30. Chapter 30- Lily #2
Here, he snorted, removed his hat, and ran his hand through his hair.
It promptly fluffed to thrice its original height.
“Thank heavens I can absolve myself of any guilt in that quarter. But by the time I truly knew the person I had married, she was already in a family way. Not that I can bring myself to regret it, in the end. Rebecca is the one thing I don’t regret from my first marriage. ”
“She’s wonderful,” Lily said stoutly.
“And not a bit like her mother, thank goodness. I’ve since communicated with several of Francine’s cousins.
They all told me similar stories—that Francine hadn’t been quite right, ever since she was a child.
Instead of crying for her mother, she was eerily silent, and she’d scratch and pummel anyone who tried to cuddle her.
When she turned five, the other children’s parents started noticing their children would come back injured every time they played with Francine at family gatherings.
” He swallowed deeply. “She was seven the first time she tried to kill someone.”
Lily went rigid; gooseflesh erupted along her bare forearms.
“Or at least, that’s the first time her cousins know of it.”
“What happened?” Lily hardly recognized her own voice—it sounded calm, even though her heart pounded in her ears.
“She pushed her youngest cousin—a boy of two—down the stairs. She didn’t realize it, but his elder siblings had come up behind her and saw the entire thing clearly.
Even so, she denied it and said he tripped.
He was badly bruised but healed completely.
But the children’s parents never let their children near Francine again. ”
“Understandably so,” Lily said with clear umbrage, her back ramrod straight.
“Even from a distance they still heard rumors. When she was ten, it’s said that she accidentally trapped the kitchen mouser behind the grate after the fire was lit.
A family dog met another unexplainable end when Francine was twelve.
After that, her extended family heard little about Francine from her parents.
” He sounded disgusted when he added, “And then she was presented, and a foolish young boy thought she was very pretty and asked her to dance.”
Bradford stared out across the pond for long moments while Lily tried not to choke on the sheer horror of it.
“Of course, I didn’t hear any of this until after.” He tugged at his hair again.
Under any other circumstances, Lily would have teased him for the sheer volume of it, but it wasn’t the time for lightness. Not when he was confessing this darkness in his past. In Rebecca’s past. And Lily knew the worst was to come. This story didn’t have a happy ending.
Bradford nodded as if hearing her unspoken thoughts.
Tears shimmered in his eyes. “Heaven forgive me, but part of me hoped motherhood would settle Francine. Please remember that at that time, I didn’t know about the violence.
She struck me twice in those months, but I reasoned that it was her delicate state that prompted such outbursts. ”
He smiled through his tears. “And then Rebecca was born, and for a beautiful, single moment, everything seemed right in the world. Francine appeared—at least to my eyes—to be everything a mother should be. She tended Rebecca morning and night. Rebecca slept in a little cot next to her bed. It was perhaps six weeks before… Well, those were the happiest six weeks of my marriage.”
Bradford took a shuddering breath, and Lily could no longer stand it. She reached for him and held his hand. Whatever came next, they’d face it together.
He smiled down at her. “In truth, I can’t believe you’re still here.”
“I haven’t heard a single thing to change my opinion of you.”
He shook his head. “That might change, for I’m not finished.”
“Tell me.”
He did as she asked, though it seemed an effort for him.
There was a restless energy in his limbs.
“I received a letter from my steward in Whitehaven, stating that I needed to come and inspect the mill. The repairs were going to be expensive, and he wanted my approval. It was a three-day trip, and things had been so peaceful, I thought little of going.”
He swallowed convulsively and said, “When I came back, Francine was… She was a different person, a hundred times worse than before. She ranted and raved and cried, claiming that I’d set her aside for another woman.
She truly believed that was where I’d been.
” Bradford met her eyes and shook his head.
“I promise you, I was never unfaithful. I never would have been unfaithful.”
“I believe you.” She squeezed his hand with both of hers, wishing she could press comfort through the callouses into his very bones.
“It was so bad that I sent for the doctor. He took one look at her and said I should have her committed, that he’d seen such things before.
” Bradford gritted his jaw and stared forward as if he couldn’t bear to meet Lily’s eyes.
“And this is the point of my true guilt in the matter. All else that came before can be forgiven as sheer ignorance and stupid naivete, but this is where my pride nearly cost me all.”
He took a deep breath and met Lily’s eyes.
His expression was bleak, full of self-recrimination.
“The doctor told me, in no uncertain terms, that Francine was a danger to herself, and to others, especially our child. But I think the six weeks of temporary bliss had given me false hope. I wanted to believe that the true Francine was the one I’d met after Rebecca was born, and the other version was just a terrible mask she wore.
“I was a fool. A prideful fool. I thought I could reach her. And if I’m being completely honest, I didn’t want anyone to know what Francine was.
I didn’t want to be the man who committed his wife when they hadn’t yet been married a year.
Rebecca just born, besides.” Bradford shook his head and gave a noise of derision.
“After all, what would people think? What would people say?”
“It was a natural response. Your hope.”