Jonathan Barrett Gentleman Vampire (119 page)

“You’re just being the pessimist.”

“I’m being an abject coward,” I said truthfully. “Suppose I bungled things and started a war? I’m not prepared to have those deaths haunting me. Other men are able to stand it, but not me. I’ll gladly choose my own path, but will not presume to tell others where to walk themselves.”

He scowled. “Well, put that way, I can’t blame you, though one might argue that you would have an equal chance of preventing a war, thus sparing untold lives.”

I shifted, uncomfortable, scowling back at him. “There’s that,” I admitted. “But I’m not wise enough for such work and know it. Please, Oliver, let’s not pursue this subject, it’s making me liverish.”

He acquiesced, much to my relief. “Very well, can’t have you coming down sick on me because there’s no tonic you can take but the one, is there?”

“Right enough,” I agreed, but I was not feeling hungry at the moment. Quite the opposite.

“Then politics aside, what about Edmond? You’ve no plans for him one way or another if he decided to take Richard away?”

“But he’s not going to; I only mentioned that as a remote possibility, born out of my own fears. It’s true that I could influence Edmond, or most anyone else, to suit to my needs, but where does one stop once one has started? No, sir. That takes it back to the political once more and my liver won’t stand for it.”

He gestured to indicate his dismissal of that topic. “But then what about Ridley and Arthur? You’re doing your best to completely change
their
lives.”

“And don’t I wish to high heaven to be free of the responsibility. I’ve come to take no pleasure in any of it, even if it is to change them for the better. I’m hoping that the need for my influence will eventually cease for—believe me—I’ve a tremendous dislike of playing the god in men’s affairs. I am stuck having to do this to them for the present, because for the life of me I can’t think of any way around it. If there is a way out, I shall take it, and if you’ve any better ideas I should gladly hear them.”

“None at the moment. But the changes you’re making within them are for the better. Surely that mitigates some of your strong feeling against using your talent for influence?”

“Oliver, how many times have you writhed inside when someone told you that they were doing something awful to you simply because it was for your own good?”

He thought that one over, then said, “Oh.”

“And recall your feelings when you remembered how Nora had dealt with you back at Cambridge. It was for your good as well as hers that you should forget your liaisons with her and what she did with you, but still. . . .” I spread the fingers of one hand, using a gesture to complete the thought.

“Oh.” He gulped, the corners of his mouth turning earthward in a bleak frown.

“Indeed. And again, where does one stop? Who am I to decide whose soul is in need of improvement and whose is not? Who am I to decide what’s best for me is also best for another? Remember how you felt when you found out I was influencing you into not noticing my ‘eccentricities,’ as you call them? It wasn’t so intrusive as to make a major change in your life, but I hated doing it, especially to you of all people. Before God, as hard as it was to go through at the time, I am most thankful that you walked in on me and Miss Jemma that night in the Red Swan or else I might yet be having to gull you of the truth.”

He went pink around the ears and nose and made a business of clearing his throat before speaking again. “No need to be so harsh on yourself, Coz. You did what you thought was necessary and explained things to me quick enough. I don’t think badly of you, y’know, for I understand why you had to do it. All’s forgiven and forgot, I hope.”

A little wave of relief washed through me and I nodded.

“Well, then, that’s that.” He gave a shake and shrug of his shoulders. “But just to end my curiosity on the topic for good and all. . . .”

In a comical manner I groaned, raising my gaze to heaven, making us both laugh. We needed the relief of it, it seemed. “What is it?” I asked after we’d settled ourselves.

“I was just wondering that since you’re already influencing Ridley and Arthur, you might think of it in terms of in for a penny, in for a pound.”

“Think of what?”

“Of influencing Clarinda, of course. You mentioned it as a possibility earlier.”

“A possibility I’m not ready to undertake for all those reasons I’ve just set before you. Besides, before you took the bit and ran with it, I’d been about to add that I’m doubtful it would work on her.”

“Why so?”

I hesitated, making a face. “If she’s mad—and it is my admittedly unqualified opinion that she is—then it won’t work well—if at all.”

“How do you know that? Oh, do stop glowering and tell me.”

I stopped glowering and sighed instead. “All right. The first night I was in London I paid a midnight call on Tony Warburton—”

“You
what
?”

“—and tried to find out if he knew anything about Nora’s whereabouts.” Before being struck down by sudden insanity, Tony had been an especially close friend of Oliver’s at Cambridge. He was now one of Oliver’s patients.

“The Warburtons never mentioned this to me,” he said.

“Because they didn’t know about it. I let myself in through a window and left in the same manner.”

“What, like the way you passed through Ridley’s door that time, and how you get from the cellar to your room here?”

“Exactly the same way.”

“And you then influenced him?”

“Tried to. It didn’t work. I just couldn’t catch hold of his mind—like trying to pick up a drop of mercury with your fingers.”

“But what has this to do with Clarinda? She may be as she is, but she’s not mad that I can see.”

“Are there not kinds of madness that are less obvious to the eye?”

“Of course there are.”

“Then my feeling is that Clarinda might be in that number. My mother’s like that.”

“But I thought your mother yells a lot, then goes into fits.”

“She does, but most of the time she’s merely disagreeable. When she’s with people other than her family, she gets on quite well. One might think of her as being somewhat highly strung, but otherwise unremarkable. I’ve seen her being cordial, even charming when she puts effort into it. She’s all right as long as she can keep hold of her temper. Only when her grasp slips does she go flying off into one of her fits and shows all that she’s kept hidden about herself.”

“I saw no sign of that sort of temper with Clarinda, but then, as you say, her madness must surely be of a different kind. She hides it well enough.”

“It’s the madness of being so single-minded that she overcame all obstacles by any means possible in order to obtain what she wanted.”

“But lots of people are like that,” he protested. “Just look at the House of Commons.”

“True, but for the most part I don’t think they normally run about arranging duels, committing murder, and shutting their spouses into tombs preparatory to shooting them dead to achieve their goals.”

“I shouldn’t be too sure of that, my lad. But doesn’t that just make her clever rather than mad?”

“Good God, Oliver, listen to yourself!”

Apparently he did, and went flame red in reaction. “Yes, I see what you mean. I believe I’ve been hanging about with you too much; I’m starting to sound like a lawyer, trying to offer a defense when there is none. Well then, you’re telling me that because Clarinda has a touch of hidden—for the most part—madness, you don’t think your influence will work on her?”

“Perhaps for a time, but I’d not want to trust my life or another’s on it. I couldn’t do anything with poor Tony because his mind just isn’t there to be touched; Clarinda’s is—my feeling is that she is much too focused and strong to hold any suggestion contrary to her desires for any length of time.”

I’d been able to make her forget my unorthodox entry to her temporary prison at Fonteyn House; that was one thing, but to change the very pattern of her will was quite something else again. Add to that my own still caustic feelings toward her and the likelihood of successfully turning her about became a remote, if not impossible expectation.

“But how can you be sure without trying it?”

“My mother,” I said, not looking at him.

“You mean you tried to influence her?”

I felt myself color a bit in my turn. “Yes. Once. I tried to get her to stop being so cruel to Father. It didn’t last long, not long at all. I’m not proud of what I did, either, so promise me on your word of honor that you’ll say nothing to him about it. Or Elizabeth.”

My tone was so forceful he immediately gave his solemn pledge of silence.

“From what I’ve heard from you about Nora and the Warburtons,” I continued, “I’m sure that she’s been trying to help Tony in the same way, to influence him out of his madness.”

“She did spend a goodly time with him when they were in Italy—or so his mother told me.”

“With indifferent results, sad to say.” For the present it seemed best I not inform Oliver that Nora caused Tony’s madness in the first place.

No, that wasn’t precisely true.

Tony had been mad to start with; Nora’s influence merely sent him more deeply into its embrace. Perhaps later I might tell Oliver the whole story of that dreadful night when Tony tried to murder Nora and me, but not just now.

“I wonder why she stopped visiting him?” Oliver asked, leaning well back in his chair to gaze at the ceiling.

A long moment passed as I tried to dredge up the words to answer. It was proving unexpectedly difficult to cast them into speech. They felt sticky, hardly able to release themselves from my throat. “Tony said . . . said that she was ill.”

“Ill?” He looked hard at me, brows drawing together. “What from, I wonder?”

I spread my hands. “I just don’t. . . .”

He perceived the sudden rawness of my feelings well enough and, sitting forward once more, raised a hand to make a hushing gesture. “There now, don’t come apart just yet, you’ll make the most awful mess on the floor if you do.”

An abrupt choking seized me. Laughter. Brief, but it seemed to clear things inside. Trust my good cousin to know exactly when and how best to play the fool. “Sorry,” I mumbled, feeling somewhat sheepish. “It’s just that whenever I think about it, that she might be lying sick and helpless somewhere, I come all over—”

“Yes, I know, it’s as plain as day—or as night, in your case. No need to feel badly about feeling bad, y’know. Did Tony say aught about the nature of her illness?”

“Couldn’t get anything else out of him. Maybe he didn’t know.”

“But his mother might. She’s fond of Nora, very touched by her kindness to Tony, y’see. I’ll call ’round first thing tomorrow and have a nice talk with her.”

“But you’ve already questioned Mrs. Warburton ages ago.”

“And time and again since, lest we forget. She made no mention of Nora being ill, either. On the other hand, that’s the one question I managed not to ask her. Can’t make promises, though. It’s been so long and her main concern is ever for Tony. The lady might not remember anything useful.”

I heaved from my chair, needing to pace the room. My belly was twisting around again from an idea I did not care for one whit. “Oh, God.”

My manner puzzled Oliver. “ ‘Oh, God’ what?”

“Oh, God in heaven, why am I in such a cleft stick?”

“What cleft stick?”

“The one where I spend all this time telling you the worthy reasons why I should abstain from influencing people, and now I see an equally worthy reason to use it again.”

“On Mrs. Warburton?” His brows shot upward, his eyes going wide. “You mean you could influence her into a better memory for a past event?”

“Saying one thing and then wanting to do another,” I snarled, but to myself, not to him.

Oliver watched open-mouthed as I made a few fast turns about the room. “What are you on about? You
are
thinking of influencing Mrs. Warburton, are you not?”

“I’m a damned hypocrite, that’s what I am.”

He shook his head at me. “A damned fool, you mean.”

“Yes, I’m sure of it. To inflict it upon some innocent woman is—”

“It’s positively brilliant! I see where you got the idea, if you and Nora are capable of making people forget certain things, then you’re just as capable of helping them to remember others. It’s marvelous.”

“It’s deceitful. . . dishonorable. . . .”

“Rubbish! It’s not as though you were changing the woman’s life and if not precisely honorable, then it’s certainly nothing harmful. Heavens, man, you could even ask her permission to do so.”

That stopped me in my tracks.
“What?
”

“Ask her permission,” he said clearly and slowly.

“How the devil could I do that? I’d have to tell her about myself and—”

“No, you wouldn’t. You think you have to explain yourself to everyone you meet? Vanity, Coz, beware of vanity. If her memory isn’t up to the work, then all you have to do is tell her you have a way of refreshing it and ask if she’s willing to try. She doesn’t have to know
how
you
do it, only that you can and that it is perfectly harmless. I’ll be there to back you up. Now what do you say?”

Asking permission.
It was so obvious I felt like one of nature’s great blockheads, Perhaps I should put myself on display at Vauxhall or Ranleigh for the entertainment of the crowds.

“If she tells you it’s all right, then your conscience is clear, ain’t it?” he asked in the manner of a person for whom only one answer will suffice.

“I . . . that is. . . .”

“Excellent! I knew you’d be sensible. I’ll just tell her that it’s something you learned to do in America. People will believe
anything
you tell them about that land, no matter how
outré
, y’know.”

* * *

Oliver went off to supper, leaving me to find my own amusement. I did not ordinarily join in the evening meals as the odor of cooked food in a confined space was overwhelming to my heightened sense of smell. Here, though, I found a degree of relief from its unseen presence, and if things got too much I could always open a window. So far, there was no need to let in the winter cold, and when he returned Oliver would find his room as warm and comfortable as he’d left it.