This Side of Heaven (15 page)

“Yes, of course,” she said woodenly, acting on her newly strengthened resolve by easing her fingers from his as carefully as she could. Matt glanced up at her then, his eyes cloudy with pain and, she thought, fear. Her instincts told her that he wished her to stay. Tightening her lips, she tried to ignore the small pang that smote her heart.

Still he looked at her, not seeming to understand that she was deserting him. Her eyes met his; it took an effort of will to pull them away. He had been kind to her, in his fashion; ’twould after all be no more than a fitting recompense were she to do what she could to lessen his pain, and no admission of caring need enter into it at all.

She raised her eyes to the apothecary. “I’ve something that might make the setting of his leg easier for him to bear. Some medicine to ease him through the worst of it.”

Turning to the small store of medicines she had set
out on the bedside table, she reached for a brown glass vial.

“What have you there?” Mr. Williams sounded unnaturally shrill. Caroline wondered precisely what it was that he feared. Did he imagine she meant to poison Matt? she wondered. Had gossip labeled her a would-be murderess as well as a thief?

“I told you. Medicine. Twill make him sleep.” She poured out a dose as she spoke. Daniel, Robert, and Thomas watched her as warily as Mr. Williams.

“Hold a minute, there!” This was Robert. He looked alarmed as Caroline turned toward Matt, glass in hand. “We’ll not permit …”

“If ’twill make the pain easier, give it to me,” Matt interrupted, reaching out for the glass. Caroline put it into his hand, and when he was unable to hold it, she helped him guide the glass to his mouth. He swallowed its contents quickly, then lay back on the pillows with his eyes closed.

For a moment no one said anything while all eyes fastened on Matt.

“If he takes ill of this, the blame will rest on you,” Mr. Williams said. Caroline was not surprised to hear near hatred in his voice. She had given up expecting anything approaching reason from men.

“ ’Tis something to make him sleep, no more.” Caroline’s words were even as she set the glass back on the bedside table and turned to leave the room. As she exited with regal dignity, she felt four pairs of male eyes boring into her back.

The sensation made her skin prickle with unease.

15

M
att’s scream of pain when the bone was set into place made Caroline grit her teeth. Even the haze induced by her medicine could not shield him entirely from what must be done, though she prayed he would drop back into sleep as soon as the moments of acutest agony were over. She continued with what she was doing, refusing to give into the impulse to go back up the stairs to Matt’s side. He had the apothecary with him, and his brothers. He could have no need of her.

Still, despite her resolution, her ears were attuned to the departure of Mr. Williams as she kneaded the bread dough, covered it with a cloth, and set it aside to rise. ’Twas strange how quickly she had fallen into the routine of caring for this rowdy crew. Already she could do what required doing without the need for even thinking about it. The afternoon was well advanced by now, and she should be planning supper. For Matt, if he could eat at all, a thin broth would be best. But the rest of them would want a full meal. Their luncheon, unless consumed by Raleigh or some other animal, lay forgotten in the field.

Peeling a veritable mountain of potatoes, she set them to boil with a few handfuls of greens, then retrieved a joint of venison from the smokehouse and
put it on the spit over the fire. A small chunk of the venison she dropped into a separate pot, where it would boil until it was so soft it fell apart. Strained, the liquid would be Matt’s supper.

It was taking Mr. Williams an unconscionable time to leave, she decided finally. He had already been abovestairs near an hour. Curiosity at last got the better of Caroline, and she left the meal to cook while she ascended the stairs. Pausing on the threshold of Matt’s chamber, she drew in a shocked breath at the sight that met her eyes.

Mr. Williams clutched Matt’s arm, holding his wrist over a cup held by Thomas, who was kneeling at bedside. Thomas’s eyes were averted from the bright scarlet blood that ran from Matt’s vein into the receiving vessel. Daniel and Robert leaned against the wall on either side of the bed, watching intently. All three brothers were nearly as pale as Matt, who was as white as a corpse and still insensible, either from pain or the drug she had given him, or some combination of the two.

“Stop!” she cried with more urgency than tact. “He doesn’t need to be bled! He’s lost a bucketful of blood already!”

Thomas, Robert, and Daniel looked at her with identical expressions of surprise. Mr. Williams straightened, regarding her with lofty disdain.

“Bleeding is necessary to remove the poisons from the system,” Mr. Williams said as he continued with what he was about. To Caroline’s horror, she spied a basin that had been set on the floor beside Thomas. It held blood perhaps a quarter of an inch deep. Apparently
Mr. Williams had seen fit to bleed Matt more than once.

“If you keep that up, you’ll kill him!” Her voice was fierce as she hurried to the foot of Matt’s bed.

“If he dies, ‘twill be from the potion you administered to him, and not from anything I have done!” Mr. Williams’s lip curled angrily at her, and he turned his back in deliberate insult. Matt’s blood still gushed into the cup.

“Daniel …!” Caroline’s gaze shifted in desperate appeal to the brother she knew best. “Two ounces of blood is the prescribed amount in cases like this, and he has lost far more than that at Mr. Williams’s hands alone. To lose too much invariably proves fatal!”

“And how would a chit like that know anything about it?” Mr. Williams demanded of Daniel in wrathful rebuttal.

Daniel’s brow knit with worry. For a moment he looked undecided. Then, with a glance at Robert, who was scowling fiercely at Caroline, and at Matt’s limp form, he stepped forward to place a forestalling hand on the apothecary’s arm.

“There’s no need to take more, is there? If there was poison in his system, surely ’tis let now.”

“So you would take the advice of this—this female, over mine? It shall be as you wish, then, and the consequences shall be yours! Do not think to summon me back when he worsens!” Mr. Williams straightened, glaring at Daniel, whose hand dropped from the other’s arm. But at least Mr. Williams was binding the wound he had opened in Matt’s wrist, and the bleeding was at an end. Caroline did not even mind the venomous
look the apothecary gave her as he jerkily restored the implements of his trade to his bag.

“ ’Tis not that we take her word over yours, but merely that enough is enough. Bleeding him was surely beneficial, but he needs have some left to recover on.” Daniel’s attempt at soothing the irate apothecary with gentle humor fell flat. Mr. Williams, bag closed and in hand, responded to this with a glowering look.

“I’ll have my fee, if you please,” he said stiffly.

“Aye, of course.” With a defeated nod Daniel ushered Mr. Williams from the room.

Caroline moved around the bed, her fingers seeking and finding the pulse in Matt’s untapped wrist. Robert came to stand beside her, as if to put himself between his injured brother and harm.

“Williams may be nine parts a fool, but he made a good point: what can you possibly know of doctoring?” Robert’s question was hostile. His eyes as she glanced up to meet them were cold.

“My mother was skilled in the healing arts. I learned what I know from her.” Caroline silently counted the beats. Matt’s pulse was weak and slow, and she feared that the blood loss had weakened him severely.

“ ’Tis passing strange that your sister had no such skills.” It was almost a sneer.

Putting Matt’s wrist down, Caroline straightened to regard Robert steadily. Although he was some inches shorter than Matt, he still topped her by half a head.
trust. Caroline felt her temper begin to heat, and deliberately reined it in.

“Elizabeth and I were half sisters only. Our father was the same, but while her mother was of noble lineage, mine was a gypsy whom my father met in his travels. She knew much of herbs and medicines and healing and taught what she knew to me. Now, will you permit me to use that knowledge on your brother, or will you stand here and watch him die?”

Despite her efforts to remain cool in the face of Robert’s attack, fierceness crept into her words. Her gaze did not flinch as Robert glowered at her. Behind her, she was aware of Thomas approaching. He went to Robert and put his hand on his brother’s shoulder. They exchanged glances, then both of them looked at her. Thomas was perhaps an inch the shorter, and his sandy hair and fair skin made him seem like little more than a boy. Still, by the determined jut of his chin, Caroline knew that he was as opposed to her interference as his brother.

“We have little choice but to allow you to do what you can for him, as Daniel permitted you to run off the apothecary.” Thomas’s voice grated. “But be warned: we’ll be watching you, and if anything amiss occurs, we’ll know it.”

Daniel reentered the room then and took in his brothers’ posture with a glance.

“Take shame to yourselves, the both of you,” he said sharply. “She has given you no reason to think ill of her.”

“The sins of the fathers are visited upon the sons,” Robert retorted.

“It says nothing of sisters, and in any case Caroline is not Elizabeth.” Daniel’s words were nearly as mystifying as Robert’s. What was becoming abundantly clear was that for some unknown reason Matt’s brothers had distrusted and disliked Elizabeth, and their feelings were being carried over to her. Caroline would have liked to ask questions, to discover what had occurred to earn her sister so much enmity, but that would have to wait for another time.

Matt stirred, and all eyes shifted expectantly to him. But he did not rouse, and after a moment it became clear that he would not.

“If one of you will sit with him, and summon me should he awaken or seem to grow worse, I will finish preparing the meal.”

The three of them looked at each other.

“I’ll stay,” Daniel said at once. “Rob, you and Thomas had best go back to work. With Matt bedridden, we’ve no time to waste if we mean to get the planting done.”

Still the two of them hesitated, and from the glances they cast at her Caroline had no difficulty laying their hesitation at her door.

“Oh, for goodness’ sake,” she snapped, exasperated. “If you’re that suspicious of me, then I doubt you’ll care to eat the supper I’m cooking. For all you know, I might have poisoned it, or put a spell on it to turn you all into jackasses. Though,” she added with a mocking smile, “that’s hardly necessary, is it?”

And with that masterly shot she left the room. Moments later, the clatter of feet on the stairs told her that Thomas and Robert had done the same.

16

“W
ill Pa die?”

Caroline, in the act of sponging Matt’s burning forehead with cool water, looked up to find John standing in the doorway watching her. It was midnight or thereabouts of the day following the accident, and the boys had, at their uncles’ insistence, retired long since. John wore his nightshirt, and his feet were bare. By the light of the single candle that sputtered on the bedside table, he looked very young and defenseless as he stared with fear in his eyes at his father lying unconscious in the big bed. Caroline’s heart ached for him: she knew what it was to despair for the life of a beloved parent.

“No, he won’t die.”

At least, she prayed he would not. The bloodletting had left Matt very weak, and he had developed a raging fever over the course of the day. She had been able to rouse him only enough to take a few spoonfuls of broth and swallow a draught of medicine. Other than that, he’d been insensible.

His leg was hugely swollen and inflamed above and below the new, sturdier splint. When she had adjusted the dressings so that she could check the wound where the bone had thrust through his flesh, she had found
that it was still bleeding sluggishly. The loss of blood was a danger; she’d seen nothing for it but to sprinkle basilicum powder on the gash and pad it as solidly as she could with lint and clean rags. When after a few hours no new blood appeared on the surface of the bandage, she judged—hoped—that the bleeding had stopped at last.

Fever was the primary threat now, along with gangrene. If such should set in, she would not like to wager on Matt’s chances of survival, with or without his leg intact. But there was no need to tell his son that.

Because John looked so pathetic, she smiled at him. The gesture felt strange, rusty; she had not smiled often in the last few months. But if she’d hoped to touch a chord of fellowship in him, there was no sign that she had succeeded. He did not smile back but looked uncertainly at his father.

“If I said good night to him, do you think he could hear me?”

“Oh, I think so.”

Caroline sounded far more confident than she felt. Her smile died, but her compassion for the boy did not. If it was a comfort to him to imagine that his father could hear, what harm would it do? She beckoned John nearer. He came to stand beside her, his tousled black head just topping her shoulder. He was so thin that she could see, through the neck opening in his nightshirt, his shoulder bones pushing against his skin.

“Good night, Pa,” John murmured almost inaudibly
and reached with a tentative finger to touch Matt’s outflung hand where it lay against the quilt.

There was not the slightest flicker of response. Caroline started to say something, anything, to try to make the child feel better. But before she could frame the words, a gush of tears filled his eyes that were already red-rimmed with crying.

Despite what Caroline could tell was a supreme effort to maintain his composure, John sobbed once, a great gulping sound, before catching himself and biting down hard on his lower lip. His pain was so raw that it made her hurt too. Instinctively her arm encircled his shoulders, and she hugged him. But instead of responding positively to her effort to console him, he gave a muffled cry, shoved her roughly aside, and, turning, ran from the room.