Tangled (51 page)

They loved him and yet they were a perfect family group there on the bank without him. Father with his new wife and family. Dave and Becka and the child—the three of them clasped firmly together, heedless of the fact that they no longer belonged together—because there was Julian. And Becka would not divorce him, he knew. It was never Becka's way to take the easy way out if the easy way involved what she conceived to be sin.

The image of family and the thought of his own intrusion into it despite his conviction of being loved all imprinted themselves on Julian's mind within a second and several seconds before those on the bank thought to turn back to him in concern.

He could feel reeds wrapping themselves annoyingly about his free boot again. And his right arm was becoming numb beneath the wounded shoulder. He could still free himself easily. He had always been quite at home in

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water. And he could always call on Dave for help if his arm really was incapacitated. But . . .

His eyes picked out Rebecca again. She was holding the awkward blanketbound bundle of the son who meant more to her than life and her head was tipped sideways and resting on Dave's broad shoulder.

He wanted to do something for her, he had told her just that morning. He wanted to do something decent in his life for a change.

Well . . .

He went under the water to disentangle his legs without first gulping in lungfuls of air. He felt fear as he pulled at the reeds, his decision not quite made. It was still not too late. If he wrenched with his legs as well as tearing with his workable hand, he would be free in no time at all.

And then, before he could make the mistake of thinking too much and before he could allow cowardice, the bane of his life, to control him, he breathed in deeply through his mouth.

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David had met his father by the sheerest chance just three miles from home. It was at a crossroads with thick trees on all sides.

Another minute either way and they would surely have missed each other. As it was the earl had hailed David, who was so intent on getting quickly to his distant destination that he was not looking about him.

The earl had looked blank and puzzled when asked what was the matter and why he was riding home when there was supposed to be a matter of great urgency at the Wiggins' cottage. The earl had not been near Wiggins in almost three weeks.

And then the truth had struck David with utter certainty. He had felt no doubt at all that Scherer was behind the strange message and that his purpose had been to draw David out of the way. But why?

Out of the way of what? David had been planning to go to the lake because the women and children were there. Did Scherer also know that? But of course he knew. He always seemed to know everything concerning Julian or Rebecca or himself.

And if it seemed necessary to Scherer to make sure

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that David and his father did not go to the lake, and if Scherer knew that Julian was on his way to the inn . . .

"Is that horse of yours fresh?" he had asked his father. "Can it gallop? We have to get to the lake as fast as we possibly can."

His father had frowned, but such was the urgency with which David spoke that they were both galloping back toward Craybourne before he began to ask questions. David had answered them as briefly as possible. He could not quite imagine what danger Rebecca was in, but he had no doubt that she was in danger. Scherer was deranged.

Rather than challenge Julian to a duel and attempt to kill him for an admitted wrong, he would harm Rebecca.

They had left their horses when they were among the trees surrounding the lake. Trying to ride through the trees would only slow them down. They had run the rest of the way, the earl falling only a little way behind David.

The sight that met David's eyes when he came in sight of the lake almost paralyzed him for one moment. Scherer was standing with his back to the lake, very close to it, Charles clutched in one arm, a pistol in the other hand. Julian was a few feet away, poised to leap. Rebecca was standing on one of the blankets, both hands in tight fists pressed to her mouth. Louisa was holding Katie.

David shouted and heard his father do the same. At almost the same moment Scherer drew back his arm and flung Charles into the lake. Rebecca screamed, Julian dived for the water, and Scherer fired at him.

David heard the shot and then another, almost simultaneous one.

There was an uncanny feeling of deja vu for a brief moment. Sir George Scherer turned to look at him, surprise on his face, and then pitched forward. David looked down at the smoking pistol in his hand.

But the moment lasted perhaps less than a second. In the next instant he was racing for the lake, past an hysterically screaming Rebecca, and seeing blood in the lake and Julian with Charles's head blessedly above the water. The baby was coughing and spluttering.

He was alive, then.

David checked the instinct to dive in after them and forced himself to think like an officer again. Panic had

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never saved any lives. He glanced quickly to his right, but there was no doubt about the fact that Scherer was dead. His head was turned to the side. His eyes were staring. Blood was oozing from his mouth.

David set down his pistol on the grass, called to Julian, and reached out his arms.

Julian, he could see, once calm had been ruthlessly imposed on his mind, was wounded. It looked like a shoulder wound and probably hurt like the devil, but it had not incapacitated him and was doubtless not very serious. Charles was squawking and squirming, a welcome sight under the circumstances. Rebecca had stopped screaming.

"Hand him to me, Julian," he called, keeping his voice deliberately calm. He knew from military experience that panic around him tended to recede if he kept himself calm. But Julian, of course, was tangled up in the reeds and had to toss Charles, who landed with a plop, short of the bank. David had him out of the water almost before he had hit it.

It was only when he felt the wet body of his son and got to his feet that reality began to hit. Charles might have drowned. Their son might be dead by now. He turned and set the child in Rebecca's arms and reached for them both, folding them against him as if by the sheer strength of his arms he could keep them safe from all harm forever after.

"Sh," he said over and over again as Charles whimpered and Rebecca gasped and moaned. "He's safe now, love. No one is going to hurt him ever again. Or you. You are both safe."

Louisa had pushed her way between them to wrap one of the large blankets about Charles, but David folded them to himself again when she moved back. Rebecca set her head on his shoulder. Their son was crying with cold and discomfort and with self-pitying indignation.

David did not know how much time passed—seconds or minutes—before he remembered guiltily that he had no right to be holding Rebecca and that Julian would be needing a hand to help him up onto the bank.

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Julian had saved Charles's life and was being thoroughly ignored as a reward.

But there was no sign of Julian when David looked out onto the lake. "He must be having a time of it disentangling himself," David said to his father. "I had better go out there and help him.'' He shrugged hastily out of his coat and dragged off his boots.

And then, just when Julian's head should have bobbed up to take another breath of air, Julian appeared all right—on his front, with his arms stretched loosely out to his sides. His face and his head were still underwater.

"God!" David said and dived.

It took him only a few strokes to swim up to the limp form of his foster brother. He trod water, careful to move his legs up and down instead of swishing them about and giving the reeds a chance to wrap themselves about him. He hauled Julian's head up by the hair. He was unconscious.

And then his father was there too, diving down to free Julian's legs, swearing as one of his own was caught, kicking free, and helping David to swim toward the bank with Julian's inert form between them.

The two women were busy undressing Charles, toweling him dry with the blanket in which he had been wrapped, and then wrapping him warmly in the other blanket. Two servants were approaching, having abandoned the food wagon when they saw that there was trouble. Lady Scherer was standing in the shadow of the trees.

But David saw none of it. He got Julian onto the bank with his father, turned him onto his side and thumped his back to try to dislodge the water he must have swallowed, and rolled him over onto his back.

"Come on, Julian," he said harshly. "Time to wake up, old fellow."

"He's dead," his father said, a hand against Julian's neck.

But David remembered saying the same thing in the Crimea after finding no pulse at Julian's neck. "No," he said. "He's not dead, just unconscious. Come on, Julian."

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He shook him, slapped his cheeks, pressed on his chest to try to get his heart beating again. He even tried breathing into his mouth.

"Bring the blanket," he ordered his father, ruthlessly suppressing the panic that was threatening to take his control. "He's cold."

"He is dead, David." His father's voice was very quiet but appallingly distinct.

"No." David kneeled to one side of Julian, set his hands one over the other on Julian's heart, and tried to pump for it. "Come on, breathe, damn you. Where the devil is that blanket? Bring the damned blanket. Breathe!"

Someone was kneeling beside him, beside Julian's head. David did not waste energy looking to see who it was.

"Breathe, damn you. Wake up, Julian."

"He is dead, David. "His father, standing behind him, rested one hand on his shoulder.

And finally he knew it to be the truth. Julian was dead. Julian had died while he, David, had been wallowing in the feeling of relief and rapture as he had held Rebecca and their son in his arms. Julian had died saving Charles's life. He had been left to drown.

Julian was dead. Cold and wet and still on the ground. And quite, quite lifeless.

David leaned forward, buried his face against Julian's stomach, and wept with deep, painful sobs.

Beside him Rebecca knelt still and quiet looking down at the dead face of her husband.

"Julian," she whispered, and she reached out a hand and smoothed the wet hair out of his face. "Julian." She took a handkerchief from the pocket of her dress and dried his face with gentle thoroughness.

"Julian." She gazed down at him, at the face of her sunny-natured, charming boy, now surprisingly peaceful in death.

He was dead. She had thought him dead for so long and had mourned him bitterly. And then he had been miraculously restored to her. For a short time. For such a pitifully short time. Now he was dead again. Dead forever this time.

"Julian." She smoothed a hand over his cheek and across his lips.

There was no warmth of breath. No breath at all. He was dead. "Oh, Julian, my love. My love." She slid an arm beneath his neck and bowed over him, resting her warm cheek against his cold one.

She wept.

Stedwell, July, 1858

Rebecca sat down on the grass, arranging her black skirts around her so that they would not crease too badly. She removed her black bonnet with its heavy veil and set it down beside her. The weather was still gloriously sunny and warm for the time of year. It was good to feel air and warmth against her head and face.

She had chosen almost the exact spot on which she and Louisa had spread their blankets a week before. It was peaceful again as it had been then at first. Sunlight sparkled off the water among the reeds.

Perhaps it was morbid to come back to this very place so soon afterward. Louisa had looked horrified when Rebecca had mentioned where she was going. She had probably been relieved too, Rebecca thought, to know that there was no question of her being asked to go as well. The earl had insisted that Louisa spend a few days in bed before the funeral yesterday, and he was still keeping her very quiet.

Poor Louisa—she had gone all to pieces.

It was just there he had died, Rebecca thought, looking at the sparkling, lovely waters of the lake. Not very far from the bank and among reeds that should not have been so very dangerous to a man who could swim. But Julian had died.

Of course, both the earl and David had explained very emphatically to the magistrate who had come to the house, Julian had been badly injured and had lost a lot of blood in the water. And the water had still had its early spring chill. And Julian's heavy clothes and boots would have made it extra difficult for him to keep his head above water. And the reeds were quite treacherous.
Both men had stressed every single point that might have accounted for the fact that Julian had died.

His death had been an accident, aggravated by a deadly assault.

That had been the magistrate's final decision. Father and David had shown almost open relief. So had she. It would have been dreadful if this death had been ruled . . .

Rebecca drew in a deep, steadying breath.

The killing of Sir George Scherer had been ruled quite justified under the circumstances. David had shot him through the heart.

Through the center of the heart, not an inch higher this time. Lady Scherer had had the body taken away and had disappeared from Craybourne. She had refused the help the earl had offered.

Rebecca had a strange memory of Lady Scherer that afternoon—though perhaps it was not so strange after all. Rebecca had been too distraught with her own grief to notice much at the time, but later she had remembered Lady Scherer standing silently a little removed from the family, gazing stony-faced, not at her husband's body, but at Julian's.

Rebecca could remember Lady Scherer saying that she had loved Rebecca's husband. Julian. It had seemed clear that afternoon that her love had never died. Poor lady. But at least now she was free of that villain, who had made her suffer for years for loving Julian.