Chapter 11
M
eredith stared down at her breakfast with a marked lack of interest. The porridge and kippers, and even the artful scones with their flaky crust that she had taken from the sideboard, held no appeal. With little appetite since having returned from
The Brigand
two days earlier, she pushed the dishes aside and proceeded to do nothing more than brood in her room and the library for the rest of the day, listening to the unrelenting sleet on the windowpanes and the coal fire in the grate. The unseasonably cold London weather resulted in her drinking pots of tea and pacing about in her dressing gown.
Most of all, she thought of the girls, missing them with an ache that was physical, a part deep down inside always afraid for them. Throughout the town house, there were deliberate reminders of her wards, mementos she had brought with her from Montfort. Her eyes fell upon Julia's favorite daguerreotype of the three of them, taken in front of the south garden of Montfort when it was in full bloom. Rowena appeared lit from within, careless and carefree, no doubt having just returned from a ride. Then Julia, her beautiful eyes shadowed and all too aware for a young girl. And finally, Meredith, her arms around both of them, protective, watchful.
Meredith looked away and continued her pacing in the small salon at the front of the town house. Her eyes shifted to the elegant side table, where her hand strayed to Rowena's pen, a gift for her thirteenth birthday, nestled in its ebony box, sitting alongside a copy of Wordsworth's poems. Sentimental fool, she told herself, knowing that she also kept the girls' baby slippers somewhere in a trunk upstairs. The girls were women now, married, happy and safe. She wiped her eyes with her hand, pulling herself up straighter and gathering her cashmere scarf more closely over her shoulders.
This was no time to let down her guard, no time for vulnerability. She had been managing on her own for years and it was only recent events that caused her to call her decisions into question. The child's kaleidoscope rose in her mind's eye. She had taken it with her upon her departure from
The Brigand
, a painful reminder burning beneath her pelisse, but one she could not leave behind. Standing at the window overlooking Belgravia Square, she tried to cope with the implications of that time spent with Archer.
She blew out a breath and shut her eyes for a moment, drawing upon what sliver of good sense remained to her. It was entirely unhelpful remembering awakening in the bed they'd shared only to find him watching her, an inscrutable expression on his face. She knew that look. And distrusted it. What had she done? She had never envisioned being with a man again. It was not the specter of fire and brimstone or bromides concerning chastity that had ensured she did not seek out masculine company. Her fall from grace the first time had been enough to shut down the stirrings of her body and her heart. Until Archer.
Determinedly, she pulled the brocade curtain closed, obliterating the gray outlines of the street below wreathed in cold winter weather. What did she wish for most desperately in her life? A sense of normalcy, a return to a quiet, undisturbed existence where she could pursue her studies and revel in the satisfaction that Rowena and Julia were safe at last. The past was better left dead and buriedâif only she could. Damn Archer and the toy from the nursery at Claire de Lune, so innocent and yet so vile a reminder of that which was better left undisturbed. Lord Archer seemed to have that effect upon her, exacerbating her moments of vulnerability with catastrophic results. It was her fault entirely, her failing and her panicked need that had led them to cross a boundary from which she desperately hoped she could return. She wasn't going to open herself up to the possibility of love again. Not after Faron. The path from love to corrosive hatred was not a journey she would risk again.
She huddled into the richness of the cashmere around her shoulders, convinced that she could put both Archer and the temptation he represented behind her. She had fallen asleep in the chair on
The Brigand
, as promised, but had awakened in the bed, alone, with Archer nowhere in sight. A carriage waited for her and had taken her back to London with only the sharp cold and even sharper regrets for company. She had been dealing with the specter of danger for yearsâand she could do so again. Without Lord Richard Archer. It was time to resume living. It was better to be going off to Cambridge to spend a few days exploring the university town and the Fitzwilliam collection with Hamilton. That Archer had no use for the Cambridge don made the prospect all the more enticing.
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Shortly after dawn the following morning, Meredith shook off her melancholy. Energized by a goodly dose of guilt, she sent Broton personally to fetch Dr. Codger from Harley Street to Mr. Hamilton's lodgings. Having forwarded a note to the inn expressing her wish to visit later that morning, she berated herself for not having inquired as to his convalescence. Stingingly aware of what she owed the man, she pulled herself together and set out for Charing Cross.
The rain and sleet had left deep puddles on the cobblestone street; the sky overhead was the color of gravel. Waiting for Dr. Codger at the entranceway as he alit from his carriage in front of the modest inn, Meredith introduced herself, reminding the doctor of their meeting several years before when Julia had had a bout with scarlet fever during their stay in London.
The doctor cocked his head and squinted at Meredith, rummaging through his recollections. “Of course, of course, my dear lady, I recall very well. Such a sweet child.” After the brief exchange, they passed the taciturn innkeeper sitting behind a polished desk in the entranceway, who diffidently waved them upstairs.
The physician took his time climbing the narrow stairs to Mr. Hamilton's rooms, somewhat winded, but at last he arrived, clutching his worn leather satchel in one hand. He was close to seventy and stout, with disorderly white hair and a threadbare suit coat. Meredith stood tentatively behind him as he knocked on the door to Hamilton's rooms.
Not waiting for a reply, the doctor turned the knob with Meredith hovering on the threshold. “Mr. Hamilton,” she called out, averting her eyes. “It is Lady Woolcott and Dr. Codger. So pleased that you are able to entertain us upon such short notice.”
“Do please come in, Lady Woolcott. It lifted my spirits to read your earlier missive. What a welcome tonic!” Paler than his white nightshirt but clearly prepared for her visit in a green dressing gown, Hamilton was wreathed in smiles. He rose stiffly from a chair by the window of the small sitting room. A cache of books listed in the corner by a grate steadily giving off warmth. A pot of tea sat in readiness on a table covered by a worn lace cloth. Stiflingly warm with the aroma of camphor about it, the overall atmosphere was of a sickroom.
“Please do sit down,” Meredith entreated, taking a step inside. Hamilton eased himself gingerly onto the bed, still favoring his leg. “I brought Dr. Codger along to ensure all is well and, quite frankly, to assuage my guilty conscience,” she said lightly, aware that the physician also served as chaperone for those concerned about propriety.
Hamilton's eyes sparked behind his spectacles. “I do so wish you would do away with the apologies, my dear. Entirely unnecessary. Now come and sit here by me so I do not feel entirely unlike a gentleman.”
Meredith demurred. “Not until Dr. Codger has had some time with you, Mr. Hamilton.”
“May I take your coat, at the very least?”
“I can manage quite well.” Meredith slipped her pelisse from her shoulders, happy to remove it in the crushing heat.
Hamilton watched as the doctor set down his tattered satchel. “Doctor, I assure you this visit is entirely unnecessary. Your earlier ministrations have done me a world of good. Although the tincture is foul tasting indeed.”
“It has no potency unless it tastes foul, Mr. Hamilton.” The doctor cocked his head and looked back at Meredith. “We can't be too careful, so let's have another look. Would you not agree, Lady Woolcott? Mr. Hamilton here is still favoring his leg. Shouldn't wish sepsis to set in.” He threw back the buckles of his bag. “Now let me see to these dressings.”
Meredith shrugged helplessly, the closeness of the room enervating. Smiling encouragingly at Hamilton, she sensed he would give in.
“Is there still pain at the site of the wound?” Codger asked.
“At times,” Hamilton said, wincing when the doctor's hands hovered over his thigh. Muttering to himself, Codger turned back to his satchel to begin extracting a number of medical implements from within. Once or twice, the patient glanced at Meredith as if expecting her to excuse herself rather than hovering on the threshold. Instead, she shut the door quietly behind her, aware of Hamilton's gaze upon her.
“Not that it is any of my business,” the doctor muttered, looking into the recesses of his bag, “but are the two of you by any chance affianced?”
“I beg your pardon?” Meredith said.
“Whatever made you think that?” Hamilton echoed.
The doctor looked between them and shrugged. “It is unusual for a woman to visit a man in his sickroom unless they are relations or ...” He trailed off. “Never mind. Now kindly extend your leg for me,” he said to Hamilton, who was observing the doctor with a dubious eye, made clearly uncomfortable by the physician's blunt question. Nonetheless, he submitted to the doctor's ministrations. Dr. Codger spent the next quarter hour asking him all manner of questions while prodding and poking him from his neck to his chest to his abdomen and finally ending with his leg.
A gnarled hand bore Hamilton back down onto the bed as the interrogation continued. “Does it hurt when I do this? Have you experienced any fevers?”
“Truly, I am fine, Dr. Codger. Perhaps just a change of the dressing.”
With a small smile, Codger turned around and motioned to Meredith. “He's a stubborn one, but then all men are when it comes to illness.” He turned back to his patient and pressed his ear to Hamilton's chest. “The heart is strong,” he announced, listening. He straightened and finally opened his patient's dressing gown and began unwinding the bandages while Meredith spent her time studying the dusty tower of books teetering at the edge of the doorway.
“We are quite finished now, Lady Woolcott,” the physician announced some time later. When she turned around, he motioned her to a chair opposite Hamilton. He too sat down, rubbing his hands on his knees. “You will live, Mr. Hamilton,” he proclaimed with a sigh, beginning to throw an assortment of instruments back into his bag.
“No fever?” Meredith inquired.
“I feel almost entirely myself,” Hamilton interjected, “with only some stiffness remaining.” He managed a reassuring smile for Meredith before turning to the physician. “Well, I daresay we are finished here. I thank you for your time, doctor.” The physician remained silent in his chair, as though awaiting his tea.
Meredith's shoulders fell. “There is nothing else, I trust?”
The doctor scrubbed a hand around his unshaved jaw. “Well, Lady Woolcott, to answer your question, Mr. Hamilton is taking longer than expected to heal,” he said finally. “And I don't quite know why, given the slight nature of the wound.”
Hamilton considered it. “My constitution has never been particularly strong.”
The doctor set his hands over his knees and drummed his fingers for a moment. “Your predisposition may indeed play a role in your convalescence. Interesting, you are not putrid, feverish, or swollen about the lymph nodes.” Codger waggled his head from side to side, equivocally. “I should recommend then, no strenuous activities for the next while, despite the fact that your leg appears to be on the mend. You can put your full weight on the limb, I take it?”
Hamilton gave a terse nod. “Not entirely. But almost. So you see, it is just this weakness, or perhaps I might call it a malaise.”
Dr. Codger threw up his hands. “No worries. You will be entirely well as long as you do not overexert yourself, young man.”
Meredith exhaled audibly, sliding forward in her chair, her fingers braced on the arms. “I shall see to it personally, Dr. Codger. I feel somewhat responsible.” The doctor knew some of the story about the attack outside Burlington House.
The doctor added cheerfully, “Every man needs a nursemaid at some time in his life, certainly. Now not total bed rest, of course. Simply no vigorous activity of any kind and a bland dietâbeef broth, well-cooked vegetables and the like.”
“He will do as you say,” Meredith said, as Hamilton looked grimly over both their heads.
“I suppose it is for the best if I am to fully recover,” he added, much subdued.
“We're finished then.” Codger grasped his satchel.
Hamilton rose from the bed, suddenly eager. “If you could perhaps wait for Lady Woolcott in the vestibule, just for a moment, doctor. I have something I should like to discuss with her.” His concern to observe the proprieties was obvious.
Snapping his satchel closed, the doctor squinted at them both, murmuring something indistinct under his breath before shuffling his way to the door with a wave over his shoulder. “Take your time. Take your time. I shall wait for you outside, Lady Woolcott, and perhaps I can secure you a hansom when you and Mr. Hamilton have concluded your conversation.” His footsteps receded as he carefully made his way out of the room and down the hallway stairs.