The Irish Healer (26 page)

Dreadful? Hollowing? Black and frigid as the maw of hell?

Rachel withdrew her hands, dropped them to her lap. “He still believes in God, though. He has not lost all hope.”

Mrs. Mainprice considered Rachel for a long time. She chafed under the woman’s gaze. “Holding on to hope in God is all we ever have in this world, Miss Dunne.”

CHAPTER 23

Rachel’s mouth was dry as a week-old oatcake, and her head . . . the sooner she reached the kitchen and found Mrs. Mainprice’s store of headache powders, the less chance her skull would cleave right in two in the hallway. Rachel groped her way down the stairs. She had been too insensate last night to realize the housekeeper had laced her tea with laudanum. Enough to put down ten women, if the pain in her head was any indication. Without the laudanum, however, she wouldn’t have slept, and sleep had been preferable to reliving Molly’s last minutes on this cruel earth.

Slowly and quietly, Rachel pushed open the kitchen door.

“I was expecting I might see you about now, miss.” Mrs. Mainprice brushed her hands across her apron, retrieved a knife from its storage block, and sliced a loaf of bread waiting on the broad oak table. “I was just preparing a bite for you to eat.”

“I’ve no appetite.” Rachel dropped onto the bench. “Though I could use a generous pinch of headache powder.”

“By itself? Nonsense. You need toast and coffee to fix you right up.”

Mrs. Mainprice poured a cup of coffee as proof and set it in front of Rachel. The smell, hot and bitter, churned Rachel’s stomach and she grimaced.

“No turning your nose up, Miss Dunne. Don’t make me stand here and watch you to make sure you eat, when I’ve so much to do.”

“I would much rather hide in my bedchamber the rest of the day than take a bite of anything.”

“And when did hiding do anybody a bit of good?”

“It might this time.”

“
Wheesht
. Stop your silliness.”

Rachel obediently took a bite and swallowed some coffee. The first sip made her tongue recoil and her stomach as well. The headache powder—a mixture of willow bark and slippery elm and wormwood with ginger and pepper, diluted in a cup of water—tasted no better.

Mrs. Mainprice patted Rachel’s shoulder and returned to the bread, slipping it into a rack for toasting. “Molly’s passing is hard on all of us, in one way or another. You’re not alone in your suffering, but time will pass and you’ll feel calmer. Trust in the Lord.”

Rachel curled her fingers around the stoneware mug. “I wish I could, Mrs. Mainprice.”

The housekeeper tutted. “He’ll wait for you until you can, miss.” She deposited a plate in front of Rachel. “Here’s some toast, Miss Dunne. Won’t help to starve yourself either.”

Mrs. Mainprice settled across the table from her. The perfectly browned bread, dripping with an extravagant dollop
of butter, waited next to the coffee. She watched until Rachel bit off a corner; Rachel didn’t even taste it.

Mrs. Mainprice nodded, looking pleased about Rachel’s meager cooperation. “I’ve been thinking about a bit of work for you, miss, if you’re up to the task. It would be nice to have some trimmings for our bonnets, for the funeral. As your mother was a seamstress, I thought you might have some skill with the needle.”

“I can sew a little. I would be pleased to help.” A positive task to occupy her mind. “I lost my bonnet, though, in St. Giles.”

“I’ve a spare you can have,” she offered generously. There is black crepe in the attic storage. In one of the crates. Left over from when the household mourned for Mrs. Edmunds, God rest her soul. Feel free to search up there when you’re recovered.”

Steps sounded on the flagstones in the hallway and Dr. Edmunds came through the door.

“I thought I might find you down here, Miss Dunne.” He nodded at Rachel then turned to look around the kitchen as if he hardly recognized the place.

Mrs. Mainprice hopped up from the bench, surprised to see him. “Are you needing something, Dr. Edmunds?”

“I just wanted to see how Miss Dunne is faring.” His gaze traveled over Rachel, and she knew he was remembering last night, how close, how tight he had held her.

“As well as might be expected, Dr. Edmunds. Thank you for asking.”
Thank you for caring. Though it does neither of us much good
.

“Good.” He took a step closer. “I wanted you to know that I have arranged for a funeral for Molly. A proper funeral.”

“Oh, sir,” exclaimed Mrs. Mainprice, “that is most generous of you.”

Dr. Edmunds’s eyes didn’t leave Rachel’s face. She suspected he hadn’t even heard his housekeeper. “I had to, Miss Dunne. It was the least I could do.”

“I understand.” Understood everything about guilt.

Just then, Joe burst into the kitchen. “Sir, Mrs. Woodbridge and Miss Amelia are at the front door.”

“They’re here?” Dr. Edmunds asked, his body going tense.

“Aye, sir. Sure as I’m standin’ in the kitchen.”

“Then I suppose I’d better greet them. Miss Dunne.” He inclined his head and left, Joe on his heels.

Mrs. Mainprice shot Rachel a glance and frowned. “Now why did they have to come today, of all days?”

“Whatever is the matter?”

The housekeeper clucked her tongue dolefully. “’Tis the day of reckoning, Miss Dunne. You stay right here, miss, and finish up your coffee and toast. No need for you to get snatched up by the whirlwind that has just blown in.”

“What is going on, Sophia?” James asked, his voice reprehensibly harsh, his eyes not on his sister-in-law but upon the young girl beside her on the threshold. Upon the golden curls of her hair, the eyes blue as summer skies. Just like Mariah.

Sophia’s face was as pallid as the lining of her bonnet. She carried a valise and used it to push James aside. “Agnes
is ill. With the cholera. Let us in, James. Unless you want the neighbors to see your relations out on the steps, arguing with you.”

Amelia blinked up at him, her small hand tightly clutching Sophia’s.
Do not leave me here
, James imagined her thinking.
Not with this angry man
.

Sophia shoved into the entry hall, Amelia stumbling to keep up. “Amelia, say hello to your father.”

Amelia sidled up to Sophia until she was half-hidden by her aunt’s voluminous black skirts. Scared to death of James. As scared as James was of her.

“Good day, Papa.” She had such a tiny voice. Its impact was far from tiny, however. The child wielded it, unknowingly, as sharp and large as a scimitar James had once seen in the British Museum.

“Hullo, Amelia,” James stiffened his back against the cuts bleeding away his composure. “Would you like to see the kitchen? Have a bite to eat? I would guess a young person your age is hungry.”

“James, she doesn’t need to eat right now She has already taken her midday luncheon, like she always does at this time.”

Should I have known that?
“That may be the case, but I insist.” He signaled to Mrs. Mainprice, who had hurried up from the depths of the kitchen, anticipating his need.

“Kiss your Aunt Soph before you go,” said Sophia, bending down for the girl’s swift peck on her cheek. “Be a perfect miss, like you know how to be.”

“I will, Aunt Soph.” She smiled adoringly at her aunt. Amelia didn’t need a mother when she had Sophia. Might not need anyone else at all.

“Come now, lass,” encouraged Mrs. Mainprice, “we’ve all sorts of good food to eat in my kitchen.”

Smiling, she took Amelia’s hand and led her away. The girl steered clear of James as she passed. A natural response, James reassured himself. Caution was good when you only saw your father a scant few times a year.

The scimitar cut deeper, right down to his heart.

“I would not have brought her if the situation weren’t desperate, James,” Sophia explained unnecessarily. “I had to get away from the house. I have instructed my housekeeper to burn sulphur in Agnes’s room and to wash down the walls with carbolic acid. I could hardly stay with that going on.”

“Are they sure Agnes has the cholera?”

“Quite sure. She’s . . . she’s terrible. It’s terrible.” Sophia freed her hair from the monstrous bonnet she wore, all feathers and ribbons. “I sent her to the hospital. Tell me that was the right thing to do.”

Sophia, asking his approval, when the only person she had ever taken advice from was her husband. If she took advice at all. The world had turned on its head. “Dr. Castleton would have attended Agnes at your house.”

“Forcing me and Amelia to stay there with her, nursing her, exposing the sweet girl to the consequences of such a frightful disease.” She tossed her gloves and bonnet onto the entryway table with a slap. “Agnes must have contracted it over at her sister’s. She’d been there to visit recently—you remember me telling you that. And I heard that her sister died from the cholera. Right out on St. James Street, if you can believe it! In the middle of the pavement!”

“In front of a chophouse?” James asked, certain he knew the answer. He’d wondered why he had thought he recognized
that woman. Years ago, Agnes had introduced him to her sister, not many weeks after Agnes had been hired to act as Amelia’s nursemaid. “Thatched House?”

“Precisely the place! How utterly dreadful. To breathe your last in front of an uncaring mob. I can’t be certain, though, that Agnes caught the cholera at her sister’s house. Maybe she had done so in my own home. If you consider, New Bond Street is really not much of a barrier to protect us from St. George’s. I told you about that fellow passing away who lived in that neighborhood. The winds have been so hot, and blowing toward our house from that direction . . . the mere idea we could contract cholera by staying has kept me awake all night. I couldn’t imperil Amelia like that. So I sent Agnes off and now we are here.” Her voice rose with each word until she reached an impossible soprano squeak. “I have nowhere else to turn. You must take us in.”

“I . . .” How could he face Amelia every day, in this small house with few places to avoid the child? This reunion was supposed to wait until Finchingfield, where there was more space for them all. That was what his carefully laid plan had been. “I . . .” he stuttered.

“Besides, what if Amelia or I fall ill?” Sophia persisted, battering him with her rationale. “The good Lord forbid, but you would want to tend to us, wouldn’t you?”

Please, Lord, do not let it come to that
.

“Then stay, Sophia.” In the end, he had no legitimate rebuttal against her arguments. “Amelia can use Molly and Peg’s room. You can use Mariah’s old bedchamber. We’ve begun to pack it, but the bedding is still in place.”

“Amelia will not be a bother to the household, but I
know how hard her presence here is going to be for you. Each passing day she is coming to look more and more like my beloved Mariah. I find the resemblance a comfort, though I know you do not. I am sorry for that.”

There were others who would be reminded by the resemblance. James counted on them not to mention it. His sister-in-law, however . . .

“Sophia, I do have one request to make of you—please don’t discuss Amelia with Miss Dunne. She doesn’t know about our arrangement. I’ll explain the situation to her.”

Sophia’s eyebrows twitched scornfully. “Believe me, I have no intention of discussing family matters with a servant.”

“Miss Dunne is not a servant. She is my assistant, and her cousins are the Harwoods, which makes her grandfather a gentleman.”

“She has fallen very far from such heights, hasn’t she?” Sophia pursed her lips. “It continues to disturb me, James, that you seem to care about Miss Dunne’s opinion. I cannot fathom why her sentiments are of any value.”

He met his sister-in-law’s hard gaze. “Because, Sophia, I care what she thinks. This poor Irish girl you so enjoy despising. I won’t have her believing that I am a heartless coward.” Less than the man he should have been.

Sophia exhaled sharply, a sound filled with disgust. “The shock of our arrival has befuddled you. Clearly. I am going to take my rest now, and hopefully when I see you later you will not be speaking such nonsense. Troubled over a servant’s sentiments. Bah.”

“Don’t count on me being any less troubled when you see me next, Sophia.”

“Mariah . . . your father . . . they would both be severely disappointed in you.”

The scimitar sliced his heart in half. “I know.”