The words that fill a house seep into the pores of the walls, creating the atmosphere in which you carry out your life. I will choose only a man who speaks vivid color and life into my home.
~A scientist’s observations on love
He ushered me into an outdated but tasteful sitting room, with drapes shielding it from the blessing of sunshine. Only a dying fire lit the long room, glowing over the impeccable old furniture that smelled of turpentine.
Then I spotted Golda Gresham, stately and poised as she leaned forward in her striped chair, gripping the carved arms. Age had caught up to this woman no older than my own parents as if she’d never even tried to outrun it, and a hardness had settled into fine parentheses around her mouth. The fire crackled and popped behind her, throwing garish shadows over her unwelcoming face, and the red teacup sat on the table beside her.
Burke addressed her. “You’ve finally managed to summon a nurse, it would seem. May I present to you Willa Duvall, daughter of Doctor Phineas Duvall. Miss Duvall, your new patient.”
Golda Gresham rose in all her red and gold glory, and I could not look away, any more than if she were Queen Victoria herself. Slow, measured treads brought her to the center of the dark room that seemed to hold its breath at what she might say. “So. Some poor little thing has finally braved the position.”
She had the same commanding presence as her gregarious son, yet with a fraction of the volume—which somehow made it even more effective. “I rather expected a woman of some experience.” She looked me over as an antique broker from Christie’s might, assessing every flaw that detracted from a piece’s value and cataloging her finds.
A chill passed over me and a dusty old memory crept to the surface. I had, at ten years old, dipped into a philosophical discussion on romance with Burke’s younger siblings, Celeste and Gabe, as I faced the reality of walking my own father down the aisle for his second wedding.
“How would I know anything about love? There’s not an ounce of it at Crestwicke.” Celeste, who was normally one of the few Greshams with any sense, said this to me from atop her tall black horse. “You’ll see when you hang about the house someday. They’re simply too busy for it.”
“No one carves out time for such a thing—that’s why it’s called ‘falling in love.’ You simply fall, right into it.” I smacked my leg. “One can’t help it. Don’t you agree, Gabe?”
Her brother Gabe dipped his gaze, and I could see from his profile that I’d earned one of his rare smiles. “Sounds dangerous.”
“Oh, it is. Wonderfully so. But it’s nothing a person can help, any more than falling out of a barn loft.”
“Crestwicke doesn’t have those sorts of people,” Celeste mused. “The people here all remain on solid ground, I’m afraid.”
“I pity all of you if that’s true.” I looked up at the great ivy-covered house on the cliffs sprayed with the sea below and felt a sudden release from lifelong envy. Marriage was only an acceptable fate if love was involved. No amount of wealth could make up for the lack of it.
Celeste sighed, looking up at the grand old estate. “When one is rich, one cannot afford to marry for love.”
Yet the somber house swelled with deep, authentic love pulsing just beneath the surface, romance buried in shadows, kept away from practical eyes and sharp tongues. I could feel it. Someone had fallen in love the way Alice fell into that rabbit hole. I would find them, and the letter would be delivered—it was merely a matter of time.
I touched the apron pocket that held the letter. How I wanted a taste of such love myself, like a girl holding out her tongue for the delicate swirling snowflakes. Perhaps that taste would come from a distance, as I reunited the couple. What a delight if it was meant for the woman now poised before me, with a lost love in her past that had folded her so tightly into what she was now—and the letter would unfurl it all.
“You will begin your duties immediately?”
“Of course. I sent word of my arrival, but perhaps it hasn’t come yet.” I set my valise down to tug my gloves off by each fingertip. “I’ll begin with a thorough examination, then I’ll ask a few questions about your symptoms and . . .” I fell silent at her look of patronizing amusement, head tipped just so. She twined her lace-covered fingers and waited.
A cat. That’s what she reminded me of. I could picture her tail flicking back and forth as she watched me, her every movement weighted with grace. Even her eyes, stunning blue slits that were drawn up in a lovely slant at the corners, watched me with feline detachment.
I’d never been much of a cat lover. My nature more closely resembled a dog, with my bounding eagerness, fierce loyalty, and habit of crashing headlong into things.
She sipped her tea, gaze always on me over the gold rim of the cup. “Why is it you believe you’re here, Miss Duvall?”
And now she was playing with me, batting me about and watching to see what I’d do.
“To monitor your chronic health concerns and ensure—”
“Burke, have you told her nothing?”
His low voice came from behind. “I didn’t want to take the pleasure away from you.”
She lifted a red volume from the table beside her, fingering it tenderly, then handed it to me as if it were a scepter. “I need your assistance to perform . . . these.”
My eagerness ground to a swift halt. “Perform?” Perhaps she had misunderstood my profession.
“It’s her throat, you see.” Burke crossed his arms, eyes snapping with mischief. “There’s something the matter with it when she attempts to sing. It tightens on the high notes, gives out on the long notes, general fits of coughing and then a bit of swooning. She needs a nurse to attend her as she practices to help her overcome these . . . ailments.”
I raised my eyebrows, uncertain how to take the direction of this conversation. I glanced toward the closed doors. Where was Gabe, anyway? He knew I was here, but he hadn’t shown himself yet. Oh how I needed his quiet smile to defuse the tension, to explain in commonsense terms what was happening in this increasingly odd situation.
Burke settled a condescending smile on his mother. “Come, show Miss Duvall the problem and we’ll see what can be done about it.”
She straightened, a tower of silk poplin and lace, and glared at him. After a reverent pause, she breathed deeply, chin raised as if looking up to a heavenly sphere from which she would draw her music, and released a somber melody that stretched out, reedy and thin. Soon she became lost in it, seeming to forget we were there. Her cheeks grew flushed and her low voice wavered over the tones.
Her singing wasn’t intolerable, at least to my untrained ear, but neither was it pleasant like the full-bodied voices of opera or even pleasant like a second-rate parlor singer. It rose to higher notes, grating on my senses, then shattered at its peak when her voice broke. With a few delicate coughs, she cleared her throat and looked about for tea.
My official diagnosis was swift and complete: an overabundance of time and wealth complicated by an utter lack of skill and vainglorious delusions. I shoved those ungracious thoughts aside with a gnawing guilt, and a great deal of unease about my future here.
Burke leaned toward me. “Well now, Miss Duvall, you did promise honesty in all matters. I eagerly await your assessment.” Now he looked amused. His lips curled into a wicked smile. Apparently no one had openly discussed the fact that she simply wasn’t a singer, but that shouldn’t surprise me. It was the Gresham way of doing things—every unpleasant thing was either ignored or paid out of existence.
“Well?”
I looked away, my instincts at odds with each other. I had promised this family my forthrightness, yet I felt the dire need to tread carefully and protect my new position. I took a breath and settled on another virtue in which I prided myself—thoroughness. One never pronounced a judgment before performing an examination. I turned to the patient. “Open, please.” That should buy me a few moments to think, anyway.
She cleared her throat and opened her mouth. I pulled a small mirrored instrument from my bag and held a light up to it, peering into her throat. Then I massaged the outside. There didn’t seem to be polyps, or anything truly preventing a prime vocal range. Not every throat, it would seem, was meant to create music. With Stepmother’s warning weaving through my thoughts, I pondered and smoothed out every word before releasing it. “It appears the larynx has become inflamed, possibly from strain, which might cause it to tighten around the vocal cords, minimizing its ability to project. With the natural thickening of the vocal flap that comes with maturation—”
“Miss Duvall, are you calling me old?” Her stare held. “I’m not asking you to prepare me for a London stage—merely a few parlors among our acquaintances. Surely I’m capable of that much.” She turned her unblinking gaze on me, daring me to contradict her.
I opened my cotton-dry mouth and closed it again. There was simply no way to be both honest and diplomatic in this moment.
Her eyes glinted like sun against gunmetal. “You cannot expect to be impressed when I haven’t a proper warm-up or accompaniment.”
Yes, a piano would drown out her voice a bit. “I suppose I ought to hear an official rehearsal then.” I forced a smile, to which she offered only a deepened glare.
I released my breath. I was staying—for the moment, at least.
“Right, then.” Burke’s voice was jarring. “I’ll leave you to settle in to your new position, and I’ll send the porter after your trunks. I assume they’re still in the drive?”
I nodded numbly, and the wretched man bowed and slipped out, closing me into this opulent old chamber with its owner.
So this is what my grand dreams had come to. I had wrested my fate from the hands of no less than four men—five, counting Father—and spent years studying medicine, all so that I could squeeze talent out of this woman like water from a rock and be her glorified pillow when she fainted. Simply lovely.
I looked up and she was still studying me. “Miss Duvall, there is one other reason I’ve asked you here.”
“Oh?” My heart ricocheted. This could be a good turn, one that made everything fall into a sensible order, or it could be bad. Quite bad.
“I assume you are able to remain discreet.”
“Of course.”
She looked away. “I’ve brought you here for my protection. You see, they are trying to be rid of me.”
My jaw went slack. My utter astonishment was now complete. Experienced as I was, this position was completely out of the scope of my abilities in so many ways.
I stepped carefully out onto the proffered limb. “And who might wish to harm you?”
She frowned, gaze narrowing on me. “You think me paranoid.”
“It’s possible that you have imagined—”
Her delicate nostrils flared, eyes shooting a warning. “I don’t care for you, Miss Duvall.” The quietly arresting statement, hardly audible, stabbed me. Yet I had spoken the truth, and I could not regret that.
“Please understand, Mrs. Gresham, it is certainly not a reflection of you or your sterling character, nor of your intelligence.”
“Your attempts at flattery fall flat.”
My heart began to wither as I gathered the direction this particular assignment was heading, but I forced poise into my spine. “I shall work to improve your opinion of me.”
“Don’t.” She eyed me with open contempt. “It’ll only tire you. Simply prepare yourself to stand between me and those who have decided my existence is hindering what they want.”
I glanced at my medical bag still slouched by the door where I’d left it as the waters of doubt rose higher. “Why hire a nurse? I’m not a guardian.”
“My death is not what they’re after, Miss Duvall. At least, not my physical death. Come, sit.”
I did. “Perhaps I’m not the most—”
A scrape and a thump sounded below, drawing our gazes to the weakly glowing hearth. A hard look silenced me, then she pointed one slender finger at the fireplace.
“She’s up to something, you can be sure of that.” It was the voice of Burke Gresham, climbing up the chimney from some distant room below. “She’s never allowed a nurse to attend her before, much less requested one, and I’ve half a mind to force the issue and find out her plan before she gains the upper hand.”
Celeste’s tight voice sounded next. “And how will you manage that, Burke? No sanatorium will take her based on her exaggerated swooning spells and fictitious complaints.”
My throat cinched. I’d been inside such places, and a few moments as a visitor was suffocating. Years as a patient would be unbearable. As much as I despised all institutions, none were worse than asylums.
“She’s mad, Cec. I’m telling you, she needs to be sent away, and the business left to me. One wild decision from her could sink us. Foolish woman, always scheming.”
Yet not deserving of inhumane captivity. Animals were treated better than residents in those clammy places that echoed with wild cries. I couldn’t let this happen. Where was Gabe? He would set this to rights, but he was conspicuously missing from the gathering of Gresham siblings below.
“You know Father would never commit her, and Dr. Tillman has already refused to recommend her. How ever would you . . .”
More shuffling. “There is a way. We could be done with her before Father even returns from London, but it has to be handled right.”
“But now that a nurse is here—”
“That won’t last. You know that. She’ll make her miserable and that poor woman will be gone before two shakes. Then our way will be clear.”
“How will you convince anyone she’s mad? Do you truly believe it yourself?”
Footsteps sounded and the voices faded as they moved away. “Do you know anyone else like her? It’s unnatural. Suppose she happened to make a . . .”
Then the voices were gone.
My patient lifted a demur smile in the shadows. “And there you have it, my loving family.” She sipped her tea and returned it with a gentle clink to the saucer. “Do you still think me paranoid?”
“You don’t belong in an asylum, I know that much.” Another thing I knew—my position was a dangerous one, a tenuous tug-of-war between my patient and her grown children, a delicate balance of remaining in this woman’s good graces and theirs.
And me, with more truth than sense.
“I’m delighted you think so. Now you must, as a certified nurse, convince everyone else of that. They cannot send me away if you declare me fit.”
“I’ll say what’s true.” It was the only promise I could make, and I desperately hoped it was enough. Her silence stifled my confidence, stabbing it with memories of Mother’s precious life slipping through my hands so long ago. The harder I had clung, the more she wilted. Then she was gone, even while I held her tight in my childish arms.
That familiar panic swirled up in me now.
My patient looked out the window as she sipped her tea, unmoved by the lightning cutting through the dull gray sky. Low rumbles followed. “It seems a storm is approaching.” Another cube of sugar, then a stir. “I do hope you are prepared.”
I wasn’t.
Several silent moments passed, then Golda turned back to me, summing me up again. “Why is it you’ve never married, Miss Duvall? Have you found no respectable man willing to take you on?”
This again. Always this. “I’ve not found a man I wish to take on. I’ve great plans for my future, and much I want to accomplish. There isn’t a single man of my acquaintance who might do anything but hinder those plans.”
She leaned back in her Queen Anne chair, looking past me with a vague smile. “Well now, there’s Gabe.”
Gabe? Sometimes it seemed the world had a binary vision—they saw people in pairs and felt compelled to match everyone who wasn’t wed. It had been this way when we’d last parted—I’d suggested Gabe and I write letters, and somehow that meant I was proposing marriage. My face burned at the way that had left our once-dear friendship. Was the entire world given to playing cupid and pairing people at random? Quiet and brotherly Gabe was no love match, and all we had in common was our unmarried state. Apparently, that was enough. “I beg your pardon, but there couldn’t be a more ill-fitting match.” I stood, flustered, and began pouring tea just to give my hands something to do.
Golda’s eyes flashed a venomous shade of green and blue. Her body stiffened, displeasure radiating from her white face. My breath strangled me as footsteps thudded on the rug. I looked up as a tall, distinguished man strode into the room, followed by the faint scent of cinnamon.
My breath caught. I was dizzy. Suddenly tea was spilling everywhere, warming the front of my dress and splashing onto my shoes. I sprang back and righted the pot. There’s Gabe, she had said, and she’d quite literally meant, There is Gabe. For there he was, nicely filling out his trim suit, wild curls slicked into wavy submission, warm gentleness radiating from his face.