“Your Grace!” Lady Motley cried, entering the drawing room. “You have come!”
“Of course I have,” he replied, looking suddenly crestfallen. “How could I stay away when my beloved is in peril?”
Clementine’s eyes narrowed. He knew!
“Oh, Hugo, I am simply distraught for you - and for my beloved cousin!” Evangeline cried.
“Dear Evangeline,” said Sir Hugo, crossing to her side and handing her a handkerchief, “you mustn’t get overwrought this was not unexpected.” Then, turning to Lady Motley, he added, “I hope you will permit me to see her.”
“Of course, Sir Hugo, It is your right as her intended,” she said, gesturing to the door. Clementine flew up the stairs ahead of them. Perhaps her beloved Hugo would kiss her and wake her from Slumber, just like in a fairy tale! Quickly, she laid down in her body and waited expectantly for the Duke’s entrance. Lady Motley came into the Tower Room first and sent Agnes packing.
“His Grace has permission to visit, nurse,” she said coldly. “You may go.”
The Duke rushed over to the bed. “My poor darling!” he gasped.“My Lady - might I beg a moment alone with my intended?”
“Of course, Sir Hugo.” Lady Motley replied and she ushered a reluctant Evangeline out of the door as Clementine settled herself down comfortably to await the lover’s kiss which would snap her back to life.
“You look as exquisite as ever, Princess; perhaps even more so in Slumber,” Sir Hugo murmured. He leaned down and Clementine puckered her spectral lips in anticipation as the Duke cupped her breasts in both hands and jiggled them about for good measure.
“You unspeakable pig!” Clementine yelled and she leapt out of her body determined to do him a mischief.
The Duke hadn’t reacted to her voice. She tried to pick up a jug to throw at him but, without Gilbert nearby, she lacked the strength. Sir Hugo rearranged her dress and snatched his hands away from her body just as Lady Motley and Evangeline entered the Tower Room.
“I shall take her as she is of course,” he said, wiping a hand across his eyes as though he had shed a manly tear, and he followed the ladies back down the stairs.
“Spinose apical processes - my guess would be it’s from Rosa Chineses.” The professor straightened up. “Have a look for yourself.”
Gilbert looked down the microscope., “I think you’re right; well, about it being a thorn anyway. I cannot claim any knowledge of flowers.” He regarded Professor Fitzgerald with interest. “Where might one come across the China Rose?”
“Oh, they are all the rage these days!” the professor enthused. “Imported from East Asia, of course, but they grow splendidly in these chillier climes. You’ll find them in many ornamental gardens in this part of the Kingdom.” He pointed at the microscope. “So, what’s got you suddenly interested in Botany then, Thackeray?”
“I found it embedded in the finger of an acquaintance - who is now unwell.”
Fitzgerald nodded. “Lock jaw?” he asked sympathetically.
“No, it’s a little stranger than that.” Gilbert hesitated not wishing to be indiscreet. “I can trust you to keep this to yourself?”
“Good heavens!” Fitzgerald laughed self-deprecatingly. “Who would I tell?” He picked up a ginger cat who had wound himself around the professor’s ankles. “We don’t get too many visitors down here in the subterranean levels of this fine establishment, do we Monty?”
Gilbert smiled at his old friend. “You might consider getting out a bit more, Fitz.” he said - and then realised he could say the same for himself.
“So, where did it come from then, old chap?”
“I actually removed it from Princess Clementine’s index finger.”
“Ah ha!” Fitzgerald nodded knowingly. “You think it might be the reason for the Slumber?”
“I suspect so.” Gilbert ran his hand through his hair. “I’m just not sure why it should have that reaction.”
“Far-fetched, I know, but isn’t the Princess supposedly under a curse?”
“So the King, and everybody else, believes,” Gilbetr said. He shook his head. “I just find it difficult to believe in such things.”
“Discount nothing, Thackeray. As a scientist and a scholar, you should know that!”
“You’re right,” Gilbert acknowledged. He thought about the stack of books he had ordered from Godwin’s. “I had better go. It seems I have some reading to do.”
Clementine amused herself by moving the belongings of her aunt and her cousin around the second their backs were turned. It was was only a small act of defiance but it was all she could do without the presence of Gilbert. Why he, of all people, should empower her spirit she didn’t understand. Without that knowledge, she felt she was missing something important. Perhaps even something which might save her life.
Bearing witness to the suffering of her father was harder than anything else she was dealing with, including her own impending death. He had seemed so shrunken and diminished by what was happening. Little surprise when he had already lost his beloved wife to the same wicked fate.
Strange as it seemed, Clementine did not view the curse as wicked. Actually, she felt it had set her free, Her life before the Slumber had been dominated by the spectre of The Curse. It had touched every aspect of her existence: the people she was exposed to; the activities in which she was permitted to engage; the objects she could touch and, most damaging of all, the places she was never allowed to see.
It had taken the Slumber for Clementine to appreciate that her life was no life at all. Her tiny world had fooled her into believing she lived a full life. She had felt blessed to live in such a magnificent Palace and to be surrounded by people who doted on her.
Clementine had been told her whole life how fortunate she was and she had believed it to be true. Only her father had understood how her world was too small to contain her and had tried to teach her to reach beyond it. Through books, hiring tutors and bringing explorers and great orators to the Palace, her Papa had done his best to introduce her to the amazing world outside the Palace.
But none of it had felt real to Clementine - not in her encapsulated, palatial universe. So, rather than engage with the opportunities with which her father presented her, Clementine had instead rolled her eyes and told him she loved him.
Only now did she understand what she had been missing while cooped up here in the Palace. Only now did she realise there was a world beyond these stone walls; a world in which she played no part.
Her brief time with Gilbert had opened her eyes to a world of which she was not the centre. There, people went about there lives regardless of the Princess and her needs. In Gilbert’s world, she was benignly ignored or teased and made fun of and yet - perversely - she felt more a part of it than she ever had in her own Palace. She wanted the chance to explore that world and find her way in it: and, to do that, she had to find a way out of Slumber.
Agnes was muttering soothing words as she bathed the body of her beloved charge. The dear woman was crooning to her now just as she had when the Princess had been a small child and feeling poorly. Clementine knew she had to find a way back from Slumber not just for herself but for Papa and Agnes too.
“There now, my sweet girl; doesn’t that feel better?” Agnes whispered, patting dry the arm she had just washed. “I feel you here, Lemmie. I feel you around me and I pray that doesn’t mean you have left your body for good.”
Agnes began to cry. The hot tears tracked down the old nurse’s cheeks and Clementine could feel them as they splashed onto her hand. She looked down at her spectral hand in amazement: How was it that she was feeling Agnes’ tears falling on her skin?
Chapter Twelve
“At least when he was doolally he was happy. And eating his meals,” Hill lamented sadly as yet another tray of food went to waste.
“It’s true. He’s done nothing but hide away for days now and, my goodness, what a foul mood he’s in too.�
�� Mrs Finn had been trying to persuade Mr Gilbert Thackeray to eat but, each time, he would send her away with a curt word and a promise to eat later. Hetty refused to go anywhere near him, claiming he was possessed by the spirit of his evil grandfather.
“What rot you speak, girl!” Mrs Finn snapped at her. “Old Granbury weren’t evil. He were just a nasty old man who had no time for anyone but himself. Not that you would know - you never even met the man!”
“Maybe not,” Hetty answered sullenly, “but that don’t mean I don’t know ungodly goings-on when I sees it.”
“Ungodly goings-on, indeed!” Mrs Finn tutted. She poured herself a cup of tea from the pot on the kitchen table then poured another for Hill who had come and to sit with them.
“You’ve got to admit, Mrs Finn, there’s been some rum goings-on here of late.”
“I’ll not deny that somethings going on, Hill. For him to change from being so steady to all over the place of late just don’t seem right.”
Gilbert didn’t have time for trivial matters like food. He had to find a connection between the rose and the curse. He was convinced now that someone was trying to harm Clementine. Wearily, he picked up another book from the pile in front of him. He had read through most of those which Goodwin had sent but had found nothing that seemed to fit.
He took his glasses off and rubbed his tired eyes. The house felt empty without her here. He knew he had done the right thing in taking her back to the Palace but - still: he missed her. He would catch himself suddenly smiling at the memory of one her antics. Things which should have exasperated Gilbert, such as her wrecking his study to get his attention or following him up the hill while singing Old King Cole simply made him realise how empty his life felt without her in it.
He thought now of her eyes shining with laughter as she teased him about the waterfall and then, unbidden, came the memory of that moment. That moment when he had walked through her: the jolt of pure pleasure he had felt and then the sense of recognition - as though he had been waiting for her; waiting his whole life.
Gilbert shook his head denying the ridiculous thought and, with it, the knowledge he carried inside him.
No. He did not love the Princess.
“He still wants her, Mother!” Evangeline sobbed. “Hugo still wants Clementine.”
“Marcus will not let him have her, my dear.”
“But I don’t understand why he should want her - that - when I am here!”
Clementine shook her head. Her cousin spoke of her in such cold, spiteful tones. She expected no better from her aunt. Lady Motley had never pretended to be anything but resentful that Clementine bore the title of Princess while her own daughter was merely Lady Evangeline. But Clementine had always thought of Evangeline as her friend and confidant.
Perhaps the fault lay with her? After all, Clementine had known her cousin was enamoured of the Duke before she had even met him. But, then again, when he had met Clementine and pursued her, Evie had insisted she didn’t care. She had even said her feelings towards Sir Hugo were on the wane before he and Clementine were introduced. Had her cousin lied to her, to protect Clementine from feeling guilty?
“Worry not, Evangeline,” Lady Motley told her daughter. “There will be plenty of opportunities yet for you to win him over.”
Evangeline brightened. “Yes, the muslin gown will arrive tomorrow - just in time for the garden party!”
“Perhaps you could borrow one of your cousin’s pretty headdresses?” Lady Motley smiled cat-like. “The one she wore for her birthday would suit you well.”
“That’s a wonderful idea, Mother! I could wear my hair braided on one side just like Clementine wore hers for the Ball!”
“You see, my dear: a little thoughtful consideration of your appearance and the Princess will fade into memory.”
So, Clementine raged, while I lie dying in the Tower, my cousin and aunt think only of looting my wardrobe and mimicking my style! This was too much! She had done nothing so unforgivable that it should cause such ill feeling towards her. In her anger, Clementine swiped the embroidery hoop from her cousin’s hand and smiled in grim satisfaction as she sent it sailing across the room.
Evangeline screamed hysterically, “What was that?” she shrieked, clinging tightly to her mother’s skirts and looking fearfully to where the hoop had landed.
“Calm yourself, Evangeline!” Lady Motley instructed. She picked up the hoop.
“Do you think it might be …?” Evangeline pointed her finger towards the ceiling.
“Your cousin?” Lady Motley snapped. “No, Evangeline, I do not think the Princess is haunting the Palace. And, unless you want to be the subject of gossip and ridicule, I suggest you keep such ludicrous ideas to yourself from now on.”
“Yes, Mother.”
Evangeline took the hoop from her mother and reclaimed her seat on the settle. Lady Motley picked up her own embroidery and the two women silently carried on with their work, both pretending that something inexplicable had not just happened right in front of them.
There was a perfunctory knock at the door and Meekers entered. “Post, m’Lady!” he bellowed. Clementine smiled. Poor old Meekers thought everyone was as deaf as he was.
“I will thank you to wait before entering next time, footman!”
Mishearing her Ladyship’s censure, Meekers responded with a cheery, “Welcome, ma’am!” before bowing and taking his leave.
“That fool has to go!” Lady Motley growled as the footman slammed the door shut behind him. “It’s from your uncle,” she told Evangeline as she broke the seal and began to read. “It seems the so-called wise woman he has gone to see thinks she might have a cure but says the potion ‘cannot be rushed’.” She looked up at that, giving her daughter a doubtful look, and dropped the letter onto the occasional table. “He intends to be back for the summer solstice.” She went back to her embroidery.
“Is there nothing for me, Mother?”
“Were you expecting something?”
Keeping her eyes firmly on her embroidery, Evangeline muttered, “I was hoping for something from Hugo.”
“That’s hardly likely, Evangeline, and, anyway, you’ll see him tomorrow at your garden party.”
Clementine knew better than to get her hopes up on the promise of a possible cure. There had been so many who had claimed the same thing over the years. What had encouraged her, though, was the memory that had surfaced as her aunt was reading the letter from the King. She recalled the morning of her Slumber. The post had arrived that day, too: a letter from her father and - and a package!
“A rose!” she said. Evangeline looked up.
“Did you say something, Mother?”
Lady Motley, who had heard nothing, glanced at her daughter. “Perhaps you should go and rest, Evangeline,” she said, “We don’t want you having one of your episodes.”
As her cousin meekly left the drawing room, Clementine frowned to herself. Why was it, she wondered, that her cousin had not mentioned the rose to Gilbert?
Gilbert closed The Secrets of Malediction and rubbed his eyes. He had read every book Goodwin had sent him and still he was no closer to understanding how to cure Clementine. The combined wisdom of all the books seem to come back to one or other cure: either a religious cleansing ritual to expel the evil or some far-fetched magical nonsense about true love’s kiss.
As Clementine’s curse could be said to be one of imprecation, it put Gilbert back where he had started: it had to be all in her mind. That, however, did not explain the rose thorn he had found buried in her finger - or the fact that she was undeniably a ghost. Around and around he went, as he had done for the past two days. There had to be something he was missing!
Chapter Thirteen
“I wonder what His Majesty would have to say about this then?”
“I’d say he’d be bloody furious.”
“Well I hope we don’t take the flak for it.”
The se
rvants were setting up the garden for the afternoon party. Clementine thought they were right to be concerned: her father would be livid when he found out.
“Stop idling and get those tables set up!” The servants scattered at Lady Motley’s sudden appearance. None wished to incur her Ladyship’s wrath. “You girl! What are you doing?”
The maid jumped as she was singled out. “I were just asking Molly what were needed doing, m’Lady.”
“Molly is not in charge here. If you have questions you ask me!” Lady Motley upbraided her and was gratified to see a chastened Molly blush and look away. “I want you both over there polishing the silverware. I will not have my guests using tarnished cutlery.”
Slumber Page 9
