Today began with high hopes, descended into bitter awkwardness, and has ended in what’s become commonplace, it seems—terror. I cannot trust my mind. I cannot trust my dreams, save that they are portents of disaster and death.
But first, tea.
I arrived at Maggie’s beautiful home, knocked on the carved wooden door with beveled glass, and was greeted by a harried maid who took one look at me and said: “You must be Natalie, the quiet one. How I wish they all were like you.”
I hardly had time to wonder at this or to enjoy the lavish appointments of the home before I was ushered into the parlor, where Maggie and her friends jumped to their feet, all chattering at once. Having grown up in a home that was preternaturally quiet, I wondered if the maid didn’t have a point.
“Natalie, my dear, you’re here. Good. We’re driving Mama batty so she’s sent us out to have our high tea in the park. Isn’t that a lovely idea? Natalie, this is Fanny. She lives just a few blocks south, and her father runs a very successful mill.” Maggie gestured to a dark-haired girl with plump cheeks and a pinched nose, who waved at me but then continued staring at my dress as if she was a bit confused. Perhaps I’d worn the wrong thing? I bounced a bit of a nodding curtsey back.
“And Elsie, who lives just north and whose mother was an actress but married into old New York money, so she redeemed herself.” Maggie giggled, gesturing to a blond with wide bright eyes and a small mouth, who also nodded to me. “All our lives the three of us have sneaked away at dinners and other functions to gossip,” Maggie explained. “Girls, Natalie doesn’t speak, but don’t you mind that. She’s very nice. Her father works for the Metropolitan and has been wrapped up in the business of that haunted painting!”
The girls all cooed at once. Heavy with the burdens of nightmares and wondering if I’d ever have another magical turn inside Lord Denbury’s room, I could feel my heart sink. Could I ever begin to share such things with these young women who I hoped could accept me into their circle?
“You’ve seen it then. What do you think?” Elsie cried.
“Ells, she can’t respond to you, so don’t ask,” Maggie said.
I waved at them not to worry and fumbled with my notebook.
Exquisite, I wrote and showed it to each of them, drawing closer to sit on a poufy chair nearby.
“Is that how you…communicate with the world?” Fanny asked.
I signed: “Yes, or by sign language.” And then wrote what I’d signed for them to see.
“Ah.” Elsie nodded. “Your voice doesn’t…work, then?”
Rather than attempt to explain, I simply shook my head.
“Girls,” called a matronly voice, I assumed a housekeeper’s. “The carriage is ready.”
Everyone jumped up and rushed out to the portico. Maggie hung back a moment and drew close to murmur in my ear.
“Natalie, dear, it isn’t that you don’t look nice, but that’s more of an evening dress than a day dress. I’m sure you’ve not many dresses, but it’s best if you know the difference. The one you wore out with Auntie and me would’ve been better.”
My cheeks burned bright red. That’s why the girls had looked at me so curiously. Surely they thought me an unfortunate in more ways than one. I’d thought about wearing the dress Maggie had suggested, but I didn’t want her to see that I only had a few. I scribbled in my notebook: “I could go change.”
Maggie batted her hand at me. “Don’t worry, we’re not out to prove anything or catch any particular eyes today.” She rummaged in a closet by the door and pulled out a thin, summery shawl and a parasol. “Here.” I took the items and followed, feeling shamed.
A sour-faced housekeeper trundled us into the carriage, the folds of our skirts all touching, which gave the others more time to evaluate my green taffeta and wonder how much mending had had to be done. Their dresses were all laces and muslins, satin ribbons and light embroidery. Lovely summer flowers, each of the girls. And all I could do was stare out the window as the open spaces, clumps of trees, and sculpted knolls of the park came into view, hoping that my silence would, as it usually did, return me to simply not being noticed. It would seem that I’d fare better that way in this crowd.
The chatter was nonstop, high pitched, and in a language I hardly knew. Some of the names they tossed about I knew well from the papers, but as for the turnings of the societal wheels down to the movement of each and every cog, such details were lost on me. It was as if they were spies, these girls, knowing details I’d thought only a butler would or should know. And the plotting! Which eligible bachelor would be where and how one might catch his eye and ensnare him by trickery, wit, or, shockingly, pregnancy. Nothing seemed off limits in the making of a name, a fortune, and a housewife. I had been sheltered indeed.
We were trundled just as awkwardly, amid doubled skirts and crinolines, back out of the carriage by the housekeeper, whose name I overheard was Mrs. Ford—not that she’d been introduced. Elsie was quick to pick an open spot near both the avenue and a confluence of walking paths, an area shaded but widely visible. Clearly the girls wanted to see and be seen, as they kept glancing over their shoulders at any well-dressed passerby or particularly fine carriage, instinctively smoothing their skirts like preening birds.
The ceaseless flow of plotting continued without pause or even a breath as we spread the blankets, dove into the confections brought from a basket, and poured tea from a latched decanter into small teacups. The three of them were perfect princesses, and I found myself glancing at Mrs. Ford, the designated chaperone, who was watching from afar by the parked carriage. Her hard gaze softened after watching me for a while.
Perhaps I looked like I belonged better with the help. Not, clearly, one of the princesses. I wasn’t in the right costume, and I could not talk, let alone speak their language, so how could I ever have held court? They all spoke so swiftly that even if I did have something to add, they wouldn’t have waited for me to write it.
I do have to give Maggie credit for attempting to include me. At one point, the unending tide of gossip turned to what possibly could have happened to the real Lord Denbury: if he’d had any lady friends, what would happen to his fortune, and if he was really and truly dead or if it was all a ruse.
Despite my flare of jealousy and my keen desire to offer up this diary as an account of what had really happened to Denbury and to scandalize the living daylights out of each of them, I smiled at Maggie when she turned to me and said: “Natalie sees it too. It’s truly like the painting is alive, isn’t it, Natalie?”
I nodded in agreement. Oh, if only they knew.
And just as soon as I’d been included, I was forgotten again. I couldn’t blame them, really. It was hard to know how to include me. People were often awkward about it. Even Father, and he loved me. But all that awkwardness? That’s one of the reasons it felt impossible for me to open my mouth. I didn’t want a strained conversation made worse by my fumbling attempts. Silence was simply a less stressful existence. But oh, such a lonely one.
And at that, speak of the devil, I saw the very demon impostor walking along the park path. We were not far from the Metropolitan; thus, this area might be one of his haunts if he indeed strove to check in on his “other half.” It was good the girls weren’t paying attention to me, so they didn’t notice how my teacup suddenly began rattling on my saucer and how the color surely fled from my face as I felt my blood ice over and my heart lodge in my throat.
I couldn’t look away from him. Inside the portrait, Denbury was utterly magnetic. Here in the real world, he remained all-consuming. And while he was still handsome in these dimensions, my shortness of breath upon seeing this Denbury was far less pleasant.
In a suit so fine it was nearly gaudy, pinstriped and sveltely tailored, Denbury strolled with a crystal-topped walking stick, a fine hat, and a sprig of something on his lapel. He was every ounce a tall, broad-shouldered, clean-shaven, neatly trimmed, and perfect dandy. And ungodly beautiful. Save for the shimmering of his eyes when he looked from one way to another with an odd swiveling of his head and a strange reflection in his gaze that reminded me he’d become inhuman.
And because it seems I’ve been crowned the queen of all things uncomfortable, of course the devil turned to stare right at me.
He waved. Jauntily swinging his walking stick, he looked me up and down, just as he’d done at the Art Association. A glimmer of recognition flickered over his face, and he put his finger to his lips and winked at me, very amused with himself. The lascivious look made me want to retch.
Unfortunately, his dashing figure would not go unnoticed. But while the real Denbury was engaging, charming, and indeed a bit of a flirt, this creature was a pale and paltry imitation. Even if he looked the same outwardly, he was a disquieting mockery of the man who’d held me in his arms. My strange entwined reality with Denbury felt more real to me in that moment than did the sun warming my cheek through the leaves.
“Why, doesn’t that look like Denbury? Just like!” Maggie breathed, catching where I’d fixed my stare.
“Oh, Mags, you see him everywhere we go, silly,” Elsie scoffed.
“I don’t care who he is, just that he’s gorgeous,” Fanny breathed with a bit of a purr. She lifted a hand to wave, causing Elsie to giggle and bat her friend’s hand down. “And wealthy. Look at that suit!”
“No, truly—” Maggie insisted.
“Well, whoever he is, he seems to have eyes only for Natalie.” Fanny scowled, staring not at me but still at Denbury’s body. None of the girls could take her eyes off him, and certainly neither could I. And that oddly reflective gaze would not release me.
“Honestly, he’s drinking her in like she’s some catch,” Elsie gasped in shock, still not looking at me. Gazing at me to the last, Denbury’s devil half turned down another path and disappeared behind a flowering shrub before Maggie could determine his identity for certain.
“To some, a deaf and dumb girl has her advantages,” Fanny offered. “I bet my father would give his eyeteeth to strike me mute.” Maggie’s face colored, and she admonished Fanny softly.
I could no longer bear it. I clutched my notebook, the charcoal snapping into a stub in my hand with the furious pressure I exerted in writing: “I am not deaf and most certainly not dumb!”
I stood up, leaving the shawl and the parasol with Maggie, and strode away, nodding curtly to Mrs. Ford as I passed her. She nodded back with a bit of concerned confusion. Clearly I did not belong with these girls. I was perfectly capable of removing myself to somewhere where I would be more wanted.
I longed to run to the Metropolitan and throw myself into the painting and into Denbury’s arms, but I had to remember what had been real and what had been a dream and maintain some sense of propriety. All of it was made of madness, though, so what could I believe? I had known Denbury for only a few days—and part of that only in dreams. But even those brief moments had been enough for me to recognize that he was the one person who made me feel alive, beautiful, whole, and good for something. Funny how extraordinary circumstances breed close kinship.
But rather than darting up to the Metropolitan, I continued downtown, ignoring the glances of those who wondered what a girl in a relatively nice evening dress was doing walking unaccompanied down Fifth Avenue. Surely they thought I was either a dress lodger looking for a gentleman to pay for my services or a neighborhood eccentric. I hoped that the burning frustration knitting my brow and narrowing my eyes betrayed the latter.
I didn’t realize where I was going until I was at the door and facing its hefty bronze knocker. I lifted it and let it fall, anxiously hoping I wouldn’t regret my intrusion. I waited for a servant to appear, but instead I was greeted by the very woman I’d come to see, dressed smartly neck to toe in charcoal gray, hardly a summer day dress. Mrs. Northe didn’t seem influenced by what was or wasn’t proper fashion. She was always elegant, ever beautiful. She was everything I wanted to be someday.
“Hello, Natalie, I’m so glad to see you!” Mrs. Northe exclaimed, bringing me in the door and directly to her parlor. I almost sagged with relief at her warm welcome. But before I could get too comfortable, she surprised me with a wary question: “I don’t suppose you saw the papers today, did you? The Herald?”
I shook my head and signed: “I was preoccupied. The girls…”
“Ah, yes,” Mrs. Northe said brightly. “Margaret had you over for tea. Did you have a nice time?”
I hoped to convey everything in a look. Explaining was too difficult. Mrs. Northe’s elegant, stoic face curved into an amused expression, her hazel eyes sparkling. “Oh, Natalie, I’m sorry to seem amused. It’s just that girls can be so terrible.”
Rallying a faint smile, I accepted the tea Marie offered, even though I’d had plenty already that morning.
“I have it on high authority that you’re not like other girls, my dear, so don’t worry about being like anyone else. Do you understand?” Mrs. Northe said.
“I think so,” I signed. She smiled in return, but then the smile faded, and with its departure, a chill crept into the room.
“And I’m sure we’ll have plenty of cause for tea and company. But I wish it were under better circumstances. There’s something in this morning’s paper that you must see. Unpleasant, I’m afraid.”
“Unpleasant” wasn’t the half of it. I’ve included the article here so you will understand my distress.
The Herald, June 12, 1880
Young Aristocrat Slays Woman in Brothel Nightmare
Late last night just off Cross Street in the hellish zone of the Five Points, nineteen-year-old Barbara Call was found beheaded in the back room of a house of ill repute and with bizarre markings carved into her forearm.
Witnesses described Miss Call’s “suitor” as shockingly handsome, with a fine suit of worsted wool, black curls, and bright eyes. The British-accented man called himself “Barry.” A composite sketch is rendered here from accounts of witnesses who saw the man take Miss Call into a private room after he’d taken care to ascertain her name. No sounds were heard from within the room, and no one saw Barry exit. Nor did they see Miss Call alive again.
The New York City Police Department requests any information the public might have about this man or his further whereabouts.
On the opposite page was a newspaper artist’s sketch, and there I saw my Denbury!
“How similar and yet frighteningly different a face can be, can’t it?” Mrs. Northe murmured. “Barry, the fine clothing, the accent…it’s as if his every feature is heightened, a caricature of itself, not,” she scoffed, “that newspaper artists are known for their verisimilitude. I daresay the novelty is a handsome killer and so grisly a deed. Is this what you saw at the Art Association?”
The dark circles below his eyes were like paint, his curls twisted into near horns on either side of his head, and the high cheekbones were set even higher as if to hollow his cheeks—but even then, there was a haunting beauty to him. My blood ran cold. I nodded. The devil that held Denbury’s body hostage was a killer…And my dream had foretold it. Barbara. A beheaded woman in the Five Points.
“I dreamed…” I signed, not bothering to hide how much I shook. Mrs. Northe was patient as I struggled to relay my thoughts. “I visited Denbury through the study door he cannot access. I brought nightmares. The demon Denbury came. I hid against the wall. Then, in the corridor, I saw…a corpse. Headless. ‘Barbara’ was carved into her arm.”
I gestured to the paper and shook harder as I wrote on the margin of the paper: “My nightmare foresaw this! Why am I tied to this? Worse, I just saw the fiend strolling in Central Park! What can I do?”
I fought back the tears welling in my eyes. Mrs. Northe remained ever calm.
“You must ask Denbury to tell you every detail about his imprisonment. We cannot solve a mystery, supernatural or no, without clues.”
“The Denbury I know in the painting…Tell me he’s not the one responsible—”
Mrs. Northe shook her head. “From everything you have said, your Denbury appears just as much the victim as Miss Call. At least, part of him is. And we must do everything in our power to make sure that the side of good prevails. Trust in his good, and it will not fail you.”
I gulped and nodded. It was dizzying to think about such impossibilities. What a contrast from the chatter of society ladies and upper-echelon intrigues! “Did Maggie see the article?” I signed.
“I doubt it. She only reads the society pages.”
I asked about what the murder could mean. Why beheading? What about the symbols carved on her arm? Would logic have any bearing in such circumstances?
“I can’t say,” Mrs. Northe replied. “Perhaps those were more runes. I’ve made progress on the verses carved around the painting, but the translation isn’t yet complete. What’s clear is that this is the work of devils, not spiritualists. But come to the museum. You must meet with your father, and we must keep up appearances. I’ll see you in the exhibition room when you’re done.”
We rode to the museum in silence, sitting overwhelmed with the shock of the murder.
I am reminded that I’ve lived a sheltered, protected life. Were my circumstances different, I could have easily been Barbara Call. If my father had less respectable work, less stability, I could have been forced to such a house of ill repute as poor Barbara. My heart goes out to all the women whom society has cast onto the streets and put at the mercy of devils. Perhaps women like Mrs. Northe and me are the sort to do something about it.
But none of this to my father. Such things as this troubled him greatly; his heart was a delicate one, an artist’s heart, and I hoped he would hear nothing of this brutality. In Father’s estimation, I hadn’t a care in the world, and I appeared unusually compliant as we discussed my schedule and duties. I might not speak, but I’m a decent actress. We agreed I could spend several days a week at the museum, and he suggested several pleasant activities such as cataloguing and sketching. He did not need to know how much of the time I would spend sneaking in to see Denbury.
I do believe this apprenticeship will lead to very little work and a deal of watching, giving a restless female something to do and giving Father the sense that he’s doing right by his daughter. When he introduced me to his fellows, it was clear no real responsibility would be offered to my hands. All those stoic male tones confirmed as much. But I cannot take issue. It’s best that my duties remain vague, that my tasks are set on observation and time for sketching, that time is not always entirely accounted for…so that I may slip into the other world of Denbury’s quarters to unfold magic and mystery.
• • •
I’ve taken these few free moments, as I sit amid the glorious Greco-Roman sculptures, to write down every mad detail thus far. The pieces between important events may provide a truer sense of the whole.
Mrs. Northe will meet me here in a few minutes, and then we’re off to see my lord. My Lord Denbury. Forgive me, God, if that sounded disrespectful. My compulsion to see Denbury is total. Unseen hands push me toward him, terror be damned. Everything has been shaken inside me, and I’ve begun to pray more heartily than ever before. How odd that when one is faced with the expanding petals of a blooming, supernatural rose, one must cling to faith to keep one’s head. I’ll report anon.
Later, June 12th into the 13th
(I write late at night and into the next day, burning the gas lamp low but steady.)
My poor Denbury has been terribly scarred!
When Mrs. Northe and I arrived in his room, his canvas portrayed him in his usual stoic position, tall, broad, striking, and bold. But today he had a bright red gash upon his cheek, and his mouth was taut with pain. The curators would think that someone with an errant brush has offered a foul addition, but I knew better. Something has been inflicted on his soul from the inside out, made manifest upon the artwork.
I turned to Mrs. Northe in alarm. She clearly saw the wound too. “Should I go to him?” I asked.
“Yes,” she replied. “We must find out what he knows. And by the time you’re out again, I’ll have finished the runic translations of the frame.”
I nodded. One weird task after another. My heart pounded.
I braced myself for that most peculiar sensation. Dipping my forehead and my shoulders and then swiftly launching my weight, I was in. Denbury was at my side in an instant, catching me again. My body thrilled, flooding with heat in that delicious moment. I could feel the press of his firm hand at my back as it lingered there.
“Oh, Natalie,” he murmured, flushed. His breath, hot on my cheek, smelled of bergamot, of Earl Grey tea. Another detail my dream had foretold…
I used tending to his wound as an excuse to remain close. I plucked a kerchief from my bodice and pressed it to his bleeding cheek. “Are you well? What happened?”
“I’m so glad you’re here,” he said, wincing in pain. “You are here, aren’t you? This isn’t one of your dreams, is it? I can no longer trust my senses. I don’t know what’s real…” He trailed off, as I stepped away, the bloody kerchief in my shaking hand.
“My dreams? You…remember?” I gestured to the door that in my dreams was a portal. I ran to it and tried the knob. It was locked and would not open. Not in this reality. I turned back to him, blushing and confused.
“Of course,” he replied. “You shared your dream with me.”
“Oh…” I blushed, remembering how easily I’d fallen into his arms, how instinctively I’d run to him for protection, how we had nearly kissed…
Reaching out, I pressed the kerchief to his cheek and lifted his hand so that he could hold it himself. A shivering energy passed through our hands as he took the linen from me.
“But today you’re really here, not just your mind, but your spirit,” he clarified, looking past the frame where my body stood, his hand upraised. “I can touch you.” And as if to demonstrate, he smoothed my hair and then brought his thumb down my cheek, just as I had done on first meeting him face-to-face. It was true; this place did make one question all reality, and tactile sensation seemed to be the only grounding force. I could not tell him not to test me.
He took a deep breath as if registering my scent, and I was glad I’d rubbed some of my lavender oil behind my ears. Seeking further sensation and confirmation, he brushed my mouth with his fingertips, and my lips parted involuntarily in a little sigh.
“I am real to you now, here,” I told him. “I feel you as you feel me. And I am here to help you. You must tell me what happened. Did the demon hurt you?”
“You were there to hear his threat, but then you were gone so quickly. It almost felt as if you were a ghost. I was afraid I’d imagined you all along.”
I shook my head.
“Within an hour after you both were gone, the museum room shifted as if the devil wished me to see through his eyes. The images were clouded, as if viewed through some fortune-teller’s globe, but I saw dim, distant flashes and the form of a woman struggling. The room crackled with red fire. I felt pain and smelled blood.”
He gestured to his scarred cheek. “Then everything went black. I heard screaming. I’ve no sense of time, but when I collected my senses again, there was stillness and my museum view had returned. I can only imagine the scene that devil left behind him—”
He turned to me, cheeks pale and those unearthly blue eyes now heartbreaking. “Please. Please tell me that was a dream.”
I bit my lip. Ignorance would do him no good. “I wish it were otherwise.” The more I spoke in this world, the more my voice became a foundation with less faltering. I had to be strong for the both of us. “There’s been a murder in the Five Points. Downtown. A difficult place, a poor place.”
I described the particulars of the situation, fumbling over the word “beheaded”—truly the most horrifying word I could imagine speaking—and we both glanced at the doorway where the same terror had stood, a terrible omen down to the victim’s very name.
“There was a picture in the paper, an artist’s sketch, of the last man seen with Miss Call. It…looked like you,” I murmured.
“Natalie, it wasn’t me. It was that wretch outside me. You must believe me—”
“I believe you!”
He raked a hand through his hair and tried to remain calm. “He preys on the weak, the unfortunate. As if to spite me. There has to be a way to stop him, a way to get me back,” he insisted.
I took his hands in mine. It was a bold act, an improper act since we were not in courtship, yet in our moments, broaching custom had become custom. “Listen to me. Strength and noble virtue draw evil like a magnet, like a moth to a flame. The light of your will is attractive.” I blushed and tried to mitigate what sounded flirtatious. “To both the noble and the ignoble.”
He stared at me with such sudden gentleness that butterflies took flight in the pit of my stomach. His moods, with their shifting directions, were enough to make anyone reel. I became dizzy again, because in the next moment he darkened.
“But it is my fault. Perhaps in part. Can I confess something, and will you promise not to hate me?”
My throat went dry. “Please tell me you’re not somehow a killer—”
“No.” He spoke with such quiet conviction that I could not doubt him.
“All right then, I’ll not hate you…”
Restless, Denbury moved to the bookshelf and slid out a book. It was Dickens’s Hard Times. Oddly fitting. It shook a bit in his hand, its image flickering like a candle, caught between mist and mass. Things weren’t entirely solid here. Only he was.
Denbury shook his head, weighing the book in his hand. It was not real, and yet he was requesting it to be so. Staring at Dickens’s sullen work, he pondered: “This room responds to what you expect of it, but here I am testing its limits, forcing this volume to become what it represents. This dread room is full of phantom objects. If only that were the case with the way out. The longer I’m here, the more these objects strain against existence. Will I be the same?”
I placed my hand on his shoulder. “No. You are firm. Strong. Remember how your light bid my nightmares fade? Like a guardian angel? Hardly a phantom.”
He smiled, and the dark circles of weariness below his eyes seemed to lessen a bit. Bolstered, he had an idea.
“So help me demand these to be real. Until I find a way out, I’ll have to keep living, keep hold of something tangible, else I’ll go mad. Come, let’s alphabetize the books while you talk to me.”
I nodded, accepting a few books he thrust in my hands. “But I believe you had something you were about to confess to me.”
“So I do,” he sighed.
We moved methodically. The task kept him from having to look at me, which is always best with a confession.
“I returned to the Greenwich estate upon my parents’ death. The servants were hysterical, driving me mad. A solicitor awaited me there, Crenfall. I didn’t like him. He was eerie and odd. Yet he was the only one not screaming, crying, or demanding something of me as a new lord.” Denbury ground out the words as we hovered back and forth along the shelves. “Over properties and ledgers, he promised he’d take me to a place to cure me of all pain and frustration. I didn’t realize he would take me to an opium den.”
I shouldn’t have gasped, but I did. It was a bit shocking. Denbury was blushing and ardently avoiding my eyes. But he continued.
“There were beautiful women strewn about, all dazed and blissful. Everything was dark and filled with sweet scents. I took a pipe into my mouth and I was lost. I don’t remember a thing past the drug overtaking me. I awoke bound to a truss and trapped in the Greenwich study with a mad artist painting my doom.”
He moved closer, shifting a book over my head, and I could feel the heat from his cheeks, which were burning with shame. My heart broke further for him and his plight. “So you see, Natalie,” he murmured, “I was Adam. I bit the apple. I tasted. I fell. This is my punishment.”
“No. That wasn’t fair.” I shook my head, looking up at him. “You were vulnerable. Tempted, tricked—”
“So was Adam. He paid the price. We all did.”
“You can’t think that way. People make mistakes. You were targeted. Crenfall counted on you being inexperienced, vulnerable—”
“Still, I should have been smarter—”
“I don’t think less of you for one mistake in the throes of grief. And regrets won’t fix your present situation.”
His tortured grimace eased as he reached out as if to touch me and then suddenly dropped his hand, thinking better of it. I bit my lip. I craved that touch again. We touched in moments of emergency and fear. Touching for the pleasure of it was new. Still, it felt so natural, right, comfortable. If it were reality—Oh, who was I fooling? Reality meant I couldn’t talk and I would never be the sort of girl to attract a man like Lord Denbury. I don’t turn in all those godforsaken societal circles I’d been hearing about all morning.
I changed the subject, handing him more books to sort. “Tell me more of your hopes for the future, about your work as a doctor.”
He nodded and brightened. “Ah yes, a doctor’s noble work…A horrible cholera outbreak during my childhood made me wish to understand its causes. Ever since then, I’ve felt my purpose in life is to tend to those afflicted and have studied whenever and wherever I could. A lot of English wealth was built upon the backs of the poor. It’s my duty to make a return on that investment of blood.”
As he moved to place a book on the same shelf as I did, he gestured toward my mouth and we were close enough that his fingertips inadvertently brushed my throat. I couldn’t hide my delighted shudder. “That this strange affair granted you a voice is my only comfort. You are my only comfort. My only friend.”
The brush of contact had me thinking of our near-kiss in my dream, and I had to steady my hand upon the shelf. Denbury’s next words were sobering enough.
“I wonder if I’ll survive another day if the demon strikes again. If consequences of death fall on me, I wonder how long I have.” He threw a few books onto a cleared shelf.
“I don’t know,” I replied.
As he glanced at me, the wild light of his startling blue eyes stilled me. It wasn’t the foreign, reflective darkness of his other half, yet it was still frightening; his natural gallantry had been supplanted by slow-building desperation. And yet with us standing only a few feet apart, the heat between us was palpable and the effect of his fingertips a wonder. I didn’t know what to do around this man: how to act or what to say. Every moment was charged, meaningful, and unexpected.
My mind spun with the crime and its results, but Denbury’s magnetism overpowered all. I didn’t just wish to take his hands again; I wanted to bring them to my lips, confessions and all. My own impulses were dangerous. The mad shifts of emotion that this world evinced affected me too. My eyes closed and opened slowly. I had known from the first that I was under his spell, so why deny it?
“We…shall meet each day as it comes,” I stammered, trying to regain some sense of myself, only to find that he’d drawn closer. “You’re not alone. Mrs. Northe is your friend too.” I turned to face the frame, having entirely forgotten about her and my mission for information.
The room was empty except for my stilled body on the other side of reality, alone in the exhibition room.
“No one else comes through,” Denbury stated, gesturing to my stationary self. “Not that I called to anyone but you, and only then when I saw your light. None who’ve handled the piece can travel through its portal, save you and the demon.”
“But Mrs. Northe is versed in magical things. Why me?” I asked.
Denbury looked at me curiously and suddenly chuckled, wincing from the pain of his wounded cheek but unwilling to let it keep him from smiling. His ability to maintain some humor did him credit. “Haven’t you read fairy tales? I’d have thought a girl like you would know all about the manner in which they work magic.”
I bristled and held my head high. “I’m nearly eighteen years old, I’ll have you know, a woman, not a girl. While I read fairy tales in my youth, they are foggy in my memory as an adult.”
This was an outright lie. I read my book of fairy tales cover to cover at least once a month. Still, I wasn’t about to have a man near my age thinking I was a child. I wasn’t exactly sure what he was getting at. He just kept smiling at me.
“You must be special. The moment I saw you, my world shimmered, like bright light through dark water. Like an angel.”
“Does that mean you’re a frog? Or a sleeping princess?” I asked, unable to hold back a giggle. “You need a kiss and you’ll be free from this painting?”
Wincing as his expression caused a drop of blood to weep from his wound, Denbury pressed the kerchief to his cheek again but valiantly maintained his smile. “I’d be lying if I said I wouldn’t be honored by a kiss from such a fair maiden. If you’d like to try, I daresay it would make for a most pleasing experiment.”
My cheeks were on fire. He kept that delicious grin on his lips, the lips of a prince in need of kissing.
“I am a gentleman, Miss Stewart. I promise,” he assured me. “But in a circumstance like this, it’s easy for one’s fantasy to get away with them, for I exist in a fantastical premise. You must think I’m a cad.”
“What, for wanting to kiss me?” I breathed. I thought it was a fabulous idea. “Would you think me not a lady if I wanted to kiss you too?”
“I think in this particular case, being a lady is overrated.” He stepped closer and took my hands in his.
I wasn’t adept at flirting. I’d only cast longing glances at Edgar Fourte, and look how far that had gotten me. I’d have to write Maggie for advice. Surely she was a genius. Though I wasn’t about to tell her I wanted to sharpen my wiles upon her professed beau.
But as his mouth lowered toward mine, I had a moment of panic. “What if by kissing you, I become trapped here too? A girl doesn’t simply press her lips to a man, however attractive or titled, unless she’s quite sure a curse won’t similarly imprison her.”
He released my hands. “You are too sensible by half, Miss Stewart.”
“You know, you’re the only person who’s ever told me so!” I said, pleased with the idea of being sensible, even if he perhaps hadn’t meant it as a compliment. I shook my head, clearing its fog. “This place bewitches me. We must talk business. If I’m to help you, I need to know every particular of your predicament. Mrs. Northe awaits me, and I need to tell her we spoke of something other than kissing.”
His humor was gone and the wildness in his eyes returned, making me shudder. I liked the flirting Denbury so much better. But flirting would not solve his imprisonment. We eagerly took up the books again.
“What of the curse itself?” I prompted. “Were there words? Powders and explosions? Magic wands—”
“Words. But not ones I recognized. The artist had a French accent. There was an odd phrase in Latin, but…something was off. Do you know Latin, Miss Stewart?”
“I can read a bit of it. Never quite saw the sense in learning a dead language. Considering my inability to speak, I thought it would be doubly pointless to learn it.”
Denbury laughed. “Again, how very sensible of you.”
“It’s a shame, really. Speaking here, I realize I’d like to know every language on this planet, living or dead, to feel them all on my tongue and taste each syllable on my lips.” I paused as I noticed him leaning toward me and focusing on my mouth. This peculiar place had its witchcraft!
“Business, Miss Stewart, yes.” Denbury rallied, stepping back.
It seems mad to assume a man as exquisite as Lord Denbury would be “under the spell” of a girl like me. While I maintain that I’ve been told I’m pretty, I’ve nothing to offer a titled man of his station. However, I tell you that this odd place brings out the honesty in two souls. When we look into each other’s eyes, it’s as if we already know one another intimately, our strengths and our weaknesses plain to see. But we finally recovered ourselves from fawning reverie. This world wasn’t real, as much as we could lose ourselves in it. The wound on his face was a garish reminder of unfriendly territory.
“Mrs. Northe needs details,” I stated. “If anyone can help, surely it is she.”
Denbury went to his desk. “I wrote an account. Please, take it. I’ve had time to reflect on every detail of the horror—if nothing else, to try to keep my sanity.”
He pulled papers from the top drawer and handed them to me. His penmanship was hasty and strained, the script reflecting the fear I’d seen in his eyes.
“Thank you. I shall study these with great care.”
“Mrs. Northe knows what has come to pass here?”
“Yes, she alone. Thank God, she doesn’t think we’re lunatics. She awaits my report.” I brandished his account. “This will be vital evidence.” I had no other place to tuck it but into my bodice, directly against my skin, which prolonged my blush. But he had not handed me a love letter. I held a damning account of supernatural terror against my bosom. That was enough to cool my cheeks.
“Oh, and there’s this,” he said grimly, lifting back the cuff of his sleeve to showcase freshly scabbing red marks on his arm, just as he’d revealed in one of my dreams. The same sort of marks that coursed around his portrait frame. Runes.
“Last night, after the fiend came to declare his evil, this sizzled fresh onto my skin as if I were again branded, perhaps at the time of the murder,” he said bitterly. “It was part of the screaming and everything going dark…”
I snatched a pen from Denbury’s desk. The implement shook in my hand—as it took on the reality I demanded of it. I began to copy the marks upon my own flesh.
“Careful,” he cautioned. “Take those symbols lightly. Don’t curse yourself in effigy.”
“Mine’s hardly in blood,” I retorted. “Still, there’s sense in your warning. These are runes. Mrs. Northe is working on the translation of what’s around the frame.”
I altered the characters from what was written on his arm by omitting crossing lines. I’d present the whole of it to Mrs. Northe and let her guide me. I glanced out at the museum beyond. Mrs. Northe stood as a hazy shadow, watching. What was time like for her? I moved about the room, wondering what she’d see from the other side. I went to the window at the side of Denbury’s bookshelf and tried to peek out, but my head and hands hit resistance, as if a wall was there, though dimensions appeared to carry on beyond it. The room remained terribly deceptive.
“I’ve thrown myself against every wall,” Denbury said. “The only way out seems to be through the front, and even then, not for me.” He glanced then at the door that would have led, if this were truly his study, to the rest of the house. It was the way to him via my dreams. But it was no way out.
“I’ll…I’ll keep trying to find a way,” I promised. “Awake or asleep.”
I glanced out the “window.” The sky was beautiful beyond, and the rolling hills of the Denbury estate were stirring. This was England at her most lovely, but it was all a flat pretense. Eerie and unwelcoming, the forced cheer was painted with perfect reality, more clear and realized than any photograph, and yet so false.
I heard Mrs. Northe calling as if from a great distance, an echo beyond the murky expanse between us. She drew close. And then she touched my body’s arm. I felt split in two. I felt both sides of me—the me outside and the me at Denbury’s side, both of them in excruciating pain. This was the pain he must have felt when he was banished here, and it was awful.
As with two magnets that at first repel but once turned slam against one another, I felt a violent push and pull between my spirit and my corporeal self. I was nearly sent to the ground. Denbury moved to steady me, but I was roughly tossed into my own body again and I gasped as I fell against Mrs. Northe in the exhibition room beyond.
“Oh, dear! I’m sorry!” she cried. “Did I startle you? I didn’t know my touch would affect you. Are you hurt?”
Nauseated, I had to keep my arm steady upon her. I opened my mouth to attempt to speak but was hardly capable or brave enough to try out the sound. I pressed my shaking hand to my bosom to reach for Denbury’s account…
It was not there. Something itched against my skin within my clothing. I heard a sifting noise onto the floor. Glancing down, I saw that the pages of Denbury’s account had turned to dust and sand upon my bosom. The paper could not withstand the cross between worlds. How on earth, then, did I? A small sound of defeat gurgled in my throat. I was far from answers and farther from a solution.
Mrs. Northe helped me onto the bench outside Denbury’s exhibition room. “Your father came looking for you. I could hear him calling so I made up some excuse. But as we can’t have you simply disappearing, we’ll have to keep your forays within reason of your ‘apprenticeship.’”
“Denbury wrote an account,” I signed to her and then gestured helplessly at the mess made along the collar of my dress and the sand on the floor.
She looked at the remains of the papers and frowned. “His portal is the stuff of spirits, not objects,” she said. I furrowed my brow. That didn’t make sense. I gestured to my skirts and brushed my sleeves. She caught my meaning.
“Why, then, would your clothes go through?” she clarified. I nodded. She shrugged. “Have you ever seen a naked ghost? They usually appear in the clothes in which they died. I’d hope your spirit would travel with a sense of itself. And of propriety.”
Somehow she made the most ridiculous ideas almost make sense. I smiled.
She touched the flaked paper remains in the folds of my skirt and ran them through her fingers. Her mouth contorted with the same frustration I felt. “I will need that information or we’re all helpless.”
“Let me go back in,” I insisted, my hands shaking as I signed a viable excuse. “Tell Father that I’ve gone to the ladies’ room and to meet us at your home, that you’ll take care of me. Tell him…how fond of you I am. That I can’t ration our time together. You’re trying not to hurt my feelings by humoring me.”
Mrs. Northe eyed me with admiration. “Why, Natalie, you’re quite good at fabricating plausible, emotionally substantive lies.”
I grinned and signed, “It comes from my literary heroes. I’m a born storyteller.” I gestured to my throat. “The greatest irony.”
Mrs. Northe laughed and touched my cheek with a mother’s fondness. “You are so much cleverer than Maggie. Bless her heart how she tries.”
My face fell. I wanted to like Maggie, obnoxious friends and all. She’d tried to be as nice to me as she knew how, and who could help swooning over Denbury? And yet I was Evelyn’s favorite. That she trusted me with things she would not entrust to her niece gave me a rush of pride. I felt a keen desire to keep the place I’d unexpectedly earned intact and without competition. Any good society lady would do as much, as I’d heard firsthand from Maggie and her friends; one should jealously guard the place of privilege one has gained. I wanted friends my age, but I needed Evelyn Northe more.
Always attentive, she watched my face, and I doubted this would be the last time I’d wonder if she could read minds. “Oh, I care for Maggie, Natalie, don’t worry. But you are meant for things she is not. She has been given every advantage in this world, while you have not. You need me. She does not. That’s the simple truth.”
I nodded and turned my thoughts back to Denbury, signing, “I fear for him. He’s hurt. When the demon strikes, Denbury suffers.”
Mrs. Northe nodded. “Yes. We can’t let this continue. I don’t know how many blows he can take. Go on then, all the more urgent to get the details,” she encouraged. “I’ll await you and fend off your father as you’ve suggested. Then I’d like to tell you what the runes say.”
I rushed back into the room, stepped into my position, reached out my hand, and fell forward into Lord Denbury’s world. He was eager to see me again, his altered sense of time not realizing it was a mere moment since we’d last met.
Oh, goodness, and I’ll have to tell you all about it in the morrow. It’s late. Even madness such as this cannot entirely win over the need for sleep. It won’t do if both Denbury and I look so wearied around the eyes. I wonder if I’ll dream of him again. I wonder if I can help myself.