Scandal in Spring
Page 44

“A what?”
Even though the door was mostly closed, the conversation could be heard by the people in the room. Lillian’s sharp voice came from the bed. “You brought me an animal doctor?”
“He was highly recommended,” Swift said.
Since Lillian was covered with the bedclothes, Daisy opened the door wider to allow her a glimpse of the man.
“How much experience do you have?” Lillian demanded of Merritt.
“Yesterday I delivered puppies from a bulldog bitch. And before that—”
“Close enough,” Westcliff said hastily as Lillian clutched his hand at the onset of another cramp. “Come in.”
Daisy allowed the man to enter the room, and she stepped outside with another clean towel.
“I would have gone to another village,” Swift said, his voice roughened with a note of apology. “I don’t know if Merritt will be of any help. But the bogs and creeks have overflowed and the roads are impassable. And I wasn’t going to come back without someone.” He closed his eyes for a moment, his face drawn, and she realized how exhausting the ride through the storm had been.
Dependable, Daisy thought. Wrapping a corner of the clean towel around her fingers, she wiped at the mud on his face and blotted the rain caught in his day-old beard. The dark bristle of his jaw fascinated her. She wanted to stroke her bare fingers over it.
Swift held still, his head bent to make it easier for her to reach him. “I hope the others have more success at finding a doctor than I did.”
“They may not make it back in time,” Daisy replied. “Things have progressed rapidly in the last hour.”
He pulled his head back as if her gentle dabbing at his face bothered him. “Aren’t you going back in there?”
Daisy shook her head. “My presence is de trop, as they say. Lillian hates being crowded, and Annabelle is far more able than I am to help her. But I am going to wait nearby in case…in case she calls for me.”
Taking the towel from her, Swift scrubbed the back of his head, where the rain had soaked into the thick hair and made it as black and glossy as a seal’s pelt. “I’ll return soon,” he said. “I’m going to wash and change into dry clothes.”
“My parents and Lady St. Vincent are waiting in the Marsden parlor,” Daisy said. “You can stay with them—it’s far more comfortable than waiting here.”
But when Swift returned, he didn’t go to the parlor. He came to Daisy.
She sat cross-legged in the hallway, leaning back against the wall. Lost in her thoughts, she didn’t notice his approach until he was right beside her. Dressed in fresh clothes with his hair still damp, he stood looking down at her.
“May I?”
Daisy wasn’t certain what he was asking, but she found herself nodding anyway. Swift lowered himself to the floor in a cross-legged posture identical to hers. She had never sat this way with a gentleman, and had certainly never expected to with Matthew Swift. Companionably he handed her a small glass filled with rich, plum-red liquid.
Receiving it with some surprise, Daisy held it up to her nose for a cautious sniff.
“Madeira,” she said with a smile. “Thank you. Although celebration is a bit premature since the baby still isn’t here.”
“This isn’t for celebration. It’s to help you relax.”
“How did you know what my favorite wine was?” she asked.
He shrugged. “A lucky guess.”
But somehow she knew it hadn’t been luck.
There was little conversation between them, just an oddly companionable silence. “What time is it?” Daisy would ask every now and then, and he would produce a pocket watch.
Mildly intrigued by the jangle of objects in his coat pocket, Daisy demanded to see what was inside it.
“You’ll be disappointed,” Swift said as he unearthed the collection of items. He dumped the lot into her lap while Daisy sorted through it all.
“You’re worse than a ferret,” she said with a grin. There was the folding knife and the fishing line, a few loose coins, a pen nib, the pair of spectacles, a little tin of soap—Bowman’s, of course—and a slip of folded waxed paper containing willowbark powder. Holding the paper between thumb and forefinger, Daisy asked, “Do you have headaches, Mr. Swift?”
“No. But your father does whenever he gets bad news. And I’m usually the one who delivers it.”
Daisy laughed and picked up a tiny silver match case from the pile in her lap. “Why matches? I thought you didn’t smoke.”
“One never knows when a fire will be needed.”
Daisy held up a paper of straight pins and raised her brows questioningly.
“I use them to attach documents,” he explained. “But they’ve been useful on other occasions.”
She let a teasing note enter her voice. “Is there any emergency for which you are not prepared, Mr. Swift?”
“Miss Bowman, if I had enough pockets I could save the world.”
It was the way he said it, with a sort of wistful arrogance intended to amuse her, that demolished Daisy’s defenses. She laughed and felt a warm glow even as she recognized that liking him was not going to improve her circumstances one bit. Bending over her lap, she examined a handful of tiny cards bound with thread.
“I was told to bring both business and visiting cards to England,” Swift said. “Though I’m not entirely certain what the difference is.”