Chapter 22
Chapter Twenty-Two
The doctor had gone an hour ago, his bag clicking shut like a verdict.
The house was quieter now, though the hush had a weight to it. Servants moved softly beyond the door. Cordelia had taken Louisa upstairs and stayed there, sensing Adeline needed to be alone but promising with a sharp look that she would be back for answers. The clock chimed twelve, midnight.
It should be me taking Louisa up to her bed. I am her governess. Cordelia is Winston’s mother. But as the doctor said, he is in no danger, and sleep is the best medicine.
She sat beside Winston’s bed with her hands folded in her lap.
The lamplight painted half his face in shadow while the other half was pale against the pillow.
The bruise at his temple had already turned the color of ink.
His breathing was steady above the bandages which tightly wrapped his ribs.
If she closed her eyes, she could still see the moment again.
The flash of the carriage lamp, the horse shying.
Then Winston’s strong embrace, forcing her to surrender to the speed and fluid grace of his body.
She had been forced to let him suffer the bruises, risk the broken bones and even life itself. She had become a passenger in his protective arms. He had become her shield. Guilt burned in her.
I should have controlled myself. I let the fear build to a peak and responded like a wild animal, not a reasoning adult human.
The violent crack of his head again against the cobbles was loud in her memory.
Horrific still, even the recollection made her stomach lurch.
For one sickening moment all her fear had been redirected, and she was certain that Winston was dead.
Killed by the ferocious impact. Then, wrapped in his suddenly limp arms, the cold night air draped over her, she had felt his heartbeat against her. Strong. Vital.
He was alive and still is. He sleeps to heal. Oh Lord, but what am I to tell him?
She had panicked, had run without thought or direction. Her fault. And all because she had seen a man who looked like her father.
Not looked like. It was him! I am…was certain. I think. Was I?
Her thoughts whirled and she put her face into her hands, wishing for clarity and receiving only murky memories and half-remembered images. A man with thinning hair. Tall, face half-turned and the same cruel beak of a nose.
“Adeline…” Winston whispered.
“Yes, I’m here,” Adeline replied.
But he was still asleep. He murmured something that might have been her name again, but it was impossible to distinguish.
“Sarah…” came another whisper, but it might have been a sibilant sigh. The whisper of dreams.
Adeline felt a disquieting pulse of jealousy.
I have no right to it. He calls for his late wife. Even though he denies that much, he must have loved her deeply. I have no right to him and certainly no claim over a woman he took to wife.
She reached out to smooth the sheet, barely touching him, afraid to cause pain even in sleep.
His hand was wrapped in bandages, and three ribs were badly bruised.
The doctor had said he was lucky. Lucky.
The word made her throat tighten. A faint sound broke the silence.
Winston stirred, his head turning slightly on the pillow.
His lips moved, the words unclear at first, then forming her name again.
“Adeline…”
She bent forward, heart quickening. He didn’t wake. His brow furrowed. More words came, low and raw.
“Sarah…don’t take her, please…don’t take Louisa into the mere.”
Adeline froze. The name struck like a cold hand. Why would he dream of Louisa being taken into the mere?
How did Sarah die? What does it have to do with the mere?
She touched his arm gently. “Winston, you’re dreaming.”
He exhaled sharply, and the tension in his body eased.
For a moment, she thought he might wake up, but his eyes stayed closed.
She sat there, listening to the uneven rhythm of his breathing until it steadied again.
When he finally stirred once more, the clock had chimed the hour again, and his gaze flickered open.
Confusion passed across his face before recognition found her.
“Adeline?” His voice was hoarse.
“Yes. Don’t move. The doctor said rest is essential.”
He blinked, looking around the room as though trying to remember how he had come there. “How bad?”
“You’ll mend,” she said, forcing calm into her tone. “Your ribs bent but did not break. They will be painful, but you’ll mend.”
He tried to sit up, grimaced, and abandoned the attempt.
“Was anyone hurt?”
“No. Only you.”
He closed his eyes again, as though the answer brought both relief and shame.
“I don’t remember leaving the theater. My last recollection is the cast taking their bows.”
Adeline licked her lips.
This is the crossroads. This is the chance to tell him everything. Tell him the truth and be free of the lie forever, for better or worse.
“What happened?” Winston asked, his eyes pleading, seeking an answer.
“It was my fault,” she said quickly. “I was uncomfortable in the crowds and hurrying. I didn’t realize how close to the road I was and stepped into the path of a carriage. You saved me,” she said, hoping that her lie would land better if delivered quickly.
“You were frightened. Yes, I think I remember that. Something about…your fiancé?” Winston asked.
Adeline felt shame at the relief that surged in her at Winston innocently reinforcing her story.
“Since we came to London, I was afraid of meeting him. He is not very nice. I’m sorry that I caused this.”
Tears welled in her eyes, and she tried to hide her face. But, despite the pain, Winston lifted himself from the bed and turned her face to his.
“Don’t. If you say you’re to blame, I’ll have to argue, and I’m in no condition for it.”
Despite herself, a small, uneven laugh escaped her.
The sound felt wrong in the solemn air, but eased the tightness in her chest. Silence settled again, quieter this time.
Winston’s gaze lingered on her face, and she saw the question form before he spoke it.
Adeline burned to ask him about his dream. About Sarah and the mere.
But I have no right to ask if I am not being equally as honest as he.
“Did I talk in my sleep?” Winston asked, unexpectedly. “I feel like I spoke aloud but cannot remember what I said.”
She hesitated, then nodded. “You called for me. Then for Sarah.”
He looked past her toward the shuttered window.
“Yes, she is never far from my thoughts.”
“You said she…” Adeline began, then faltered. “You said she should not take Louisa into the mere.”
He was quiet for a long moment. “Did I?”
She waited. When he finally spoke, his voice was measured but distant, as if he were speaking through another man’s memory.
“Sarah drowned herself in the mere behind Greystone. The servants found her shawl tangled in the reeds. Then her body. She’d left a note for no one, only the word enough on a torn page.”
Adeline’s breath caught. “I’m sorry.”
“She never wanted the life my father and hers arranged for her,” he said. “We married because it suited the family. Not because it was what we wanted. She was clever, spirited…but not free. I thought she’d learn to love Louisa in time. She never did. Said the child reminded her of her cage.”
Adeline felt as though she had been struck. It was shocking to hear that Louisa’s mother had not loved her.
How can that be?
She thought of her own mother. Of embraces and kisses. Smiles and eyes that seemed to shine when they looked upon her. Tears came unbidden.
She was taken from me by my father. He stole all those things from me and left me with anger, hate, and resentment.
Winston drew a slow, painful breath. “I was blind. I thought duty could make a family. When she began to drift away, I called it melancholy, nothing more. If I’d seen, if I’d stood against my father and refused to marry her, then perhaps she’d have lived.”
Adeline reached for his hand, resting her fingers lightly on his. “And likely her father would have blamed her for the failure of the match. What kind of life would she have had then as the object of his resentment?”
“I should have tried.”
He looked at her then, eyes dark and unguarded. “I was a coward, Adeline. I did what was expected. And when it killed her, I kept her ghost alive by shutting every door. It was easier than acknowledging the truth.”
“Louisa does not know what would hurt her,” Adeline said softly. “She feels her mother as something distant, not cruel. You protected her in your way.”
He closed his eyes, and for a while there was only the quiet tick of the clock. When he spoke again, his tone had changed.
“You understand grief well.”
Adeline hesitated. The letter. The man in the theater. The lie she had told Cordelia. The secrets that would not stay buried.
She was vacillating, and she knew it.
“I have experienced my share of mourning. My mother’s death was particularly hard.”
That was true, and the tears she rubbed from her cheeks were real. He stroked away a rogue tear-trail with his thumb.
“I do not know what that is like. My father’s death took away a disciplinarian who desired to control everything and everyone around him. His passing removed the weight from around my neck of trying to live up to his ideals.”
“I think you have replaced that weight with one of your own making. It may be even heavier,” Adeline observed.
“Very astute. What of your weights?”
“Do I carry a burden?” Adeline said, deflecting.
“Of course you do,” Winston replied. “You have been like a chicken watching a fox enter the coop since we arrived. Tell me what concerns you. Please.”
She looked at him for a long moment. Her hand remained tucked in his. She saw the injuries his courage had inflicted on him. Saw the future that had nearly come to pass, where the Duke of Greystone was dead.
Dead because I panicked. I owe him something.