Page 44 of Grasp the Thorn
The horse was fresh and made short work of the hill, and in minutes, Bear approached the gate of Rose Cottage. He pulled the horse to a halt. Better calm himself before he went inside. In his current frame of mind, all his protective instincts aroused by the village scandal-mongers, he was likely to lose his temper and say the wrong thing. He dismounted and took several deep breaths, his eyes on the gate.
What was Pelman doing here? Leaving, apparently, opening the gate and coming through, then looking around and flinching when he saw Bear. He hid the flinch by straightening and puffing out his chest, pushing his shoulders back. “Home are you, Gavenor? About time, but you’ll have to wait in line. I’ve had my turn, and now Redding is having his. They’re around the back in the garden.”
Bear returned sneer for sneer and shoved the poisonous weasel out of his way. “I’ll deal with you later,” he promised. Was Rosa in the garden? Only one way to find out. He rounded the house, scanning what he could see. No Rosa.
He was about to enter by the back door when a puff of breeze brought the sound of murmuring voices. There. Shadows in the shrubbery near the gate to the park. One shadow, rather. A small woman in the arms of a tall man.
Several of his soundless strides brought Bear close enough to confirm what his eyes reported, despite the denial of his mind and the screaming desolation of his heart. Another two steps and he ripped Caleb away from Rosa, felling him with one murderous punch.
His anger roared in his ears, painted his wife’s face with a red haze. Someone called her a filthy harlot. Was that him? His throat was raw with shouting. He wanted to hit Caleb again, but the man was unconscious.
Rosa was shouting back, but he couldn’t hear her words, couldn’t let them in while the anger raged. Someone had bruised her neck, scratched her face. Her dress was torn, too. She’d been crying. The eyes glaring at him were red-rimmed. She wagged a finger at him, and suddenly Bear knew he had made another mistake.
He backed away, then broke and ran, brushing past the servants who were hurrying to Rosa’s support.
CHAPTER 30
Bear ran around the house, and in moments Rosa heard a horse galloping away. Mrs Gillywether enfolded her in a hug, and Sukie bent to Caleb, who opened one eye and then the other, and looked the way Bear had gone before pushing himself up. “Gone, has he? Stupid Duffer. Never you mind, Mrs Gavenor. I’ll explain to him when he gets back.”
If he comes back, Rosa thought. She sent Caleb with the cook, to get a steak to put on his eye, and asked Sukie to bring her warm water to wash in while she changed out of the torn dress.
By the time she settled herself in Belle’s room, she was feeling more hopeful. His reaction suggested his feelings for her were strong, and surely the word he had been babbling before he fled—after the horrid insults she refused to remember—was ‘sorry.’
Belle was unconscious, and her breathing irregular—two or three shallow breaths followed by a long pause that had Maud and Rosa sitting forward, waiting for the next. Death could not be far away.
Maggie came to fetch her when Jeffreys arrived with Bear’s carriage. Jeffreys was astounded to hear that Bear had left again. “He was that keen to be home, Mrs Gavenor. If he told me once, he told me a thousand times.”
Rosa was not going to gossip about her husband, though the other servants would tell Jeffreys what happened. “I expect he will return soon,” she said.
The carriage was full of extravagances. A little writing desk and chair, several paintings of roses, jewelled dancing slippers, packets of comfits, two more bonnets—each more expensive than anything Rosa had ever owned.
She let Jeffreys bring all the gifts in and lay them out around the parlour, then took the smallest of them up to Belle’s bedroom and sent Maud off to have her evening meal.
Alone with the aunt who was also her mother, Rosa displayed the gifts, described what had happened in the garden, and explained her conflicting feelings. Though Belle did not respond, still Rosa felt she knew what Belle would say if she could. “He will come,” she said aloud. “He would not have reacted so violently if he did not care about me, and when he has had time to think, he will come home.”
However, when she went to say goodnight to her Father, and ordered the doors shut against the night, Bear had still not returned.
Rosa was determined to stay awake, feeling somehow that Belle would continue to live as long as Rosa watched. However, Rosa woke with a start in the first light of dawn to find Belle dead, her relaxed face looking years younger, her lips curved in a smile that seemed a promise of joy.
Maud, when summoned, burst into tears and proclaimed that Madam was happy now, and with His Grace, and Rosa could not argue with the maid’s theology.
Bear examined the tankard from which he had been drinking. He’d slept properly for the first time since leaving his poor wife crying in the garden, and thus was nearly sober again. He could finish the tankard and go inside the scruffy hedge tavern to demand another, or he could go home and pay for his sins. Neither option appealed.
He looked up as a shadow fell across his table. “So, there you are, Mr Gavenor.”
“Jeffreys?” What was his manservant doing here?
“Two days, I’ve been looking for you.” Jeffreys shook his head slowly. Even watching the motion sent Bear’s head and stomach into rebellion. “Ever since you run off from poor Mrs Gavenor, leaving her in such trouble.”
“Rosa is in trouble?” That brought him to his feet, though he groaned as the full weight of his headache hit him.
Jeffreys leant a supporting hand to Bear’s elbow. “Need to get you cleaned up so you can go home and help her.”
“Redding can help her,” grumbled Bear.
Jeffreys cast his eyes upward and sighed. “That’s just nonsense, and you know it. He’s telling people he got his black eye when he rescued Mrs Gavenor from that swine Pelman, but Pelman is saying you gave it to him. And if you did, then you should be ashamed, sir. Pelman, too, for assaulting the poor lady with her father sick and the poor London lady on her deathbed.”
“Mrs Clifford is dying? Hell and damnation, Jeffreys. I have been an ass.”
