He reached out and grasped her wrist, jerking her closer to him so that he would not need to shout. She resisted, twisting her arm to be released, but he would not let go. He clenched his teeth and hissed in a furious whisper.
"You allow her to be raised by others, and when you bring her to you, it's so that others will care for her once more. She has no idea, does she?" he demanded. "I suppose you intend to be a friend to her, but you do her ill to conceal the truth and deny whatever support your brother may give."
She stilled, shock coming into her face. "You think she's mine, don't you?" She stared at him a moment, then her lips gave a faint twitch of amusement. "I should have guessed it, but I thought you more astute than that."
"You give me no other explanation, so I am forced to come to my own conclusions." Her mockery of him and denial of her relationship to the child made him grip her wrist harder, when what he really wanted was to shake her until she was forced to acknowledge that he had some part in her life. "Maggie told me the girl is six years old. It's rather too much of a coincidence, don't you agree? And you loved Henley. What I cannot understand is why you would have the child here and then sent away to Ireland, if you cared for her and her father so much."
She stared at him blankly. She gave one tiny shake of her head in denial, but he would have none of it. Her secrets drove him mad, to the point of desperation. He must have the truth, and in the next moment he asked the questions that had been haunting him for days.
"Does Henley know? You keep contact with him?" He bit down hard on what he really wanted to know – if they were still lovers; if ever they contrived to meet. He told himself he was outraged, but still could not shake the feeling that it was jealousy – sharp, mortifying, uncivilized jealousy – that surged inside him and forced the questions out.
Her look was cold, her voice scathing. "You are a fool. Leave us now."
"I shall go nowhere, madame, until I learn the truth."
He did not pull her closer, but she did not pull away. They were locked in this pose, glaring at one another, when the blacksmith came upon them and summoned her inside quickly, the urgency and fear in his voice breaking through to them.
Helen swept into the house the moment he released her. He could not leave her, would not, uncaring that she wished him gone. In the bright little room, the child sat up in the bed with a cloth pressed to her mouth as she coughed. It was a desperate sound, too loud and violent to come from so small a child. The noise of it made it easy to understand the fear in the blacksmith's face. Helen stroked the girl's forehead until she calmed again. It took a very long time and when it was over, it was plain that the girl was feverish.
Helen looked to the smith who stood waiting, and gave a nod which sent the man off at a run. He must have gone for the doctor. Helen stayed sitting, her hand on the child's forehead, looking utterly defeated. He thought she must have feared this, and that now she feared even worse.
"Miss Helen," said the girl with a shy eagerness, her eyes bright with the fever. "I wanted to ask you something before you go. May I?"
Helen's helpless gaze reached across the room to him, her hand crushing the handkerchief she held. She looked bewildered, as though she could not imagine that she must answer. But after a moment she turned back to the girl, her face relaxing into a kind of dazed acceptance.
"You may ask me anything you like."
Stephen considered leaving, but could not bring himself to break away from the scene. He felt his breath come short in anticipation. The truth was coming. He recognized it, smelled it seeping into the air like smoke from under a door.
"They told me you knew my mother and father." She stopped speaking at the emotion that flashed briefly across Helen's face.
"You would like to know about them," Helen said, regaining her calm. "Turn away a bit, so I can pull your hair back. There. I only met them the once, the day they died. The day we found you. I can't tell you much."
The child's fingers plucked at the blanket covering her legs. "Oh. Then they really are dead, miss?"
Helen stared at the child's head, smoothing her hair in a mechanical gesture. "Yes. You may call me Helen, if you like. I saw them when... Your father had hair like yours, black and curly. Not a big man. He had a kind face." Her voice was dream-like, the words floating through the room like feathers in the wind.
"And my mother?"
"Black hair, too, but straight. And blue eyes. Pretty hands. Your face is like hers, strong-featured."
He was intruding. He knew this conversation was private and none of his affair. But he knew equally well that Helen Dehaven was at last telling the unadulterated truth about some piece of her past. He recognized it immediately, the shame of misjudging her smothering him, immobilizing his limbs.
"I'm sorry, I never saw her face," she was saying now, in a voice that trembled. "Or knew her name."
As if to distract herself, Helen brought out a packet from beneath her cloak, carefully unfolding a square of cloth to reveal brightly colored ribbons. They were neatly pressed, as if they had been prepared far in advance of this moment. Seeing them, the girl's flushed face lit in delight. "They're so pretty!"
He watched Helen and felt something inside of him give way, break loose and attach itself to her as tears began to fall from her eyes. She hid it well from Katie, whose back was to her. She reached around to where the child held the ribbons, taking up a green one and gathering black curls in her hand.
"You've been so good to me, both of you," said Katie, looking skittishly at Stephen as he schooled his features to show nothing. "You bought me the nice cloak and everything else. I never had such nice things before." She held the ribbons up. "I hope they didn't cost too much," she said sleepily.
A spasm of grief crossed Helen's face, a quick creasing of her features as her tears slipped silently down.
"They came quite dear. But the expense does not signify. I bought them long ago." She managed to hide the sound of her tears as she spoke, tying the ribbon around the girl's hair and biting her lips together as she laid a hand on Katie's head. Her whisper caught at him as he slipped out of the room, and she unmistakably spoke to herself as much as the child.
"Never again think of the cost. It does not matter now. Not anymore."
Chapter 10
Whitemarsh,
I write to you briefly and deliver an unequivocal message: Have no dealings with Henley, in business or otherwise. I ask you to trust me in this judgment, without giving you cause to do so. I can only hope that my reputation speaks to the worth of this advice.
In the matter of your sister I leave all judgment to you. I have come to know her better, but I find myself reluctant to speak to the terms of your reconciliation, if indeed you should wish such a thing. If you care to find her, she can be found and I will venture to say that she may well like for her brother to find her. I will say no more on the topic.
As for myself, I will not treat with Henley on any matter. I hope that we may continue as partners in business dealings and together keep the enterprise viable, but if you choose to associate with him I must regrettably retract my backing of the shipping venture. If I have in any way offended you with these words, accept my sincere apologies.
My regards to Lady Whitemarsh.
Summerdale
He hired a doctor, the best he could find, sending the man off to Bartle to see to the child and asking for daily reports of her progress, if there was any. The path from his manor to her house was worn down with the passing of messengers and the hooves of his own mount. He visited every other day, to see if anything was needed.
He supplied whatever was called for, without being asked. On his first visit, he brought a new cloak for Helen to replace the ragged one she wore. When she looked about to protest, he told her it was ridiculous to care for the child but not for the caretaker – it was getting colder every day, after all – and she seemed too tired to argue it. He brought a book each time he called, something that would amuse a chi
ld, or so he hoped, and sat back to listen as Helen read by the bedside. Always looking around him for anything missing, anything at all he could provide, not knowing if he did it for Helen, or for Katie, or for his own conscience which still smarted with guilt over his accusations against her.
"If the child is to recover properly," said the doctor, "she must remove to a warmer clime. I do not hold out hope that her lungs will ever be strong."
So Stephen spoke to Jack, the blacksmith who already considered the girl his own. It had become evident that he and his wife had anticipated Katie's coming for so long that they already felt for her as much as any natural parents might.
"I've a cousin in Sussex, a place called Eastbourne," said Jack. He looked toward his wife, who had joined them in the little kitchen while Helen sat with the girl. "Like a brother to me, when we were boys. He says to me the sun shines all the time there, and the doctor says the sea air will do her good."
Stephen nodded. "You are assured will find a welcome with your relations there?" If not, there was the Gildredge family, who owned half the land around Eastbourne. They would give whatever modest help might be needed for the family to establish themselves, if he put it in their minds to do so.
Jack was sure they would find a place with his cousin. "But," he said, with a look at his wife, "He's had the idea in his mind for a time now, to make his way to America. And I'm thinking it may be even better for her there, when she's strong enough to make the trip."
This became the new, carefully introduced topic of much discussion over the next week. The doctor endorsed the move to Eastbourne and thought it advisable, if the girl was stronger after some months there, to consider a move to the Carolinas. It was a strange and sudden turn for them all, especially for a child who had only lately left Ireland, and he said as much to Jack.
"It's in her blood, as I understand," was his mysterious rejoinder. But though Stephen questioned him, he would say no more about it. He pled ignorance, his face closing up in that way all the villagers had with outsiders. Stephen was still an outsider and always would be, he knew.
When moments later, Helen came into the kitchen and heard of this proposal, she fell utterly silent. When asked what she thought, she did not respond. Jack listed the undeniable advantages to the girl's health, and she only stared at the hearth and nodded faintly. It was only after the mention of emigration to America that she looked up at last. She seemed as bewildered as a child.
"She won't be here. With me. She won't…" Her voice trailed off as though she had not more breath to speak. Then her eyes focused on Jack and she spoke in a voice that seemed to Stephen to throb with suppressed resentment and grief. "She will be with you. Away from me. It will be better for her."
Jack looked unsure of how to respond. He looked to Stephen, then back at her, and just as he opened his mouth to speak, she turned and walked with a purpose back to Katie's room. Everything in her manner seemed to indicate that she would not speak of it with them.
At first the idea of their leaving seemed only to be a kind of theoretical musing. But after the child's fever broke and she began to recover, it became more real. They began to talk about going immediately, to enjoy a milder winter in the south. Helen let them talk, and never participated in the conversation, as though she put all consideration of it into their hands. So Stephen took it in hand entirely. He wrote to acquaintances in London to make discreet inquiries into the most promising places to emigrate in America, where the weather was warm and the prospects good. He spoke with the doctor and with Jack, and he made all the necessary arrangements as they were needed.
And all the while, he watched Helen pretend as though it was not breaking her heart. She smiled as Katie grew stronger, and happily told the girl about the adventures to be had in places so exciting as Eastbourne.
"How lucky I shall be," she said one day when Katie was strong enough to take a walk down the lane, "if I should have a friend in America. You must learn your lessons well, so that you can write pages and pages to me, all about everything you will see and do there."
The girl chattered happily in response, roses blooming in her cheeks, unware of the emotion that was so plain to Stephen. Such a sadness came from Helen that he could not bear to look at her, sure as he was that she might burst into tears at the thought that she would never see the girl again. He looked instead to Marie-Anne, who walked alongside and quietly slipped her hand into her friend's hand, and who looked almost as forlorn.
When he came to visit, it was to Helen's house that he rode. She always met him at the door, and they walked together to see Katie, who now breathed so well and ate so heartily that the decision was made to leave at once, before winter set in. The date was set and Jack and Sally prepared to pack up their home. They were anxious with the hastiness of it and fretted that Katie would not do well on the journey, but it was Helen for whom Stephen worried.
She barely spoke anymore, except to Katie. She seemed to become more frail and distant with each passing day. He thought that she was only waiting for the little family to leave Bartle, and then he could not imagine what she might do except to fall into a thousand pieces. Even the doctor noticed it, as Stephen discovered when he took the man aside one day and noted her pallor.
"Melancholy," the doctor said, after some hesitation over whether he should even speak of it, as he had not been engaged to care for Helen. "Without examining her, I cannot say with any real certainty. But if it is as you say and this is not her usual disposition, then I daresay you can expect her spirits to improve with sufficient sleep and adequate nourishment. See that she rests, and eats more, or else it will grow into a chronic condition, my lord."
So he watched her. He came to visit even when he knew there was no more for him to do once he had arranged the most comfortable and swift transportation to Eastbourne, once the doctor had declared Katie fit for travel. But still he came to see Helen, to assure himself that her spirits were not even more downcast.
On the day before Katie and her new family were to depart, Helen did not answer his knock. He turned back to the road but heard a dull thud that carried through the crisp air, a sound he followed to its source.
He found her behind the house, a veritable forest of arrows at her feet where she had worked the tips into the earth. As he watched, she jerked one from the ground and notched it, pulling back the bowstring violently and letting go with a soft grunt. Even from this distance, he could see the target was nothing more than a battered piece of wood now. Helen shot arrows as if possessed, yanking them from the ground and letting fly with barely a glance at the target. But she never missed her shot.
As he watched, she ran out of arrows and stalked over to the target, pulling the shafts free with a savage twist of her arm. When she turned back to begin the whole process over again, she saw him.
Gone was the sadness that had seeped from her for so long, replaced with a fury. Her anger had always been, in the few times he'd felt it, a cold and controlled scorn. But now she seemed in a rage, and his presence served as a focus for it. She glared at him almost menacingly, half-running toward him and stopping a few paces away.
"Well, my lord? Why have you come?" Her voice was low, filled with a sullen accusation. "To announce you have found a place for them in Abyssinia, no doubt."
Her pale face showed exhaustion, her body rigid with tension. It caused a wave of affection to spring up in him, to see her so unhappy. Her anger was a thing he welcomed, relieved at last to see that she would show something of the truth of her feelings. But he could also see beneath it, to what caused it, and could not help himself. He raised a hand to her forehead.
"I come to see that you are well, Helen. To see if this furrow in your brow has become permanent." He stroked the lines on her forehead with the back of his hand, gratified to see the tension ease a bit.
It only lasted a heartbeat before she pulled back from him, jerking away from his touch as though it burned.
"Don't. I cannot bear your kindnes
s." She looked down, gathering her hands into tight fists at her side, recovering her anger after that instant of vulnerability. He could almost hear her reminding herself to hate and distrust him. "You come here to see me weep. To see me broken, so that you may enjoy the sight of it."
He did not bother to defend himself against this accusation, but only stood where he was, waiting for more. He remembered, vividly, how he had longed to shout like this when his brother lay dying. There had been no one there to shout at when he realized how great his loss would be, and that was the worst part of it all. If he could be here for her in this, perhaps he could make himself something other than just a means to an end. Perhaps she might allow him to become her friend once more, a more permanent part of her world.
His stillness only seemed to infuriate her. She stepped closer and pushed at his shoulders, nearly knocking him down with the force of her feeling.
"Don't you see?" she cried. "It is all for nothing! All the time and expense and the planning – for years, do you understand? It was all for her, but it was for me, too. It was for me. That I might have something for myself. I am that selfish."
She whirled away from him, showing him her back. "Nothing I can do will make it what I thought it would be. Not even you, not even the Earl of Summerdale. Everything you know, and how you know it – they say you know everything that happens, ever. But the best it can give her is a life far from here. Far from me." Her voice grew harsh, hoarse with emotion. "And she should be far from me, I know it. She will have a family, she will be safe. But I can only think how it was all meant to be different, how hard I worked for a future I will never see. You cannot imagine how much I hate myself for thinking it."
The bitterness in her voice cut at him, so many words after so long a silence. It made him picture the future she had thought to build for herself, tucked away in this quiet village where she might have something like a family again. How much she must have needed the comfort and the promise of it, and now she must watch that promise ride away from her forever.
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