“Oh, but, ma’am!” Startled after getting a good look in the full light of day, the assistant came forward to take her gloved hand. “Please, do come sit down. I heard how badly you were hurt, and what happened to Ben and all, but I didn’t realize—here, can I get you a cup of tea or somethin’?”
“That would be delightful, Mr. Dunlap,” graciously assented Camellia, taking the chair he had pulled forward for her. “But I’m not here to take up your time when I know how hectic things are. You and Miss Gotham must be furiously busy here at the store, with Mr. Forrester—Mr. Forrester...”
It was no use. Her tongue seemed stuck to the roof of her mouth, refusing to form the words.
Jimmy, taking pity on her plight, stepped into the breach. “Oh, ma’am. The sheriff stopped by to let us know his condition. I hope you haven’t come to tell me that he’s—he’s—” A gulp.
“No, no, please—I’m sorry to be acting so like a silly woman today—” But just wait until I can sink my teeth into the meat of what I intend—! “You must understand that this is the first I’ve set foot out of my house in—well, my goodness, several days. And I’m just a little giddy. No, Mr. Forrester is actually showing a slight improvement, and we’re all simply thrilled.”
She couldn’t help it. For one dazzling moment, she spun back in time to that lovely Thursday supper hour. She and Hannah were consulting in the kitchen over what supplies were available and what recipes their fertile imaginations might produce, when she had heard the muffled thud of one stockinged foot landing on the parlor floor and the croak of a rusty voice.
Like a demented bird, beating its wings, she had flown.
“Ben,” she breathed, skidding to a precipitate halt beside the settee.
He wasn’t physically able to move more than a few muscles (try though he might). He wasn’t able to speak more than a few words before running out of steam. But he was able to look at her with recognition. And respect. And relief. And something else...
“Cam. Darlin’.”
She shivered a little. Since the first time she had heard that sweet word, uttered with such concern and that “something else,” as recently as yesterday, he had won her heart. As easily and completely as that, did he but realize it. Nothing else mattered; all else could be fixed.
Kneeling on the rug, as near as she could be without actually joining him on the settee, leaning down, she murmured, “Ben,” in a tone rich with longing.
“Here...safe...?”
“Yes, Ben,” she assured him. “You’re home. You’re safe. You’re with me.”
“Good...” Exhausted but determined, he fumbled weakly for her hand. “Always—with you...”
For some time, the wounded man lay still and silent, content with her presence. While Hannah fumbled around uncomplainingly with pots and pans in the kitchen. Finally Camellia had gently freed herself from her sleeping husband’s loose clasp to return to duty. She had gained some slight knowledge of culinary skills since her wedding, and it was only right that she should put them to use. She could at least fry eggs!
Hannah, who was mixing ingredients together in a bowl—flour? and baking powder? a dab of milk? Biscuits, evidently—looked up, pleased. “He woke, Cam? He actually woke? How encouraging is that!”
“He did, Hen. And he knew me. And he looked so—so—” Camellia’s every muscle tightened with another delighted shiver. “Well. At any rate, next time he wakes, I plan on fetching Dr. Havers. I’m not strong enough, and he will have to help Ben with the—uh—more—personal—functions.”
“I understand. A rather delicate task.”
“Yes. As soon as I mix up our griddle cake batter, I’ll run upstairs and bring down the—uh—the convenience.”
And she had, and he had, and by early evening, when the doctor came to visit and willingly performed his task (in the study, for privacy), Ben was already more alert and slightly more talkative.
“You need to make this boy some good rich soup,” opined Gabriel, tucking up to the table with a napkin stuffed into his collar. Supper was ready, wasn’t it? He might as well get a home-cooked meal, mightn’t he? Food was food, especially if he didn’t have to prepare it with his own two hands. Except—the menu around here could get a trifle boring, because he was once again being served...
“Don’t we have eggs pretty often, Cam?” Hannah, staring at her plate almost cross-eyed in resignation, wondered aloud.
“My thought, exactly.”
Hannah looked down her nose at him. “Beggars can’t be choosers, doctor. Why don’t you get a wife of your own, and then you can eat at home?”
The grin on Gabriel’s face stretched wide. “An excellent suggestion. Are you applyin’ for the position?”
She gave a delicate shudder. “Heaven forfend.”
The bickering—good-natured enough for the time being, Camellia had noticed—continued throughout the meal; and the doctor, having nothing better to do at the moment, stayed chatting with an occasionally lucid Ben until Hannah marched to the front door and pointedly flung it open. With a sigh, Gabe had assisted his patient to the private downstairs bathroom one last time, then offered the ladies an elaborate bow and disappeared.
And thus had passed Thursday, Camellia, sipping at the tea Jimmy Dunlap had so willingly brought her, now recalled.
Friday’s busy hours had slipped by in even happier fashion. Ben, fortified by half a messy omelet (“Eggs again?” Hannah had sniffed), was actually able to half-sit half-recline on the settee, after his morning visit to the necessary. He had been aided once more by the affable Gabriel, who just happened to stop by.