Sinful Nights: The Six-Month Marriage / Injured Innocent / Loving

‘The vet isn’t here,’ she told Sapphire, ‘but I know where he is. I’ll ‘phone him and let him know the position. I know he’ll be with you just as soon as he can. Are you able to get in touch with Blake?’ she asked worriedly, ‘I know how much he thinks of that mare … ’

It wasn’t hard for Sapphire to find Miranda’s telephone number, but she hesitated before dialling it. As she had half-expected, there was no answer. She ought to have felt a savage satisfaction that Blake was being repaid for his duplicity, but all she could feel was a growing concern for the mare, and concern at her own ability to handle the situation. The shepherd who might have been able to help was out on the hills with his flock; her father was far too ill to help and Mary … Mary was a trained nurse, Sapphire remembered excitedly, picking up the phone again and punching in the numbers quickly.

Mary listened while she explained the situation. ‘I’ll be right over,’ she assured Sapphire. ‘The vet may not be long, but it’s better to be safe than sorry. This won’t be the first birth I’ve attended by a long chalk.’

While she was waiting, more to keep herself busy than anything else Sapphire boiled water and scalded the buckets, finding carbolic soap, and a pack of clean, unused rope. If for some reason the foal was turned the wrong way they might need the rope. Hurriedly she tried to think of anything else they might need, rushing into the yard when she heard the sound of a vehicle. To her disappointment it was Mary and not the vet who alighted from the Range Rover.

‘You’ve done well,’ she approved as she followed Sapphire into the barn. ‘But where’s Blake?’

‘He had to go out,’ Sapphire avoided her eyes. ‘I haven’t been able to reach him.’

Fortunately Mary was too busy examining the mare to hear the slight hesitation in her voice.

‘The foal’s turned into the breech position,’ Mary explained, fulfilling Sapphire’s own fears. ‘I’ll try and turn it, can you hold the mare’s head, try and soothe her?’

Her father had once told Sapphire that she had a way with animals, and Sapphire prayed that he might be right as she softly coaxed the nervous mare, talking to her in soothing whispers.

‘This isn’t her first foal,’ Mary commented, ‘but she’s very nervous.’

‘Missing Blake, I expect,’ Sapphire murmured absently. ‘Are you going to be able to turn it?’

‘I think so.’ Mary’s face was strained with the effort of concentrating on her task, and Sapphire felt herself willing her to succeed.

‘There … I think that’s done it. Good girl,’ she soothed the mare, adding to Sapphire, ‘I think we can let nature take its course now, although I hope the birth won’t be too protracted, she’s already suffered a lot of pain.’

As the birth pangs rippled through the mare’s swollen belly Sapphire found herself tensing in sympathy with her, and yet the mare did seem more relaxed as though she knew that they were there to help her.

‘Quick, Sapphire, look.’ Mary’s voice was exultant as she pointed to the foal’s head as it emerged from its mother’s body. Deftly she moved to assist the mare, Sapphire immediately moving to help, remembering how she had assisted her father in the past.

The foal was a tiny bundle of stick-like limbs on the straw at its mother’s feet when they heard the sound of a vehicle outside.

A door slammed and the vet came hurrying in bringing a gust of cold air with him, his anxious frown relaxing into a smile as he saw the foal. ‘Well, well what have we here?’ he asked gently, quickly examining the mare, nodding with approval as he inspected the foal.

‘I’m sorry I couldn’t get here before—an emergency at Low Head farm, but you seem to have managed well enough without me.’ His smile was for Sapphire, but she shook her head, directing his attention to Mary. ‘Without Mary’s help I couldn’t have done it.’

‘The foal had turned,’ Mary explained, ‘but fortunately he was small enough for me to turn back.’

‘Umm, quick thinking on your part to send for Mary,’ the vet praised Sapphire, ‘but where’s Blake?’

‘He had to go out.’ Sapphire repeated the explanation she had given Mary.

‘Lucky for him and the mare that you were here.’ His eyes were curious as he inspected her, and Sapphire wondered if he knew that she was Blake’s wife, and that they were back together again.

It was another two hours before Sapphire could crawl into bed. She had made supper for Mary and the vet, who had pronounced both mother and foal to be in perfect health, and by the time they had gone she had been almost too tired to sink into the hot bath she had run for herself. As she pulled the quilt up round her ears she glanced at her watch. One o’clock, and Blake still wasn’t back. A bitter pain invaded her body. Was he at this very moment making love to Miranda, kissing her with the barely restrained passion he had shown her earlier in the day? They had not been lovers he had said to her, and for a moment she had believed him, but surely his actions tonight proved that he had lied?

She closed her eyes, willing herself to sleep. She wasn’t going to lie here awake, wondering where he was, waiting for him to return as she had done so often in the past.

CHAPTER SIX

A SURPRISE AWAITED Sapphire when she opened her eyes the following morning. It was the clarity of the light in her bedroom that first alerted her, and padding across the room on bare feet she flung back the curtains, bemused to see the white blanket of snow that must have fallen during the night. Everything was so quiet; the air so crystal clear it was almost like wine. She frowned; where was Blake? Had he even returned? She padded back to bed, picking up her watch and nearly dropping it as she realised how long she had overslept. It was gone ten o’clock!

Showering quickly she ran downstairs and opened the kitchen door. The room was empty but there was evidence that Blake had had some breakfast. The aroma of coffee hung tantalisingly in the air making her aware of her thirst. Deftly she moved about the kitchen going to stand by the window as she waited for the coffee to filter into the jug. The snow lay surprisingly deep in the yard, criss-crossed with footmarks plus those of a dog. Of course, the sheep! Sapphire gnawed at her bottom lip. Attractive though the snow was to look at it could spell disaster for any unwary farmer. She remembered her father’s shepherd telling her that he had expected this weather. Had Blake got the ewes down to the lower pastures? If not there was every danger that the new lambs would be lost beneath the huge drifts Sapphire knew could form on the bleak mountain tops. Without consciously making any decision she found herself searching in the porch for a pair of suitable Wellingtons, mentally ticking off all that she would need if she was to be any help to the men. She could follow their tracks through the snow without any difficulty. Perhaps if she took them hot coffee and tea …

Fifteen minutes later Sapphire tramped through the farmyard, following the clearly defined footprints upwards. The snow had frozen to a crisp crust, her laboured breath made white plumes in the sharp morning air. At another time she would have found the atmosphere invigorating, but right now she was too concerned about the sheep to really enjoy the delights of the morning.

The baaing of the sheep and the sharp yelps of the dogs reached her first, carrying easily on the clear air, and she expelled her breath on a faint sigh of relief. Obviously some of the sheep at least had been brought down to the lower meadows. As she followed the footprints along a dry-stone wall Sapphire caught her first glimpse of her quarry, a rough shelter had been constructed in one of the fields, and men were busy unbaling hay from a tractor. The field sloped away slightly offering some protection from the wind and drifts, and as she got nearer Sapphire recognised her father’s shepherd, busily at work. The other men she also vaguely recognised as general farmhands attached to Blake’s farm whom he had no doubt taken from their other tasks to help with the all-important job of saving the sheep.

Tam recognised her face, a weary grin splitting his weathered face as he hailed her.

‘I’ve brought you something hot to drink,’ Sapphire called out as soon as she was close enough, adding anxiously, ‘How’s it going? The ewes …’

‘Brought most of them down yesterday,’ Tam informed her. ‘Blake’s gone looking for the rest of the flock. Shouldn’t have too much of a problem with my Laddie to help him. Fine sheepdog.’

‘Anything I can do to help?’ Sapphire asked, handing out the thermos flasks and cups.

‘No. I reckon everything’s under control. Luckily Blake was running your dad’s flock with his own, so we shouldn’t have too many casualties. If this weather had come another two weeks on we could have been in trouble—the first ewes are due to start lambing then.’

‘You don’t think it will last then?’ Sapphire asked, studying the snow-covered landscape.

Tam shook his head. ‘Not more than three or four days, and we were prepared for it.’ He nodded in the direction of the new shelter and the bales of hay. ‘Blake knows what he’s doing all right.’ There was approval in his voice and Sapphire turned away, not wanting the shepherd to see her own bitter resentment. What time had Blake come home last night? He could have had precious little sleep she thought revengefully. Had he arrived before the snow came or had the fact that she had not heard him been due to the fact that it had muffled his return?

What did it matter? It was no business of hers how he spent his time, or whose bed he shared.

She waited until the men had finished their drinks before gathering up the empty flasks.

‘I’ll keep this one for Blake,’ Tam offered taking a half-full one from her and screwing on the top. ‘He’ll be fair frozen by the time he gets back.’

‘Is he up there alone?’ Sapphire frowned when the shepherd nodded. ‘Is that wise?’

‘Blake knows what he’s doing.’

Tam had been right, Sapphire reflected several hours later when a noise in the yard alerted her to Blake’s return. Snow clung to his thick protective jacket and the cuffs of his boots, his skin burned by the icy cold wind. She hadn’t known whether to prepare a meal or not—there was still the Beef Wellington to cook from last night, and she had spent what was left of the morning making a nourishing hot soup, thinking that if Blake didn’t return she could take it out to the men in flasks.

She had also been in to inspect the new foal, now standing proudly on all four spindly legs while his mother looked on in benign approval.

As Blake crossed the yard the ‘phone rang. It was her father calling to enquire about the sheep. ‘Everything’s under control, Dad,’ she assured him. ‘Blake had already got the ewes down to the lower pasture and he’s been up to the top to bring the rest down.’

‘Yes, Mary told me I didn’t need to worry, but old habits die hard.’

The kitchen door opened as she replied, and she could hear the sound of Blake tugging off his boots. ‘Blake’s back now,’ she told her father, ‘would you like to speak to him?’

‘No, I know myself what it’s like. He’ll be frozen to the marrow and tired out—the last thing he’ll feel like is talking to me. I’ll speak to him later when he’s thawed out.’

‘Who was that?’

She hadn’t heard Blake cross the floor in his stockinged feet and whirled round apprehensively. Exhaustion tautened the bone structure of his face, dimming the gold of his eyes to tawny brown. White flecks of snow clung to his hair and jumper.

‘My father. Is it snowing again?’