Crossed in Love, page 12
She felt him hovering behind her, fearful of what would happen should he leave his daughter unguarded for even a moment. She touched a hand to his sleeve, daring to meet his eyes just this once. “Go, Jack. You have done everything humanly possible. The matter is in God’s hands now.”
He needed to be reminded of that. Nodding, he pressed her fingers. Not daring to say more, he left in search of a maid.
Telling himself he would nap only a few hours, Jack collapsed, still dressed, on a guest bed near the nursery. When he had fully recovered his faculties, he would decide what to do with the obstinate Miss Thorogood. She would certainly be missed by dinner. He had no illusions that she had told anyone where she was going, or she would have been prevented. Somehow, he would have to find a way to spirit her back into the safety of her own home. When he woke.
It was nearly midnight before he opened his eyes again. It took a minute to recollect why he slept in a strange bed with all his clothes on. He hadn’t been that drunk in years. When the memory came, it was with a rush of pain and fear, and he hastily swung his legs to the floor.
Amy’s room was lit by a branch of candles. In their flickering light he watched Carolyn wring out a cloth in a washbowl and gently place it over his daughter’s forehead. A worried frown lined Carolyn’s brow as she worked, and he could see that she was biting her lip. In fear, he turned to observe Amy.
His daughter was tossing restlessly. As he approached her bed, he could see the fine sheen of perspiration on her small face. Even as he watched, he heard her low moan, and the bottom seemed to fall out of his stomach.
“What is wrong? What can I do?” he whispered hoarsely.
Carolyn glanced up at him in relief. “Her fever is rising. We must keep it down. Call some of the servants and have them bring up snow to add to the washbasin.”
Jack looked at the empty cot where the maid should be and shook his head in disbelief. Where in hell were his servants? Furiously he went in search of a maid. His daughter could be dying, and they all lay cozy in their beds. He would fire the lot of them on the morrow.
He forgot his temper a little while later as he cuddled his unconscious daughter on his lap while Carolyn applied the cold compresses to her brow. Amy seemed to lie quieter in his arms, and he felt better holding her close. She was so damned small and helpless. She needed him to protect her, and he hadn’t done a very good job of it. Perhaps this was God’s way of telling him he didn’t deserve love. He’d certainly failed the child’s mother. And Carolyn. He looked up to watch the grim lines of worry on her lovely face.
“I meant to send you home hours ago,” he murmured more to himself than to her.
“I wouldn’t have gone.” Carolyn packed the latest bowl of snow into a cloth. “You needed sleep, and Mrs. Higginbotham is useless. I’m afraid I yelled at her.”
The idea of yelling at that redoubtable matron had never occurred to Jack. He lifted a surprised brow at this delicate lady beside the bed, gently applying compresses, and wondered what other secrets she hid. How much did he really know of her, after all?
“Did you yell at the maids too? I thought I specifically assigned them to helping you while I slept.”
“They’re sweet, but they haven’t a brain between them. Mrs. Higginbotham dismissed the one who spoke up earlier, and she told the other to go on to bed. Then she went off to bed herself.” Carolyn offered a small grin. “I gave her her marching orders, but she didn’t seem to think they were final.”
“Did you, now?” Jack leaned back against the wooden headboard and made Amy more comfortable in his arms. Carolyn’s proximity and the faint scent of wildflowers soothed him. Under other circumstances, they would have aroused him, but not when his daughter lay ill in his arms. He just needed Carolyn’s reassuring presence to let him know all would be well. “You’re developing quite a nasty temper, my love.”
Carolyn didn’t give him a second glance at this endearment. She’d heard his honeyed words before. She had yet to see proof of them. “I’ve always had a nasty temper. You just never came across it before.”
“I think I’ve encountered it once or twice of late, and I remember a particularly brilliant tantrum that haunted my worst nightmares for years. Had you shown Mrs. Higginbotham that fury, she would be out of the house by now.”
That caused Carolyn to meet his gaze. In this light, she could discern little of Jack’s expression, but what she saw made her vaguely uneasy. His light words had a peculiar intensity. Ignoring his reference to another time, she stuck to a safer subject. “I’m sorry I did not let my tongue fly, then. She is your servant, so I held back.”
Amy stirred in his arms, and Jack returned his gaze there, brushing a strand of ebony hair from her dark complexion. “Mrs. Higginbotham will have to go. I just didn’t know how to go about interviewing governesses or nannies. I don’t know very much about children, I suppose.”
Carolyn sat in the rocker and replied softly, “You know how to love them. That is what counts most.”
At the gentleness of her voice, Jack relaxed, and closing his eyes, leaned back against the bed. “I don’t know what I would have done these last years without her. She is the only softness, gentleness, that I know. I hold her, and she smiles at me with all the love and trust in the world. I needed her faith to keep from losing mine.”
Tears came to her eyes, and Carolyn had to look away from the man on the bed. He was so large sprawled across the child’s narrow mattress, but he looked perfectly natural. She wondered how many nights he had sat just like that, rocking his infant daughter to sleep. “Her mother?” she heard herself asking.
Jack didn’t look up. His mouth tightened into an ironic curve. “If you wish more evidence to cast me aside, that tale ought to do it.” When she made no reply, he shrugged and continued. “The poverty in India is excruciating. Many times worse than you see on a London street. Servants can be had for the offer of a roof over their heads and food in their bellies. I was saving every brass farthing I could put a hand to, so I led a very simple life, two rooms and one old ayah to look after me.”
He felt Carolyn rise to change the soaking compress, but he didn’t open his eyes. He would have this story told and done with. There would be no more illusions between them. “With nothing better to do in the evenings, I was drinking heavily. I won’t go into details of what life is like down there, but drink kills a lot of us. I suppose my ayah feared losing her lucrative position, or perhaps she sought a second income or a measure of comfort for another. Whatever her inscrutable reasoning, she brought a young girl to me one night when I was half out of my mind.”
Jack opened his eyes to watch Carolyn’s expression at this revelation. He was going far beyond the bounds of propriety to speak these things, but he wanted Carolyn to know all that he was. He had fooled her when she was younger, filling her head with romantic fantasies while concealing the harsher side of his life. It had been an act of desperation at the time, just as the truth was now. Perhaps he was older but no wiser. Carolyn’s expression told him nothing, and he took that as permission to go on, though he felt as if he were cutting his own throat once again.
“She became my mistress. There is no polite way to state it. I had no intention of marrying her. She filled a place in my life that was empty, but we scarcely spoke the same language. She was young and ignorant and became pregnant immediately. It made her happy, so I suppose that was what she wanted. She knew it would give her a position of comfort for the rest of her life in my household. That’s the way things are done down there.”
Carolyn made a small noise that sounded almost like a sob, but he couldn’t stop now. It all had to be said. “She died shortly after giving birth to Amy. It was only then that I learned my mistress was also my ayah’s daughter.”
A soft exclamation indicated Carolyn heard and understood, but she made no other reply to this tale of Amy’s origins. It was a tawdry tale, at best. He could have done as so many others had and left the child behind, but just as he had been unable to send the old woman and babe away at birth, he could not do it four years later. With a sigh, Jack snuggled his daughter closer, clinging to her warmth.
“You took the child from her grandmother?” she asked, still looking for a reason to condemn him.
He shook his head. “She was stabbed in the marketplace one day. Amy has no one but me.”
Carolyn shuddered at the horror of such a life. “I’m glad you told me,” she offered once she recovered her composure. She hoped he couldn’t see the tracks of her tears. The thought of his loneliness in that horrible place of exile and the mother willing to sacrifice her child to a life of infamy rather than allow her to starve tore at her heart. She was glad he had saved Amy from such a life. “Will you adopt her?”
Jack looked up and caught her eye. “I think that depends on several things,” he answered slowly. The telltale blush did not rise to her cheeks, and he saw only curiosity in her eyes. His hopes plummeted, but he clung fiercely to their remains. “Yes, I will probably adopt her.”
Carolyn did not understand the sharpness of his words, but she was not given time to consider it. Amy began to shake and moan, and perspiration poured freely from every pore, drenching her night shift. There wasn’t time to do anything but act.
Afraid to expose her to the chilly night air, they wrapped her in blankets until she lay still once more. Then, removing wet garments and finding dry ones, they returned to the previous routine of applying compresses. Within the half-hour she was shaking again. Steadily they worked throughout the night.
Shortly after dawn the kitchen sent up tea and toast, and Jack sent for the nursery maid and Mrs. Higginbotham. The maid arrived and applied herself to changing the linen, giving the master and the lady surreptitious looks in the process. Both looked haggard but vaguely triumphant. The little girl seemed to be breathing easier.
Mrs. Higginbotham didn’t arrive until an hour later. She gave Carolyn a smirk and turned her full attention on Jack. His rumpled clothes of two days before set her aback, but the snarl on his face made her quail. She turned to the offensive. “I beg your pardon, my lord, but I was told in no uncertain terms that my services weren’t required. I will be more than happy to sit with the child while you get your rest. You shouldn’t have the burden of nursing an ill child. I’m certain you have much more important things to do. Shall I ring for your bath to be sent up?”
Jack’s lips tightened, but he held his temper with remarkable aplomb. Carolyn admired his performance. She would have scratched the woman’s eyes out. More important things to do, indeed!
“We’ll no longer be requiring your services, Mrs. Higginbotham. I will speak with my secretary when he arrives, and he will advance you six months’ salary. I would like you to remove from the household before day’s end.”
The woman stared at him in astonishment. “On what grounds, my lord? Have I not cared for the wee one like one of my own, dressing her in all that is fine and seeing that she is properly instructed in conduct? I cannot be blamed that her kind cannot learn simple obedience. I have done my utmost to teach her.”
Jack rose to his full threatening height and the woman stepped backward. “Out, Mrs. Higginbotham, before I lose my patience. I recommend that you do not seek any other position requiring understanding or compassion, for you have none. Leave us, at once!”
He practically roared this last, and the woman gave a squeak of alarm and rushed to the door, throwing Carolyn a malevolent look in parting.
Jack collapsed into himself, but a sound from the bed returned his attention there. Amy sneezed, then opened her eyes. “Papa?” she inquired weakly as he scooped her into his arms.
Jack’s shining eyes and radiant smile returned tears to Carolyn’s eyes. Touching her hand to the child’s cheek and ascertaining that it was considerably cooler than before, she felt relief flood through her and felt the same in him. They needed no words of understanding.
“Nanny’s basket will have arrived by now,” she murmured. “I will go home and fetch it.”
Jack’s smile faded. “Not yet, Carolyn. Wait until I can come with you. I would not have you face the consequences alone.”
She had not given much thought to consequences. She had possessed the freedom to come and go at will for some years now. Her father trusted her to do the proper thing. In all probability, he did not even know she wasn’t at home. She offered Jack an uneasy smile. “That isn’t necessary. My maid is the only one who knows, and she won’t talk. You needn’t worry.”
Amy’s fit of sneezing, followed by her hungry complaints, distracted them both. Jack became frantic when she cried and spit up her toast. Carolyn soothed him and the child, offering apple juice and tea laced with honey and slicing the toast up into soft, buttery strips dotted with cinnamon. Between Jack shouting orders at an army of servants racing up and down the stairs and Carolyn patiently doctoring the food to suit an invalid, they succeeded in getting the first decent meal into Amy that she’d had in days.
Their triumph did not last long. Just as they got Amy into another clean gown and asleep, a roar in the lower hall warned that still another hurdle awaited. They exchanged glances at the familiar fury. Carolyn’s father had discovered her whereabouts.
She paled at the unexpectedness of this visitation, but held her head high as angry strides approached. Not daring to compromise her further, Jack kept a respectful distance as the door burst open.
Henry Thorogood took in his daughter’s wrinkled walking gown and weary expression, Jack’s rumpled clothes and defiantly protective air, and the tiny child lying curled beneath the covers. The vulgar message that had brought him flying here had no basis in fact; he knew his daughter too well to see anything else in this scene but what it was. He concealed his relief and turned his furious gaze on the young man who had so successfully turned his comfortable world inside-out.
“I will see you in my study in one hour, Chatham. Come, Carolyn, we will go home.”
Carolyn looked from one man to the other. Had they been tomcats, they would have their backs arched, their hair on end, and they would be spitting. That was an odd way to picture Jack, and she threw him a second look. His fingers were curled around the chair back while he engaged her father in a duel of glares. The tension mounting between them was too electric to bear. Silently she picked up the pelisse and muff she had thrown over the chair the day before and walked out of the room.
Angry shouts echoed up and down the hallways, vibrating through the normally sedate Thorogood household. Blanche sent her sister a speculative look as Carolyn sat reading in the far corner of the library. Carolyn’s air of indifference didn’t fool her this time. She looked like one who hadn’t slept in weeks, and the book she held was upside-down. Something was going on, but no one had given thought to informing Blanche.
Carolyn didn’t seem surprised when the footman came to fetch her. She shook out the warm yellow skirts of the wool gown she had donned, wasted no time tidying her loose arrangement of curls, and proceeded out, as if walking to her execution.
Her father at least had the decency to leave them alone, Carolyn observed as she entered the study to find only Jack waiting. He had that haunted look on his face again, but his eyes were warm as they took in her appearance. He made no attempt at an improper embrace, as he might have in earlier years, but Carolyn felt his desire to do so. She was grateful for his restraint.
“How is Amy?” Although she had left the child little more than an hour ago, it seemed much longer. She would hear this news first, before the argument to follow.
“Sleeping when I left her. Your maid brought the basket of remedies. I thank you for your concern.”
His formality indicated uneasiness. Carolyn could understand that. Her father could have that effect on heads of state. Nervously she took a seat and clasped her hands in her lap. “You needn’t look like that, Jack. He doesn’t bite.”
Jack made a wry smile. “I wouldn’t swear to that. He’s in the right of it, though. I have compromised you beyond repair. I’m obliged to offer for you.”
She had hoped he would phrase it a little less bluntly. It would be soothing to her injured feelings to hear him mouth a few of the pretty phrases he was so good at saying. Just for a little while she would like to cling to the illusion of those long-ago years.
Her smile matched his as she replied, “I am obliged to refuse.”
Jack’s shoulders slumped and he turned to play with the candlesticks on the mantel rather than reveal his expression. “You cannot, Carolyn. That Higginbotham woman is spreading word far and wide. I could slit her throat, but the damage will already be done.”
She had not expected that. Carolyn contemplated her alternatives, but her ability to think straight had flown out the door when Jack entered it. She shook her head in hopes of freeing it from cobwebs. “We can deny everything. I’ll not be forced into marriage.”
“I knew you would say that.” Bleakly he turned back to face her. “Can you not even consider it, Carolyn? Would it be so horrible a fate? I’m quite wealthy now, you know. I can support you in any manner that you choose.”
Carolyn rose and gave him a cold glare at this insult. “What does wealth have to do with it? I would have married you when you were penniless, but you preferred gold to me. Go wed your gold, Jack. I’ll not have any part of your lies.”
She swung to leave the room, but he stepped forward and caught her wrist, his face a mixture of despair and desperation. “Is it George? Do you love him? I will go speak to him today and explain all that has happened. If you love each other, this misunderstanding can’t come between you.”
