She gazed at him accusingly. “She doesn’t like company, and you brought me here—”
“It isn’t quite like that,” he said.
“Then what is it like?”
“I’m not sure,” he said. “My mother and sister seem to understand. Alice says she’s a ghost—”
“A what?”
“Figure of speech,” he said. “You’re not going to turn hysterical on me now, are you?”
“I might.” She sat in a nearby chair and folded her hands. “This day feels as though it’s gone on for weeks. I believe my nerves are wearing.” For a moment she’d envisioned a deathly ill or dying auntie, and having to leave this house and seek yet another refuge. In that moment, she’d wished she’d stood before the minister the way she’d promised to do.
Was it only this morning?
She wanted to put her head in her hands and weep, but she couldn’t. She had to see to Ripley’s injury first, before he did anything to make it worse. Males had an appalling tendency to worsen their injuries because of a mystical belief that, if they said nothing was wrong, nothing was wrong, and they could do what they wanted.
“Nothing to fret about,” he said. “Aunt Julia is a superior sort of relative.”
Before Olympia could ask any more questions, Tewkes returned, with two footmen, a sturdy maid named Mary, the brandy, and the various other items Olympia had requested.
“Tewkes,” Ripley said. “Where’s my aunt?”
“At the mausoleum, Your Grace. Joseph has gone to inform her of your arrival.”
“You heard him,” Ripley told Olympia. “At the mausoleum. I told you she was somewhere about.”
Well, then, Aunt Julia wasn’t better.
Still, this was Camberley Place, and even haunted, it remained the refuge Ripley remembered: household in order, servants going about their business calmly, and everything looking clean, neat, and well cared-for. The antithesis, in short, of the home in which he’d endured too much of his boyhood.
He watched Lady Olympia direct the servants to bring a small table to the sofa. There she had Mary set out strips of cloth and bowls, a bucket of ice, another of water, and a small pitcher of the vinegar she’d ordered.
She had them move her chair closer to his foot.
Then she sent all of the servants except Mary out of the room.
When the door had closed behind them, Ripley said, “You didn’t want a brace of footmen leaping to do your bidding?”
“Best not to let the men see you weep,” she said. “And do try to keep the screaming down. I don’t want them bursting in to the rescue and making things worse.”
A titter escaped Mary.
“Do not be alarmed,” he told the maid. “I shall sob quietly into my brandy.” He took a sip—and then nearly choked because Lady Olympia drew up his trouser leg, and her hand—her bare hand—touched his skin for an instant, and it was as though she’d applied an electrical machine. He didn’t leap from the sofa, but he must have twitched at least, because she looked up at him.
“Sorry,” she said. “Is it tender?”
“Erm. No. Just . . . nothing. Thought of something.”
“I shall do my best not to hurt you,” she said. “But I fear the area is going to be very sensitive.”
Several areas, actually.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “I’ve borne worse.”
He told himself to relax and enjoy it. By the looks of things, this was as close to womanly attention as he’d get this night, but as he saw her hand move to his garter, he said, “I can do that.”
“Really?” she said. “You know how to untie your own garters?”
“And pull up my own stockings,” he said.
And darn them, too, he could have added.
“Drink your brandy,” she said. “It’s better to leave this to me.”
“I’m not sure it’s proper,” he said. “Not that I remember what is and what isn’t.”
“There’s nothing to be afraid of,” she said.
“Afraid!”
“I’ve done this any number of times. If it isn’t one of the brothers, it’s one of the cousins. Or their friends. You’re safer with me than with most doctors.”
“That I don’t doubt,” he said.
“Then be brave,” she said. “I’m going to untie the garter. Try not to cry.”
Gently, she untied the garter. His groin tightened.
She set the garter on the sofa. He stared at it and drank brandy.
She touched his stocking.
He swallowed a groan.
Slowly, gently, she peeled the stocking down his calf. The room grew hot and he tried to think of cold things. Like the mausoleum. And Ashmont. Yes, Ashmont, to whom she belonged. Ashmont, so cheerful, talking about getting married.
Slowly, gently, she drew the stocking down his foot.
Ripley’s heart beat faster, and it was no good trying to stop what was happening inside him. He was a man, and a woman had her naked hands on his naked skin. A woman was touching him, undressing him. This was what he knew. The rest—he, trying to reason with himself and not be a damned fool—the rest was noise, like the noise of the London streets.
He drank.
She slid the stocking off his foot and gave it to Mary, and he was aware of his breath, coming so hard, it seemed to whoosh like a wind through the library.
She, innocent that she was, hadn’t an inkling what she was doing to him.
He would have laughed if he could have mustered the breath for it.
She was so serious, concentrating fully on what she was doing.
He watched her work, her brow slightly furrowed above the spectacles, her lip caught between her teeth, as she made a mixture of ice water and vinegar. She soaked the cloth in it.
“It’s going to be cold,” she said. “Brace yourself.”
Cold, yes. He needed cold.
She wrapped the icy bandage about his ankle. And he nearly jumped off the sofa. And said a word even he knew one didn’t utter in front of women.
“Yes, I know,” she said. “But in a moment it’ll feel better.”
“Right,” he gritted out. Then it did feel better, in more ways than she knew. The cold shock worked wonderfully, numbing not only his foot but the frustrating sensations of a moment before.
With Mary helping, she continued her work, wetting more strips of cloth, and wrapping them about his foot. He told himself his suffering was his own fault. He should have insisted one of the menservants attend to him.
But Lady Olympia was so dictatorial that the reasonable thing to do hadn’t occurred to him.
And dictatorial, he told himself, was exactly what Ashmont needed.
And yes, maybe Ripley felt a qualm or two about a misspent life that had kept him away from such interesting girls. And yes, maybe he wouldn’t altogether mind being wrestled into order by a tyrannical female in spectacles.
But mainly what he felt was balked in every direction. Her ministrations had got him all excited, with no way of relieving the excitement. He hadn’t a prayer of dealing with his celibacy this night or of dealing with Ashmont. The chances of Ashmont running amok were very good. One could only hope he’d drunk himself unconscious before he could get into fights with members of her family.
Her voice dragged him out of the private hell he was constructing.
“I know that many medical persons recommend liniments or leeches or both,” she was telling Mary. “But mariners rely on cold and wet. They will hold a sprained part under the pump when the ship is pumped out, morning and evening—and you know seamen are wanted to be fit and strong again as quickly as possible. A number of medical men urge similar treatment. At least it isn’t wintertime. As the shock fades, the cooling sensation ought to be not entirely unpleasurable.”
She looked up at him, her brow wrinkled in worry. “Have I made the bandages too tight?”
“No,” he said.
“You’re scowling,” she said.
“You can’t go anywhere,” she said. “It’s essential to rest the foot, and keep it elevated.”
“Drat you, Ripley, now what have you done?” came a familiar voice from the doorway. “Hardly back in England and in trouble already.”
Chapter 9
Aunt Julia remained for a moment on the threshold, fists on her hips, wearing the grim expression that had cowed him when he was a child. Even now it made him uneasy.
She looked harmless enough, fair and sweet-faced and while above-average height, not impressively so. She had the knack, however, of appearing impressively above-average formidable. She’d stood up to his impossible father when few men would or could.
All the same, she seemed to Ripley a pale imitation of herself—the ghost Alice had written about—and that wasn’t simply the somber grey dress, with its sensibly narrow but unfashionable sleeves.
Still scowling, she advanced upon him. She didn’t box his ears as he expected, but ruffled his hair as though he were still a boy before turning her attention to Lady Olympia. “And this, I collect, is the lady who shot you?” Her brow knit. “Plague take you, Ripley, it’s Ashmont’s bride. What on earth were you thinking?”
“Excessively intelligent, my aunt,” he said to Lady Olympia. “Knows everything about everybody. Did I mention that?”
“You never were good at pouring butter,” said his aunt. “No subtlety.”
“I daresay. Aunt, may I present Lady Olympia Hightower.”
His aunt rolled her eyes. “No, you mayn’t. I met Lady Olympia when she was presented at Court. I should know her anywhere, in any event. Yet I hoped against hope my eyes were playing tricks on me today. Silly of me. How I wish your uncle were here. Of all the stupid things you’ve ever done, this beats them all. By miles.”
“Lady Olympia, it appears you are acquainted with Lady Charles Ancaster, my favorite aunt—”
“I disown you, as of this moment.”
“Auntie Julia, don’t be cross. Can’t you see I’m wounded?”
His aunt gave him a look that would have shriveled a better man. Not being a better man, he bore it as he’d borne any number of disapproving looks, though her opinion counted for more than others’ did.
“In fairness, Lady Charles,” said Olympia, “I was the one who did the stupid thing, and the duke has been my knight in—”
“Don’t say that,” he said.
“The duke has been trying to save me from myself. He even tried to make me see reason.”
Aunt Julia studied his companion for a moment. “Hugh tried to make you see reason? My nephew? This great, useless hulk of a fellow? Now that is something I should have liked to witness.”
“I’m not entirely sure she did a stupid thing,” Ripley said. “And when she wouldn’t give it up, of course I went along.”
“That goes without saying,” said his aunt. “Then what? You drove her to violence?” She moved to examine his foot. “Neatly done, Lady Olympia. But had you not considered amputation?”
“Don’t put ideas in her head,” Ripley said. “I’ll need all my limbs to clear up this business. Which I had intended to do this evening. The Fates, however, had other ideas.”
“Fate, indeed. You weren’t looking where you were going.”
“I wasn’t looking to step into a rabbit hole, I agree.” He’d been looking at Lady Olympia in all her finery. So dashing and splendidly feminine—and whistling like a man.
“We were trying to catch a runaway dog who’d deceived us into believing he was properly trained,” Lady Olympia said. “I advised Tewkes to have him taken to the stables. I didn’t like to bring a strange canine into the house when I’m so uncertain about his manners.”
“A runaway bride,” said his aunt. “A runaway dog. An incapacitated nephew. It seems the evening’s conversation won’t be boring. Come, Lady Olympia. You must be longing for a respite from my nephew, not to mention wishing for the sorts of things a lady needs when she finds herself a stranger in a strange place, unsupplied with luggage, servants, or anything else necessary to her comfort.”
“Our departure was hasty,” Ripley said. “We hadn’t time to—”
“Really, Hugh, I’m not completely in my dotage. You needn’t point out the obvious. The servants will make up the bed in your uncle’s study for you. If I catch you trying to climb the stairs, I’ll shoot you.”
She was bearing Lady Olympia away when he remembered. “Where’s my sister got to, by the way?”
“Alice?”
“I’ve only the one, last I heard.”
Aunt Julia shrugged. “She was here for a time, and I was glad to see her, but what is there for her to do in this gloomy place? I sent her with Georgiana to the Drakeleys’ house party. I refer to my youngest daughter,” she explained to Lady Olympia. Turning back to Ripley she said, “Alice won’t be bored there. You know the Drakeley boys adore her.”
“Excessively, I always thought,” he said.
“That is her husband’s problem,” said his aunt. And out she went, taking Lady Olympia with her, and leaving Ripley to wonder why Alice hadn’t gone back to London to her spouse, instead of in the other direction, where her beaux lurked.
After helping Olympia wash off the dust of travel, Lady Charles’s maid, Pickard, had gone in search of something suitable for the guest to wear to dinner. This left the two ladies to enjoy in private the tea Lady Charles had ordered, “as a restorative after your trials.”
Olympia had remembered her as soon as she saw her, but had not expected to be remembered among so many debutantes—from seven years ago, no less. Besides, Lady Charles had always traveled in diplomatic and political circles, whereas Mama and Papa gravitated to the sporting types. Their paths had rarely crossed.
The lady was about Mama’s age and, like Mama, had not lost her looks. There the resemblance ended. Ripley’s aunt was altogether different in manner. She had a fearless air and she was infinitely more organized and orderly. A strong woman, in character and confidence.
And sad, too.
The subdued grey dress would have told the tale, even if one failed to see the sorrow shadowing her hazel eyes.
It was so like Ripley’s lack of consideration, Olympia thought, to bring a stranger here to intrude on the lady’s grief.
“You’ll wonder why I waste my breath scolding my nephew,” Lady Charles said after she’d poured. “But somebody must, and fiercely, even though he won’t heed. Since he had the wits to bring you here, however, one must admit he isn’t entirely bereft of sense. Well, then. You are my first bolter. I did wonder how Ashmont won you over, a sensible girl like you. But there is Alice, wed to that blackguard Blackwood. Did she have the sense to abandon him at the altar? And so you see I am of two minds. I appreciate the feelings that drove you. On the other hand, my dear, this will be rather a muddle to sort out.”
“Yes, I kn-know.” Then, to her dismay, Olympia wept as she’d wanted to do before, in the library.
Lady Charles stood up quickly, and moved to give Olympia’s shoulder a sympathetic squeeze as she said, “Men,” in exactly the tone to make Olympia laugh and sob at the same time, like a complete ninny or hysteric.
Her hostess had hardly sat down again before the ninny-hysteric was telling her story in all its not-making-much sense, although leaving out the parts about naked dukes and more-than-friendly kisses in post chaises.
“Ah, I was not aware that brandy came into it,” said Lady Charles at the end. “That explains a good d-deal.” Her lip trembled, and for a moment, Olympia thought she’d weep, too, perhaps reminded of her own wedding day.
Instead the lady laughed, and heartily, and while she did, the cloud that seemed to hang over her vanished, and the atmosphere lightened and brightened. At that moment Olympia understood, in her heart as well as her head, what made this aunt specia
l to Ripley.
But the laughter subsided too soon, and her hostess said, “The first thing we must do is set your parents’ minds at ease.”
“I should have sent a message myself, but at first all I could think of was getting away. And then I didn’t know what to say. I’ve hardly known my own mind.”
“As I said, the brandy explains a good deal. Then, too, we must keep in mind your traveling companion. Not the type to contribute to clear thinking.” Lady Charles closed her eyes briefly, then, with a sigh, opened them. “Those three. Really. One makes allowances, given their fathers. But my dear, when a man reaches the age of nine and twenty, one would hope for maturity.”
Olympia knew nothing about their fathers. None of them had been alive by the time she left the schoolroom. Though Lady Charles had made her very curious, it would be impertinent to seek details.
“All in all, I thought the duke took matters calmly and about as logically as he could, in the circumstances,” she said. “My behavior was irrational. There I was, changing my mind constantly and falling into the river and stealing the dog—and he took everything in his stride.”
“Of course he would,” said her hostess. “It’s nothing to what those three have done. Stop berating yourself. When men do the sorts of things you did, everybody’s amused.”
“But I’m not a man! You know caricatures of me will hang in the print shop windows and my name—of all names—will feature in Foxe’s Morning Spectacle. And nobody will say, ‘Boys will be boys’—because I’m not a boy!”
“Indeed, it’s most unfair,” Lady Charles said. “But you leave it to me. I’ll write to let your parents know Ripley brought you straight to me. It’s best they think so. You may trust me to find a way of putting matters so as not to distress them. I’ve had a good deal of practice, I promise you. The letter will go out this night, express. They’ll have it in a few hours and will sleep easy.”
“I should like to think so, but I very much doubt it. How they’ll face their friends, I cannot imagine—and how I wish I’d thought more of them before I climbed through the window.”