“Yes, my lord.” She hurried to the fireplace and heaped coals on the embers there.
“What’s your name?” he asked her when she returned to the bed, as much to distract himself as anything else.
“Quick, my lord,” she said.
“How long have you been with your mistress?” His mind was running in circles, like a mouse trapped in a glass jar. Where was the doctor? How much blood had she lost? Was the bleeding stopped?
“Eight years, my lord,” Quick replied. “I’ve been with Miss Corning since she came out.”
“A long time, then,” he said absently. He laid the back of his hand against Beatrice’s cheek. Still warm. Still alive.
“Yes, my lord,” the maid whispered. “She’s such a gentle mistress.”
The door opened and several footmen came in with cloths and hot water. One of them was Henry, looking grave at the sight of his unconscious mistress.
“Has the doctor been sent for?” Reynaud asked him.
“Yes, my lord,” he replied. “Right away ’e was sent for, and Lord Blanchard has gone down to wait for ’im.”
Reynaud nodded. “Bring a new cloth here.”
“Will she be all right, m’lord?” Henry asked as he gave him the cloth.
o;Around the corner; there’s no room for it to stop here. Are you bamming me about not letting me go?”
“I don’t make jokes.”
“That’s the silliest thing I’ve ever heard,” she said, rather too loudly. “Everyone makes jokes, even people with no sense of humor like you.”
He yanked the arm he still held, making her bump into his chest. Hard.
“I assure you,” he snarled into her face, “that—”
But something odd happened then. She felt a shove from behind her, a sharp hit at her side. Lord Hope’s hands tightened painfully on her arms, and she saw that he was glaring murderously over her shoulder.
“What—?” she began.
But he pushed her back and behind him, toward the house’s steps as he took his big knife out from under his coat. “Get inside!”
And she saw, horribly, that the three loitering men were advancing on him. Their leader—the man with the walleye—had a knife in his hand, and there was blood on the blade.
Beatrice screamed.
“Get inside!” Lord Hope shouted again, and launched himself at the leader.
The big man lifted his bloody knife to strike the viscount. But Lord Hope caught his wrist, halting the blow, even as he slashed at the man’s belly. The leader sucked in his belly and skipped back, his shirt and waistcoat in ribbons. A second man, hatless and balding, wrapped his arms about Lord Hope from behind, imprisoning his upper arms. The walleyed man grinned and advanced to strike again. The viscount grunted and wrenched his left arm free just in time, blocking the knife with his arm. The knife blade sliced through his sleeve, and blood sprayed in a thin arc across the street.
Beatrice covered her mouth and sat suddenly on the town-house steps. Black dots swam in front of her eyes.
A man screamed and she looked up.
The balding man had fallen to the ground and was clutching his bloody side. Lord Hope was grappling with the leader again while the third man raised his dagger behind the viscount’s back.
Beatrice tried to scream a warning but couldn’t. It was as if she were in a nightmare. Her throat worked, but no sound came. She could only stare in horror.
The knife descended, but the leader stumbled back under Lord Hope’s ferocious attack, bringing the viscount with him, and the knife missed. Lord Hope suddenly whirled, dragging the leader with him, and shoved the man into the attacker behind him. Both men fell to the ground in a tangle of legs and arms. The leader was bleeding from a terrible cut to his head, and his ear appeared to be dangling.
Lord Hope straightened and advanced on the fallen men with an intent, deadly stride, like a wolf sighting a wounded hare. He wore a warlike grin as he came, savage and gleeful. His great knife was raised, its blade bloody now, too. His bared teeth were white against his swarthy skin. The men on the ground looked more civilized than he.