by Paula Paul
Wilma opened the door after Alexandra knocked. She didn’t speak for a few seconds, obviously surprised to see the doctor. Judging by the expression on her face, Alexandra surmised that she might be a little dismayed to see her as well.
“Oh!” Wilma said, finally. “We…we didn’t send for you, Dr. Gladstone. There must be some mistake.” She backed away as she spoke, as if she didn’t want to be too close to the doctor. “Everyone here is in the best of health. No need for a doctor. No need at all.”
“I know you didn’t send for me, Wilma, and I don’t mean to intrude.” Alexandra spoke softly, trying to calm Wilma. “I only wanted to stop by to talk to Young Beaty. I was concerned that he—”
“He’s not here,” Wilma said, interrupting her. Her eyes had grown wide with what appeared to be fright. “He’s down at the oyster beds. Beds needed tending, you see. Don’t know when he’ll be back.”
“I see,” Alexandra said. Odd, she thought, that Beaty would find the need to tend the oyster beds now. The annual Oyster Harvest Festival had ended two weeks ago. Most oystermen had already groomed their beds by the time of the festival.
“Don’t know when he’ll be back.” Wilma tried once again to close the door.
“Are you all right, Wilma?”
“Of course,” she replied a little too quickly. She hesitated for a moment, as if she couldn’t decide whether or not to try to close the door again. “I’m weary to the bone,” she added. “I guess you can see that.”
“Do you need—”
“All I need is for Old Beaty to stop his moans and his demands day and night. ’Tis bothering me husband, too, you know. Gets beside hisself sometimes, Husband does. Says things he don’t mean. Like seeing the queen.” She tried to laugh, but it came out sounding strained. “He never meant a word of that, you know. ’Twas just his way of…well, what I mean…he never meant a word of…gets beside himself, he does. What with his father…” She let the words hang in the air while her eyes pleaded with Alexandra to accept her lies.
“Certainly I didn’t think it likely he really saw the queen,” Alexandra said. She saw some of the tension go out of Wilma as she spoke. “But he was acting strangely, and that gave me cause to worry. Is he sleeping well? Perhaps I could leave some powders to help him rest.”
“No, no. No need at all. He sleeps like a babe. Oh!” she exclaimed and jerked her head toward the stairs. “There he is again. Old Beaty calling for attention. Thank you for stopping. Thank you.” Her last words were muffled as she finally closed the door.
Alexandra left the Beaty cottage feeling even more concerned. Wilma was now acting as oddly as her husband was. There had been no call from Old Beaty. For some reason, Wilma didn’t want to talk to Alexandra. It occurred to her that Young Beaty could be having hallucinations and Wilma was trying to protect him from embarrassment. She’d seen wives react that way before. Young Beaty was still in his fifties, and while it wasn’t unheard of, it was certainly not common for a man of that age to begin a decline into dementia. Was he drinking heavily? No sign of that and no gossip to indicate it was so. In a village the size of Newton-upon-Sea, word would spread if a member of the community took to drink. Nancy would be among the first to know. She had her ways of getting people to confide in her, but there’d been no mention of it from Nancy or anyone else. It concerned her still that Wilma and Young Beaty could have a more sinister reason for their strange behavior. But killing an old woman? Why? She couldn’t imagine a motive.
Alexandra was still contemplating the odd behavior of the Beatys when she arrived at her home and turned her mare over to Rob and Artie. She called out to Nancy as she entered the house while Zack went immediately to his favorite spot in front of the fireplace, where a coal fire was blazing. He dropped himself with a thud and with no hint of grace onto his stomach with his rear to the fire.
“Lunch is almost ready, miss,” Nancy said, appearing suddenly from the back. “I made a meat pie from the leftover beef.”
“Yes, of course,” Alexandra said, without knowing she’d said anything.
“You’re distracted,” Nancy said, stepping closer to peer at Alexandra’s face. “Someone have a troubling illness?”
“No. All of my patients seem to be doing well.”
“Except whom?”
“Excuse me?”
“You’re worried about something. Or someone.”
“Well,” Alexandra said with a sigh. “Wilma is acting as strangely as her husband. I’m a bit concerned about both of them.” She hadn’t wanted to discuss it with Nancy, thinking it would likely breed gossip, but she knew better than to resist Nancy’s uncanny ability to read her temperament and the subsequent cajoling for answers.
“Quite natural that they would be acting strangely,” Nancy said. “If one is to assume Young Beaty wasn’t lying about finding a dead woman and seeing the queen, I mean. Neither of those things is something a person does every day, you know. Might upset anyone.” She was walking toward the kitchen, where they often took their meals.
Alexandra followed Nancy into the kitchen. “He did find the dead woman. I suppose that’s upsetting enough.”
“We can never know what gets into a person,” Nancy said as she sliced the pie. “Could be Old Beaty is driving him mad.”
“That’s the excuse Wilma gave,” Alexandra said as she unfolded a napkin and placed it on her lap.
“You’re wise to listen to her. A wife knows her husband’s mind better than he knows it himself.”
Alexandra made no attempt to argue with Nancy and managed to steer the conversation to more mundane subjects as they ate their meal. When they finished, Alexandra made her way to the surgery to see patients while Nancy saw to cleaning the kitchen. Later, she joined Alexandra in the surgery to straighten and organize the shelves of herbs and chemicals they kept on hand. The number of people visiting the surgery was light compared to the day before. Alexandra and Nancy were both grateful for the less taxing day and were looking forward to closing the surgery early when Zack came bounding in from the living quarters barking and sounding agitated—something he rarely did, since, over the years, he’d grown quite used to patients coming and going all day. He barked only when he sensed something unusual.
“There’s someone out there in a carriage,” Nancy said, peering through the window. “No one we know comes in a carriage.” She made it sound as if arriving in a carriage was a distasteful act. “No wonder Zack is causing such a ruckus. That’s a stranger out there.”
“Open the door and bid him come in,” Alexandra said as she spread a clean sheet on the examination table.
Nancy had not quite made her way to the door when several loud and rapid knocks sounded, and Zack’s barking became even more urgent.
“Patience! Patience!” Nancy called as she fumbled with the lock. “Breaking the door down doesn’t improve the service. There! I have it,” she said as the lock clicked. “Now calm yourself before you…Oh! It’s you!”
“Nicholas!” Alexandra said, as the visitor entered. Zack growled while the fur on his neck lifted.
“Lord Dunsford!” Nancy said at the same time.
“Please come in,” Alexandra said. She was silently chastising herself for not addressing him by his title, even though he had long ago insisted she call him Nicholas. “I’m surprised to see you. I had no idea you were in Newton. I thought you were in—”
“In London, of course. Where I should be,” Nicholas said as he stepped inside. He kept a wary eye on Zack, who growled again. For some reason, Zack had taken a disliking to Nicholas. Nancy insisted it was because Nicholas had too much interest in Alexandra, making Zack jealous.
“Shush, Zack,” Alexandra said. “Are you ill?” Alexandra asked, scrutinizing Nicholas, taking in his tall frame, dark hair, and hyacinth-blue eyes, and skin a little too swarthy for the average Englishman. All in all, he appeared in fine fettle.
“Quite fit.” Nicholas took his eyes off Zack long enough to address Ale
xandra. “It’s my mother who needs your attention.”
“Your mother? I didn’t know she was in the parish,” Alexandra said, reaching for her bag. “Fetch my cloak, please, Nancy, and tell the boys to saddle Lucy.”
“You’ll ride with me in my carriage. No need to saddle the little mare,” Nicholas said.
“My cloak, Nancy!” Alexandra said, with a wave of her hand toward the maid. She turned back to Nicholas and noticed the perspiration on his upper lip and his restless manner. He was obviously concerned about his mother. “What’s the nature of Lady Forsythe’s complaint?”
“She says there is pain in her heart,” Nicholas said.
“I see.” Alexandra reached for a bottle of distilled foxglove and dropped it into her bag. “Any other symptoms? Nausea? Vomiting?”
“I don’t believe so,” Nicholas said, “but she does keep clutching her side and cries out that it is burning.”
Alexandra nodded and reached for another bottle to drop into her bag. By now, Nancy had returned with her cloak. Nicholas grabbed it quickly and draped it over Alexandra’s shoulders.
Nicholas took her arm. “I must warn you that Lady Forsythe will not be an easy patient. She can be…unpleasant.”
“Please don’t concern yourself.” Alexandra was not inexperienced with difficult patients.
“And she’s not likely to trust you,” he added as he helped her into the carriage.
“Then why did she send for me?”
Nicholas waited until he had made his way around to the other side of the carriage and had taken up the reins before he answered. “She didn’t send for you. That was my decision.”
Alexandra breathed a weary sigh. “Then she most likely will indeed be difficult. Perhaps I should have—”
“Should have refused to come?” Nicholas said, interrupting her and sounding agitated. “You don’t understand. She is gravely ill.”
Alexandra said nothing.
“Mother claims no one is fit to treat her except her physician in London. That’s what I meant when I said she won’t trust you.”
Alexandra’s only response was a noncommittal “Mmm-hmm.” She had seen her share of patients who didn’t trust her, especially in the early days of her practice in Newton-upon-Sea soon after her father, the trusted physician for the town, had died and she took over his practice for him. She’d done her best to be understanding. After all, when a person trusts his health and life to someone, he shouldn’t do it lightly.
Nicholas gave her a quick glance. “Is that all you’re going to say? Just ‘Mmm-hmm’?”
She turned toward him. “I’m not sure what you expect me to say.”
“Must you always put such distance between us?”
She didn’t respond. Nicholas had, in the past, made her aware of his feelings for her, but she had never dared admit her own feelings. He was a member of the peerage, and she was distinctly middle class. She was in no position to deal with the problems that would cause with his family or with her own life as the only doctor in Newton-upon-Sea.
“Very well, then,” Nicholas said, apparently resigning himself to her silence. “We shall concentrate on MaMa and nothing else, and I shall do my best to pave the way for you.”
“My Lord Dunsford—”
“So we’re back to that, are we? Can’t you at least forget my title and call me Nicholas? I’d much prefer that, and I will attach no more than friendship to such familiarity on your part.”
She glanced at him, but in the darkness it was difficult to see his face. She was glad that he would not be able to see hers, either. “I’m sorry, Nicholas. I had no intention of offending you.”
“Very well.” He sounded a little too brusque. “Now, what was it you had started to say?”
“I was only going to say that it may be rather difficult for you to pave the way, as you put it, but that I shall do my best in any event.” That was not at all what she’d wanted to say.
“I’m sure you will.”
Alexandra pulled her cloak tighter around her shoulders. His taciturn remark had chilled her as much as the cold November air. Why couldn’t he understand the difficulties their relationship could cause if it went beyond friendship?
—
Montmarsh, the country estate of Nicholas Forsythe, sixth Earl of Dunsford, was ablaze with light, as if a candle or lamp had been lit in each of the house’s many rooms. The lights gave it the look of a collection of sparkling jewels against the black velvet fabric of night.
As soon as Nicholas stopped the carriage, two grooms appeared, one to hold the horses and the second to help Alexandra step down.
“Mind the step, miss,” the groom said as he took her hand.
Within seconds Nicholas was at her side, holding her arm to guide her the short distance to the walkway leading up to the house. “I still haven’t become accustomed to all the attention one gets as an earl.” His voice sounded as if he were making an effort to lighten his mood. “Makes me think I should have made a concerted effort to become an earl sooner.”
Nicholas Forsythe had inherited the title and the land of the Earl of Dunsford soon after the fifth Earl of Dunsford, a cousin with no heirs, had died at the hands of a disgruntled business partner. Though Nicholas was a second son and had no expectations of inheritance, his older brother had refused the title. He had inherited the land and title of their father, which he claimed was quite enough to distract him from his true interest of biology. He was a devotee of Charles Darwin and more interested in finding new species in the animal kingdom than he was in the peerage of the United Kingdom.
The door to Montmarsh opened as if by magic when they approached. “Thank you, Lancaster,” Nicholas said to the butler who had opened the door. Alexandra could see a bevy of servants at the end of the great hall, trying without success to stay out of sight as they looked on with curiosity. She felt their eyes following the two of them all the way upstairs. Then they came to an open door, revealing a room richly furnished with a high four-poster bed of heavily carved mahogany and spread with a satin coverlet of cream and green. Underneath the coverlet, Alexandra could see the profile of a slender, dark-haired woman, well past her youth but still beautiful. A female servant, most likely the lady’s personal maid, was at her side, adjusting the pillows.
“MaMa?” Nicholas knocked lightly at the half-opened door as he spoke.
“Nicholas? Is that you?”
“Yes, my dear lady. I’ve brought someone to see you.”
“Nicky, you wouldn’t dare! Not when I look so…Who is that?” she said when she spied Alexandra entering with her bag in hand.
“Lady Forsythe, may I present Dr. Alexandra Gladstone.”
There was no response from Lady Forsythe as she kept her eyes trained on Alexandra, who took immediate note of the lady’s flushed face and bleary eyes.
Nicholas spoke again. “I’ve brought her here to—”
“Did you say doctor?” Lady Forsythe still had not taken her eyes from Alexandra.
“Dr. Gladstone,” Nicholas said. “She is the physician for the parish and one of the best—”
“I should say not,” Lady Forsythe said, interrupting him. She winced slightly as she tried to turn away from Alexandra.
“But, MaMa—”
“Please don’t cause an embarrassing scene, Nicky. I will allow no one to examine me except Dr. Smythson. Not even Sir…well, never mind.”
“But Dr. Smythson is in London.”
“Precisely.” There was a definitive tone to the lady’s voice. “Nicky, my dear, I’m sure Miss Gladstone is quite adequate for the people of the village, but Dr. Smythson has the finest and highest degree of training available for a physician. I have already sent for him.”
“My lady,” Nicholas said, trying once again to persuade her, “it will take a good day for him to arrive if he comes by train, so that means late tomorrow at the earliest. It will take longer if he insists upon traveling by coach, as he has in the past.”
Lady Forsythe’s eyes widened in surprise as she looked at Alexandra. “You see, Nicky,” she said after a moment. “Even the young woman agrees with me.”
“Forgive me, Your Ladyship,” Alexandra said before Nicholas could try again to come to her defense. “If I may ask, is the rash becoming more painful?”
Lady Forsythe’s eyes grew even wider. “The rash?”
“On your trunk. Perhaps on one side and wrapping around toward your back?”
“How…how did you know?” Lady Forsythe touched her right side gingerly.
“I suspect it is red and quite painful. Sometimes it feels as if the pain is in your chest.”
“Why, yes,” Lady Forsythe said. “That’s exactly…” Her voice trailed off as she stared at Alexandra with a mixture of suspicion and awe.
“You’ve never had these symptoms before?”
“No, certainly not,” Lady Forsythe said.
Alexandra nodded but said nothing more.
“What does it mean? That I’ve never had the symptoms before, and now I’m experiencing so much pain?”
“You’ve experienced a rather high level of anxiety recently.” Alexandra kept her tone matter-of-fact, hoping not to overly excite the lady.
“Yes, yes, of course I have. Not until I came here, of course. But when one has guests who demand such…Well, never mind that,” she said, wincing again at the pain in her side. “Just tell me what it all means.”
“It means you need rest, and you should drink water to help bring down your fever. Perhaps you could allow Nicholas to entertain your guest. As for the rash, since I haven’t seen it, I can’t say if any vesicles have appeared—”