The Heart's Companion (17 page)

"Fifty pounds," Georgie growled.

The scraggly man putted about, muttering to himself; then he straightened staring Georgie in the eye. "Not enough," he said.

Georgie’s mouth worked with rage. Nothing this day was working out right. They should have been far away by now, on the road to London. He seemed ready to slug the man, until Sophie laid a staying hand on his arm.

"One ’undred pounds, you old robber, and not a penny mor’r you’ll find word of your not-so-Godlike activities lodged with Bow Street," she threatened.

Crawley scratched his whiskers. "You have a right persuasive way about you. All right, one hundred it is. But I still can’t do it if you don’t have a license."

Sophie reached into her reticule and pulled out a crumbled piece of paper. She unfolded it and smoothed it out, then handed it to him. "’Ere, this’ll make it legal, like. "

He took it from her and shuffled over to the lamp, leaning down to read by its weak light.

A horrible coldness began to grip Jane. It spread throughout her body, working its way toward her heart. The oppressive dread made her limbs lead weights. Her mind struggled against the invading cold. Her eyes were drawn repeatedly to the single lamp and the warmth of its flame. She began to feel she needed that flame, that she needed its warmth to melt the icy miasma of gloom. She scarcely heard what the others said around her. She walked forward like a puppet to stand by the table, facing the hearth, as Crawley read the marriage vows. His voice was like a bee buzzing in her brain. She hung her head down, concentrating on that pure flame burning in the glass globe. Next to her Sir Helmsdon was tense, but she couldn’t tell him what she intended, couldn’t warn him. Suddenly Crawley was at the part where they must answer, he was muttering words of honor and obedience.

"NO!" Jane shrieked as she threw herself against the round oak table, pulling Sir Helmsdon with her, knocking him off-balance. He fell to his knees. The table was heavier than it looked. Watching it tilt and topple, Jane felt like she was watching something in a dream. It seemed so slow. The lantern finally crashed to the floor, shattering. With a whoosh, a bright yellow and orange flame shot up. It caught the fabric of the greasy, stained tablecloth.

Behind her Sophie screamed. Sir Helmsdon struggled to stand up. He pulled at Jane to get her away from the flames. Swearing, Georgie picked up a pillow and began beating at the fire, shouting at Crawley to help him, but Crawley had other interests. He ran to a cupboard and pawed frantically through the contents, throwing things every which way.

Thick smoke stung Jane’s eyes and burned her throat when she breathed. She coughed, stumbling after Helmsdon toward the door. Georgie saw them escaping, and his rage blossomed. "Witch!" he yelled, dropping the pillow and abandoning his fruitless efforts to stop the spread of the blaze.

He grabbed for Jane, using his bulky weight as an anchor. Suddenly caught between Helmsdon and Georgie, Jane felt her arms would tear from their sockets. She fought, twisting and turning. Helmsdon charged Georgie like a bull, butting him in the stomach. Georgie fell back, letting go his grasp. The edge of his coat caught fire. He screamed, beating at his clothing like a madman.

Crawley retrieved a heavy sack from the cupboard. Clutching it closely to his chest, he scuttled toward the door. Sophie was in front of him. He would have pushed her out of his way, but she fought like a wild thing. Finally together they pulled the door open to be confronted by two large black shapes with pistols pointed straight at them.

But they all gave way before the screams and the terrifying image of a burning man, a denizen of hell, charging toward them.

With even his hair on fire now, Georgie ran screaming past them to fling himself into the long grass outside the cottage. He rolled frantically to smother the fire. Jane, with Helmsdon in tow, ran after him. With her bound hands she beat at the remaining flames on Georgie. She scarcely noticed when the rope binding her to Helmsdon parted until the last of the fires on Georgie were out.

The smell of burned flesh rivaled that of burning wood, causing the others to gag. A blackened, distorted mass of flesh and bone lay on the ground, barely conscious. Tears welled in Jane’s eyes. "Oh, Georgie," she murmured.

His cracked lips parted, blood-red against black. "I just wanted to show my Mama . . ." he rasped, straining to get the words opt. A gurgling sounded in his throat, then silence.

Gentle hands pulled Jane up and away. Sobbing, she found her face pressed against a broad chest with a familiar masculine scent. Her head was stroked as soothing words were murmured in her ear. Behind her, the fire burned hotter. A loud boom and crash warned everyone that the cottage was doomed. Barely conscious, Jane found herself lifted off her feet and carried away from the heat and smell of the blaze.

She curled against the solid warmth that held her, her confused mind fractured into a thousand pieces. She whimpered as she was carried to a nearby horse. Like a mechanical puppet, she waited docilely by the animal while her benefactor mounted and lifted her into the saddle before him.

A wail pierced the quiet of the crackling flames. With dim surprise Jane realized the sound came from her. A choked sob caught in her throat as a wave of dizziness overwhelmed her. She pressed her face against the solid masculine warmth, clinging while he kept up a litany of soothing words. Slowly Jane relaxed her muscles. Tears streamed down her cheeks.

Then everything went black.

The night became a crazy kaleidoscope of sensations and scenes. For awhile Jane was conscious only of the gentle, rhythmic plodding of the horse accompanied by murmured words of endearment. Later, she was transferred carefully to a carriage. A warm lap robe was wrapped about her and a distasteful liquid forced between her lips.

She fell into a light, uneasy slumber from which she often jolted awake as much from the poor carriage springs as from the fiery pictures that haunted her mind. Finally, after what seemed a lifetime, the carriage rolled to a stop. A swath of light pierced the night. Again she felt herself being lifted, this time carried up steps into that light. Around her a murmur of voices rose and fell; but she paid them no more heed than she did to the sound of crickets in the night. She was laid down, the warm arms that held her sliding away. She murmured a protest. Gentle hands raised her head and coaxed more of the foul liquid past her lips.

Snatches of low-voiced conversations reverberated in her aching head, pounding viciously against the edges of her consciousness.

"It was a mercy ..."

"... prey upon her mind. "

". . . laudanum. Let her sleep. It's the best . . ."

Jane tried to capture each wisp of murmured voice, but the words scampered nimbly away, teasingly beyond comprehension. The effort to hear and understand exhausted her. Finally, she fell into a deep, dreamless slumber.

When next she woke there was brightness against her closed eyelids. Sunlight? She moaned and stirred restlessly. She was vaguely surprised to discover she lay on a soft mattress and was covered with cool, fresh, lavender-scented sheets. Such comfort seemed wrong, out of place; though she couldn’t think why. Jane tried to open her eyes, but they felt heavy. It was like lifting great weights.

Slowly her eyelids fluttered open. Everything was blurred and dizzyingly swirling. She closed her eyes, then tried opening them again. She blinked, and the world focused. She turned her head, gazing about. Dispassionately she realized that she recognized the bed hangings. They were from her room at Penwick. How did she get here? Last night she’d been near Royal Tunbridge Wells, hadn’t she? Last night...

The vision of a blackened and blood-blistered body swam up to her consciousness.

"Aa-hh!" she softly wailed, the sound catching achingly in her throat. She bit her knuckle as sobs wracked her slender body. "I killed him," she whimpered. "I killed him!"

"Hush, hush, Jane!" came an urgent, soothing voice from the side of her bed, the face indistinct yet comforting. A cool hand was laid against her brow. "It could not be helped. No one faults you. "

The blurred image with its gentle voice coalesced into Lady Elsbeth.

"I warned her. She dinna heed me warnins," mourned an Irish voice from somewhere near the end of the bed.

"That’s enough, Mrs. O'Rourke," snapped Lady Elsbeth over her shoulder. Then she turned back to Jane, gently pushing fine strands of black hair away from her face. "That woman—Sophie? She’s convinced it was a form of release for him. She says Georgie couldn’t reconcile his rough and crude existence with the knowledge of his better blood. He felt he should have naturally been refined and well-spoken. It tore at him that he could not rise above the circumstances of his upbringing; that his mother, having all the advantages in the world, could give him away as easily as one would a cast-off dress or jacket. I know he planned to present himself to his mother dressed and accoutered as befitted her station. He believed dress made the man. In the end, he would have been bitterly disappointed. I shudder to think what he might have done when that happened."

Jane nodded, then swallowed around the lump in her throat. "It is hard to believe he had all that in him, when one considers the bluff, hearty gentleman he played."

"I believe throughout history it has always been the same. Those who would act the buffoon for other’s enjoyment are generally people lacking joy in their own lives. Perhaps that’s what always gives the piquant flavor of truth to their antics, a sort of larger-than-life hopelessness that lessens our own."

Jane nodded listlessly. "But that still doesn’t excuse his death.
Any man’s death diminishes me.
He did not deserve to die."

Lady Elsbeth leaned back, her hands folded in her lap. "Now that will be enough maudlin missishness. I beg you to remember he was not beyond doing violence to you to achieve his ends," she said sternly.

"I suppose," Jane conceded, absently plucking at the sheet. Her lips twisted as she thought over the events of yesterday. "What time is it?" she asked suddenly, her expression serious.

Lady Elsbeth looked down at the pendant watch pinned to her bodice. "Almost one-thirty. Why?"

"One-thirty? In the afternoon?" Jane threw off the bed covers. "You must have been heavy-handed with the laudanum! Why did you give it to me? You know how I hate the stuff. And don’t try to deny that you did, for I won’t believe you! I heard you last night. At least, I think I did," she amended as she levered herself up to a sitting position.

Lady Elsbeth thought it wise to ignore Jane’s questions. "What are you doing?" she demanded.

"Getting up." She swung her legs to the floor.

"Jane! I’m not convinced that is wise. You have been through a terrible ordeal!"

"Elsbeth, I cannot put off maudlin missishness, as you call it, if I am relegated to this bed. Besides, I have business with the true author of this little fiasco. "

Lady Elsbeth sighed and stood away from the bed to let Mrs. O'Rourke help Jane into her wrapper. "I’m afraid you’ll not get satisfaction there. I don’t know how, but she feels entirely justified in her actions. How can one chastise another if that other sees no wrong? Believe me, I have tried. All I get from her is how she wished to free me."

"Free you? I don’t understand."

"Neither do I," Lady Elsbeth said grimly. "But, if you insist on getting up, I’ll order you something to eat."

"Fine, only I want coffee, not tea."

"Now Jane, an herbal tea—"

"No," Jane said, laughing. "I know you swear by your herbals, but please, I’d prefer coffee."

"All right, coffee," her aunt grumbled, pursing her lips in displeasure. But she couldn’t keep the expression long. Her lips began to twitch and soon she was laughing with her niece. "I cry craven! Mrs. O'Rourke, please order Jane something to eat,with coffee!"

"Laugh if ye will, but know it is the devil’s oon work afoot. And that trickiest of tricksters, he’s not done yet, mark me words. "

They watched the Irish woman shuffle toward the door muttering words and curses.

"Seriously, what are we to do about Serena?" Elsbeth asked once Mrs. O'Rourke was safely out of the room.

"I don’t know, though I would very much like to know what is behind her little machinations."

"I wouldn’t call kidnapping you and nearly forcing you into a distasteful marriage little! But neither can I keep her locked in a storeroom indefinitely."

Jane laughed. "Elsbeth! Is that where she is?"

"Yes. I locked her in yesterday. And it really isn’t a storeroom. I locked her upstairs in that disused antechamber at the end of the hall. I understand from the servants who have taken her food that she has stripped the furniture of Holland covers and made herself comfortable, though she is calling down all manner of curses upon your head."

"My head?"

"As you would call her the author of this fiasco, so she would call you," Elsbeth said dryly.

Jane sighed. "I suppose you’re correct." She went to the wardrobe and pulled out a green spring muslin dress ornamented with pale pumpkin braid and yellow embroidery. She held it out in front of her, turning from side to side as she judged its effect in the tall mirror. "I feel as if I should wear black. However, under the circumstances, I don’t wish to dress the Ice Witch part. Spring is much more in keeping. What of Conisbrough and Royce?"

"What of them?"

"Are they still here?"

"Gracious, yes. At a minimum it would take an order from the regent to dislodge them! Between them they have decided to be our protectorates, and no amount of argument will nay say them. Not even Lord Royce’s ankle will come in the way of what they see as their duty," Lady Elsbeth said, laughing lightly.

"Lord Royce is situated, or I should say holding court, upon a settee in the parlor. I argued for his room and bed. He answered that would be unseemly for private discourse with yourself. Something he is anxious to pursue?" she suggested archly, an amused laugh hovering on her lips.

"I really don’t know," Jane said, startled at how that admission hurt, like an ill-timed blow to the stomach. Was she merely some duty he’d assumed—or something to relieve the tedium of the country? Either answer lowered her spirits further, though she was careful not to reveal that to Lady Elsbeth.

"His ankle is the worse for wear," her aunt was saying, "but has not, thankfully, suffered lasting injury. I have rebandaged it and instructed him not to pick up objects larger than his boot!"

Jane blushed, for she knew it was his arms that had caught her as she’d swooned. And it was toward his body that she had contentedly curled.

"Mr. Nagel has kindly offered the earl the use of his crutches for the day; his activities, being limited to his small apartment, do not demand extensive walking. His only request was that the boys come to visit him to regale him with the events of the past few days."

"The old softie," Jane murmured. "He just will not admit how much those boys mean to him."

"And he was not happy to hear that the boys were not available today. "

"Oh?" Jane asked, pausing as she pulled up her stockings. "You know how gossip flies. I swear, half the neighborhood has visited this morning to ask how you are and try to ferret out of us all the details. Anyway, the Culpeppers were among those that called. They offered to take the boys for the day. I know they did so with the hope of learning more. I’m afraid I accepted their offer without providing a morsel of information in return. Quite shameless, wasn’t I?"

Jane laughed as she dropped the dress over her head and twitched it into place. "Shameless perhaps, but deserving. I only hope Bertram does not return with another black eye, especially as Lord Royce will not be on hand to intercede for him! Lace up the back, would you please? Elsbeth, speaking of Lord Royce, what is your opinion of him?"

"I like him, why do you ask? And stop fidgeting if you want me to do this."

"I don’t know. It just all seems so confusing. I don’t know what to think or believe anymore. I was determined not to listen to gossip or speculation concerning the Willoughbys. But look where that got me. I have been equally determined to reevaluate Royce, to keep an open mind where he is concerned. But will I again be fooled and led astray as I was with the Willoughbys?"

Lady Elsbeth sighed, then bit her lower lip as she pulled the laces tighter. "I think we have to learn to listen with an open mind and heart—not only to what others tell us, but also to that little voice inside us. I think it must be our soul, for it is neither of the heart nor of the mind, but rather a meld of the two."

Jane looked over her shoulder. "And what does that little voice tell you of Conisbrough?" she asked softly.

Lady Elsbeth blushed. "I—"

"Here now, what be ye doing?" asked Mrs. O'Rourke, bustling into the room bearing a large tray. She set it down on a side table near the hearth. "I’ll tend to that, Lady Elsbeth."

Jane frowned and pursed her lips.

Lady Elsbeth laughed, handing the laces to Mrs. O'Rourke who tied them with brisk efficiency while Elsbeth uncovered the tray and poured out her niece’s coffee from the silver ewer.

Jane sat down at the dressing table so that Mrs. O'Rourke could tend her hair, and Elsbeth carried over her coffee.

Jane nodded her thanks, then instructed Mrs. O'Rourke not to get overly elaborate. A simple coronet would suffice.

"Nay, lass, that’ll not serve the likes of him!"

"I beg your pardon?" Jane demanded frostily, but she blushed anyway.

"Salvation lies with a tall dark gentleman," the woman intoned.

Behind her, Lady Elsbeth laughed.

Mrs. O'Rourke turned toward her. "Tis not a matter to take lightly. Miss Jane’s trials are yet before her. I know you donna believe in the sight. Tis a gift and a curse, it is. If Mr. Nagel had heeded me warnings about danger in his position, he’d not be sufferin’ a splinted leg. "

"Oh, really," Jane said, put out. "But if I recall properly, you counseled him against danger in the kitchen."

She nodded solemnly. "My sights are often teasing, ready to lead me and all astray, just like the little people are wont to do. That is why tis a gift and a curse. "

In the mirror, Jane caught her aunt’s amusement. A rueful smile slowly curved her own lips. She would not hurt this intense woman by laughing at her beliefs. She reached up a hand to lightly touch one of Mrs. O'Rourke's hands as she pinned a curl in place.

"I shall heed your words and have a care, I promise."

The older woman dropped her hands down in front of her, clasping them together. She nodded, then reached up to the back of her own neck to remove a silver chain ending in a large medallion bearing what looked to be a Celtic cross design. "I should feel that much more relieved should ye wear this for me," Mrs. O'Rourke said, slipping it around Jane’s neck and fastening it in back.

"Oh, but Mrs. O'Rourke, I couldn’t—"

She stilled Jane’s hands as they would remove the necklace. "Please, miss. It is such a small thing I beg of ye. See, we can tuck it behind yur fichu if ye like and no one to the wiser." Knowing herself to be lovingly defeated, Jane acquiesced.