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Radford did not for a minute believe his apology had won her heart. His apologies, Westcott had told him repeatedly, rarely came close to meeting the definition.
Furthermore, Radford had never bothered to learn the art of ingratiating himself.
No, his convenient quarters had nothing to do with his limited grasp of polite address. His father had to be the reason her ladyship hadn’t had a brace of footmen throw him out bodily.
But he couldn’t think about Father now. Mother was a good and loving nurse. Not to mention he’d seemed in slightly better spirits this last time. Or such was Radford’s impression. He’d rushed in and rushed away, giving only the briefest explanation of his errand to Kensington, and he might have only imagined his father brightening up.
Never mind. He’d think about his family later.
The present, critical task was keeping Lady Clara from sinking too far to be brought back.
“Kindly have someone bring me the medicine case,” he told the maid. “And sleep now, while you can. I’ll need you later.”
She did go out, though she paused for a moment at the sickbed, and stroked Lady Clara’s forehead.
Before the door closed behind Davis, he heard her murmur to somebody. Within minutes, the young footman William appeared with the medicine case.
“I’m a step away in the corridor, sir,” he said. “Anything you need for her ladyship, I’ll be pleased and grateful to help. I stay until daybreak. Then Tom comes. Miss Davis said somebody must always be within easy call.”
Thanking him, Radford took the medicine chest his father had taught him to carry whenever he traveled. He set up his traveling tea-making kit at the fire, and brewed a dose of willow bark tea. For once he used his pocket watch, to time it exactly.
When he returned to Clara’s bedside, her eyes were closed, but her breathing and her hands’ restless movements over the bedclothes told him she wasn’t asleep.
“I’ve a delicious treat for you,” he said.
Her eyelids came up halfway. “Nothing is delicious,” she said.
“I see,” he said. “You’ve arrived at the surly phase of the program.”
“I think you should go away,” she said.
“Normally, my ears tingle to hear your opinions,” he said. “They’re so amusing. But that one’s boring. I reject it as immaterial. I’ve made you willow bark tea with my own dainty hands, and you will drink it. There isn’t the remotest chance of my going away until you’re well. Since you’re not well, you haven’t the strength to make me go away.”
She turned her head away.
“Clara.”
She turned back to glare at him, a flash in the blue eyes of the combative girl he knew. “Lady Clara to you. Or my lady. Or your ladyship, Mr. Radford.”
He bit back laughter. He remembered the first day he’d seen her all grown up. The demented hat. The dress resembling a French chef’s delirious idea of a cake. The haughty air with which she ordered him to summon a constable.
He wanted that Clara back.
“If you want respect, you must take your medicine like a brave aristocrat,” he said. “Think of the French nobles who walked to the guillotine, double chins aloft.”
Her mouth quivered.
“Actually, I had my not-at-all-French cousin’s chins in mind,” he said. “Did you ever see that old Gillray caricature of the Prince of Wales? ‘A Voluptuary under the horrors of Digestion,’ it’s titled. It was done in your grandmother’s time. My father has a framed print on his study wall. The prince slumps back in his chair, picking his teeth with a fork. His belly is so big, his breeches can’t cover it, and half the buttons are unfastened. His waistcoat gapes, too, stretched so far, only one button is buttoned. Behind him we see an over-filled chamber pot. Behind that a table heaped with sweets. Empty bottles under his feet. That’s what my cousin put me in mind of, last time I saw him.”
“Cousin? Do you mean Beastly Bernard?” She looked more alert.
“I won’t tell you any of his ridiculous story unless you take your medicine,” Radford said.
Her chin went up, and though her head, covered in a wrinkled nightcap, lay on the pillow, the arrogant-aristocrat effect wasn’t altogether lost.
“Very well,” she said. “You’re boring me witless and you won’t go away. You might as well poison me. It’ll make for a change.”
He set the tea on the bed table. Then he hesitated.
He knew what to do and how to do it properly. He’d had to help his father move to a sitting position time and again, in order to feed him. He knew he could do it while causing as little pain as possible. But she wasn’t his father.
She was a vulnerable young woman dressed in nothing more than a nightgown. And he, of all people, was suddenly shy.
Suddenly insane was more like it.
She was ill. He’d chased away everybody except her maid and put himself in charge of her care. He’d made himself both nurse and doctor because he didn’t trust anybody else not to kill her with good intentions. Before the disease ran its course, he’d probably undertake many, more intimate actions.
It wasn’t as though he’d never seen a woman in a state of undress. It certainly wasn’t as though he’d never touched this woman before. He’d held her in his arms. On his lap . . .
He ought to have written to her, as she’d asked in the teasing, offhand manner that did such disruptive things to his brain.
Too late for epistles, loving or otherwise.
He slid his arm under her shoulders to raise her, and carefully tucked one of the pillows behind her. Though she didn’t cry out or so much as whimper, he saw her mouth tighten.
He wanted to take her in his arms and promise everything would be all right: He’d take care of her. He’d make her well again.
He said, “Can you bear to be propped up a bit more? Or shall I hold your head up? I’d rather you didn’t choke. A murder charge will gravely disrupt my plan to become Lord Chancellor.”
That won him a weak smile.
“One more pillow,” she said. She took a deep breath and let it out, her bosom rising and falling. “I feel . . . better . . . with my head up.”
He found another pillow and propped her up.
He waited for her to collect herself, then took up the teacup and spoon.
“Your cousin,” she said. “Tell me about your cousin.”
He commenced the Saga of Beastly Bernard.
Clara was terrified.
No one said exactly what was wrong with her. This in itself was troubling. She’d heard Radford and the doctor quarreling, but she’d been too foggy-brained and miserable to follow it. All she remembered was Dr. Marler’s angry voice, and Radford’s, so dispassionate, driving the doctor mad, beyond a doubt.
Still, she understood that she must be dangerously ill, if no one came to visit, if even Great-Aunt Dora had stopped coming to look in on her, and—most frightening of all—if it had brought Mr. Radford from Herefordshire to nurse her.
Not that Clara wanted others. She didn’t want to see Great-Aunt Dora’s worried expression. She certainly didn’t want to hear Mama carry on the way she did at everything that wasn’t exactly as she believed it ought to be. Mama had never nursed her, in any event. She wouldn’t have the slightest idea how to do it.
Until Davis came, nursemaids had looked after Clara.
But she hadn’t fallen ill in years and years.
Leave it to her to sicken in the most spectacular way, with a nasty plague of some kind. Not the cholera, else she’d be dead by now, wouldn’t she? How long had it been?
Did it matter?
He had come, and he was here, talking about Beastly Bernard, and making her laugh. Inside, that is. Laughing openly was too laborious. It left her weak and the weakness frightened her. For now she had work enough, dr
inking the brew he promised would ease the pain and fever.
Yet while he talked, fear receded. Hearing about his youth wasn’t the only reason. It was his low voice, with the trace of huskiness she found so compelling. The sound stirred feelings she didn’t know the names for. She knew, though, that his voice made her shiver inside, and not with cold.
While he talked, he spooned the tea into her. She wanted to feed herself but she couldn’t. She was as weak as a baby. She had all she could do to keep her head up. She hated being helpless, especially with him. And yet she was glad he was the one looking after her. Her Raven. Brusque and caustic. And funny. Unlike her, he said whatever he wanted to say. It didn’t matter where he was or with whom.
She, meanwhile, had to closely inspect in advance every gesture, act, and word for possible violations of ladyship rules. Except with him.
He was Raven, nothing at all like the other men she knew. No other man taxed her mind the way he did. Even Clevedon hadn’t demanded as much of her intellect and wit.
No other man, either, had made her feel what her Raven made her feel.
He didn’t even have to try. She had only to look at him. He had only to touch her hand. To talk.
