CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
A fter the initial surge of emotions ebbed, leaving her gasping, she asked, “Gil told you about Darius Varney?”
“Yes, I was just speaking with him. He is quite beside himself, my dear.”
“We’ve lost two monsters in one day.” Leona bit back a laugh. “Am I truly the dangerous fool Gil thinks I am? Millie came here not for help but because of our address. And then she helped herself.”
“Leona, you have a good heart. And she knew you wanted her to turn herself in. You hoped she would respond to your kindness. And she did, to a small extent, and gave you the information and the confession you needed. This does not make you a dangerous fool. But Leona. Darius Varney has raised some difficult questions in my mind.” He put his hand over his eyes, ink-stained fingers long and strong but knobby with age.
“If the newspapers find Gil not so innocent, that evil will taint you, too.”
What was he hinting at? Her heart refused to hear it.
“I had a dream I was happy with this man, this life, this house. Was it only a dream?” As if pushed there by hidden forces, she sank into the kitchen chair.
“I love Gil, and Gil is not Lawrence. I’m sure we can find family of his to testify all he has told us about the matter. ”
“There’s a storm coming. Are you and Gil strong enough to survive it?
” He took a seat across from her. “I asked you to come back to Halcyon with me, but the farmhouse is empty, the family gone. Nothing but ghosts. It’s the way of the world, but death comes for us all, in one way or the other.
I miss your grandmother every hour of every day. ”
She took his hand across the table. Of course, she knew.
“I am less sure of a reunion in Heaven the older I get. And if this is all there is, then we must make the most of it.” He sighed. “We were almost getting back to normal.”
With a shiver, she realized once the newspapers had the story, gossip and speculation would likely take Darius Varney’s side.
She’d only just begun to regain her friends and reputation.
But what about Helen? Gil, in the public’s eye, made a juicy target.
Perhaps he would realize this and stay away from Helen.
***
O NCE SHE HAD THE IDEA , it smoldered in her thoughts through a driving rainstorm lasting two days, shutting them inside. She focused her thoughts on Helen, going over in her mind all the meetings and conversations they’d shared.
The first afternoon of the storm, the hard rain pounded the roof as she and her grandfather sat in the parlor before the fire.
The newspapers were commenting on the unusually warm winter, which was proving lucky for the bridge work.
Gil worked in the study down the hall. She re-read her journal entries from the time before Daphne’s death.
Leona had no hint of things to come, though her friendship with Helen had felt honest at the time.
Helen, however, was a troubled woman. The doubts had returned, but it was doubt in herself, of her own impression of the people who claimed to love her.
Sitting opposite her in the winged chair, her grandfather nodded over his newspapers. He deserved a respite, to be free from worry.
Oh, God, so did she.
The wind drove the rain against the windows.
Leona stood and set another log on the fire, pushing it into place with the poker.
Her acquaintance with Helen had not been a long one.
They had shopped and lunched while Helen loved to talk about the newest fashions, moving to Manhattan City, and traveling to Paris.
Why hadn’t Henry taken her with him when he left?
He doted on her when sober. The more inebriated they became, the more they fought, until Gil had tired of the public scenes and refused to go to dinner with them.
Henry disappeared soon after that, which was—she checked her journal.
Mid-October. But if she’d been paying attention to her marriage and not playing at M.
Dupin from Mr. Poe’s stories, might Gil not have sought out Helen’s companionship?
“But it makes no sense,” Leona murmured. It just didn’t feel quite right, the story felt incomplete. Maybe they were wrong about Helen and Gil, then. But she’d pay another visit to Helen, or else drive herself mad thinking about it.
***
T HE DAY AFTER, IN THE late afternoon, the storm stopped. When Leona stumbled from her study and down the stairs for coffee, Abigail informed her Gil had gone out. Leona changed into a traveling dress and boots in a hurry, anxious to get away before he came home again.
When she opened the front door, he was standing there, his mouth comically open in shock at the sight of her. He wasn’t alone.
“Gil, I—”
“No, Leona. Please, go back into the house.”
“But Gil—”
“Leona,” he said with more sternness. “Dr. Farouche is here to see you, my dear. Now, step back inside. The doctor is very busy. We’re lucky he consented to see you on such short notice.”
Having no choice but to fight her way out, she turned and went back in, pulling off her coat as she did so. Abigail bustled into the foyer and took the coat from her to hang on the coatrack, her expression concerned.
In the parlor, her grandfather sat reading a book, his pipe clenched between his teeth. He glanced up when they entered and frowned. An air of the saloon surrounded the two men—tobacco, hops, and a return to jocularity.
“Here now, proper introductions.” Gil had found his smile again and spread it around as he took in the room. “Leona, this is Dr Silas Farouche. Dr. Farouche, my wife.”
“Lovely to meet you, my dear,” he said, shaking her hand. Older than Gil, with spectacles, a trim goatee, and a sallow complexion, he dressed expensively.
“And Leona’s grandfather, the poet William Harrison Earl,” Gil said with a hint of pride.
“Indeed, indeed.” Dr. Farouche beamed and shook her grandfather’s hand vigorously. “Truly an honor to meet you, sir.”
Her grandfather sent a baffled glance to Leona. She pressed her lips together with a slight nod of agreement.
Leona said, “Will you be staying for dinner, Dr. Farouche?” She turned to Gil. “It’s really no bother. I’ll just go tell—”
“He’s come to see you as a favor to me.”
Gil had kept his word about her seeing a doctor for her so-called proclivities.
Her throat ached from holding back her frustration and anger. “How interesting. Isn’t that interesting, Grandfather?”
Anger turned his face red, and he clenched his fists as if he might strike Gil right then.
Gil said, “William, would you please tell Mrs. McCarthy Dr. Farouche will be staying for dinner?”
Mouth tight and back stiff, her grandfather left the room.
“There now.” She sat in the armchair by the fire and braced herself to play along. “We can begin the examination.”
“The examination has already occurred, Leona.” Gil took the chair opposite her. “Dr. Farouche is a doctor at the Bloomingdale Insane Asylum in Manhattan City.”
Her heart froze, icy tendrils snaking through her veins. Her muscles felt weak, and she had to stop herself from calling her grandfather back into the room. “What—what do you mean, Gil?”
“Dr. Farouche is here to give a recommendation for your care, my darling.”
Her stomach dropped. She hadn’t expected this.
A physician to listen to her heart and question her dietary habits, yes.
A doctor to examine the inside of her poor head—not at all.
Worse, her thoughts ran to thrice great Uncle Timothy, an apprentice who had reacted violently to mistreatment by his master and run away.
Captured once, he’d run away again. Captured twice, his unforgiving father had a specially built cage for him placed in the barn.
Family members took turns caring for him.
He remained there until his death forty years later.
She’d almost forgotten the story until just this moment. The neighbors called him the Essex Devil. He died in filth, abandoned, alone, enraged. Who wouldn’t be?
Families did not have to care for their lunatics anymore but now sent them away.
She fought down hysteria as if it were Tom Perley himself.
It would not mix well with the atmosphere in the room, with the intentions of these men.
Her loving husband. Dr. Farouche and his calculating smile.
Bloomingdale was a private hospital, not a cage, but it was still a prison.
So much could go wrong here, so much reworked as lunacy and not a determined, willful spirit haunted by her experiences.
“And what is his recommendation? Darling.” They sat with knees nearly touching, so she reached out and took his hand. “I have been very tired lately. There’s so much to do.”
“Dear Mrs. Gladney.” The doctor, standing to one side and observing them, removed his spectacles and polished them with his handkerchief. “Rest is exactly what I recommend.”
“But I don’t want to leave—” Her voice sounded small to her own ears. Where was the soldier who’d run at the enemy without fear, Minie balls whizzing past her as if she were some untouchable battle goddess?
“Indeed, Mrs. Gladney.” Dr. Farouche appeared taken aback by her reaction. “I recommend rest within the home. Of returning to your role as woman of the house and not chasing about town after phantoms. Accusing your husband of infidelities. Inviting violent strangers into your home.”
Her husband said, “We can’t afford a place like Bloomingdale. There are worse places you will end up if you continue as you have.”
She stared hard at him until he looked away.
“You can’t leave,” he said, eyes on the fire. “I want you whole and healthy, the way you used to be, Leona.”
But she’d heard it. Behave or he’d send her where? Blackwell’s Island?
He didn’t dare.
Gil finally brought his gaze back to her, his eyes filled with emotion. “I’m so worried about you.”
The hair on the back of her neck rose. She clenched her fists as if preparing to fight her way out. Oh, when did Gil become her enemy?