The Lost History of Dreams

by Kris Waldherr

  Robert gave a start. “How did you know?”

  “People chatter. You’re Hugh de Bonne’s relation.”

  “Robert Highstead at your service, madam. And you are?”

  She must not have heard his question, for she remained silent as she removed her bonnet and veil. Once they were placed on her mantel, she asked, “The disturbance was over Hugh’s funeral?”

  “Among other things. How did you know?”

  “It’s not surprising.” She peeled off a pair of black silk gloves, revealing a black jet ring beside a gold band on liver-spotted hands. “Everyone feels strongly about Hugh de Bonne, especially now that word has escaped of his passing.”

  The low upholstered chair Robert settled in offered a full view of her sitting room, of which one wall was covered in floor-to-ceiling shelves. Half of the shelves contained books, their titles indistinct in the shadows. An array of framed art and daguerreotypes filled the remainder, each decorated with black crape bows.

  “Mr. Highstead, do you take lemon or milk in your tea? Lemons are a luxury this time of year, but I insist on them for health.”

  “Milk, please.” Robert looked up at her. “Whom do I have the pleasure of attending?”

  She turned in marked dismissal. After two attempts to obtain her name, it would be rude to press further; he’d have to think of her as the mourning woman.

  “Milk with the tea, Marcus!” She rang a small brass bell. To Robert: “Marcus will drive you home when we’re finished. He’s my only servant, but he’s loyal. He’s been with me since my husband passed five years ago.”

  A distinct sense of unease crept along Robert’s spine. After five years, she should be wearing half-mourning if that. No matter. He’d drink the tea and accept her carriage. He had no other choice.

  He pointed to the crape bows. “My condolences for your loss.”

  “They’re not for my husband.” She bit her lip and looked away. “My loss is your loss.”

  “How so?” Robert’s neck prickled.

  “Are you not cousin to Hugh de Bonne?”

  God help him, she was in mourning for Hugh. “You’re a pilgrim.”

  She arched a brow. “No, Mr. Highstead, I’m not a Seeker of the Lost Dream or whatever nonsense they’re calling themselves these days. Though I’m more acquainted with them than I would wish.” She glanced down the hallway toward where Marcus had yet to appear. “Tamsin Douglas can be quite formidable.”

  “Tamsin Douglas?”

  “The lady who accosted Miss Lowell, if I am to trust the commotion I overheard.”

  “The woman with the red hair? She seemed disturbed of mind.” Robert wouldn’t mince words. After her display at the church, his earlier sympathy had soured into wariness.

  “I don’t know if Mrs. Douglas is disturbed as much as she’s grief-mad,” his hostess opined. “Her son was stillborn, just as Hugh’s daughter had been. And then her husband died unexpectedly—they’d been exceptionally devoted to each other. She’d equated her loss with Hugh’s, but many do after reading The Lost History of Dreams. Now that she’s learned of Hugh’s death . . .” She gave a little shrug. “It is unfortunate Mrs. Douglas’s grief fuels vulgar displays rather than charitable acts. The irony is Miss Lowell once considered her a friend—yes, I know, ’ tis unexpected. They’d had a falling out three years ago over Ada’s chapel.”

  “You witnessed this?”

  “Not personally.” She flushed. “Again, people chatter. They’re like those doves around Ada’s Folly, billing and cooing to no effect.” The mourning woman sank into the chair beside his. “Anyway, ’ tis for the best you’re here. I’m so very, very pleased to make your acquaintance at last. We’ll have tea and a chat, and I’ll return you to Weald House in time for dinner.” She pointed to a hassock upon which someone, presumably herself, had needlepointed the words Hope, Love, Faith in purples and greys. “Pray rest your ankle, Mr. Highstead. I’m amazed you were able to carry Miss Lowell considering your injury. From what I could see, you appeared quite heroic.”

  “I suppose it was the shock of the situation.” He hadn’t even noticed the pain at the time. “You’re acquainted with Miss Lowell?”

  “When she was a child.” She set a pair of half-moon spectacles on her nose. “Ah, now I can see you properly! Hugh de Bonne was your uncle?”

  “No, cousin through marriage.”

  “Then Miss Lowell is your cousin as well.”

  “I suppose a distant one.”

  Her eyes filled behind the thick lenses. “Even if you share no blood, you truly are the image of Hugh when he courted Ada. Oh, I know your hair is far lighter, and your chin sharper. But you’ve longish hair parted on the side like his, a similar height. A similar sensitivity. Between your limp and that scar, the clothing—I recognize Hugh’s waistcoat, yes?—the effect is quite transporting.”

  Her rhapsodies were interrupted when the aforementioned Marcus finally shuffled in bearing a teapot on a long tray accompanied by a tall glass bottle, half a seed cake, and other implements of hospitality. His face was far more wrinkled than the mourning woman’s, but his frock coat was of the latest cut from London and sewn of bright green velvet. Expensive. Robert had recently daguerreotyped someone in Mayfair wearing a similar garment; afterward the man’s sons had squabbled over who should inherit it.

  The mourning woman gestured toward the bottle once Marcus left the room. “Have some elderberry cordial, Mr. Highstead. It’s medicinal. You need it after the shock you just received.”

  Robert relaxed. This was a reaction he could understand. “You’re very kind, madam. Tea is sufficient.”

  “Cake?” Before Robert could demur, she’d cut a large slab and set it on a plate. “You really should try the cordial—I brought it with me from Geneva.”

  “It’s not necessary, madam.”

  The mourning woman adjusted her spectacles before pulling her chair closer to Robert. Her bombazine gown smelled as fusty as it looked; the grain of the fabric shimmered like water.

  “That is so interesting about your relation to Miss Lowell,” she said. “Did you know her before Ada and Hugh wed?”

  Robert stirred sugar in his tea. “I only met her for the first time this past week.”

  “You knew her parents?”

  He set his spoon down. “No.”

  “Then you had no knowledge of Isabelle Lowell’s person until this past week. Never interacted with anyone who’d met her.”

  “This is correct. My brother sent me to Weald House to inform Miss Lowell of her uncle’s death. Until then, I was unaware of her relation. However, I was unaware of Hugh as well.” In an attempt to swerve the conversation from the personal to the universal, he added, “I must admit I am still dumbfounded by what occurred at the church. Wouldn’t you agree?”

  “Yes, it was quite loud even in the graveyard. Very disturbing . . .”

  Her papery lips spread into a smile, baring yellowed teeth.

  The clock ticked. Robert stared down at his tea.

  The mourning woman broke the silence. “One might say your visit is most fortuitous, Mr. Highstead.”

  Robert looked up. “Fortuitous?”

  “Very.” She flicked cake crumbs from her sleeve. “You see, there’s a matter you may be able to assist with. It’s a small matter . . .”

  “How small?”

  A girlish giggle. “Very small indeed. Regardless, it’s a matter that has troubled me even before Hugh’s passing.” She made the sign of the cross. “A matter that has led me to return to England for the first time since my marriage fifteen years ago.”

  Robert said impatiently, “I suspect you’re about to tell me your small matter has to do with what occurred at church with the Seekers of the Lost Dream.”

  “Not directly.” Her teacup clattered against the saucer. “What I want to say is difficult. First off, I have no doubt that Miss Lowell is a good woman—everyone agrees she saved Weald House from ruin after Mr. de Bonne’s
disappearance. I also have no doubt she holds Ada de Bonne in the highest esteem. But . . .”

  The mourning woman’s lips pursed as though she couldn’t bring herself to say what she’d intended.

  “But what?” Gooseflesh crept along his arms.

  “It troubles me to admit this, but . . .”

  There was that troubling word but again.

  “Just say it, madam,” Marcus called from the next room. “No need to be so delicate.”

  “Very well then.” The mourning woman met Robert’s eyes at last. “Mr. Highstead, Miss Lowell may not be whom she claims.”

  IV.

  “I don’t understand,” Robert said, slumping back in his chair. He pointed toward the cordial, no longer shy.

  “She’s not who she claims to be,” the mourning woman reiterated, pouring the liquor into a tall thin glass. “Just as I said.”

  “You mean she’s a fraud,” Robert replied after he’d taken a healthy slug; he welcomed the burn as the alcohol snaked down his throat.

  “Those are hard words, Mr. Highstead,” she replied; her dark brown eyes were enormous behind her spectacles. “But yes, that’s what some claim.”

  “Who claims?”

  “The Seekers of the Lost Dream. Especially Mrs. Douglas. Now that Mr. de Bonne has passed”—again, she made the sign of the cross—“she’s demanding access to Ada’s Folly to make certain he’s buried beside Ada. Of course, she’s also eager to view the chapel, like everyone else. She wants to ‘break the glass, but not to plunder’ and all that.”

  Robert waved the fragments of poetry away. “Mrs. Douglas has no legal authority.” Though he desired the same fate for Hugh’s remains, he felt obliged to disagree.

  “She claims she does, Mr. Highstead. And she’s engaged a solicitor to prove Miss Lowell is an imposter.” Whether it was the alcohol she’d imbibed or relief from no longer avoiding a difficult subject, her words arrived tripping on the heels of each other. “Tamsin Douglas and her ilk claim Ada’s Folly is a property of artistic importance, like Lord Byron’s Newstead Abbey. They think it’s a crime for Miss Lowell to refuse them access, that she’s selfish and obstinate.”

  Robert couldn’t argue with their assessment of Isabelle’s character. Yet he felt oddly protective of her.

  The mourning woman continued. “Three years ago Tamsin Douglas tried to purchase Ada’s Folly, offering an absurd amount of money to entice Miss Lowell. Miss Lowell refused, using Hugh’s disappearance as an excuse.”

  “But wouldn’t this prove Miss Lowell to be as she claims? An imposter would have accepted the money and left, don’t you think?”

  She pursed her lips. “It matters not. It ended badly.”

  “Frankly, it’s hard to imagine them friends in the first place.”

  “I suppose to you.” The mourning woman leaned in, her eyes bright behind her spectacles. “It’s a well-known tale among the pilgrims, Mr. Highstead. Mrs. Douglas was the widow of Hugh’s editor. She assisted Miss Lowell in the aftermath of Hugh’s disappearance—Miss Lowell ended up responsible for more than just Weald House. Initially Miss Lowell was sympathetic to Mrs. Douglas’s losses—who wouldn’t be?—but soon comprehended that Mrs. Douglas valued Hugh’s poetry and the key to the glass chapel more than their friendship.” She shook her head. “But now that Hugh’s dead and Miss Lowell’s his heir . . .”

  “Hence the unpleasantness this morning.” Robert rubbed his brow. “But how exactly does any of this make Miss Lowell suspect as an imposter?”

  “No one can vouch that Miss Lowell—this Miss Lowell—is the one who grew up with Ada de Bonne at Weald House. You see, until the night Isabelle showed at Weald House over a decade ago, no one there had ever seen her before.”

  The mourning woman paused to pour herself another cup of tea with a hefty dose of cordial for good measure. “It’s a peculiar story I am about to tell you. If I hadn’t heard it with my own ears from those who witnessed it, I’d believe someone made it up.”

  The remainder of the tea passed in such strange conversation that Robert was later to speculate whether he’d dreamt it.

  “It was late November 1838,” the mourning woman began. “Just after the first snow. Soon after Hugh’s disappearance upon completing the glass chapel for Ada. That night Mrs. Chilvers discovered a young woman nearly frozen to death in Ada’s rose garden. You should have seen her, all skin and bones, along with that shocking white hair! She even had lice and sores from malnourishment. Mrs. Chilvers saved the creature, of course—she’d have died otherwise. Once she was able to speak, she told Mrs. Chilvers she was barely twenty, that she’d traveled all the way from France to speak to Hugh about an important matter.

  “And then she said the inconceivable: ‘I am Isabelle Lowell.’

  “Mrs. Chilvers didn’t know her; the housekeeper had only inhabited Weald House after Ada’s marriage. The other servants didn’t believe her. Isabelle had been a favorite of Ada’s, but no one had seen her in years because she’d been sent to school. Most assumed she’d gone into service since she was an orphan.

  “The servants wanted to turn her out once she’d recovered. ‘How do you know she’s really Isabelle Lowell? She’s probably an unfortunate seeking to swindle us.’ Even then there was so much ado about Hugh’s poetry, though they didn’t call them pilgrims then—they just called them mad. Mrs. Chilvers argued it went against Christian principles to refuse her shelter. ‘Let her stay until Mr. de Bonne returns—he’s sure to show eventually since this is his house. If she is whom she claims to be, he’ll know her.’ But . . . But—”

  The mourning woman pressed her lips tight as a seam.

  “But Hugh de Bonne never returned to Weald House,” Robert finished, steepling his fingers before his face in an attempt to affect a detachment he didn’t feel.

  The mourning woman nodded, her eyes glistening. “Once Miss Lowell recovered, she just took over Weald House, though no one recalled her. You see, Mrs. Chilvers wasn’t the only one not to know Miss Lowell. Nor did anyone else in the village. Not the doctor. Not the grocer. No one.” She shook her head. “I recall encountering Isabelle as a girl once or twice during holidays, but she didn’t make much of an impression—she was a shy, fey child. I suppose there’s some resemblance between her and Ada, but it’s been so long and my eyesight is weak even with spectacles.”

  “I’d been a historian,” Robert said, waving away her offer of a second slice of cake. “Questions of identity can often be resolved through a record search. Birth certificates, church records. School rosters. Primary sources.”

  “I haven’t been able to find any thus far, Mr. Highstead. Perhaps the new solicitor I’ve hired will have better fortune.”

  “What of extended family? They could vouch for her.”

  She shook her head. “The Lowells died out after the war—all were farming folk save for Lucian, Ada’s father. Nor could anyone find relations of Mr. de Bonne.” She locked eyes with Robert. “That’s why I was so surprised to learn you were his cousin—I’d truly considered Miss Lowell Hugh’s last kin. I’d hoped you could offer resolution. This seems not to be.” She shook her head. “It’s as if Isabelle Lowell never existed save through thrice-told stories and hearsay.”

  Robert could bear no more; he felt as though he were suffocating beneath the weight of the past. Tamsin Douglas had sought to exploit Isabelle for her own interests. Isabelle wasn’t whom she claimed to be—this explained much of her animosity. Yet he found himself disappointed, though he couldn’t explain why. Why should he care? Isabelle had been nothing but repellent during his stay at Weald House. The compassion he’d felt at church was a reflection of the moment. Nothing else.

  He pointed to the mantel clock. “I’m expected at Weald House. I appreciate your hospitality.”

  “I’ll have Marcus ready the carriage.” The mourning woman offered a knobby hand to Robert. He had the sense she expected him to kiss it in the continental fashion while she assisted him to his fee
t. He didn’t.

  Once he was securely upright, he asked, “Why does Isabelle Lowell’s identity matter so much to you?”

  “Because, Mr. Highstead, I knew Hugh de Bonne. I have an obligation to make sure his legacy is secured. I knew him during his time in Europe even before his first book was published. I cared for him in my way. Not as Ada did, but as one grateful for his art. It was a privilege. I’d been a patron of his even before he wrote The Lost History of Dreams. That poem, ‘The Raven and the Rose’—I cannot tell you how it comforted me during my bleakest moments.” The mourning woman drew a gold frame from a shelf. “Here, I have something precious to show you. Something no one else has seen.”

  She offered Robert the gold frame as though it were a relic. It contained a greying auburn plait of hair encased in a tiny glass compartment below a daguerreotype—he sold similar frames in his Catalogue of Possibilities. Once the daguerreotype was in Robert’s hands, he recognized Hugh’s features on the murky silvered plate, but something was off.

  Hugh was dead. A corpse.

  Robert’s tea curdled in his stomach. How different this was from when he’d encountered Hugh’s remains in his childhood home. Though he’d taken hundreds of post-mortem daguerreotypes in the past three years, this was the first time he’d viewed someone related to himself in one. He’d only been on the other side of the camera. The observer, not the mourner.

  Robert stifled these thoughts, scanning the daguerreotype for some clue to the man his cousin had been. Was Hugh the homeless romantic described in Isabelle’s story? Or the saint of poetry and lost love venerated by the Seekers of the Lost Dream? The daguerreotype revealed little: Hugh looked like many of the other corpses Robert had encountered during his employment. His cousin sat in an armchair with a book in his hands, his eyelids shut. Most likely the daguerreotypist had arrived too late to pry the eyes open before rigor mortis set in, but Robert had never shied from such manipulations.