“I never said that!” Caroline protested, feeling more frustrated than ever. Here she was, getting tangled up in the other Caroline’s life, which was apparently a mess, and it was keeping her from getting her own life back on track and getting home to her own universe.
“You didn’t need to say it—every day and in every way it was implied,” Richard informed her stiffly. “Still, in light of the situation, I fear you must allow me to ply my trade and examine you to ascertain that you are well in both body and mind. I promise I will try to keep the examination brief.”
“But—” Caroline protested and then realized it was no use. She couldn’t make him understand and they were almost out of the park by now since Richard’s long strides were eating up the distance. Also, it was more than likely that the window had already closed. The question was, would it ever open again?
Not unless someone on the other side opens it, she thought grimly. And I’m the only one who knows how to operate PORTAL.
For better or worse, she was stuck in this universe—at least for the time being. And she had no idea how she was ever going to get home.
Chapter Four
Despair overwhelmed her and Caroline gave up fighting to get back. Instead, she lay quietly and let herself rest in Richard’s arms. She felt numb inside, as though the cold, drenching rain had somehow soaked through her skin to find her heart and she just couldn’t move.
Richard didn’t speak to her, he just carried her tirelessly onward, though it couldn’t have been easy for him. She certainly wasn’t as skinny as the heroines in her favorite dramas, who could be toted around with no effort by the heroes, Caroline thought grimly. Still, he never seemed to get tired. He must be extremely strong.
The front of his shirt was damp linen which felt slightly scratchy against her cheek but the muscles under it felt firm and warm. It was still raining and she turned her face in towards his chest, trying to shield herself from the fat droplets falling out of the sky, which was a dark, purplish gray.
They left the park area and soon Richard was striding down a paved street lined with old-fashioned-looking lampposts. These had big globular heads inside of which small flames flickered. Due to the rain there were no pedestrians but Caroline did see several vehicles driving along the street beside them.
A few were horse-drawn carriages but there were also strange-looking brass and wooden coaches. These were round and reminded her a little of Cinderella’s pumpkin which had turned into a carriage. Each had a driver perched up high on a bench at the front and a round door on the wood-paneled side. In the back was a large wind-up key like the kind you might see in an antique toy.
Caroline wondered who in the world would have the strength to wind the huge keys—they were three feet wide and appeared to be made of heavy brass. Were they purely ornamental or did the strange pumpkin-shaped coaches actually run by clockwork? The vast keys turned steadily as they drove by, making a tic-tic-tic sound but the wind-up carriages seemed to move as quickly and efficiently as the horse-drawn ones.
She was so intent on looking at the bizarre traffic that she nearly missed the houses they were passing. When she finally looked away from the road, her breath caught in her chest. Immense Victorian-looking mansions with cupola towers and gabled roofs, their wide front porches spread like a lady’s apron around them, were passing by as Richard strode tirelessly on, still carrying her in his arms.
“Beautiful,” she whispered, blinking her eyes to see better in the rain. It looked like something out of one of her beloved period dramas. She couldn’t believe that such a place could actually exist in reality.
Well, in an alternate reality, she reminded herself. I suppose that technically anything is possible here, since this is a whole different parallel universe.
Just then, Richard turned off the main street and down a narrow alleyway between two of the houses—a nice pale blue one and a forbidding gray one trimmed primly in white.
The change of route, away from the main street, made Caroline nervous.
“Where are you taking me?” she blurted, looking up at him.
“Why…home, of course.” He nodded in the direction of the big gray mansion which was on their right. “I thought it best to go around to the servant’s entrance. If your mother sees you in this state she will doubtless become agitated in the extreme.”
“My…mother?” Caroline’s heart did a somersault in her chest. She wondered if the mother here would be anything like the mother she had lost back home.
Her mother had been a happy, laughing woman despite her intensely intellectual pursuits. She loved to share jokes with Caroline and their relationship had developed into a genuine adult friendship before she and Caroline’s father had died so suddenly. If there was even a chance that the mother in this world was anything like her own…Caroline’s heart ached at the very thought.
“Oh, my mother!” she whispered.
“Yes, of course—your mother,” Richard said, frowning. “She already disapproves of me. The sight of you wearing naught but my coat would certainly set her off.”
“It would? Why? Can’t we just tell her about the lightning strike?” Caroline asked.
“I doubt she would believe it,” he said dryly. “I imagine she might think I had…” he cleared his throat, “Had outraged you in some way. I would not give her reason to worry so about her only child.”
“Outraged me?” Caroline tried to think what he could mean by this strange euphemism which clearly stood for something besides making her really angry, which was what “outrage” meant in her own world. Richard’s language patterns seemed to be straight out of a BBC production but she still found some of his expressions confusing. “What do you mean?” she asked, giving up at last.
“You know precisely what I mean,” he said, frowning. “I told you on our Joining night that I would never give you cause to reproach me in that way.”
“In what way, though?” Caroline asked, still confused.
“A gentleman cannot say more to a lady and remain a gentleman,” Richard replied shortly—and entirely too obliquely for her taste. “Ah—here we are. Can you reach out and ring the bell?”
He had climbed the wooden back steps of the tall gray house as they spoke and he was indicating a small black handle hanging beside a large white door.
Caroline reached out and pulled the handle and heard a jingling sound inside. Almost at once, the door opened and an older woman with graying hair tucked neatly under a little white cap was standing there. She was wearing some kind of uniform, Caroline thought—a long black dress with a long white apron Her eyes went wide when she saw them and her hand fluttered to her mouth like a plump bird.
“Goodness gracious, Master Richard!” she exclaimed. “Whatever can this mean? What has happened to the Missus? Is she quite all right?”
“That remains to be seen, Dixon. There has been an accident in the park and I must get your mistress into her room directly,” Richard answered curtly. “Stand aside and let us pass, if you please.”
“Oh yes, sir! Of course, sir!” The maid—if that was what she was—stepped hastily to the side and fumbled a rather clumsy curtsey. Caroline thought Richard would go right past her but he turned to speak to her first.
“Where is Mrs. Lambert, Dixon?” he enquired.
“Oh, she went calling to the Harrisons, so she did!” the servant exclaimed. “I expect she’s stuck there now, what with this rain.”
Caroline heard Richard breathe a sigh of relief and he muttered, “Thank the Goddess.” Aloud he said, “Very well, I’m going to take Miss Caroline up to her room. See that we’re not disturbed—I must examine her.”
“Oh, of course, sir. Yes, sir!” Dixon exclaimed.
Richard nodded and brushed past her, still carrying Caroline. They made their way through an old-fashioned looking kitchen with some strange brass appliances, through a parlor decorated in flocked wallpaper, velvet furniture and an austere but colorful hurricane lamp, and up a
flight of stairs to the second floor.
Halfway down a long hallway, Richard set her down gently and opened a door. A large, rather gloomy room was revealed with an old-fashioned four-poster canopy bed in the center and heavy, dark furniture scattered around the perimeter of the living space.
“Damn! The fire’s been allowed to go out.” Richard sounded upset. “Let me get you to the bed and I’ll call for the upstairs maid and Mary Ann.”
“What? Why? Um, why do we need all those people?” Caroline protested. Despite the misunderstanding about her identity, she had begun to feel safe with Richard—who she still felt oddly as though she knew. It seemed to her that the more strangers they brought into the equation, the more complicated things were going to get.
“We need them to help you change into your peignoir as it would not be proper for me to help. And to build up the fire—you’ll catch a chill if we don’t get you warmed.”
“Change into my what?” Caroline asked, frowning, but he was already stepping out into the hall and calling for the people he had mentioned in a loud, authoritative tone.
At once, another maid in a black uniform with a white apron came running and knelt by the fireplace opposite the bed. She busied herself with making up the fire. As she did, yet another servant, this one a woman a little older Than Caroline and wearing a plain, neat, dark dress, appeared.
“Yes, Master Richard?” she asked and then caught sight of Caroline, who was standing by the four-poster bed still wearing only his coat. Her eyes widened. “Gracious, Miss Caroline—what has happened to you?”
“There was an accident at the park, Mary Ann,” Richard answered for her. “I believe that Miss Caroline was struck by lightning.”
“Struck by lightning? Oh no!” Mary Ann’s eyes widened even more. “But that is simply dreadful.”
“She is, as you see, alive,” Richard said steadily. “But I very much need to examine her. However, she must be made decent first. Can you please help her into her peignoir and make her comfortable in her bed so that I might attend her?”
“Oh, of course, Master Richard.” The woman nodded emphatically. “I won’t be a moment.”
“Thank you.” he nodded back gravely. “I shall go and get my instruments and be just outside the door awaiting your call.”
He went out leaving Caroline alone with the two women. The upstairs maid quickly finished her task, leaving a fire burning slowly but steadily in the hearth. She stepped out of the room and closed the door softly behind her.
“Well, Miss Caroline, it sounds like you’ve been having a bit of excitement.” The woman Richard had called Mary Ann looked at Caroline’s bare legs and feet critically. “Hurt, were you?”
“Not really,” Caroline said but then she remembered that she was supposed to have been struck with lighting. “At least, I don’t think so. I’m not sure,” she said. “I did get extremely dizzy earlier.”
“Well, let’s get you changed so that Master Richard can examine you. What a mercy you married a physician, for all your Ma-ma doesn’t approve of him.”
“She doesn’t? Why not?” Caroline asked, before she thought.
“My-my.” Mary Ann, whom Caroline was beginning to think was some kind of personal lady’s maid, gave her a side-long look. “Did getting struck by lightning affect your memory then?”
“Um…maybe it did. Yes, I think it did,” Caroline said, deciding to run with it. It occurred to her that if she could pretend that her memory was affected, she would be able to get a great deal more information out of people just by asking questions, instead of trying to bumble her way through the other Caroline’s life by chance.
“Well then, I’ll try to help,” Mary Ann said kindly. “As you should hopefully soon remember, having a Kindred husband isn’t considered fashionable in the least—and it hasn’t been for the past twenty-five years or so.”
As she spoke, she was helping Caroline out of the heavy, damp black wool coat in a business-like way, as though she helped her in and out of clothing all the time. She stared blankly at Caroline’s naked skin, which she was trying to cover with her arms.
“Gracious, Miss Caroline—what has become of your underthings? Where is your corset and cage? And where are your pantalets?”
“I…I don’t know,” Caroline faltered. “I, um, think they were burned off when the lightning struck me. Tell me more about the Kindred,” she said quickly, hoping to deflect any more questions about her nudity. “You said they haven’t been, uh, fashionable for the past twenty years? How long have they been here?”
“Well, they came around fifty years back, around the turn of the century, during the reign of Good King George,” Mary Ann told her. As she spoke, she was rummaging in one of the heavy wooden dressers, obviously looking for something. “They saved us from those nasty Scourge, don’t you know? And then, when they asked if they might call brides from the women of Terra, everyone was so grateful that the King granted them the right to do so forever, so long as they agreed to come live amongst us and adopt our ways as their own. Oh, and they weren’t allowed to bring any of their fancy, new-fangled gadgets with them either.”
“And they agreed to that? To give up their, uh, gadgets?” Caroline could scarcely believe it. She knew the incredibly advanced technology the Kindred possessed in her own universe. Had they really been willing to give that up to come and live someplace which appeared to be barely post-industrial, maybe around the level of Victorian England?
“Well, they had to, didn’t they?” Marry Ann said briskly. She made a disapproving face. “There was talk of it being witchcraft, after all. And that won’t do.”
“So…Richard came down from the uh, Mother Ship, and called me as a bride?” Caroline asked.
Mary Ann made a tsking sound. “You really don’t remember anything, do you? Poor lamb. Well no, Master Richard is a second generation Kindred so he has never been to that strange ship of theirs. His mother was Lady Pennington—before she married his father, anyway, who was some kind of officer in their army, you know. Of course, she lost her title when she married him but all the same, Master Richard comes from good bloodlines. Still he’s Kindred and that was enough to turn your Ma-ma against him.”
“But why—why should she be against him?” Caroline asked. “Is it really just because he’s Kindred?” She didn’t like unreasoning prejudice and it gave her a worried feeling about the woman who was her “mother” in this universe.
“As I said, that’s enough.” Mary Ann shook her head. “At first it was thought to be a great honor to be called as a Kindred bride. But these days, I’m afraid people feel differently. They’re so queer in their thoughts and notions and they won’t give up their worship of that goddess of theirs—they’re really the next thing to perfect heathens when you think of it. Anyway, it’s considered quite a social come-down to have a Kindred husband, especially among the quality like yourself.”
“The quality? Do you mean the upper crust? The, uh, aristocracy?” Caroline asked, shivering. She wished she could go closer to the fire but she didn’t want to walk around the room nude so she just stood there miserably, wishing she could put something—anything—on to cover herself.
“Well now, Miss Caroline, I’m afraid you’re not quite part of the aristocracy—though you will be if your Lady-Mother has anything to do with it.” Mary Ann cast a brief smile over her shoulder. “Ah—here it is at last! Your best peignoir. Let’s get you into it, shall we?”
A peignoir turned out to be a lacy, diaphanous garment made of yards and yards of silky, pale fabric that floated around Caroline like the petals of a flower. It was a golden champagne color that looked good against her pale skin. To Caroline, who was used to living in yoga pants and t-shirts under her lab coats, it seemed like the most decadent thing she had ever put on.
“Oh—this is beautiful!” she exclaimed, watching how the lighter-than-air fabric floated around her.
“It’s your finest one,” Mary Ann said with some satisf
action. “For all you won’t let Master Richard near you, you’ve always been determined to look nothing but your best around him.”
“I don’t? But he’s her husband, isn’t he?” Caroline protested. “Why wouldn’t she want him to touch her?”
“Her husband? Why wouldn’t she want him to touch her?” Mary Ann frowned. “Miss Caroline, you’d best be careful. You’re talking rather strangely and you don’t want to end up in the mad house like poor Lizzy Clayton did last year.”
“What? What happened to her?” Caroline recalled reading somewhere about how unwanted women had been put conveniently out of the way in the past by declaring them incompetent and committing them to insane asylums, but she’d never expected to visit a place where such practices still took place.
“Well, it happened shortly after her father died and her brother took over as head of the family,” Mary Ann said. “Some people said it was grief that drove her mad—others said that her father had given her too much license to do as she pleased and she couldn’t bring herself to obey her younger brother’s will when the time came. Poor girl.” She shook her head and sighed. “It’s terrible but once a woman has been afflicted with hysteria, she almost never gets better. Though I understand the mad house her brother had her brought to has all the latest treatments.”
“Latest…treatments?” Caroline’s throat was suddenly very dry. “Like what?”
“Oh, water therapy—ice baths up to your chin morning and evening, I’m told,” Mary Ann said airily. She had gotten out a hairbrush with an ivory handle and was trying to work it through Caroline’s curls, which were beginning to dry. “Oh, and they have that new electro-therapy too. Where they tie you down and run a current through your brain—that’s supposed to be very helpful for madness.” She sighed. “But poor Miss Lizzy—despite all those treatments we haven’t seen hide nor hair of her since she was committed and I doubt we ever will again.”
Trapped in Time Page 4