Philanderers Gone

by Beth Byers

  “I don’t know if I’m crying for him or for that fool girl who believed his love letters. Ah,” Hettie said, pressing her lips with her fingertips, “I miss her sweet heart. She was a peach.”

  “Maybe you’re crying for a little of both,” Ro suggested, pulling a handkerchief out of her handbag to give to Hettie. “I’m struggling to feel sad when I’m just so angry. I’m angry with my parents for pushing me into marrying Leonard, I’m angry at him for making me think he’d be true to our vows, and I’m angry at me for falling for it all. I’m furious about those lost years while I was being disillusioned, and I’m angry at my heart for being so heartless. I mean, by Jove! The man I married is dead. I should care more. I feel—”

  Ro slumped into a seat, and the two of them stared at each other.

  “Like it was inevitable now that it’s happened?” Hettie guessed. “This was always how it was going to end, wasn’t it?”

  Ro nodded and they sat silently together. Who else would recognize what this moment was but the other? Hettie didn’t know Ro’s favorite color, her childhood dreams, whether she’d wanted children, what her favorite food might be. None of that and yet—Hettie understood Ro all the same.

  “What’s your favorite color?” Ro asked suddenly.

  Hettie blinked, startled. Had she and Ro been sharing the same thoughts?

  “Blue? I think? It was blue the last time I thought about it. You?”

  “Red. What’s your favorite food?”

  “Gin after Harvey leaves.” Hettie laughed bitterly. “He did always ruin the things I loved. I won’t enjoy that the same way anymore, will I? Perhaps fish and chips. Fresh caught that day and still hot. With vinegar. That was what I loved before Harvey. Food lost its flavor a while ago.”

  “That is sad,” Ro said. “I prefer strawberries. Fresh from the garden, cream, and sugar.”

  “I don’t know what to do now,” Hettie said after long minutes of silence. “I knew what to do if the marriage act passed. I knew what I was going to say when my mother told me that marriage is supposed to be forever. I knew what to do for so many scenarios, but not this one.” Hettie jumped to her feet, wrapping herself in her own arms. “I—I—I need to walk. I need to move. I feel like I have something crawling inside of my skin.”

  Hettie disappeared. A moment later, Ro followed. She eventually caught up and twined their arms together.

  “Are we going to have to look at them?” Ro asked. “I’m not ready to see what Leonard looks like dead.”

  “Does he have other family?” Hettie asked.

  Ro nodded. “I suppose I could shove this off on his brother, but then will I regret it later? If I didn’t face that last goodbye?”

  “I need to see Harvey. I need to say goodbye. I need to know it wasn’t a lie. I want to see his dead face and know with my own senses that this isn’t a dream.”

  Chapter 4

  They hadn’t meant to find the morgue, but it appeared as though fate wanted them to face the mistakes they made. There was a neat sign on the wall next to a dark door. They had wandered through halls and down stairs aimlessly, tired from being awake through the whole of the night and numb as their new reality began to settle over them.

  Hettie nibbled on her thumbnail, a bad childhood habit, as she stared at the door marked ‘Morgue.’ Ro was entirely emotionless and dry-eyed.

  A blonde woman exited the morgue, weeping into a handkerchief. Hettie recognized her from the party the previous night. There was a vague recollection of the woman leaving earlier than she and Ro after kissing another woman’s face and saying something into her ear. They’d laughed and then the blonde had called a happy, “Ta!”

  Hettie guessed that the second woman hadn’t survived the night. Seeing the blonde weep made her feel cruel. Happily, or perhaps luckily, the blonde avoided their gazes as she hurried down the hall.

  The morgue door opened and a doctor met their gazes. “Are you here about the yacht accident?”

  Neither Hettie nor Ro answered. They both stared at him and then Ro spun, hurrying down the hall.

  Hettie nodded.

  “We haven’t identified everyone yet,” the doctor said gently. He adjusted his jacket. “Are you here for a loved one?”

  The man’s warm eyes were what made her feel the smallest amount better. Warm eyes with those wrinkles on the edges that declared he was a man who smiled. She liked that. She stared at those wrinkles rather than the problem in front of her.

  “I believe my husband may be here,” she heard herself say. “I’m not sure I’m ready. I think I might be sick.”

  The doctor winced, crinkling those eyes that smiled often. Hettie tucked her hair behind her ear, sorry for him in having to deal with her.

  “Do you want to wait?” the doctor asked. “It isn’t necessary to do this now.”

  Hettie shook her head.

  The doctor eyed her and then with that same gentle sweetness suggested, “What if I were to walk you to my office and give you a few minutes? I’ll come check on you and when you’re ready, you can tell me what he looks like—maybe an identifying mark? I’ll ensure he’s there before you have to face the remains.”

  Hettie nodded, sniffing. “I’m sorry. I just…”

  “It’s quite all right.” His gaze was steady on her and full of gentle kindness, and she had never been more grateful for anyone than him at that moment.

  Hettie sat down in the seat he’d led her to. There was a picture on the desk of a young woman staring up at a younger version of the doctor. He was grinning at the camera, and she smiling at him. Was that what love looked like?

  She was, perhaps, too tired for such a moment. It was before 9:00 a.m., and Hettie had been up since the afternoon before. Her stomach roiled from too much alcohol and not enough food. With the realization that Harvey might be dead, a headache had started to build behind her eyes and she wanted nothing more than a long bath, a massive plate of breakfast, and a long, long sleep.

  When the doctor returned, Hettie stood out of the sheer necessity of escaping to her rooms and taking a few aspirin. The doctor, in that gentle, low voice he must save for the mourning, asked, “Are you ready?”

  “I’m not sure I’ll be ready,” Hettie admitted. She steeled herself. “Harvey has rather an odd-shaped mark on the back of his left shoulder. It’s nearly the same orange-brown as my hair. He has blond hair, blue eyes, and is perhaps a stone or two larger than he should be.”

  The doctor nodded. “I will ensure that I have the right man for you and we’ll step in. You can stay as long as you need.”

  While the doctor prepared Harvey for her, the clock ticked the loudest seconds possible. The tick-tick-tick of the clock sucked her in, and she jumped when the doctor returned.

  “If you’ll come this way—”

  Hettie closed her eyes for a moment. She wasn’t surprised that he’d found Harvey, but it seemed impossible that the fellow who’d bellowed across the room at her the night before was no longer breathing. He’d so fervently kissed his mistress and laughed so hard his pomade had stopped being effective. He’d groaned that afternoon that his wallet was empty and asked her with a charming grin to fill it up. He’d slapped her on the bottom when she’d given him her money to make him leave her in peace. He’d told her that her dress had made her look downright passable despite the spot on her chin. He’d eaten a steak too rare, shoving aside the green beans during dinner. He’d laughed and then begged her for a dance as if she were something other than a source for money, and when they’d danced, he’d smiled at her with the same charm he’d shown when he’d been romancing her.

  She might have liked him all right, if he’d belonged to someone else. She’d have thought his jokes were funny. She’d have winced for his wife and the way his philandering ways would never be what the poor girl wanted, but if he were someone else’s, she’d have liked him all right.

  The memory of his face, grinning at her during their dance the previous evening, haunted
her before she found the courage to step into the next room. She took one slow step through the doors. It was the hardest step she’d ever taken. It was followed by another, slightly easier. With greater ease, she dared to look up.

  On a trolley was a human form covered in a sheet. Hettie paused as the doctor crossed to it. He waited for her while she stared at the form from the doorway. Bloody hell, she thought, bloody hell. This moment felt like a memory. She was so unsurprised to be here, so accepting at the natural conclusion to her life thus far that it seemed she’d done this before. If she’d done this before and survived, she could do it again.

  Finally, Hettie walked to the trolley and nodded at the doctor. She knew, of course, she hadn’t done it before, but playing a trick with her mind to see her through was a gift she wouldn’t turn away.

  He slowly pulled back the sheet, and Hettie kept her gaze on his kind eyes. She didn’t want to look down. She couldn’t. What if it wasn’t Harvey? What if it was? What if he had died and this wasn’t a dream? She bit down on her lip again and then darted a glance downward. She turned her gaze away with a gasp before she’d even registered what she’d seen. Slowly, she breathed in and looked at him fully.

  Those same dark circles were under his eyes, but against his blue skin they were even darker. His hair had clearly been wet, but it had dried and lay about his head every which way, and she couldn’t help but remember the many times she’d caught him smoothing it back. She always knew when he was well and truly sloshed by the state of his hair. If it was perfect, he hadn’t succumbed fully yet.

  The doctor stepped away as Hettie stared down at her husband’s body.

  His lips were blue. Oh god, she thought, why are his lips blue? Why is his skin grey? Why isn’t he breathing? She scowled at him, knowing she’d never forget this moment. Yet another memory, yet another horror, yet another haunting moment.

  “Harvey, you bastard,” she said. “Why am I not surprised that we ended here?”

  She stared at him, hating him and regretting his death at the same time. She had wanted to see him turn to fat, to have his lovers abandon him for someone better, to see him left alone and realize what he’d lost in her.

  He’d made her love him once. She’d wanted to see him realize she’d moved beyond him for all the pain he’d given her. She hadn’t realized until quite this moment how destructive hating him had been. She’d wanted him to regret making her love him and then crushing her, but she hadn’t wanted this.

  “What did you do to me, you bastard, and how am I going to fix it?” She yanked the sheet back over his head and glanced up, only realizing that the doctor was still in the room. She blushed deeply and admitted, “He was a philanderer, a cheat, and a liar.”

  “Ah,” the doctor said, avoiding her gaze.

  “He didn’t deserve to die,” Hettie tried, attempting to sound less heartless. “Just perhaps to be thrown over by his mistress and beaten by her husband.”

  “I’m sure that it must have been difficult.”

  Hettie found a tear slipping down her cheek. “It was rather. I wish he wasn’t dead. I wanted him to stay alive and now I don’t know what do with all of these feelings he’s made me feel.”

  “Just breathe,” the doctor told her. “Just breathe in and out slowly. Remember the good times, forget the bad times, and be grateful you have time yet.”

  Hettie’s bottom lip was trembling and her heart physically hurt within her chest.

  “Does it get better?” Hettie stared at the doctor’s kind eyes. She felt certain she’d be able to tell if he were lying given those eyes.

  The doctor hesitated before answering. “It gets familiar.”

  “Familiar?”

  He looked apologetic as he nodded, but the kind eyes weren’t lying to her. She wanted him to be lying.

  “I’m sorry for your loss.”

  The two of them stared at each other until Hettie found a shred of manners.

  “Thank you.”

  Chapter 5

  Ro wasn’t ready. She despised Leonard. The lying, cheating, rude, mean, manipulative destroyer of dreams. She hurried through the hall uncertain of where she was going, only knowing that she wasn’t prepared to see his face again. The fact that he was dead did not invoke any feeling other than relief and then disgust at herself that someone’s death could cause such a feeling.

  She almost wished he’d been physically abusive so that her relief would be justified. He’d made her feel like nothing. Less than nothing. So worthless she wasn’t even worth slapping. Her feelings were a whirlwind of venom and hatred and guilt in the certainty that he hadn’t found it even possible to give her simply kindness. Despite his vows before God that he’d love, protect, and cherish her.

  Ro found that she’d walked to an exit and pushed through. The garden on the other side was small, but there were a few benches and patients who’d been wheeled outside and left to take the air, as though London’s dirty smog would make a sick man feel better. Ro scowled at the sky and found her own space on a bench. It was in the shadows of a tree, and she hoped that she’d go unnoticed while she delved her soul. Would she be able to look at Leonard one more time? She wasn’t Hettie, and Hettie needed to know for herself. Ro had little doubt that one of Leonard’s grubby, wart-like brothers or cousins would come to take a look for themselves. If they looked, she didn’t have to, right?

  She gazed up at the grey sky, dirty and clouded, then closed her eyes. If she were in the country, she might have felt the sun on her face. She might have been able to take in a deep, cleansing breath and let it slowly out. She had done that, she thought suddenly, with Leonard when they were children. They’d run until they collapsed in a meadow and then close their eyes, letting the sun shine down on them. That was when she’d fallen in love with him. When she was young enough to think that Leonard Ripley, the boy in the big house next door, was lovable. She didn’t know about things like cuckolds, affairs, broken hearts. She didn’t know about walking into your bedroom and finding your husband with a woman you had always counted friend. She didn’t know about how his parents had demanded he marry and settle down and him shouting, “Who should I marry then? Who will satisfy you and make you stop trying to dabble in my life?”

  Why had she married Leonard Ripley? The answer to that question was easy—the pressure of her parents and those days in the sun when they’d found bears and unicorns in the clouds and the future between them had seemed inevitable and beautiful.

  Ro wasn’t sure how long she sat there, staring at the ground and fighting with herself about seeing Leonard. The truth was, she knew she needed to do it. She needed to know he was gone and then handle whatever she felt. Maybe she’d need to find a Catholic priest and go to confession. Maybe she’d need to go for a long walk in nature and talk to God herself. Maybe she’d need to do good deeds until she felt like less of a beast, but she did need to see him.

  “The wife is acting right odd,” a man said.

  Ro recognized the voice of that handsome detective immediately and bit her lip. Was he talking about her? How was one supposed to feel when their husband drowned after probably running his yacht aground while he was drunk? Leonard had been on that boat with his mistress. She had every right to hate him a little.

  “You think she had something to do with it?” the other man, Detective Harris, asked. Ro gaped.

  Do with what?

  “It’s not normal that those two women were together when their husbands died, and neither of them was acting right. The nurse who told them their husbands died said the redhead laughed. Who hears her husband dies and laughs? Villains, that’s who.” Detective Truman was far less handsome than Ro had originally thought.

  “The nurse said that the redhead laughed and cried and was in full hysterics,” Harris reminded his partner. “That nurse had to slap the wife. Could be only woman nonsense. You never can tell when they’re just giving into their weaker nature.” Harris cleared his throat and then growled. “Spoilt li
ttle rich girls who needed a good slap and a few chores when they were younger.”

  Ro’s gaze narrowed. She wanted to cross to those gents, shake her finger under their noses, and scold them. She’d bet they would have been infuriated if their wives stepped out on them. The hypocrisy of men never failed to surprise her. Just what she and Hettie were being held in suspicion of, she wasn’t sure. What had they done so wrong? Not follow their husbands to watch them cavort with their trollops? Find their own moment of happiness at a bottle party among friends?

  She scowled at the detectives until they stepped away, then she traced her path back to the morgue and found Hettie sitting outside.

  “Was it terrible?”

  Hettie nodded. Her face reflected it. Her redheaded complexion was paper white with blue circles under her eyes, emphasized by smeared kohl.

  Ro wasn’t sure she was ready to feel how Hettie looked. “Do you regret it?”

  Hettie shook her head. After a moment, she asked, “Do you want me to go with you?”

  “After I abandoned you? No. Give me a few minutes, sister. May I still stay with you? I don’t think I can sleep in our bed.”

  Hettie nodded, lip trembling. “I’d love to have you. Please, by god, please stay. I’ll be here for you when you’re ready.”

  “We have much to talk about,” Ro said. “I feel like a wrung-out dish rag that has been used to shreds.”

  “I dream of aspirin and my bed with a side of food.”

  “Finally a dream that will actually come true,” Ro said. Their gazes met, and how could they not? Realizing the men who crushed their dreams had died made each of them face those shattered remnants once again.

  Ro stared down at all that remained of her husband and the nightmare he’d sentenced her to when he’d wooed her and she’d fallen for his lies. The doctor lingered near the back of the room as though sensing her need for privacy.

  “You old fool,” Ro whispered through her teeth at Leonard’s gruesome remains. “I didn’t wish death on you. How dare you, after everything, leave me to feel guilt for fantasizing about my freedom? You tried to take everything from me while you lived, and in death, you still achieve the last blow.”