suddenly slid to the side of the bed away from him. Was trying to heave herself out, but was instead doubled up and starting to retch helplessly.
In a couple of strides Alec had pushed the porcelain bowl from the washstand on to the floor beside her. ‘I’ll send Mary up. I’m going for the doctor.’
‘No—’
‘This time,’ he said, ‘I’m giving you no choice.’
Exhausted with sickness and with Mary quietly tidying up around her, Rosalie sagged back against the pillows in despair. Oh, no. She’d made so many dreadful mistakes. She’d been wrong about Helen’s printing press, and the fire, and about his rackrenting. In return he despised her as a cheap little widow, a courtesan. And even though Alec Stewart might be a despicable seducer—my own sister denounced him to me!—just now she’d found comfort and something even more disturbing in his calm voice, his very presence …
You are mad. You are ill, Rosalie.
Ill indeed, because during the course of that morning the fever took her more firmly in its grip. Bed rest, the doctor ordered.
The next few days for Rosalie passed in a haze. She was sometimes aware of Mary serving her with the powders the doctor had prescribed, or bringing her a fresh cotton nightgown. Of Katy being brought up to see her, her little thumb in her mouth, sometimes with Mary, sometimes in Alec’s strong arms, which Rosalie found almost unbearable.
Sometimes, she would hear the physician’s grave voice. ‘The fever lingers … She must have caught a chill on the night you found her.’
Then Alec’s low tones. ‘Mrs Rowland was drenched that night, in the rain. And I’ve reason to believe she was served drinks that had been tampered with.’
‘That would not have helped. Rest is what she needs; a little light food, plenty of liquids …’
That threat, that note Alec had shown her, hung over her all the time. Stop asking questions, whore. Your friend has already suffered the consequences, and you’re next.
Who could it be from?
One morning—Rosalie guessed her fourth day here—Alec knocked and came in after the doctor’s daily visit. She had tried getting up earlier, but her legs were as shaky as a newborn colt’s.
‘I’ve brought you a letter,’ he said. Her pulse began to race. ‘It’s from your friend Helen.’
Helen. Oh, poor Helen would have been so worried, so angry … ‘How did she know I was here?’
‘I told her,’ Alec said quietly. ‘I went to see her at Mr Wheeldon’s house two days ago to explain that you were ill and had taken shelter at my home. She—expressed her disapproval quite strongly.’
Rosalie could imagine. She opened the letter quickly. Rosalie, my dear. What can you be thinking of, staying at that place? You know you are welcome here, with Francis and his sister! I have news. But first please write, to let me know you and Katy are safe.
‘She wanted to visit you,’ Alec said. ‘More than that, I think she wanted to drag you and your child away from here and tear me limb from limb. Her friend Mr Wheeldon was more reasonable. Do you wish her to visit?’
‘No, I don’t. Because that threat was directed to her, too, wasn’t it, Captain Stewart?’ Rosalie managed to sound calm. ‘So at the moment I imagine it’s best if she has as little as possible to do with me.’
‘Then I’ll tell her that the doctor still advises you to rest. And if you wish to write to her, I’ll see that your letter’s delivered.’
So Rosalie wrote to her.
A reply came the next day from Helen. Alec waited while she read it. Rosalie. I am disappointed that you have chosen to place any trust in that man. Since you don’t wish me to visit, I am obliged to write with my news. Francis has asked Toby and me to travel to Oxford with him for two weeks, because he has been approached to set up a church school in a village there and wants me to help. Just think, it’s not far—ten miles or less—from where you used to live, and I used to teach! I am considering making a permanent move—I don’t think I can be happy in London again. I hope you know, Rosalie, that I will be there whenever you want me. Yours, Helen.
Alec was watching her. ‘Are you all right, Mrs Rowland?’
She pushed some loose strands of hair back from her cheeks. ‘Helen is leaving London for a little while. I—I think she feels I’ve rejected her.’
‘You did so for very good reasons,’ he reminded her quietly. ‘Unselfish reasons. Some day, you’ll be able to tell her so.’ He hesitated. ‘I’ll leave you to rest.’
She lay back against the pillows.
Now, she really was on her own.
Whenever she was by herself she would get up from her bed and try to walk a little further around the room, but Rosalie was frightened by how weak she was after these days of illness. Katy was brought up to her regularly, but was always happy to return to her new friends.
Time for Rosalie hung heavily, until she noticed some books on a shelf by the window. She was surprised by their quality. Several of them, she realised, were sketchbooks that must have belonged to someone in the army. Quickly she became captivated by the swiftly but skilfully drawn portraits of soldiers at rest, or marching, the deft watercolours of mountains and villages, in Spain, she guessed. There were also other, heavier volumes containing reproductions of the work of more famous artists.
Mary had brought her some spare clothes, and on her seventh morning there Rosalie took off her nightgown and pulled on a sleeveless cotton chemise, intending to wear the plain rose-pink cambric dress that lay over the foot of the bed. But it was warm in here with the sun pouring through the window, so she decided to continue reading the book on Boucher she had found while sitting curled on the bed. The doctor had been and there was no danger of any other visitors just yet.
She was fast learning the rhythms of the household. She’d heard from Mary, always willing to chatter, that the soldiers were usually up and about early. Some went off to local places of work, at building sites or timber yards. Others were organised by Sergeant McGrath into doing repair work around this ungainly great building. Alec was often out until his fencing lessons began in the early evening.
But now, as Rosalie sat cross-legged on the bed in that flimsy chemise, engrossed in her book, Alec Stewart walked in, carrying a tray laden with a steaming teapot, china cups and a plate of bread and butter. He almost dropped everything. He clutched the tray and steadied it with a clatter of crockery, but not before one of the cups had rolled off and smashed on the floor.
He said, ‘My God.’
She dropped the book and jumped off the bed, putting it between herself and him. With his tousled dark hair, his rumpled white shirt, black boots and breeches that clung to every inch of his muscular thighs, he looked utterly devastating.
Her pulse was hammering. ‘If you’d knocked first,’ she declared, ‘you might have saved yourself a broken cup! How dare you just march in?’
‘It’s my damned house,’ he pointed out reasonably. ‘And Mary asked me to bring your tea. Normally you’re hiding
