Page 22 of Snapdragons
“Get—him—out—first.” Water sprayed from Lucas’s mouth as he pushed each word out.
Niles and Kes each took hold of one of the young man’s arms and helped him up onto the boat launch. He was no more than fifteen years old, and though he wasn’t unconscious, he was clearly shaken to his very core. Miss Seymour was there on the boat launch and wrapped the young man in one of the wool blankets they’d been using for their picnic. It was grass stained but dry.
They pulled Lucas up out of the water as well. Miss Seymour immediately wrapped him in another blanket.
“What happened?” Miss Seymour asked the servant who’d not fallen in.
“He slipped. Slipped right into the water. He don’t know how to swim.”
Through chattering teeth, Lucas asked the sodden young man, “Why are you . . . tending to a boat . . . if you . . . can’t swim?”
Shivering as well, the boy answered, his voice identifying his homeland as India, “Because... I am... expendable.”
“No person . . . is ever expendable,” Lucas said.
The group of picnickers the young man worked as a servant for were making their way slowly toward the boat launch, none looking motivated by compassion. The young man watched them warily and with a hint of worry.
“Don’t you fret about them,” Kes said.
“I will be... dismissed without... references.” Poor young man sounded despondent in addition to being cold.
“Concentrate on warming up,” Miss Seymour insisted.
Holding his own blanket tight around himself, Lucas moved to the young man’s side. “We’ll walk with you... back to the inn. If your employer objects... we’ll deal with that as well.”
“You are . . . very kind, sir.”
Lucas motioned for him to begin walking. “What’s your name?”
“I am . . . called Wilson.”
An entire crowd had gathered around the boat launch, including all the others from Pledwick Manor.
Miss Seymour spoke quietly to Niles. “You managed to get rather wet as well. You ought to find a fireplace at the inn to sit near for a time.”
He took a look at himself and found hewasa bit soaked from the ordeal. “You were thinking fast on your feet, bringing the blankets like you did. Well done, Miss Seymour.”
“Tell my brother that, if you get a chance. He’ll be upset that I was running as fast as I was, which is generally not considered very ladylike.”
“No matter what he says, coming to the aid of another person is heroic.”
With a smile that proved unexpectedly tender, she said, “Then, you, Mr. Niles Greenberry, are a hero.”
Chapter Nine
Mr. Layton had sent hiscoachman back to Pledwick Manor to fetch a change of clothes for both Lord Jonquil and young Wilson. Both waterlogged men had spent the interim in rooms at the inn, sitting in front of fires, and once the coachman had returned, they had changed into dry clothing.
In the meantime, the rest of the party had gathered in the inn’s private dining room, joined by the group Wilson worked for. Penelope didn’t usually pass judgment on people upon first acquaintance, but she found herself entirely displeased with those who’d joined them.
“I will not pay for the room that boy has been in,” one of the others said to the innkeeper when he came in to stoke the fire in the dining room. “He ought to have been sent to the stables.”
Mr. Layton spoke up before the innkeeper had to. “Youaren’tpaying for the room;Iam.”
“That boy already has ideas above himself,” the same sour-faced gentleman said. “You are making a great deal of trouble for my household, making him think he warrants special treatment.”
“Do you considernotbeing required to tend to a boat when one doesn’t know how to swim to be ‘special treatment’?” Niles asked, standing near the fire.
The room seemed to jump a little, not in surprise at what he’d said but in having, apparently, forgotten he was there.
