Anne Perry - Rutland Place

Charlotte felt anger and pain well up inside her, because Amaryllis spoke out of her own passion, without thought for the pain she must be causing Eloise.

"Then stand, if you prefer to," she said tartly. "If you imagine it will be of some conceivable service, I'm sure no one will mind."

Amaryllis seized a chair and sat down, her silk skirts everywhere.

"At least if he will get better, then that is hope," Emily said, trying to ease the electric harshness a little.

Amaryllis swung round, opened her mouth, then closed it again.

Eloise was sitting perfectly motionless, her face blank, her hands lifeless in her lap.

"He will not," she said without a shadow of expression, as if she had faced death itself and grown accustomed to it and ac shy;cepted it without hope. "He will never stand again."

"That's not true!" Amaryllis' voice rose almost to a shriek. "How dare you say anything so dreadful? That is a lie! A lie! He will stand, and in time he will walk. He will! I know it." She stood up, went over to Eloise, and stopped in front of her, shaking with emotion, but Eloise neither looked up nor flinched.

"You are dreaming," Eloise said very quietly. "One day you will know the truth. However long it takes, it is always there, and it will come to you."

"You're wrong! You're wrong!" The color flamed up Amaryllis' face. "I don't know why you're saying all this. You have your own reasons-God in heaven knows what they are!"

There was accusation in her voice, shrill and ugly-frightened. "He will get better. I refuse to give in, to surrender!"

Eloise looked at her as if she were transparent or of no importance, as if she were unreal, as inconsequential as a magic-lantern slide.

"If that is what you wish to believe," she said quietly, "then do so. It really makes no difference to anyone, except I would ask you not to keep repeating it, especially if the time should come when Tormod is well enough to receive you."

Amaryllis' body became rigid, her arms like wood, her bosom high.

"You want him to lie there!" she cried, almost gulping the words. "You evil woman! You want to keep him a prisoner here! Just you and he, all the rest of his life! You're mad! You're never going to let him go-you-''

Suddenly Charlotte woke into action. She jumped to her feet and slapped Amaryllis sharply across the face.

"Don't be idiotic!" she said furiously. "And so utterly selfish! Who on earth do you imagine you are helping, standing there shrieking like a servant girl? Pull yourself together and remem shy;ber that it is Eloise and not you who has to bear the hardship of this! It is she who has cared about him all her life! Can you possibly believe that poor Mr. Lagarde wishes to have his sister subjected to abuse on top of everything else? The doctor is the only one who can say whether he will recover or not, and false hope is more painful than learning to accept with patience the truth, whatever it may be, and await the outcome!"

Amaryllis stared at her. Quite possibly it was the first time in her life anyone had struck her, and she was too appalled to react. And the insult that she had behaved like a servant was a mortal one!

Emily stood up also and took Charlotte aside, then guided Amaryllis back to her seat. Eloise sat through it all as if she had neither seen nor heard them, absorbed in her own thoughts. They could have been shadows passing across the lawn for any mark they made upon her mind.

"It is natural you should be shocked," Emily said to Amaryl shy;lis with a supreme effort at calmness. "But these dreadful things affect people in different ways. And you must remember that Eloise has spoken with the doctor and knows what he has said. It would be best if we were all to await his advice. I daresay Mr. Lagarde needs as little disturbance as can be." She turned to Eloise. "Is that not so?"

Eloise was still looking at the floor.

"Yes." She raised her eyebrows a little, almost with surprise. "Yes, we should not distress him with our feelings. Rest-that is what Dr. Mulgrew said. Time. Time will tell."

"Is he to call again soon?" Caroline inquired. "Would you care to have someone with you when he does, my dear?"

For the first time Eloise smiled very faintly, as if at last she had heard not only the words, but their meaning.

"That is most kind of you. If it is not a trouble? I am expecting him momentarily."

"Of course not. We shall be happy to stay," Caroline assured her, her voice rising with pleasure that there was something they could do.

Amaryllis hesitated when they all turned to look at her, then changed her mind.

"I think there are other calls it would be courteous for us to make while I am in the neighborhood," Emily said. "Charlotte can remain here. Perhaps Mrs. Denbigh would care to come with me?" She spoke with exquisite ease. "I should be most happy for your company."

Amaryllis' eyes widened; obviously it was a contingency she had not foreseen, and she was about to protest, but Caroline grasped the opportunity.

"What an excellent idea." She rose, straightening her skirts to make them fall elegantly behind her. "Charlotte will be delighted to remain here, and I shall accompany you so we may continue with our visiting. I am sure Ambrosine would be pleased to see us. You would be happy to do that, wouldn't you, my dear?" She looked to Charlotte nervously.

"Of course," Charlotte agreed quite sincerely. For once, Mina and the mystery surrounding her death were banished from her mind and she was aware only of Eloise. "I think that is most certainly what you should do. And it is only a step. I can quite easily walk back when it is time."

Amaryllis stood a few moments longer, still trying to think of some acceptable excuse to stay, but nothing came to her and she was obliged to follow Emily out into the hallway as Caroline took her arm and walked with her, and the maid closed the door behind them.

"Don't let her distress you," Charlotte said to Eloise after a moment. She would not be fatuous enough to suggest that what was said was not meant. It was blindingly obvious that it had been fully intended. "I daresay the shock has affected her judgment."

Eloise's face shadowed with a ghost of humor, wraithlike and bitter.

"Her judgment, perhaps," she answered. "But only insofar as previously she would have thought the same, whereas good manners would have prevented her from saying it."

Charlotte slid more comfortably into her seat. Dr. Mulgrew might-yet be some time. '

"She is not the pleasantest of persons," she observed.

Eloise met her eyes; for the first time she appeared actually to see her, not some inward scene of her own.

"You do not care for her." It was a statement.

"Not a great deal," Charlotte admitted. "Perhaps if I knew her better-" She left the suggestion as a polite fiction.

Eloise stood up and walked slowly over toward the French windows and stood facing the rain.

"I think a great deal of what we like about people is what we do not know but imagine to be there. That way we can believe the unknown is anything we wish."

"Can we?" Charlotte looked at her back, very slender, with shoulders square. "Surely to continue to believe what is not true is impossible, unless you leave reality altogether and sink into madness?"

"Perhaps." Eloise suddenly lost interest again and her voice was weary. "It hardly matters."

Charlotte considered arguing, purely as a principle, but she was overwhelmed by the grief and futility that drowned the room. While she was still struggling to think of anything to say that had meaning, the parlormaid returned to announce that Dr. Mulgrew had arrived.

Shortly afterward, when the doctor was upstairs with Tormod and Eloise was waiting on the landing, the maid returned to ask Charlotte if she would receive Monsieur Alaric until Eloise should reappear.