Chapter 16
Sixteen
“He will probably not survive the month.” The physician said it with the indifference of a man commenting on the weather. “The fluid is gathering again, and his constitution is not what it was. A week, if you are lucky. Two, if he is very stubborn.”
August stood by the cold fireplace, posture perfect and face composed. “Thank you, Doctor. I trust the servants have made your journey comfortable?”
“They have, My Lord.” The physician packed away his tools with a series of crisp snaps. “I wish I could offer better news.”
August offered the barest incline of his head. “You have done your duty. I will see that you are paid for it.”
The physician left without waiting for further pleasantries. August watched the door close, the latch setting with a small, final click.
He remained in the center of the sitting room, one hand braced on the mantelpiece.
The grandfather clock on the far wall beat out the seconds in threes and sixes, always a hair ahead of the pulse in his neck.
A chair sat overturned in the corner, evidence of Dorothy’s earlier panic.
He righted it with unnecessary care, as if the act might restore order to the room.
He was about to move toward the bedchamber when he heard the stifled sound of weeping. He turned, and his motherappeared at the threshold, her hands knotted at her chest.
He tried to summon the appropriate words—comfort, assurance, even a joke—but none came. Instead, he opened his arms, and she flew into them as if they were the last stronghold on earth.
“Oh, Augie,” she said, using the name she had not spoken since his childhood. “He is dying.”
He held her, the weight of her grief pressing through the fine muslin of her dress. She wept in great, tearing sobs, the kind that left her gasping. August said nothing. He only tightened his hold, anchoring her against the collapse.
When the worst of it had passed, Dorothy drew a handkerchief from her sleeve and dabbed at her eyes. “You must tell the girls,” she managed. “They will want to come.”
August nodded. “I will send for them.”
Dorothy looked at his face, searching. “You are so like him. He was always the strong one.”
He could not say what he thought: that strength, in this family, was merely the ability to survive sorrow without showing it. That every wall in Wildmoore House was mortared with reticence.
Instead, he kissed the top of her head and said, “I will take care of it, Mother.”
She pulled away, already assembling her dignity. “Of course, you will. I am being absurd. I should go to him. He needs me.” She patted his arm, gathered her shawl, and vanished into the adjoining room.
August waited until he heard the door close behind her then let his own shoulders drop.
The air in the room was thick with the sweet, rotting perfume of lilies.
He crossed to the window and stared out at the darkening lawn, the yew hedges casting elongated shadows.
He pressed his thumb to the bridge of his nose, pinching until the world sharpened.
He lasted sixty seconds. Then, with a violence that startled even himself, he struck the mantelpiece with his palm. A blue china vase toppled and shattered, shards skittering across the hearth. He stared at the wreckage, heart pounding, and forced himself to step away.
He needed to move, to act, to fix.
He fled the room and walked the length of the hall, taking the stairs two at a time to the first floor.
He went straight to the Duke’s study, the true nerve center of the house.
The door was unlocked; August pushed inside and made for the desk.
He dropped into the chair, opened the center drawer, and withdrew a sheaf of parchment. The quill in his hand shook.
He made a list: The lawyers to contact. The staff to inform. The arrangements for the estate, the correspondence for Parliament, the instructions for the burial. For every item he crossed off, three more took its place. He wrote with such pressure that the nib cut through the paper.
His breathing came fast, each inhale sharp and insufficient.
The first time the door creaked, he ignored it. He thought it was the wind.
The second time, a voice said, “August?”
He froze, and for a moment, he could not bring himself to look.
He heard the sound of slippers on the carpet. Eliza did not speak again. She waited.
He forced the words out, voice flat and strange, “He is dying. Days, they say. Perhaps a week.”
Eliza said nothing.
He kept his eyes on the desk. “There is much to be arranged. The title. The transition. The servants will be unsettled and the tenants. The girls cannot be told like this. I will—”
She spoke his name again, very quietly. “August.”
He could not remember the last time anyone had said it without irony or scorn. The syllables pulled at something he thought he had buried.
He tried to continue. “I have a list. I need to—” But his hand trembled so violently that the quill made a jag across the page. He stared at it, mortified.
She crossed to the desk and without a word, took the quill from his grasp, and he let her.
She set it down and stood beside him, her hand resting lightly on the blotter.
He watched the tremor in his own fingers, unable to stop it.
Eliza waited. When she spoke, it was as if nothing else mattered. “What do you need?”
He swallowed. “It has to be perfect. No mistakes. The funeral, the notices, the legal—” He stopped, unable to summon the next word.
She leaned closer, her shoulder nearly brushing his. “You have never made a mistake,” she said.
He wanted to protest, to tell her that the whole of his life was an improvisation, a patchwork of errors disguised as certainty. He wanted to confess how desperately he feared the future, how utterly unprepared he was for the finality of loss.
Instead, he shut his mouth and squeezed his hands together until the knuckles ached.
She took a clean sheet from the stack and smoothed it before him. “Tell me what to write,” she said.
He stared at the paper. The line of his jaw quivered.
“Tell me,” she repeated.
He did. He dictated the letter to his sisters, the one to the family solicitor, the note for the village.
When they had finished, she said, “Is there anything else?”
He shook his head, but she saw the lie in it.
She waited, the silence vast and kind.
He wanted to ask her not to leave. He wanted to say that the world was ending and that he was afraid to face it alone.
He said none of it.
She stood, tidied the papers, and left them stacked in order on the blotter.
Just before she reached the door, she looked back at him. He expected a look of pity or triumph. Instead, he found only understanding.
She left, the door shutting without a sound.
August sat at the desk for a long time after, the list complete, the world unchanged.
He did not move.
He will probably not survive the month, he recalled, and for the first time since he was a boy, August Vestiere wished someone else would take charge.
August had not sat for hours, not even when the clock on the mantel struck one then two then the dull, accusing stroke of three. He stood at the side of his father’s bed with his hands behind his back.
Eliza sat by the window, the only patch of gray in the dimness, her presence so unobtrusive that August sometimes forgot she was there—until, of course, he remembered, and the recollection struck him with something perilously close to gratitude.
Albert had been in and out of consciousness for most of the night. Once, he had opened his eyes and demanded a glass of port which August fetched and held to his lips. Albert drank, coughed, and muttered that if he were to die, he would do it properly fortified.
In the small hours, Dorothy Vestiere had drifted in and out, her energy spent after a long siege of tears. Now, only August and Eliza stood vigil. The nurse dozed on a low stool by the hearth, her head bobbing in time with the fire’s dying light.
The hour grew close and tight, the way time does when one is waiting for disaster. August stood so still that his own pulse began to pound in his ears.
Then, quite suddenly, Albert opened his eyes.
He squinted at August, as if seeing him from a great distance. “You there,” he croaked, “come closer.”
August stepped forward, bending until his face was in the shadow of the old man’s. “I am here, Father.”
Albert’s gaze slid past him then returned. “Not you. My father. Where is he?”
August’s spine went rigid. “He is gone, Father,” he said, reverting instinctively to the role Albert always cast him in at these times. “You are the head of the house now.”
Albert grimaced, half in pain and half in memory.
“That’s a bloody shame,” he said, voice dry as sand.
“He was a bastard, but he kept the books in order.” His hand shot out, grabbing August’s sleeve.
The grip was shockingly strong. “Don’t let them take it from you, boy. They’ll try. They always do.”
August bowed his head, jaw clenched against the ache in his chest. “I won’t, sir.”
Albert’s hand relaxed, but his eyes stayed open, roaming the room with confusion. “Where is my boy?” he asked, softer. “Where’s the little one—August? He shouldn’t be here. He shouldn’t see this.”
The words broke something in him. August felt the iron in his neck give, his shoulders curling forward as if to protect his heart. He let his eyes drop, staring at the trembling fingers that clung to his own.
Across the room, Eliza rose. She moved to stand at August’s side. She did not touch him at first, only watched the tableau: the dying man, the son losing his mooring.
Albert’s voice grew fretful. “Don’t let him in, I said! It’s not right. A child shouldn’t see this—”
“It’s all right,” Eliza said, addressing the old man as if he were a child himself. “He’s not here. You’re safe.”
Albert calmed, the muscles in his face smoothing out. “That’s good,” he murmured, “that’s very good. Tell him I’m sorry. Tell him—” But he never finished.
His hand slackened and dropped, the blue veins luminous against the white sheet.
August bowed his head, and for the first time in his life, he did not bother to hide the evidence of grief. A single tear traced down his cheek, burning hot in the cold room. He did not wipe it away.
Eliza placed her hand on his shoulder, solid and real, and let it rest there.
They stood in silence for a long time, the only sound the pop of the dying fire and the slow tick of the clock. The world had gone very still.
When at last August straightened, he did not let go of his father’s hand. He looked down at the old man’s face, the lines now peaceful, and saw not a duke, not a legend, not a symbol, but only the man who had once taught him to ride a horse and to tell the truth, even when it was unbearable.
Eliza leaned in, her breath warm against his ear.
“He knows you’re here,” she whispered. “He always has.”
He closed his eyes, just for a moment, and let himself believe it.