It Only Takes a Kiss Read online

  The Jacobs men left and Hero immediately mentally kicked herself for letting them go. The leg had not been set yet.

  The man was naked now except for a towel Dr. Whitby had thrown across his groin. Hero smiled to herself. It was not as though she had never seen a naked man before, but her father always tried to be protective of his daughter’s modesty.

  “He looks to be in good physical shape,” Dr. Whitby said, “in spite of all these scars.” He pointed at a scar on the man’s side that ran to his back and a long scar on the thigh of the leg that had not been broken. Hero noted two others on his face, one from his nose to his left jaw and another that slashed through the outer edge of his right eyebrow, but she also noted that neither of these diminished his looks appreciably. His face and neck, as well as his hands—though bloodied—were deeply tanned; his torso from the neck down slightly less so. She could not help noticing that, cleaned up, this would be one very attractive man.

  “I would say our sleeping giant either is or has been a soldier,” her father continued. “Come look at this leg, Hero. You will have some needlework to do here.”

  Hero looked and was dismayed to see that her father was right. She hated sewing pieces of human flesh back together, though the Good Lord knew she had done so often enough. A jagged section of the man’s femur jutted from a six-inch slash above his right knee.

  “You will need to clean that out thoroughly,” her father said. “See that there are no small bits floating about to cause infection.”

  “Yes, Papa,” she said patiently.

  “Sorry, my dear. I sometimes forget that you know as much as I do by now.”

  “I sincerely doubt that, Papa, but I do remember how to clean a wound.”

  “Stewart, you help her set the leg. There should be some boards and strips of cloth for a splint in the closet.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Mrs. Hutchins and a maid shuffled in carrying buckets of hot water.

  The maid Dorcas—Mrs. Hutchins’s pretty sixteen-year-old niece—stared at the body on the table. She emitted a long sigh. “That there is a real good-lookin’ feller.”

  “Never you mind, missy,” her aunt said. “You just set them buckets down and get on back to the kitchen. Refill that tank and then you get started on the bread. It ain’t gonna make itself.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Dorcas backed out of the room slowly, keeping her eyes on the supine figure on the table. Mrs. Hutchins made a shushing noise and waved the girl on her way.

  With the help of her father and Stewart—and silently glad the patient was still unconscious—Hero carefully placed several strips of cloth and a flat length of wood under his injured leg. These would form the basis of the splint to keep the broken bone in place.

  Stewart had brought in a stool for Dr. Whitby, who watched with great interest while Hero cleaned the surface of the wound and began probing for bits of shattered bone, which could cause problems later. The patient groaned and flinched from time to time. Stewart stood at the head of the table, ready to grab the man’s shoulders if necessary to keep him in place as Hero worked. It was yet another task the handyman performed occasionally. Dr. Whitby, acting as his daughter’s assistant, kept mopping the fresh blood away. In recent years, that had been more and more the way of things. Whereas Hero had once been his apprentice in all but name, the roles had been reversed as her father’s stamina had weakened and he now experienced occasional tremors in his once steady-as-a-rock hands.

  “I think that’s it.” Hero stood back for a moment while her father mopped at the slowing trickle of blood. “Now, to set this bone. Mrs. Hutchins, if you will hold his shoulders down to keep him from thrashing about, and, Mr. Stewart, if you will take hold of his foot and ankle and pull when I tell you to—”

  Hero gripped the patient’s leg around his upper thigh to hold it steady; Stewart gripped his ankle and pulled, and Dr. Whitby guided the bone into place, then held another, shorter, flat length of wood against the inside of the leg as Hero stitched together the edges of the wound on his outer thigh. The patient had groaned and tried to thrash about as they repositioned the bone, but Mrs. Hutchins was a strong woman and prevented undue movement. The final step was to bandage the wound, then place a third length of wood along the outside of the leg and tie the strips of cloth that would hold the splint in place.

  Hero stepped away from the table slightly and arched her back. “What time is it?”

  Her father extracted his watch from a pocket. “Almost nine.”

  “Oh, dear. And we’ve still his ribs to see to. Papa, why don’t you go and get your foot elevated?” The fact that he offered no protest told her volumes about his degree of pain and lack of stamina.

  She ran her hands along the injured man’s rib cage—bare, this time. His skin was warm—not feverish yet, just warm. As she leaned close, she caught a whiff of cedar and spice. His shaving soap? As she ran her hands over his ribs, she felt and saw some old scars. It occurred to her that if her father’s conjecture was right—and she thought it was—this man had been through more than one campaign. She thought of her brother Michael, two years her senior, still with the British Army of Occupation in Belgium. As a medical man, Michael would not have been directly involved in that awful battle at Waterloo nearly ten months ago, but he would have seen the results firsthand.

  She abandoned these musings and turned to the task at hand: binding broken ribs. With the help of Mrs. Hutchins and Mr. Stewart, she managed to get two wide bands of cloth under the man’s rib cage despite his incoherent protests. She then tied them tightly. Stewart wheeled one of the beds in from the adjoining room. That was another of her father’s brilliant innovations: wheels on patient beds. Stewart blocked the wheels with small wedges of wood and, trying to cause the man as little discomfort as possible, the three of them transferred him from the table to the bed and wheeled the bed back to its customary location next door. They also put side rails in place to prevent the patient’s rolling out of bed. The wheels were again blocked, and he was covered with warm blankets. The transfer process had not been easy because of his size and his state of unconsciousness. His mutterings had decreased significantly and Hero thought he might have drifted into real sleep.

  “I’ll sit wit’ his lordship while ye get a bit o’ rest,” Mrs. Hutchins announced. The older woman, nominally a servant in the doctor’s household, had years ago taken a motherly interest in her employer’s motherless children.

  “‘His lordship’? What makes you think he deserves such an exalted address?”

  “Well, he ain’t no fisherman or farmer with that fine linen shirt an’ them boots.”

  “You may have a point there,” Hero said, “though he could just as well be a member of the gentry as the aristocracy. However, I’d rather you see to breakfast—late as it is. Stewart, will you watch ‘his lordship’ for a few minutes as I freshen up?”

  Twenty minutes later, Hero had hurriedly changed into a comfortable day dress and serviceable shoes and rebraided her hair, arranging the braids in a crown on top of her head. She also grabbed a bit of breakfast, choosing to sit at one end of the kitchen worktable rather than sit alone in the dining room, when Mrs. Hutchins told her that her father had already broken his fast and gone about whatever business called him today. Hero always loved the warmth and the spicy smell of the kitchen.

  Taking with her a bucket of hot water, she reported back to the hospital rooms, where she found not Mr. Stewart, but her father sitting on a chair beside the patient’s bed. She sighed. She should have known.

  “How is he?” she asked, setting down her steaming bucket and reaching to feel the pulse at the base of his neck.

  “Quiet. Getting a bit feverish, though. Have to watch that.”

  “Mrs. Hutchins is calling him ‘his lordship’ until we have a real name for him.”

  “Is she now? We could use someone of that ran
k in this area. Someone to put Willard Teague and his bully boys from the docks of Bristol in their place.”

  “I know, Papa. But you know as well as I do that the only person who could wield such authority is the absentee owner of the Abbey. Ever since Sir Benjamin died—”

  “Now, now, daughter. Don’t you be working yourself into a tizzy over that man’s absence,” her father cautioned mildly.

  “I won’t,” she promised, idly fussing with the bedding covering their patient, “but it is such a shame. That whole estate—the farms, the mine—people are really hurting. Our neighbors! Diana says their roof needs repair. The roof, Papa! He’s responsible.”

  “Never mind, my dear. Your sister knows well enough she and her family need never go without a roof over their heads.”

  “Papa, that is not the point and you know it. Sir Benjamin has been dead for what?—eight years now—and the biggest landholding in the area continues to go downhill. Tenant farmers like Diana’s Milton and those miners—they are all victims of an owner who puts none of his gains back into his holdings. How on earth could anyone with a shred of conscience allow people to suffer so?”

  “No tizzy, remember?” His voice softened. “Of course you are right. But we cannot do much about Weyburn Abbey if the current owner continues to ignore it.” He pointed at their patient. “Best stick to what we can do—like see to this poor fellow.” He rose and hobbled on his cane to the door. “Keep an eye on him. Let me know if his temperature rises.”

  Hero placed a hand on the patient’s forehead. “Not bad at the moment. And, Papa, you should be in the drawing room with your foot elevated!”

  “I’ll go as soon as I see to Jupiter. Perkins says that gash above his left foreleg is not healing well and Jupiter will not allow anyone in the stable to touch it.”

  “You be careful now,” she said automatically. She worried about her father’s doing too much, but she hadn’t the heart—let alone the authority—to force her stubborn parent to slow down. Maybe when Michael comes home, she mused.

  She poured clean water into a bowl, dipped a clean cloth into it, and, parting the patient’s lips, dribbled a bit of liquid into his mouth. She was pleased to see his throat move as he swallowed.

  “We must see that you get enough water,” she said to the inert figure.

  Leaving open the door between the surgery and the room where he lay, Hero set about putting the surgery back in order. Mr. Stewart had already swept the floor and restored the litter to its proper place, upright in a corner. She washed the instruments they had used and the surgical table, then placed a clean sheet on it, noting that Mr. Stewart had already taken the soiled one, along with the patient’s clothing, out to the washhouse.

  She looked around for something else to do, but all seemed in order. Again, she forced a bit of water into him, then took the chair her father had vacated and just sat there watching that rather disturbingly handsome man breathe. She chastised herself for not thinking of bringing a book or her knitting. One of his hands lay at his side outside the blanket. Noting that the nails were mostly free of dirt, she lifted the hand in her own. It was much larger than hers, with long, well-shaped fingers. Suddenly, he seemed to grip her hand, and he mumbled something; it sounded to her like “Damnation, Ollie!” Then he loosened his hold and fell silent again.

  “Well,” she murmured, putting his arm and hand back under the covers, “there’s something going on in that mind of yours. Let’s hope you wake up sooner rather than later.”

  She dozed off, resting her head on her arms folded on the edge of the bed. She was startled awake when Stewart touched her shoulder.

  “Doc says I should relieve you, Miss Hero. Says you should have a proper nap.”

  “Oh. Oh, all right.” She yawned and showed Stewart how to dribble water into the patient. “Don’t hesitate to ring for me if you need to,” she said, gesturing at the bellpull at the head of the bed.

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Chapter 2

  She had a nap, albeit a short one. Then she returned to the side of her patient. Beginning to think of the process as not unlike watering a plant to keep it alive, she gave him a bit of water, then set about making up a schedule of two-hour shifts for herself and others of the household to watch over him—with strict instructions to call her immediately in the event of any changes. Out of worry for her father’s health, she would have left him off the schedule, but she knew he would feel slighted if she did not include him. As would Mrs. Hutchins, who, besides having her household duties, was of an age with Hero’s father. Dorcas was thrilled to be asked to help watch over “such a fine-lookin’ feller”—until she had been at it for about fifteen minutes and discovered watching another person breathe and moistening his lips occasionally was not such a thrill after all. A young footman shared Dorcas’s lack of enthusiasm for the task, but both performed it without too much protest.

  Shortly before supper, the Whitby household received a visit from Samuel Porter, the blacksmith and mayor of the town of Weyburn.

  “Heard you got yourselves a new patient,” announced Porter, a man whose physique fitted—or resulted from—his profession. Hero’s age, he was of medium height, but had shoulders as wide as the door. Hero had helped in the delivery of two of his four children; each time the strongest man in the town—who had been through the process before—hovered anxiously outside the bedroom where his wife, knowing he was there, tried to control her cries of pain. Hero had grown up with both of them and had always envied the closeness between Sam Porter and his Susie.

  “Yes, we have a new patient,” Dr. Whitby said as the visitor was shown into the library, where the doctor sat with his foot propped on a footstool and Hero had been reading about blows to the human head in one of her brother Michael’s medical books.

  “Know who he is yet?” Porter asked, still clutching his cap in his hand.

  “Haven’t a clue,” the doctor replied. “Hero, take Sam out to have a look. See if he knows him.”

  Hero led the way to the hospital rooms, asking about Susie and the Porter children as she did so. Dorcas sat at the patient’s side with a pile of assorted cloths on a small stool near her chair, needle and thread in her hand. She looked up with a smile, welcoming the interruption.

  “I hate mending,” she announced without preamble, “but Aunt Mary says I ‘might as well do something useful while I’m here.’” She imitated her aunt’s speech, then added in her own youthful tone, “Hello, Mr. Porter.”

  Porter nodded at the girl. “Dorcas.” He stepped nearer the bed and studied the patient, then said, “I never saw him before, but Wellman said some feller rode through town yesterday—late afternoon. Well dressed, Wellman said. Asked directions to the Abbey, but didn’t say anything else.”

  Wellman, the town’s butcher, owned the town’s mercantile store, which also held the post office. Hero knew that Bertie Wellman would have been disappointed that a new face in town did not stop to supply him with more information.

  “Maybe he is a lord then.” Dorcas was obviously excited at the prospect. “The owner, maybe.”

  “Don’t mean to dash your hopes, Dorcas,” Porter said, “but the man who owns the Abbey is a real nob—son of a duke. Those sorts travel in fancy carriages with outriders and all.”

  “I s’pose you’re right,” she said glumly.

  “And besides that,” Hero said, “Papa thinks this man was a soldier.”

  “Well, some nobs is also soldiers,” Dorcas said, sounding defensive.

  “The main seat of the Duke of Thornleigh is way up north in Yorkshire,” Porter explained. “I doubt any member of that family would be traveling down here on horseback. Alone.” Porter put his cap back on his head and turned to Hero. “I gotta get goin’. Susie will have supper on the table already. Let me know if you find out who he is.”

  Hero had no sooner seen Porter on his way
than two more visitors arrived at the Whitby gate. The elder Jacobs man jumped down from the wagon as his son sat holding the reins of their horse. The father handed Hero a package wrapped in newspaper.

  “Cod. Good fishin’ today, Miss Hero.”

  “Let me pay you for this,” she said.

  “Now, Miss Hero, you know well as I do it ain’t bin a year since you saved my Aggie. The deal was I’d keep you supplied with fish for a year.”

  “Well, thank you,” she said, acquiescing.

  “So, how’s our man a-doin’?”

  “He’s still unconscious.”

  “Did Porter know ʼim? Saw Sam leavin’ as we drove up.”

  “No. Still no clues. Though Mr. Wellman is said to have spoken with a stranger riding through yesterday afternoon. Asked directions to the Abbey.”

  “Hmm. That’s not necessarily good news, now, is it? Could be he has business with Teague.”

  “Now, Pa,” the younger Jacobs cautioned. “You promised not to be sayin’ anything openly against Mr. Teague. ʼTain’t safe.”

  “I can surely speak freely with Miss Hero.”

  The son merely shrugged.

  The Jacobs men took their leave and Hero took the fish into the kitchen.

  “More fish, eh?” Mrs. Hutchins commented. “It’s good at least some of your patients pays you in real money. Just put it on the table there. I’ll have Davey take it out to the well house when he comes in for supper.” Davey, twin brother of the teenage Dorcas, helped out in the Whitby stable, but also functioned as an extra footman, doing odd jobs for Stewart, mostly outside.

  Concerned that her patient remained unconscious, Hero had checked on him throughout the afternoon and evening, seeing little change in all those hours. Before retiring for the night, she reiterated that the “night watchers” should notify her immediately of any change. Thus it was that half after two the next morning she answered a soft knock at her bedroom door to find a nervous Stewart standing there.

  “I went to relieve Mrs. Hutchins and the two of us think maybe you’d better come to see to his lordship. He’s moanin’ to beat all an’ he’s thrashin’ about some.”