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“What’s a French letter got to do with anything?” Melisande inquired, more mystified than ever. “If you’re expecting me to put a piece of paper in my…”
“Such an innocent!” Sukey said, shaking her head. “It’s a wonder we allow her out at night. A French letter, Lady Carstairs, is something the gentleman wears over his rod. He spills his seed inside it, not inside you. ”
Rod, she thought, momentarily distracted. It seemed like rather a nice word. Evocative. “I think Rohan will be prepared,” Emma said. She looked at Melisande for a long, thoughtful moment. “Is there any way I can make you change your mind?”
Author: Anne Stuart
Melisande shook her head, half determined, half terrified.
“Then ladies, we need to make her irresistible,” Emma announced. “Hetty, where are your emeralds?”
21
Emma sat alone in the library after Melisande and the strongly disapproving but very proper Miss Mackenzie had left. There’d been no talking Melisande out of her sudden decision, and in truth Emma hadn’t been that surprised. She’d seen the signs for days. She knew when the heat rose in the blood; she’d seen it often enough. It should have been no surprise that even Melisande would succumb when faced with the delectable temptation that was Rohan. Even she had been tempted, for the first time in her life, just a few short months ago.
Her work at the hospital, her effort at penitence, had been grueling, not for the faint of heart. She held the patients’ hands when they died, but she seldom looked into their faces. Until that night.
The boy—for he looked like a boy, his hair tumbled over his pale, sweating face—he should never have been there in the hospital. People of his class were taken care of at home, the doctors being summoned, the care provided by upper-class maids and butlers. But when Lord Brandon Rohan arrived back on the ship he’d been delirious with fever and somehow his papers had gotten lost. No one knew who he was, or even that he was an officer. He’d been shunted off like so many of the wounded men, to the stink of a hospital, there to live or die as may be.
He still had all his limbs, though one leg was cruelly wounded, and he would never walk without a limp. That was, assuming he even lived long enough to go home. The scars that covered so much of what must have once been a strong young body bore testament to the horror he had been through, and his pretty face was a travesty. He had been brought in at the end of a long day, and Emma had taken one look at him and known he would die. Not from any mortal wound—each of his terrible injuries had been tended to, and given a strong constitution he would normally recover. But he had opened his bright, fever-glazed eyes, and she’d known he’d given up.
It was a Catholic hospital, run by stern nuns, and Emma had chosen it, knowing the very thought would have offended her antipapist family, had they known. Mother Mary Clement had assigned her the young man, and Emma had known better than to protest. She pulled the curtains around his little cubicle and prepared to make him comfortable enough to die in peace.
She had changed his dressings, not flinching from the mangled flesh. There was no smell of putrefaction, and whatever fever he had contracted hadn’t come from any of his wounds, which were all a healthy pink. He lay perfectly still on the bed as she bathed him in cool water, trying to bring his fever down, knowing it was a wasted effort.
She talked to him as she worked, her low voice keeping up a steady stream of inconsequential pleasantries. The dying often retreated so far that they never heard a human voice or felt the touch of their caretakers, but on rare occasions that voice or touch could call someone back. She covered him again, then sat back in the spindly chair beside his bed, rubbing the small of her back absently. “Are you going to die, young man?” she said softly, thinking that he was older than she was, feeling like his grandmother. “There’s no need. You can fight this—you’re young and strong. You’re far better off than half the men in this hospital—you have all your limbs, and even if half of your pretty face is ruined you still have the other half to charm the girls with. If you can cultivate the right brooding, Gothic air, the young women will find you vastly heroic and romantic, and you’ll have to beat them off with a stick. ”
He didn’t move, and she could almost feel the life force draining from his body. “You don’t have to die,” she said again with some asperity. “But if you’re determined to then I’m damned if I’ll waste my time with you when there are other men who are fighting to stay alive. ”
Not even a twitch suggested there was anyone left inside the spare frame of the young soldier, and she decided to try one last time. “Have you got a sweet-heart, perhaps a wife somewhere? A mother who’s worried about you? You can’t just give up, child. Fight, damn you!”
Nothing. She rose slowly, her shoulders bowed in weariness and defeat, and she was turning to go when a small movement caught her attention. She turned back to see that his eyes were open, bright blue staring up at her. “Is that supposed to convince me to live?” he asked, his voice a weak croak. “Aren’t you supposed to hold my hand?”
“I already tried that,” she said matter-of-factly, hiding her burgeoning hope. “It didn’t seem to work. ”
He might almost have smiled. It was difficult to tell with the scarring, but suddenly she released her pent-up breath. It was as if there’d been a third entity in the cubicle with them. Death had been there, waiting.
And now it was gone.
She sat back down, taking his thin, clawlike hand in hers. “What is your name? You were brought in without papers, and if you’d been selfish enough to die we would have had to bury you in an unmarked grave. ”
He looked at her steadily. “I don’t remember,” he said finally, and she knew it for a lie. Even with the weak, thready quality of his voice she could tell he was a far cry for an ordinary soldier.
“You’re being difficult,” she said lightly. “But I’ll have the truth from you sooner or later. Mother Mary Clement gives me the difficult cases. Of which you are one. But at least you’ve decided to live. ”
“Why do you say that?” he whispered, looking at her.
She smiled, squeezing his thin hand lightly. “I just know. ” She rose, releasing him. “I’ll be back tomorrow. Don’t give the night sister too hard a time, all right? And don’t die while I’m gone—I’ll be very cross with you. ”
It was definitely a smile. “I’ll endeavor not to. What’s your name?”
She shook her head. “I’ll tell you when you’re ready to give me a present of yours. At least tell me your rank, so I can address you as lieutenant or something. ”
“Call me Janus,” he said.
She didn’t miss the allusion; Janus was the god of two faces in Roman mythology. “Don’t be tiresome, child,” she said in her best governess-y tones. “You’re way too pretty as it is—too much loveliness for one face. You needed to do something to tone down that handsome profile. ”
He laughed then, a choking sound that nevertheless made her feel warm inside. “And I think I’ll call you Harpy, if we’re going with classical allusions. I’ll endeavor to survive until tomorrow, if only to spite you. ”
