True Born (16 page)

"You are not troubling me," Hester
replied.

She went to the kitchen and started preparing
the meal she had described, and set it all down on a tray
carefully: the dish with eggs, toast, lamb cuts, jam and butter.
She set down the pot and threw the tea leaves inside, and from the
pocket of her dress she took a bag with dried sprigs of wolfsbane,
and put a good quantity inside the pot as well.

She poured hot water over the leaves and
sprigs, and stirred the pot. She watched as the tea leaves colored
the water and, when she was satisfied, she fished the sprigs out
and put them back in the bag. She took seeds from another bag, and
mixed them in the jam. Then she took the tray and climbed the
stairs to Georgiana.

As John rode away from Georgiana, a feeling
of unease increased in him.

There had been signs which he had ignored in
Hester, because he was a man who chose not to examine things that
he could not help too much.

Yet, there was the part of him that was
always observing people, and the thoughts that grew out of his
observations could not always be kept at bay.

He knew that Hester was not a woman of light,
changeable feelings, and that she was deeply in love with him.
Because he did not want to reward her heroic efforts on behalf of
his farm and livelihood by sending her away to almost certain doom
-- for who would take a woman in and allow her to run a farm,
unless it were a farmer who married her? Who would employ her
otherwise at decent wages? -- John had kept her with them, though
he had not liked that her eyes should always still be on him, only
flicking towards Georgiana with an expression of puzzlement.

A creature such as Georgiana begot love in
others; this love could turn nasty, if it were an unrequited
passion, as it had been for Hugh. Most often, however, Georgiana
was loved back, or at least admired, except by a few envious,
jealous people.

Bess had been one of these people, and Hester
was another.

Hester would not think of her feelings as a
jealousy of Georgiana's nature. John had correctly understood that
she could only respect what she considered strength, but he also
knew that there was something in Georgiana that a woman like Hester
would crave: the capacity to feel and give happiness.

He had seen the strange scratches on Hester's
face and hands following Georgiana's arrival, and he had put the
suspicion that she had done something to herself away, because he
had been absorbed in Georgiana.

But he had seen Hester's eyes half an hour
before, as she had told him what was needed from the store. She had
been thinking of something else, and she never did that. She was
always present, always focused on him or on the task a hand. She
had been thinking of something else; she had been impatient for him
to go.

"No, no, no!" John cried out loud.

He turned his horse around and began riding
back. She would not dare do anything to Georgiana! She must realize
that he would immediately know, and hate her forever - maybe even
kill her, or have her hanged!

But, as he rode back, the knowledge that he
had been avoiding, and which nevertheless had been gathering at the
back of his mind, sprang to the fore.

Hester was mad.

She was mad, and therefore she was capable of
extraordinary efforts, of being silent and still for months, of
braving storms and standing between the abyss and charging animals,
of not fearing the lightning or the storm, of working so hard that
she exhausted him, who was so much stronger than she was.

She was going to do something mad, convinced
that he would accept it when it was done.

John was sure of what he was thinking now,
and he rode his poor horse hard, bending over its head so that the
wind might not slow them down.

He had almost lost Georgiana, he had almost
felt the despair that would be inevitable if she were gone. The
irony of recovering her only to lose her again to something that he
had refused to see, to something not as obvious as a deadly
disease, to something as anodyne as a silent woman in his own
household --  this irony would be dear to Fate, that terrible
thing turning its wheel with tedium, looking for ways in which the
race of men could be made more miserable.

He rode so fast that he almost forgot to
breathe, and when he got to the farm the very stillness of his
house told him that something was happening inside.

John burst through the door of the kitchen,
smelled the food that had been prepared and saw the smoke rising
from the leftover water; he saw the tea leaves uncovered in the
tin, and the sugar; he saw the jar of jam.

He started to run up the stairs, shouting,
"Georgiana!"

In a second he was in the room and
immediately knew that he was right, because Georgiana, with the cup
of tea to her lips, was very surprised, but Hester did not turn
round at all. She did not move, and the almost imperceptible slump
of her shoulders told him that she had attempted
a 
thing
, and it had been confounded.

"Don't drink!" he said, and going towards
Georgiana he took the cup from her, setting it down on the tray
with a clatter. "Did it touch your lips?" he asked sharply.

Georgiana was confused, looking at him with a
smile. "Whatever is the matter with you? It's only tea!"

Of course, she would never think another
person capable of perfidy. She would never believe other people
capable of truly desiring harm on each other, of actually causing
it, because it wasn't in her heart.

John had several times wished someone dead by
his hand, though never by such an indirect method as poison, so he
knew that such feelings existed,
 he knew.

"Did it touch your lips?" he asked again.

"I was blowing on it!" Georgiana said. "It
was too hot!"

Hester was looking at Georgiana, and only now
she raised her eyes to him, and in their darkness he read the
truth.

"Whatever could the matter be?" Georgiana was
saying.

It was what Hester considered stupidity in
Georgiana that made her smile, as she looked at John.

"Whatever could the matter be?" she repeated
with a small laugh.

"Is there no matter?" John asked her, his
face pale.

Her smile only widened. And then, the
terrible thing in John, the thing that made him relentless and
vengeful, took over.

"If there is no matter, then you might want
to drink the tea?" he asked, motioning to the cup.

Hester never took her eyes of him. "If you
want me to, I will drink it."

Georgiana was looking from one to the other,
but there was such intensity between them that she did not
speak.

"I want you to," John said, in a hard voice,
and with hard eyes.

Hester reached out, took the cup of tea, and
drank it. She lifted the pot, her pulse as steady as it always was,
filled it again, and again drank it, though the liquid must be
burning the inside of her mouth and her throat.

She threw a look at John, who was staring at
her with no mercy, took a spoon and, scooping jam from the dish,
she put it in her mouth and swallowed. Then she did it again.

Hester was still looking at him, and smiling
as if she were the victor in some contest. "I am afraid I have
spoiled your breakfast," she told Georgiana as she turned to take
the tray. "It is almost time for luncheon, anyway."

She stood up and left with the tray, as if
she were any servant bringing food to her mistress, then taking it
away.

"What is happening?" Georgiana asked John,
after Hester descended the stairs.

"Nothing," said John, though he knew now that
he had been right.

He was perturbed during the rest of the
morning and the beginning of the afternoon. He did not leave
Georgiana's side, but could hardly find enough serenity to answer
her questions or speak.

"Has something happened between the two of
you?" Georgiana finally asked. John could see in her eyes how much
such a thing would hurt her, but what he could not see was the
understanding of what Hester was capable of doing.

"No," he told her. "Nothing has happened.
Nothing could ever happen between her and me."

Georgiana seemed to accept what he was
saying. She knew him not to be a liar.

As the short day ended and the sky started to
dim at three o'clock, John was at the window, looking out at
Hester's house. There was a candle burning in her room, but no
movement inside. But, as he looked, the door opened and she came
out. She seemed to walk quite stiffly, a hand to her stomach, and
he saw her staggering towards the fields.

He knew what she was going to do: like a
beast, she would find a safe, hidden place to die. Like a beast,
she was ashamed to be seen dying.

It was safe to leave Georgiana now, and John
did, without telling her what was happening. He still felt no pity
as he followed Hester into the woods. He tracked her as if he were
a hunter, and would not leave her the consolation of dying
alone.

When he found her lying on the mossy ground,
she was bent over in pain, her face contorted. It seemed as though
the pain were so great that the veins bulging in her head and neck
might explode. He crouched next to her and watched her convulsions;
by their severity, she would not be long in this world. She looked
at him with eyes that were still unafraid.

"How could you do this?" he asked. "How could
you think of killing Georgiana, who did nothing to you?"

There was a grimace like a smile on her face.
"There were a million devils in me," she managed to say.

She suddenly reached out and grabbed his arm
with super natural strength, then she let out a whimper that she
had been holding inside. She would have liked to go with no sound
at all.

"I'm not sorry," she said. "It wouldn't
matter if I were, in the place where I am going."

Her hand still clutched his arm as her head
fell on the ground. Her eyes closed as if a heavy curtain were
falling over them, as if with an effort, and froth came out of her
lips.

It was a terrible winter for them, with shock
succeeding shock, and a police enquiry following Hester's
death.

After a short investigation, her death was
ruled as self-inflicted harm, since she had been seen gathering
wolfsbane and drying the leaves and seeds, and her passion for John
Crawford had been noticed by his housekeeper, Abby, who had now
returned to the relative safety of the farm.

John had finally found some compassion for
Hester, at seeing her face more pale and still than ever as she lay
in her coffin, and she had her wish after all: since no church
would accept a suicide on its grounds, John laid her to rest in his
own land. She never left him, just as she had determined that she
never would. At times he would even go to the stone that marked her
grave, and think of the woman who had had great courage, and yet
had been destroyed by ungovernable passions.

It was only the number of deaths by smallpox,
which had spread to half the country, that stopped tales of
the fatal love triangle from spreading. There was, as well, the
story of Countess' abandonment of her marriage in favor of her
husband's bastard brother. It was enough gossip for a lifetime, but
with so many loved ones dead, most people had no appetite for it.
After the dangers and trials they had passed, John and Georgiana
would not have cared about what people might say, and nothing would
ever be said to Mad Jack's face, or to the woman he loved and her
sisters.

Therefore, when a letter bearing Hugh's seal
arrived for John via a messenger who had been told to wait for a
response, he felt no great surprise.

"
John,

You know that I have long disliked, and even
hated you.

Hatred might seem like too strong a word
when, before your return from India, you had not caused me any
direct harm.

I do not mean to explain my feelings here.
The explanation might be thought insufficient, as so often we
cannot help what we feel, and it is not the point of this
letter.

I am writing to you because I know Georgiana
is in your house, and I cannot bring myself to write to her.

You should know that I mean her no harm, or
you, by the fact that I did nothing about this state of affairs, in
spite of the dishonor for me. It is no longer a time for honor and
dishonor -- it is a time for life and death.

I write to ask, even to beg, that you should
allow Georgiana to come to me in London.

When she finds out that I am dying she will
want to come, and you will naturally try to stop her. I say
naturally, because as a man of sense you will think that I
abandoned her to die, and that she is justified in doing the same
to me.

I know Georgiana's heart, and that is my
greatest sin. I know the heart of the woman I married, I know how
immense it is, how kind. It is my greatest sin because, knowing it,
I yet abused it.

That my heart is nowhere as kind as hers is
not a sin of mine, but a fact of nature. I think she was born the
way she is, because otherwise why would her two elder sisters be
such monsters of self-regard, and she have so much more regard for
others than for herself?

But this smacks of justification already. I
do not want you to understand me, or forgive me – firstly because I
do not wish it, and also because there would be no time for it.

I want to see Georgiana once more.

You know I am Catholic, and on my turn I
know my faith is looked upon with disdain by Anglicans and
Protestants such as you. The easy way to heaven, you think. Repent
at the last moment, and cross the gates to be with God.

I cannot tell you, at this moment when
disease is eating me, how much the need to see Georgiana is
unconnected to the fear of hell. I may go to hell, whether or not
she forgives me, yet I beg that I should see her once again.