Lady of Milkweed Manor

by Julie Klassen

  “I never said . . .”

  “How many other fatherless children could hope for such as I, as we, could provide?”

  “But your wife . . .”

  “Need never know!”

  “You offer only because your own son is dead. Had he lived . . .”

  “Then you and I would not be having this conversation, I grant you. But he did not live, did he? And here I stand, not—what?—a few steps from my own flesh-and-blood living, breathing son? I say it’s providence.”

  “I say it’s heartless and selfish.”

  “But it does not really matter what you say. It only matters what Charlotte says, does it not?”

  Daniel shook his head, arms crossed, head pounding.

  “Please, man, I beg of you. Let me at least see her!”

  Daniel stared at the man, but instead saw a younger Charlotte, smile beaming, looking up into the face of this man before him. Would she want to see him? Consider his wretched offer? Daniel longed to protect her, but who was he to make such a colossal decision?

  Daniel insisted on entering Charlotte’s room first, on having a few moments alone with her. To prepare her, somehow—as if such a thing were possible.

  He sternly waved Harris back, waiting until he was hidden in the shadows several steps down the corridor, before knocking softly on Charlotte’s door.

  “Yes?” she answered after only a moment’s hesitation.

  Pinning Harris with a “stay there” stare, he opened the door a few inches. “Charlotte? It’s Daniel Taylor. May I come in a moment?”

  “Of course.”

  He stepped into the room, closing the door behind him, his lamp held low at his side, hopefully providing her some modesty should she need it.

  “Good evening,” he said, striving for normalcy. “Please forgive the lateness of the hour.”

  “I was still awake, watching him.”

  He noticed that a candle burned on her bedside table. He set his small oil lamp atop the chest near the door, causing large shadows to quiver on the room’s walls.

  She sat up on the bed, facing him. “Is everything all right?”

  He stood awkwardly clenching his hands, then realizing he was, stuffed them into his pockets. In the bed beside Charlotte the babe awakened, fussing a bit. Charlotte leaned over and picked him up. She leaned back against the headboard, bouncing him gently in her arms.

  “There, there. You cannot be hungry yet, little one.”

  When the infant relaxed back to sleep, Charlotte smiled up at Daniel, her tired eyes alight with a look of maternal wonder at, perhaps, her unexpected skill with her child. Her smile held a touch of pride; her face, glowing in the golden light of the candle, beamed with deep contentment. What a lovely portrait she and her babe made at this moment. He smiled at her in return, and felt another pricking at the back of his eyes and a tightness in his throat. He feared that this was the last time she would ever look this happy again.

  “Have you decided what to call him?” he asked, putting off the inevitable.

  “I believe I have. I found the task much more difficult than I would have imagined.” She laid the child on the far side of the bed beside her, securing him with a pillow.

  “Why is that?” The moment the question left his mouth, he knew it was a stupid one and wished it back.

  “Well, because normally I should name him for . . . his father. At least that is customary. But there is little customary about this situation.” She straightened a blanket over the babe. “Or I should name him for my own father. But given the circumstances. . . .”

  “Yes, I see what you mean.”

  He cleared his throat.

  She turned to him. “Is something the matter?” she asked gently.

  “Yes, I am afraid there is something. Something that might—potentially—trouble you.”

  “What is it?”

  “There is someone here who wishes to see you.”

  “Now? Who is it?”

  “It’s, um . . .”

  “My father?” she asked, surprise and, he could not miss, a note of hope in her voice. His heart ached dully at disappointing her.

  “No, I’m sorry. Not your father.”

  She stared at him but didn’t reply. He took a deep breath and continued.

  “It’s Charles Harris.”

  “Mr. Harris?”

  “Yes, you see, his own child . . . that is, his wife Katherine’s child was born this night.”

  He saw Charlotte’s face harden at his words, and for a moment he was relieved. He hoped she might rebuke the man without a second thought.

  “But he lived for only a short time,” Daniel continued. “I revived him but was not successful in keeping him alive.”

  “Poor Katherine.”

  “Yes, though Mr. Harris is distraught as well.”

  “Is he?”

  The door creaked slowly open and both turned to look.

  “Charlotte?” Harris’s voice was both plaintive and determined.

  “Sorry, Taylor, I could not wait any longer.” He stepped into the room, closing the door quietly behind him. “Charlotte, I had to see you.”

  He approached the bed, hat in hand. “What has Taylor told you?”

  Charlotte stared up at him. “That your . . . that Katherine’s newborn child died this night.”

  “Oh, Charlotte. I am laid low indeed.” Charles dropped to his knees beside the bed and grasped her arm, his hat falling unnoticed to the floor. Now he looked up at her with tear-streaked eyes.

  “A little son—did he tell you?”

  Charlotte nodded mutely.

  “I held him in my hands as he died. . . .” A sob broke through his throat, and Daniel looked away from the painful scene. Still, Harris must have suddenly remembered that he was standing there. “Taylor. Give us a moment, will you?”

  Daniel wanted nothing more than to flee from this room, filled with one man’s pain and likely to soon flood with another’s. But he feared the older man might pressure Charlotte, who was clearly susceptible to his persuasion. And given her fragile emotional condition as a new mother . . . No, he couldn’t leave her to face this alone.

  “I am staying.”

  Charlotte looked over at him, clearly surprised. She opened her mouth as if to argue but then closed it, saying nothing. She returned her gaze to Charles Harris.

  “Katherine will be insane with grief as you might imagine.”

  “Any woman would be.”

  “She does not yet know. The nurse sedated her while Taylor here tried to revive him.”

  She stared at the man, clearly perplexed. “I am sorry for your loss.”

  “Thank you. That means a great deal to me. I know I made an immense mistake where you are concerned. That you could still say that, well, I thank you.”

  Her brow wrinkled as she listened to him, perhaps trying in vain to follow his line of thought.

  “And you, Charlotte? How do you fare?”

  Harris was evidently avoiding the issue—that is, the baby—a mere arm’s length from his nose. Waiting, most likely, for Charlotte to bring him into the conversation.

  “Quite well, actually. Everyone here has been very kind to me, and my son and I are in good health.”

  “Your son, yes. Taylor mentioned him.”

  She looked up sharply at Daniel, eyebrows high. “Did he?”

  “Well, I asked him about you. How you were . . . and everything. He deduced the rest himself.”

  “I see.”

  “And your son. What do you call him?”

  “Dr. Taylor and I were just discussing that very topic. I have decided to call him Edmund, after my grandfather.”

  “That was my father’s name as well.”

  She looked away from both men’s gazes. “Yes,” she murmured. Charles Harris smiled through fresh tears. “You honor me.”

  Charlotte’s gaze shifted to her sleeping son. “It was not my intention.”

  “May I . . . see him?
” he asked.

  She looked at Harris, clearly confused by his attention, but she complied, shifting the little bundle to her other side. Harris laid out both forearms on the bed to receive him. In the lamplight, Harris studied the small face, the tiny hands, and a new wave of sorrow stole over his features.

  “He is beautiful . . . perfect . . .” He forced words over his tears. “Like his mother.”

  Charlotte’s eyes filled with tears of her own at the man’s obvious awe layered over raw grief.

  She smiled, causing a tear to run down each of her cheeks. She whispered, “Actually, he looks a great deal like you.”

  Charles nodded, tears coursing down his face too.

  Daniel stood there feeling the worst of interlopers and had just decided to leave the sad pair to themselves when Charles changed tactics.

  “I cannot help wondering . . . how will the two of you get along? I would help you if I could, but you know I haven’t any money of my own at present. Perhaps in time, but for now . . . how will you live?”

  “I do not know exactly, but we will manage.”

  “Will you? Charlotte, forgive me, but I must ask. You are young, you might yet marry and have more children. Katherine, as you know, is much older. The pregnancy was very difficult for her and she has vowed never to bear another child should anything happen to this one.”

  Charlotte stared at him. “What are you saying?”

  “Charlotte . . . think about it before answering.”

  “Before answering what?” Her voice rose.

  “Charlotte. Think. You could go back to your old life. Reenter society. I would raise him as my own.”

  “He is your own! And that has never tempted you to any duty before now.”

  “I do not deny I have treated you ill. But I would treat Edmund very well. You know I would be a good father to him. And Katherine . . . You would be saving your cousin from a broken heart, from the brink of insanity.”

  “It is you who is insane. Do you think I would just give my child to you? How dare you ask such a thing? He is my son!”

  “He is mine as well.”

  “He is yours no longer. You gave him up when you married my cousin.” She gathered her infant back into her arms and held him close.

  “I had no choice.”

  “You had a choice. And you made it. Now leave us alone. Leave, this instant.”

  Daniel took a step forward, ready to escort Harris from the room, feeling none of the satisfaction he had anticipated now that Charlotte had refused him. There was no happy ending for such a situation as this.

  Harris rose to his feet, clearly shaken and chagrined. “I am sorry, Charlotte. I had no right to ask.”

  She shook her head, wonderingly, despairingly. “Again you would choose your own happiness—and Katherine’s—over mine. Again.” Her voice shook as she spoke. “You would have me take on Katherine’s heartbreak, to suffer in her stead. I cannot have her place in your life, but I can have her intolerable grief?”

  Mr. Harris looked at the floor. “You are right, Charlotte,” he said quietly. “It is too much. Forgive my asking.”

  Harris turned toward the door, Daniel a few paces behind him. He opened it and gestured Daniel through. As Harris was about to shut the door behind him, Charlotte called out, “Wait.”

  Charlotte swallowed as Mr. Harris stepped cautiously back into the room.

  Dr. Taylor stood near the door, searching her face. “I shall wait just outside the door,” he said. “If you need me, you need only call.”

  Charlotte nodded mutely, and Dr. Taylor closed the door behind him. Mr. Harris took a tentative step back toward the bed, arms behind his back, head bowed.

  Charlotte looked away from him, away from her son. She stared toward the window, its shutters folded back. From across the room, the light of the moon outside drew her gaze. She was silent for several minutes. Unable to think. Only to feel.

  “You know I want what is best for him,” she began, her throat tight and burning. “But this . . . this is too much, too sudden.”

  From the corner of her eye, she glimpsed his nod, but he said nothing. She turned from the moonlight to look at him.

  “Do you have any idea what you are asking of me? He is my son—my heart! I love him more than my own life. Have you ever felt that way about anyone? Or do you love only yourself . . . and that estate of yours?”

  “That might have been true once. But no longer.”

  “You really do love her, then—Katherine?”

  “Yes. Not at first, perhaps. But now . . .”

  “And would she . . . love my son?” Sobs racked her entire body.

  He did not answer immediately. When he did, it wasn’t the answer she expected. “Charlotte, you know my wife. Katherine is very loving, but she is also very proud, very jealous, and very possessive.”

  “Yes, I know her well.”

  “If we act now, and give Edmund to her, she will believe him her own and he will grow up with every advantage, free from scandal, with both a father’s and a mother’s love. But if she knows he is not her own flesh and blood, I fear she will reject him, or at best be bitter toward him—and me—all his life. While Katherine has her failings, she is capable of great love, great loyalty and devotion, and I can promise you Edmund will have all these things from her.”

  “She will not mistreat him?”

  “Of course not. He is my own son! And she will believe him hers as well.”

  “If I were to consent to this, would you be willing to promise me something?”

  He nodded cautiously.

  “If she does realize Edmund is not her own, if she cannot love him utterly, I beg you please, return him to me. Promise me you would not let him suffer.”

  “I give you my word.”

  “Would you give me some time to think about it?”

  “We haven’t much time, Charlotte. If I take Edmund home now, or at the very least in the next few hours, when Katherine is just waking from the sedatives, I can easily persuade her that this little boy is her own, home safe and well from his trip to the hospital. If we wait and she suspects, not only is her devotion in question, but my ability to bequeath my land and holdings to him as my legal heir would also be at risk. If we are to do this, it must be now. Tonight.”

  “But how . . .?”

  “Taylor!” He startled her by shouting.

  Dr. Taylor opened the door, behind which he had been standing at the ready as promised.

  “Come in, man, and close the door.”

  When Dr. Taylor had complied, Mr. Harris said in a low, conspiratorial voice, “Is there any reason—should Miss Lamb agree, of course—if I left here tonight with this child, that anyone would know he is not my own? The one I arrived bearing?”

  Daniel Taylor’s face looked ashen and angry behind his grim mask. “For that to work, Miss Lamb would need to falsely claim your, pardon me, deceased son, as her own. And I should also have to lie to verify that somehow a perfectly healthy infant in my care has died during the night. The death certificate would need to be forged and the birth certificate falsified. And then there is the problem of the accoucheur and the monthly nurse who witnessed your son’s struggle. But beyond these minor inconveniences”—his tone was acid—“I see no reason whatever.”

  Mr. Harris ignored his sarcasm. “The accoucheur will be so relieved his patient has a living child—that his own reputation will not suffer—he will raise no alarm. And I am quite certain he completed neither birth nor death certificate. Remember, my poor child was still alive, though just barely, when we left the house.”

  “And why would I lie for you and risk my own reputation and career?”

  “You would not for me,” Mr. Harris said, “but you would for Charlotte. You’d do anything you could to help her.”

  Dr. Taylor paused but did not deny the man’s words. “If it was what she truly wanted.” He looked at her, and the panic and nausea that rose in her while they discussed details of a
n act that would surely kill her now made her whole body tremble.

  “How can I? How can I part with him?”

  Mr. Harris searched her face earnestly. “I shall appeal to you only once more, Charlotte, and then torment you no further. But think on this. You do not know how you would provide for Edmund, though I’ve no doubt you would try admirably. With Katherine’s wealth and, God willing, a return to prosperity for Fawnwell, Edmund will have the best of everything—the best doctors, the best tutors, the best schools. When Katherine and I die he will be our heir. He will know no want and want for nothing.”

  “And he will never know me.”

  “A terrible loss to be sure, but he will not know what he is missing.”

  “But I shall know what I am missing.”

  “Yes, dear Charlotte. You will know.”

  They stayed as they were for several moments, none of them speaking. Charlotte thought not so much on Mr. Harris’s promises of abundance for her child but rather on the alternatives. What flashed before her mind were not idyllic images of Edmund romping about the croquet lawn in a fine suit of clothes, but rather the things she had seen at this place. She saw the perfect brown-haired boy she had fed die for no apparent reason. She saw the desperate young woman who put her infant on the turn beg for a wet-nursing post hoping to be reunited with her baby—only to find her heel-marked daughter dead by morning. She thought of women like Becky’s mother, who couldn’t afford to feed her children, of Becky herself, who would likely have to give up her baby and go back to work or starve.

  But surely she had more options. Wouldn’t Aunt Tilney help her? She’d already offered her a place to live, and she could nurse Edmund herself for at least a year, if her milk held out. But what then? How would she buy him food, let alone all the other things he’d need? Would her uncle allow her aunt to help further against her father’s directives? Not likely. What sort of post could she get with an infant to nurse every few hours? The words she had so naïvely spoken to Mae echoed back at her, “I would never give my child to someone else to feed . . .” And here she was, considering doing just that. I must be insane. She shuddered.

  Dr. Taylor cleared his throat. “Perhaps, Miss Lamb, there might be something I can do. I haven’t a large income, but I am sure I could find a way to help you out of this predicament.”