Not for a moment had any of the repercussions crossed my mind. And to be honest, if I thought of Mr Ambrose’s hot mouth on mine, devouring me in the sweetest way possible - they still didn’t seem all that important to me. Which was, of course, completely ridiculous. If we really and truly did it, I could end up pregnant - or worse - married! I mean, if there was a way to live in sin for the rest of my life without blowing up like a balloon…now, that would be interesting. But marriage? Ugh!
Really? Are you sure that’s how you feel, Lilly?
Yes! Marriage was an instrument of the patriarchy designed to oppress womanhood!
Is it? Is it really?
Yes! I had only to think back on that Times article on ‘quarrelsome wives’, and the idea of marriage made me want to get a bucket to puke in. I would die before I ever became a slave to a man!
But spending the rest of my life side-by-side with one…
Strange how the idea didn’t seem quite as abhorrent as it had a while ago. Especially if we were talking about one particular man.
Getting Mr Ambrose up the cliff hadn’t been half as difficult as I had thought. He had woken up shortly after we had dragged him ashore, and after the old lady had called two of her people down, had managed to stagger up to the village with two strong natives supporting him. I had to admit, I enjoyed the sight. It was probably the first and last time I would see Mr Rikkard Ambrose staggered.
I wasn’t particularly worried about his head wound. That man had a skull as thick as a rock, and I was betting he would be up and about again in no time, ready to order me about and stare at people just as coldly as ever. Still…when the old lady asked if anyone would sit up with him during the night, for some reason I volunteered.
So now I was sitting next to Mr Ambrose in the dark silence of the hut, gazing into space, lost in thought. Mr Ambrose was a dark form against the wall, lying on a thin mat, as stiff in sleep as he was awake. He didn’t snore, didn’t move, gave no sign of life at all - but I still wasn’t worried. He would pull through. Of course he would. I definitely absolutely totally wasn’t worried.
Is that so?
Bloody inner voice of mine! Couldn’t it shut up for two minutes?
Swallowing hard, I shifted closer to Mr Ambrose. A strip of moonlight was falling into the hut through the door, illuminating his face. There was no trace of blood now. The tribe’s doctor, or medicine man, or whatever he was called, had washed it off, and applied a nasty-smelling poultice to the head wound. But in my mind’s eye, I could still see the line of blood trickling down the side of his face. His hard, cold, incredibly beautiful face…
Suddenly, my hand started to move. I had no idea why. I certainly didn’t tell it to sneakily creep out of my lap and across the floor. I most definitely didn’t tell it to skulk across the floor and sidle up to Mr Ambrose’s cheek like a thief in the night. This was outrageous! Who had taken control of my bodily parts?
My hand didn’t seem to share my outrage. In a manner that was altogether too self-satisfied for my taste, it settled down on Mr Ambrose’s cheek and - of all things! - began to stroke it! In a way that was suspiciously reminiscent of tenderness.
But things didn’t stop there. Oh no! My hand had the bloody cheek to slip away from his cheek (no pun intended) and slide down, over his chest and abdomen, until it reached his hands, lying folded on his taut belly. And what did it do then? It took his hand, and squeezed it, sweetly, almost lovingly.
‘Wake up, will you?’ I whispered. ‘There are plenty of people left in the world for you to fleece and terrorise.’
*~*~**~*~*
Mr Ambrose woke up the next morning, grouchy as an old bear who had just woken out of hibernation to find out he’d had a full-body shave. Luckily, by then my hand had started to behave itself again, and I was sitting in my corner of the hut, where I belonged. I greeted him with the brisk efficiency of a secretary who hadn’t spent the day before half-naked in a pool with her employer, and informed him straight up that, no, we couldn’t leave right away, not until he could stand up on his own two feet and walk in a straight line for more than three steps.
‘Don’t be ridiculous, Mr Linton,’ he snapped, and pushed away the blanket my traitorous hand had pulled over him during the night. ‘I feel perfectly fine.’
Bracing himself against the wall, he pushed himself up and started forward. ‘There, you see? Perfectly finnng…!’
There was a thud as his face collided with the floor. I had to admit, I felt a bit sorry for the poor floor. It didn’t deserve such a harsh beating.
‘Back to bed with you, or I’ll be calling Karim!’ I threatened. ‘He’ll tie you down if he has to.’
‘Unlike you,’ Mr Ambrose informed me, his voice muffled against the floor, ‘Karim is a loyal employee. He will follow my orders, not yours.’
‘Not if I threaten him with you-know-what. Back to bed, now!’
‘This is mutiny. If we were on a ship, you could be hanged for this.’
‘How fortunate for me that we are not on a ship, then, Sir.’
He continued to grumble a bit, and then contented himself with being icily silent at me. Nobody could be icily silent like Mr Rikkard Ambrose. I swear, he brought the temperature in the hut down to minus twenty degrees. Fortunately, after nearly a year in his employ, I was almost immune to frostbite, and was able to change his bandage without my fingers turning black and falling off. The old Indian lady came in after a while and told Mr Ambrose in no uncertain terms that he was not going to leave until he had fully recovered.
Of course, I should have expected him to make a record-time recovery out of sheer contrariness. After only a day, he was back on his feet, and after two days, he was ordering Karim about, gathering supplies and making other preparations for our departure. Our time in the Indian village was coming to an end. I had to admit, I was a bit sad about that. I had grown really fond of the old lady who was in charge here. On the other hand, maybe it wasn’t such a bad idea we were leaving. I wasn
’t completely sure Mr Ambrose would survive her next attempt at matchmaking.