Mr. Impossible by Loretta Chase (21)

Chapter 21

DAPHNE DID AN ADMIRABLE JOB OF PATCHING Rupert up, scolding him all the while she picked out bits of cloth from the knife wound. It was thanks to those thick layers of cloth—the Arab-style sash he’d worn and the lethal objects it contained—that Rupert was alive.

The wound was rather more than the “scratch” he’d labeled it and was rather more uncomfortable than he’d expected. Nonetheless, she seemed to think he’d live. Her main concern, she said, was infection. She did not think that leaving shreds of dirty cloth in the wound would aid his recovery.

He lay upon the divan of his cabin, occasionally peering down to see what she was doing but mainly watching her face in the lantern light. He would never grow tired of looking at her wonderful face. He was quite pleased he’d live to do so.

He’d truly thought the wound no more than a scratch, at first. It hadn’t hurt at all. But he’d probably been too furious at the time to feel anything. They’d been having a fair enough fight, fists only, he told Daphne. But then, when Noxley realized he was losing, he cheated.

“I cannot believe you so addlepated as to imagine Noxley would fight fair,” Daphne said, when Rupert waxed indignant on this point, calling it “deuced unsporting.”

“But it isn’t done,” Rupert said. “Ask your brother. Ask anybody. I did not draw my pistol. I did not draw my knife. I had never killed anybody, and I did hope it would not be necessary.”

He was a great deal more upset than he let on. He hadn’t meant to throw Noxley out the window. At least Rupert hoped he hadn’t. At such times, though, a man was not truly capable of thinking. It was all instinct. Noxley had stabbed him. Rupert had yanked out the blade and thrown it aside—and the next thing he knew, Noxley was sailing out of the window.

Having got the wound as clean as she could, Daphne quickly and neatly stitched it up and bandaged it.

“Pray do not distress yourself about Noxley,” she said, quite as though she’d spent the last few minutes reading his mind. “He would have killed you without a second thought, certainly with no qualms. He had no conscience whatsoever. A moral vacuum. He must have what he wanted. Anyone who stood in the way must be annihilated.”

She turned away to the medicine case that stood on the floor nearby. Rupert couldn’t see what she was doing. After a moment, she turned back, a small glass in hand.

“I had not realized he wanted me until his men dropped a hint,” she said.

“I told you he wanted you,” he said. “It was obvious in the way he looked at you. He might have been mad for power and fame, but he wasn’t blind.”

“Power and fame can be costly,” she said. “He was not in lust with my person alone. He doted equally upon my fortune.”

It took a moment for Rupert to fully grasp what she was saying, and these mental exertions must have shown in his face because she said, frowning, “You did know Virgil left me heaps and heaps of money, did you not? All the world knew, I thought.”

“Heaps and heaps?” he said. “Well, it was the least he could do, the lying swine. Not that I imagined you were a pauper, when you saw nothing out of the way in your brother’s spending thousands for one of those brown, rolled-up thingums.”

“Papyri,” she said crisply, almost as she’d done that first day, in the dungeon. But he heard the note of amusement.

“I know,” he said. “I knew. I was only trying to provoke you that day. I knew you had a temper. I could feel it, when you were twenty feet away. It was like standing on the edge of a storm. Very…stimulating.”

“You’ve had sufficient stimulation for the present,” she said. She came close then, raised Rupert’s head, pressed it to her delicious bosom, and held the glass to his lips. “Here, drink this.”

He’d had an unpleasant feeling the glass was for him, but the conversation had diverted his attention. The warm femininity he rested upon was an even greater distraction. “What is it?”

“A little laudanum mixed with wine.”

He carefully turned his head away from the glass without endangering his agreeable position on her soft endowments. “I don’t want any.”

“You will drink it,” she said, “or I shall summon Akmed and tell him to gather the largest men aboard. They will hold you down while I pour it down your throat. Will you submit gracefully, or would you rather be embarrassed in front of the boys?”

“I don’t need any laudanum,” he muttered, but he turned back and drank.

When he was done, she set down the glass and gently but firmly transferred his head from her bosom to the pillow. “The wound is sure to become a great deal more painful as the shock wears off,” she said. “This way, you will get some rest.”

“I wish you might rest with me,” he said, letting his hand slide to her thigh. She was dressed like an Arab man, but no man with working eyesight would ever mistake her for a member of his sex.

“That would not be restful,” she said. “And kindly remember that my brother is now aboard.”

Rupert sighed. The brother. Yes, of course. But the brother was not Akmed, with whom she’d threatened Rupert a moment ago. Who was Akmed?

Oh, yes, the fellow who spoke up, just as matters had promised to grow very interesting, indeed.

What had he said? He’d spoken in English first, then reverted to Arabic.

“What did he say?” Rupert said. “The Akmed fellow? He called you ‘mistress.’ ”

“That was Akmed,” she said, unenlighteningly.

“That’s what I said,” he said patiently. Really, there were times when he wondered whether that immense brain of hers contained an empty chamber or two. “He said something, just before I…um…dozed a bit.”

“You fainted,” she said. “Several times.”

“I was a little sleepy,” he said. “I hadn’t slept since they took you. I was…tired. I did not faint.”

Her delicate snort sufficiently expressed her views on the subject.

“I wish you wouldn’t keep turning the subject,” he said. “Who is Akmed and what was he saying?”

“He said you saved his life.”

Rupert thought about this. “He must have confused me with someone else,” he said.

“On the bridge outside Cairo,” she said. “He’d been badly beaten. A Turkish soldier tried to finish the job. But you stepped in the way.”

After a period of cogitation, which went even more slowly than usual, Rupert realized who she was talking about: the dirty cripple on the bridge. “Oh, that fellow.”

“That was why you ended up in the dungeon,” she said accusingly. “You risked your life on behalf of a miserable native you didn’t know from Adam.”

“It wasn’t a fair fight,” Rupert said.

She gazed at him for a good long while. Then she stroked his cheek briefly. “No, it wasn’t,” she murmured. “But only you would care.” More distinctly she added, “Akmed is the servant who went with Miles to Giza. What you saw was the results of the beating the so-called police gave him—the ones who kidnapped Miles. Akmed is the servant who ran away when the men came to my house and stole the papyrus.”

“He’s the servant who didn’t come back,” Rupert said. “Tom’s uncle. The fellow on the bridge. One and the same. And he turned up here? Extraordinary.”

“Not really,” she said. “Akmed knew he wasn’t safe in Cairo and being there might endanger his family as well as me. So he went to Bulaq, to get work on a boat. There he heard Lord Noxley was going to look for Miles. Akmed had no trouble getting hired. He speaks English and a little French, and he is intelligent and hardworking. He thought Noxley was a fine man. Akmed had no doubts about this until the fine man fed a few followers to the crocodiles—very possibly the same ones you and I saw above Girga.”

“But Akmed didn’t run away then?” The lantern light was growing fuzzy—or was that Rupert’s brain? He seemed to be drifting…on a river…no, a cloud.

“He stayed on because he was determined to find Miles,” she said. “Then, when Noxley’s men found my brother, Akmed stayed to look after him and protect him as best he could while avoiding discovery. He’d grown out his beard, and Miles didn’t recognize him. Akmed decided not to enlighten him until he could arrange for an escape for both of them. Then I turned up and complicated matters.”

She went on, but Rupert lost track of what she was saying. Her voice became a distant music, sweet and familiar. And then by degrees the sound, too, drifted away, and he slept.

Saturday 5 May

CARSINGTON DID NOT wake until midafternoon. Sun streamed through the cabin window, and Miles, sitting upon the far end of the divan, had been trying to while away the time reading a book.

He gave up the effort when Carsington pushed up to a sitting position.

“I’m not sure you’re allowed to sit up,” Miles said.

Under lifted eyebrows, the coal-black eyes regarded him steadily.

Miles remembered that the patient was not to be agitated, either. “On the other hand,” he added, “I’m not sure who could stop you. Daphne, maybe, but I finally persuaded her to get some sleep. She sat up all night with you. Worried about a fever, she said.”

“Not very likely,” Carsington said. “How should I look them in the face, I ask you, was I to get infected and feverish and such—over a bit of a cut? They’d laugh themselves sick, the lot of them.”

“The lot of whom?” Miles said.

“Family,” Carsington said. “My brothers. Alistair was at Waterloo, you know.”

“I know.”

All the world knew. Alistair Carsington was a famous Waterloo hero. Why couldn’t he be the Carsington in Egypt? Or any other one of them? Why did it have to be this one?

“They shot three horses out from under him, sliced him up with sabers, and stuck him with lances,” Carsington said. “Some cavalry rode over him and a couple of soldiers died on him. Did he get infected and feverish?”

“Did he not?” Miles said.

“Well, not very much,” Carsington said. “He lived, didn’t he? If he could live through that, I can jolly well live through a nick in the belly.”

“I hope so,” Miles said. “I think Daphne would take it very ill, were you to require planting.”

He couldn’t imagine what she’d endured when she believed Carsington dead. He felt like a fool for not realizing she’d become attached. But she had concealed it so well.

Besides, Daphne never noticed men—or if she did, it was to regard them with mistrust. Why should Miles think Carsington’s case any different? Why should he, of all men, turn out to be the one she’d risk her life for? Miles could scarcely believe his bookish sister had risked her life on his own account, and he was her brother.

Belatedly he recollected the instructions and explanations she’d given before departing the cabin. “I’m to offer you a glass of water,” he said. “Daphne said she’d given you some laudanum, and you might wake up feeling dry.”

“I feel as though someone moved the Arabian Desert into my mouth while I was sleeping,” Carsington said. “Along with the camels. Am I allowed to have a wash and a shave and clean my teeth at least? But never mind what she allows. She’s asleep. What she doesn’t know won’t hurt her.”

“Yes, but you really must move as little as possible,” Miles said. “To avoid putting pressure on the wound. You will not want all her work to go for naught?”

Carsington instantly stilled. “No, of course not. She was picking out bits of cloth—the merest threads—for hours, it seemed. What a beast I should be, to undo all her efforts.”

Miles blinked, once, twice. He was not sure what he’d expected. He knew Carsington was unmanageable. Everyone in the world knew it. Even his formidable father appeared to have given up the case as hopeless.

Miles did not wonder at his lordship’s sending his fourth son to Egypt. He only wondered at the earl’s not sending the son to China, or Tierra del Fuego, or the Antipodes.

“I’ll valet you,” Miles offered. He collected the bowl, ewer, and towel. He found Carsington’s toothbrush and shaving kit, and placed all within easy reach.

While he was playing manservant, the mongoose ran into the room. She rose up on her hind legs and watched the proceedings.

When Miles had settled back into his place, she crawled into his lap and watched from there. “I heard her name is Marigold,” Miles said.

“She’s in love with your shirt,” Carsington said.

Miles had already heard the story, and put two and two together. While Carsington set about his toilette, Miles told of his adventures in Minya and the limping mongoose he’d fed.

“Obviously it’s the same one,” Carsington said. “What a wicked deceiver she is. I thought she was fond of me. Yet I’ve never seen her sit still for so long. She usually grows bored with my shaving in a minute or two. I now realize she was only using me to while away the interval until she saw you again. You’re the one she truly loves.”

Miles stroked the creature. “You seem to have collected several strays on the way upriver,” he said.

“Marigold collected us,” he said. “The rest is Daph—Mrs. Pembroke’s doing.”

At that moment, Miles silently bore what he hoped was the last of the shocks. Daphne had not simply formed an attachment. She had formed an intimate attachment.

With Rupert Carsington, Lord Hargate’s famously wild and famously untamable scapegrace son.

Still, Miles reminded himself, there were worse men in the world. Noxley, for instance. Pembroke.

Meanwhile this man had beyond doubt won the affection and loyalty of the crew and servants. They had nothing but praise for him. They’d fought for him. The mongoose liked him, too.

Even the cats had wandered in once this afternoon and deigned to sit at the foot of the divan and stare at him while he slept.

When the toilette was done, Miles helped him into a fresh Arab-style shirt, of the style that came nearly to the ankles. It was not elegant, but it was cool. The long front opening allowed easy access to his wound.

When he was dressed, and Miles had helped prop him up with another pillow, Carsington made him feel a little better by saying, “That was wonderfully quick thinking on your part last night: the torch and the papyrus.”

“That curst papyrus,” Miles said. “I should be glad to be rid of it, if not for Daphne. She had done so much work, and it was a fine manuscript, superior even to the immensely long one illustrated in the Description de l’Egypte. Now the French will have this one as well, plague take them.”

“She still has the copy,” Carsington said. “It isn’t so beautiful, of course, and lacks the illustrations. But she’ll persevere. She’s dauntless. I’ve never known a woman like her, not remotely like her. Did you see her last night, when those fellows were coming at us, that great lot of ruffians? She turned and cocked her pistol and fired, just as sure as you please. Got the fellow in the leg, too. Not that I was surprised, when I’ve seen her courage again and again. From the very start.”

He launched into the story: how Daphne had gone down into a dungeon of the Citadel to get him when no one else would help her…the murders in the second pyramid and the pluck she’d displayed then…the tour of the Pyramid of Steps at Saqqara, which had involved miles of narrow passages and during which she’d uttered no complaint—quite the opposite.

“I vow, she might have been at the Egyptian Hall in Piccadilly or making a tour of Stourhead,” Carsington said. “If she was uncomfortable, she took no notice—and you ought to know it was ninety degrees at least inside that pyramid, and the air thick with smoke and dust.”

“Daphne?” Miles said. “But she has a deep fear of small, closed spaces. Her voice goes up to a squeak, and she jabbers endlessly. It is very irritating.”

“She did not squeak with me,” Carsington said. “I saw she had a morbid aversion to such places, but she will not let the fear hold her back. I wish you had seen her when we were stuck in that caved-in robber’s tunnel in the tomb in Asyut.”

He went on to tell that tale while Miles listened, wondering if he’d got drunk again without realizing, because it could not be his sister Daphne of whom Carsington spoke with so much enthusiasm. And admiration. As though…as though—

“You’re in love with her,” Miles said. Then, “Er,” he said. Because he hadn’t meant to say it aloud. He stared hard at the mongoose. She licked his hand.

“In love?” Carsington repeated. “In love?”

“Er, no. Sorry. Don’t know what I was thinking. The heat. The shock. Couldn’t believe it was my sister you were talking about. Brave and dashing and and all that.”

Carsington’s countenance darkened.

“Not but what I expect she’d rise to the occasion,” Miles added hastily. He was not afraid of Carsington, exactly. Yet he had to admit the glare was a trifle daunting. In any event, it wasn’t good for the man to become overwrought. Daphne had said so. “My sister is a plucky creature, of course—continuing her work in spite of all the discouragement, and so forth.”

“You’ve got it backwards,” Carsington said. “It wasn’t her rising to the occasion. It’s the occasion rising to her. Egypt and this business with you and the papyrus have finally given her the chance to show what she truly is. She’s—she’s a goddess. But human. A real goddess, not make-believe. She’s beautiful and brave and wise. And fascinating. And dangerous. As goddesses are, as you know, in all the best stories.”

“I’ll be hanged,” Miles said. “You really are in love with her.”

The black eyes regarded him steadily. Then they regarded the cabin ceiling. Then the window. Then they came back to him.

“Do you know,” Carsington said mildly, “I’ve been wondering what it was.”

DAPHNE CAME AT sunset, accompanied by Nafisah. The Isis was still traveling upriver and would not moor until darkness made it too dangerous to proceed. The Nile was very low. Even in broad day, navigation wanted every iota of the helmsman’s attention.

Archdale had thought they might make it to Isna before night fell.

Rupert didn’t care where they were or where they would moor. He saw that Nafisah’s tray held utensils for two. Daphne intended to dine with him. Alone.

Perfect.

Nafisah set the tray on the stool and left. Marigold ran in, stood up and sniffed at the tray, and ran out again.

Ignoring both the mongoose’s antics and Rupert’s not very convincing protests, Daphne arranged cushions behind him. Only when she’d settled him to her satisfaction did she settle herself.

Rupert didn’t mind. She had donned a particularly fetching Arab-style ensemble comprising full but wickedly thin Turkish trousers, a thin crepe shirt, a silk sash draped provocatively over her hips, and a flowing silk overgarment. The faint scent of incense wafted about him.

This was all highly encouraging.

“That is a horrid temptation to put before a man who is forbidden to make vigorous movements,” he said.

“Is it really?” she said. “No wonder Miles did not approve. He looked daggers at me.”

“Maybe his face froze that way,” Rupert said. “He was looking daggers at me a few hours ago. Do you think he suspects?”

“I think he knows,” she said.

“I’m glad I don’t have a sister,” he said. “I should have to get over my aversion to killing people.”

She turned her attention to the tray. “If I remember my physic correctly, you need to strengthen the blood. You must take some lamb stew. Red wine, of course. The rice is cooked in chicken broth with onions. Some bread and cheese. Some fruit. A little—”

“I can’t eat just yet,” he said. “I am too—too—” He frowned. “Too something. Feelings.”

Her green gaze met his. “Feelings,” she repeated.

“I meant to wait,” he said. “Until I was better. Because I didn’t want pity to influence you.”

“Pity,” she said.

“On account of my wound,” he said.

“Don’t be absurd,” she said. “I shouldn’t pity you on account of a nick in the belly.”

“In any event, I can’t wait,” he said. “And I had better warn you that I don’t mean to be in the least sporting. If I have to go on my knees, and start bleeding again—”

“I can think of no reason for you to go on your knees,” she said severely.

“Then you’re not thinking clearly,” he said. “It’s the usual way these things are done.”

“These things,” she said, a degree less severely.

“I should have done it that way the first time, but I hardly knew what I was doing,” he said. “You said it was better to marry than to burn, and I was in a state of eternal conflagration, it seemed—but that wasn’t what it was at all.”

She shifted up onto her knees. “Perhaps you ought to take some wine,” she said.

“My strength is up to this,” he said. “I only hope my brain is, too. I want to explain first. Because you aren’t to think it’s completely on account of lust. Lust is a part, yes. A large part.”

She sank back onto her heels and regarded her hands.

“But I liked you from the moment I first heard your voice,” he said, “when I had no idea what you looked like. I thought it delicious, the way you bargained for me, as though I were an old rug. Then I loved the way you looked at me. Then I loved the way you ordered me about. I loved your patient and impatient ways of explaining things to me. I love the sound of your voice and the way you move. I love your courage and your kindness and your generosity and your obstinacy and your passion.” He paused. “You’re the genius. What do you think that means?”

She threw him a sidelong glance. “I think you’re insane,” she said. “Perhaps you have developed an infection which has gone directly to your head.”

“I am not insane,” he said. “A woman of your highly advanced intellect ought to be able to perceive that I am in love. With you. I wish you had told me. It was deuced embarrassing to find it out from your brother.”

Her gaze swung toward him, green eyes wide and flashing. “Miles?” she said. “Did he get into a snit about my honor and insist—”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he said. “He has not lived the life of a recluse, as you have. You may be sure he knows all about me. I’ve no doubt I’m the last man on earth he’d want near his sister. Well, maybe I’m second to last. After Noxley. But never mind them. This is between us, Daphne. I love you with all my heart. Will you be so good as to marry me?”

“Yes,” she said. “Yes, of course. I should never have said no the first time. I have bitterly regretted the error, believe me. I could live without you, but that would only be breathing. It would not be living.”

He opened his arms, and she crawled toward him on her hands and knees and came into them. “I missed you,” she said. “I missed you so much.” She lay her head upon his shoulder. “Can we be married right away? I hate sleeping in my own cabin.”

“We can be married now,” he said, nuzzling her soft hair. “Remember?”

“Yes. But you must have a dowry.” She reached down and untied the silken sash. “This will have to do.”

He took it from her. It was quite heavy, even for a large piece of silk. “What have you got twisted up in this?” he said. “Rocks?”

“Five purses,” she said. “About thirty-five pounds.”

“You came prepared.”

“Of course I did,” she said. “When I want something, I will stop at nothing. Look at what I’m wearing.”

“I like what you’re not wearing, too,” he said.

“I am even so shameless as to take advantage of you when you are weak and wounded.”

“I’m not that weak,” he said. He dropped the sash onto the divan and put his hands to better use, roving over her shapely body. “We’d better get married right away,” he said.

“Yes,” she said.

Her hands weren’t idle, either. But her mouth, that soft mouth was even more dangerous, gliding over his neck and collarbone.

He raised her head and brought her mouth to his. She tasted cool and sweet, like Turkish sherbet. She tasted hot and dark like brandy held over a flame. She tasted mysterious, like a goddess, and her power over him would have terrified a lesser man.

But he wasn’t a lesser man, and a strong woman was exactly what he wanted. A strong, wondrously curved woman who fit perfectly in his arms. He dipped his head and drew his tongue down the opening of her kamees and along the fragrant path between her breasts. She sighed and dragged her fingers through his hair.

He slid his hand over the beautiful swell of her bottom. She moved under his touch, shifting closer. He grasped that magnificent derrière and brought her sex firmly against his. And stifled a groan.

“You’ll hurt yourself,” she murmured against his mouth.

“That wasn’t a groan of pain,” he said.

He was aware of the wound. Every movement caused a twinge. He didn’t care. She was all soft woman and in his arms, and in his mouth and his nostrils and he was drunk with the taste and scent of her…and she’d said she couldn’t live properly without him. She’d said yes.

“We mustn’t tear the stitches,” she said.

“Then we’d better not move very much.”

“Is that possible?”

“Yes.” He stroked down her belly, over the thin fabric. He loosened the waist string of her trousers and pushed them down. He stroked over the feathery curls and the soft flesh, so warm and wet, so ready and willing. She sighed and moved against his hand. She pushed his shirt up to his waist. His rod sprang up in cheerful welcome, as usual. With a soft laugh, she grasped it and drew her slim fingers down its length. Then she shifted herself, bringing her leg up high on his thigh, and guided him in, and the jolt of pleasure in that joining took his breath away.

They scarcely moved at all. Awareness became all the more intense. He was aware each time her muscles tensed about him and eased, and of the very slight motion of her hip that sent waves of pleasure coursing through him. He was aware of her hands, gliding over him, and making long trails of sparks over his skin.

He opened his eyes and looked at her, and they smiled at each other in silent, wicked amusement, the devil in him recognizing the devil in her. And so they lay, watching each other, making secret love, while from outside came the familiar sounds of footsteps on the deck, voices calling out as they prepared to land.

A long sweet while of rippling pleasure ensued, like the Nile rippling beneath them, and then he was caught in a rushing current. She grasped him tightly, holding him still, while she moved upon him. The world went dark and wild, and he fell into it, into her, and all he knew was feeling beyond any words, a vast, mad happiness.

Then came her voice in his ear: “I give myself to thee. I give myself to thee. I give myself to thee.”

And at last she sank onto him, and he wrapped his arms about her and savored the delicious peace. The stray, funny thought came: we’re married, and he laughed out loud.