chapter 11
James leaned more heavily against her as they went, his steps slowing. When they reached his room, Demosthenes took up his post outside James’s door, fiercely watching the hall, as if he could keep the danger at bay. Laura blinked tears from her eyes.
They weaved across the floor to his bed, and Laura eased James down on it, grateful for the servants’ custom of turning down the bed. He started to lie down, but she grabbed both his arms, stopping him.
“Wait. Let me get your jacket first.” She reached out to grasp his lapels.
He pushed weakly at her hand. “No. I can do it.”
“Oh, do shut up, James.” Laura pulled the garment off him. He was, apparently, feeling too bad to put up any more protest, but sat docilely as she started on his waistcoat and ascot.
“How far do you plan to go?” he asked drily.
“It’s encouraging that you feel enough improved to make annoying comments,” she told him, giving him a little push back onto the bed. “Where do you hurt?”
“Where do I not?” He lay back, raising his hands to his head and squeezing as if he could crush out the pain. “My head is the worst. Damn it, I wish it would just get it over with.”
Laura looked at his drawn face and brushed her hand across his forehead, gently pushing back his hair. “I’ll get you something for the pain.”
“I don’t need—” He stopped and sighed. “Laudanum makes me ill.”
“Then I won’t give you any.” She pulled the covers up over him and crossed to the door. Demosthenes turned to regard her, but did not give way. Laura reached down and stroked the dog’s head. “Don’t worry. I’m coming back.”
She gave his shoulders an extra pat. The mastiff let out a long sigh that sounded much like James’s and stood aside, leaving a narrow space open for her to leave. Laura went to her room and pulled her father’s bag from the bottom of her wardrobe.
It occurred to her that she should probably put on something besides her nightgown and robe. She had never been around any man but her father in only her nightclothes. But she didn’t want to take the time, and it was scarcely as if James would notice or care in his condition.
Picking up the medical kit, she returned to James’s room. Demosthenes, who had remained standing at the door, flopped down across the doorway after she entered and laid his head on his paws, closing his eyes. Apparently he had decided it was safe to leave James in her care. Laura shut the door softly behind her and tiptoed across the floor.
“You needn’t sneak,” a voice said from the dark. “I’m not asleep.”
“May I turn on a low light?”
“Whatever you like.” James eyed her bag suspiciously. “What is that?”
“Instruments of torture.” She was pleased to see his face had recovered a bit of color.
“Ah. Good to know.”
“It’s what my father took with him when he visited a patient.” She pulled out a bottle and poured some of the contents into a glass, adding water. “This isn’t laudanum; it’s from willow bark, good for headaches.”
“Your father dabbled in folk medicine?”
“He wasn’t one to discount a remedy merely because it was old.” She slid one hand beneath his head to lift it, and he raised up on his elbows.
“I’m not helpless.”
“I’m sure you’re not. Drink this.”
He sipped and made a face. “That tastes terrible.”
“Of course it does—it’s good for you.” She gave him a teasing smile and laid her palm over his forehead. “Now drink the rest of it.”
James complied, then lay back down and watched her as she moved about, pouring water from the pitcher into the bowl and dipping a rag into it.
“You feel a trifle hot,” she commented. She feared that was the reason for the color in his face. “Are you feverish?”
He shrugged. “Perhaps. I’m no longer sure what I am.”
Laura wrung out the rag and bathed his face. He closed his eyes, his features relaxing under her hand. She rewet the rag to cool it and returned to his bedside.
He watched her warily. “Clearly you have some need to nurture someone, but I am not—”
“Oh, for—why do you make such an effort to be obnoxious when you are feeling so ill?” She began to wash his face again.
“I don’t like being fussed over.”
“It’s unfortunate you didn’t think of that before you married me,” Laura retorted. “I am a doctor’s daughter, and I have been in the habit of helping sick people all my life, even those who are annoying. You will simply have to get used to the fact that I’m not going to stand about watching you suffer and do nothing about it.”
“I should have known you’d turn out to be a despot,” he muttered, closing his eyes. “Graeme has a weakness for overbearing women.”
A chuckle escaped Laura. “Insulting to the end, I see.” She was pleased to see that his lips curved up in response.
“Will it bother you?” he asked softly. “Being so close to Graeme here? Seeing him frequently? He’s bound to come over when he gets back from London.”
Laura glanced at him, startled. “No, of course not. I told you—”
“But you must . . . when you see him . . . you surely feel . . .”
“Friendship,” Laura said firmly. “That’s all.” She poured the contents of a bottle into the water and dipped the rag into it. A pleasant scent stole through the air as she wrung out the cloth and laid it across his forehead.
He took a deep breath. “It smells like you.”
Laura glanced at him, surprised. “It’s lavender—soothing for a headache.” She thought he looked a little better. “Will you be able to sleep now?”
He snorted. “I never sleep.”
“I hear you walking about at night.”
“I get restless. It’s madness to be so tired and yet unable to sleep.”
She perched on the bed beside him. “I would have kept you company, but you didn’t seem to want it.”
He slanted a look over at her. “You mean I was rude as the devil.”
“Yes. But I expected that. I wasn’t sure, though, whether company would make you feel worse or you were just being unpleasant.”
He snorted. “I have yet to see you let either of those things slow you down.”
She shrugged. “I spent all my life managing a man who took no care of himself.”
James scowled. “You’re saying I remind you of your father?”
Laura laughed. “Goodness, no. My father was a kind man. A good man.”
“Very different then.” There was a hint of a smile on his lips. Laura was aware of a peculiar desire to trace her finger across them.
“He was too busy looking after others to take care of himself. I’m not sure why you neglect to do so.”
“I take care of myself. Most would say I am my greatest concern.”
“Perhaps. I don’t know you well enough to say. But you refuse to let anyone help you.”
He stirred, turning his head away. “It’s obvious you don’t know me well. I have a great many people who help me.”
“You pay them to work for you; that’s an entirely different thing. What you won’t do is allow someone to give it to you freely.”
“You’re daft.”
“Am I?” She curled her legs up on the bed, positioning herself more comfortably.
James frowned. “What are you doing? Are you settling in for a cozy chat?”
“I don’t see why not. I’m wide-awake, and you say you never sleep. We might as well talk to each other.”
“What if I don’t want to chat?” His tone was so close to that of a petulant child that Laura had to smile.
“Then I suppose I shall have to do all the talking, won’t I?”
“You probably would.” But he turned toward her.
“Why won’t you tell your family that you are ill?”
“What do you expect me to do? Stand up at dinner and announce I shall die soon? I’m sure they have figured it out by now. Nobody wants to speak of it.”
“Your mother doesn’t realize it. She thinks that marrying me shows you’re expecting a long life ahead of you.”
“Mother likes to be happy. She doesn’t want shadows or lurking demons or anything but fine clothes and a pretty reflection in the mirror. And ample men to admire her.”
“But what about when you—when it happens?”
“You see?” He quirked an eyebrow at her. “Even you have trouble saying it.” He rubbed his hand over his face, knocking the cloth askew, and Laura leaned over to adjust it. “Don’t worry yourself over my mother. She will have a grand opportunity to emote. Throw herself across the casket and weep. She has perfected the art of crying without damaging her looks.”
“James!” Laura was shocked. “What a horrid thing to say. Do you really believe your mother won’t grieve for you? That she doesn’t love you?”
“Oh, she cares. Just as she cared for my father. Or Aunt Mirabelle. Or—” He broke off with a shrug. “But she dearly loves the drama of it all, as well.”
Laura studied him for a moment. His thick, dark lashes shielded his gaze from her. He appeared to be intent on the path his fingers took as he traced the pattern on her brocade dressing gown where it spread across the bed coverings.
She wondered if she ought to cease questioning him, but it seemed to her that conversation, even his irritation at her probing, distracted him from his pain.
“If you know that your family has surmised you are ill, why do you try so hard to keep them from seeing it? Why do you hide your tiredness? Your pain?”
“My weakness?” He looked up at her then, his mouth twisting in a mockery of a smile. “Well, one cannot let down the side, can one?”
“What side?”
“I’m not sure,” he admitted, the smile falling away. “Very well, if you must know, I cannot bear to have my mother indulge in her tragic role. Crying and bemoaning and asking me every two minutes how I feel. Handkerchief always at the ready, reminding me of every tender moment in my life, real or imagined, pleading with me to be strong and not leave her. It’s exhausting.”
“I see. But what about the others? Your brothers and sister, their spouses.”
“Them?” His jaw tightened. “I wouldn’t give them the satisfaction.”
“So they are the other side.”
“Mm. I suppose the other side is everyone except myself.”
“You’re wrong there,” she said in a matter-of-fact voice, reaching out to turn the cloth over so that the cooler side lay against his forehead. “I am your wife. So whether you like it or not, I am on your side.”
His eyes flew to hers, an odd spasm of emotion so fleeting she couldn’t identify it flickering across his features. “I don’t need your pity,” he told her roughly.
“Maybe not. But you could certainly use my help.”
He turned his eyes back to his forefinger tracing a whorl on the brocade. After a moment, in a low voice, he said, “I’m losing my mind.”
“What?”
He wet his lips. “I couldn’t tot up a column of numbers today. It wasn’t just my stupid hand shaking. I couldn’t . . . I couldn’t remember how to add them. It was hopeless.”
“Don’t fret over that. Someone else can do it. I’ll check them for you if you like.”
“Yes, but that’s not the point. I’ve always been good with numbers. I understand them. They’re fixed, certain. But now . . .” He turned his hand palm up, flexing his fingers as if grasping at air. “I’ve lost them.”
Laura took his hand. “You haven’t lost them. They’re still there; they still mean the same things. They’re just as constant as they were before.”
“Yes. It is I who’s not.” He stroked his thumb idly up and down hers. Sad as his words were, it was the intense heat of his skin that worried her. He was growing more feverish. “I sometimes see . . . things that aren’t there.”
“What do you see?”
“Nothing important. The other day I saw Mother’s cat. Only it died years ago. Last night I dreamed my—I saw Sir Laurence beside my bed. I remember the occasion; I was seven and had a fever. Years later my mother told me they had been afraid I was about to die, too, as my brother Vincent had.” His hand tightened on hers as he looked up into her face. “I am not given to imagination or mystical thoughts, Laura.”
“I’m sure you are not.” Laura’s throat burned with tears, but she managed a smile. She had not realized he had had another brother, but this was scarcely the time to question James about Vincent or his death.
His eyes drifted closed, though his thumb continued to slide along her skin. After a moment, it, too, stilled, and his grip loosened. He was asleep. Laura felt a small moment of triumph.
She considered pulling her hand from his and leaving him to sleep, but she feared the movement might awaken him. Her position, however, soon grew tiring, and her eyes kept closing. Finally she moved, and his hand tightened on hers. Her eyes flew to his face; he was still asleep. After a moment, she lay down on her side, curled in a ball in the lower quadrant of the bed, her hand stretched up to his.