* *
The youth carrying the food tray grinned at Lucas. ‘You’ll have to forgive Mairi. She has a bee in her bonnet about something, I’ll give you that.’
‘I understand she tended to me these last three days,’ Lucas responded. ‘She must be quite fatigued.’
‘Well, I helped some,’ the boy said. He lifted the tray slightly. ‘I’ve brought you some food. Shall I set the tray on the table or would you like to eat on the bed?’
‘The table.’ After the doctor had left, Lucas had forced himself not to crawl back under the bedcovers, but he’d not progressed beyond sitting on the bed’s edge.
He rose, holding on to the bedpost until he knew his legs would support him. He marshalled enough energy to walk the few steps to the chair by the table. He nearly collapsed into it.
‘Mairi said your name is Lucas.’ Niven set the tray in front of him.
He ought to have introduced himself. ‘That is so.’
The boy flopped down on a second wooden chair at the table. ‘Mr Grassie said you were in the army, because of the scars on your chest. Is that so?’
They’d seen his scars? Of course they had. He’d been nearly naked.
‘Not any more,’ he replied, wishing the boy would probe no further. He tore off a piece of bread and swallowed a small bite. ‘Tell me what you know of how I came to be here,’ he said instead. ‘Your sister said very little of it.’
The boy was eager to answer. ‘Davina and I found you. Davina is my other sister. You saw her before when we came in.’
He told the story in great detail with emphasis on the speed of his running to seek help from his older sister and again to send for the wagon that had carried Lucas back from one of the hills on their property, a hill that possessed a stone circle. Flashes of memory returned. The rain. Staggering to a stone that kept the cold wind from his back. Voices—Niven’s and Davina’s voices, he now surmised.
Mairi Wallace had waited with him until the wagon came. It seemed she’d been at his side right from the beginning.
‘How was it your sister was the one to care for me?’ Why not a servant? Or their mother?
‘Mairi? She wouldn’t let anybody else,’ the boy responded. ‘Except for me. I sat with you when she had to eat or rest or something, but she wouldn’t let me touch you. Said nobody else should get close.’
Because they could become ill? What about her? She had risked illness tending to him.
Lucas took a long gulp of ale. ‘Were there no servants who could help?’
‘Mairi would not hear of it,’ Niven replied. ‘We don’t have that many servants, anyway. Several have left us recently.’ Niven leaned back, balancing on the back legs of the chair. ‘So Mairi thinks she has to do everything to make up for it.’ The chair slipped, but he caught it in time to right it again. ‘If Mama knew it, she’d be very cross.’ He grinned mischievously. ‘Mama thinks the servants are still doing all the work. I tease Mairi that I’ll tell Mama she’s doing it. Or making Davina and me do it. Mairi becomes too iron-handed at times. She can be the most insufferable nag.’
Mairi sounded incredibly burdened. More so now with him barely able to stand.
‘Why did your servants leave?’ Lucas asked.
‘I think they wanted to get paid,’ Niven replied. ‘Things are a little tight for us at the moment.’
That was quite an admission. Lucas had apparently wound up in a household that could not afford one extra mouth.
The boy chattered on as Lucas finished the soup. An hour passed pleasantly enough and Lucas learned more about the family than he suspected Niven’s older sister would have wished.
There was a rap on the door and Niven called out, ‘Come in.’
Miss Wallace—Mairi—entered. Lucas stood, but braced himself on the table.
‘Niven!’ She glared at her brother. ‘I’ve been searching for you. What are you doing in here? You should not be bothering this man.’
Niven looked petulant. ‘We were conversing. Conversing isn’t bothering.’
‘It is when he’s unwell,’ she retorted. ‘Take the dishes back to the kitchen, then wait for me. I need your help.’ She turned to Lucas. ‘I’ve brought your purse, Mr Lucas.’ She handed it to him.
‘Thank you, Miss Wallace.’ His hand brushed hers as he took it from her. ‘I appreciate that.’
Niven glanced towards Lucas and rolled his eyes. ‘I suppose I must do her bidding. Good day, Lucas.’
‘Thank you for bringing the food.’
‘Mairi made me do it.’ The boy grinned. ‘But I did not mind.’
‘Go!’ Miss Wallace commanded.
Niven slowly slid off the chair and ambled from the room.
Miss Wallace turned her lovely blue eyes on Lucas. ‘I am terribly sorry. He wasn’t supposed to stay.’
‘He was no bother,’ Lucas assured her. ‘Thank you for the food, Miss Wallace. I am much restored.’
She shrugged. ‘Cook had the soup already made.’
Her gaze caught his and held. Her presence soothed him. He did not want her to leave.
She glanced towards the door and back. ‘Do you require anything else?’
He would not hold her there, much as he wished to.
He rubbed his chin. ‘My satchel? My razor should be in it.’
She nodded. ‘Your satchel was also hung to dry. That night you spent out on the hill, it rained quite heavily.’ She started for the door. ‘I will have Niven bring it to you.’
Not her?
‘I will leave you now.’ Their gazes caught again, but she turned towards the door.
‘Miss Wallace?’
She looked back at him.
‘I am grateful to you. More than I can say.’
She lifted the latch on the door and walked out.
Lucas was left alone with only his memories and regrets. He closed his eyes, wishing he had the company of a bottle of whisky. Or two.
Mairi again left his room with her heart racing. When the Englishman looked at her with those vivid blue eyes all she could see was pain. Not physical pain, but the kind that reaches down into one’s soul, the kind of pain with which she was acutely familiar. It felt like a bond with him.
What nonsense, though.
She shook off the feeling and hurried to the kitchen, where Niven was happily munching on some biscuits Cook had given him.
‘Niven, I need you to bring Mr Lucas his clothing and satchel and everything that was in it. They are in the footmen’s room.’
Her brother looked up at her. ‘Zounds, Mairi. No need to bark orders at me. I want to help.’
She walked over to him and ruffled his hair, which always annoyed him. ‘I am sorry, Niven. I do not know what I would do without you.’
He ran a testy hand through his hair, but looked up at her with serious eyes. ‘Do you need me to forgo my visit with Crawfurd?’
Niven knew their family was in financial difficulty, but Mairi did not have the