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‘Issie, wake up,’ Jane said, tears filling her eyes. ‘Please, Issie, please wake up.’
Isabel’s eyelids fluttered and then she opened her eyes wide. ‘Where am I?’
‘You came off your horse,’ Drew said.
She turned her head towards him. ‘Oh, it is you.’ Her eyelids fluttered and closed again with a soft sigh.
‘Wake up, Issie,’ Jane implored her. ‘Tell us if you are hurt. Are you in pain?’
‘My head aches.’
‘It is not to be wondered at,’ Drew said. ‘You hit your head and there is already the beginning of a lump, but I do not think there are any broken bones. We must get you home and send for a doctor to make sure. Mark has gone to fetch a carriage.’
She struggled to sit up, but he gently pulled her back. ‘Lie still or you will make your head worse.’
She subsided, leaving Jane to worry about the inelegant position in which her sister lay and the fact that Andrew Ashton was cradling her in his arms in a most loving way. Did Issie know what was happening? Did Mark?
A hired carriage drew up beside them and Mark jumped out. Drew picked Isabel up and carried her to it. He put her gently on the seat and Jane climbed in beside her.
‘We will bring the horses,’ Mark said, addressing Jane. ‘Do not attempt to leave the carriage until we arrive to help. We will be right behind you.’
‘We’ll soon be home, Issie,’ Jane said when the jolting of the carriage as it moved off made Isabel cry out. ‘Put your head in my lap, if it helps.
Isabel did that and Jane sat cradling it, noticing the bump on the side of Issie’s head growing and turning purple. If she had had doubts about the genuineness of Issie fainting at the Museum and at Ranelagh Gardens, she had none over this. She would not have fallen from her horse deliberately, even if taking off like that had been meant to cause a stir. Oh, foolish, foolish Issie, she thought as she prayed there would be no permanent damage to her lovely sister.
* * *
The two men were right behind them when they drew up outside the Mount Street house. Mark dismounted and ran to the carriage to help Isabel from it. She was too unsteady to walk, so he carried her up the steps into the house followed by Jane and Drew. The footman who admitted them ran off to fetch Lady Cartrose, who immediately took in the situation. ‘She must go to bed at once,’ she said, turning to dispatch a footman to fetch her physician.
Mark had put Isabel on a chair, but picked her up again to carry her to her bedchamber. Bessie was sent to help Jane undress her while Lady Cartrose and the two men waited in the drawing room. Neither felt like leaving until they knew the extent of the injury.
‘What happened?’ her ladyship asked, indicating that they should take seats. ‘How did Isabel come to fall from her horse? I understood you were only going out for a gentle hack in the Park.’
‘That was the intention,’ Mark said. ‘But Isabel’s horse bolted with her. Drew and I galloped after her to try to bring it to a halt, but before we could do so, she was hit by the overhanging branch of a tree which knocked her to the ground. It was so sudden no one had a chance to prevent it.’
‘She was knocked out of her senses,’ Drew put in.
‘What made the horse bolt?’
‘I really do not know,’ Mark said. ‘I wish we had been watching more carefully.’
‘I wish it, too,’ Drew said. ‘I sincerely hope there is no permanent damage. I should never forgive myself.’
The sound of voices in the hall told them the doctor had arrived. Her ladyship rose to conduct him to the patient’s room, leaving the two men facing each other in a silence which last several minutes. ‘Someone ought to see to the horses,’ Mark said in a flat voice. ‘We can’t leave hired horses on the street.’
‘I will do it.’ Drew jumped up and left the room, leaving Mark musing on his own. He was sorry Isabel had been hurt and would not for the world have wished it on her, but if she had not spurred her horse in that reckless fashion the accident would never have happened. Why had she done it? Why was he having to make excuses for her and pretend the horse was to blame? Would life with her always be like that? What did that augur for their future happiness together?
Lady Cartrose came back into the room. ‘She is comfortable and the doctor has prescribed something for the headache. He said she needed to rest for at least a week, but he did not think her life was in danger.’
‘Thank the lord for that,’ Mark said.
