His Darling

Chapter Two

Anne Floss made her way to the mansion’s service entrance. She had already dismissed the side portico with its stately pillars and peaked roof as not for her. And the front door? Lord! Simply out of the question.

Her rough-and-tumble background had toughened her. Whilst used to taking orders from her superiors – both in a hospital and battlefield setting – she was no easily intimidated mouse. When she knew she was right, she refused to back down. Rather, she spoke her mind until someone in authority listened and acted accordingly. In the care of her patients, she never buckled under societal dictates. But she did know her place in the grand scheme of things and that place was the service entrance.

As she walked briskly along, she rehearsed how she would handle Mr. Braxton Southbourne.

First things first. After rendering him a formal apology for her late arrival, she would then give him the set-down he so richly deserved. An unhealthy laborer toiling under the hot sun was mistreatment, clear and simple, and she intended to tell Mr. Southbourne so.

He would never hire her now anyway. Why not speak her mind?

This was practically a new century, the dawning of the twentieth, a time of mechanical enlightenment. A gilded age, as satirized by Mark Twain. For heaven’s sake, no wonder that laborer was so cranky! He should have been using one of those new steam-powered whatnots – mowers, she believed they might have been called – rather than scythe by hand, backbreaking work in the best of circumstances, a possibly killing proposition in the case of a man so obviously ill.

Mr. Southbourne could well afford the additional landscaping expense. By all accounts, the industrialist was enormously well-off financially. His lush green lawn, manicured to perfection, only affirmed his wealth. Otherwise, he would have eliminated the laborer altogether and let hungry sheep graze the rolling hills of his property. Now there was cheap labor! And he would have gotten a few pairs of woolen socks from his flock too.

Shame on you, Mr. Southboune, she would say, for not making a mechanized cutter of some sort available to your hired help!

At that point in her scold, she would most likely be shown the door.

Trudging along, Anne chuckled again, and for only the second or third time in as many months. This last year had done her in for sure. Leeched the saucy minx right of her. Now she sounded for all the world like someone’s prim and proper maiden aunt.

Oh, well. Missing her appointment was probably all for the best. Mr. Southbourne was most likely a tightwad skinflint, ala Mr. Dickens’s Scrooge, too parsimonious to buy machinery for those in his employ. His long-suffering cook most likely slaved over an open flame in an antiquated kitchen. Anne could only imagine the kind of treatment she, a nurse, would have received in the household. Kicked about like a mangy alley dog, she wagered.

Anne had another reason too for believing not being hired was probably all for the best:

That laborer outside.

Hearts afluttering! Ailing or not, he had sent her fancy soaring.

The man cutting reeds would be a magnificent animal…if he put some weight on his tall frame. He would never be brawny, but some additional pounds would turn him sleek and sinewy, a powerful panther.

And just as dangerous. To her.

There was that bulge in his trousers to consider. What with him being sick and all, his getting it up so that she noticed spoke volumes about his virility. What must he be like ordinarily, she mused, with a naughty sigh.

Just like her chuckle of an instant before that naughty sigh was her first in many a month. Not in over a year had she paid much mind to herself, never mind the opposite gender. Not since, William’s death…

The small amount of cash put aside for her by her beloved had given her far too much idle time to mourn his passing. Too much time to think. Too much time to feel sorry for herself.

Anne shook her head. Get on with it! What purpose does wallowing in sadness serve?

None. Sadness would certainly not help William and it would not help her either.

Idle hands were the devil’s workshop and all that, and she had never been one to sit around doing nothing. She was almost glad the money had run out when it had. Depleted funds and boredom had sent her scurrying for employment opportunities. It was in the New York Daily News that she stumbled upon the ad from Mr. Braxton Southbourne.

The position was to have been her re-entry into the workaday world after William’s death had left her a widow at the age of twenty-nine, far too young by anyone’s reckonings to give up on life. She was no quitter, and her husband would not have wished persistent melancholy on her.

No, her husband would not have begrudged her sighs and chuckles. And so she must forgive herself for noticing the substantial bulge in the laborer’s trousers.

In her own defense, not noticing something that huge would have been difficult.

But really…had that stiffy in the laborer’s trousers been all for her?

Hard to believe.

She had once been a looker but she had let herself go. Lack of sleep…lack of joy…did that to a woman. Even to nurses well used to going without rest for long stretches at a time and being around death and dying as a matter of course. When it was your loved one doing the ailing, it was different.

Alas, her poor husband was gone now, and the laborer had been a tasty treat for her starved eyes with his bare chest and sculpted muscled flesh glistening with manly sweat. In ceaseless rivulets, moisture had streamed off his body, a tall, unquestionably thin body…

Appallingly thin for a man of his height and shoulder breadth.

Anne frowned. Had she dismissed his weight loss too casually? There had to be a reason for those lost pounds.

The body she had examined in minute detail from under the full brim of her new lavender bonnet of half-mourning, a hat she could ill-afford and despised but must wear for propriety sake, had been almost wasted. Not all that far removed from the emaciated ravages of illness she had witnessed and tended to in Cuba.

On the drive, Anne came to a complete standstill.

Good Lord. Malaria! The laborer might very well have fallen victim to the dreadful disease.

According to the employment ad, Mr. Southbourne had been a Rough Rider. And Anne had indeed heard of him in Cuba, particularly in reference to his courage under fire and his valiant regard of human life whilst disregarding the danger to his own. The ad went on to relate how Mr. Southbourne had returned to this country feeling under the weather. The ad had not specified the nature of his illness, only that he still required a lengthy convalescence at home.

Had the laborer fought in that same unit too?

He must have! Malaria was not spread person-to-person, and so Mr. Southbourne could not have passed it to his employee through contact. Plus, there was the laborer’s nearly unrecognizable slouch hat. Roosevelt’s cavalrymen had also worn them…

From Anne’s own time in Cuba, she knew illness was every bit as dangerous as the putrefying wounds of war. If not for grief dulling her wits, she would have put two-plus-two together and reached the correct diagnosis sooner.

This must end. Melancholy was interfering with her ability to think, never mind nurse, a skill at which she had once excelled.

And, now that she reconsidered it, though complimentary to her at first blush, that laborer’s erection was also highly suspicious. The man was sick and she was only serviceable in appearance at the moment. How could she have caused any man’s lust when wearing a dove gray travelling suit that disguised her figure?

Men did notice her bosom. All the time. They rarely if ever met her eyes and spied the dismissive look in their glare. But none of that applied today, not with that all-enveloping coat she had on. Also, she had scraped her dark hair back into a widow’s unbecoming chignon at the back of her head, torturing the thick wavy strands into a no-nonsense straightness under her new bonnet of half-mourning. All around, she had looked as sensible as her boots, presently scuffed and dust-coated after her militant march up the drive. Today, she would have to put the laborer’s tented trousers down to a man desperate to get laid and none-too-choosy by whom. Unless…

The laborer’s extreme sexual excitement had not been caused by lust at all but was a symptom of his distress, a distress that had manifested itself in an involuntary and most likely painfully debilitating way.

What a relief!

Well, not for him. The poor bugger had to be suffering. Not for her either. His erection had buoyed her spirits and now…and now…

No, she was not wretched again. How he made her feel out on the drive for those few minutes had been the light at the end of long dark tunnel and she intended to keep travelling towards it.

Elsewhere.

But first, before leaving this opulent estate for good, she would discuss the laborer’s condition with Mr. Southbourne. As was her duty as a nurse.

And so she arrived, deep in thought, at the mansion’s service entrance.

Here to see Mr. Southbourne, she announced in her most professional manner to the female servant who answered her summons. I am expected.

"Was expected."

The reply, given by an unseen male, came from the deep recesses of the hall’s shadows. Along with:

You were expected two full hours ago, Nurse Floss.

That voice sounded familiar. Too familiar. Condescending too, now that she thought about it. His voice also resonated with something else, something other than condescension. Actually rumbled with the quality. Hard to put her finger on precisely what, her thought processes being so slow these days, downright scrambled. In proof, she was seeing prison inmates out in the tall grass where only a sick a laborer stood.…

And now he stood in this grand mansion laughing at her.

Oh, it was glee she heard in his voice all right, she finally realized. His voice rumbled with barely suppressed mirth, damn him, as if he had caught her with her hand stuffed up to the wrist in the cookie jar and she was pretending otherwise…despite the fine coating of white sugar powdering her lips.

He thought he possessed the punch-line to an inside joke she was not privy to. Only, she was privy to it. In fact, she had first-hand acquaintance with it. She recognized this territory all too well, particularly when it was rubbed in her face.

She was a poor nobody. And she needed no common laborer telling her so.

As a child, she had been the brunt of much the same brand of hurtful humor, made fun of by jesters far better off than this scruffy and rude and foul-tempered laborer. The spiteful ridicule had scarred her, and that scar tissue had toughened her, made her the woman she was today – a nurse!

And so bad attitude or not, she must at least try to help him. Though – what on earth was the laborer she had mistaken for a prison inmate doing here, inside this grand mansion? And where was Mr. Southbourne?

Anne squared her shoulders, about to tell the laborer off but good, when he stepped out of the shadows and commanded her sympathy.

A nurse first, an enraged woman second, she said: I need your employer’s permission before treating you. Where is Mr. Southbourne?

You are looking at him. Or, rather, you are looking at his cock.

What! You – the owner of this estate – the gentleman I came to see about a nursing position?

Correct. About time you arrived.

Right was right and wrong was wrong, and she was in the wrong here as far as missing the appointment went, just as he was in the wrong in playing her for a fool out on the drive. But she had more important concerns now than right and wrong. The contemptuous bastard who looked down his aquiline nose at her was clearly in pain.

Anne blew out a gust of air. Stiff cocks were all well and good, and there was a time and place for them, but not when their intended purpose had long since passed.

Letting go of why a gentleman of his means would perform not only manual labor on his own estate but completely unnecessary manual labor on top of it, she said in her best nurse’s manner, Tell me what is going on down there.

I will not deflate, no matter what I do.

Did you employ the usual method?

Do you think me an idiot?

No, I think you are ill, sir, she said evenly. And I would like to be of assistance, which is why I answered your employment inquiry.

Of course, I employed the usual method and without success.

I see, she said with a nurse’s compassionate nod to his jutting penis. Now, by usual method, do you mean calling in a whore? Or did you use your hand?

A whore would not be safe with me at present. I employed my hand, he grumbled.

And nothing worked. Well, I will see what I can do.

I would be most grateful.

With his humility, he rose in her opinion. Sunstroke can cause excitability, which typically takes this form in a man. But I believe you contracted malaria in Cuba. Did you?

Yes.

Has your surgeon prescribed quinine?

Yes.

To make sure, she asked, "The yellow bark of the chinchona tree, ingested as a gum? Bitter in taste?

He nodded.

What dosage are you taking , Mr. Southbourne?

When he told her, she gave vent to her despair. Physicians unfamiliar with the treatment of malaria often overprescribe the bark. You should rightly be on half that therapeutic amount. Your present amount is poisoning you. Cinchonism or quinism, it is called. Continue on as you have done and this present side effect might eventually lead to impotency.

Christ, he said weakly, I have no family, no one to inherit my wealth. My need to wed and produce a child was why I placed the ad for a nurse in the first place. On the morrow, I stop taking the stuff.

And thereby throw out the baby with the bath water, sir. Reduce the level you take now and the…problem…will subside. Now, shall we proceed to your bedchamber so I can help…resolve…this issue?

No.

Even pained as he was, the rich prick rejected her. Well, she would need to hear him say it, the arrogant sod.

Why not? she asked tightly.

In my present state of…penile tumescence…I find climbing stairs extraordinarily difficult, Nurse Floss. My office is right around the corner to the right. Come this way.

Sadly, coming this way or any way will not improve your predicament, Mr. Southbourne, she said to his back as he scuffed along ahead of her. Ejaculation is not a remedy, and the word nurse is not synonymous with the word whore, regardless of what you might believe.

Nurse Floss – I would have solicited a prostitute days ago had I been able to so without endangering her life, he said over his shoulder. But I cannot seek out a whore, not in my current state of mind. Nothing to do with the malaria. Something else altogether.

Exercise might help decrease the blood flow…

Damnation, you saw me! I have been toiling outside all day, with no relief. Why do you think I was out there baking under the hot sun when I have mowers my landscapists regularly use to do the same work?

In her occupation, she was well-used to male anger being directed at her. The trick was not to take a patient’s outbursts personally. To let tirades and insults roll off her nurse’s back with as much good grace and humor as she could muster.

And so too did she here. In a cheerily optimistic voice, she said, Reducing the remedy’s portion will make you fit as a fiddle again. Unfortunately, that is the future. For now, into your office we go.

With the stumbling walk of man thrice his age, the instrument of his torture leading the way, he swung open the office door. Like a gentleman, he politely indicated she should enter first.

As she was no lady, she declined.

WC? she asked instead.

He pointed to the end of the hall.

How convenient. Go on ahead, sir. Everything off from the waist down and make yourself comfortable.

My inability to make myself comfortable is the whole problem in a nutshell.

Anne bit her tongue. No ribald jest about nuts here!

When I return, sir, I will set to making things right with you. She turned to go.

Before you leave and just so you know – you will not get marriage out of me this way, Nurse Floss.

I beg your pardon? She whipped back around.

I had a private detective investigate your background prior to your arrival. I know of your opportunism in regards to your recently deceased husband.

Opportunism? What opportunism?

Aware he was dying, you married him anyway. For his money, I suspect. I knew you were as tough as nails and could handle yourself in adverse situations, which is why I thought you might do for this position, but though I have certain deficits, I am not so vulnerable as all that. Plus, I have a team of lawyers looking out for my best interests. To be perfectly clear, he groaned, clutching the doorjamb with both hands, Seduction will not work on this private nursing case. You will need to find yourself another dying benefactor from whom to bilk easy money.

Her back was up now, good and up. Her claws were out. No hiring a paid assassin for her – even if she could afford a cutthroat from her misbegotten youth. She was throttling this wealthy bastard with her own bare hands.

Baseborn, that was her, and she was more than capable of ridding the world of yet another arrogant so-and-so. For, as he had only just related, she really was tough as nails.

Why farm out the job when she could have the fun of killing him herself?

Under her overlarge coat, she drew herself up. "My dear husband had a little money put aside which I received upon his death. Hardly a fortune, and not nearly enough to compensate my loss of income for the year I spent caring for him. I did so because I wished to. And, afterwards, grieving for my loss, I made do. A real loss it was, too, for my husband was the strongest and kindest person I have ever known. He left a whole in my life no one else will ever fill. Now, that is the last I shall say in regard to this matter. My marriage was private, not one meant for public consumption. I shall be of assistance here because I am nurse and I cannot in good conscience walk away from anyone I might be able to help. For that, I must have your cooperation. Do I have it – yes or no? A nod will do me."

His swarthy complexion growing paler by the instant, he jerked his strong jaw at her in the affirmative.

"Good! Furthermore, sir, you are not ‘dying’. It only feels that way to you now. You will be right as rain in jig time,