“I thought I saw something. It was only a feather.” He sighed and shook his head.
As he went back to searching, she noticed again how he seemed to have regained his strength and was no longer pale. He still had a few bruises visible on his face, but they were fading, and his thick hair completely covered the stitched-up wound on his head. It was as if she was seeing him for the first time. Now he appeared as he must have been before the attack — not pitiable and weak and raving mad, but strong and handsome and determined. He had said he was the son of a wealthy lord back in England, and she had no reason not to believe him. Perhaps she shouldn’t treat him so much like a servant.
“Thank you for trying to help me.”
He looked up at her with raised eyebrows.
“When you told me to jump and you would catch me.”
“Oh. Of course.”
“And I am sorry for not coming back to the healer’s chambers to visit you. I thought about you a lot and prayed for you.”
“You thought I was addled.” There was no anger in his tone. “That the blow to the head had brought on madness. It’s understandable. Besides, you are the daughter of Duke Wilhelm. Your family would not have thought it prudent for you to befriend someone like me who could have been a beggar, a ruffian, anything.”
“Frau Lena thought my presence made you anxious. She said perhaps I shouldn’t visit you anymore. But I am ashamed that I did not come back to see if you needed me to translate for you.”
“The priest came and helped me, so I was not completely alone.” He gave her a crooked smile, making his right eye squint.
“I didn’t think about the priest. I am glad he came and helped.”
She couldn’t be sure, but she thought he rolled his eyes again before going back to searching the ground. He was entitled to a bit of resentment, but she wouldn’t let him get away with too much insolence.
They searched all the way to the stable, keeping her left arm close to her side and trying not to move it, and still she did not find the bracelet. “I need some more water.”
She walked back toward the well. She dropped the bucket over the side and it splashed into the water below. When she reached with her good arm to pull it back up, Colin drew near and peered into the well.
“Halt!” He grabbed her arm.
She stopped pulling on the rope, leaving the bucket of water dangling, and leaned over to see what he was staring at. Something sparkled, caught on a stone that jutted out slightly a few feet down into the well. “My bracelet! You found it! It must have slipped off my wrist.”
“Yes, but now we have to get it out without sending it into the water below. Careful.” He took the rope from her, and the front part of his shoulder inadvertently brushed against the back of her shoulder, as he slowly and carefully pulled the rope. The windlass creaked as the bucket rose. He continued to pull, making sure the bucket didn’t sway and hit the bracelet and knock it off its precarious perch.
The slight brush of his shoulder against hers made her feel strangely warm.
“How will we ever get it out?” Her voice was a raspy whisper, as if talking might cause the bucket to bump the bracelet into the deep well below.
“I will go see who I can find to help.” Colin hurried toward the stable. Soon he reappeared with the scowling stable master Dieter and stable boy Fritz as he led them up the slight hill to the well.
“What does he want?” the stable master asked Margaretha.
“He wants you to help me get my bracelet out.” She pointed down into the well. “It must have come loose and fallen off my wrist when I took a drink.”
“Will you translate for me?” Colin asked her in his smooth English accent.
“Of course.”
“Tell them to each grab one of my feet and lower me down far enough that I can reach the bracelet.”
“Oh, that sounds dangerous — ”
Before she could say anything else, he hefted himself up onto the top of the well’s wall on his stomach and teetered on the edge.
Quickly, she yelled, “Grab his feet!”
Dieter and Fritz lunged forward, grabbing Colin’s legs. They hugged his ankles as they lowered him head first into the well.
Margaretha held her breath as he inched closer to where the bracelet dangled. If he didn’t grab it carefully it could easily fall, sinking to a watery grave, and then they’d never find it. But the thought of Colin himself plunging head first into the narrow well was what made her heart pound against her chest and her stomach turn in circles.
She shook her head and blinked hard to get the image out of her mind.
He was almost close enough to reach the bracelet. “Just a little more,” he said, his voice echoing back at them.
Fritz and Dieter looked grim as they clutched Colin’s ankles.
He reached out with his right hand, and Margaretha closed her eyes, too afraid to watch.
“I got it!”