The Thief's Daughter by Victoria Cornwall

Author:Victoria Cornwall [Cornwall, Victoria]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Historical, Romance, suspense/mystery/spy thriller, 18th-century Cornwall
Publisher: Choc Lit
Published: 2017-09-08T04:00:00+00:00

Jenna watched the men ride away and let the drape drop. The small amount of time that had passed was enough for her to regain her composure and see their kiss for what it was. An act to fool. It almost fooled her. She had hoped her plan would work, yet its success still surprised her. She finished buttoning her dress, then lifted the pot of boiling water from the fire and placed it on the table. Carefully she took three kitchen utensils from the boiling water and placed them onto a clean cloth. She placed it onto a tray next to clean bandages made from a sheet, a bread and milk poultice, and some boiled water for cleaning.

She carefully carried the laden tray up to Jack’s room and placed it by his bed. She noticed beads of perspiration had formed on his forehead during her absence. Any earlier embarrassment was now well and truly extinguished by her concern for him.

‘They have gone. Is it very painful?’

‘It is getting worse by the minute.’ His face was etched with pain, but seeing her worried expression he attempted to make light of it. ‘Perhaps you should try distracting me again.’

Jenna did not feel like laughing. ‘The time for playing games has come to an end. Your wound must be tended to.’

‘I will see no surgeon. He will raise too many questions and the ones I know are too quick to pick up a saw.’ He managed a slight smile. ‘I am rather attached to my arm and have no wish to lose it now.’

‘Which is why I brought this,’ Jenna answered, waving a hand across her tray.

Jack looked at the knife, fork and sugar prongs and sniffed the bread and milk poultice.

‘What do you plan to do with that? Eat it off?’

Jenna broke into a smile, the first in many days. His joke lightened her spirits and dispelled any awkwardness between them.

‘My brothers and father were often wounded during their …’

‘… law breaking?’

‘We could not afford a surgeon and even if we could it would …’

‘… raise too many questions?’

Jenna nodded. It was always difficult to talk about her family’s unsavoury ways of earning a living.

‘So my mother learned how to tend to them and reduce the risk of infection. She found that by boiling everything it seemed to work. I don’t know why but it does.’ She carefully arranged the utensils. ‘I am going to use these to examine the wound.’

‘Then I hope your mother taught you well.’

‘It was the only thing I was willing to learn from her.’ Jenna began to undo the makeshift bandage and laid it carefully into a clean chamber pot.

‘It has stopped bleeding, but it must be thoroughly cleaned. If a musket ball is still in there, I need to get it out.’

‘Do what you need to do.’

‘It will be painful.’ She poured a large glass of brandy from a decanter and offered it to him. ‘It is best if you drink yourself into a stupor.’

Jack shook his head.

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