The fire had already consumed Davy’s ropes and Alexandra fed the hungry flames with another lump of coal. She glanced up to see Mr. Crombie watching her.
“Davy must have gone home,” he said. “I didn’t hear any screams from Jemmy on his way across the gardens.”
Alexandra sighed with relief. “Just as well. Jemmy is no match for Davy.”
Mr. Crombie’s face was whiter than parchment.
She chewed her lip. “Sir, how will you get the ball out of your shoulder? Do you know a surgeon or a doctor who can be dissuaded from making a report to the authorities? I mean, surely you won’t report poor Davy? I doubt he truly realised what he was doing.”
“You think Davy didn’t understand what he was doing? That was not my impression. But if it pleases you to think so…” Then he added, “My man will dig it out.”
“Oh.” Alexandra cringed as she thought of the fearful pain an inexperienced person could inflict.
“Are you worried about me?” he asked, sounding surprised.
“Of course.” Alexandra couldn’t imagine not being worried about a man who had saved her and her sister from their father’s wrath and Davy’s anger. Certainly he’d been helping himself at the same time, but he’d done it all with a piece of lead lodged in his shoulder. She didn’t know any other man who would have done that.
“Rest easy. My man was with me at Waterloo and during the Occupation, so he is well used to injuries.”
A soldier. He’d been a soldier. “Who were you with? What rank?”
He looked amused. “13th Light Dragoons, ma’am. Lieutenant. You sound like one of my sergeants.”
She clapped a hand over her mouth. “Sorry.” It wasn’t that she was like one of those silly girls who dreamed of soldiers in their smart uniforms marching to glory or death. But during the many sojourns in her room, she had had only old newspapers to keep her company. Sometimes when she’d heard Papa and his cronies warbling on about the cost of keeping an army now that the Corsican monster had been vanquished, she had been tempted to speak out to explain that many of the French people were poised, waiting for another Napoleon to arise.
But of course she hadn’t. Young ladies were not expected to know anything of such matters.
Looking at Mr. Crombie’s downbent head, she prayed that he’d not endured years of soldiering to find death at the hands of a footpad.
There was a scratching sound at the back door and she rushed to open it.
Jemmy hurried in, followed by a tall, spare man in the attire of a gentleman’s valet.
“Sir!” the valet exclaimed, rushing to Mr. Crombie’s side.
“I’m still alive, Murdoch, as you see,” Mr. Crombie muttered.
Alexandra fretted. He sounded much weaker now than he had only a half-hour ago. “He needs to get that ball out of his shoulder,” she advised Murdoch. “Quickly.”
“Yes, miss.” Murdoch did not seem at all fazed. He hauled Mr. Crombie to his feet. “Lean on me, sir. The carriage is waiting.”
“Thank God,” Mr. Crombie said devoutly. He tried to turn towards Alexandra and almost collapsed.
She grabbed hold of his other arm. “I’ll help,” she told Murdoch. “Jemmy, you may go back to bed now. Thank you for fetching Mr. Murdoch. I hope you will keep your tongue between your teeth about this incident.” She bit her lip as Mr. Crombie struggled to hold himself upright. He was many pounds heavier than Murdoch who was having a difficult time trying to prop up his master.
They shuffled awkwardly along the garden path and through the gate. A carriage blocked the narrow lane.
“Here we are, sir,” Murdoch puffed. By dint of pulling and pushing, they managed to shoehorn Mr. Crombie into his carriage.
Lying back against the cushions, he held out his good hand to Alexandra. “Good evening, Miss Alexandra Tallis. Somehow I shall find a way to thank you for this night’s work. I hope we meet again soon.” Then his hand dropped and he slumped back on the seat.
She bit her lip. “Look after him,” she whispered to Murdoch and stood back from the carriage. Standing alone in the dark, she listened to the receding sound of carriage wheels on cobblestones.
Something scuttling near her foot yanked her out of her daydream. Rats were not her favourite animal. Furthermore, it was dark and cold and she was alone in a dirty lane at the back of the townhouses. Her heart pounding like a drum, she rushed back inside and bolted the back door.
“Miss Alexandra! What are you doing at this time o’ night?”
Alexandra jumped with fright. Oh, good heavens! It was Mrs. White, their housekeeper. Garbed in an outsize robe with her hair in a nightcap, Mrs. White stood beside the dying fire, her arms akimbo.
“I’m hungry,” Alexandra whispered, hoping Mrs. White’s stentorian voice hadn’t roused the entire household.
“You poor lamb!” the housekeeper exclaimed. “You missed dinner again, didn’t you? How did you get out of your room?”
“Emmaline...”
“That Miss Emmaline! Such a kind young lady to remember her sister even though she had such a busy evening planned.”
A busy evening indeed, Alexandra reflected. Emmaline had attended the Everton’s ball with their father then returned home while Papa went on to his club. Then she’d waited until most of the staff were abed and had sneaked out again to meet…who? She had met up with Davy, kidnapped a stranger and caused her older sister much grief. Oh yes. Emmaline had been busy.
Their father often laid the blame for Emmaline’s misdeeds on Alexandra’s shoulders, but if anyone was to blame it was he and the useless chaperone he’d foisted on them. Aunt Broadwood admitted she didn’t know why Papa had elected her to play chaperone. She was an impecunious widow with no taste for Society. Emmaline said Aunt Broadwood had agreed to chaperone them because Papa had paid her generously. Alexandra thought there was more to it than that. She was sure there was bad blood between Papa and his sister and she was suspicious of Aunt Broadwood. The people Papa had warned them about before they arrived in London were the very sort of people Aunt Broadwood had introduced them to. At best they could be termed pretentious mushrooms. For example there was one particular gentleman who seemed to attend every entertainment they did, and he simply stood and stared at them. He made them most uncomfortable. However, seeing that Aunt Broadwood was Papa’s sister, they could hardly criticise her acquaintances. Most of the time the sisters were left to fend for themselves as Aunt Broadwood often disappeared for hours at a time. After a lifetime with Papa’s tight grip on the reins, Emmaline had not unnaturally kicked over the traces.
Alexandra stared at Mrs. White, wondering how much the housekeeper knew.
“I shall heat up some soup for you, Miss Alexandra and—”
“Please don’t bother, Mrs. White. Go back to bed. I’ll find an apple or something—”
“What the devil is all the noise down here?” Sir Colin Tallis held a candle aloft as he loomed at the top of the kitchen stairs. “Ever since I returned from my club, I’ve heard people shuffling up and down the hall. Now I find a gaggle of you down here prattling on.”
Alexandra’s stomach clenched. She had thought her father abed long since. Thank the Lord he hadn’t taken it into his head to come out of his study and see what the noise was. How lucky they had been! For once her guardian angel was on duty. That damsel had been missing lately.
“You, missy,” her father said. “What are you doing out of bed?”
If he remembered he’d banished her to her room, he was not admitting it.
“I came downstairs to get an apple, Papa. I seem to have woken everyone up.”
Mrs. White rushed into speech. “Nay, Miss Alexandra. You didn’t waken me. I was still awake.”
Alexandra stared at the housekeeper. Was the woman trying to protect her from her father’s wrath, or had she been woken by the noise Alexandra and Mr. Crombie had made? But Alexandra could tell nothing from Mrs. White’s face. The housekeeper had assumed the expressionless, vague mien she always adopted around Alexandra’s father.
“Get to bed the both of you,” Colin Tallis snarled. “May God defend me from gabbling women.” He stomped back to his study.
Mrs. White and Alexandra breathed twin sighs of relief.
“Come with me, Miss Alexandra,” Mrs. White whispered. She held a candle aloft and tugged Alexandra into the pantry. “Here.” She dumped an apple and a slice of sausage into Alexandra’s hand. “Go,” was all she said.
Alexandra, grabbing the stub of her candle from the kitchen table, fled to her room.