her mug. She sat next to him; the stone step was only so wide—less than an inch separated their hips and shoulders.

Without a word, she, too, sipped her tea and looked out at the dawn as the sun rose over a landscape that was familiar to them both.

Minutes passed, then without looking away from nature’s splendor, he asked, “The poison in the well—do you have any idea what it might be?”

She looked down; she frowned at the mug in her hands. “No, not really. It could be something organic, like a fungus or mold, or mineral-based.” She paused, then added, “If I had to wager, I’d put my money on the latter.”

He sipped, lowered his mug. “Why?”

From the corner of his eye, he saw her raise her head.

“Because a fungus or mold would have taken time—weeks or months—to grow to the point of poisoning the well. Any illness would have come on gradually, over a long period, not as it appears to have done, all in one morning.” Her gaze on the horizon, she sipped, then said, “Salts of some sort. That would be my guess.”

He let that settle between them, then asked, “I take it we’re in agreement that, although Joy could have, for some reason, eaten a mushroom or some other poisonous plant while on her way here, it’s very strange that a healer of her experience, one who was born and lived all her life in these parts, should have made such a mistake?”

He made the statement a definite question.

Lucilla frowned. “Yes. Beyond strange, heading toward incomprehensible.” She waited, sipping her tea. When Thomas said nothing more but simply stared broodingly out at the fields, she decided it was her turn to ask questions. “What brought you back to the estate?”

He shifted on the stone beside her, then settled again. “I got a letter—two letters. The first from Bradshaw, telling me there was a problem with the seed supply for the season’s planting. I happened to run into Nigel and Nolan in town, and they assured me it was…some change in procedure. Something like that. Yesterday, Forrester sent a courier with a note to tell me that he and his wife had found the Bradshaws very ill. Forrester confirmed the difficulties with the seed supply.” He paused, hands clasped about his mug, then said, “I decided I needed to come down and see what was happening for myself.”

She’d harbored a tiny kernel of hope that she might have contributed to his reasons for returning, but…whatever the reason, he was at last there. She sipped, turning over his words. Puzzled, she said, “Our farmers have already planted or are in the process of doing so.” She glanced at him. “I haven’t heard of any new procedure, or any seed shortage, but if there has been any disruption to the supply, Marcus would know.”

He met her gaze briefly. “I’m sure the situation will sort itself out.” He looked forward again.