Hello Stranger (The Ravenels #4)(73)

“What do you like about farming?”

West considered the question, while the train puffed and clambered resolutely up the incline of a broad hill covered with golden-flowered furze. “I like clearing a new field and hearing the roots crack and watching stumps being pulled under the plow blades. I like knowing that after I sow three bushels of wheat on an acre, the proper mixture of sun, rain, and manure will yield sixty-four bushels. After having lived in London for so long, I’d reached a point where I needed something to make sense.” His gaze turned absent and dreamy. “I like living in the seasons. I love the summer storms that come in from the sea, and the smell of good soil and mown hay. I love big breakfasts with new-laid eggs boiled until the yolks are set but still a bit soft, and hot buttered muffins spread with comb honey, and rashers of fried bacon and slabs of Hampshire ham, and bowls of ripe blackberries just picked from the hedgerows—”

“Please,” Garrett said thickly, beginning to feel nauseous from the train’s oscillation. “Don’t talk about food.”

West smiled. “After some rest, and a day or two of fresh air, you’ll find your appetite.”

Instead of stopping at the public station in the market town of Alton, the special train proceeded to a private railway halt located on the east side of the vast Eversby Priory estate.

The halt consisted of a single platform covered by a wooden-and-iron scrollwork canopy. The two-story signal box had been constructed of brick and wood, with multipaned glass windows and a green tiled roof. Having been built to service a nearby hematite quarry on Ravenel land, the private station included a number of small buildings and freight facilities. There were also wagons for quarrying, tramways that led to and from the quarry site, steam drills, pumps, and boring equipment.

A mild early-morning breeze swept inside the train carriage as West opened the door. “It will take a few minutes for the ambulance cart to be unloaded and reassembled,” he said. After a pause, he added apologetically, “You’ll probably want to give him something extra for pain during the last part of the journey. Not all the roads are paved.”

Garrett’s brows rushed down. “Are you trying to kill him?” she demanded in a scathing whisper.

“Obviously not, or I would have left him in London.”

After West left the railway carriage, Garrett went to Ethan, who had begun to stir. His eye sockets appeared bruised and sunken, and his lips were dry as chalk.

She held a flexible rubber tube to his lips, and he sucked in a few sips of ice water.

Ethan’s lids cracked open, and his unfocused gaze found her. “Still here,” he said in a hoarse whisper, not appearing entirely happy about the fact.

“You’re going to be better soon. All you have to do now is sleep, and heal.”

Ethan looked as though he were puzzling over some foreign language, trying to interpret it. There was a brittleness about him, as if spirit and flesh were coming unstitched from each other. He trembled with fever chills despite the dry-baked heat of his skin. Traumatic inflammation, the clinical part of her brain noted. Wound-fever. Despite the abundant use of antiseptic fluids, infection had set in. The rigors would soon be accompanied by a rapid elevation of temperature.

She coaxed him to take another sip of water.

“I’m in a bad takin’,” Ethan whispered after he’d swallowed. “Need something.”

God only knew what it had cost him to complain.

“I’ll give you morphine,” she said, and swiftly prepared another syringe.

By the time the injection took effect, the ambulance cart had been reassembled and hitched to a broad-backed, placid-tempered dray. The ride to Eversby Priory manor seemed interminable as the cart’s India-rubber wheels rolled gingerly over the rough terrain.

Eventually they approached a massive Jacobean house on a broad hill. The brick-and-stone residence was dressed with parapets, arches, and long rows of diamond-paned windows. Rows of elaborate chimney stacks gave the flat roof the appearance of a birthday cake covered with candles.

The ambulance cart stopped at the entrance. Four footmen and an elderly butler emerged from the oak double doors. Without preamble, Garrett explained how to detach the stretcher and unload it from the cart. She was annoyed when West interrupted her instructions.

“They’re footmen, Doctor. Carrying things is nine-tenths of their job.”

“He is not a thing, he’s my . . . my patient.”

“They’re not going to drop your patient,” West said, escorting her past the front threshold. “Now, Dr. Gibson, this pleasant-looking lady with the gaze of a brigadier general is our housekeeper, Mrs. Church. And all those capable young women are housemaids—we’ll introduce them later. For now, all you need to know is that we have two Marthas, so that’s the name to call out if you want something.”

The housekeeper curtsied hastily to Garrett before directing the footmen to carry the stretcher bearing the wounded man upstairs. Her matronly form bounded up the stairs with unexpected agility. As Garrett followed, she had only a cursory look at her surroundings, but it was enough to allay any concerns about the manor’s condition. Despite its venerable age, the house appeared scrupulously clean and well-ventilated, the air scented with beeswax and rosin soap. The soft white paint on the walls and ceilings showed no trace of mold or damp. Garrett had been in hospital wards that had been maintained in far worse condition.