by Lara Blunte
"But he had none," she said in a hard voice.
Adrian got up with difficulty. As he fully turned towards her, his bloody shirt and hands became visible. "You're hurt!" She rushed to him just as he fell on the cold ground. "Adrian!"
The light had started to shine through the holes in the ceiling. He faced the sudden brightness and narrowed his eyes, saying, "It's morning. You need to go! Someone will come soon."
"Get up, then. I'm not leaving without you."
She tried to help him up, but he shook his head. He felt too weak to stand up. "I wanted to kill him so badly....but not like that."
"I know..." she said, still trying to pull him up. "I told you that you weren't a savage."
"I'm glad you are," he laughed. Then he turned serious again. "I always thought I might die trying to kill him. That's why I couldn't promise you I would return."
It was her turn to shake her head, "Adrian, I know. I understand so much now, so much that you did or tried to do ─ but you can't die. Please get up!"
He had felt that he was about to lose consciousness, but when he heard the anguish in her voice he made a superhuman effort and stood up. She helped him move towards the door and they stepped outside.
A heavy summer rain started as the sky turned a piercing light gray. They walked down the street while the water poured on them. Adrian stopped around the corner. Much as he would like not to disappoint Catherine, he had no strength left. "Adrian!" she cried. "Adrian, please, just two more streets!"
He sank to the ground, his back against the wall, his face as pale as the morning. She knelt next to him, knowing that he was dying and that she needed to get help. "I have to get Omar. Promise me, promise me you won't move from here!"
She was weeping. He managed to raise his hand to her cheek, "Don't cry, Kate!"
"For my sake, for your child's, don't die now ─not now that it’s over, not after everything that you've gone through,” she said, taking his hand.
He smiled. "I'll do my best."
Catherine got up and started running down the street. She ran so fast; she was such an extraordinary girl. He might have gone on walking the Earth and never found someone that he liked better than her. That was it, he didn't just love her, he liked her so much. He had wanted to tell her that.
He watched her until she disappeared, then his hand fell from his side and he looked at the gaping wound. The phrase suddenly came to him, 'Tis not so deep as a well nor so wide as a church-door, but 'tis enough, 'twill serve.
The blood poured out of him, turning pink as it mixed with the rain. He saw it running to the ground and away from him. Using the very last of his strength, he tore a piece of his shirt off and folded it. He placed the cloth over the wound and pressed hard.
It was getting dark, though it was morning, and he was cold. He hated the cold, but he felt as if he could finally close his eyes and rest, understanding how tired he had been, and for how long. There was a light inside him that seemed inviting.
He gritted his teeth and shook his head. He wouldn't close his eyes. He would press on that wound with all his might. He wanted to see his child, he wanted to see Catherine again. He might not know what business she had with him anymore, but he had promised her not to die.
He struggled to keep his eyelids open, but they felt very heavy.
V. Nine. A Shadow Passes
The room, he knew, was at Halford ─ but it didn't look like Halford. He walked in feeling dread and saw his mother, brother and father sitting at a very long table as if waiting for dinner.
They were covered with earth: it lay on their hair, in the folds of their clothes, it streaked their faces.
"Why weren't you on time?" his father asked angrily.
James was frowning at him. James never frowned. As he approached, he saw that his mother held a bundle ─ it must be the child!
"Nan, I'm sorry!"
Anne shook her head. "You're late. You missed it. Now it's time for us to go."
"Nan, you can't take the boy. He isn't dead."
His mother looked down. "You are silly. Can't you see it's a girl?"
There was no movement from the bundle in her arms, but the earth seemed to gather round it and fall from the creases of the blanket. He went closer, but he couldn't move his arms to take the baby.
"Nan, give her to me."
"It's too late. He's here."
A black figure had come into the room. He could see it out of the corner of his eyes. It sat down next to his brother. He couldn't turn his head to look.
Adrian awoke with a start.
For a moment he lay where he was. It seemed that he was alive: he was lying on a bed in a room with white walls. It was hot and a window was open. He could hear voices from the street, and they were speaking in Turkish.
He moved his head and saw that there was an armchair next to the bed and that Catherine was asleep in it, her feet tucked under her. She had dark shadows under her eyes and looked tired, but so much like a girl again that he smiled feebly.
"Kate," he wanted to say, but he didn't manage it. He tried to move his hand, but it would not obey him.
She opened her eyes as if sensing something and saw that he was awake. "Adrian!" she cried.
He must have been very sick, because she leapt from the chair and rushed to the bed, apparently forgetting that she wanted to keep her distance. The torpor that had paralyzed him seemed to be dissipating and he managed to move his hand. She took it. "Adrian," she whispered. "Can you hear me?"
"Yes." He swallowed. His mouth was dry. She reached over and took a jug from a small table and filled a glass with water. She held it to his lips and he sipped. He felt as if his thirst couldn't be quenched.
Finally, his head fell back on the pillow. The door to the room was open, and he could see the corridor. The nurses seemed European, and there was an air of normalcy about the whole scene, as if he had woken up in a different world than the grim one he had left. He wanted to ask where he was but there was something much more important that he needed to know.
"Is she safe?"
"Yes!" Catherine cried. And then frowned, puzzled. "How did you know it was a girl?"
He smiled. "Edmund said so many times it was a boy that I had to assume it wasn't. He must have thought I would care more about a boy who could be my heir. He should have known me better."
"It's a little girl. She's healthy, Adrian, and she's so beautiful!"
His smile grew wider. "Does she look like you?"
"She's fair... And fat!"
"That's nothing like you. He didn't lie about that, then."
"I wish I could bring her here, but this is a hospital..."
"No, don't bring her here. Not inside."
He looked worried for a second. She read his expression and said, "He really is dead, this time. There's no doubt of it."
"I thought I was dead too."
"The wound was very bad, you were in such danger of infection ─ and they had to set your shoulder. But you fought like a lion!"
He managed to raise an eyebrow. "I can hardly have fought like a lion if I was unconscious the whole time..."
It was Catherine’s turn to smile. "All right, you fought like Hairy Cat, then."
"Yes," he said tiredly. "I must have fought like Hairy Cat."
His eyes were closing. She said something about getting the doctor, but he didn't want her to go. He felt her hand slipping out of his.
When he was stronger, he was allowed to go to the garden, where he sat in the shade enjoying the slight breeze that stirred his hair.
Nurse Pattison, a ginger haired, outspoken nurse of about fifty who had been caring for him most of the time, was walking towards him, but he looked past her at Catherine, who had just appeared in the garden with the baby in her arms.
Catherine's hair had grown slightly and she looked refreshed, as if she finally had managed to rest. As she approached he thought she never been more beautiful. She had become a
woman, he thought, but he didn't want all her girlishness to be gone.
And then there was the child in her arms, the only creature who was flesh and blood to him, when he had thought there would never be another. His heart beat painfully as he looked at the two of them.
But Nurse Pattison got to him first and seemed bent on spoiling the poetry of the moment with her common sense. Perhaps it was just as well.
She glared down at him. "Now, Your Lordship, I know it's the first time you see your little girl, but you must not overdo anything." She looked at Catherine, who had reached them. "I trust your good sense, Your Ladyship."
Adrian frowned at her and she frowned back twice as hard before she walked away. Catherine smiled and Adrian looked at the baby in her arms.
"Will you be able to hold her?" she asked.
He bent his right elbow and she placed the little girl in the crook. For a few seconds he feared that Edmund had played a trick, even beyond the grave, and given them a fair haired child that wasn't theirs. But the baby's eyes were almost exactly Catherine's.
She waved her little arms and looked at him in what seemed like surprise. No wonder, he thought; she sees her father for the first time after nearly four months on earth.
His chest seemed to shrink with love. She was so small but, as Catherine had said, she was already a person. A happy one, apparently, because she was laughing up at him.
He touched her soft head with its fuzzy blonde hair and she laughed some more. She reached out and grabbed hold of his finger and he couldn't help smiling down at her, though there was a knot in his throat.
So many people had held innocent creatures and fiercely wanted the best for them. Adrian knew how destructive the human spirit could be, and he had endured terrible losses, but he looked at his little girl knowing that he would never let any harm come to her. It was a much happier task than the one he had undertaken for so many years.
Catherine stopped smiling and looked contrite as she sat down. "I hope you forgive me, but I've had her baptized. You ought to have been there, of course. I ought to have waited, but I suppose I needed to do it. I called her Edward in my head for so long, I needed to give her a real name."
"And what did you name her?"
"Anne."
He looked up sharply at Catherine. She smiled at him. "It's over now, Adrian. It truly is, and we shouldn't be afraid to honor the people we loved and lost. Let her life redeem all the others."
He looked back at the girl's face; he wondered if love would ever come to him without fear. "Who stood as godfather?"
"Omar."
"There isn't a better man," Adrian said. He was pleased. "Though I can only imagine the priest's confusion."
"In any case, it's Anne Helen," Catherine continued. "I think mama will forgive me more quickly that way."
"Your mother must despise me, but she will never blame you for anything. She will just be happy to get you back," Adrian said. "What family name did you give her?"
"Mine. You were unconscious, I could not get you to sign any papers.”
He frowned, “I hope that can be remedied.”
She was looking at the ground, and said softly, “I suppose it can.”
In spite of the fact that she had been avoiding him, he wanted to tell her that they should be married now, before going back. But she seemed determined to stop him from saying anything, as she hastily took folded papers out of her pocket and showed them to him. “We found these in Edmund's carriage…”
He took them and unfolded each: as he suspected there was a birth certificate for the child, where she was called Sophie. Catherine was listed as the mother and Adrian as the father.
There was a forged certificate of marriage between Catherine and Adrian; one of the witnesses was a Mr. Stuart. The little girl must be the product of a legal wedding, if she were to inherit not only Catherine's fortune, but all that Adrian possessed: the titles, the estates and the money.
There was a letter to Lady Ware, signed by Catherine in a feeble but unmistakable hand, commending Mr. Stuart as the guardian of the baby, and asking her to keep him close by. It would have been like keeping a scorpion in her bosom: it would not have been long before he started poisoning her too.
Catherine was watching him, and said calmly, "I took a life, and I am not sorry for it. He couldn't help doing harm, any more than a snake can help being poisonous."
Adrian was glad that she didn't seem haunted by what she had had to do. But there was something else, a letter that was sealed; his name was written in small, almost illegible handwriting on it. He felt a pang of cold dread, knowing that it was a letter from Edmund.
“I didn’t open it,” Catherine said. “I wish you would not either.”
He was still looking at the handwriting; it was like a spider on the paper, the “a”, “d” and “n” of his name reaching up and down like long thin legs.
“I think I must read it,” Adrian said after a while.
Catherine sighed, “I wish we had nothing at all of him, not even that paper.”
“He is dead now,” Adrian said. “He cannot do anything to us.”
Anne seemed suddenly testy.
"She needs to be fed,” Catherine said. “I must go.”
Catherine looked at him more closely than she had lately, then she took the baby. He could smell her skin as she bent over him; it had a perfume of its own. She stood before him and he looked up, waiting for her to say something. Instead, she gave him a melancholy smile.
"Goodbye," she whispered.
V. Ten.Doubt
Adrian walked in the sun for a while longer, the letter in his hand. He knew that he had to open it, and he did.
Cousin,
You are reading this, so I am dead.
Does it worry you that you should be hearing my voice in your head as you read, a voice from beyond the grave?
Do I even have a grave?
I hope I do not; I always thought that it was a paltry last dwelling for a man, taking up an amount of space barely big enough for his body, with a headstone to mark a whole life in a few words.
What few words would mine say? Here lies a man who made others suffer…
I was aware of it, cousin. I could not stop. I also did want the money, and the castle, and the titles, but it may well be that my passion for destruction confounded all my plans. Passions are our undoing.
I could say that of the lovely Lady Catherine. She has a passion for you, and it was her undoing.
For, cousin, there is a thing I left behind, thriving in both of you, and it’s called doubt. It’s a pernicious thing, and the enemy of love.
Love is not such a big thing, believe me. I could not feel it, so I observed it in others. I saw it in Lady Catherine, all the time she was my guest. Her love for you. Her love for her child, for her mother.
Then doubt that the child was still alive, doubt that you would ever come, doubt that she deserved to be saved.
I did not single-handedly make her doubt, she was already suffering from that illness. She is a very resilient girl, that I will say for her, but she doubts that you love her; she feels that she is an inconvenience.
When you tell her you love her, I do not think she will believe you. If, that is, you tell her ─ because you doubt that she loves you now, do you not? Do you think that she has gone through terrible things because of you, and that she has been cured of her feelings? Do you think you are now an inconvenience to her?
I have told you, love is a punier thing than doubt.
If you are reading this, I must be dead, because one of us was finally about to prevail and if you did, you would not fail to kill me. This letter is my testament, and as you are my only relative, I must leave it to you.
Do with it what you will.
Your cousin, Edmund
Son of a man with no name
Son of a woman with no family
Adrian stood in the hot sun, looking blindly at Edmund’s letter. It could be a final piece of crue
lty: it would be like him to have the last poisoned word.
It is my testament. Do with it what you will…
Edmund was capable of anything and its opposite, and Adrian suddenly thought that the letter was not a provocation, it was not gloating: it was a warning.
It was a warning about what he might lose.
Cousin…How Edmund insisted on the word, as if in some unthinkable way he had loved Adrian after all.
She feels that she is an inconvenience. And she had said goodbye.
He heard Nurse Pattinson’s voice, "Now, Your Lordship, that's enough. Back inside!”
“I need a horse,” he muttered.
“What on earth for? Get to bed this instant!”
He looked up at her as she bustled toward him, and said in a strong voice, "Out of the way! I need a horse!"
Nurse Pattison looked outraged as he walked past her without a glance.
“Your Lordship! Your Lordship, I cannot be responsible…”
But the Earl was gone.
It hurt to ride over to the house Catherine had taken, but he hardly thought of it. When he arrived, he found Omar in the hall. Adrian didn't see the small smile under his friend's beard.
"Where is she?"
Omar pointed outside.
Adrian walked to the garden, holding his side, and saw Catherine standing under a big tree, the wind stirring her short hair as she looked out at Constantinople. She was taking her leave of the city.
“What the devil do you mean by saying goodbye to me?” he asked as he approached her.
She turned around with a gasp; she had not expected him. Her hands went up to her cheeks and she covered them in shame. She felt ashamed because she doubted that he loved her.
He just kept on walking until he could take her by the wrist and pull her towards him. His arm went around her waist, his left hand held the back of her head and he kissed her, as he had longed to do for months.
There was an initial surprise in her, and then her body was molding to his, as it used to do. Her arms came up, as they had always done when he kissed her, and she wrapped them around his neck.
