Читать книгу Blackstone's Bride - Bronwyn Williams, Bronwyn Williams - Страница 9

He wasn’t one of the Millers. Eleanor didn’t recognize the man as anyone she’d ever seen before. Barely even recognized him as a man, the way he was slumped over, his arms cradling his body as he broke through the laurel slick and lurched shoulders first into the clearing.

She reached him just as he collapsed, nearly carrying them both to the ground. Bracing her feet, she managed to lean her weight against his in a manner that supported them both until she could regain her balance.

“Steady, steady,” she murmured. “I’ve got you now—don’t try to move.” Oh, God, oh, God, what do I do now?

In the dusky light his hair appeared black. Or wet.

Blood? That wasn’t water dripping across his face. It was too dark. “Are you hurt?”

Of course he was hurt! This wasn’t the waltz they were doing!

“They— I—” Clutching her, he swayed, tried to speak and broke off. He tried again. “Damn,” he muttered.

Eleanor replanted her feet and braced herself to support his full weight. “Shh, don’t try to talk, just lean on me. Can you walk at all?”

If he collapsed she could probably roll him uphill to the cabin, but getting him inside would be another matter. Tie him in a quilt and drag him up the steps? Was it physically possible?

It might finish him off. Whatever had happened to him, he didn’t look as if he could survive much more punishment. Both his eyes, his mouth…his entire face was battered and swollen beyond belief. Dear Lord, it hurt just to look at him.

“What happened to you?”

“Mm.” It was more groan than answer.

“That’s all right, you don’t have to talk now. Let’s just rest a bit.”

“Mm!” There was urgency in the single utterance, enough so that she sensed his meaning. He wanted her to…

Hide him? “All right, we’ll try to get you inside, but if you have any broken bones, walking isn’t going to help,” she told him, reduced to stating the obvious. “Lean on my shoulder—steady now. That’s it.” He was a good half a foot taller than she was, and must outweigh her by fifty pounds. Hard as a rock, but a dead weight. “Don’t try to hurry—that’s it, one step at a time.”

Who on earth could have done this awful thing? One of the Millers? God in heaven, she hoped not, but there was no one else around.

It took almost more strength than she possessed, but eventually they made it as far as the porch, moving two steps forward, falling one step back. “How on earth am I going to get you up the steps and inside?” she wondered aloud.

He held up a shaking hand, silently pleading for time to catch his breath.

Just as well, because she needed time to think. There was no way she could drag him inside without his cooperation—at least not without aggravating his injuries.

“What to do, what to do?” she murmured, not expecting an answer and getting none. She had managed to help cousin Annie from her bedroom to the front parlor so that she could watch the passersby, but by that time her cousin had weighed barely eighty pounds. This man was built like…a man.

“Who are you? Who did this terrible thing to you? It wasn’t the work of an animal, I don’t see anything that looks like teeth or claw marks.”

Might as well talk to a rock. The poor man was past answering. It was a wonder he’d managed to get this far.

“Where did you come from?” she asked.

Could he have been coming to help her get away? Had he somehow heard of her plight and come to help, and been caught on his way up the hill?

Lord, she didn’t want to be responsible for this.

She couldn’t even summon help from any of the Millers, not until she knew who had done this awful thing…and why. If it had been Alaska, he wouldn’t even need a reason, not if he’d been drinking.

“Now,” he panted after a few minutes.

“Yes, well—all right—we’ll take it slow and easy.” She eased her shoulder under his arm, conscious of the heat of his body. Aside from the coppery scent of blood, he smelled of whiskey, but something told her he wasn’t drunk. Could he have come to buy whiskey from Alaska and got into a fight over the payment?

At the moment it didn’t matter. He needed help and until she knew more, she didn’t dare call on anyone to help her help him. He was wet and shivering. Dirt and dead leaves were stuck to his clothes, his skin. He was barefoot. One sock on, one sock missing, which told her he hadn’t set out that way.

“Who did this to you?” she asked again as she helped him deal with the last step up onto the porch. Something was wrong with one of his limbs. It was either broken or badly sprained. If it was broken, moving him this way had to be causing irreparable harm, but what else could she do? She certainly couldn’t leave him lying outside with night coming on.

From the valley below came the faint sound of more shouting. Someone fired a gun. She had a feeling they weren’t hunting. They never shouted when they were hunting. At least, not when they were hunting wild game.

Hurry, hurry, hurry, she urged silently.

They made it through the door, and Eleanor took a deep breath and steered him toward the sofa, one of the few pieces of furniture Devin hadn’t sold. “I’m sorry we don’t have a doctor, but there’s a woman in the village below here who’s considered something of a healer.”

He caught her hand in a painful grip. Dark eyes glittered through swollen lids.

“What are you trying to tell me?” she whispered. “You want me to go? You don’t want me to go?”

He shook his head, his look so urgent that finally she got the message. “You don’t want anyone to know you’re here.”

His response said it all. What was it he feared, that this time they might succeed in killing him? “All right, just rest then for now. I’ll do what I can to clean you up, and after that…well, we’ll see.”

She gave him half an hour to rest before she came at him with a basin and cloth. She needed to know the extent of his injuries. If the man died on her…

He wouldn’t. She simply wouldn’t allow him to die.

Cleaning him up was embarrassing for her and painful for him. She was no fainting maiden, afraid to look at a man’s body, for heaven’s sake, it wasn’t that. Not entirely. But no matter how gentle she tried to be, there was no way she could discover where and how badly he was hurt without causing him further pain.

“My, you do have an extensive vocabulary, don’t you?” she said dryly the third time he let fly with a string of mumbled obscenities. At least he was speaking in words of more than one syllable now.

“Sorry.” It was more a groan than an apology.

“Never mind, I’ve heard worse than that from little boys.”

She hadn’t, but he didn’t need to know it. If she didn’t know better she might have thought the twitch of his swollen mouth was a smile.

Later that evening Eleanor lit the parlor lamp. Her guest was still on the sofa, which was not a good fit. As tall as she was, she could barely lie flat on it. The stranger was several inches taller. His neck was bent at an awkward angle that the pillow didn’t do much to alleviate.

She eyed the distance between there and the bedroom door, a matter of less than ten feet. The cabin was basically a square, with one side being taken up by what she termed a parlor, the other with a kitchen and a closed-off bedroom.

“We need to move you to the bedroom,” she said, standing back to survey the damage now that she’d cleaned him up some. He’d been wearing a buckskin coat, but one of the sleeves had been dangling by a thread, almost as if someone had tried to pull it off.

He looked at her. At least she thought he did. With those swollen eyes, it was impossible to be certain. “Do you think you can move if I support your left side?” It was his left ankle that was swollen. “You could use the broom as a crutch.”

He mumbled something and she said, “Is that a yes or a no?”

More mumbling. One hand lifted and she thought he pointed to the window. “Close it? Open it wider?”

More swearing. At least that’s what it sounded like. He could barely move his lips.

Hands on her hips, she said, “All right, I’m going to suggest a few things. If I’m right, nod your head.” Which would probably hurt, too, but they weren’t getting anywhere using words. “You’re hot. You want me to open the window.”

Was that a nod, or a negative? He barely moved.

She tried again. “You want me to hide you in case whoever did this comes looking for you.”

This time there was another stream of curses, followed by a groan. She leaned over and whispered, “Shh, don’t try to say any more, I understand.”

Oh, yes, she understood. The Millers distrusted all strangers. This man was a stranger, an angry stranger if she were any judge. Who could blame him if this was an indication of their hospitality?

“Never mind, I know you can’t talk, but you might as well know it now—sometimes I tend to talk too much. Comes of living alone,” she said as she lifted the afghan she’d spread over him when she’d peeled him down to his long underwear. That, too, was wet as if he’d been caught in a downpour—or dunked in the creek—but she hadn’t been able to bring herself to strip him completely bare.

“All right then, let’s see if you can sit up. It’s only a few steps away—right over there where the door is.” Torn between wariness and sympathy, she studied her unexpected guest and tried to think of some way to make the transfer easier.

There was simply no way. As gentle as she’d tried to be, he had groaned when she’d peeled his muddy blue jeans down over his bare foot. Hopefully it wasn’t broken, but even a sprain could be painful.

She positioned herself on his good side and slid one arm under his, taking most of his weight on her shoulder. He groaned. She grunted. “Don’t worry,” she managed. “I’m a lot stronger than I look.”

Working together they managed to get him onto his feet. Or rather, onto his foot. With her on one side and the broom on the other serving as a crutch, he hobbled toward the back of the cabin.

His body felt unnaturally hot, and she wondered how long he’d been lying out in the woods before he’d found his way to her cabin. If he was already feverish, it could be either lung fever or an infection of one of his wounds. Surely it was too soon for that. But then, she still didn’t know the full extent of his injuries. Wouldn’t until she got him out of his underwear.

Feeling her face flush, she told herself she would worry about that later. For now, she needed to get him onto the bed before he collapsed. Then she could start by cutting off the tight cuff of his long johns. It had to be constricting circulation, with that swollen ankle.

If he had internal injuries, she could only pray that they were minor. She should have paid more attention to biology as a student, but at the time she couldn’t picture a situation where knowing how a frog was constructed would be of any value.

He practically fell across the bed, giving her mere seconds to sweep the covers aside first. Then she had to reposition his heavy limbs until he was lying more or less straight on the feather tick. Her sheets would be wet clean through, but that was the least of her worries.

What on earth was she going to do with him? He was too big to hide under the bed, even if he could crawl under there. There was simply no place else to hide, but if the Millers were to show up—if they were to come inside and discover that she was harboring a strange man…

They couldn’t. Chances were they’d been the ones to do this to him, but even if they hadn’t, they hated strangers. They would drag him away, and in his present condition, he might not survive their rough handling.

“Think, Eleanor, think!”

He focused a bleary eye on her face, and she said, “Sorry—I told you I tend to talk to myself.”

All right, she was thinking. What if he were a fugitive? A bank robber? A train robber? What if the sheriff was after him and had followed him here? In that case, she could be arrested as an accomplice.

On the other hand, if she explained how she’d found him and they took him away, she could insist on going with them. Not even the Millers would risk trying to hold her against her will with a sheriff as witness.

“No. Don’t even think about that now,” she muttered. Whoever or whatever this man was, he was no threat to anyone in his present condition. He certainly didn’t need any lawmen dragging him down the mountain. What he needed was to sleep until he could tell her where he hurt, what to do about it, who did this to him and whether or not they were likely to follow him here.

At the moment, though, she needed to get him up long enough to peel the rest of those wet clothes off his poor battered body. If the parts that were hidden were in as bad shape as the parts that were visible, he might not even survive the night.

And if he died…

“Don’t even think about it,” she muttered as she turned to her sewing basket to find her scissors.

“Mm?”

“I wasn’t talking to you,” she said hurriedly, fingering the thick knit of his long johns. “That is, I was, but I don’t expect a reply. I think I might have mentioned that I tend to talk to myself occasionally.”

This time when he said, “Mm,” it was without the questioning inflection. In other words, she translated, “I hear you, woman.”

One piece. She would have to cut around the waist and pull them off in both directions. A blindfold might help her modesty, but it wouldn’t help get the job done.

“Be still now, don’t move,” she cautioned, and positioning the scissors, she slit the left leg of his underwear up to his knee, wincing at the way the cuff had cut into his swollen ankle. Between bruises and abrasions, his skin was a lovely golden color, like well-polished maple.

“I’ll be as gentle as possible, but we have to get you out of these wet clothes before you catch pneumonia.” She cut all the way around just under the knee, then lifted the remnant away. Now all she had to do was get the top part off, then she would worry about what came next.

“Here, let me cover you with this,” she said, unfolding the crocheted afghan she had found in Cousin Annie’s hope chest after her cousin had died. She had wept gallons at the time, but being the practical woman she was, she’d packed it in her own hope chest, which by then she had thought of as her hopeless chest.

She covered his midsection and began unfastening the bone buttons that led from the hollow of his throat all the way down to…

Wherever. “You look like you were dragged all over the mountain,” she said, seeing that one eye was slightly open.

No reply. He appeared to be fascinated by the unadorned whitewashed walls. The poor man had to be every bit as embarrassed as she was, letting himself be cut out of his underwear by a strange woman.

She continued to chatter to take both their minds off what she was doing. “I thought at first you might have tangled with a bear, but I’m pretty sure there aren’t any bear caves around here, at least not any longer. I think the mining must have driven them away.”

Accustomed to conversing with herself, she didn’t wait for a response. “There, roll over a little bit so I can cut around your waist. I’m just going to cut the top part loose and pull it off first.” Leaning over him, she tried to roll him onto his side. She got no farther than halfway when he let out a sharp cry.

“I’m sorry!” He must have internal injuries, and here she’d been lugging him around like a favorite doll.

She waited for him to catch his breath, then eased him onto his back again and reached for her scissors. “I think this will be easier, don’t you?” She began to cut. First the right sleeve, then the left, severing it from the body of the garment near the shoulder. There were bruises, but so far as she could tell, nothing was broken. At least nothing visible.

Stepping back, she surveyed the rest of the garment, aware of the beautiful shape of his muscular arms. He wasn’t knotty, the way some of the Miller men were—the way even Devin had been. Instead, he was smooth and golden, his forearms reminding her of Michelangelo’s statue of David.

Mercy!

“All right, here’s what we’ll do then,” she announced. General Eleanor, advising the troops of her battle plan. “I’m going to cut away your union suit.” She was holding the scissors up in her right hand.

His eyes widened so that she actually caught a glimmer of the darkness behind his poor swollen lids. Obsidian was the term that came to mind. “Mm-mm,” he warned.

“Mm-hm,” she countered. “I’ll simply cut it up from the bottom to where it opens down the front, and then pull it out from under you. It has to be done, you know, else you’ll catch your death, lying in a wet bed. I’ll be as gentle as I possibly can.”

With the afghan spread over his middle for modesty as well as warmth, she positioned the scissors. His eyes widened still more, until she could see that his eyes were brown, not black. Topaz, not obsidian. They only looked black because his pupils were enlarged from…pain? Fear?

“I won’t hurt you,” she said softly, reassuringly. “I would never deliberately hurt anyone.” And just as she began to cut away the sodden fabric, the oddest feeling came over her. Staring down at the stranger on her bed, with all his injuries—with his face swollen and discolored—she felt something almost akin to…recognition.

Which was beyond absurd. If she’d ever seen him before in her life, she would have remembered. He wasn’t the kind of man, even in his present deplorable condition, that any woman could forget.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” she muttered, embarrassed by her own reaction.

Fortunately, he couldn’t see her flaming face. His eyes closed and remained shut until she had cut almost all the way to his groin.

“No.”

The single word momentarily stayed her hand. “We agreed, you can’t lie around in wet clothes. I’m going to cut across to the placket and—”

“Madam,” he said just as clearly as if his lips weren’t swollen like a split melon, “you’re not getting anywhere near my privates with those scissors of yours. Leave me be and I’ll get undressed.”

“Well for heaven’s sake.” She laid the scissors down on the table beside the bed. “I wasn’t planning to do you any harm, I only wanted to make it easier for you.”

Her face must be steaming by now. She knew as much about a man’s anatomy as any other woman who had been married for nearly two years. That is, she knew where it differed from a woman’s, and which parts were more sensitive than others. She hadn’t planned on getting anywhere near those particular parts, but if he thought he could do better, then let him. At least he was speaking now.

“I’ll just go—go and put the kettle on, then. Call me when you’re done.”