Now ’twas noon and she and Bella were in Roxanna’s cabin, watching Abby tend to Sukey. One of the regulars had made a little cradle out of mountain ash, and she rocked it with one hand. Roxanna caught the cradle’s sweet wood scent as she stood at the door and looked reluctantly at the preparations for battle.
Cass was atop his stallion beneath the flagpole. Though she didn’t want to, she lingered on him for what might be a final time. Seeing him thus brought back a string of memories. He looked just as he had when she first caught sight of him on his return from the winter campaign. Though she tried to shut away the thought, one bittersweet recollection led to another. His gift of the teacup and letter. Their first dance. That maddening cribbage game and breathless, unending kiss.
How was it that even now, despite everything, she had to lean into the door frame for fear she would give way? Butterflies flitted from the pit of her stomach to her chest in a woozy dance, and she lay a hand across her bodice as if to still them. Then a layer of anger and regret overrode everything, tainting it all.
Despite the press of preparations—the fact that a dozen or more men needed his attention in the melee all around him—Cass’s attention was fixed on Roxanna as she stood in the doorway of her cabin. If he did nothing else this day, he must return her father’s locket. The slight weight of it now seemed heavy in his waistcoat pocket, a reminder that he had erred greatly by withholding his confession and needed to relinquish this too, before another minute passed.
Though dust and distance separated them, he had a clear view of her atop his horse and read unmistakable weariness in the slant of her shoulders and unkempt hair. Black tendrils wafted about her solemn face, freed of a few carelessly placed pins. Lately she’d left off wearing her hat, and her fair skin was slightly freckled, her nose sunburned. But her eyes were a brilliant, unforgiving blue—and she was looking straight at him.
Her expression held a hint of the resolve he’d seen in her the moment he’d first met her, when she’d held up that trembling hand as he’d started to tell her about her father, her face so full of pathos it wrenched him even now. No doubt she’d think he’d deceived her doubly by withholding the locket.
With a terse word to a regular to mind his horse, he dismounted to go to her. But as he reached into his waistcoat pocket, it seemed a cold hand clutched his heart. The locket, kept close for long months, now seemed almost a part of him. He hated the thought of releasing it. If he kept it as he longed to do, if only for solace in the difficult days ahead, ’twould soon return to her.
Just as he’d searched Richard Rowan’s still body before burial, one or more of his men would do the same to him, stripping him of all personal possessions and finding this, a testament of his love for her. Though she didn’t believe he loved her in life, perhaps she would in death.
Thinking it, he hesitated, weighing the wisdom of what he was about to do. The grit of dust in his mouth, the sun making him squint in the golden glare, he made a last move toward her.
Bella moved to stand beside Roxanna, eyes on the gates as if willing Hank to appear. The sun was hot, bearing down with devilish intensity, turning Roxanna’s thoughts to watering her garden. But Cass would no longer let her outside fort walls, sending a regular to tend it for her. Too much Indian sign, he said. Yet she craved its greenness and order and peace. Heat shimmers danced with the dust kicked up by the horses and wagons on the teeming parade ground. Even the sky seemed like a square of faded linen from the heat, no longer blue but a stark, bone white.
“Law, but he’s down!”
Bella’s breathless words pulled her back to the present. What?
In a swirl of linen skirts, Bella bolted out the door, and Roxanna went running after her. Was Cass on the ground? There was such a press of soldiers gathering that she couldn’t see clearly. Bella pushed past all those broad, sweat-stained backs with a hard hand as the Herkimer brothers called for a stretcher. At the edge of the crowd stood Graham Greer. Roxanna had the uncanny feeling he was more concerned with her reaction than his commanding officer’s well-being.
Micajah took charge as second in command, his voice a bit shrill and unsteady, Roxanna thought. “Take him to the stone house, not the infirmary. And make haste for Dr. Clary.” With that, he moved to talk to Bella, who, from the look of her, wasn’t obliging. She spun away from him and cut through the throng to Roxanna.
Chin jutting stubbornly, she approached Roxanna with renewed purpose. “With Hank away, there ain’t nobody to tend McLinn.”
“But Major Hale asked you—”
“I ain’t goin’ to be holed up in that house when Hank comes in.” Her shining eyes, deep wells of pain, brooked no argument. “Besides, the colonel’s your man, not mine.”
Though whispered, Roxanna wondered how many others had heard. Heat inched up her neck in uncomfortable prickles. She didn’t dare refute the bold statement. “But I have Abby to tend to—”
“Abby ain’t no trouble. You’d best go on up with the Herkimers and the guard lest they have to make another trip.”
Folding her arms across her chest, Roxanna tried another tack. “I know nothing about the ague, Bella.”
“Well, you is about to.”
“And I don’t know enough about the stone house—”
“You is a fast learner. Once you is up there, you ain’t likely goin’ to want to come out. Take some of your belongin’s. Sick as he is, this ain’t goin’ to be a quick trip.”
As if this were all part of some grand, prearranged plan, Roxanna saw the guard waiting for her by the sally port through which the stretcher was just exiting. Heart pumping with a wild resistance, she returned to her cabin on leaden feet and stuffed some of her belongings in a knapsack, stooped to kiss Abby, then followed the funereal procession up the hill.
While Cass was taken upstairs, Roxanna dropped her belongings by the door and wondered where the kitchen was. Without Hank’s amiable presence, she felt at sea. The foyer was even grander flooded with morning light than it had been touched by candlelight. To her right was the study, the door ajar. Avoiding it, she walked past the dining room and touched the cool knob of a slightly less ornate door she suspected was the kitchen. It opened invitingly and she stood slightly openmouthed on the threshold.
The large room was painted a bright brick red. Milk-white cupboards with black butterfly hinges abounded, and a huge stone fireplace took up the entire west wall. Tucked just behind this was a narrow stair that ran up to Cass’s room, she guessed, and also descended to a cellar.
Crossing to the nearest cupboard, she peered inside. Coffee. Tea. Cocoa nuts. Loaf sugar and spices. Almonds and raisins and olives. A veritable treasure trove.
Next she took in a stone sink with spring-fed water. Bella had told her the house had been built atop a spring, but she’d hardly believed it. Her heart squeezed tight.
Why did everything have to be so perfect?
She could hear the Herkimer brothers talking in low tones upstairs, awaiting Dr. Clary. Reaching into her apron pocket, she withdrew a small tin of cinchona Dr. Clary had supplied after the poisoning and then kindled the hearth’s ashes, surprised to find her hands unsteady.
I shouldn’t be in this house.
Her dear mother would be scandalized, though in times of war, propriety was set aside for necessity. She didn’t want to play nurse. Cass had, in the span of a few weeks, become her enemy, the man who’d taken her father’s life. She could never see him any differently. How was she to nurse him with any compassion?
Within half an hour, she’d familiarized herself with everything in the beautiful, practical kitchen, wishing Hank would walk in and render it all unnecessary. But it was only Dr. Clary she heard, his footfall heavy on the stair overhead. She stayed where she was by the hissing kettle, nose wrinkling as bubbling water met bark and made a bitter brew. So lost was she in thought that she wasn’t aware of anyone behind her.
“I must admit I’m pleased to have an able nurse,” Dr. Clary s
aid, looking her up and down. “With all the trouble pressing in on us, I doubt I’ll be back this way in the near future.” She turned to take in the hardened, backwoods doctor, his breeches and weskit soiled from riding far and fast. “Colonel McLinn is resting now, but this is a particularly bad attack. My advice is to keep him cool with cloths and administer cinchona if he can keep it down. There’s little else to be done.”
“How long do these spells last?”
He shrugged. “Days . . . a week or better. He’ll likely not die from it, as he’s strong as a bull and just as stubborn. But he’ll be weak—and out of his head at times. My advice is to find all the firearms in the house and hide them.”
The alarm she felt negated the need for her next question.
Scratching his whiskered chin, he expelled a resigned breath. “Sometimes a patient wearies of the cyclical nature of the disease, and a life is lost. I wouldn’t mention it, but dire as his present circumstances are, it might seem a palatable option.”
She waded through his gentlemanly phrasing to the heart of the matter beneath. Clary knew Cass well. Suicide among soldiers was rampant, second only to desertion. With the fever goading him—not to mention the failed march and the enemy approaching across the river—he might well consider it.
He passed her a brace of pistols. “I found these in his bedchamber. Hide them carefully.”
She simply nodded, aware of the Herkimers hovering in the foyer. Within moments they left her alone, and the only sound was the tense ticking of the grandfather clock. Setting the cinchona aside, she bolted the front door and entered the study like a woman condemned. All was just as she remembered—twin wingback chairs, tilt-top table, overstuffed bookcases. On one wall hung a fine Kentucke rifle, the elaborately carved stock a work of art. She took it down, wondering if it was loaded—and where to hide it. A quick but thorough sweep of an unfamiliar, elegant parlor gained her a few more firearms.
Down the kitchen stair she went to the cellar, arms full, forgetting a candle. The plink of dripping water and utter darkness returned her to the kitchen. After lighting a tin lantern, she finally finished her task—having buried the guns under a pile of straw and potatoes before going upstairs to search next.
Should she check on him?
Entering his bedchamber seemed as formidable as crossing the river and facing the enemy. She’d never seen his room, just imagined how it would be, even dreamed of such. Her nocturnal waywardness of months before returned to her in a rush as she climbed the smooth steps. A lingering hint of oil paint. Wedgewood blue walls. A wag-on-the-wall clock. A bed big enough for six people overhung with a crewelwork canopy.
A hint of a smile softened her mood. Papa had always said she had an overactive imagination.
She went into the blue bedchamber before searching the two rooms opposite. No guns within. The stair to the third floor beckoned. Surely there were no firearms in a ballroom. She’d search there later. Best master her fears and face Cass, who was likely lost in the grip of fever.
His door was partially ajar, and she hesitated at the opening.
Lord, please . . . give me infinite grace.
Slipping inside, she blinked—and felt her jaw go slack. The beautiful room seemed to greet her in an intoxicatingly familiar fashion. Her backside connected with the first seat available—a finely turned Chippendale chair. The deep Wedgewood blue walls seemed to mock her, as did the wag-on-the-wall clock above her head. Though the shutters were drawn and the room was shadowed, the immense lines of the bed were plain, as were the bed curtains—not fancy crewelwork but brocade. Only this was in error. Even a whisper of oil paint lingered.
“You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
Her gaze ricocheted to Cass, planted firmly in the middle of the bed, lying back against more pillows than she could count. Seeing him thus was doubly disorienting, as he was usually on his feet. Taking a bracing breath, she said, “How are you feeling?”
“Given Clary tried to knock me out with whiskey, ne’er better.”
She was acutely aware of the distillation of sweat, spirits, and the tang of leather. “You should be drinking cinchona.”
“I should be on my feet. Come morning I’ve a campaign to begin.”
“You’re delirious,” she whispered, getting up and going to him. Placing a hand on his brow, she felt its strange heat. “I’ve made some tea and I’ll bring up some cold cloths.”
His gaze shot round the room. “What did Clary do with my pistols?”
“Entrusted them to me.”
“The devil he did! I cannot be abed and defenseless. Bring them up from the cellar.”
Her eyes widened. “How did you know?”
“’Tis the first place someone would hide them.”
Sighing, she gave a slow shake of her head. “Nay, Colonel McLinn. You must prove yourself a good patient before I return them. And thus far you’ve earned no favors.”
“Come now, Roxie, be a good sport.”
“Patronizing me will gain you nothing. I’ll give them to the British. Now, which will it be? Cinchona or cold cloths?”
He gave her a withering look. “Neither.”
“That, sir, is not an option.”
His feverish eyes held hers in challenge. “The pistols first. Then some cinchona.” Dismayed, she turned away, but he caught her wrist. “Here in my own house I’ll say and do as I please.”
“If you keep this up, I’ll leave.”
“Then who will tend me? Hank?”
“Nay, he’s . . .”
“I know, Roxie. He’s missing. Since late yesterday. Just because I’m out of my head doesn’t mean I’ve lost my hearing. The scouts found his wagon and everything was untouched. But he’s disappeared.”
Did he miss nothing? Not even she knew this.
He let go of her wrist. “I ken you don’t want to be here any more than I do.”
Their eyes met again, and she glanced away. Despite everything, despite all the hurt in her heart, she still longed to build a bridge between them, to return things to the way they’d been before circumstances had carved a deep chasm between them. But she couldn’t—and he couldn’t.
The room was too warm, and she looked longingly toward the shuttered windows.
“You need fresh air,” she murmured, but it was she herself who felt the need.
“Not in war time,” he cautioned. “Have you ne’er seen an Indian or Redcoat scale a wall?”
She suppressed a shudder, forehead furrowing, and moved to the coolness of the hall. Hurrying to the third floor, she entered a long, lovely room with painted paper and a cut-glass chandelier. Dancers swirled in her imagination across the gleaming walnut floor. Opening a window, she felt a breeze brush her heated cheeks as she looked down at the orchard and then the river. All was green and serene and quiet. But for how long? From here the fort looked small, the soldiers no bigger than nails. Surely the enemy couldn’t reach a third-floor ballroom.
Coming back down, she lingered at Cass’s door. His eyes were closed, and the feverish intensity of his face had returned. She’d bring cinchona and cold cloths as soon as she could. For now she’d best find another hiding place for those guns.
At half past six, Roxanna heard a dove cooing in the orchard. The big house was blissfully still. The hearth smells of crusty bread and chicken broth seasoned with thyme and pepper wafted to the far reaches of the house. She’d set out a tray with some slices of Cheshire cheese she’d cut from a huge wheel to tempt Cass, along with some cold cider from the cellar. When he awoke, she’d take it up to him. So far he’d slept all afternoon, but she couldn’t dismiss the notion that he had meant what he said and would commence the campaign come morning, sick or not. Hours had passed since she’d checked on him, and this second time was no easier than the first.
Up the stairs she went, still full of wonder that his room was so similar to the room in her dream. Night was falling fast, and the house was cast in unfamiliar shadows. But all was pe
aceful, offering a luxurious retreat despite the turmoil. When she went in to him, he appeared to be sleeping. She rested a hand against his cheek, and the heat of it seemed to singe her palm. A sinking sensation ripened in the pit of her stomach.
Some nurse I am.
Cold cloths and cinchona should have been brought up long ago, though she’d thought it best he sleep. Dr. Clary had left him in his shirtsleeves, and she moved to remedy that, setting her mind against the intimacy of doing so. Fumbling with the glass buttons of his linen shirt, she finally triumphed—it peeled away in a damp layer, revealing a masterpiece of muscle and bone. The sight of so much skin sent her senses scattering. ’Twas a task for a wife . . . a manservant. Hank.
Forcing herself to look away, she turned back the quilted coverlet till only the sheet remained. He murmured a smattering of Gaelic and rolled on his side, oblivious to all she did. Balling up the damp linen, she felt the weight of what she guessed was a watch fall out of the shirt’s folds and roll beneath the bed. For a few brief seconds, she stooped and groped about, fingertips touching something smooth and round. When she took a good look, she went to her knees. Could it be?
Papa’s locket.
Opening it, she looked down at the girl she’d been at eighteen, the year he’d had her portrait painted. They could only afford a small likeness, but the artist did not disappoint. Nay, he’d flattered her immensely. Was her hair truly that black? Her eyes so blue? But all that paled beside the question her heart clamored to have answered.