Free The Last Debutante by Julia London

help, Daria would have to. The only thing she knew to do was to walk the ten miles or so to Nairn.
    All right then, she would have to plan for it. First, there was the issue of shoes. Perhaps Mamie had some boots she might borrow. She would need to pack a bit of food, wouldn’t she? And then . . . then she would follow the road. It couldn’t be that difficult, could it? Follow the road to Nairn, where she would send a letter to Charity and ask her to come straightaway. And then she would prevail on any authority there to help her. All very easy!
    She had to believe it was easy because she had no other hope. If she was successful, Daria couldn’t even guess what it might mean for Mamie. She feared for her grandmother. But she feared more for the stranger’s life.
    Morning came quite early after such a sleepless night. Daria pulled on a woolen robe Mamie had given her and combed her hair, letting it fall loose down her back. She padded down the little hallway to the main living area. She could smell ham, and found the one Mamie had buried beneath the hot coals at the hearth last night. She dug it out and removed it from the covered cast iron skillet, placed it on a platter, and put that in the middle of the table. Funny, she thought sleepily,that after only a matter of days, she was quite comfortable pulling hams from glowing embers. As she stirred the embers she heard a door open. She expected to hear footsteps, but the heavy, lurching step and dragging foot were decidedly not Mamie’s.
    Daria quickly stood and wrapped the robe tightly around her. The stranger came into view, dragging his injured leg. He was wrapped in his plaid, belted precariously with a soiled bandage. His matted hair stood on end, his beard had thickened, and dear God, how his eyes were blazing. Not with fever. With anger. He glared at Daria as he wordlessly passed her and roughly pulled a wooden chair from the table, landing on it with a grunt and then laboriously arranging his leg beneath the table. He saw the ham and instantly leaned forward, his hand reaching—
    “I’ll carve some for you,” she said quickly, and picked up the knife that she’d used to protect herself from him the day before.
    He responded with a menacing look, but he shifted back, his hand sliding down the table and into his lap.
    She sliced off a thick slab of ham, put it on a plate along with some of Mamie’s bread, and slid it across the table to him.
    He ate as if he were starved. “More?” she asked when he’d devoured the food. He nodded curtly. Daria sliced off more of the ham and bread. He’d eaten almost all of it when Mamie scurried into their midst, coming to an abrupt halt when she saw him sitting there, eating ravenously. She was still clothed in the gown she’d worn yesterday, her graying hair half up on her head and half down. She looked exhausted and half-crazed. “Oh dear,” she saidanxiously. “No, Daria, you shouldn’t give him so much food. I’ve made a broth—”
    “Enough of your broth,” he said through a mouthful of ham.
    Mamie pushed her hair back and looked wildly at Daria, then at him. “Please come back to your bed, sir. Allow yourself to heal properly—it’s been only three days.”
    “I’ll no’ return to that bloody bed,” he said firmly, and dragged the back of his hand across his mouth.
    “I only want to help you—”
    “You’ve a peculiar way of helping.”
    “Mamie,” Daria said, coming around to put her hand on her grandmother’s arm. “Sit, please. Clearly he prefers to recuperate on his own terms. And it would be in your best interests to find another occupation than nursemaid to a stranger, don’t you agree?”
    “Aye, she’s right.”
    Mamie cast him a glare that would have frozen the North Sea, which was met with an equally chilling look from him. The tension between them was palpable. Lord, there was so much unspoken in this room! Daria felt as if she were in the parlor at Rochfeld, the Horncastle