‘No, thank you. I’ll take care of everything myself from here on.’
‘Well… if you’re sure.’
‘Absolutely sure, Captain.’
If it wasn’t really Mr Ambrose who had been washed ashore, I didn’t want the captain there to see me crumble. And if it was him… Well, I didn’t want anyone around for that meeting.
‘Very well.’ The captain bowed. ‘Farewell, Miss Linton.’
‘You, too, Captain.’
Captain Crockford barked a few orders, and two sailors pushed the dinghy away from the shore. Not long after, it was moving back towards the dark shape of the ship, contrasted sharply against the flames of the sunset.
I didn’t stay to watch the dinghy disappear. Instead, I turned and started marching up the beach towards the twinkling lights of the village. After only a few paces, I stopped marching and started trudging instead, the sand shifting and scraping under my thin, and still damp, shoes.
‘Dash it all! Couldn’t that arrogant son of a bachelor manage to be washed ashore on a paved stretch of shore?’
The night remained silent, unsympathetic to my trials and tribulations. The walking became easier once I was across the beach and on the path up to the village, but by that time my socks were already full of sand. Muttering a few more unladylike expletives, I considered how Mr Ambrose would react if I were to ask him for three days sick leave because of footsoreness.
Hm. Probably not a very good idea.
The village at the end of the path was tiny. It didn’t take me long to find the vicarage, and after I knocked, it was only a few moments before the door swung open, and a portly little man with glasses blinked out at me, obviously confused at finding a strange female on his doorstep.
‘Um… yes, my dear? How can I help you?’
‘Are you Vicar Dawson?’ I asked, although his white collar really made the question rather redundant.
‘Um… Yes. I suppose so. Most of my parishioners seem to think so, at least.’
‘Good evening, Vicar.’ I made the best curtsy I could manage in a damp dress and sand-filled socks. Judging from the vicar’s expression, my efforts didn’t exactly come up to scratch. ‘You found a man on the beach earlier today, I believe?’
‘Yes, indeed, Miss… err…’
‘Linton. Lilly Linton.’
‘Yes indeed, Miss Linton. The poor soul was half-drowned and unconscious, clutching a piece of wreckage as if it were the railing of Noah’s Ark itself.’
I stepped forward, eagerly. ‘Did he wake up? Did he tell you his name?’
‘Why?’ the vicar asked, with obvious curiosity. ‘Do you know him?’
‘I can’t very well say until I know what his name is, can I!’
‘Oh. Of course. How silly of me.’
‘Well? Did he tell you who he was?’
The vicar shook his balding head with regret. ‘I’m afraid he did not wake up while in my charge, Miss, and since he’s not in my house now, I can’t say whether he might have woken up by now.’
‘Not in your house?’
‘I live alone, Miss, and am more used to taking care of souls than earthly bodies. So I gave the unfortunate man into the care of Mrs Fotheringay, a kind lady living just above the cliffs, at the edge of the village. She has a room where she takes in lodgers during summertime, and with true Christian charity she agreed to put the unfortunate gentleman up for a few days.’
‘Where? Where exactly does this Mrs Fotheringay live?’
‘You know him, then? The man who was washed ashore?’
‘Yes, yes!’ At least I hope so. Oh God, please let it be him. ‘Tell me, where can I find this Mrs Fotheringay?’
Stepping out of his door, the vicar pointed down the village. ‘Just go down the main street until you come to the big oak. Turn right and carry on until you see a red brick house with pretty green shutters. That’s Mrs Fotheringay’s house.’ He gave me a kind smile. ‘I hope your, um… friend is all right.’
‘Thank you, Vicar! Thank you so much!’ I had already started running down the street, when I screeched to a halt. Blast! Quickly, I turned around again. I had nearly forgotten to ask the most important question.
‘Vicar, that room that he’s in - will he have to pay for it?’
The vicar blinked at me, taken aback. ‘Um… I don’t think so, no.’
‘Thank God!’ A wide grin spread over my face. ‘That means he really will be all right!’
If it’s him, that is.
Not wasting another second, I went tearing down the street. Not even the sand in my socks could hold me back now!
The house was there, just as the vicar had described it: red brick and abominably pretty green shutters. It also had an ornate brass doorknocker, which I grabbed and smashed against the wood hard enough to crack the paint. After a while, hesitant footsteps approached from the other side, and the door opened a crack.
‘Yes?’
‘Mrs Fotheringay?’
At hearing that it was a woman outside, and not a mad axe murderer, the person on the other side widened the crack slightly.
‘Yes. Who is this?’
‘My name is Lilly Linton. The vicar gave me directions to your house. I’m here about the man you’ve taken in.’
‘The castaway?’
I couldn’t help grinning at hearing that term applied to Mr Ambrose. It made me think of some fellow in a Robinson Crusoe getup, with a huge beard, a jacket made from goatskin and an old-fashioned rifle over his shoulder. Just thinking of Mr Ambrose in that outfit made me want to burst into giggles.
But then I remembered that it might not be Mr Ambrose I was about to see, and my urge to giggle ceased abruptly.
‘Yes. The castaway. Please, Mrs Fotheringay. I know it is late, but will you let me in? I… I was on the ship that went down, and have been searching for a man who was with me for five days now, and…’
My desperate pleas trailed off as the door swung open the rest of the way. In the doorway stood a crinkly little lady with the kindest smile I had seen since nearly drowning. Atop her brown hair, shot with grey, sat a homely-looking brown bonnet, and her shabby beige dress looked to me like the garment of an elderly angel who had retired to a nice cloud in the country.
‘Oh, my poor dear! Come in! Come in, please!’ I was grasped by both hands and pulled inside. ‘You were on the ship when that dreadful accident happened?’
If it was an accident…
But I didn’t say that out loud. Instead I just nodded.
‘Oh, dear Lord! Come into the sitting room and have a cup of tea, my dear! We’ll find you a nice place by the fire. You’re shivering!’
‘Perhaps later, thank you. Your guest, the man…’
‘Of course, what was I thinking?’ Squeezing my hand again, the old lady tugged me down the hall. ‘I’ll take you to him right now, dear.’
Letting myself be pulled down the hallway, I gathered enough courage to ask the question I really, really didn’t want to ask.
‘Mrs Fotheringay… What did he give as his name?’
Please, Lord, let it be him! Let it be him!’
Mrs Fotheringay gave a good-natured snort. ‘He hasn’t told us his name! In fact, the gentleman hasn’t deigned to speak so much as two words strung together. When I asked who he was, he looked at me as if it were an insult that I didn’t recognize him at first sight!’
‘Well, that definitely sounds like the one I’m looking for,’ I muttered, hastening my steps. Please, let it be him! Please! ‘What does he look like?’
‘Well, entirely too cool and collected for a man who had seaweed in his hair not half a day ago. He’s tall, and dark, and… tall. Even when he’s lying down, if that makes sense.’
‘Handsome?’
‘I suppose you could call him handsome, if you do not mind that cold glower following you around the room.’
Thank God!
My lips twitched upwards without meaning to. ‘I don’t think I’d mind.’
Opening the door at the end of the hallway, Mrs Fotheringay led the way into the sitting room, where to my surprise a girl, about my age, sat in an armchair. She was doing her needlework, and it took me only one glance to see that the work was perfect, and there wasn’t a single bloody puncture wound in her fingers. I disliked her immediately.
‘Miss Linton, may I introduce my daughter, Violet?’ Mrs Fotheringay gestured to the girl with a smile. ‘Violet, my dear, this is Miss Linton. She was on that ship that went under, and thinks she might know our guest. If she does, she’s going to take him away with her.’
The girl’s hands twitched, and her eyes flashed to my face. Oh. Apparently, my dislike was reciprocated - fervently!
I curtsied. Slowly, Miss Violet Fotheringay rose from her seat to return my curtsy, making it quite obvious she took pleasure in the fact that hers was about ten times as graceful as mine.
‘So pleased to make your acquaintance, Miss Linton,’ she lied.
‘As am I,’ I lied right back at her.
‘Violet has been nursing our guest,’ Mrs Fotheringay supplied cheerily, blissfully unaware of the lightning bolts crackling through the air in her sitting room.
Nursing him, hm? So that was it. I bored my gaze into the girl, trying to drill my way through her brain. Keep your hands on your needlework, where they belong, Missy!
‘So…’ Young Miss Fotheringay’s eyes slid over me from head to wet toe, obviously not impressed by what she found. ‘You want to take him away with you, do you?’
‘Yes. And I will.’
She gave a condescending smile. ‘Of course. Forgive me, I’m sure my mother mentioned it and I just didn’t catch it, but… What is your connection to him, exactly?’
Her eyes drilled into me as mine had into her. Even Mrs Fotheringay looked at me with interest. My connection… My connection with Mr Rikkard Ambrose…
In the fraction of a second, myriad images flashed past my inner eye:
Mr Ambrose, glowering at me from across his desk. Mr Ambrose, threatening me. Mr Ambrose beside me, fighting, ducking gunshots in the dark.
God, what could I say to explain my presence here? That I was his dogsbody? His secretary? It was true, but I’d be damned if I let her look down on me!
Mr Ambrose glowering at me again, his eyes glinting with cold danger. Mr Ambrose rushing towards me…
Just for a moment, I considered telling them that I was his sister - but the moment the idea entered my brain, my mind, body and soul mutinied and kicked me in the metaphorical backside. No! No, no, no, no!
But why not? Why wouldn’t I use a perfect explanation for being here?
Mr Ambrose’s lips crushing mine while he pulled me against him…
I pulled a face. Probably that was why not. Blast that man! Why did he have to do that?
What if I told her I was his fiancée? But… I wasn’t. And I didn’t want to be, did I? Bloody hell, I was a proud feminist and a suffragette! I wasn’t supposed to want or need any man, least of all a bloody chauvinist like him!
‘I’m his cousin!’ The words came out of my mouth before I knew what I was saying. A cousin. A relation close enough that it wouldn’t be strange for us to have been travelling together—and distant enough to still make me competition for Miss Fotheringay.[2] The flash of hostility in her eyes told me she understood perfectly.
‘Oh, his cousin?’ Her eyes swept once more over my rather short figure, my brown, shoulder-length hair and equally brown eyes. Her lips twitched in a sarcastic smile. ‘Of course! The family resemblance is so startling! I should have noticed it before.’
‘What do you mean, Violet?’ Mrs Fotheringay asked, confused, not noticing how I was trying to murder her daughter with my gaze. ‘She looks nothing like the gentleman.’
Apparently, the daughter had not inherited that penchant for sarcasm from her mother. Her father must have been a nasty piece of work.
‘He gets his looks from the other side of the family,’ I told them both, not taking my eyes off the younger woman. ‘Now, if you would be so kind as to take me to him…’
Mrs Fotheringay opened her mouth, but her daughter was faster.
‘Of course! I’ll take you.’ She smiled at me, her teeth gleaming like razorblades. ‘I’m sure he will be glad to see me. He has grown quite fond of me over the last few days. I was the only one who was really there for him, you know.’
If I strangle her now, would that count as murder? Surely, English law would make an exception in a case like this.
Probably not. After all, the law had been written by men, and they hardly ever were reasonable.
‘Lead the way,’ I told her, returning her smile.
She led me down a corridor towards a room at the back of the house. Outside, I could hear the whisper of the wind and surge of the sea. We had to be close to the cliff’s edge, here.
‘Wait here, will you?’ she told me with another smile. ‘I’ll go in first. Maybe he doesn’t want to see you. He hasn’t had long to recuperate, and it might not be good for him, seeing a strange face like that.’
Strange face? Who does this witch think she is? If anyone is the stranger here, it is she!
I opened my mouth, but before I could say a word she had already slipped into the room, leaving the door open just a fraction. Peering inside, I could barely see the end of a bed in which someone was lying. Part of me wanted to fling that door open - but another part shied away from it. What if it wasn’t him in there? What if it was some total stranger?
‘Hello, darling…’ Miss Fotheringay leaned over the bed with a broad smile on her face. ‘How are we this evening? Do we feel a little better?’
The only answer to this was silence. Icy silence.
Promising. Very promising indeed.
‘Have we drunk the hot tea I made for you? I’m sure it would be good for us.’ Her smile widened even more. ‘And have we kept the hot water bottle on our feet?’
Hot water bottle or no, the silence on the other side of the door dropped another few dozen degrees in temperature. The smile on Miss Fotheringay’s face flickered slightly, but she did her best to keep it intact.
‘Well… um… listen. There is this young woman here to see us. I mean, to see you. There’s no need to, of course. I can send her away and make you another cup of tea, and you won’t have to worry about-’
Her voice broke off in the middle of her sentence.
‘Um… All right. Maybe I should let her in.’
Two seconds later, she came marching out, her lips pressed tightly together.
‘He wants to see you,’ she informed me. Huffing, she stalked off down the corridor. I, for my part, reached for the doorknob.
Please, I sent one last, desperate prayer upwards. Blimey! I hadn’t prayed this much in years! Please, let it be him!
Pushing open the door, I stepped inside.
Sweet Reunion on the Rocks
The room was small and homely: a single window looking out over the cliffs, a gently flickering lamp on the bedside table, pictures of sailing ships on the wall and a four-poster bed with velvet hangings that had seen better days. But I didn’t really take in any of that. I didn’t even see the beautiful view of the cliffs and the sunset over the sea through window. Because in the bed, clothed in the tattered remnants of his black tailcoat, and with a bandage around his right leg, lay Mr Rikkard Ambrose.
He was not looking at me, but staring the other way, at the flowered wallpaper. This gave me a prime opportunity to study his profile to my heart’s content. It was just as I remembered it: rock-hard, immovable and with power etched into every inch.
‘Whoever you are,’ he said to the wall, ‘get on with what you’ve come here for and get out. I have no patience for time-wasters.’
‘I know, Sir.’
My voice was nothing but a whisper - still, his head whipped around the moment I spoke. His facial expression didn’t change when he saw me, but there was the slightest widening of his ey
es.
‘It’s you!’
‘Yes, Sir.’
Silence sank over the room. Mr Ambrose’s dark, sea-coloured eyes bored into mine, but his lips didn’t move.
Blast you, why can’t you say anything? You had no problem yelling at me on the ship, during the storm! You didn’t even have a problem with kissing me, for heaven’s sake!
‘It’s really you.’
‘Yes, Sir.’
Silence. More bloody silence!
Why can’t you say something, damn you? And I mean more than just ‘It’s you!’ You can! I know you can! Remember last time? Last time we spoke. Last time you held me. Last time your lips touched mine! Remember that? Why don’t you say anything about that?
‘I thought you were dead,’ he told me. My breath caught. The words themselves were as cold and curt as any you could think of, but the tone… Had I really heard emotion there? Surely not.
‘Well… I’m not, Sir.’ Whatever was in his voice, there was emotion in mine sure enough. Blast it!
‘I can see that. What took you so long?’
The corner of my mouth twitched up. ‘I’m glad to see you, too.’
My feet suddenly started to move. Before I knew it, I stood beside his bed. My fingers reached out, and I took his right hand in mine. Closing my eyes, I squeezed, gently, letting the feel of him, smooth and hard, fill me up.
‘What, pray,’ came his cool voice from down on the bed, ‘are you doing?’
‘I’m holding your hand,’ I murmured, basking in the feeling. He was real! He was real, and alive, and with me!
‘I realize that. To what purpose have you initiated this superfluous form of physical contact?’
‘Oh, shut up!’
There was a momentary silence.
‘I beg your pardon?’ His voice lowered to a dangerous level - but right now I didn’t care. ‘I am your employer! You will address me with respect!’
‘Fine. Shut up, Sir!’
‘That is not what I was referring to and you—’
‘Blast you!’ Wrenching my eyes open, I glared down at him. ‘I thought you were dead, too!’ And I would have bloody missed you! Really missed you!