A minute later she was standing foursquare on Sylvester's balcony, easing open the window.

Soft-footed, she stepped into the darkened bedchamber that, despite the slightly opened window, felt as stifling as a greenhouse.

"Who's there!" Henry spun from the curtained bed, his eyes glowing in the dimness, his outraged whisper hissing in the quiet.

"It's me," Theo said calmly, crossing the room. She had very little to do with Henry – none of the household did. It was accepted that he had a special relationship with the earl, one that Theo decided was more intimate in essentials than her own. But that was going to change.

"My lady!" His outrage was superseded only by his astonishment as he gazed at the window behind her, the curtain fluttering in the breeze.

"What is it, Henry?" Sylvester's voice was a cracked thread, like the voice of a very old man. It put Theo in mind of her grandfather in his last days.

"It's all right, m'lord, don't go fretting now," Henry said, laying a hand on Theo's arm. "You must leave here at once, my lady. His lordship can't have visitors."

"I'm not a visitor, Henry." She shook his hand off her arm, and her eyes flashed in the darkness, her voice frigid in contrast. "I am his lordship's wife."

"My lady, I must insist!" He renewed his hold on her arm.

"Take your hand away, or I might break your wrist," Theo said with the same soft, cold ferocity. She raised her free hand, the edge of her rigid palm hovering like a steel blade above the wrist of the manservant's gripping hand.

The dreadful dry retching came from the tented bed, and a groan that filled Theo with a horrified pity, but she maintained her menacing stance, and after a second Henry's hand dropped from her arm.

"Thank you," she said, brushing her sleeve pointedly. "You may remain if you wish, but I will be responsible for nursing Lord Stoneridge, as is my duty."

Henry stood openmouthed as she walked quickly to the bed, gently drawing aside the curtain at the head.

Sylvester's face was a pale shadow on the pillows, gray and waxen, his right eyelid so swollen that it was almost closed. Lines of pain etched his brow and ran down his nose to his mouth, as deep as the furrows of a plowshare.

His hand moved, shuffling to the bedside table where the bowl and a glass of water stood. She took the glass and gently slipped an arm beneath his neck, holding the glass to his lips.

"Theo?" he croaked. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"Hush," she said. "Henry's right, you mustn't become agitated."

"But how in the devil's name did you get in here?"

"I flew through the window," she said, bending to lay her lips on his forehead. "I wish I could take it away."

His mouth twisted in what might have been a gruesome travesty of a smile, but whatever he'd been about to say was lost as he groaned and reached for the bowl.

Henry jumped forward, but Theo forestalled him, holding the bowl until Sylvester fell back on the pillows, racked with renewed torment.

Theo wiped his mouth, gently bathed his face, and laid a lavender-soaked cloth on his forehead, ignoring the hovering Henry.

"Theo, go away," Sylvester murmured after a minute. "I appreciate what you're trying to do, but I don't want you… don't want you here, seeing me -"

"Hush," she interrupted with quiet force. "You're my husband, and I will be a part of your suffering. There's nothing you can do about it anyway."

Whether through weakness or acceptance, he ceased to object and lay still and silent, wrestling with his agony.

Theo moved away from the bed and whispered to the still outraged Henry, "I have to go down and see Lady Gilbraith, but I'll be back directly. You're to leave the door unlocked." There was such crisp authority in her eyes and the set of her jaw, such an edge to her soft voice, that Henry bowed and moved to open the door for her.

Theo sped downstairs. She could hear her mother-in-law's irritable voice from the hall.

"I cannot think how a household can be run in this fashion. It's past midmorning, and there's no sign of either Stoneridge or his wife."

"I do beg your pardon, ma'am," Theo said, jumping down the last two steps. "Sylvester is ill."

"Ill? What on earth do you mean, ill? He's never had a day's illness in his life. And what kind of a slugabed are you, girl, to appear to your household at this late hour?"

Theo ignored this latter complaint "Sylvester has a war wound that afflicts him with severe headaches," she said with an attempt at patience. "I'm afraid I must leave you to your own devices today, I'm needed at his bedside. Please feel free to order things as you wish, and, of course, if you'd like to take the air, or pay some calls, then the barouche is at your disposal. Now, if you'll excuse me -"

"Goodness me, gal. If the man has a headache, it's ten to one he dipped deep in the cognac last night. He should take a powder and sleep it off. There's no need for you to dance attendance on him, and I wish you to accompany me on some errands. Mary's too busy sniffling and moaning to leave her bed."

"My apologies, ma'am, but I must beg you to excuse me. Foster will attend to everything for you."

Lady Gilbraith's complexion turned a curious mottled salmon color, and she began to huff, but Theo didn't wait for the head of steam to burst forth. She turned and ran back upstairs.

Henry looked up from the bedside as she came quietly in, but he moved aside when she came over.

Throughout that interminable day, and half the next night, she sat beside the bed, offering what little relief she could, concealing her horror at the hideous pain that turned a powerful, self-determining man into an inarticulate, groaning husk barely capable of raising his head from the pillow.

Henry, initially tight-lipped, changed his attitude as the hours went by, and she didn't flag, didn't shrink, from performing whatever service was necessary, and didn't hesitate to ask his advice. He found himself telling her of how he'd found the major in the prison transport, barely alive, his head wrapped in foul, blood-soaked bandages. He described the hellhole where they'd languished without medical attention or supplies for the best part of a twelvemonth.

Theo listened, and a few more pieces of the puzzle that was her husband fell into place.

"Were you at Vimiera with his lordship?" she whispered when they'd drawn away from the bed and were eating supper over by the open window, so the smell of food wouldn't increase his misery.

Henry shook his head. "No, ma'am. But his lordship talked of it during his illness."

"What did he say?" Theo tried to hide her intense curiosity.

"Oh, he was out of his head mostly, ma'am. It was all disjointed, like. Couldn't make hide nor hair of it, mostly. Besides, he couldn't remember what happened before that damned Froggie bayoneted him."

"Oh." Theo was disappointed. She returned to her vigil beside the bed.

"We'll give him the laudanum now, my lady?" Henry spoke softly behind her. "It's been all of fifteen minutes since he last vomited, and maybe he'll keep it down long enough to fall asleep."

"Will that be the end of it?" she asked anxiously, watching as he measured a few drops into the class of water. Sylvester seemed barely conscious, although his swollen eyelids jumped and twitched.

"Please God," the manservant said. "Here, my lord." He slid a strong arm around his neck and lifted him, holding the glass to his lips.

Sylvester swallowed the opiate without opening his eyes. He seemed no longer aware of either of his attendants and lay still on the pillows.

Henry stepped back, drawing the curtains around the bed again. "You'd best get some rest yourself, my lady. I'll sleep on the truckle bed in here."

Theo was dead tired; last night had been a very short one, but she looked doubtfully at the shrouded bed, listening as Sylvester's breathing deepened.