Breathless from her tirade, Rose O’Donnell at last stopped for breath and looked across the expanse of the library. Lord Harrington still wore that empty, vacant glazed look. Holy Mother of Jesus, were all men mad, and had they always been so, or had she just noticed it?
“Lord Harrington?” she ventured. “Did you hear what I just said?” she asked, raising her voice, hoping to penetrate the emptiness.
Still no response, except he seemed to tighten his grip on the bureau where she’d found him working on household bills. She’d only just arrived, still wearing the mud-splattered brown dress of the journey.
A miserable journey it had been, too. She had been plagued every mile of the way by twin torments. One, the fact she’d not taken the time to report the nigger’s assault to the police. And, two, that her profitable little game was over before it had ever really gotten started. With Mr. Eden dead, there was, of course, no one interested in any news coming out of Talbot House, and Lord Harrington could rest easy. The boys were his for as long as he —
“Are you... certain you understood correctly, Mrs. O'Donnell?”
“I’m certain, Lord Harrington.” She nodded vigorously. “What the impostor said was, 'Mr. Eden is dead.’”
“Was... there anyone else present?” Lord Harrington asked, still sitting rigidly straight in his chair.
“Just one,” said Rose O'Donnell hastily, at last remembering the old crone of a woman who'd just stood placidly by.
“Who?” Lord Harrington demanded.
“A serving woman,” she replied. “A hag. I didn't know her name.”
“Anyone else? A Mr. Aldwell?”
“No. I know Mr. Aldwell. He wasn't in sight.”
“Did Aslam say how John had...?” His voice broke and at the same time he rapidly bowed his head.
For a few moments Rose O'Donnell was prepared to swear the man was deeply moved.
“Was Lord Richard present?” Lord Harrington asked, still probing for additional witnesses.
“I said no, Lord Harrington, and it's no I'll be saying again,” Rose snapped, losing what little patience she still had after the tedious, prolonged coach ride.
Now she ached to get out of these filthy clothes, to submerge her weary body in a hip bath of steaming lavender water, and to turn all her energies and attention to forgetting the horrible episode.
“If that's all, Lord Harrington...” she murmured, heading back toward the door. She should have inquired after Stephen, but she'd stop off in his chambers on the way up to her own and see for herself. She feared the child had grown worse, for something of sad consequence had occupied Lord Harrington the weeks she'd been gone. She'd never seen a man so morose.
“Wait, Mrs. O'Donnell,” he called out, at last rising from his chair. “Please, I must...” All at once he sat back down and suddenly pressed his clasped hands against the center of his forehead, making a sound that caused gooseflesh on Rose's arms.
“Sir?” she inquired. “I thought you'd be pleased with news of the villain's death. He's certainly caused you a mountain of grief.”
He nodded as though he wasn't going to refute her words. Then, speaking carefully around them, he said, “But in the beginning, I loved him as much as my daughter loved him.”
In the beginning, Rose thought wryly. What matter in the beginning? It's what we are and will become that matters.
“Did Aslam say... how? When?” Lord Harrington asked, looking up.
“No, he said nothing. Now I've told you everything, and if you'll excuse me, I'm very exhausted and cold and hungry...”
“Of course,” he murmured.
She sensed an apology in his voice. As she started toward the door, she called back over her shoulder, “I will place an itemized account of my expenses on your bureau come morning.” She waited for a response, and when none was forthcoming, she drew open the library door and felt the pronounced chill of the hall.
“I trust Stephen is no worse,” she said. “I'll look in on him on my way - ”
“No!”
Surprised, she looked back. “I beg your - ”
“I said no,” he repeated, his voice growing stronger. “He's sleeping.”
“Then I'll wait until he awakens.”
“No, Mrs. O'Donnell, I don't want...”
“What, Lord Harrington?” she asked, her voice hard with a slight edge. She was sick to death of men and their weak purposes and weaker wills. “What precisely is it you want? Tell me.”
Under the duress of the direct challenge, the man faltered, as she knew he would. She was about to repeat her intention to stop in at Stephen's chamber when once again the man stopped her.
“I... don't want you to see the boy,” he said with a directness that alarmed her.
“I said I'll wait until he awakens.”
“No. I mean I don't want you to see the boy... ever.”
Shocked, she thought one word — “ingratitude.” “I'm afraid it's my turn to express puzzlement,” she pronounced primly.
“I don't want you to see Stephen, or Frederick either. They mustn't know about their father's death. Not yet.”
“Then I shan't tell them.”
“No, it's more than that. It's...”
Again he faltered, and Rose O'Donnell clearly saw the handwriting on the wall. She was being dismissed, although why, she had no idea. And there was that word again in her consciousness — “ingratitude, male ingratitude.”
“Lord Harrington, please don't confuse the message with the mes-
senger,” she said, pleased with herself for coming up with that bit of wisdom.
“I’m not, Mrs. O'Donnell,” he said, new kindness in his voice. “And I know what you're thinking. I'm not dismissing you. The truth is that Mr. Parnell has need of your... services.”
Interested, though distrustful, she held her temper. “Mr. Parnell?” she asked, warning herself not to let her hopes rise too high.
“He has your passage to America. He needs a connecting link that he can trust to run messages to the Skirmishers.”
All at once both her heart and her hope vaulted. Dear God, it was her dream come true! But cautious, be cautious...
“He has plenty of loyal men to run his - ”
“No. Men are being too closely watched and checked,” Lord Harrington said, shaking his head and moving closer. “Mr. Parnell thinks a woman will be able to pass with greater ease.”
“Is this... true?” she sputtered, still thinking he'd retract part or all of it, that it was merely a lie to serve his own ends.
For the first time since she'd entered his presence, he smiled. “It's true, I swear it,” he said. “In fact, as soon as you are rested from your journey, Mr. Parnell will be expecting you in Dublin so that a date for your departure may be set.”
Dear Lord, thank you! She breathed the quick prayer, then turned immediately to the door. “I need no time for rest, Lord Harrington, just a brief interval to restore myself and gather up my belongings. Then, with your permission, I'll be on my way to Dublin.”
“Of course with my permission.” Lord Harrington nodded, a smile on his face.
For a moment there was something unpleasant that lodged in her consciousness. Why was it he seemed so relieved at the prospect of her departure? Well, no matter. The men of this once grand country were dying, as was the country itself. All the true lifeblood, the men who were still capable of daring, had been sent to America. Now she could shortly follow, there to be reunited with that grandest of all men that God did ever create, Denis Bourke O'Donnell.
“Then I'm off,” she said, and started with renewed energy down the cold corridor, and saw ahead not the frayed runner which ran up the creaking staircase, but the shores of America, which she was certain would receive her kindly and make room for the talented, resourceful, and Christian lady she knew she was.
Lord Harrington held his position in the library door until he made certain the distasteful woman had indeed bypassed Stephen's door and
was safely ensconced in her own room on the third floor, preparing for her departure from Talbot House, from Dublin, from Ireland, thank God.
He leaned heavily against the door frame, feeling every day of his seventy-six years. Briefly he envied John Murrey Eden for entering the peace of death so prematurely. No, he didn't mean that, and God forgive him. And John's death — my God, it was a waste of one of the most infinitely varied and gifted personalities he'd ever known.
Should the boys be told? Stephen particularly seemed to cling to a very idealized and romantic dream.
“Someday, when Papa is ready, we’ll all go back.”
To tell the boy now there would be no reunion, no return to Eden, might in a very real way hinder his recovery. No! The news would have to wait until the boy fully regained his strength. Lord Harrington paused outside the closed door in order to adjust to the fact of his cowardice. As he waited, he heard two young piping voices raised in dispute.
“It is so your fault! You ordered the army forward, and they - ”
“They would have moved anyway,” Stephen protested angrily.
How good it was to hear anger in that small boy’s voice that a mere two weeks ago had been too weak to ask for water.
Lord Harrington stood a moment longer, seeing John's face everywhere, in the curious configuration of January sun and shadow through the lace curtains at the far end of the long corridor, in every aspect of his mind and memory. Quickly he pushed open the door.
The two miniature generals were on their knees, the “battlefield” between them. Stephen wore the robe and slippers of his confinement, while Frederick appeared to be lost in a gray hand-me-down sweater from Stephen, which obviously had been handed down several months too soon. The battles — both of them, the one on the board and the one between the two boys — still raged.
“Napoleon would have performed with greater genius had he not been ill,” Stephen announced, obviously identifying with the emperor who at Borodino had ordered eighty thousand French, German, Italian, and Polish soldiers to fight to their deaths.
Frederick, one year younger and not naturally as aggressive, was more intelligent and therefore intimately acquainted with all the statistics of that dramatic and fateful battle.
“What difference does a cold make?” Frederick protested, growing every day to resemble his mother, Lila, delicate, fair, light blue eyes, inquisitive, sensitive. “The face of Russia was not transformed at the will of one man. One man can do nothing.”
“It wasn't Napoleon's fault,” Stephen muttered defensively.
Lord Harrington stood very still, amazed Frederick had briefly taken the upper hand.
“Of course it wasn't,” Frederick readily agreed, at last backing off his knees and slumping deep into the chair. “I never said it was. Napoleon did not fire at anyone. All that was done by his soldiers. Therefore, it was not he who killed those men.”
“That's what I said,” Stephen repeated triumphantly, with just a hint of scheming to his voice, as though deep down he knew he hadn't said that at all, but to say it now would make him appear victorious.
Shades of John.
Lord Harrington announced his presence from the door. “May a neutral party join the battle? I promise to keep quiet and not - ”
“Grandpapa!” It was Frederick who shrieked the greeting and hurried across the room for a warm embrace.
Lord Harrington was only too happy to receive him, this living part of Lila.
“Stephen is mad at me again,” the child mourned, nestling into Lord Harrington's arms. Stephen's approval as older brother meant a great deal to Frederick.
“Why is Stephen mad at you?” he inquired, carrying the boy like an infant back to the large window, where the heavy drapes had been drawn to let in as much January sun as was available.
“For the same old reason,” Frederick sighed, imitating adult weariness. “Because I won't shout ‘Vive Napoleon!’”
Lord Harrington smiled and winked at Stephen, who had slouched down in his chair.
“I don't care what he says,” Stephen muttered in response to Frederick's accusation. “Napoleon may not have ordained the course of Borodino, but his inferior strategies are superior to any similar arrangements conceived by lesser men.”
“Agreed,” Lord Harrington said quickly, ruffling the boy's hair as he thought again, with ever-increasing pain: John dead...
How sad, he could never watch these two bright miracles grow. Lord Harrington stood for a moment at the arm of Stephen's chair looking down. The only sounds in the room now were those coming from the crackling fire, the staccato bursts of sleet on the large windowpane and Frederick's soft humming.
“How are you feeling, Stephen?” Lord Harrington asked, still holding Frederick and at the same time caressing Stephen's neck.
In answer, the boy merely shrugged and continued to keep a close vigil on the disagreeable day.
As the silence persisted, Lord Harrington briefly regretted interfering with this second Battle of Borodino. He knew one way to stir life back into this frozen room of failed emperors and failed dreams. Though in the past he'd loathed to do it — because then he hadn't been sure if John Murrey Eden was a threat or not — now he knew corpses couldn't threaten and knew further that nothing pleased the boys as much as tales of their father. So, with the creation of a legend in mind, he urged Stephen to scoot to one side of the massive wing chair and eased down into it, cradling Frederick in one arm and drawing Stephen close with the other.
Briefly he felt Stephen's resistance, like the January wind, but held him tightly despite the resistance, saying quickly, “Let's talk about your papa, shall we?” He launched into the subject that he'd once dreaded and which now caused him to feel mournful.
“Your papa...” he mused, pleased at both boys, who were slowly relaxing against him. “Do you know what he was doing the first time I ever saw him?” Not waiting for an answer but sensing their rapt attention, he went right on. “He was sitting flat down in the middle of my garden at Harrington Hall, in the dirt, mind you. A grown man just sitting there like a boy, like both of you, with my daughter — your mother — and both were studying rainbow colors that decorate the backs of earthworms after a May rain.”
Calais, France March 16, 1875
Father John Dudley, age seventy-three, nicknamed “Old Charon” by the French customs officials, stood at the gate leading to the ferry house, as he'd done for the last thirty years, checking not the luggage of boarding passengers for Dover — the French did that thoroughly, if not efficiently — but rather standing there to answer questions. He was capable of answering them in excellent French, better English, flawless German, and magnificent Italian, for in his younger days before he'd become an Anglican priest and long before he'd become Old Charon, he'd studied language and had excelled at it.
On this late winter's evening he drew his monk's robes more closely about him in protection against the damp wind off the water and watched the last passengers hurry by on their way to the ferry house, where, sadly, they thought they would find warmth. The only true warmth on the decaying dock was up there in the French inspector's office, which sat above the loading area, looking down on everything as though from the smug elevation of French bureaucracy.
But at least the passengers were out of the wind in the large crumbling old ferry house until they were permitted to board one of the large packets which plied back and forth across the murky channel waters.
Abruptly he turned toward the end of the long quay leading to the dock house. Something was moving there. Should he go and see? It was such a long distance to make on frozen feet, close to three hundred yards, and he was freezing. What if he walked all that distance only to find a bundle of discarded rags caught on the sharp rocks and twisting in the harsh wind like a collapsed old man, for that's what the blowing rags looked like, and undoubtedly what they were.
Suddenly his attention lifted from the small mystery to a large carriage which had just pull
ed up at the end of the quay and around which appeared to be considerable activity. He squinted harder and saw several footmen arranging steps before the carnage door, saw one unlatch and draw open the door, and saw a child descend. At least from this distance it looked like a child. A few moments later another child emerged, followed by a black-bonneted woman — clearly a nanny — who shepherded them to one side while all waited with what appeared to be nervous anticipation for yet a fourth party to emerge from the carriage.
A lady. Clearly a lady, who stepped hesitantly down the two steps while leaning heavily on the arm of a steward. Her small frame was encased in layers of garments, as though she chilled easily.
Old Charon watched the distant scene, concentrating lovingly on the children until the cold wind caused his eyes to water. He turned away, certain such grandeur did not need him in any way. He stopped his turn briefly to see if the old discarded bundle of rags could still be seen. Gone. Nothing in sight save the large retinue which had just arrived and was now starting down the quay, the children in the lead, each safely tucked away under the protective wings of the black-clad nanny, followed by the woman who continued to lean heavily on two stewards, her head down, her face obscured by the thick black cloak. Though she was walking, her steps were hesitant, the support of her legs questionable, as though if the stewards were to withdraw their support she would surely fall.
Quickly he lowered his head into the coarse fabric of his monk's robes and realized thus far today no one had asked him to identify his ecclesiastical order. He was always secretly pleased when they did, for this gave him an opportunity to respond, “I belong to the Order of Life and worship any god who alleviates pain, compulsion, obsession, and grief.”
The two children were still in the lead, though something had distracted them. They had veered close to the edge of the quay, only to be herded back on track by the nursemaid.
Two of them. Two girls? Two daughters — and suddenly an ancient pain like an open wound throbbed at the base of his throat.
Why?
In 1850 Old Charon had taken a leave from the flourishing little parish church in Westminster considered by all to be a necessary stepping-stone to the abbey, which in turn was a necessary stepping-stone to Canterbury. He'd also kissed good-bye the three jewels in his personal crown: his wife, Florence, and his two beautiful little daughters, Amy and Trudy.
Eden Rising (The Eden Saga Book 5) Page 41