“You are the mistress of this house?” His tone was unreadable.
She nodded, and he continued to stare, which was rather disconcerting. She turned up the lamp, but it did not remedy the tension as much as she had hoped it would. She clasped her hands in front of her and moved to the foot of the bed. “We grow our own roses here. Did you know?” She waved toward the vase.
“I did not.” He glanced at the flowers. “They, um, smell very nice.”
“Thank you,” she said, able to study him now that he was looking away from her. The swelling in his face had gone down, allowing him to open both eyes, though the left one was not as wide as the right. His face was still mottled with bruises, and a cut showed up black against his forehead. A painful-looking split cut through the perfect line of his bottom lip. “I came to see how you are faring.”
He looked toward the fireplace, laid but not lit as the day had been warm. “I am unable to rightly answer that question, Lady Sabrina. I have never felt so . . . unwell in my life, never lain abed for an afternoon, let alone days, and yet I am beyond grateful for your help.” He looked back at her, then away again as though embarrassed by his thanks. Or perhaps his dependence. “You saved my life.”
“I did what anyone would have done.”
He let out a punchy laugh, but then cringed and pressed a hand to his right side, where Therese had said he had at least two cracked ribs. Once he’d caught his breath, he continued. “You have a much higher opinion of humankind than I do.”
“Perhaps,” she said, though she needed him to believe that anyone would have done as much to make her motives look like general concern for her fellow man. “I believe that as I seek to create a world I would wish to live in, that world becomes more of a possibility. You told me you had nowhere to go, no one I could call for you. Bringing you here seemed the only option.”
He stared at the covers pulled up to his chest and seemed to curl into himself. “I-I don’t have other resources, and so I thank you very much for your kindness. I do not deserve it.”
The sincerity of his words struck that tender place in her heart. “Everyone deserves mercy, Mr. Stillman.”
He shook his head but said nothing. After a few moments, he cleared his throat. “Therese tells me that you and I knew one another once. I feel terrible, but I don’t remember. I am sorry.”
Did it hurt that he did not remember their meeting? It was silly to think he would. That night had been of far greater significance to her than it would ever have been to him. Besides, she did not want to be remembered as a scared woman hiding from her husband.
“Our acquaintance happened some time ago, when you were new to London. I had quite forgotten about the meeting myself until you told me your name.”
“I am all the more regretful not to remember yours, seeing as how you have done me this turn.”
“Do not worry yourself over it, Mr. Stillman. Your focus must be on your healing.”
“Therese says it may be weeks before I am able to walk again.”
“Yet you will walk,” Sabrina said encouragingly. “Therese is remarkably skilled, and as you are young and . . . hale, I’ve no doubt you will impress all of us with your fortitude. You are welcome to stay here for the next month—that is how long Therese expects it will take before you are fit to travel—but there must be some additional arrangements in place by then.”
“Yes, she told me. I am . . . considering my options.” He paused, his expression thoughtful. “Could tell me how it happened? Your coming upon me?”
Sabrina regarded him warily and then crossed to straighten the curtain on the rod covering his window. She needed something to do with her hands. “Do you remember anything of that morning?”
“I remember being pulled by my arms into the alley by two men, but then only fragments—flashes of . . . a black stick and a carriage and a big man. I think it might have been Joshua—he is a footman here?”
Sabrina understood his confusion. Joshua was not built like the typical footman, small-boned and elegant.