25 Pursuit #3
She saw no sign of Dr Hooper or the young man with red hair, but whenever anyone entered her room, the guards stood outside to prevent her escape.
Occasionally she heard the other occupants of the house screaming or shouting, but mostly all was quiet.
She was tolerably certain now that she was being held in a lunatic asylum.
In a drawer she found paper and pencils, so she began to keep a diary.
Not that there was much to write about. She noted the weather, and attempted to identify the food, but the main reason was to record the number of days of her captivity.
She had a fair idea of the date she must have arrived, and it helped to steady her to record the days as they passed by.
There was a Bible in her room, as well as a prayer book and several books of sermons, so on the Sabbath she recited the office and read the collect, kneeling and rising at the appropriate times, and then she read a sermon.
Whether her prayers helped to lift her spirits or merely the sound of her own voice, but after this she felt stronger, and resumed her exercise around the room, recording the number of circuits completed each day in her diary.
Late on Monday afternoon, the door opened and, to her utter astonishment, Richard walked in.
“How are you, Mother?” he said, for all the world as if he were making a regular morning call and not visiting a prisoner in a lunatic asylum. “You look tired.”
“Do I, indeed? I wonder why that would be?”
“Are they looking after you well enough?”
“Looking after me? Good God, Richard, what is the matter with you? Are you going to take me home?”
He flushed, and shuffled his feet awkwardly. “I cannot do that, as you must surely realise. This is for your own good, Mother. It grieves me beyond anything to have to do this.”
She crossed the room in three swift strides and poked him angrily in the chest. “Have to? Have to? Why, do you think me insane, is that it? I must be locked up in a lunatic asylum because I dared to reach out for my own happiness, I suppose. I am as sane as you are — more so, I think. No rational man would kidnap his own mother.”
“No rational woman would behave as you have,” he shot back.
“You are not yourself, that is all. This man has deranged your mind… temporarily. A quiet spell away from him will bring you back to your senses, I am sure. You will not be in this place much longer. I am preparing more comfortable accommodation for you.”
“Oh, how reassuring. I feel much better now. So you lock me up until I agree to give up Cal, is that it? How long would that take, do you suppose? A week? A month? A year? A lifetime?”
“You would soon see the error of your ways.”
“Suppose someone took you away from Rowena… locked you up and kept you there until you agreed never to see her again. How long would that take, do you suppose?”
“That is completely different, Mother.”
“How is it different? Because you love her, is that it? But I love Cal. I want to be with him just as much as you want to be with Rowena.”
“There is no comparison,” he said, sounding suddenly tired. “Rowena is my wife. We are respectably married, Mother, not mired in sin.”
“So you are. Perfectly respectable. Unlike her mother, who was illegitimate, and her grandmother, who intentionally got herself with child outside of marriage for her own selfish reasons. But heaven forfend that I, who did my duty uncomplainingly for fifty years, should enjoy a little happiness without harming anyone, and do not spout any nonsense about protecting your wife and daughters, Richard. You will be a duke in the future, and I will never be anything but a commoner, of very little account. No one in society will care what I do.”
“But I care,” he said quietly. “You may be right to say that I do not need to protect Rowena and our daughters, but I surely have a duty to protect you. When I see you making a terrible mistake, I must try to prevent you.”
“By kidnapping me? You are aware, I take it, that kidnap is a serious offence. I am not sure if it is a capital offence, but—”
“Nonsense! I did not kidnap you, I merely exercised my right as your son to take measures to protect you from malign influences. I cannot compel Garford to leave, so I was obliged to remove you, instead.”
“You have no rights over me,” she said tiredly. “Only a husband has that power. Take me home, Richard. Take me back to Cal.”
“Never!” he spat. “If you think for one moment that—”
The thought remained incomplete, for at that moment a great noise was heard outside the room, the door burst open and Cal rushed in. He saw her, sighed and smiled.
“There you are, love!”
Behind him, a veritable flood of familiar faces poured into the room.
Hardly daring to believe it, Cora whispered, “Have you come to rescue me?”
“Indeed I have.”
Richard puffed out his chest and stepped forward to stand beside Cora. “You will have me to deal with if you try it, Garford.”
Cal laughed. “With pleasure.”
And with one fist to the jaw, he knocked Richard clean off his feet and halfway across the room, where he crashed to the ground with an ‘Oof!’ of surprise.
“If it’s all the same to you, Merrington,” Cal said calmly, “I’m going to take my wife home now.”