Surely it was a harmless lie. ‘I wanted her to approve of us.’
‘Clever.’ His voice rattled. ‘Worked a charm.’
She beamed under the compliment. ‘We must remain in their good graces. We are totally dependent on them.’
‘Food. Clothing. Shelter,’ he agreed.
She pulled at her shirt. ‘I try to remember we would not have clean clothes if they had not stolen from the dead soldiers, much as I detest the thought. They are poor. It was generous of them to share what little they have with us.’
‘And you gave them some coins,’ he said.
She smiled. ‘Yes.’
The peasant wife bustled in, bandages and folded towels in one hand and a small pot in the other. She knelt down at the captain’s side, chattering and gesturing for Marian to unwind his old bandage. The captain tried to cooperate.
The woman dipped a cloth into the water and bathed around the wound. That done, she opened the pot. The scent of honey filled the air.
‘Honey?’ His eyes widened.
‘Ja.’ The woman nodded. ‘Honing. ‘
Honing. Another word for Marian to learn, but why?
The woman poured the honey directly into his wound and he trembled at its touch. After placing a cloth compress over it, she gestured for Marian to help him lean forwards. She dressed the exit wound in the same manner. Then she wrapped the cloth bandage around him to keep everything in place. She smiled and chattered at them both.
Marian helped him into his shirt. ‘Honey.’
‘Let us hope she knows more about healing than we do.’ The captain glanced at the farmer’s wife. ‘Thank you, madame.’
Marian had been moved by the tenderness of the woman’s care.
When the woman stood to leave Marian walked her to the door. She pointed to herself. ‘Marian.’
The woman grinned and tapped her own chest. ‘Karel.’
The two women embraced. Marian wiped away tears. She had an ally.
The rest of the day proved that comfort was fleeting.
The farmer left with the mule laden with plunder. Marian had neither the means nor the opportunity to ask him to carry a message to someone—anyone—English.
Captain Landon’s fever steadily worsened and he slept a great deal of the time.
Marian busied herself by washing their soiled clothes, which dried quickly in the warm afternoon sun. She spent the rest of the time at the captain’s side, talking when he wished to talk, bathing his face to cool him, or merely just sitting next to him.
Late in the afternoon he became even more fitful. The little girl carried in another basket of bread and cheese, this time with the addition of a tankard of ale.
The girl stared wide-eyed at the captain while Marian took the food and drink from her tiny arms.
‘Fetch your mama,’ Marian asked her. ‘Mama.’
The little girl ran off and her mother showed up soon afterwards kneeling down to check the captain. She clucked her tongue and furrowed her brow and said … something. She rushed off again.
Several minutes went by before she returned with a pot of some sort of tea, leaves and pieces of bark floating in the liquid. She handed Marian a spoon and gestured for her to give the tea to the captain.
‘Thank you, Karel,’ Marian said.
She spooned the tea into the captain’s mouth.
He roused. ‘What is this?’
‘Tea,’ she responded. ‘To make you feel better.’
By the time darkness fell, he was sleeping uneasily, their old clothes were dry and folded, and the farmer had still not returned. Marian surmised wherever he’d gone had been too far to return in a day.
She continued her ministrations as the moon rose in the sky, lighting the stable with a soft glow that gave her enough light to see by. The captain mumbled and moved restlessly.
Exhausted, Marian fell asleep at his side, the wet cloth still in her hand.
‘No!’ the captain cried.
She woke with a start.
He rose to a sitting position. ‘You bloody bastard. You ought to be hanged.’
He swung a fist at an imaginary enemy. His eyes flashed in the moonlight and he tried to rise.
‘Captain, stay down! ‘ Marian held him from behind and tried to keep him still.
‘I ought to kill you myself.’ His voice was low and dangerous and frightening.
‘You are dreaming, Captain,’ she told him. ‘There is no one here but you and me. I am Marian Pallant. Remember me?’
He reached around and easily wrenched her off his back. Suddenly he held her in front of him, her legs straddling his, his face contorted in anger. ‘I ought to kill you myself for what you did.’
Marian trembled with fear. While he still held her, she managed to cup his face between her hands and to keep his head steady enough to look at her. ‘I’m Marian, Captain. You are dreaming. You are sick. You must lie down again.’
Her hair came loose and tumbled down her back. His face changed, but he seized her hair and with it drew her close so that her face was inches from his. ‘Foolish woman,’ he murmured, his other hand feeling her bound chest. ‘Not a boy at all. A foolish woman.’
Her fear took a new turn, her heart beating so hard she thought it would burst inside her. Forcing him to look at her again, she made her voice steady and firm although she felt neither inside. ‘Yes, I am foolish, but you are very sick and you are hurting me. Release me and lie back down this instant.’
For a brief moment he seemed to really see her, then his eyes drifted from her like a boat that had lost its sail.
He released her and collapsed against the saddle, shivering so hard his whole body convulsed. ‘Cold,’ he murmured. ‘So cold.’
She gathered up all the blankets and wrapped them around him. Then she moved to the other side of the stable, watchful lest he would again mistake her for whomever he wished to kill. Or to seduce.
A rooster crowed.
Allan lifted his eyelids, seeing first the weathered grey wood of the barn stall, then the hay, the light from the window and finally Miss Marian Pallant.
She sat against the wall opposite him, her hair cascading on to her shoulders, her eyes closed. He examined her sleeping face.
How could
