Elizabeth Mansfield (8 page)

"Not know who we are?" Her ladyship sneered. "Don't be a fool!" With a gesture of dismissal, she turned on her heel and marched up the remaining stairs, muttering in disgust, "Not
know
us? Not know
us!
I've never heard such nonsense in all my life!"

Chapter 10

After the doctor left, Jeremy had sent everyone in the household to bed. He himself, however, had spent the night in the room with the sleeping Lady Beringer. For a long while he'd stood over her, staring at her face by the light of the candle he held. He was fascinated by that face. Although she was not in the first flush of youth (there were, indeed, tiny lines beginning to show at the corners of her eyes), and although her dreadful accident had left a large purple bruise round her left eye and over the cheek that still held a streak of yellow paint on it, he thought her beautiful. There was something about her—a look that combined an exquisite delicacy with a courageous strength—that moved him to the core. She reminded him of a Botticelli painting he'd once come upon that he'd stared at for hours. She had the same ropy gold hair, the same perfection of features, the same quality of ethereal loveliness. Such fragile beauty should not be made to endure the pain and suffering that this visit to his home had inflicted on her.

He continued to stare at her until the candle burned almost to the socket. Then he blew it out and sank into a chair beside her bed, determined to keep vigil.

By morning, however, he'd fallen into an uneasy sleep. Thus, when Cicely burst into the room very near hysterics, followed by her aunt and an apologetic Hickham, he was caught unprepared. "Cicely!" he muttered, blinking himself awake. "Perhaps you should wait outside until Dr. Swan—"

But Cicely caught a glimpse of her sleeping mother's bruised and battered face.
"Oh, my God!"
she cried out in horror.

Cassie heard the cry and stirred. Dr. Swan had dosed her with a strong solution of laudanum to ease her pain and 30+help her rest. The loud cry of anguish awakened her from the depths of a drugged sleep. Feeling utterly thick-headed and bewildered, she opened her eyes to find a strange young woman bending over her, crying, "Oh, my poor mama! Your
face!
"

Cassie, her head throbbing with pain and her mind clouded in confusion, shrank away from this stranger who was trying to embrace her. "Who... are you?" she murmured fearfully.

"Oh, Mama! Surely you recognize me! It's Cicely!" the girl said, tears filling her eyes.

Lady Schofield, who'd always believed that strength of character could overcome any impediment, had little patience for what she saw as mental weakness. "Of course you remember Cicely," she insisted, "even if you
are
a little muddled. Be
firm
with yourself!"

Cassie stared at these two new strangers in complete and terrifying confusion. "I'm sorry," she managed, edging back against the headboard and holding her comforter up to her neck as a shield, "but I... I have no... no recollection of..."

Jeremy gave his butler a glare that said without words,
How could you have let them in without announcing them?

Hickham responded by merely shrugging helplessly.

Meanwhile, the distraught Cicely bent over the bed and grasped her mother's shoulders. "But you
must
know me!" she insisted, trying to shake her mother into remembering. "I'm your
daughter!"

"P-please," begged the panic-stricken Cassie, "let me go!"

Jeremy pulled the girl from the bed. "Cicely, my dear, you're frightening her," he said. "Let your aunt take you downstairs to the morning room. The doctor should be arriving shortly. After he's explained your mother's condition and answered your questions, we can all sit down and help you decide what to do."

During this speech Eva Schofield had been gaping at her sister wide-eyed. For the first time since she'd had word of the accident, it occurred to her that something truly dreadful had happened to Cassie's mind, something that even firmness of character could not overcome. Her heart clenched in her breast. "Lord Inglesby is right, Cicely," she said, forcing herself to stay calm. "We must wait and speak to the doctor. Come with me downstairs." And she pulled the weeping Cicely from the room.

Hickham led them down to the morning room, where a breakfast buffet had been set. Charlie Percy was seated at the table, sipping a cup of hot coffee. He got to his feet as they entered. "Good morning, your ladyship. I am Lord Lucas. I met you and Miss Beringer several months ago in London, if you recall."

"Yes, of course we recall," Eva said testily. "Nothing has impaired
my
memory. Or Cicely's either." She dropped down upon one of the chairs and tried to calm herself. "Don't just stand there, girl," she added almost automatically. "Say your how-de-dos to Lord Lucas."

But Cicely was too overwrought to cease her weeping long enough to acknowledge his presence.

Charlie, taking no offense, made a leg to both ladies and helped the weeping girl to a chair. "I take it you've seen our patient," he said with what Eva felt was an unwarrantedly cheerful air.

His innocent remark brought on a fresh flood of tears from the young lady. "Mama looks as though she was
m-m-mauled!
"
she wailed.

Charles, though he understood that the first sight of Lady Beringer's bruised face would naturally be a shock to her daughter, nevertheless could not admire such a watering pot. "You mustn't take on so, Miss Beringer," he said, going to the buffet and pouring her a cup of steaming tea. "I know matters seem appalling right now, but your mother will surely recover. Bumps and bruises, no matter how disfiguring and painful at first, do mend remarkably quickly."

"But she d-d-doesn't even re-m-m-member me!" Cicely wept.

"Doesn't she?" He exchanged a disappointed look with Hickham. "We rather hoped she'd recover her memory after a night's sleep."

Eva looked up at him in immediate alarm. "Did the doctor expect her to?" she asked worriedly.

"Dr. Swan thought it quite possible."

Eva covered her mouth to keep from crying out in her distress. Cicely, with a choked groan, dropped her head on her arms on the table. "How can I bear it to have
my own mother
not remember me?"

Charles clenched his teeth to overcome a feeling of impatience toward the girl. "It seems to me, Miss Beringer, that all this must be a great deal worse for your mother. How do you suppose
she's
feeling about being unable to recognize
you?
"

Cicely lifted her head and stared at him, her swollen mouth dropping open."Y-Yes, of course. You're quite right." She wiped her cheeks with the back of a shaking hand. "It must be a nightmare for her. I'm a thoughtless wretch."

Charles set the teacup down at her elbow. "Yes," he said callously, eyeing her with cold dispassion, "I rather think you are.

Upstairs in the invalid's bedroom, Jeremy was attempting to console the trembling Cassie. "Please don't look like that," he said, seating himself beside her and taking her hand. "You will remember everything in time. Dr. Swan said so."

Cassie peered up at his face, which, of all the faces she'd seen looking down at her, was the one with which she was becoming most familiar. "Did he?" she asked, pulling her hand from his and grasping his lapels as if to keep herself from drowning.

Jeremy took her hands in his. "He assured me of it. In fact, he said—"

There was a tap at the door, and the doctor himself came into the room. "And how is our patient this morning?" he boomed with hearty good cheer. But then he saw her anguished face. "Oh, dear," he said, his smile fading, "what has happened here?"

Cassie shuddered and hid her face in Jeremy's shoulder. Jeremy threw the doctor a worried look. "She's had visitors. Her family."
 

"And she didn't remember them?" Jeremy shook his head.

The doctor's face fell. "Do you remember
my
name?" he asked, approaching the bed and lifting her head to look into her eyes.

"Dr. Swan, isn't it?" she offered hesitantly.
 

"Yes, good!"

"But I still don't remember my own name," she said. "Nor that of this kind gentleman."

"That's because I haven't told it to you," Jeremy reminded her gently.

"But I knew it before, did I not? And the names of the ladies who were just here? I must have, for one of them said she was my daughter!" She looked up at the doctor, her eyes distraught. "I've had six visitors so far and was unable to recognize a single one of them."

"Ah, but you counted them. That means you can still calculate."

"Calculate? I merely counted to six. A three-year-old
child
could—"

"Not so, ma'am. With a blow of the sort you suffered, you are lucky you can calculate at all. And not only can you calculate, but you seem to have no trouble remembering words. That's another good sign."

"Is it?" she asked doubtfully.

"Very." He loosened her grip on Jeremy's lapels, sat down in his place and, with gentle fingers, measured the size of the lump on her cranium. It was even more swollen than it had been before. "Head still hurting?" he asked.

"Like the very devil."

The doctor nodded understandingly. "Be patient, my dear. This memory lapse is temporary, I promise you, and so is your pain. I'll give you another dose of laudanum. Sleep's the best curative for concussion."

Despite his hearty optimism, Cassie's anguish was not eased. She watched him prepare the potion—mixing a glass of water with some opium powders taken from his bag—but when he offered it to her, she turned her head away. "I don't want to sleep," she said, reaching out and taking Jeremy's hand for support. "I had dreadful nightmares all night long."

Jeremy took the glass from the doctor's hand, sat down beside her and held it to her lips. "Nightmares are only dark dreams," he said gently. "Wisps of nothingness. They can't hurt you."

His voice and his nearness soothed her. She drank the concoction and sank back against the pillows. "If I didn't have this blasted headache, I'd think
this
was a nightmare," she muttered.

"So it is, in some manner," said Dr. Swan, closing up his bag. "Well, I shall be on my way. Will you come along, my lord, and see me out?"

Jeremy started to rise. Cassie, experiencing a sudden flood of terror at the thought of being left alone with her pain and her despair, raised herself from the pillow and threw her arms about Jeremy's waist. "Don't leave me," she whispered into his chest.

Jeremy could not keep himself from cradling her in his arms. He had the strangest feeling that she belonged there, tight against him. Her closeness, the softness of her, the silken touch of her hair against his cheek, her tremblingly innocent need of him, all combined to arouse in him a feeling of tenderness that was beyond what he'd ever before experienced. If it were only possible, he thought, to take on himself all her pain and her fears, he would do it. He had an overpowering yearning to keep her safe forever, to offer her his protection from all of life's hurts.

But of course he could not encourage these feelings, not in himself and not in her. He was the man whom she'd expressly instructed to stay out of her life. When her memory returned, and she learned his true identity, he would be the man she would wish never to see again.

Realizing that he must not encourage her to cling to him, he loosened her hold on him. "You will not be alone," he said, urging her gently back against the pillows and smiling reassuringly. "I'll send Mrs. Stemple in to stay with you. You'll find her a most comforting companion."

Jeremy and Dr. Swan hurried down the stairs to face Lady Beringer's family. They found the ladies sitting at the table, attended by Charles and Hickham, but in spite of the number of dishes placed before them, they had evidently not touched a bite of breakfast. Eva and Cicely jumped to their feet as the two men entered, their eyes tense and anxious. Jeremy introduced the doctor and suggested that they all sit down.

"Well, Doctor, what did you find?" Eva asked as soon as they were seated.

"I found a patient who's suffered severe trauma," the doctor said bluntly.

"Trauma?" Cicely asked. "What's that?"

Dr. Swan smiled sheepishly. "It's a word we doctors like to use to make us sound important. It simply means
wound."

"Which severe wound are you speaking of, Doctor?" Eva inquired dryly. "Her wrist, her hip or her head?"

"I won't minimize any of them, but I'm sure it's the head wound which gives you, her family, the greatest concern. As, I admit, it does me."

"Why?" Eva wanted to know.

"Because such mnemonic impairment—the abrupt onset of derangement due to memory loss, in plain words—is very rare. I myself have never seen a case of it, although I've read of them."

"Derangement!"
Cicely gasped. "That's a
dreadful
word!"

"Yes, I agree," the doctor said, reaching across the table and patting her hand. "But it is my understanding that such impairment is usually temporary."

"How temporary?" Cicely asked.

The doctor shrugged. "Hours... days... weeks at most."

Eva peered into his eyes intently. "Have there been cases when the... er... impairment has
not
been temporary?" she asked, searching his face for the truth.

He met her look. "To be honest, there have."

"Oh, my
God\"
Cicely wailed.

"However, I have no expectations of such a dour outcome," Dr. Swan assured her. "Your mother seems to have retained a remarkable degree of alertness and responsiveness, as well as a capacity for fairly complicated mental performances, all of which makes me quite hopeful."

"Whatever causes such a strange thing to happen?" Charlie asked curiously.

"I'm afraid we don't know much about how the brain remembers, so we cannot have a precise idea of the damage that external violence does to its mnemonic functions. I can only theorize that the blow or blows that Lady Beringer received caused a numbness in the brain that resulted in the mnemonic loss."