A Fallen Lady

by Elizabeth Kingston

  Her nightmares increased. They came almost every night now, after she had become accustomed to their fading. They had never left her but now they were more vivid, and different. Stephen was in them.

  She would dream she was walking with him, waiting for a kiss she knew would come when suddenly Katie was there in the road. She looked at Helen and beckoned her away, into a stand of trees at the side of the busy thoroughfare. Helen followed, though she knew Stephen didn't want her to. He yelled at her, shouting that she could not leave him. But she did, turning her back on him and following Katie to the trees where Henley waited. She felt Stephen watch as Henley greeted her, held her in his arms and gave her the kiss that should have been from Stephen.

  She opened her eyes, thinking they had played a trick and switched places with each other. But they hadn't. It was Henley who had kissed her so sweetly. Stephen stood watching as Henley took her down on the ground and she screamed. She saw blood wash over Stephen's shoes as he watched, holding Katie, her little face buried in the warm curve of his neck. Helen fought in the dream as she had not in life, but Henley was too strong. No matter how much she screamed and begged, he would not let her up and Stephen would not help. He only watched, his face white as chalk as he tried, and failed, to protect Katie's little back.

  When it was over, Henley lying dead on top of her, a knife inexplicably in his throat. Stephen looked at her accusingly. You wouldn't let me stop him, he said.

  That was when she woke, the pillow beneath her cheek sodden with tears.

  "My wife is convinced you despise her," said Whitemarsh as he shuffled the papers on the desk. "Can't convince her that Helen has a mind of her own and would do as she pleased no matter what was said."

  Stephen barely glanced up from the accounts he was examining. "Bring her for dinner tonight. I'll be at my most charming."

  It would be a pleasant ending to their business. The shipping venture was on its way to solvency, and there was no reason to meet with Whitemarsh so often to discuss it. He supposed they could see each other socially, if Stephen ever bothered to go into society again. But he was done with it, once and for all – done with the whispers and lies that had so shaped him that he was unaware of the danger in concealment. A poisonous atmosphere, was the London he inhabited. He had always known it, but had not realized how it had made him like all those he hated until it lost him his wife.

  "I don't know that I want your charm released in the same room with my wife," replied Whitemarsh. "She's feeling sorry for you and I'm not entirely forgiven. Dangerous combination."

  Stephen turned the page of the ledger book, afraid to look up and see Alex's half-smile, so like Helen's.

  "She won't come back to me." He said it as if it were written on the page before him. "Will she?"

  Alex shifted uncomfortably in his chair. They had not spoken of it, except briefly at Chisholm's estate, and then only long enough for Stephen to tell a weeping Elizabeth that Helen had indeed left him. He didn't want to speak of it, but somehow words were leaking out of him. Like a brick stolen from a dam, the hole in his vaunted discretion grew, sending a web of cracks throughout the structure, words and thoughts seeping through until one day there would be a deluge.

  "Will you be coming to Everley's ball tomorrow night?" asked Alex, instead of answering him. "You can ask Elizabeth to dance, that should take care of it."

  "At the risk of sounding unchivalrous, I'm more concerned about my wife than yours." He heard the drip of his words trickling out, impossible to stop.

  "Then stop drinking yourself into a stupor and do something about it," Alex snapped, referring to the state he'd found him in last week. Stephen felt he could hardly be faulted for that little scene. He had just learned his wife did not object to divorce.

  He rolled his eyes. "A man takes too much brandy once and is called a drunkard forevermore."

  Alex stood. "It was before lunch," he pointed out. Well yes, it was an admittedly unprecedented bit of debauchery, but he did not say so. "And how the hell should I know if she will come back to you? She didn't come back to me, and you told me yourself it was because I made it easy for her to stay away."

  Stephen felt the anger rise to the surface, just under his skin. "You compare your situation to mine?" he asked carefully.

  "How can I, when I barely know what your situation is?"

  That was fair enough. Stephen barely knew it himself. It was not the same. Her brother had not believed her, but Stephen had done nothing but believe in her. And still he lost her. And she wanted to be lost, as her willingness to divorce indicated.

  "Look here," said Alex firmly, clearly in preparation of an exit. "Here's what I know about Helen. She has a wild imagination. She can take care of herself, even when maybe she should let someone else. And I know firsthand that she's the forgiving type." His mouth twisted, clamping shut against whatever else he might have said about forgiveness. "But give her enough time and space and she'll lock herself away. She's always been that way."

  He picked up his papers and moved toward the door, where he turned back to Stephen. "If you go to her, you might have a chance, that's all I know. Can't you bother to try?"

  Stephen saw his hands held out to her, following her across the floor as she moved away. It didn't matter how much he reached out, how far he extended himself. She only put her hands in his when she was ready to.

  "I did try," he answered. "I tried from the moment I met her until the moment she walked out the door."

  "Then try again." Alex opened the door. "One more thing I know about her, Summerdale: she's worth it."

  Marie-Anne sat across from him in the back parlor. She was quite put out.

  "But why would she go to Emily and not me?" She gave Stephen an arch look. "I don't believe she's left you. She has given herself to you completely. There must be more to it than you tell me."

  No point in arguing. She had given herself completely, for a time, and he had gathered her joy to him, her release and sweet openness. But it was over now; she'd already made up her mind. His teacup clattered on the saucer.

  "Eventually, she will go back to Bartle," he said, because he knew she would. "And you can hear about it from her." He lifted his mouth in a wry smile. "Tell her about the day I first came, that I pulled the shoe off my horse as an excuse to stop at your door."

  "Why would I tell her that?"

  "Because it's the only other thing I can think of that I kept from her. It's the last thing she can use to accuse me of being false."

  "Le diable," Marie-Anne snorted. She folded her arms across her chest and gave him a critical look. "I told you not to hurt her. I told you she has suffered enough."

  He fought the urge to whine like a wronged child, that he had never meant to hurt her. "I cannot hurt her anymore," he said instead.

  "Perhaps you should," Marie-Anne said thoughtfully. "Maggie would know this with certainty, but I am unsure."

  He pushed the tea away abruptly. "I am sick of cryptic comments, madame. It is done. Will you stay to dinner?" He hoped she wouldn't. He could hear Helen in her laughter.

  "Will you go to her?"

  It angered him that she would not let it drop.

  "Must I always go to her on my knees?" He didn't want to say it, but there it was. No way to seal the leak in the dam.

  "But of course you must!" She smiled broadly, as though she had uncovered a delightful answer. "It is love, non? Je t'ai parlé de l'amour," she said, inexplicably slipping into French. "De la guerre."

  "So you did," he answered impatiently. "I don't care to speak of love and war now, if you please, nor of my wife." The words pushed through his teeth. "If she continues to be my wife, that is."

  Marie-Anne stood and came to him, putting a hand on his arm.

  "It is the answer, Maggie would say. Who knows better than Hélène that love is the more destructive thing?"

  He would not stand here and listen to the second-hand wisdom of an Irish maid. He knew what Helen was afraid of,
and it made no difference whether those fears were real or imagined. He looked at her friend's delicate features as they softened to see the emotion he could not hide. It was over, and he was a fraud fighting tears. There was no power left in his words, no way to bring her back.

  "I know it," he answered her. "She taught me all about it."

  Chapter 19

  Helen couldn't seem to hit the target. In truth, she barely tried. She listlessly shot arrows, one after the other, taking comfort in the monotony of motion. Her aim had become formidable because she'd always imagined Henley as the target, taken a vicious joy in sending arrows through his imagined body. But now she could not focus on her hatred when she thought so continuously of Stephen, and the arrows flew wide.

  She went to retrieve them from where they had fallen behind the tree. Emily had been with her earlier, sketching the summer flowers, but had gone inside when she saw how unsociable Helen was today. It was better to be alone. It was no easier to forget, but there was no need to act normal as she tried to tear the love out of her heart. Tried and failed, over and over again.

  She brought the arrows back and shot again at the target, missing eleven in quick succession. The warmth of the day suddenly reached her as she notched the last arrow, the sun warming the chill that had permanently set in. She knew, without turning around to look, that Stephen was there. She closed her eyes. Of course he would come to her. He always came to her.

  The arrow was loosed, and she opened her eyes, amazed at the sound of it hitting the target.

  Lowering the bow, she turned and saw him where she'd known he would be sitting on the garden bench. But he had no charming grin for her, as she'd expected, no easy manner that soothed the moment. He only sat, looking at her, with an expression like the one he wore as his mother hurled abuse at him.

  "Your aim is not what it used to be."

  "No." She tried to mimic his flippant tone. "I'm thinking of taking up another sport."

  Something flickered in the green eyes. "Marry someone and rip his heart to shreds," he suggested. "It's all the rage." He jerked his head minutely, as though he could catch back the words.

  She absorbed that cut, letting it go deep. But still it didn't stop the flow of tenderness that leaked from her, that clutched at her chest and smarted behind her eyes. Knowing it was dangerous, knowing it could topple the fortress of numbness she had carefully erected in the weeks of silence, she walked slowly to the bench and sat next to him. They looked out at the bright flowers together.

  He made no move to come closer, his features set in a careful mask. I am here, that look said. And this is as far as I will come. She pulled the gloves from her hands.

  "You've come to discuss divorce," she said. She stared at the gloves, lying like dead things in her hands.

  "Have I?" He sounded curious. "I was wondering why I came."

  "You told me the kind of marriage you wanted, and it did not include separation." There was no controlling the waver in her voice. "You'll be free to have someone else."

  "I also told you that I wanted you," he said, his eyes still staring straight ahead. "Only you, and only because you're you. How will you twist that into something sinister, I wonder?"

  She bit her lips hard. "I never understood it, Stephen." Could he ever know what it meant to be trapped inside this body, imprisoned in this mind that could not forget? "I never did. I never understood why."

  He closed his eyes and leaned his head back to let the sun fall on his face. His handsome face, the shape of it that she knew so well, that defined the boundaries of her heart. "Because your real beauty is hidden to all but me," he offered. "Because I thought I knew what honor was until I met you. Because your hair came free and lay against your neck, where I wanted to be."

  She stared at the distant target. Oh, don't listen to pretty words.

  "Do you love her the same way?" she asked, wanting the torture of his answer.

  "I loved her," he said. At least he did not try to deny it, and the pain came to her. "A part of me will always love her, because she was the only one who..." He shook his head. "She taught me, before you, taught me to open my heart. I would not know how to do so, otherwise. But she's nothing to you."

  "Then why?" she choked out. "Why did you hide so much from me?"

  His face lost its soft expression, his eyes opening to stare at the sky. "I could ask the same thing of you."

  She was not quick like him: it took her a long time to put meaning to his words, to realize he meant that she had hidden the truth about what had happened to her. He'd only found out because he stumbled into the room as she railed against Henley. She stiffened.

  "It's not the same thing." It came out with uncommon force, and his head turned around to her at last. "It's not. Don't look at me like you know, because you don't. It's the one thing you can't ever know, no matter how much you know about everything else in the world." She stood. "Shall I tell you what it was like?"

  "No," he said. Immediately, harshly.

  "I'll tell you. You never asked for details and I loved you for it. But I'll tell you now," she said, suddenly determined that he should hear. Her anger was surprising – a thing she had hidden from herself. He never had to live with it as she did. Always pressing for the truth. Let him have it, then.

  "It's simple. I've told myself how simple it was. He killed them and I saw it. Only by mischance or I would never have known, and I ran back to the house. Maggie was just a chambermaid, but she was steady and so kind that I told her everything. She found Katie, and her family took her in. Then I went the next day early in the morning, back to that place in the little wood."

  Her breath came fast but there was not the pressure on her lungs, the force that stole her words. It had disappeared somewhere along the way. She looked at her husband, refusing to be moved by the look of pain on his face, the denial. It was the only real thing left unsaid between them.

  "I loved him. I still loved him, even though I saw him kill them. Do you understand? Because I made excuses for his behavior, because I could not bear to believe the worst of him. But I went to see if I could find anything that her family had left behind, and I found it. An apron and some ribbons and a shaving kit. It – saved my life." She let out a laugh, so close to a sob that she thought she might not be able to continue.

  This was the hard part. If she could say this part then it would be over. She dimly remembered trying to tell it to Alex, and how tumbled all the words had been, how she had cringed and cowered from it. Better to say it quick and cruel. "And he followed me and told me I had to stay. And he – kissed me." The familiar nausea came, filling her mouth and twisting her face. It would always come, for the rest of her life, she knew. She let him see it, as she had never let anyone see. "And I should have fought but I was s-so stupid and afraid, and he had me on the g-ground."

  "Stop it," said Stephen urgently, rising from the bench to cross to her. But she stopped him, backing away and raising her hands.

  "No, you will hear it!" She drew in a hiccoughing breath as he stopped. She was determined she would not weep. "And I n-never wanted to see blood again, but then he was in me and it – hurt. He was in me and–" She stopped herself re-imagining it and remembered instead the thing that haunted her even more. The thing lived in her, as it lived in him and everyone, only waiting to come out. The thing that was greedy for blood. "I reached over and the razor was there so I – I put it on his throat and told him to get out of me." She was going mad. She could feel it as she put her hands to her hair and shook her head violently. "I told him to get out."

  Her voice had risen and now it left a ringing silence. She gave into the weakness in her knees, dropping down hard on the grass and watching her skirt billow up around her. Leaf green silk all around her.

  "But he won't get out," she said, feeling the numbness envelop her again, and happy for it. "It's too much a part of me. Not even you can change that. You try to make it better, and it brought him back." She looked at him where he knelt
before her now, his knees pressed against her skirt. "You brought him back, and the blood. And now you're part of the nightmares."

  She crossed her arms across her belly tightly, wanting to rock back and forth like a child. "He ruined me. You can't know how he's ruined me."

  He didn't move to touch her. He knew her that well. She had let him know her so well. But oh, god – what did she not know of him? Would it ever be enough?

  "Will you let him have you?" Stephen demanded, the harsh edge of his voice cutting into her. "I can't change it. But you let it take you away from me. You make me a part of your nightmares, when all I want to do is hold you when you're afraid."

  "I'm afraid all the time." A sob escaped, try as she might to contain it. "Everyone who knows thinks I'm so brave. But I'm terrified, all the time."

  He reached his hand up to her face as if he wanted to brush the tears away, but stopped short, letting his hand fall. "He can't hurt you again. Except in this way, and only if you let him."

  "I know," she admitted, hearing Maggie's voice telling her the same thing. But that wasn't all there was to fear. Oh, the thousand terrible things you might be, my love. You could hurt me worse than him. "You brought him back." How it hurt her, to know Stephen had brought him back. "Why did you bring him back to me?"

  "I'm sorry," he said, the words hard and hollow. He looked defeated, there on his knees before her. "I can't tell you how sorry. I didn't know. I never thought he would come." He let out a despairing laugh. "You'll say I should have guessed. And I should have. Always priding myself on knowing the truth and predicting the future," he spat bitterly. "Spending my life on the edges of other people's worlds. They never let me in, except for a moment, to let me run in and steal the secret."

  He caught a fold of her dress in his hand, rubbing the silk between his fingers. "Then I met you. And you made me a part of your world. I misjudged you over and over again." His mouth set in its moody curve. "I'm no good at it. I'm not what I thought I was. I'm only good at being in love with you."