Page 66 of Libby's London Merchant
Libby thought about the stolen gift she had received only that morning. “My brother is a scoundrel. Will your father and the other men track him?”
The little girl glanced again at her mother for reassurance. “Mama says that would depend on which direction he is traveling.”
Libby nodded. “Thank you, my dear.” She leaned closer. “Stay off your leg all you can.”
The girl smiled and hurried away. Libby let Anthony help her into the gig again.
“I wonder whose animals Joseph recognized and is bearing away?” he asked when they left the village.
“Your father’s, I think,” she said. “The squire told me only this morning that he was missing two horses.”
The doctor managed a thin smile, his eyes troubled. “My father doesn’t deserve such kindness from Joseph.”
They drove from Dewhurst, no wiser than before about Joseph Ames’ whereabouts. “All we really know is that there are two more horses now,” Libby said, taking inventory. “I doubt Joseph knows the way back to your father’s estate. And now it is getting dark.”
It should not have been dark so soon, on this week of the midsummer’s fair, but the sky was gray with clouds that grew blacker as they traveled in the general vicinity of Holyoke, trying little-known paths the doctor barely remembered from his childhood, and backtracking when they thought they saw something among the trees.
The rain began as they backed out of yet another dead-end path that had appeared so promising. Without a word, Anthony stripped off his coat and wrapped it around her. It could have gone around her twice, but Libby pulled it close, thankful for the warmth.
“I should have done that sooner,” he said, his eyes squinting into the gathering gloom. “You’ve been shivering this past half-hour and more. Sprig muslin is not fabric suited for adventuring, although it is remarkably attractive on you.”
She moved closer to him. ‘‘In the Peninsula, Mama dressed me in serge and flannel, but that never seemed adventurous to me. Only think what a dull life I lead now.”
Anthony held up his hand. “Did you hear that?”
Nerves on alert, she listened. At first there was only the sound of rain and leaves blowing about on bending branches, and then she heard it. Someone sneezed again and again.
Anthony cupped his hands around his mouth. “Joseph! Joseph!” he called.
Libby strained to see through the rain. She gripped the doctor’s arm. “Look, there he is. Joseph, over here!”
“Can’t see a thing,” the doctor muttered. “Spectacles all wet.”
Libby leapt out of the gig and splashed along the road to the figure that was coining toward them, head down, arms slapping his chest to keep warm. Behind him trailed three equally sodden horses.
Libby grabbed her brother and hugged him.
“Libby?” he said, then threw his arms around her. “Libby, I was so lost. And here are these horses and I can’t remember when I got them, or where they are supposed to go, and they keep following me.”
He was on the ragged edge of hysteria. She turned around to call for the doctor, but Anthony was right beside her. He took a firm grip of Joseph’s shoulders and shook him gently.
“You’re fine, laddy. These horses belong to my father and you are returning them to him. The other horse is your uncle’s hunter. Laddy, you’re just blue with cold.’’
Libby took off the doctor’s coat and wrapped it around her brother, who was looking back at the horses, recognition in his eyes. “That’s it,’’ he exclaimed, pumping the doctor’s hand in gratitude. “I remember now!’’ His face fell again. “But I really am lost.”
The doctor put one arm about Joseph and the other about Libby. “Laddy, you are in luck. I know precisely where we are.”
Joseph burst into tears and the doctor tightened his grip on his patient. Libby started to cry, too, tears of relief, and Anthony laughed. “Here I stand, a soggy petunia in the midst of the Ames watering pots.”
The idea of the portly physician as a petunia captivated Libby’s tired brain and she laughed along with him. Joseph did not join in, but his tears stopped. The horses trailed along behind them like large, bedraggled hounds.
Anthony helped Joseph into the gig and then handed Libby up to him. “Here, lad, she’ll have to sit on your lap. I would graciously volunteer, but I am busy with the reins.”
Whistling to himself as the rain drummed down, the doctor tied the horses to the back of the gig and started off again, moving faster down the lane and keeping up a spanking pace until they saw the glow of a single lamp in a crofter’s cottage. The doctor pointed. “Maud and Wallis Casey,” he said. “We’ll be six in a bed tonight, but won’t we be warm.”
The door was flung open wide to the doctor’s knock, and they were pulled inside. Wallis Casey sized up the situation and led the horses off to the bam, which made up the larger half of the cottage. He was followed by three or four little Caseys, laughing, dodging the puddles, and hollering that they wanted to help.
Almost before he knew what was happening, Joseph was stripped of his wet clothes, tucked in someone’s nightshirt, and plopped into the middle of a large bed that filled one side of the cottage. At Maud’s command, another two other Caseys leapt into bed, too, cuddling close to Libby’s brother. Joseph looked about in amazement, accepted his fate without a murmur, and closed his eyes.
