Mrs. Burns nodded in a display of proper interest.
Leaning forward, Isabelle confided, “I believe he’s beginning to regain sensation.”
The housekeeper set down her dusting cloth and stared at Isabelle. “How do you know, ma’am? What have you seen?”
Isabelle mentioned what Alexander had said about feeling a pinch. As she spoke the words, her heart ran faster with the hope they carried.
Mrs. Burns brought her hands together as if saying a prayer. “That would be most welcome.”
“If Doctor Kelley’s predictions were correct,” Isabelle said, a warning in her voice, “such a recovery would entail a fair amount of pain.”
Mrs. Burns said, “And if I could take his pain upon myself, I would.”
“As would I.”
Isabelle saw the housekeeper’s face fill with a look of contentment.
“May I offer a suggestion?” Mrs. Burns said.
Isabelle nodded.
“Keep in mind that one is not at one’s best when there’s a great deal of suffering.”
Isabelle smiled. “Nor when there is a significant life change. Nor a relocation. Poor Mr. Osgood,” Isabelle said. “He may not be at his best now, but his wife hasn’t been in particularly good form at all since the marriage.”
Mrs. Burns patted Isabelle on the arm, her maternal nature overcoming her strict and businesslike propriety for a moment. “Isn’t it a joy to know that the best is yet to come?”
Isabelle caught at Mrs. Burns’s hand. “Do you think,” she said, her voice trembling, “he can learn to love me?”
“Oh, my dear lady,” the housekeeper replied. “It is simply impossible to imagine otherwise.”
Isabelle wished she had the words to properly convey her gratitude for such a generous statement. In place of words, she pressed Mrs. Burns’s fingers and trusted the good woman to understand.
Embarrassed at her emotion, she picked up a decorative wooden bowl from the table beside the window. She turned it in her hands and replaced it.
“I believe a new lamp and matching mirror would look lovely on this table,” Mrs. Burns said. “I have received sketches from a shop for several options for drawing room tables, as well. Let us create a list of each of the furnishings that need to be replaced to make this room more a bedchamber for a married couple and less a compartment for a single man.” She brushed her hands over her apron-covered skirt and said, “There is room for both of you, I daresay.”
Cheeks flushing and heart surging at the implication of Mrs. Burns’s statement, Isabelle picked up the letter she’d written to her mother that morning. “I believe I shall post this while the doctor performs his examination,” she told Mrs. Burns. “A walk will do me good.”
“Very well, ma’am.” The housekeeper’s formality replaced the momentary intimacy of their discussion, returning them solidly to their expected footing.
Isabelle fastened on a coat and hat and stepped out into the bracing autumn wind. She wondered how soon she could expect snow, and what effect, if any, white snow would have upon the bleak gray air of the city. Would the flakes cover the dirt and grime or merely take on their shades? Perhaps, she thought, she’d look out for some late blooms or berries to add an air of festivity to their home after she posted the letter.
Upon entering the post office, Isabelle was pleased to receive several letters. Her mother had sent another, and there was a great, fat, folded delight from Edwin.
Determined to find someplace where warmth overshadowed the chill of the afternoon, Isabelle walked to a teahouse she had passed. Seated in a warm corner by a fire, she looked about the room to find herself the only patron who’d entered alone.
“No matter,” she said to herself, cracking the seal on Edwin’s letter. “This will be company enough.”
And how right she was. The letter was days’ worth of notes scribbled in stolen hours and at strange intervals. He wrote of his Charlotte’s charm and of their mothers’ conspiring to make their wedding the party of the season. He told her of Christmas holiday plans and clever and funny incidents Isabelle would have found delightful even had they been dull. But they were not dull; on the contrary, it was as if Ed sat beside her at this tiny table and spoke to her in the way he’d always done. Reading his words allowed her to fondly remember hours and days and years of playful pleasures.
When she’d had several cups of tea and spent quite a long time suspended in her joyful escape, she knew she ought to return. A shop near the teahouse offered a lovely floral arrangement she carried home to place in the parlor. Or, she thought, if it did not please Alexander, at least she could place it in the drawing room.
With luck, Doctor Fredericks would have left long ago, Alexander would ask about her walk, she would read him passages from Ed’s letter, and her husband would come to love her dearest friend through his writing.
As Mrs. Burns said, the best things were ahead.
Coming through the door, Isabelle heard a loud groan. She dropped her package on the table in the entry and ran to the parlor door, where she saw Alexander lying not on his temporary bed but on a metal-framed cot above which a tall and fierce-looking woman stood pressing on his legs. Isabelle stood mutely staring at this unexpected addition to her household. Alexander groaned again, a sound that filled Isabelle’s mind with visions of more pain to come.
“Hello,” Isabelle said, unable to think of a more suitable interruption.
The woman looked up, said, “Ah, the little wife,” and carried on pushing. Her voice could not have been more dismissive if she had actually asked Isabelle to step out of the doorway.
Isabelle walked forward into the room. “Indeed I am. And you are?” she asked, stopping at the edge of the cot.
“Nurse Margaret,” she said, assuming, apparently, that was sufficient explanation.
“Why are you here?” Isabelle asked. She had only been gone a short time. How had this woman arrived? And for what purpose?
“To nurse this man,” she said. With answers such as these, Isabelle wondered if the woman was simple or if she thought Isabelle was.
“Yes, I can see that,” she said. “But on whose orders have you come?” Isabelle resisted the urge to slap the woman’s hands away from Alexander, who had not spoken a word. Presumably he couldn’t, as he had not stopped moaning.
“Called upon by Doctor Fredericks,” the woman said.
Isabelle scowled.
“Paid for by himself,” she continued, pointing to Alexander. The woman slid her muscular arm beneath his shoulders and bent him at the waist, forcing him into a sitting position. He gasped, and she flattened him again. Isabelle watched, agape, as this woman slung her husband to and fro on the cot.
Finally, it occurred to Isabelle that she should ask Alexander’s opinion of this treatment.
She stepped closer to the cot, and as the nurse hauled up his leg in a violent parody of Doctor Kelley’s muscle exercises, she said to Alexander, “Is this what you want?”
All the air rushed out of him followed by a weak, “No.”
“Stop,” Isabelle commanded the nurse. To Isabelle’s surprise, the nurse complied.
Leaning closer to Alexander, she asked again, “It’s not what you want?”
He closed his eyes. “No,” he said. “Please go.”
Vindicated, Isabelle looked up at the nurse. “You heard Mr. Osgood. Please,” she said, “it is time for you to go.”
“No,” Alexander interrupted. He opened his eyes and looked at his wife. “Not her. You.”
Isabelle felt her mouth open, but no words formed. Even in her mind, she could think of nothing with which to answer him. The intimacy of that very morning seemed all but erased from Alexander’s memory as he dismissed her in preference of this stout and fearsome woman. She felt the foolishness of standing there, unmoving and speechless, but Ale
xander’s eyes were closed and the nurse had resumed her ministrations. Apparently, what was to be said had been spoken.
Shocked and dismayed, Isabelle turned and left the parlor. Over the sound of Alexander’s next painful moan, she called for Yeardley.
He stepped out of his room near the kitchen and said, “Ma’am?” He looked distinctly uncomfortable, and Isabelle realized she’d never initiated a conversation with him.
“I need you to come with me,” she said. Leading the way, she walked to the dining room and sat at the table. She gestured for him to take a seat.
“What happened?” she asked.
“Ma’am?”
She couldn’t tell if he was being difficult or if he really didn’t understand what she wanted to know. Isabelle let out a frustrated breath. Was this what it was going to be like to try to have a conversation with Alexander’s man? Was he not her butler as well? She decided to be perfectly clear.
“What happened when the doctor was here with Mr. Osgood?”
Yeardley nodded. “Very good news, ma’am. The doctor found that Mr. Osgood is recovering some sensation. Said the next step was calling in a nurse, so that is what he did.”
“But you can hear him,” Isabelle said. “The woman is hurting him.” The two of them sat in silence at the dining table for a moment, listening to the slightly muffled sounds of Alexander’s distress.
“Pain signals healing.” Yeardley said it like he’d heard others say it before. Often.
Although she knew it was true, Isabelle understood that it was not the only truth. “Pain also signals the limits of tolerance,” she said. “The nurse needs to go.”
Yeardley shook his head. “Oh, no, ma’am. She will stay until Mr. Osgood is well.”
“She most certainly will not.” Isabelle surprised even herself with the vehemence of her reply.
She stood from the table and walked back into the parlor. Over the moans of her husband, Isabelle called, “Nurse Margaret.”
The woman turned her eyes on Isabelle without taking her hands away from Alexander’s leg.
“I should like to speak with you at the close of your treatment.” She was pleased to hear her voice was sound, firm. “You will find me in the drawing room opposite.”
Among the sounds from the street and the noises coming from the parlor, Isabelle paced the drawing room floor many, many times before the nurse entered.
The woman stood, black leather bag in her hand, in the drawing room’s doorway. Her posture, tall and straight, gave Isabelle to understand that the nurse had no intention of stepping inside to sit. Isabelle felt a renewed sense of foreboding simply being near the frightening woman.
With a settling breath, Isabelle said, “Before you leave, you will kindly explain to me the details of your arrangement with my husband.” Isabelle remained standing, hoping it would make her feel strong.
“I suppose you could ask him yourself,” the nurse said, gazing down her formidable nose.
“At this moment,” Isabelle said, forcing strength into her voice, “I require this information in your words, directly from you.” This act of power and control was exhausting, but the nurse need not know that. If this pretense was required to run a household, Isabelle was unsure she could manage it many minutes at a time.
The nurse opened her satchel and riffled through it, showing clearly that she was giving Isabelle only part of her attention. “I am retained to rehabilitate his muscles until Doctor Fredericks tells me otherwise.”
Isabelle’s instinct was to lash out against such a claim, but as far as she knew, the woman spoke the truth.
With a bracing breath, Isabelle said, “And if I ask you to leave?”
Unflinching, the nurse said, “You’d have to take that up with the doctor. I answer to him. And now I’d like to be shown to my room.”
Isabelle felt her mouth gape open, but she quickly closed it, turned, and brushed past the woman to leave the room. She found Mrs. Burns in the kitchen.
She could not manage any polite preliminaries. “That terrible woman wants a room,” Isabelle said, sounding every bit as frightened as she felt. “Expects it. Practically demands it.”
Mrs. Burns nodded and responded gently. “I’ve been told she’ll have your dressing room, ma’am. Mae and I have moved all of your things into the large bedroom.” His bedroom. The place Isabelle had chosen to sleep for these nights she knew she’d be alone.
Isabelle stamped her foot like she’d done as a small child. “Been told by whom?” she demanded.
Mrs. Burns’s voice lowered in timbre and in volume. “By Mr. Osgood, ma’am.”
Without a word, Isabelle turned and ran out of the room. Nurse Margaret stood in the entry hall between drawing room and parlor, and Isabelle ignored her.
Entering the parlor, Isabelle marched over to Alexander, who still lay on the cot. Without preamble, she demanded, “What is going on here?”
He breathed what might have been a heavy sigh had he the strength to truly fill his lungs. “Attempting to recover.”
“The nurse? Taking a room here as though we were a boarding establishment?”
Alexander dragged his eyes to meet hers. “Doctor’s orders,” he said, exhaustion apparent in his every breath.
“The doctor works for us, not the other way ’round.”
He let his eyes close for a moment. “I apologize for your inconvenience.”
A mirthless laugh escaped Isabelle’s mouth. “My inconvenience is nothing to your agony. You cannot sustain this.”
Turning his eyes back on Isabelle, he said, “I am willing to suffer difficulty if it means I’ll heal.”
Isabelle leaned forward and whispered her fear. “She’s killing you.”
Alexander’s lips turned down. “I can handle this. Worse than this.”
Isabelle heard a plea in his words. Did he fear she doubted his ability? Her reply held more spark than she intended. “I certainly hope so, as this was only the first day.”
Alexander made a sound that frightened Isabelle with its feebleness—a murmur of agreement that was nearly a whimper.
She leaned closer and lowered her voice. “I know I am not a trained professional, but I cannot believe this course can be the correct one. Bring Doctor Kelley to the city. Let him see your progress. There is progress, isn’t there?” What began as despair mellowed to a quiet entreaty.
“Progress is not definitive,” Alexander said, closing his eyes. “For the past days, I might have been fooled. What I thought I felt could be imagined.”
What had he thought? She clamped her mouth closed, fearing that an interruption might silence his admission. Isabelle wanted to assure him—assure them both—that whatever minuscule sensation of healing he’d experienced was real, but she dared not speak.
“Both the doctors spoke of phantom impulses.”
When Isabelle shook her head, Alexander explained. “Often those who have lost a limb continue to feel pain where there can be no pain,” he said, glancing at her and apologizing for the indelicacy of the sentiment. “I was warned not to succumb to false hope.” He closed his eyes again, then reopened them, looked at her, and looked away. “Today, Doctor Fredericks performed the same tests he does in hospital. The results suggest that sensation is returning to my hands and neck.”
Isabelle felt her breath catch as she remembered him returning pressure on her hand, how she’d caressed him while standing before his seated form. Had he felt it?
He filled his lungs slowly, as if to prepare for a long speech. “If that sensation is returning with the small steps we’ve been taking, you and I, just think how my functionality will return under the ministrations of Nurse Margaret.”
His words were bold. His voice was anything but.
“I can do better,” Isabelle said.
Alexander did not answer. Nor did
he meet her eyes.
“I can,” she repeated. “I will learn to push harder, to take you to higher limits. I can do the work so she can be gone.”
Alexander spoke gently. “There is something I need to say to you, and I must know you hear and understand me. Please come closer.”
Isabelle stepped nearer, until the skirts of her dress touched the metal frame of the cot on which he lay.
“You are not a trained nurse,” he said.
“I know. I can learn. I will find someone who can teach me. Doctor Kelley taught me, didn’t he? I can learn more. I can become helpful.”
“No.” Alexander’s word was barely above a whisper, and she saw the hurt in his eyes.
“Why can’t you trust me?” she pleaded.
“It’s not that. I need more help than you can give.”
She could tell this admission pained him.
“I can do better,” she said again.
“Nurse Margaret has years of experience.”
“I don’t like her,” Isabelle said.
With a quirk of his lips, Alexander said, “No one expects you to be her friend.”
“I don’t want her here,” she whispered. “In our home,” she added, feeling the enormity of the presumption of calling it such. She reached for Alexander’s hand and gripped it in both of her own. “Please, please send her away.”
Alexander held her gaze. “If you truly want her gone, I will dismiss her.”
Relief flooded Isabelle. “That is what I want.”
He closed his eyes again. “And I will go with her.”
A gasp.
“Into hospital care.” His clarification did nothing to alleviate Isabelle’s horror at the suggestion.
Her hands tightened over his, and her response came out as a shout. “No!”
He spoke quietly, and it was all she could do to stand nearby and not run in circles about the room, shouting and stamping her feet like an angry child.
“Please,” he said, his voice hoarse from such a long discussion. “Listen to reason. We cannot have it both ways. Nurse Margaret and Doctor Fredericks will make me well if I can get well. That can happen here in this room, or it can happen in an asylum.”
Isabelle and Alexander Page 14