Fergus lurched forward to catch him before he put any weight on his broken leg. As the man popped free of the cabin, the yellow traveling coach pitched to the side, then slid into the flood, taking a great slice of the bank with it.
“Oof,” Fergus grunted as he took the injured man’s weight in his arms.
“Hell’s bells,” Coker gasped, jumping back. He only just avoided the shaft knocking him into the water, too.
The carriage bobbed like a cork on top of the rushing water, then with a loud creak, it sank up to its shattered windows, and the current swept it away. Macushla and Brecon barked and dashed down the bank in pursuit, finding all of this a grand adventure.
Bracing his booted feet against the slippery ground, Fergus shifted his grip on the groaning Italian. The injured man was as tall as he was and twice as wide. His bulk made it no easy task to keep him upright. Straining to balance under his burden, Fergus hardly looked up as with a bang, the wrecked carriage jammed on a rocky islet about five hundred yards downstream.
The woman slid her shoulder beneath her father’s arm, mercifully taking some of the weight off Fergus. “Papa, are you all right?”
Gasping for breath, Fergus shifted to the other side to prop the Italian up. Even with two of them supporting him, the man’s weight was crushing.
“Porca miseria, my leg hurts.” Under thick gray hair, the man’s face was as white as new snow on the mountains. He, like the woman, was dressed in the height of fashion.
After much grunting and groaning, and some savage swearing from Papa that Fergus didn’t need translated, they managed to swing the older man onto the grass verge.
“Can you hold him up?” Fergus asked her.
“Papa, lean on me and balance on your good leg,” she said calmly. By God, Fergus had to give her credit, she was cool in a crisis.
He swept his greatcoat from his shoulders and laid it over the grass, then helped the woman lower her father onto the thick wool. That would at least keep the injured man from the worst of the damp.
The woman unfastened her red cloak and placed it over her father. Fergus bit back a protest that she exposed herself to the elements. There was no particular reason for her to heed him, apart from the fact that he was a man and in the right. But every atom of his masculine soul protested at leaving a lady to shiver on a hillside that belonged to him.
She sank down to cradle her father’s head on her lap. “How is that now, Papa?”
“Better.” The man’s lips twisted as he attempted to smile. “If I cut back on the spaghetti, it will be easier to haul me about like a bag of wheat.”
She managed a smile in return. Not a very convincing one. All three of them must be aware that leaving him on the wet, rough grass was a temporary solution.
Now that the immediate threat to life retreated, Fergus realized how cold he was. He wasn’t wearing a hat—he’d expected to be sitting beside his own fireside by nightfall, with a glass of the local spirit in his hand. His hair was sodden, and icy rain trickled down the back of his neck.
The woman must be freezing, too. Beneath the cloak, she wore a blue traveling dress that clung close enough to reveal a bonny, if not overly plump bosom, and a hint of curved hips and long legs. Her black hair was tied up in some folderol around her head. Or at least that must have been the plan. The persistent rain weighted her hair and sent tendrils snaking down around that fascinating face.
“You, coachman, get your bony arse over here and give your coat to the lady before I boot ye into the burn.”
Sullenly, the man approached and unbuttoned his coat. In the rain, Fergus couldn’t be sure, but the man didn’t smell of drink. Rank incompetence rather than drunkenness must be to blame for this accident.
With visible reluctance, the woman accepted the coat and fumbled until it covered her shoulders. “Thank you, Coker.”
“My pleasure, miss.” He couldn’t have sounded less sincere, and Fergus fought the urge to shove him into the water anyway.
The man trudged back to the horses. By now, the poor beasts were so cowed, they’d forsaken all urge to bolt. They didn’t raise their heads when Macushla and Brecon wove around their legs in a canine game.
“He’s my servant, not yours,” the woman said.
“He’s utterly useless is what he is,” Fergus muttered, straightening the coat to offer her better cover from the rain. “I fear his coat’s none too clean, and it might have fleas, but you’ll freeze wearing nothing but that becoming gown.”
“I’m glad you admire my style,” she said drily.
Fergus hunkered down and drew a folding knife from his pocket. With a couple of economical movements, he sliced away the older man’s trouser leg. More muttered Italian curses that lacked the earlier vitriol. Pain and exhaustion were taking their toll.
“Is it broken?” the woman asked, with more of that unfeminine composure. It struck Fergus as almost unnatural. These circumstances would leave the ladies of his acquaintance, including his mother and sisters, completely overcome. He wasn’t sure how to deal with a woman who took calamity in her stride the way a man would.
“Yes.” The man’s shin was misshapen and swollen, although thank God, the skin remained intact. “At least it seems a clean break.”
“That’s something.” The rough garment draped around her should lessen that air of cool control, but she still looked like a duchess.