“Bloody hell,” Payton muttered and suddenly stood, but swayed, and grabbed onto one of the four posts of his bed for support. “I’m to be sick again,” he said and lurched toward the privy.
Mared quickly stripped the bed and laid fresh linens. When Payton emerged from the privy, he looked as green as the lichen moss that grew on one side of Ben Cluaran and unsteadily wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
“Are ye quite all right, milord?” Beckwith asked and got a hooded look in response. Honestly, Payton didn’t seem capable of answering and made his way to the basin, put both hands in the ice cold water, and splashed it on his face.
Mared and Beckwith watched him warily as he did it again, then grasped the edge of the bureau and held on tightly. “Is he here, then?” he asked.
“Who, milord?” Beckwith asked.
“Who! Padraig.”
Beckwith and Mared looked at one another—Padraig was Payton’s brother who’d gone off to seek his fortune in America. When neither of them answered, Payton jerked a bloodshot gaze to Mared. “Is he?” he demanded.
“Padraig is in America, milord.”
He blinked; her answer seemed to confuse him. Mared cautiously moved toward him. “Might we have yer waistcoat?” she asked gently.
He glanced down, swaying a little, and fumbled with the buttons, but lost his balance and lurched toward Mared. She caught him by the arm and righted him, then quickly undid the buttons of his waistcoat, and lifting his arms, one by one, managed to slide it off his body.
“Mared,” Payton said, grasping weakly at her hand. “Mared! Ye’ll no’ launder it, aye?” he asked desperately.
Mared reared back. “No, milord!” She gestured for Beckwith to help her, and between the two of them, they managed to remove his shirt, too. But as they did so, Mared noted with some alarm that Payton stopped protesting and seemed far too weak to care what they did to him. He spoke only once, and that was to inquire if it was true that Padraig was in America.
They had him on the bed again, on his back, but still in his trousers. Beckwith insisted she leave the room. “I’ll no’ have ye ogling his lordship’s privates,” he whispered hotly. “Go and wait for the physician, aye?”
Mared reluctantly agreed and hurried downstairs to wait. A cold rain had begun to fall, however, and it seemed that the physician took his sweet time in coming. It was almost three o’clock in the afternoon when he arrived at last.
“I thought ye’d no’ come, Dr. Thomson,” Mared said impatiently as she helped him in the door and took his hat and gloves.
“I beg yer pardon, but Mrs. Walker’s bairn was determined to make his arrival this soggy morning.” He shook off his coat and handed it to Charlie, who had come running at the sound of Mared’s bell.
“Where is Beckwith?” he asked.
“With the laird in his chambers.”
The physician looked curiously at Mared. “And what brings ye here, Miss Lockhart? Surely ye did no’ come across Ben Cluaran on such a wet morn?”
With Charlie’s curious gaze on her, Mared said simply, “He sent for me. This way, please.”
Dr. Thomson picked up his bag and followed her up. When they walked into the room, Mared was relieved to see Beckwith had successfully undressed then dressed Peyton again—he was lying in bed, his face remarkably gray. Dr. Thomson frowned. “I’ll have a moment alone with him,” he said, and Beckwith hurried to shut the door before Mared could come in.
She stood staring at the door for a moment, struggling to hear what was being said. When it became apparent that she’d not hear anything, she sighed with frustration and went downstairs, determined to do something useful with herself while they waited.
She thought to finish her inventory of the stores, but her work was careless, and she finally shoved it aside, distracted by a singularly ugly and desperate thought—what if he died?
She could not imagine the lochs without Payton Douglas. He seemed as much a part of these hills as the trees and birds and cattle, and all right, the sheep as well. And how strange, she thought, but he seemed as much a part of her life as the glens and the lochs and the people around Aberfoyle. She’d never known a time when he was not nearby.
How could such a strong and virile man be struck down by a mere fever? What if he died?
“Miss Lockhart!”
Rodina’s urgent whisper startled Mared, and she jerked her gaze up. “Beckwith says ye are to come at once!”
It was, unfortunately, as bad as she feared. Dr. Thomson wasn’t entirely certain, but he believed it was possible, given Payton’s sampling of newly made barley-bree, that he had contracted the sort of wasting fever that had obliterated Killiebattan.
The news sent a shiver through them all. Dr. Thomson was quite clear—none of them were to leave the premises until he’d given his approval, and none of them, save Beckwith and Mared, were to see to the laird. The illness was highly contagious, he warned them, and the more they isolated themselves from it, the better their chances of avoiding contagion.