Mortal Arts (A Lady Darby Mystery) (18 page)

He frowned. “But it’s the long-term effects that can be so worrying, and those are the symptoms I witnessed in Lord Dalmay. Difficulty sleeping, nightmares when he did, startled responses to lights and sounds, loss of concentration or, alternatively, a sort of extreme vigilance, especially when it came to his men. But mostly I noticed he had trouble forgetting. It was like he couldn’t stop reliving the horrible things that had happened to him and those around him.” He nodded to indicate Michael. “From talking to Lord Dalmay himself, and his brother, I now know that’s the case.”

I turned to stare out the windows at the lengthening shadows, seeing William as he had been ten years before when he first took over as my drawing instructor. The perpetual dark circles under his eyes, the sometimes restless pacing. His refusal to receive me if there was even a hint of a thunderstorm threatening, as if I wasn’t already aware that the thunder and lightning bothered him. The despair he dragged behind him like a ball and chain.

I never pointed out the things I observed, but he knew I saw them anyway. It was a polite illusion we played, even if both of us recognized it for the fiction it was. To speak of it now felt wrong, even if it was necessary. We’d danced around the edges the previous night, hinting and insinuating, but now thoughts and suppositions were laid bare.

“What about his time spent in the Larkspur Retreat?” Gage was asking. “Are the effects of his being locked up there similar to this battle fatigue?”

“Yes and no.” Dr. Winslow settled back to consider his answer. He rubbed his thumb and index finger over his temple and forehead. “He certainly encountered some upsetting circumstances, as evidenced by his sketches, but some of his other symptoms are far more extreme than I’ve ever seen in conjunction with battle fatigue. He absolutely abhors the dark, and I’ve witnessed for myself the absolute panic it evokes when the window in his chamber is not left open at least a crack, even on the coldest of winter days. I can only speculate he was kept in some room where he was denied light and fresh air, and the thought of being without either is no longer tolerable.”

I set my tea down on the table, unable to stomach any more of it. Poor William. I had contemplated such a thing briefly, but the idea of being locked in that sort of room, for possibly years on end, was too horrible to imagine.

I could feel Gage’s eyes on me, his concern, but he continued to ask Dr. Winslow the questions I seemed incapable of phrasing. “And these episodes, like the one last evening? Do you know what is happening then? Or what is causing them?”

Dr. Winslow looked to Michael, as if asking permission to divulge something, and Michael nodded.

His brow lowered as he thought back. “When I first examined Lord Dalmay after his release from the asylum, I was worried there was nothing that could be done for him. Beyond his troubling physical condition, his mind seemed incapable of grappling with anything he saw or heard. And worse, he would lapse into these half-conscious states, like you witnessed last night. Frankly, I was convinced he wouldn’t survive for more than a week. There was little that could be done for him except to take care of his physical needs and try to reassure him that he was now safe.” He shook his head as if in amazement. “But when I returned a fortnight later, Lord Dalmay was still living, even if barely.

“We deduced that part of the problem was that he wasn’t sleeping. He paced the floor of his room night after night, as if trying to outrace slumber. We tried several medications, even some home remedies, like valerian root tea and warm milk. It took some doing, but we were finally able to convince him to take a mild sedative that would help him sleep so deeply there would be no dreams, for it seemed that was what he was afraid of.”

“They drugged him,” Gage guessed. “At the asylum. That’s why he didn’t want to take the medicine you offered him.”

Dr. Winslow nodded. “Unfortunately, it’s quite common in those types of establishments. The patients are dosed with laudanum, or some other tincture of opium, to keep them quiet and complacent.”

I frowned at the delicate white china tea set on the table. The question had to be asked. “Can’t people grow to rely on those medications?”

“Yes. And I believe Lord Dalmay may have been forced to take it so often that he did so in some capacity. But he also feared it as much as he craved it, and that helped him to overcome his need for it. He still takes small doses of laudanum from time to time, particularly after having one of these episodes, but they’ve grown less frequent in the last few months. His last one was—what? Over five weeks ago?” He looked to Michael for confirmation.

“Yes. Almost six.”

“When I received your note this morning, I was quite saddened. I thought perhaps your brother had finally beaten them.” He sighed. “Ah, but I suppose we should be happy with whatever progress can be made.”

“Thank you for coming so quickly,” Michael told him.

He waved it aside. “I was on the way out the door to visit your neighbor Lady Gaston anyway.”

“Do you know what’s causing these lapses?” I asked, determined to find an answer.

Dr. Winslow offered me a grim smile of apology. “I do not, Lady Darby. But the symptoms, when they come over him, present themselves suspiciously like that of a case of extreme, short-term battle fatigue—confusion, detachment, failure to recognize his surroundings and relate to those around him. This makes me wonder if he’s not responding by instinct to some stimulus.”

He shifted forward in his seat, leaning toward us. “He says he feels as if he’s trapped inside the asylum again, that it becomes his world. I can’t get him to tell me anything else. But if that is the case, then something must be taking him back there. A sight, a sound, a smell, a circumstance—something that connects to a memory. Like when you hear a song that reminds you of your childhood. Or smell a flower that reminds you of your wife’s perfume.”

“Whatever it is,” Gage remarked, “it must be a very powerful memory.”

Dr. Winslow nodded. “I agree.”

“Could they be brought on by a display of force?” Michael asked, glancing up from his contemplation of the rug. The dread tightening his features made the breath stutter in my lungs. “Early on you warned me against using force to make Michael do anything. You said that physically compelling his compliance might remind him of the asylum.”

Dr. Winslow tapped his chin, considering the matter. “Yes. It’s possible. You said in the beginning that something as simple as urging his lordship to remove his clothes so that he might bathe could drive him to either fight you or sink into one of his melancholic stupors.” He stopped to look at Michael, who was clenching and unclenching the spindly arms of his chair. “Do you think one of your servants is using unnecessary force with your brother?”

“I don’t know.” He sounded agonized by the thought. “I don’t . . . want to believe Mac or Donovan would do such a thing, but . . . what else can it be?”

Gage, Dr. Winslow, and I shared a look of mutual uncertainty, none of us having an easy answer for him. The idea that either of these men, who had been hired specifically to care for William, might be abusing his power over him and driving him into these episodes made me sick to my stomach.

Dr. Winslow shifted forward in his seat. “Well, I’m sure you all have much to discuss. If you have no further questions for me, I should be on my way home.”

A glance at the west-facing windows told us the sun had already set, casting red light over the long streams of clouds left in its wake.

“You know how to reach me should you have need of me,” he told Michael as he bent to gather up his black satchel. “The only advice I can leave you with is to try and discover what’s causing these melancholic incidents, if, in fact, anything external is causing them at all. Then we can progress from there.”

“But do you think that’s what’s halting his recovery?” I asked, stopping the doctor before he could rise to his feet. “I mean,
if
we can stop these episodes, do you think he can truly begin to heal? To lead a normal life again?”

He sank back into the cushions of his chair, and the look he fastened on me was one dreaded by every person who has ever been given grave news about a loved one. It was the look that, peering through the stair banisters as a child, I had seen the physician give my father when he explained my mother would not recover from her illness. And the look the doctor who examined Sir Anthony after his apoplexy had given me when he explained my husband was dead.

“Stopping these episodes will help, yes. But I’m afraid Lord Dalmay has been too damaged by his confinement and treatment at Larkspur Retreat. His mind was already fragile from his efforts to overcome his memories of the war, and I have long suspected they exploited that. So, no, Lady Darby, I do not think he will ever lead a ‘normal’ life again.”

“But he’s made so much progress already,” I protested. “Does that not encourage you?”

“Of course it does . . .” he started to say, but I talked over him.

“He’s drawing again. That’s what he did after he returned home. After the battle of Waterloo, and being part of the occupation force. Not immediately,” I admitted. “But once he started transposing the memories from his mind to canvas and paper he began to improve. Is that not what he’s doing now? And once he gets them all out . . .” I broke off, unable to find words in face of the sympathy I now saw reflected in Dr. Winslow’s eyes. I didn’t want his sympathy. I wanted him to cure William.

Gage had shifted over to the settee sometime during my speech and taken hold of my hand. I allowed him to do so, needing the comfort, wherever it came from.

“He’s drawing the same images over and over,” the doctor told me.

I glanced at Michael in surprise.

His soft gray eyes, nearly identical to Will’s, were clouded with concern. “The others are in the attic. And we’ve had to repaint the walls of his bedchamber twice already.”

I pressed a hand to my forehead, trying to come to grips with this new information.

“We need to accept that, while Lord Dalmay may continue to recover, he will never be the man he was before his confinement,” Dr. Winslow said gently. “We will all have to adjust our expectations.”

I gripped Gage’s hand tightly in my fist, not wanting to hear any of this. He had to be wrong. I just couldn’t accept it any other way. To say that Will could never return to the way that he was—did Dr. Winslow not understand to what kind of life he was condemning him? A stunted life, one of fear and isolation, of scorn and ridicule.

“Kiera.” Gage leaned toward me to whisper in my ear, but I closed my eyes and turned away, unable to face his sympathy, his pity. Remembering how he had spoken similar words to me the night before about Will never being able to make a full recovery. Those words and the doctor’s each felt like a knife thrust to the chest. For if Will could never completely recover from his ordeals, would I? Could I?

I understood that Will’s situation, his suffering, had been far worse than mine—and the realization of what I had narrowly escaped in not being confined to an asylum as my accusers had wished made me grow cold—but I still couldn’t help wondering if I would be forever grappling with memories I couldn’t forget.

Dr. Winslow said his farewells and then rose to stride across the room toward the door, satchel in hand. Realizing there was one more thing I needed to ask him pulled me from my brooding, and I called after him. He waited for me by the door.

“I wonder if I might ask you one more question.”

His eyes searched mine, as if to be certain I’d recovered from my distress. “Of course.”

I lifted my chin and looked him levelly in the eye, determined he take my query seriously. “What, if anything, can you tell me of Dr. Sloane?”

From the lift of his brows, I could tell he perceived my query was far from idle curiosity. “I’m afraid I know very little of the man. I’ve never had the misfortune of making his acquaintance.” He paused to study me closer before adding, “But I do hope, having seen his handiwork, that you find what it is you’re looking for, my lady.”

A feeling of solidarity passed between us and I continued to meet his gaze to let him know I understood. “Thank you.”

He dipped his head. “You know where to find me should you require my assistance, in any way.”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

W
hen I returned to my seat, Gage and Michael were already discussing the potential problem with Will’s two manservants.

“I can’t believe it would be Mac,” Michael said with a distressed shake of his head. “The man served with William during the war, and he’s been a loyal retainer of the Dalmay family since before I was born. He accompanied me when I went to retrieve Will from the asylum, and I’ve never seen a man be more gentle, despite Will’s struggling and confusion. Mac was honestly aggrieved by what had been done to my brother. I would swear on my life about that.”

“Then what of Donovan? What do you know of him?” Gage asked. His pale blue eyes sought mine out as I settled back onto the settee next to him.

I offered him a tight smile and gently placed my hand on his where it lay on the cushion between us to reassure him as I turned to hear Michael’s answer. I glanced back in surprise when he turned his hand over to grip mine as I began to lift it away. He squeezed my fingers in silent communication, holding on to them for a moment longer than necessary before he slowly released his grip and allowed me to pull away.

“I hired him because of his references,” Michael was saying. “He worked as a surgeon’s assistant at the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh and then the Glasgow Royal Infirmary. The man is quiet, keeps mostly to himself. The other servants seem to have accepted him readily enough. There’ve been no problems that I’ve been made aware of.”

Which didn’t mean there hadn’t been difficulties. Butlers and housekeepers often liked to handle the disciplining of their own staff before any troubles reached the ears of their employers.

“Well, speak to the head of your staff,” Gage told Michael. “Find out for certain.” Gage’s head tilted in thought. “Incidentally, did you actually check with Donovan’s references?”

He blinked in surprise. “Yes. I wrote to the addresses he supplied.”

Gage frowned. “Well, write to them again. And don’t use the directions Donovan gave you. Write to whoever is in charge of hiring their employees. The infirmaries should be able to direct your query to the correct person.”

Michael seemed shocked. “You think his references might be forged.”

“I don’t know any such thing. But I would rather be certain. I’ve seen similar tricks pulled in London.” Gage crossed his arms over his chest. “In the meantime, tell me how they alternate shifts. I take it you haven’t noticed a pattern. Whether one man is always on duty when Will slips into one of his episodes.”

“No. Donovan was on duty yesterday afternoon when it started, but Mac was just coming to relieve him.” Michael’s brow furrowed in concentration and then he shook his head. “I couldn’t tell you who was with him the last time it happened.”

“And their shifts?”

“Eight hours on, eight hours off. When William was first brought home they took twelve-hour shifts, but it became too much on the days when he was particularly difficult and refused to sleep. Eight hours was more manageable, and neither man wanted to switch back once Will settled.” Michael frowned. “I thought the shorter shifts would help them to better keep their tempers. I spent enough time with my brother after his release to understand how trying he could be, but I never dreamed . . . that one of these men would actually harm him.”

“Let’s not jump to conclusions,” I told Michael, even though I felt some of the same gut-burning betrayal that he must be feeling tenfold. “We don’t know for certain that either of them is at fault yet. And until we do, we can’t assume guilt.” I needed that reminder as much as he did.

“Kiera’s right,” Gage said. “Let’s work with just the facts.”

Michael nodded stiffly.

“Does anyone else help care for William? What happens on their days off?”

He rubbed a hand across the back of his neck. “One of our footmen, Lachlan, helps out when we need him to. Or I sit with my brother.”

“And this Lachlan?”

He shook his head. “He’s never been around when William had one of his episodes, except once in the very beginning. I would remember that.” His expression was wry. “Lachlan’s somewhat more timid than Mac and Donovan, and Will . . . notices it. On his better days, he likes to harass the lad.”

I was so surprised to hear that Will had the presence of mind to see even the tiniest sliver of humor in his situation, or at least enough to be teasing someone about it, that it startled a laugh out of me.

A smile curled the corner of Michael’s mouth. “I felt the same way the first time I realized my brother was badgering the lad on purpose.” His gaze turned distant and thoughtful. “When I confronted him about it, I think it was the first time I’d seen him smile since I’d brought him home.”

My chest tightened, and my smile stiffened into something far more bittersweet.

“We’ll need to interview Mac and Donovan,” Gage said, reminding us of the matter at hand. “Not only about this, but also to discover whether William has confided in either of them about his confinement. There’s still the issue of Dr. Sloane’s accusation to deal with, and whether he lied to discredit William.”

“And the missing girl,” I added, and then sighed. “But I’m afraid not much can be done about that until we visit Mr. Wallace again tomorrow.” And with four days—rather, five—having already passed since her disappearance, I was beginning to worry there wasn’t anything we could do at all, especially with Mr. Paxton’s interference. All of the urgency certainly seemed to have drained out of the situation, even for Mr. Wallace. I wondered whether that was because he secretly believed Mr. Paxton’s theory or because he had other reasons to suppose his daughter was beyond our assistance.

Michael nodded. “I’ll make it known to both Mac and Donovan that they’re to answer your questions, if you want to speak with them now. I’m not sure I want to be present.”

“It’s best if you’re not,” Gage answered his friend. Then he turned to me, and I could tell from the look in his eyes that whatever he said next would not be pleasant. I braced for it. “And if they can’t or won’t provide us with the information we seek, I’m afraid we’re going to have to take a look at those drawings of Will’s in the attic.”

I dropped my gaze, not relishing such a task, not if they were anything like the sketches currently decorating Will’s walls or, perhaps worse, like the paintings he had made of the war.

Michael’s voice was stretched thin. “I understand.”

I tried to catch his eye, to offer him some reassurance, but he would not meet my gaze, and I had to wonder why. Were the drawings worse than we’d seen thus far? Or was he hiding something else from us? Something he didn’t want us to know about. I worried it might be the latter.

* * *

M
ichael accompanied us to Will’s rooms, knowing we would find at least one of the men with his brother. And, in fact, we found both of them exchanging terse bits of information at the door to his parlor, in the midst of changing shifts. Michael asked us to wait a little ways down the hall while he spoke with the men.

Donovan merely nodded at his employer’s instructions, but Mac proceeded to argue. Whether that was because he did not trust Gage or me, and being an older retainer he felt more comfortable disagreeing with Michael, or because he had something to hide, I didn’t know. Mac had always been rather grim and surly, but I didn’t recall him being so outspoken ten years ago. Then again, a fifteen-year-old girl was not a very threatening figure. Perhaps he’d had no fear of what I might discover.

In the end, Michael had to be firm with him, but he received Mac’s begrudging agreement.

“His lordship needs seeing to,” he told Michael tersely in his deep brogue, while glaring down the hall at Gage and me. “They can blather at me later.” And with that pronouncement he closed the door in our faces.

Michael frowned at the offending piece of wood. “You can speak in the parlor at the end of the hall,” he told Donovan and us, leading us back down to the intersection of the two passages just before the locked door near the stairs.

The room was dark, but Michael grabbed a brace of candles from the table beside the door and lit the tapers on one of the wall sconces in the hall. Gage followed suit.

It appeared that Michael didn’t want the other servants knowing we were questioning Mac and Donovan—otherwise why hide us away in this little-used room at the top of the house? In light of all the gossip I’d been hearing from Lucy, I couldn’t argue with him. But I wished we could have conducted the interview in a more comfortable place. I glanced at the unlit fireplace and wrapped my arms tighter around my torso. Even my warm woolen riding habit could only hold so much cold at bay.

The room had visibly been cleaned—the hearth was swept and the furniture was free of dust—but it still held that somewhat musky stench of a room too little used and too long closed. The heavy drapes were pulled shut against even the starlight, and the corners were almost pitch-black with shadows. Gage set one brace of candles on the tea table before a heavy chair and the other on the table beside the door. With a nod to Michael, he closed the door and then gestured for Donovan to take the chair. When I took my seat in the corner of the settee Gage had indicated with his eyes, and he sat in the chair next to me, I realized how clever he had been. The candles on the tea table were directly in front of Donovan, allowing us to see his eyes and face clearly, but the candles by the door were at Gage’s and my back, concealing ours.

“Now, Donovan, if you will,” he began, “tell us how you found out about this position?”

His gaze was cautious, but he did not shift in his chair or attempt to evade the question. “A friend o’ mine from Edinburgh heard a doc askin’ roond. He kenned I were lookin’ for somethin’ different.”

“Than your job at the Glasgow Royal Infirmary?”

“Aye.”

“Why did you want to leave the infirmary?”

“For a position like this?” he replied, as if the answer was rather obvious. And it was. “Better pay. Better food. And I only have the one patient to mind, no’ a whole ward o’ ’em.”

His answer implied that caring for Will was a far easier job than his previous assignment, which meant the rigors and demands should have been no problem for him. I wasn’t sure whether he was simply answering our questions honestly or if he had anticipated the reason for our visit and was already presenting his defense. A man of Donovan’s bulk should not have had to use force to convince Will to do what was needed, but that didn’t mean he didn’t enjoy using it. There had been a boy in the village where I grew up who liked to bully the rest of us just because he was bigger. My brother had come home with more than one bloody nose from standing up to the lad and his mean-spiritedness.

Gage tilted his head, studying the man across from him. “I imagine the men in some of those wards could become quite riled.” He spoke conversationally, but I knew his comment was far from innocent.

“Aye. Injured men be like bairns. When one comes in hurtin’ and carryin’ on, the others join in. Canna have one screamin’ and hollerin’ wi’oot the others.”

“How do you manage it when that happens?”

“Careful like. If ye can get the first one settled, sometimes the rest ’ll follow. And if no’, mayhap they need a wee more meds. For the pain.”

Gage’s eyes narrowed. He hadn’t missed the way Donovan had tacked that last bit on at the end either. “I imagine it requires a firm hand.”

Donovan’s expression did not alter by one flicker of an eyelash, but I could have sworn he knew exactly what we were hinting at. “Aye. Firm, but no’ too firm. They be like horses. Ride ’em too hard and they’ll be more ill-tempered than ye started wi’.”

I wasn’t certain I liked the idea of Will and others like him being compared to babies and then horses, but I understood the point he was trying to make.

Gage tapped his finger twice on the arm of his chair, seeming to understand he was going to get nowhere with this line of questioning. Not if he didn’t have something specific to accuse him of. So he switched tactics.

“Were any of your patients in the infirmary with you for a long period of time?”

I could tell from the way Donovan’s eyes suddenly widened that he had not been expecting such a question. His reply was uncertain. “Sometimes.”

As if scenting his prey’s unease, Gage shifted forward in eagerness. Not enough to alarm Donovan, but enough that I, seated so close to his left side, noticed. “They must have grown quite comfortable with you. Spending day after day in your company. Relying on you for some of their most basic necessities. Did any of them ever start to think of you as a friend? Did they ever confide in you?”

Donovan was definitely suspicious now, his body tense, his eyes narrowed, trying to penetrate the gloom surrounding our features. “A few.”

“What about Lord Dalmay? Has he ever confided in you?”

The man’s shoulders relaxed and he sat deeper in his chair. “Nay,” he said, crossing his arms over his body. His eyes took on an almost satisfied gleam. “And he wouldna. He’d talk to his brother or Mac afore me.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Gage’s mouth twitch downward. “Is he close to Mac?”