Chapter Two

A week later

M ajor Douglas was at the hospital again—for the third time in the five days since she'd first seen him.

Rose should not be noticing the man, let alone surreptitiously staring at him. But, my goodness, he is hard to miss, and once seen, hard to look away from ! All that height and width, the flaming mop of red hair, and—as if that was not enough—the kilt that was part of his uniform as an officer of the Reds. The 157th (Highland) Regiment of Foot, that was. Known as ‘the Reds' for the color of their kilts, the hair of so many of them, or the blood they spilled, depending on who told the story.

Rose had heard that the kilt was outlawed in the king's realms until recently, with only certain Highland regiments having a dispensation to wear it. Heavens ! If all Scots sported calves like the major's, then the prohibition was a mercy to virtuous females!

"Rosalind?" Pauline sounded irritated. "Rose, the carriage will be ready for us."

Oh yes. They had a ball to attend tonight. Rose had better hurry up, or she would make them late, and then all three of her sisters would be annoyed with her.

"I have only one more gentleman to see, Pauline," she told her sister. "This way." She led Pauline from the room, giving thanks that the last patient of the day was not in the same ward currently being favored by a visit from Major Douglas.

It did not take long to ascertain that Corporal Waters had benefited from the latest poultice she had created for him. "The rash ain't as hot, Miss," he told her, "and it be hardly itchy at all."

Mixing just the right ingredients in the right proportions would be easier if Rose were permitted to see the physical symptoms she was treating. Lady Snowden, her mentor, examined patients, but Lady Snowden was a married woman and a decade older than Rose. However, Lady Snowden was not here.

As a maiden of not quite twenty, Rose needed to stand at least six feet away from Corporal Waters' bed and hold a conversation about symptoms that were embarrassing to them both, particularly given the position of the rash—which she had had to deduce since the corporal had been unwilling to put it into words or even point to it.

On second thought, perhaps it was just as well that, in this instance at least, she was not permitted to see the rash for herself. "I have made up more of the mix, and have left it with the orderly," she told him.

Pauline took a pocket watch from her reticule and gave it a pointed look. Rose nodded in response. "I am coming," Rose told her and said goodbye to the corporal.

As she had expected, as soon as they were settled in the carriage, Pauline scolded her. Gently, as was Pauline's way, but a scold, nonetheless.

"Rose, darling, I could not help but notice that you were watching Major Douglas again today. Do be careful, dearest. It would be most embarrassing for you if he were to notice, or if someone else were to comment." She put her hand on Rose's arm and smiled. "A fine figure of a man, Rose. But do be careful."

Rose sighed. "I know, Pauline. I do not mean to stare. I shall try harder if we encounter him again."

What else could she say? Pauline was correct. Rose really should not allow herself to be distracted by the gentleman. She had not even had an introduction to him and didn't expect that to change. Apart from her volunteer work as an herbalist, her life was the circumscribed one of an earl's sister.

She was unlikely to meet a Scots army major at the sort of entertainments she attended with Vivienne, her closest half-sister and dearest friend, and nothing would come of it if she did. If he was of a class to attend such affairs, he was too high-born to bother with Rose, even though she had been raised as if she was of noble—and legitimate—birth on both sides. No one was rude to her face, for fear of offending Peter, but everyone knew she was Peter's illegitimate half-sister, the daughter of their father's mistress. Most of them assumed she was destined to be a mistress herself.

It was the story of her life. Her family regarded her as a lady, the daughter of an earl, while prospective suitors heard the circumstances of her birth and turned away. She was, as her old nurse used to say of something that did not fit, neither fish, nor fowl, nor good red meat. She could not marry within her class because the base-born had no class.

Her path had almost crossed that of Major Douglas by chance at the hospital, with each of them on their own errands, and moving in different directions. That would be the end of it. In any case, the frowns Major Douglas sent her way indicated his disapproval of her presence. He was probably like so many men, determined that women of her apparent class should be decorative, agreeable, silent, and kept away from pain, suffering, and anything else that was real.

He clearly had no interest in knowing her, so these ruminations were unutterably foolish.

*

Ruadh kept returning to the hospital. On his first visit, he had found more than a dozen Scots veterans, all with no home to go to and nobody to care whether they lived or died. One was from his own regiment. Like all the soldiers and sailors cared for here, he had been released as unable to serve. Injuries or illness had left these Scotsmen unfit, not just for the army or the navy, but for any civilian job. Stranded hundreds of miles south of their own country, without families to take them in, they were doomed to a short life on the streets.

Each had a story of how they came to Geordie and Mick's, as they fondly called it. Some had been directed by other beggars on the street. Some had been sent by clinics such as the one at which Nate volunteered. Still others had been told of the place by vicars or kindly strangers.

"It isn't home, Major," one told him, "but it is better than the street." His eyes slid past Ruadh to the ladies who were passing down the ward toward the door. "Scenery is better, too."

The soldiers had told Ruadh that Lady Rosalind was an angel, and she certainly looked like one, with her fair hair and eyes so blue a man could drown in them.

Ruadh had no idea what her family was thinking, letting a pretty girl like her come to a place like this. When he protested to the superintendent, though, the man shrugged. "Her brother, the Earl of Stancroft, is on the board of trustees," he said, "as is Lady Snowden, her mentor. If they say she can come here with her potions and her poultices, then I cannot prevent her. Mind you," he added, as if bound and determined to be fair, even against his own prejudices, "She and Lady Snowden do the lads good. Quite apart from their concoctions, which mostly seem to work, they are a sight for sore eyes. Especially Lady Rosalind."

"Aye," Ruadh agreed, "and that is why she should not be here. These soldiers—fine lads, most of them, but rough, Mr. Parslow. You must agree they are rough. If they should offer insult to the lady, either intentionally or just because they know no better—"

Parslow interrupted. "That's just what they will not do, Major. If a man hurt a hair of her head or her least sensibility, the rest of them would have his guts out in a flash and make them into garters for their stockings. You've no need to worry that Lady Rosalind will come to any more harm here than she would in her sister-in-law's parlor."

With that, Ruadh had to be content, and after all, it was none of his business what the Earl of Stancroft allowed his sister to get up to. Not that he stopped thinking about Lady Rosalind. In Spanish, the name would be pretty rose, and it suited her. She was pretty and she had the skin of a rose. One of those soft pink roses his mother loved so much.

It would be as soft as a rose too, he would bet his last shilling, and as sweet-smelling. Not that he was expected to be able to test that supposition. In fact, his mother's news meant he wasn't going to be able to stay in London for much longer.

Duty called him north, to the last place on the planet he wanted to be. He had one more task to carry out for his mother, and perhaps one for these men and others like them. Could he set up a hospital like this for the 157th Scots Foot? Or perhaps for all the Scots regiments? Something in Glasgow or Edinburgh, perhaps, so any family they had left could visit them and so at least they could breathe Scottish air until they breathed no more. He couldn't do it on his own, of course. He would need to find sponsors.

Da might be able to help with that . If so, it would be a silver lining to his mother's unpalatable news. Ruadh's father's unexpected elevation had shocked him to the core and also made it impossible to stay away.

An obscure country scholar whose brother had done his duty and produced an heir and a spare could allow his son Ruadh to join the army, serve the Crown for his entire adult life so far, and tarry in London for the rest of it. No one but his parents would care, and if they didn't understand, they at least loved him enough to leave him be.

But as the son of the newest Earl of Glencowan, he was now Viscount Merrick and Master of Glencowan. He found it hard to grieve the uncle he could barely remember and the cousins he'd never known. But when their yacht went down in a sudden squall, his chosen life died, too.

The void where his heart used to be howled at the thought of taking his pain home. He would have to keep busy—work had always been the only poultice for his internal wounds and that meant the constant tasks of a senior officer in the army or, more recently his self-imposed position as the Wolf of Whitecross.

Yes. A hospital might be just the thing. A task to do. One that made the world just a little better.

At that, Ruadh might see Lady Rosalind again, for he would need to call on her brother, who was chair of the Board of Trustees of Geordie and Mick, to discuss the logistics of such a venture.

Not today, though, for the hour drew late. And not tomorrow, when he had a commission to carry out for his mother.

She was worried about her father and wanted Ruadh to call on him. Ruadh supposed he ought to have done it without being asked, but he had never got on with the sour old man, who had not forgiven Da for inveigling his daughter away to the north of the border, and who tended to blame Da's children for being of Da's blood.

Still, if the old man was ill or in trouble, Mama would expect Ruadh to look after him. Mama was the kindest soul on God's earth and never held a man's sins against him when he was in need.

Perhaps the day after tomorrow, as his reward for being a good son, he might call on the Earl of Stancroft and catch a glimpse of the beautiful Rosalind.

*

"Good day, Lord Hardwicke," called Rose across the garden wall. The elderly neighbor had been rolled out in his bath chair and parked on the terrace, just across the wall from the herb pots she had on the terrace of her brother's townhouse.

The gardens near the house were narrow and shaded by neighboring trees. Pauline's roses were farther down the garden and got the sun most of the day, and Rose had a patch for her herbs down there, too. The terrace was out of the shade of the trees and caught the full afternoon sun. The plants that most needed her care flourished here within a few steps of the house.

Lord Hardwicke, not so much. He looked more and more frail each time she saw him. "Lady Rose," he called. "A pleasant day for a spot of gardening."

At least, that was what she understood him to say. His speech had recovered a lot—it had been almost gone altogether after the apoplexy he had suffered a couple of months ago. It was still garbled and hard to understand.

"I am cutting back the peppermint before it runs to flower, Lord Hardwicke," she explained.

In answer to a garbled question, she agreed, "Yes, I will use it in tinctures at the hospital, to bring down fevers."

In their conversations before his apoplexy, she had learned he had a personal interest in military hospitals. His grandson was a soldier, currently stationed in Ireland with one of the Highland regiments, and Lord Hardwicke worried about him.

Poor Lord Hardwicke. He had been lonely before his apoplexy and things were worse now. Before, he had few visitors and went out seldom. Now, he went nowhere, and the trickle of visitors had dried up to nothing. Rose wondered if they had been turned away at the door, as she had been in the early days after the apoplexy, when she had become worried at his continued absence from his garden.

However, since his body failed, his wife had begun to entertain frequently. She had guests now. Rose could hear the tinkle of teacups and the buzz of conversation, drifting through the windows that were open in the heat of the day.

That was probably why the poor old man was out on the terrace. Lady Hardwicke would not want her guests to see him. That was another thing that had changed since Lord Hardwicke was struck down. Lord and Lady Hardwicke used to stay at home together, she busying herself with buying new drapes, furniture, and ornaments for the house, and he with his books and his garden.

Before, Lady Hardwicke was all sweet words and flattery. "Yes, my lord. You are so clever, my lord. It must be as you say, my lord." Not after. Rose had heard her talking to her poor husband. She obviously had not seen Rose, who was kneeling down to weed the pots, for Lady Hardwicke did not measure her words.

"You useless lump of meat. Why could you not have died in your fit? I would be a rich widow. Well. The doctor says the next one could kill you, so we live in hope, Phillip and I. I cannot wait for the day I can dance on your grave. Perhaps I won't wait. Phillip says it would be a kindness to hold a pillow over your face."

"Na i' m a will." Lord Hardwicke forced out the words, and Lady Hardwicke slapped the poor old man's face.

Phillip, Rose had discovered through the medium of the network of servants in the surrounding houses, was Phillip Wolfendale, Lord Hardwicke's valet. Rose had seen him. His hair was white, though he was at least ten years younger than Lady Hardwicke. Rose put his age in the mid-twenties.

His skin was pale, too, and his eyes were a startling pale blue. He had seen her peering over the wall, though Lady Hardwicke never noticed. Seen her and challenged her, for he had come close to the wall and stared into her eyes.

"The Ransome bastard, isn't it? Mind your own business, Miss Rosalind Ransome. There is nothing to interest you on this side of the wall, and people who interfere are liable to come to bad ends."

Rose still felt a shiver of fear when she remembered the look he gave her.

*

It was three days after he had last seen Miss Ransome at the hospital that Ruadh was finally able to call on her brother. He had visited this street twice before in the past few days, calling on his grandfather, for the old man had a house that was not only in the same row as that occupied by Lord Stancroft and his family, but it was right next door.

Calling on, but not seeing. Both times he had given his card to the butler and announced his name and his relationship to the Earl of Hardwicke. Both times, the butler went away and came back to say that the earl was not at home, English upper-class code for not receiving—what was it his grandfather had said last time Ruadh had called?—the misbegotten whelp of that thieving Scotsman Douglas.

Third time is the charm, Ruadh figured, and this afternoon, after his call on Miss Ransome's brother, he would try again. He would then consider his mother's errand accomplished as best as he could.

Meanwhile, he put the unpleasant duty out of his mind, for he had high hopes for his visit to the Earl of Stancroft. Not only did he hope for encouragement and advice from Stancroft, who had himself once been an officer in the King's army and who was by all accounts a pleasant fellow, but if the fates were with him, he might also catch a glimpse of the lovely Lady Rosalind.

The butler greeted him with a nod and a smile. "You are expected, Lord Merrick. I am to show you in."

Ruadh followed. He had made the appointment as Major Douglas, but clearly, Stancroft had checked to find out exactly who Major Douglas was.

Stancroft was in his study, but not alone. Two ladies sat with him, and one was Lady Rosalind. The other wore an eye-catching mask that had been painted to match the embroidery on her gown and covered half her face. Ruadh had heard about Lady Stancroft's mask, so this must be her.

"Lord Merrick," said Stancroft, rising and extending his hand.

Should Ruadh challenge the use of the title? It was correct, after all, and he supposed he was going to have to get used to it. "Lord Stancroft. Thank you for making time to see me."

"Of course," the earl said. "You offer an intriguing opportunity to help spread the good work the hospital has done. I have asked my wife and sister to join me, as they are both involved with the hospital in different ways and have perspectives that may be useful to you. My love? Rose? May I present Lord Merrick, the Master of Glencowan. Merrick, Lady Stancroft, and my sister, Lady Rosalind Ransome."

Lady Stancroft smiled at him. "Stancroft and I hope we can be of assistance. One hospital cannot help all those in need, so it pleases me more than I can say to think you are interested in taking ours as inspiration. Please be seated, Lord Merrick."

Lady Rosalind was frowning at him. Was it the name?

He accepted the chair to which he was directed. "Thank you, Lady Stancroft. It is pleasant to meet you and Lady Rosalind. Stancroft, Lady Rosalind and I have seen one another at a distance several times recently when we have both been visiting the hospital. They know me as Major Douglas, there. I am more comfortable with my army rank, which I earned, than with the title I only learned about a week ago. Still, I will need to become accustomed, so let it be Lord Merrick."

He had guessed right. The little furrow between the lady's brows smoothed, and she even smiled a little.

Stancroft waved him to a chair. "It took me months to stop looking around for my father whenever I was addressed as Lord Ransome, and then I was granted the earldom, and had to get used to yet another title." He and his wife exchanged a warm look filled with an intimacy that made Ruadh both embarrassed to be a witness and envious of their love.

"The Stancroft title was originally my father's, Lord Merrick," said Lady Stancroft, "so I changed my birth surname for the title of Lady Ransome and then that title for the one I associated with my mother. One does grow accustomed."

They spoke a little more about the challenges of stepping into a predecessor's shoes and even their name, until Stancroft turned the conversation to the business that had brought Ruadh here. "I understand from your letter that you want to set up a hospital along the same lines as ours, but in Scotland to serve veterans who came from that area. And you hope to hear from us what we did and why, to help you with your project. Can you expand on that?"

Stancroft was correct about the two ladies. As the conversation progressed, they made significant contributions. Lord Stancroft talked about organization, funding, and management.

Lady Stancroft spoke from the perspective of a patient. She had been badly burned in a fire as a child—hence the mask covering half of her face—and she had spent a long time recovering. She talked about the importance of things to do that made an injured person feel useful and needed, of leisure activities to give pleasure, of someone to talk to about the experience of healing. She also explained how important it was for patients to be supported as they grieved for a life changed by an injury and encouraged and to let go of anger, impatience, and other negative emotions, and to see the promise of the future in spite of one's injury.

"We house those who will never recover more than they already have. Who will, in fact, slowly deteriorate as they age. There is grief in that, but also strength in learning to take joy in what remains."

As for Lady Rosalind, she, too, made a great deal of sense. "Our patients have had enough of doctors—and the doctors of them, I rather think. Doctors want to make people well, but they place less focus on making them comfortable. If scars are pulling, Lady Snowden and I can provide a cream that will help. If a man has lost his right hand, we can suggest he uses his left, and encourage him until he is skilled. If he has lost a great deal of weight and is feeling the cold, we can find someone to provide a blanket. You need a strong group of volunteers, Major, to provide the comforts that make life more pleasant."

She did not say, but Ruadh thought, that pretty young volunteers must be a medicine in themselves. Certainly, if he were to judge by the way the soldiers at the hospital talked about "their" Miss Rosalind, she did them good just by walking into the ward. Besides beauty, she projected a feminine serenity and peace very different from the violence and aggression men—especially soldiers—emitted. Even he found himself basking in the warmth of it, and feeling calmed, however briefly.

Ruadh was shocked when he noticed the time. "My ladies, my lord, I did not realize how much time had passed." He began to gather his notes. "This has been invaluable. I cannot begin to tell you how grateful I am."

"It has been our pleasure," Peter said, standing to hold out his hand to Major Douglas. No, she must get used to thinking of him as Lord Merrick. "Please let us know how you progress."

Lord Merrick promised he would do so.

"Are you planning to stay in London for long, Lord Merrick?" Arial asked. Rose had wanted to ask the same question. The gentleman had impressed her at first sight but hearing his errand and then talking with him about the issues had broadened her appreciation. Now, her admiration was not just for his fine looks, but for his compassion and determination. Yes, and the way he listened with respect not just to Peter's countess, but to her.

There was also something familiar about him. Some elusive memory that refused to come to the surface to be recognized. Not the golden-brown eyes that could look fierce, kind, and passionate by turns, nor the tousled red hair. But something.

*

"Thanks to you all, Lady Stancroft," Lord Merrick replied to Arial. "I am much closer to completing one of my errands in London. I have a meeting early next week at Horse Guards to talk to Brigadier General Lord Redepenning about visiting the military hospitals."

He grimaced. "I do not expect such success with my other errand. I have been attempting to visit your neighbor, the Earl of Hardwicke, but he will not see me."

"Since his apoplexy," Rose offered, "Lord Hardwicke has not seen anyone."

Rose suddenly became the object of Lord Merrick's intent stare, and that elusive memory tickled her thoughts again. Something about him—his height, or maybe it was just that intensity in his gaze? Something…

"He has had an apoplexy? The butler just said he was not at home. I thought he was refusing me an audience. After last time…" He trailed off, frowning as if his thoughts bothered him.

He looked so troubled that Rose could not resist asking, "What is it, Lord Merrick?"

He turned that frown on her, then his face softened. "I was wondering what I am going to tell my Mama, Lady Rosalind. She will insist I see him for myself, but if they won't let me in…"

"What is Lord Hardwicke to you, my lord?" Ariel asked.

He blinked as if surprised to find the other two still with them. "My grandfather. My mother's father. She decided that something was wrong with him and asked me to check for her. My mother has what we Scots call ‘a touch of the fae'." Lord Merrick shrugged. "My grandfather was not pleased that his daughter married a Scot, and especially not a younger son. When I called on him seven or eight years ago, we ended up having an argument over the way he had cast her off. However, he started writing to my mother after that, so it was worth the visit." He appeared to shake this personal history off and turned to Rose. Once again, his intense gaze stirred something deep in her memory that just wouldn't present itself. "Do you know his condition? Is he expected to make any sort of recovery?"

"You are the major who was stationed in Ireland," Rose realized. Lord Hardwicke's Ruadh, of whom he was so proud. ‘Rooah', the elderly gentleman had said and then had spelled it for her, chuckling a little, perhaps over a memory he did not share.

"He used to speak of you often when he could still speak. He says you have the courage to stand up for yourself and those you love, and that you are loyal to family. You are a good soldier, too, he says. Decorated after Waterloo."

Lord Merrick flushed a little at the praise, but he nodded, decisively. "I must see him, then. Even if he does not want to see me."

"He might not know you have called," Ariel warned. "Lady Hardwicke has been turning people away."

"Lady Hardwicke," Lord Merrick repeated. "My mother said he had recently married again. A widow, I believe. Perhaps I should ask to speak with her, and explain I need to see him to satisfy my mother."

"Yes," Rose agreed. She thought of Phillip and his threat. Something should be said, she decided, but in a roundabout way. She had no doubt Lord Merrick would be able to discern there was a problem with Lord Hardwicke's treatment by his wife and her…whatever Phillip was to her. "I think that is a good idea. Perhaps—do you mind if I offer a suggestion, Lord Merrick?"

"Please. I would be grateful." He inclined his head.

"Insist, my lord. Be as polite as you wish but make it clear that his daughter is worried about her father, and if you are not permitted to see him, you will return with a magistrate."

Lord Merrick's eyes had widened at her suggestion. "Do you have reason to believe that Lady Hardwicke is hiding something, Lady Rosalind?" Good, she thought. She was not wrong about him. He understood her meaning and yet, Phillip wouldn't be able to trace her to the cause of any investigation on the part of the magistrate.

Peter spoke before Rose could. "I think you should see Lady Hardwicke and draw your own conclusions before Rose answers that question." As usual, Peter played her protector. Such a good brother. "Go and make your visit. Observe. Come and see us tomorrow afternoon, and we shall tell you what we know. Rose is the one who is best acquainted with your grandfather, for he used to speak to her from the other side of the wall when they were both gardening."

"And I still converse with him, Peter, when they wheel him out to take the sun—" or to hide him from view—"although his speech is now very hard to understand."

Their visitor was taking it in, looking from one of them to the other. His eyes were hooded and there was a fierceness in his expression that made Rose shiver. She had watched him with his men and knew how kind he could be, but seeing him now left her in no doubt that he'd been a fierce warrior on the battlefield. I think he is no stranger to violence when it is needed .

"Come and see us tomorrow," Peter repeated.

Lord Merrick stood. "I will, my lord, and thank you."

Rose, her attention on Lord Merrick, crossed the room to summon the butler to show their guest out, but she tripped on the corner of a rug. She would have fallen—and fully expected to fall—but Lord Merrick must have crossed the room in a flash, for he was there to catch her and put her back on her feet.

"Thank you," she said, breathless more at his proximity and the feel of his hands, however briefly, on her waist than at her own averted accident. She could still feel the heat and strength of them even though he'd already stepped back to stand at a respectable distance.

"I am glad I was here to stop you from hurting yourself," he said, and Rose stilled, remembering very similar words in the same light tenor. A man of this height and build, too. And that intensity radiating off of him…

No, it could not be. Lord Merrick was a viscount. A major in the army. He could not also be the Wolf of Whitecross.

She looked up at him but stopped herself from staring. Could he?