The Anonymous Amanuensis Read online

  He waited in a chair before the fire in the library, still holding the girl, until all he had requested had been delivered. Then he carried her upstairs.

  Once Mosely had made sure the door was locked, James gently placed Eve on the bed and pulled his cloak from around her. His hands still shook, worse than ever, and he clenched them briefly into fists, willing them to do as he commanded.

  Finally Mosely shouldered him aside and proceeded to cut away Eve's clothing. He curtly ordered James to pull here or hold there as he did so. The slim, strong body that was revealed was, at the same time, boyish and unmistakably feminine. Small high breasts, a curving waist, rounded hips, golden skin.

  James wondered, staring at her, how he could have failed to discern her sex. Then he realized he was staring and averted his eyes, ashamed of his momentary rush of desire.

  Mosely seemed undistracted by the loveliness that was revealed as he cut her soaked garments from her. He set James to washing the rest of the blood from Eve's face and hair as he examined her body and limbs carefully, seeking other injuries. Having ascertained that there were none, he covered her with quilts, except for her splinted arm and leg.

  Mosely cautiously unbound the splint on Eve's ankle. He prodded gently from knee to ankle, then examined her foot with meticulous attention. When he sighed with relief, so did James.

  "Only sprained," he reported at last, "not but what that can't be as painful as a break and take as long to 'eal. I'll just bind it up so she can't flex it and cause it to 'urt worse." He suited action to his words.

  Then he gave her arm an equally careful examination, although he did not remove the splint. "This arm's broken, I'm certain, so I'll leave it be for a day or two, till the swelling goes down. Time enough then to put on a better splint. Now. Let's 'ave a look at the 'ead."

  James had washed the dirt and blood from the purpling bruise on Eve's forehead so Mosely was able to examine it. The cut in the center of the bruise was small, barely half an inch long, and James commented that he had trouble believing that all the blood that had streaked her face could have come from it.

  "Aye, but 'ead cuts bleed something fierce." Rolling Eve to her side, he probed at the wound extending from just behind her ear to just above her nape. It was crusted with blood, and the hair around it was matted to her head. "Time enough later to clean this one up. We don't want her fussing about too much tonight."

  Eve was still limp and unresponsive when James laid her back and pulled the quilt to her neck. "She ought to 'ave woke before now," Mosely said. He pried open first one then the other of Eve's eyelids, peering closely at her pupils. "She looks concussed, else she wouldn't 'ave stayed unconscious so long." His expression was grave. "Jamie, we ought to call in the doctor."

  "Can we not wait until morning and see what happens."

  Mosely's nod seemed reluctantly given. At that moment, James came very close to agreeing to call the doctor and let the consequences fall where they might.

  "What about the fever? Will it get worse?"

  "Oh, aye, it could. Laying out there in the rain for 'ours didn't do 'er no good. Trouble is, I don't know what we can do, save keep 'er warm and force 'er to swallow as much as she will." Sliding his hand behind Eve's head, he lifted it slightly and held a glass to her lips. They remained closed even though he tipped the glass. Its contents ran down her chin. "Tickle 'er cheek, Jamie," he said, not releasing either glass or head.

  "What?" James looked at him in astonishment.

  "Tickle 'er cheek. Sometimes that'll make the mouth open."

  James did as he was told and was surprised to see Eve's reaction. Her lips opened and her tongue darted to their corner. Mosely was ready with the water and managed to get some into the girl's mouth. She swallowed and her lips seemed to be searching for more. Mosely was able to get her to drink the better part of a glassful before she ceased responding.

  James sent Mosely to bed, knowing he himself would not sleep this night. He wanted to be with her when Eve awoke. He remained by the unmoving girl's side until well after dawn, occasionally sponging her flushed face, but he finally could keep his eyes open no longer.

  Eve had still not awakened.

  Summoning Mosely, he ordered that he be awakened about noon. When Mosely protested that he could manage for much longer than that, James silenced him. "I think the fever's higher, and it may take us both to combat it later. Give me four hour's sleep and I'll be fine. Or call me earlier, if she gets worse." He stumbled into his bedchamber and threw himself face down on the bed. Within seconds, he was sleeping soundly.

  * * * *

  Mosely sent a footman to wake James just after noon. To his grateful surprise, a steaming tub awaited in his dressing room. He bathed quickly and dressed without assistance, donning well-worn trousers and an old shirt. As soon as he had run a brush through his red hair, he hurried to Eve's room. He tapped, then waited as he heard the door being unlocked.

  "How is she?" he asked as he slipped into the room and locked the door behind him.

  "The fever's burning 'er up, sir," Mosely answered. "We've got to get 'er cooled down. Do ye start sponging 'er while I fetch something that might 'elp." Mosely slipped out of the door, locking it behind him.

  James pulled the quilts back and began drawing a damp cloth over Eve's body. His initial response to the sight of her body was quickly submerged in his concern for her. When he turned her to sponge her back, she moaned and moved in protest. Heartened at the first response he had seen, he continued to dampen her back and shoulders. The moisture evaporated almost as soon as it reached her skin, so feverish was she.

  Mosely returned, carrying a small brazier, an iron pot, and a bundle. James raised an eyebrow in inquiry.

  "Balsam, dried elecampane root, and mint," Mosely said shortly. "I 'ope it works like it's supposed to."

  He set the brazier on the floor beside Eve's bed and the pot atop it. Filling the pot with water from the can on the hearth, he blew upon the charcoal in the brazier. James covered Eve lightly with a sheet, commenting that her skin felt slightly cooler after his ministrations.

  "What are you about?" he asked, seating himself by the bedside, his hand against Eve's burning cheek. "Is this something you learned at sea?"

  "My mother--God rest 'er--used this on my sister. I've never forgot."

  It seemed to James that Mosely's eyes gazed at something unseen, something far away, perhaps long ago. "They died of the diphtheria, but Ma did her best to keep Mattie alive, long as she 'ad the strength."

  This was the first time Mosely had ever volunteered anything of his past. James wondered if he'd done so in order to reassure, or because he was beside himself with worry.

  The pot came to a boil. Pouring some of the water into a cup, Mosely returned the pot to the brazier. He crumbled the material from his bundle and scattered it upon the water's surface.

  "Miss Comstock met me in the 'all, said this would be good for fever." He dropped several pinches of a dry, yellowish material into the cup. "Too bad we can't ask for 'er 'elp."

  "What is it?"

  "Dried linden flowers, she said." Once more Mosely checked the now-simmering water, gave it a stir.

  Soon the room was filled with a cloud of astringent smelling steam. Working together, James and Mosely were able to get both the linden-flower infusion and another half glass of water into her before she whined and turned her face away.

  Eve became restless in the late afternoon, tossing and whimpering, trying to move her splinted arm. Encouraged at her activity, Mosely opined that it should be safe to give her a light dose of laudanum against the pain. He mixed the drug with a second dose of the linden flower infusion. She swallowed readily this time.

  Soon Eve was once more sleeping quietly, but her fever had not abated noticeably. They continued to sponge her burning skin throughout the afternoon. It seemed to have little effect.

  Finally, about ten that night her fever broke and her breathing gradually eased. Everything in t
he room was damp and reeked of balsam. Both men relaxed then, and sprawled in the chairs. They sat silently, sipping brandy, the remains of a cold supper on a tray between them. At a late hour, James roused himself from the doze into which the brandy had sent him and ordered Mosely to bed.

  "I can sleep here as well as anywhere, and you have had less rest than I. Eve seems to be over the crisis, so I should be able to handle whatever arises until morning. No, don't argue. Get to bed!" After Mosely had reluctantly left the room, James pulled the two chairs together and tried to make himself comfortable between them. He was not successful, but he did doze off and on through the night, between frequent checks to see that Eve was sleeping peacefully.

  Chapter Eleven

  A cold gray light was filtering into the room when Eve awoke. At first she was only conscious of pain in her arm and leg, a throbbing ache in her head. She lay still for several moments, trying to remember why she should feel so wretched.

  The rustling of cloth drew her attention to the two high-backed chairs silhouetted against the dying fire. She turned her head cautiously on her pillow. Why should there be someone sitting in her room, sprawled between chairs? She could not see a face, only one dangling arm and a stockinged foot resting on the hearth.

  She attempted to pull herself upright, but stopped when the ache in her head turned to a stab of pain. Relaxing, she waited for the pain to subside. As it did so, she remembered the sudden whir, the explosion of movement from the shrubs along the track, Raspberry's bucking, and her own fall. A dimmer memory, of trying to crawl along the wet grass, to seek help, came to her. She must have been unconscious when she was found and brought back to Fallowfeld.

  A new pain, this one in her arm, troubled Eve and she tried to move it. Something prevented motion, something was binding her elbow. Reaching across to loosen the binding, her right hand brushed against her bare breasts. Stunned, she explored beneath the quilts. She was naked! Who had undressed her?

  Panic stricken, she could only think of clothing herself before the sleeper in her chairs woke. She laboriously pushed the quilts back, becoming conscious as she did so of the tight bindings that confined her ankle and foot also. Gritting her teeth, Eve pulled herself upright and squirmed to the edge of the bed.

  If she could only get to her wardrobe and find her dressing gown. She eased her left foot carefully to the floor and started to put her weight upon it. A wave of dizziness hit her as she tried to stand and she lost her balance, bumping against the table that stood by her bed. It tipped, sending glass, spoon, and brandy bottle crashing to the floor. Eve screamed in agony when she landed on her splinted arm.

  James leapt from his makeshift bed as he heard the crash and Eve's scream. He knelt beside her and gathered her into his arms. "Careful, there. Don't move! Let me lift you."

  Her fingers plucked weakly at his shirtsleeve. "No. Not bed..." Her voice was a thin sound, hardly above a whisper.

  "Are you in pain?" He sat back in his chair, still holding her.

  "Please...I...please...."

  "Ah. Of course." James carried her behind the screen in the corner of the room and started to lower her onto the china chamber pot. At her inarticulate protest, he hesitated, then completed his arrested motion. In the most matter-of-fact tones he could summon, he said, "Do not try to rise when you are done, Eve. I will merely step out into the corridor and will come to take you back to your bed in a few moments." He ignored her sobs and removed himself from the room.

  Once alone he cursed himself for his insensitivity. Waking in the night, pain-filled and half-drugged, to find no one was at hand. Poor girl! Then to have him treat her with all the gentleness and sympathy one would expend on a sack of oats. No wonder she wept!

  Yet if he were to hold her gently, as his body demanded he do, he would betray himself. He had been in a state of half-arousal every waking minute since he had seen her white body gleaming in the light from his lantern. Best pretend you play nurse to naked women regularly, old man. Otherwise you will find yourself with complications you would rather avoid.

  When he returned, he said only, "Did you hurt yourself when you fell?" Without waiting for an answer, he carried her to the bed and laid her in it, trying to avoid jarring her injured arm and leg. His motions were perhaps less gentle than he had intended, for he was being very careful not to let his eyes remain too long on her naked body, softly golden in the firelight.

  He saw her wince as his hands tucked the quilts about her. "Now," he continued when she was decently covered. "Answer me. And why, when you wished to get out of bed, did you not call me to help you?"

  Tears flowed silently down her cheeks from closed eyes.

  His resolve dissolved by her evident distress, James leaned closer and laid his hand on her forehead. "Eve, Eve, there is no need to cry. I am not going to expose your secret to the world. All you must think of now is helping your body to mend itself. We will speak of other things when you are no longer in pain."

  His gentle voice hurt Eve more than angry words would have. She pulled her uninjured right hand from beneath the covers and took hold of his wrist. Her mouth worked, but she could not speak for the lump in her throat.

  "No, child, do not try to speak. Let me go and I will get you some laudanum. We can talk tomorrow." He freed himself from her weak grasp and bent to fumble among the debris on the floor and picked up a dark bottle. Rinsing his brandy glass, he poured a few drops from the bottle into it, then added a little water from the nearly empty pitcher on the tray. Kneeling beside the bed, he slipped one arm beneath her shoulders and held Eve so she could sip.

  She grimaced at the taste of the strong, bitter potion.

  James tucked the quilts more securely about her and returned to his chair. Gazing into the fire, he reflected on the events of the past two nights. His initial furious surprise at her deception had been pushed aside by his concern when she seemed to be so ill. Now he had time to reflect on the ramifications of her deception. The thoughts that passed through his head did not please him.

  Eve had been in his household for nearly six months, without a chaperone until their arrival at Fallowfeld. There had been no other woman in his London house at night, all those weeks they lived there.

  He and Mosely would, of course, never speak of her masquerade, but many others had met his youthful employee. Eve's ancestry was of his own class, which made it so much worse. If she were ever to take her rightful place in society, sooner or later someone might recognize her as the young man who had worked for him.

  A further complication was how to keep Penny and Miss Comstock from learning Eve's secret. James sat in the slowly lightening room and brooded on impossibilities until Mosely came to replace him at Eve's bedside.

  Eve did not immediately sleep after taking the dose of laudanum, though she found her mind growing more and more clouded and confused. The thought that she must escape from Fallowfeld before her masquerade became widely known was the only one she could hold on to. She finally drifted into a drugged sleep with it uppermost in her mind.

  The sounds of someone moving about in her room roused her from her troubled dreams some time later, but she did not immediately open her eyes. From the brightness she could perceive through her closed lids, she knew that the late morning sun must be streaming in. She lay quietly, trying to think.

  How could she escape? Would Quinton prosecute her for her deception? Where could she go, where she would not be recognized? She wondered if Quinton would give her the part of the second quarter's salary she had earned so far. With that and what she had saved from the first quarter, she would have nearly fifteen pounds, if she counted the money she still called her 'escape fund'.

  Elmwood. That was it. She would go back to Elmwood, apologize abjectly to Alfred and Charlotte, and hide there for the rest of her life. Charlotte, at least, would be happy that she did not wish to meet any of their tonnish friends. Isolated there, Eve would be safe from having her secret discovered.

  But what a p
rice to pay for her dream of being independent! Eve knew now she had not considered all the implications of her masquerade when she had conceived the plan.

  Never mind, she told herself. It was worth it. I proved myself and I had a wonderful six months. I can live on my memories of that for the rest of my life.

  Then the vision of a pair of pale gray eyes below a head of flaming hair appeared in her mind and she knew that the cost would be almost greater than she could bear. Once she returned to Elmwood, she would never see James Quinton again.

  When Eve finally decided she could face the world and opened her eyes, she saw that Mosely was tidying her chamber. She licked her lips and essayed his name.

  It came out as a croak, but he heard her and came to the bedside. "Well, there, lass, I'm that glad to see ye awake. Jamie told me ye'd waked in the night. Gave 'im all kinds of trouble, 'e said." He winked. "'E gave ye some laudanum. 'Ow d'ye feel?"

  "Fine," Eve croaked. At his skeptical expression, she breathed a whispery laugh. "No, Mr. Mosely, I do not feel fine," she said, her voice growing stronger with every word. "I feel wretched. My arm and ankle hurt and my head seems lined with goose down or something equally fluffy and clinging. But I feel better than I did earlier, only I am so dreadfully weak and shaky."

  She tried to lever herself up onto her right elbow, then stopped as the quilt fell away exposing her bare shoulder. Heat flooded her face.

  Mosely pulled the quilt back, as casually as if he were flipping a table cover back in place. "Lay quiet, Eve. Ye twisted yer splint last night when ye fell and I don't want ye to put any strain on that arm until I can replace it."

  "But I must..." Eve stopped, appalled at what she had almost said to the man.

  "Ah." He chuckled. "I know what ye need. Can ye wait a few minutes?"