I lowered the button and looked over to meet Nora’s gaze. “A letter?” I held my breath, but my stomach still dropped. It could not be from Reggie. He could not have found me so easily.
I accepted it, my fingers shaking. Relief struck the moment I saw it properly. There was no familiar family crest upon the seal. A wave of curiosity quickly followed, and I broke open the diamond-shaped envelope. Tugging out the cream paper, I read through the contents.
“It’s an offer of employment!”
Nora sucked her breath through her teeth. “A miracle and no doubt about it.”
I read further, my own excitement climbing. “It’s a temporary position in Warwick. My duties would be to care for and tutor two young children while their current governess is away in America visiting a sick relative. Mr. and Mrs. Radley can offer me a few months, possibly more if the situation progresses. They request I start straightaway.”
“What do ye think, miss?” Nora asked.
What was there to think about? I couldn’t stay simply because I was growing attached to a stranger. “A temporary position ought to suit me well. It will give me time to secure something more permanent without the risk of starving.”
Nora snorted at my light-hearted tone. “That isn’t amusing, miss.”
“No, I don’t suppose it is.”
My eyes strayed to Mr. Long. Even though I knew I must, how could I leave him? Nora had tried to keep me away for propriety’s sake, but I hadn’t been able to stay away. I had held Mr. Long’s hand while he had fought the demons in his sleep, bathed his sweating forehead beneath his honey-blond hair, and begged the heavens for more time. Now it all must end.
Nora brushed her round nose with her hand, catching my attention. “I will ask around here to find a position for meself until I can make me way to Warwick. I won’t leave ye. Her ladyship would ne’er forgive me.”
“We are in this together,” I said. “I shall write straightaway to see if they have a place for you. You have not abandoned me, and I will not abandon you.”
Nora’s smile was the only thanks I needed. She had worn herself ragged caring for me and my impulsive decisions, and now she had taken on Mr. Long’s needs too. I swear there were a few new streaks of gray in the brown hair beneath her mobcap. I was eternally grateful to her.
A moan sounded from the bed, and I yanked my head to the side. Mr. Long’s chest still rose and fell in a steady rhythm, assuring me he was asleep. He hurt even in his dreams. The poor, wretched man.
“I had better write to the vicar, Mr. Thornbeck,” I told Nora with a finality I did not feel. “We have done all that we can for Mr. Long, and we cannot afford to stay here by his side.” At least his fever had diminished, if the swelling on his face had not. The coloring from thebruises had progressed from dark purple and blues to include a few greens and yellows. He would live, or so the doctor had reassured us, but who would comfort him during his recovery?
Only my singing would set him at ease. I had never considered my voice to hold any real talent, but Mr. Long did not seem to be particular. He needed my singing, and I needed his recovery. There was something about praying desperately over a body, and caring for it through sleepless nights, that bonded souls. I felt irrevocably connected to him.
Perhaps this was the way a mother felt for a child or a grown child felt for an aged parent. I didn’t quite know how to explain the odd attachment that refused to leave me alone.
“I’ll start packin’, miss.”
I absently nodded to Nora before her footsteps faded behind me. My eyes remained on Mr. Long’s wounded form barely hidden beneath his blanket, for what I knew would be the last time. The long hours beside his bed had left me ample opportunity to study his appearance alongside his health. I tried to picture him before his injuries. The shade of his eyes was lost to me with the linens binding them, as was the line of his swollen jaw beneath a layer of thick scruff.
I would not know him again if we met on the street.
And he would never know me.
“I wish I at least knew your real name, Mr. Long,” I whispered. I had tried to ask him for it more than once, but in his feverish state he had been unable to respond. And now, I dared not wake him from his restful sleep. All that mattered was the hope of his recovery.
I had risked everything, sitting in this chair beside him, and yet, I regretted nothing. Though my old plans once enticing no longer excited me. I had grown old these last few days. I was wiser from having seen truemisery. It made me weary about dashing into my new life. The world was quite harsh.
I fisted my hand over his gilded button. “You don’t mind, do you?” I knew I should not keep it, but I wanted to remember the miracle. The night my fragile courage and God’s hand had worked together to save a man.
Surely, this small token would bring me luck in my new employment. I would need it too. The younger me from a mere week ago had sorely underestimated the definition of adventure.
Now it was my turn to give a token. I had promised God to give Mr. Long all that I had if He let Mr. Long live, and I would keep my promise. I slipped the ring off my finger, a gold band with a ruby at its center. Father had given it to me for my fifteenth birthday. I had not been without it since.
My stomach clenched as I laid a kiss goodbye on the ruby and looked up at him. “Perhaps we shall find each other someday.”
Without another thought, I slid it on Mr. Long’s smallest finger. It wedged halfway down. I planned to leave my remaining money for his continued care, with the exception of our train fare. Mr. Long would need funds to start his life again. The ring would be of value should he need to sell it. I wished I had more to give, but I prayed this would fulfill my end of the bargain with God.
The words of the Irish lullaby that had soothed his fevered sleep so many times came to my mind once more.
“Hó bha fn, mo ghrá,” I softly sang. “Sleep my darling.”
