her fiancé with a hug.
‘I am only flesh and blood and I want a wife,’ Peter said. ‘You are not a children’s nanny, my dear, but my fiancée.’ He paced to and fro, fingers flexing at his sides. ‘As soon as I have the time I am going to Ireland to find that confounded woman. I’ll search everywhere for her and make her look after her children.’
‘You cannot do that, Peter,’ Faye said, stifling her annoyance. ‘The children don’t want to go to Ireland...and I won’t make them—’ Faye broke off at the sound of a vehicle rattling along. The hunched figure of Bertram Gideon, pipe clamped in his mouth, hove into view. And he was alone.
Faye immediately pushed open the door and sped to meet him. ‘Is the doctor coming soon?’ she gasped.
‘He’s been called out already this morning. Gone to the big house so his servant told me.’ Bert climbed down from the cart and lifted up one of his horse’s back legs, tenderly prodding it.
‘Dr Reid is at Valeside Manor?’
Bert nodded. ‘I’ve left a message with his housekeeper to send him right over when he do get back.’
‘Perhaps they have scarlatina at the manor as well.’ Faye paced to and fro in agitation. ‘Oh, how long will he be, do you think?’
‘I was on me way to Valeside to tell the doctor he be wanted here urgent, but Daisy threw a shoe so I turned around. Getting her and the cart down that hill and up again would have crippled her to bits, poor lassie.’
‘You mustn’t worry too much, my dear.’ Peter clasped Faye’s hands, giving them a comforting squeeze. ‘Your brother was fit as a fiddle just yesterday and eating like a glutton.’ He sighed. ‘I can’t be of much help to you so I’ll leave you be.’ He gave Faye a lingering look. ‘Write to me and we’ll speak more about a trip to Ireland when I return next time.’
‘I will write...and you must take care, Peter.’ Faye smiled weakly. ‘Good luck with your promotion.’
Mr Gideon also watched Peter mounting his stallion and waving farewell. He removed the clay pipe from his mouth. ‘That horse ain’t lame then,’ he said sourly.
Faye knew what Mr Gideon was hinting at: Peter could have offered to go to Valeside Manor and give the doctor a message to save time. People were always wary of coming into contact with disease and would avoid it if possible. Nevertheless, Faye felt disappointed that her fiancé hadn’t offered his assistance in that small way.
‘I’ll get the smithy to take a look at Daisy, then I’ll set off over to the manor and catch the doctor there if there’s still no sign of him.’
‘No! You can’t walk that distance, Mr Gideon.’ Faye frowned at the elderly fellow’s bowed legs. He had difficulty climbing up on to his cart at times due to his swollen joints; he’d never manage to walk over three miles. ‘I’ll go. I can run and perhaps the doctor might turn up in the meantime. I’ll be back as soon as I can.’
Valeside Manor was set at the end of a meandering avenue of lime trees that widened, after about half a mile, on to a circle of gravel with a central fountain and wide flagstone treads leading to the house.
It was an imposing crenelated edifice flanked on either side by heavily timbered wings, extending like arms to embrace manicured lawns and parterres.
Determined not to be spotted dashing up to the front steps like a hoyden, Faye had kept to the shelter of the ancient limes. When so close to the manor’s huge oaken doors that she could feel a cool mist on her hot face she came to a standstill, catching her breath.
Leaning her back against the bole of the nearest tree, she watched the fountain droplets glistening with rainbow light as they sprayed high into the air. Her body was trembling with the exertion of running up hills and down dales, her chest rising and falling rapidly. She dried her perspiring hands on her skirts, then attempted smoothing her wild fair hair into the pins at her nape. Her bonnet had long ago loosened to drape down her back on its ribbons. She guessed she looked a fright, but something more important than that was bothering her. There was no sign of the doctor’s pony and trap in front of the house; she prayed she’d not had a wasted journey and that he had parked in the stable courtyard at the back of the building. With a deep inhalation she set off to find out because she had no intention of banging on Mr Kavanagh’s door for no reason.
‘Is it me you’re looking for, Miss Shawcross?’
Swinging about with a startled gasp, Faye stared up into a pair of the deepest blue eyes she had ever seen. For a moment she was tongue-tied, overwhelmed by the striking sight of him astride his magnificent horse. He was handsome...breathtakingly so...but it was the awful knowledge that he must have been watching her for some while that made colour flood her complexion. He had come up through the trees as she had and the blood pounding in her ears from running had deafened her to his approach. The idea that he’d seen her haring in and out of the woodland with her skirts lifted high about her knees was mortifying.
‘Do you want me?’
His lilting Irish accent was making his rephrased question seem more intimate than it was, Faye imagined as she felt her blush deepen.
‘I’m looking for the doctor, sir,’ she managed to utter crisply. ‘We were told he came here earlier. Is he inside?’ She skittered backwards as Mr Kavanagh dismounted and started towards her. ‘You should keep your distance, sir; I think my brother might have scarlatina. It spreads quickly, you know.’ She glanced at his house, wondering if those inside were under quarantine. ‘Has somebody here got scarlatina? Is that why you sent for Dr Reid?’
‘The physician was called to treat a groom who’d tumbled off a nag. There’s no infection that I know of.’ He plunged his hands into the pockets of his long leather coat, continuing to pace her way.
‘I see; is Dr Reid still here? I must speak to him urgently.’
‘He’s gone. I’ve just passed him on the road to Wilverton.’ He jerked his dark head towards the town.
Faye felt her heart sink. ‘Thank you, sir, for telling me.’ She gave a farewell nod, but it seemed he had no intention of letting her go yet and changed direction as she did.
She avoided him, feeling overpowered by his thrilling virility, but then swung about, angry at herself for allowing him to fluster her. She was a betrothed woman of twenty-five years, guardian to two children, not a green girl acting shy with a boy. ‘You should stay back from me, sir...scarlatina is a nasty illness,’ she said firmly.
‘I know it is. I had it when a lad and lived to tell the tale. It holds no fears for me now.’
‘You are indeed lucky, then. The idea of one of my family having the disease terrifies me.’ Faye sketched a little bob. ‘I’m sorry to have bothered you, sir.’ She set off again, walking, but intending to break into a run as soon as she was out of sight.
‘Are you going to Wilverton to find Reid?’
‘I’m heading home, sir.’ Faye sent that over a shoulder, then turned about, pacing backwards. ‘The doctor already has a message to come immediately to Mulberry House.’ Whichever way she stepped either his muscular body or that of his stallion seemed to be blocking her path, preventing her marching on.
‘I’ll give you a ride home on horseback. It’ll be quicker; you look too exhausted to run another step.’
‘No! That is, I thank you kindly for the offer, sir, but there is no need.’ Faye felt her face prickle in embarrassment; he had watched her haring about then.
‘Surely there is a need; you must be gravely concerned about your brother to risk visiting this den of iniquity in search of the physician.’
So he was aware the neighbourhood was agog