The Devil Himself #2
“Ironic for certain. Whether or not it’s delicious, I’m unsure.
” Amelia stared unseeing at her editorial.
Her carefully ordered worldview was being rearranged against her will.
Lord Hereford—rake, critic, philanthropist, and purveyor of scandalous literature.
“I don’t suppose he writes any of it himself? ”
“Why? Planning to offer him a position at the Review?”
“Certainly not!” Amelia grabbed a fresh sheet of paper, determined to focus on work rather than enigmatic marquesses.
Amelia had barely dipped her pen in ink when rapid footsteps approached. Thompson, the assistant editor, burst through the door, slightly breathless.
“This just arrived for you,” he said, holding out a folded letter with his expression unusually grave. “It’s from Dr. Morrison and apparently urgent.”
Amelia’s hand froze mid-motion, a drop of ink falling unnoticed onto her fresh page. Dr. Morrison. She hadn’t heard that name spoken aloud in years, though she occasionally glimpsed him on London’s streets—always hurrying past with averted eyes, as if the sight of her brought him physical pain.
“Dr. Morrison?” She set down her pen with careful deliberation. “I wouldn’t have thought he’d remember me after all this time.”
“How could he forget?” Elisha said softly, perching on the edge of Amelia’s desk.
“He spent days treating you, sent you herbal compounds for weeks without charging you anything, then avoided you like the plague, didn’t he?
” Her eyes held that faraway look, no doubt remembering those dark days when she’d stayed by Amelia’s bedside through the worst of it.
Amelia broke the seal with trembling fingers. The handwriting was shaky, nothing like the precise script she remembered from her prescriptions.
“He’s dying,” she whispered. “He wants to see me. Says he has something important to tell me. What do you suppose he wishes to speak to me about?”
“I cannot imagine what it could be,” Elisha admitted. “Perhaps you left an impression on him. Would you like me to come with you?”
Amelia considered it, but something in the letter’s tone made her shake her head. “No, thank you. One of us has to stay and finish setting the type for tomorrow’s edition.”
They embraced, and Amelia felt those same arms that had once lifted her through fever-soaked nights tighten around her.
“I’ll be fine,” she murmured, though her voice wavered.
When they finally pulled apart, Amelia saw her own tears mirrored in Elisha’s eyes.
She pressed a kiss to her friend’s cheek, trying to convey in that simple gesture what words could never fully express—thank you for keeping me alive when I’d given up on living.
*
The journey to Dr. Morrison’s home stretched like a fever dream. Through the carriage window, London blurred past, but Amelia saw none of it. Instead, her mind kept returning to the day of the accident, to a pain so intense it had felt like her body was being torn apart.
The carriage stopped before a modest townhouse, its brick facade weathered and windows partially shuttered. A maid led her up a narrow staircase that smelled of camphor and illness, Amelia’s wooden leg striking each step with a dull thud.
The man in the bed barely resembled the commanding physician she remembered. Dr. Morrison had collapsed in on himself, his skin stretched paper-thin over prominent bones, his chest rising and falling with visible effort.
His eyes fluttered open at her approach. “Miss Thornton,” he wheezed, one trembling hand reaching toward her. “You came. I wasn’t sure…”
“Of course I came.” She lowered herself carefully into the chair beside his bed. “Though I confess, I was surprised to receive your request.”
“I can imagine,” he nodded weakly. “I’ve been living as a coward, afraid to face my past mistakes.
” A ghost of a smile crossed his lips. “I’ve followed your career.
Like watching my own daughter succeed.” His words dissolved into a coughing fit that shook his entire frame.
“Which makes what I must tell you all the more difficult.”
Something in his tone made Amelia’s spine stiffen. “What do you mean?”
He closed his eyes, grief etching deeper lines around his mouth.
“Your leg… I could have saved it. Should have saved it. The damage was severe, yes, but not beyond repair. But the factory owners insisted amputation would be quicker, cheaper. Said they wouldn’t pay for months of treatment. And I… God help me, I gave in.”
The words crashed over Amelia like a wave. The room tilted and spun as their meaning sank in. Her leg, her life, had been decided not by medical necessity but by businessmen’s ledgers.
“You chose expediency over your physician’s oath?” she heard herself ask.
“I was weak,” he whispered, tears tracking down his sunken cheeks. “The factory owners had influence, could have ruined my practice. But that’s no excuse.” His grip on her hand tightened. “Can you ever forgive me?”
Amelia stared at their joined hands, her mind reeling. All these years she’d blamed herself, believed she should have been more careful. But every painful step, every altered dream, every prejudice she’d endured—all of it had been a choice made by others who thought her expendable.
“Who made this decision?” she asked, fighting to maintain her composure. “Do you know the proprietor’s name?”
“I was told there were three proprietors, but I don’t know which,” he croaked. “The foreman at the time, Moore, sent missives to all three. Only one reply arrived, unsigned.” His fingers twisted weakly in the bedsheets. “The letter’s in my desk drawer. The key’s in the vase.”
Moving as if in a dream, Amelia retrieved the key and opened the drawer. Inside lay a folded, yellowed parchment, its edges worn from repeated handling. Her fingers trembled as she unfolded it:
Expediency and economy are key. If recovery more than a month, amputate.
The stark brutality of those twelve words struck her with physical force. This scrap of paper had decided her fate—a calculation that had altered every day of her existence since.
She carefully refolded the letter and slipped it into her reticule. “Thank you for your honesty, Doctor. I hope it brings you peace.”
As the door closed behind her, something hardened in Amelia’s heart.
The nameless proprietors who had deemed her leg expendable were still out there, perhaps still making such calculations about other lives.
The familiar ache transformed from memory into purpose, driving her forward with newfound resolve.