Madness (16 page)

“I’m sorry, Doctor, er—”

“Dr. Herriot, sir. I was just wondering, well, the inmate known as Simon. I don’t know his last name. He did a great deal to help my cousins yesterday, before he collapsed into some sort of fit. I was just wondering if there was something we could do for him. If I could perhaps come see him and try to help him with his condition.”

The tubby little man shook his head. “Your Christian sentiments are most admirable, young man, but some people truly are not worthy of being saved. That man Simon is just such a one. He is an animal. You should thank your lucky stars you were unharmed.”

“An animal?” Antony echoed in confusion. “Oh, surely—”

“An
animal
,” he reiterated, and called to his assistant. “Please get me the file on Simon. I think you’ll find all you need to know on the first page.”

Chapter Eight

When Antony returned from the office of the head of the hospital, Gabrielle could see at once that something had happened. Her cousin’s face was grey from shock.

“Lucinda? Is she—?”

He shook his head quickly. “No, no, everything is fine. If you and Oliver are done, I should like to go home and have a bath and some supper. Then we need to talk.”

“No, it’s not Lucinda, she’s fine. I’m just very tired and disgusted at the moment. Let’s go.”

He took her arm and almost dragged her out to the front gate. She had barely had time to snatch up her cloak and basket before he hurried her out of the asylum as though the common ward were on fire.

She shot a concerned look at Oliver, but her handsome blond colleague simply shrugged and followed on behind.

Antony took her back not the clinic, but their home, a small townhouse which he had had divided into two sets of apartments so that Gabrielle could be moderately independent and no one would attach any scandal to the cousins sharing the same household.

Their housekeeper Mrs. Darnell was a motherly type, but rigidly moral, and would never permit the least hint of impropriety. She sat in a corner with some darning as they conversed, and took meals with them. At the clinic, they were always in company with one colleague or another.

In truth Gabrielle had never looked at Antony as a
beau
, and never would. He was handsome and decent, but had never stirred in her any feelings other than tender regard and esteem.

She knew she ought to go see how Clarissa was managing back at the clinic, but the truth was that she was glad to be home. She was so tired, she decided to forgo a bath in favour of a lie down.

Only several hours later when Antony was feeling calm did he sit her down in his snug parlour and break the news to her.

“I’m sorry, Gabrielle. I can’t allow you to try to help Simon. By all accounts he is a most vicious and dangerous felon.”

“Why? What did he do?”

Antony shook his head. “I’m sorry, Gabrielle.”

“Damn it, Antony, tell me!”

“I really don’t think-”

She made an impatient gesture with one hand. “I don’t care what you think! I want the truth! How bad can it be? I’m a big girl now. I know the way the world works. What’s the worst thing he could have done?”

He sighed, then said, “Raped and killed a woman, and murdered her children as well.”

She felt her heart give a sudden lurch, and was sure it had stopped.
 
Her eyes widened, but she immediately shook her head. “No, I don’t believe it! He saved Lucinda and me from certain rape. As for killing children—”

“I’ve read through all the documents, the court deposition. The fact that he even confessed. He made no secret of his crime. Expressed no remorse.”

“If all of that is true, then why is he in Bedlam?” she asked angrily. “Why not hang or transport him?”

Antony shrugged. “Apparently he has a rich and powerful family who were able to convince everyone that he was certifiable, so he escaped the gallows. It wasn’t the first time he had been given to violent excess with women, and, well, young girls. Very young girls, in fact." He looked as though he would be ill.

"No, I refuse to believe it."

"I'm telling you, I saw the file with my own eyes. I've never felt so, so polluted in my life as I did reading it."

She leaned forward in her chair intently to argue, "There must be some mistake—"

Antony shook his head. "I've seen enough of Alistair and Philip's legal docments to know the real thing when I see it. I’m sorry, Gabrielle. I know you wanted to help him, restore him to the bosom of his loving family, but they don’t want the viper. All I can say is you need to stay away from him if your paths ever cross again.

“And I know I’m supposed to practice Christian forgiveness, but if either one of us ever get the chance to overdose him again, we should take it. Put the animal out of his misery.”

“Don’t you dare say that!” she shouted furiously. “You may well be a doctor, but you’re not God. And he saved both of us! Saved all our lives.”

“The better to roger you both himself!” he fired back.

She was so furious her palms itched to slap her cousin’s narrow face. “No, I don’t believe that for a second.”

“How can you be so naïve?”

“How can you be so sure every word of what you’re saying is true?” she returned furiously.

“Because it’s in the record, and the records don’t lie. There’s even a signed confession with his mark on it.”

“His mark?” she repeated blankly.

“Aye, his mark, plain as day.” He swished an ‘X’ in the air.

She shook her head. “For Heaven’s sake, Antony! He’s an educated man who speaks at least two languages, and you’re trying to tell me that he never signed his own name? Simon? Simon what? What’s his full name?”

Antony shook his head. “What does it matter? He signed the confession outlining all those heinous crimes and more.”

“It
does
matter," she persisted, feeling as though she were fighting for the most inportant thing in her life, though she could not have said why.

"What’s his name, where does he come from? Where did the crime supposedly take place? Don't you dare expect me to just accept your so called facts meekly after everything I've seen and heard with my own eyes. He's not a killer. Not a rapist. What you're saying is impossible. So what's his surname and who is his family?”

“I don’t know," he admitted, his brows knitting. "I can’t recall.”

“For Heaven’s sake! You tell me to forget I ever met the man because he's the most vile degenerate and killer, and yet you don’t know even the most basic particulars about his life? Or even his real name?”

“Everyone assured me that he was dangerous--” he said lamely.

Gabrielle glared at him. “I’ll bet they did. They’ve put him in there to drug him, to get him-”

“There you go again with the mysterious ‘they’ responsible for all of this,” Antony said angrily. “You sound as delusional as he does. He’s a rapist and killer. You’re my cousin, and under my protection. You're under my roof as my relative and in my clinic as my secretary and assistant. But if you persist in this course of folly to try to help this man, I swear I shall send you down to Randall in Somerset and you can work for Blake there.”

“And what of my sister? I’m not going to leave her!” Gabrielle insisted, her blue-green eyes blazing.

Antony's lips thinned. “If you conduct yourself properly, you won’t have to. I know you’re a kind little thing, believe me. I’m sure if you could help everyone in the world you would. You’ve got a heart like a lion. But this man can’t be saved. He doesn’t deserve to be.”

She raised her chin mutinously. “I don't know what you could have read in that spurious report that would cause you to be so, so narrow minded and unforgiving. We run a clinic for harlots, for Heaven's sake."

He said in clipped tones, "Prostitution is one thing, murder quite another."

"In any event, it's not up to us to judge. You tell me you've seen the legal documents and he's had due process of law. They didn't give him a capital sentence, did they?"

"No, but—"

She rose to pace in front of the hearth in the snug burgundy and navy blue parlor. "And no government in the world has the right to drug or torture anyone no matter what they've done. Think how much he's suffered as an opium addict before you start judging him and think he should be put down like an unwanted stray dog."

Antony had the grace to look ashamed at that.

She paused in her pacing and folded her arms across her chest.
 
"And Jonathan Deveril would tell you that God didn’t save us because we deserved it, he saved us in His infinite mercy. Please, Antony, Simon be so much better in no time, once he’s without the opiates.”

“The opiates are probably the only thing that stopped him from swiving you senseless. They deaden desire and generally numb the body.”

She shook her head, and clamped her hands over her ears as if to try to block out Antony's insistence. “I don’t believe you. Why, he was more of a gentleman than any of my brother’s cronies, or Lucinda’s husband!”

Antony looked appalled. “Gabrielle, please, I’m begging you. This man has infected your mind. You need to come back to the clinic with me and forget you ever met him.”

“But I gave my word that I would help him, and you've said nothing thus far to make me change my mind.”

“You can still keep your word then, but don't get personally involved. You send him baskets of food if you like, clothes, but as far as any chance for him to get near you or your sister again--”

She put one hand on her cocked hip. “Don’t try to placate me. We both know about his guards.
 
And if I dare try to help him, not only will he not get the help, I might be making it that much worse for him by showing an interest in him. I don't believe a word of the lies in that report. If he’s really mad or a criminal, why is he being treated like a prisoner with guards watching his every move? Why is he being kept alive, but drugged? It makes no sense. You have the run of the asylum, Antony. You can find out—”

“I’m sorry. It’s too dangerous. I will not have you mixed up—”

"Ah, so you do admit there is more to this than meets the eye."