Three Weeks With Lady X

  The afternoon passed like that. By the time they gave up, they reeked of the Thames, an noisome blend of fish, potatoes, coal smoke, and rain. It clung to their skin and soaked through their clothes and into the seats of Thorn’s carriage.

  At home, they bathed and dressed, and he introduced the lads to Rose. That evening, and the next, and the next after that passed as they spun tales of Will’s bravery.

  By the fourth day, they were all tired. They’d gone down scores of times, but the pouch still eluded them. Only inherent stubbornness kept Thorn in the water. Bink and Dusso were diving, Geordie was on the bank, and Thorn was on the surface.

  Thorn hung on to the alder branch, watching the water where the men disappeared. Damn it, he was wasting their time and his own. The bag was either at the curve, where it was worth a man’s life to fish it out, or it had washed down the river and fetched up at one of a hundred different spots.

  He was a fool. Eleven years is an eternity in the life of a river.

  He missed India in a piercing way that shook him to the core. When he’d offered her that diamond ring, he had been consumed with desire: he wanted her back. In his bed, in his arms.

  But now he felt as if her absence had ripped him open and stabbed him in the heart. He didn’t just love her the way a silly poet loved a maiden. He felt a primal, clawing need every time he thought of her.

  It was mad. Or he was mad.

  Abruptly he realized that Bink hadn’t come back up. Dusso was bobbing near the bank. Damn it, his attention had wavered.

  He was about to dive when Bink’s head broke the water. The man seemed to have lost a stone in the last four days; his cheekbones jutted from his face. He splashed over to the alder and hung on to it, gasping harshly.

  Thorn had stayed in fighting shape, but the rest of his gang hadn’t. He made up his mind. “That’s it!” he shouted. “We’re done. No more. We gave it a good shot. We’ve been up and down the bank.”

  “No!” Bink shouted back. “I’m not ready to give up. I know where it is.” He pointed directly to the turn in the river, the place where the water ran black and furious.

  “We’re not going there,” Thorn said. “Out of the water!”

  Dusso started splashing toward the bank, but Bink shook his head. “I need that money!”

  “It was two hundred just for going in,” Thorn said, treading water. “Come on, mate. Let’s get out of here.”

  “I ain’t taken no charity in my life,” Bink said, his jaw setting. “And I ain’t going to start now. I’m going after that damn bag.” And with that he let go of the branch and began plowing through the water toward the bend.

  Thorn shouted, knowing Bink wouldn’t hear him—or listen, if he did. Dusso howled something from the bank and Thorn started out to swim, planning to drag Bink back to the bank by force if necessary.

  But the man had a good start, and even though Thorn slashed through the water as if it were air, Bink had disappeared below the surface by the time Thorn arrived at the river’s bend.

  He followed the pale flash of legs down through the murk. Bink was no fool: he was using the current to propel himself against the bank, his gloved hands outstretched to bounce off the looming rock, pushing him lower to a pileup of silt that likely included everything from dead rats to broken crockery.

  A stream of curses went through Thorn’s mind. What in the hell had he been doing, putting his lads at risk? One wrong move and Bink would be swept sideways, straight into the rock that the water was smashing into with a throbbing roar.

  With a powerful kick, Thorn reached Bink, grabbed his arm, and hauled him up.

  They broke the surface, both gasping. Bink brought his hand up to the air. It was clutching a slimy, moldering leather hat; he shook it and let it fall. “Damn you,” he shouted. “The place is ripe. The pouch is there, I tell you!”

  “I don’t give a damn. If I hadn’t grabbed you, you’d have been driven into the rock.”

  “Well, you did,” Bink said defiantly.

  “You’re bleeding.” A thin red rivulet trailed down Bink’s cheek.

  “A flea bite. I’m going down again. I’m going to get that damn pouch. You’ll marry the bloody marquess or his daughter, and I’ll earn me reward.” And with that, he slipped beneath the water again.

  Thorn swore, and dove. Bink was like a fish. With a grim curse, Thorn swam after, eyes straining to see through the murk. The water was full of silt cast up by Bink’s first attempt.

  This was the Thames at its worst, black as soot, with a current that clutched with a hundred fingers, no matter how agile the swimmer, seeming to purposefully drive him against a shard of rock or a broken bottle, each perilous in its own way.

  The heel of Bink’s foot flashed ahead like a fish scale. He was precisely where Thorn had decided the bag had likely lodged, if it was there at all: under the shadow of the rock that the current had cut into, leaving the great bulk hanging above them like a black shelf.

  With almost no oxygen left in his lungs, Thorn reached Bink, only to see his body jerk in the way of a man who is trying to tug something free. He was making silt explode into the water, clouds of sediment spreading as fast as smoke.

  Thorn swam blindly toward the place where he’d seen Bink’s heel. His hand closed on a slick leg, and he felt forward. If a man is caught in spirals of fishing line, tugging could tighten it, trapping the swimmer until, panicked, he choked on sludge-laden water.

  Bink knew that as well as he did, and yet he still pulled. Thorn joined in, pulling with every bit of remaining strength he had. Bink lurched backward, kicking madly.

  His foot caught the edge of Thorn’s thigh and flipped him as easily it might a fish. In that instant the current caught Thorn in a rush of bubbles, turned him over, his vision gone, air gone, and slammed him against the rock. Water rushed to fill his mouth, swept into his lungs.

  The world was already black, but the rush of bubbles in his ears stopped, and everything went silent and cold.

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  In years to come, India never forgot the moment when Fred burst through the door of her sitting room, Adelaide’s butler at his heels. “He’s dying, m’lady,” he gasped. “And the little girl wants you.”

  For a moment, Fred’s words just knocked about in her head like the lyrics of a song she heard recited but never sung.

  Dying? How on earth could Thorn be dying? But the fear etched on Fred’s face told her that he was not exaggerating.

  She sprang from her chair and ran to Thorn’s carriage without her pelisse, without her reticule, without Adelaide.

  Fred leapt on and the carriage rocked around the corner. India sat, her nails biting into her palms. Her mind turned into a snowstorm, so white and violent that no single thought made it through, nothing besides the beating of her heart. Each beat was a prayer, a cry, a plea.

  Thorn couldn’t die. The world would be nothing without him. She couldn’t imagine it: her heart rejected the idea.

  The pain was like a drumbeat marking the minutes.

  As the carriage rocked to a halt in front of the house, India leapt out and ran up the path and through the door, past the silent butler, up the stairs, straight to Thorn’s chamber. A doctor was bending over the bed.

  When she saw Thorn, her knees gave way and she barely caught herself on the bedpost. He was naked, covered below his waist by a sheet. His skin had lost all color; he was white, a powder-white that wasn’t right. His lashes were black as coal against the pallor of his cheeks.

  Even worse, a huge gash stretched across his forehead. She watched the doctor make another neat, precise stitch, working to close the gaping wound. Blood was running down from the man’s hands, soaking into the pillows.

  “He’s not dead,” she said, her voice gasping. “What happened?”

  “Mrs. Dautry?” the doctor said, not lifting his eyes. “He still lives.” He took another stitch, and another.

  “Are there other injuries?”
r />   “Not unless you count drowning.”

  “What?”

  “He was pulled from the Thames, as I understand it. It’s a miracle those men got him breathing again. But he hasn’t come out of it. He should have returned to his senses by now. Could be damage to the lungs. Or brain concussion from the blow.” More blood oozed over the doctor’s hand, and a woman, likely Thorn’s housekeeper, moved forward with a wad of damp cloth.

  The world snapped back into focus, and India grabbed her wrist. “Is that towel clean?”

  “I do the washing on Monday,” she answered, her chin wobbling. “It’s only been a day or so.”

  “I will take it, if you please,” India said, softening when she saw the housekeeper’s red eyes and the tears rolling down her cheeks. “What is your name?”

  “Mrs. Stella,” she said.

  “I’m Lady Xenobia. I’d be grateful if you could bring me a stack of pristine, unused cloths. Put in an order for ice to be delivered every day for the next week. I also want to make up a poultice of eggs, oil of roses, and turpentine.”

  She took the cloth and wiped the blood from Thorn’s face and neck, carefully avoiding the wound itself.

  The doctor glanced up. “If he doesn’t return to himself, you’ll have no need to treat the wound or ward off fever.”

  “He will wake up,” India said flatly.

  The man grunted, finished the last stitch, and cut off the string with a small knife. “That’s all I can do,” he said, wiping his hands with the edge of the sheet. “Either he’ll wake or he won’t.”

  “There must be some treatment for head wounds of this nature,” India said, eyeing the doctor. His waistcoat was splattered with Thorn’s blood.

  “Not that I know of. You can try to give him some water, but he won’t live long if he doesn’t open his eyes. That’ll be a sovereign, payable immediately,” he added briskly.

  “Fred, please escort this man to the door. The butler will pay you,” India said, giving the doctor a look that had him scuttling out the door and down the stairs.

  India sank onto the bed and took Thorn’s hand.

  His wound was still seeping blood, but she didn’t want to touch it until she had a clean cloth. A doctor had once told her he thought that dirty wounds were more likely to become infected. Lord knows, the Thames was dirty.

  “Thorn,” she whispered. “It’s India.”

  He didn’t stir.

  “Please come back,” she said, leaning over so that her lips touched his cheek. “I can’t lose another person I love to that river, Thorn.” Her throat tightened. “Please, please, wake up.”

  Fred reappeared, looking anxious. “Mr. Dautry’s man is wondering if this would be a good time to wash the river water off and change the bedsheets.”

  India looked up. “I will do that.”

  The footman looked horrified, but India impatiently waved a hand at him. “I’ll need help with the sheets. What’s Mr. Dautry’s man’s name?”

  “Mr. Pendle.”

  “Please ask Pendle to lay out clean sheets and night clothing, as well as warm water. Mrs. Stella is bringing clean cloths. Meanwhile, I’ll go to Miss Rose.”

  “She’s in the nursery,” Fred said. He hesitated and said, “It was Miss Rose who insisted that we send a carriage for you, my lady. I hope that was the right thing to do. There was such a commotion when he was brought home that she heard it in the nursery. The duke and duchess are at their country house, so I sent a message to you. And, of course, to the duke as well, but his seat is two days away.”

  “You were absolutely correct to call me,” India reassured him. “I’ve sat in many a sickroom. Will you please send a messenger to Lady Adelaide to inform her of the circumstances? And where are the men who pulled Mr. Dautry from the river?”

  “Messrs. Bink, Dusso, and Geordie are bathing and changing their clothes.”

  India frowned. “Who are these men? Do you mean to say that they are in residence here?”

  “They are former mudlarks,” Fred said, “and very proud of it too. They’re the ones who saved Mr. Dautry. By all accounts, they got him breathing again.”

  “I will thank them later,” India said. At the moment she had to visit Rose.

  When she reached the nursery, she found the child listening as her tutor read aloud from a history of ancient Rome. Rose sat on a straight-backed chair, Antigone perched on the rocking cow beside her.

  As India entered, Twink’s voice broke off. Rose pulled Antigone from the cow and stood, clutching her doll tightly in her arms. The tutor came to his feet and bowed. In the corner, Clara bobbed a curtsy.

  “Mr. Dautry is alive,” India said quickly. “The doctor just left.”

  “Has he woken up?” Rose’s voice was tight and high.

  “Not yet.” India went to her and knelt down. “He’s going to be well, darling.”

  “They said that about my father as well,” Rose said.

  “May I pick you up?” India asked.

  Rose nodded. India scooped her into her arms, carried her over to the sofa, and sat down. The little girl remained bolt upright on India’s lap.

  “I’m very grateful that you sent a carriage for me,” India said, stroking her back.

  “Lady Adelaide said that you work miracles,” Rose reminded her.

  This hadn’t been what Adelaide was referring to, but India nodded. “If there is a miracle to be had, I shall do it,” she said fiercely. “I promise you that. And if that miracle doesn’t happen”—India forced the words out because they had to be said; she could not leave the child in the grip of utter terror—“if Thorn is lost to us, Rose, you will come and live with me.”

  India felt Rose shudder. “I shall probably be sent to America, to my aunt.”

  “That’s not what Thorn would have wanted—wants. He wants you to live here in England. And remember? I announced to half the world that you are my daughter.” India’s arms closed tighter, and she coaxed Rose back against her shoulder. “I can think of no greater privilege than that.”

  Rose made a little gasping sound, but said nothing. Still, her body relaxed in the circle of India’s arms, and her head sank against her shoulder. “He won’t die, will he?”

  “Not if I can help it.”

  India put her cheek against Rose’s bright hair and rocked her back and forth. “How is Antigone?” she asked.

  “She’s not feeling very well,” Rose whispered. “She feels sick, as if she swallowed river water too.”

  “You must soothe her.” India put the child on her feet and looked into her eyes. “Tell Antigone that she is loved, and that she will be safe and warm. Tell her that Thorn would want her to be hopeful and never give up, because he isn’t the sort of man who gives up, is he?”

  Rose shook her head. “Never.”

  “Neither am I,” India said. “I will not give up on Thorn, and neither will you. Now I’m going to return to him and put a poultice on his forehead. If you are worried and want to know how he is, just send Clara to me.”

  “I won’t give up either,” Rose said stoutly.

  India gave her a hug and ran out the door.

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  By the time India returned to Thorn’s bedchamber, she felt calm again. She was at her best in a crisis, when others fell into hysterics. She stopped to introduce herself to Thorn’s butler, who was clearly beside himself with worry.

  Between the two of them, they made certain that every member of the household had work to do, from Mrs. Stella to the grooms, who could work scrubbing river water from the carriage.

  “You’ll meet the mudlarks tonight, my lady,” the butler said. “They just left for Cheapside to find a patent medicine that Mr. Dusso knows of.”

  What on earth had Thorn been up to? Could it be an odd reunion, where the four of them plunged back into the river and revisited their childhood? But she had no time to chat; she hurried back to Thorn’s bedroom and shooed out his valet, who had changed the s
heets but not yet bathed his master.

  She talked constantly as she dipped a clean cloth in warm water and began to wash Thorn. She told him how much she had missed him, and was missing him now. She might have cried a bit, especially when she pulled back the sheet in order to wash his legs and feet. She had never clearly seen all the scars that covered his legs, the pale slashes that cut through a rough covering of hair without disguising the muscle that lay underneath.

  His manhood lay against his leg, looking entirely different than it always had been in her presence. Like him, it was suspended in time.

  India kept talking as she washed, softly telling Thorn stories of the more extraordinary households she’d seen.

  Every so often she would stop and ladle a spoonful of water into his mouth, holding his head up so that some of it ran down his throat.

  Just as she drew the sheet back to his waist, there was a tap at the door and Mrs. Stella appeared, followed by a footman with more hot water. She was clearly restored to her efficient self. “I ordered the ingredients you wanted, and I have Rose and Clara supervising as Cook bakes a special cake for the master.”

  India smiled at her. “What a splendid idea. Thank you, Mrs. Stella.”

  When the door was shut again, India turned her attention to Thorn’s hair. Blood and river water had dried it into a stiff helmet, so she washed it over and over. All the time she kept speaking to him in a low, soothing voice, though she occasionally stopped and begged him to wake up.

  By the time she was satisfied that he was clean, the bed was completely soaked. She pulled the bell and supervised as footmen moved him into the connecting bedchamber, the one meant for the lady of the house. The irony of that did not escape her.

  The evening wore on; the butler appeared and asked if she would like to join Messrs. Dusso, Bink, and Geordie for the meal. She declined, but stepped from the room to greet the gentlemen.

  Mr. Bink pressed a brown bottle into her hands. “It’s Edison’s Magno-Electric Vitalizer,” he told her earnestly. “The best stuff in London. It’ll jolt him right awake. And if that doesn’t work, I’ll find some of them tablets they make for rousing one’s manhood. That’ll do it!”