Rules For A Proper Governess (MacKenzies & McBrides #7)(67)
Author: Jennifer Ashley

“Mama! Mama . . .” Cat’s continued cries penetrated the silence, punctuated by another crack from the guns across the valley.

“I have to be daft,” Bertie muttered to herself as she sought the next solid rock with the toe of her boot. “I belong on city streets, I do, trying to make ends meet and keep meself out of trouble. What the blazes am I doing climbing down a mountain in Scotland to rescue a doll?”

Bertie knew, however, that she wouldn’t climb back up without it. If Cat had been any other little girl, an ordinary child Bertie didn’t know well, she’d have told Cat to sod the bloody thing and have her rich father buy her another.

But Bertie had come to know Cat in the last weeks, and she understood exactly what the doll was to her. Bertie’s mother’s locket swung against her skin inside her bodice—she knew good and well she’d be climbing down these rocks if she’d dropped it.

Not everyone had Bertie’s climbing skills either, honed from a childhood of getting herself up the sides of buildings and through tiny windows to let her father in a discreet side door. Her dad would never take very much during these jobs, just one or two things that might not be missed right away. By the time people realized they’d been robbed, they couldn’t be sure when it had been done or who’d been nearby at the time.

Bertie was a bit past those childhood days, however, and no longer as agile. It had taken everything she’d had to climb up the scaffolding after Cat and Andrew the first day she’d met them. This going was harder, and the rocks seemed determined to cut her hands, the damp to make her slip.

Almost there. At the top of the hill, Cat continued to cry frantically; Sinclair was cursing, his hands full with keeping Andrew from climbing after Bertie.

The doll hung face downward, its pretty silk dress caught on a rock, which was why it had ceased its tumbling. Bertie had to inch her way toward it, holding hard to stones that cut her gloves. She knew she’d never climb out onto the jutting rock—she’d have to hang on here, and reach . . .

She heard Sinclair say, “Bertie,” in a tone of terror, anger, and certainty that he was seeing the last of her.

Bertie gripped her handholds tightly and prodded with her boot until she had very firm rock under her foot. Then she leaned out, bracing with her hand- and footholds, and hooked her fingers around the back of the doll’s dress.

She plucked the doll from the ledge, much as Sinclair pulled Andrew back by his coat even now, the doll’s little gown filthy with mud. Bertie levered herself upright, and thrust the doll inside her coat.

Now to make her ascent. Bertie felt for handholds going up, testing each one before trusting her weight to it. Climbing up was always easier for her than down, mostly because she didn’t have to look at the empty space beneath her feet. She went slowly, though, knowing that any misstep could mean her death.

Halfway up, she found chunks of the doll’s broken face strewn about the gorse. The poor thing’s smile was split in two, but both eyes remained in one piece, gazing at Bertie in cheerful encouragement. Bertie gathered up the bits, dropped them into her pocket, and continued.

She was almost to the top when a pair of strong hands gripped her under the arms and hauled her to solid ground. Bertie landed against Sinclair’s large body, and his arms went around her, holding her tight, tight. He crushed her to him with arms as hard as steel, lips in her hair. “Bertie. Damn and blast you . . .”

Behind them, Cat continued to cry, her wailing breaking into hoarse breaths. Bertie pushed away from Sinclair, but he didn’t let go of her hand as they made their way back to Cat.

Andrew was kneeling next to his sister, stroking her hair, his small face troubled. “Don’t cry, Cat. Bertie’s here. She saved your dolly. See?”

Sinclair gently lifted Cat and drew her into his arms. “Shh. Sweetheart.”

“It’s all right—I nabbed her,” Bertie said breathlessly. “She’s a bit worse for wear, but I think we can make her better. Nothing a little glue and needle and thread won’t fix. And maybe a good scrubbing.”

Cat peeked out at the smashed doll, her eyes red and flowing. “Ma . . . ma.” The word came in gasps, Cat sounding more like a tiny child than an eleven-year-old girl.

Bertie smoothed Cat’s hair, which was tangled now with thorny twigs and dead leaves. “I know, sweetheart. I know.”

Cat pushed herself away from her father to reach for Bertie. Bertie opened her arms and gathered Cat in. Over her head, she met Sinclair’s gaze, his gray eyes red-rimmed.

“Is she going to be all right?” Andrew asked in a small voice.

Sinclair took his hand. “I think so, lad. Don’t you worry, now.”

He squeezed Andrew’s hand, but the look he shared again with Bertie was uncertain, and she had to nod back in the same uncertainty.

Sinclair took Bertie and his children not to the shared nursery at the top of the house, but to the suite of rooms he’d been given in Lord Cameron’s wing. Sinclair didn’t want to have to explain the incident to the contingent of nannies or even to Ainsley and his well-meaning sisters-in-law. Not until Cat was better.

Cat was covered in grime, her face streaked with tears and mucus. Bertie didn’t look much better—her gloves in shreds, her gray wool gown torn, her face covered in dirt and little cuts. For once, Andrew was the cleanest of the lot.

Sinclair and Andrew waited rather forlornly in the little sitting room while Bertie ordered up a bath for Cat in the bedroom and bathed the girl herself. When she opened the door later to admit Sinclair, Bertie was damp and flushed, her face scrubbed clean, her bodice unbuttoned at her throat. Bertie told him in a quiet voice she’d take Andrew on up to the nursery, and left Sinclair alone with his daughter.

Cat lay in Sinclair’s bed, tucked up in her nightie that a maid had fetched from the nursery. The doll, stripped of the gown it had worn for seven or so years now, was propped next to the washbasin like a war casualty. Bertie had carefully set the pieces of its broken porcelain head beside the tattered body.

Sinclair smoothed the blankets over Cat. “Are you all right now, love?”

Cat nodded. The mad light had gone from her eyes, and she looked sad, ashamed, and a little discomfited. “I’m sorry, Papa.”

“Nothing to be sorry about,” Sinclair said. “I know she’s special to you. Bertie’s right—we’ll fix her up again.”

“She’s just a doll,” Cat said, her voice listless.