Defiant Captive Page 25

  "I see."

  Hawke's eyebrows rose in sharp slants. "And what precisely does that mean, Miss Maitland?"

  Replacing the miniature and raising another, Alexandra appeared not to have heard. A pale young boy of four or five with a thin clever face looked out from the painting in her hands. He was resting against the broad trunk of an oak — the Sussex oak in Hawkeswish park, unless she was mistaken. But it was his eyes that held her attention, for they were bold and perceptive, yet touched with haunting sadness. "And this, I take it, is —"

  "My son, Robbie. Poor little lad — not that she cared how it might affect him, damn her soul."

  "It was recently painted?"

  "Last year at his birthday. Lawrence caught his likeness rather well, I think." Hawke's voice hardened. "Right down to the sadness in his eyes."

  The boy's face disturbed Alexandra more than she cared to admit, and she forced herself to remember whose son he was. "He looks very clever and more than a touch willful. But that is to be expected of your offspring, I suppose."

  Hawke's eyes flashed sparks of silver fire. "Next you'll be telling me you have gypsy blood," he said mockingly. "When I need a fortune-teller, I must be sure to send for you."

  Alexandra's fingers tightened on the miniature.

  "Don't do it," Hawke warned. "I'm not so weak that I can't make you very sorry."

  "You are as crude as ever, I see. I won't take this ceaseless bantering and sarcasm, do you hear?"

  Her breath came fast and jerky as she glared back at him, the air between them electric with tension.

  "Then leave my son out of it. He's had enough pain. This affair is between you and me only!"

  Just then, there was a commotion outside the door, followed by a babel of voices and insistent knocking. Shadwell appeared at the door, his face white and his usually pristine livery askew.

  "Well?" Hawkesworth demanded sharply.

  "A footman's just come from London, Your Grace." Shadwell's voice was unsteady. "There's news — very bad news, I'm afraid." The butler held out a cream-colored envelope. "He brought this."

  Hawke ripped open the envelope, and his eyes flew across the scribbled lines. For long moments he stared blindly at the page, an expression of disbelief on his face. Finally, he looked up at Shadwell, his jaw hard and set. The letter fell forgotten to the floor. "Let's have the rest of it."

  "You know about — about what happened yesterday. The boy's been half out of his mind since, it seems. The footman says he slipped from the house later in the afternoon and was out in the rain for several hours before they found him. His — his lungs may be affected. He's been coughing and feverish, asking for you regular. The doctor fears he'll get worse before he gets better and begs you to return as quickly as possible."

  Hawke's long fingers closed tightly around the rosewood arm of the settee. His eyes were stark with pain, reminding Alexandra of his son's. Blindly, they searched out the miniature in her hands.

  A painful silence settled over the room in the wake of the butler's words. Wretchedness welled up in Hawke's face as he stared at his son's picture.

  None of this mattered to her, Alexandra reminded herself. She hated this man. She would always hate him.

  "Robbie," the duke whispered hoarsely, "what in God's name have we done to you?"

  * * * * *

  In the next hours pandemonium descended upon the great house. Nervous footmen darted up and down between the study and the duke's chambers, readying baggage and taking a flurry of last-minute instructions. Wide-eyed housemaids sped back and forth between the kitchens and the stables, a thousand questions trembling on their lips.

  Jeffers and Pence prepared the fastest coach for the trip to London. Hawke decided to spare the aged Jeffers the rigors of the trip and take one of the younger men. But the old servant fairly sputtered with anger when Hawke told him.

  "You do that, and I reckon I'll — I'll be turning in my notice, Your Grace. No matter that I've worked here for thirty-five years nor don't find myself desirous of looking for a new position."

  A faint glimmer of thanks pierced the dark distraction of the duke's face. "Thank you for coming with me, Jeffers. 'Twould be hard to replace you."

  "The post chaise'll be around in a half hour," Jeffers said. "Everything else is being prepared as you directed."

  "Good man," Hawke said, then returned to the letter he was scribbling to his solicitor.

  A knock at the door brought him up with a frown. "Oh, it's you," he said curtly to Alexandra, who had come at his summons. With a distracted air he directed her to a chair beside the desk. "You're to accompany me to London," he announced, his tone clipped and impersonal. "Be ready to leave within the hour."

  Alexandra gasped at his colossal arrogance. "Not in an hour or a day or a year!" she snapped.

  The duke's lip curled. "I don't recall offering you a choice, Miss Maitland."

  "Of course not! It would be beneath you to make a polite request of anyone."

  "Damn it, must you always argue, woman?"

  "Must you always be so insolent?" she countered furiously.

  Hawke put down his pen and stared at her, his expression forbidding. "You are coming with me," he said acidly. "I'll not risk Telford getting his hands on you."

  "Or me getting away from you." Alexandra did not blink before his harsh gaze. "Very well," she said finally. "Since you'll be far too busy with your son to pay much attention to me. Especially if the contagion has set into his lungs." Yes, she would enjoy watching Hawke suffer, Alexandra told herself.

  The man at the desk frowned, his mouth tightening into a thin line. "You are familiar with the disease?"

  "Sickness is a way of life in India. I've seen pneumonia and a great deal worse," Alexandra said grimly. "If the boy truly has pneumonia, the chief danger will come in the first days. The fever builds, you see, until it saps every last bit of the victim's strength." She spoke very clearly, taking merciless pleasure in describing the course of the disease.

  "Good God!" Hawke passed an unsteady hand across his face, and it came away damp with sweat. Shaken, he stared at Alexandra, but with a hint of steel about his eyes. "What else? You think to hurt me, but the more I know, the better I can prepare."

  "If it is pneumonia, the boy will be in a great deal of pain. He won't want to rest or drink, but he must to survive. And if the fever is extreme, he will recognize neither you nor his surroundings."

  Every word drove another spike into Hawke's heart. "I shall try to remember that."

  Alexandra stood abruptly, liking herself as little as she liked the man who studied her so coldly. "Of course, if the boy is even half as thick skinned as his father, he will certainly survive." Then she was gone, leaving the faint scent of lilies drifting in the air behind her.

  For long minutes the duke did not move, staring at the doorway where she had disappeared. The pallor of his face was marked, and new lines etched his brow.

  Suddenly he was back at Corunna, with the clank of oxcarts and the moans of dying English soldiers ringing in his ears. The cold was fierce, and the smell of death hung over everything ...

  Slowly, Hawke's eyes closed, and his head slanted forward onto his clenched fists.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Those first hours of travel were a nightmare. By mutual consent, the two people in the carriage did not speak. Hawke was fighting continual pain as he was bounced over rutted country roads. Sitting in the post chaise was impossible, so he stretched out along the length of one seat.

  The sun had been disappearing in a blaze of crimson when they left Hawkeswish's main gate, and twilight had soon bled the landscape to gray. With the advent of darkness the journey had become even rougher. On the box Jeffers had to squint to judge the road in the meager light cast by the carriage's two lanterns. Occasionally, Alexandra heard the old man grumble that it was downright dangerous to keep such a pace in the dark, and she had to agree.

  She tried without success to sleep. Finall
y, with a frustrated sigh, she bent forward to look out the window, where the road stretched west like a ribbon of silver in the moonlight. The moon inched gradually higher, veiled by a pale curtain of clouds. At some point the roads improved — was it after hours or minutes? Alexandra wondered — and the post chaise began to bowl along under Jeffers's expert hand, raising clouds of silver dust along the chalky road.

  The was no sound from Hawke. Alexandra dozed fitfully, awoke, and then slept once more. Not long after, she was roused by the grumbling complaints of sleepy hostlers and the neighing of horses. She was rubbing her bleary eyes when Hawke moved into the moonlight, the hard planes of his face suddenly splashed with silver.

  Alexandra nearly gasped. His eyes were bleak and bottomless, his ashen face deeply etched with lines of pain and fatigue. The coach door was thrown open by Hawke's rangy groom.

  "Uckfield, Your Grace."

  Alexandra rose awkwardly to her feet and took Jeffers's arm down the steps to the ground. Without a word Hawkesworth followed, his expression stony. At the doorway of the inn a fat publican met them, hurriedly drying stubby fingers on his greasy apron. One commanding look from Hawkesworth was enough to send the man scurrying ahead to the second floor, where a hearty repast awaited them in the inn's best private parlor.

  During the meal Hawke's impatience smoldered, never far below the surface. He strode to a window that opened over the courtyard. Wordlessly, Alexandra prepared a plate for him, then forced herself to eat something.

  "What, no hysterics, Miss Maitland?" Hawkesworth dropped into the opposite chair, an eyebrow quirked in surprise as she offered him a heaping plate. "No reproaches about the indifferent food or the wretched pace I've set?"

  "Would it do any good?"

  "Nicely reasoned. But that would not keep any number of females of my acquaintance from raking me over the coals just the same." Hawke tried to eat, only to push aside his plate almost untouched a moment later. There was a hard look on his face as he reached for the excellent Burgundy the landlord had thoughtfully provided.

  "Do you join me?"

  "I think not."

  "By that, you mean I'd best not have any either?"

  "It cannot be good for your wound," Alexandra said coolly.

  With a dull crack the glass crashed down onto the table, splashing Burgundy onto the scarred wood. "And what bloody concern is that of yours?" he demanded.

  "Absolutely none," she answered brusquely.

  Hawke's hand shot across the table and caught her fingers. Alexandra frowned, looking down at their hands upon the wine-spattered table — one small and one large, one ivory and one bronze.

  One soft and one most painfully hard.

  "Forgive me," he said gruffly, his long fingers tightening.

  "For which offense?" Alexandra asked bitterly. "There have been so very many, after all."

  "And always you were the blameless one? Your litany of virtues grows monotonous, I warn you!" Hawke shoved her hand away roughly and pushed back from the table, his chair scraping loudly upon the wooden floor. Angrily he strode to the window and jerked the curtain to one side. "What the devil could be keeping Jeffers? He ought to have made the change by now. I told him half an hour, and not one minute more." With a graphic curse he let the curtain drop, then turned back to face Alexandra, his expression menacing. "You will, by the way, continue to call yourself Mayfield while in London."

  Alexandra choked on the tiny piece of roast beef in her throat. "Are you insane? I will not conceal my identity — not now."

  Hawke crossed his arms over his chest, his lip curled cynically. "Not so long ago, you were determined to conceal your identity — from me, at least. Was that only when you were set on murdering me?"

  "What if it was? You deserved nothing better! I've naught to be ashamed of in the name of Maitland!"

  "If you want my help in clearing your father's name, you'll do as I say, woman! I don't care a tinker's damn about your father's reputation or your prickly ego, but we've made a bargain, and I intend to see it through. If your identity became known now, it would throw all my efforts into jeopardy."

  Her sea-blue eyes narrowed. "As well as give Telford new ammunition against you," she guessed shrewdly.

  Hawke sketched her a mocking little bow. "That too."

  Alexandra slapped her cutlery back down upon the table. "You bloody bastard!" she whispered. "Both of you!"

  "I don't know why that should surprise you," Hawke said coldly, sweeping up his greatcoat. He tossed it awkwardly over his broad shoulders, then strode from the room.

  * * * * *

  Dawn had begun to streak the eastern sky by the time the post chaise entered the outskirts of London. Alexandra was awakened by the raucous cries of sweeps and knife grinders plying their wares against the background clatter of carriages on the crowded thoroughfares. Ignoring the duke, she smoothed her tangled hair and tidied her crumpled skirts, knowing that she must look a sight after the long hours of travel.

  In Bedford Square the post chaise clattered to a halt, and Alexandra wondered what sort of scene awaited them. In spite of her determination to remain aloof, she was curious about this boy who had become an innocent victim of his parents' hatred.

  In a moment Jeffers appeared, his face pale with fatigue, to let down the steps. Though recently wounded, Hawke was tense with raw, explosive energy. He bolted from the carriage, crossed the sidewalk in two strides, and stormed into his elegant townhouse.

  Alexandra climbed down slowly and reached for the small case that Jeffers had just brought down from the boot. She smiled on hearing faint scuffling noises inside the tan hamper. As she walked past a pair of sleepy footmen, they started, surprise creasing their faces.

  "But — but — Your Grace—" the nearer one began uncertainly.

  "Miss Mayfield," Alexandra corrected him, moving calmly inside, her heels tapping across a floor of inlaid marble. It was an imposing structure, she had to admit; her eyes widened at the sight of the grand double staircase of white veined marble overhung with a magnificent chandelier. As grand as its owner, she thought bitterly, stopping beside a fluted marble column that flanked the staircase.

  From the top of the stairs Hawke spun around and glared down at her. "Well? What are you doing down there, damn it?"

  "I haven't the slightest idea," Alexandra snapped. "It was your idea to bring me here, remember?" His eyes flashed with deadly fury, and Alexandra knew a brief moment of fear.

  Never corner a wild animal. Her father's warning from long ago while they prepared for a tiger hunt flashed into Alexandra's mind as she tried not to flinch before Hawke's menacing scowl.

  "Get up here," he growled, "before I carry you up myself! I'll hurt more than your pride if you don't."

  Alexandra's chin rose defiantly as she climbed the stairs, pride and anger set in every line of her back and shoulders.

  Hawke was already striding along the second floor. "I want your opinion about the boy," he said tersely, crossing the landing and moving to the far end of the corridor.

  A hired nurse was hovering by Robbie's door, awaiting their arrival. After a quick glance at the woman's suspiciously bright eyes and ruddy cheeks, Alexandra turned to the slim figure upon the bed. He was resting fitfully, his breathing rapid. Although thinner and paler, he was clearly the same sad-faced boy she had seen in the miniature at Hawkeswish.

  Hawke's breath checked as he drew close to the thin, struggling figure who tossed restlessly upon his pillow, his little frame shaken by bouts of coughing.

  "Doing ever so much better, he is," the mob-capped nurse said unctuously. "Nor so hot as he was, I fancy."

  "You are dismissed," the duke said curtly. "See the butler about your wages."

  The woman began to set up a racket, but Hawke silenced her with an extremely colorful oath. "One more word, and you'll see nothing but the street."

  Mumbling angrily, the nurse backed from the room.

  Gently, Hawke stroked his son's flushed cheek
s, but the boy did not open his eyes nor give any sign of recognizing his father. Hawke's gray eyes were bleak when he turned to Alexandra. "Have you seen this before?"

  Alexandra touched the boy's heated forehead and noted the spots of color that stood out against the waxy pallor of his face. "I'm afraid it is pneumonia," she said quietly. "What has been done for him?"

  Hawke's teeth gnashed audibly, and he smothered a curse. "I'll tell you soon enough," he growled, already plunging toward the door. "Come along."

  The dark-clad doctor was waiting in the study. Without preamble Hawke strode across the room to his desk. His features hardened when he saw the half-empty glass of brandy and his best Chinese porcelain snuff box lying open before the red-faced physician.

  "Miss Mayfield, Dr. Sudbury." With that approximation of an introduction, the duke flung himself down behind his desk and faced the physician, his fingers steepled. "What have you done for the boy, Sudbury? He's burning with fever, man, so weak he can't wiggle a finger!"

  "It is only to be expected in an illness of this sort," the physician said defensively. "Undoubtedly, the fever will burn itself out in several days. In the interim we are following a regimen of bleeding, of course."

  "How many times?" Hawke demanded.

  "Three times daily," the physician said stiffly.

  "That's six bloody times in the past two days! Hell and damnation, man! Is that all you can do? I won't have it, do you hear? The boy's listless enough as it is!"

  "I am sorry to correct you, Your Grace," Sudbury began, bristling with angry self-importance, "but it would be criminal not to carry out a full course of venesection. The boy is young, relatively hardy, and bleeding is, in my considered opinion, the best method of reducing his febrile condition."

  "Speak English, man!" Hawke said with a snort. "Let's face it — you're in a fog and afraid to admit it."