PortraitofPassion (26 page)

Beatrice curled into a ball on the carriage seat and allowed
Gerald to tuck a lap rug around her. Her mind was eerily blank. It frightened
her, this strange, quiet calm that had enveloped her. She knew she should be
crying, howling with pain, both mental and physical. She could feel blood
dripping from her knee, staining her dress. Her ankle and her hip were
throbbing. Both hands stung from where she had scraped them raw upon the hard
steps. There was a sharp pain above her eye and along her cheekbone. She
suspected she would have a shiner tomorrow.

She listened to the wind and rain outside the carriage,
shivers traveling up and down her limbs. Where would she go, what would she do?
Bea pulled the blanket tight around her shoulders. She had never allowed
herself to think about what if, to consider defeat. She had never imagined she
would lose her bid to regain Idyllwild. She had no alternate plan, no alternate
destination in mind. She was lost, with no direction, no goal, no dream on
which to pin her future. She thought she should feel confused, desolate, abandoned.
Instead she felt cold and empty.

“We’ll have you home in no time, Miss Beatrice,” Gerald
whispered from the floor of the carriage where he knelt.

“No,” Bea replied softly as she gripped his hand. “I want to
go to Idyllwild.”

“Yes miss,” Gerald said. “I’m that certain his lordship will
take you there in a few days when you are able to travel.”

“Please, Gerald,” Bea begged. “We need to go now.”

“But, Miss Beatrice,” he argued, “you cannot just fly north
without stopping home. You have no baggage. We must check with the viscount.”

Bea thought about that, knew he was right.

“Hurry then, before it is too late.”

“Too late?” he asked in alarm.

“I must go now, before they stop me, before they realize my
destination.”

Gerald backed out of the carriage and onto his perch. Bea
relaxed as the vehicle began to move.

The carriage stopped and Beatrice forced herself to sit up,
groaning as pain seemed to shoot everywhere at once. Her entire body felt
bruised and battered, broken.

The door opened and Bertie stood there staring at her in
horror.

“Dear God! What’s happened to you? Who did this to you?” His
voice shook with rage and sorrow. He climbed the steps Gerald had released and
sat beside her on the carriage seat.

“I did it to myself,” she whispered.

“What?” he demanded.

“My lord, Miss Beatrice fell down the steps,” Gerald hurried
to explain. Bea looked out to see him standing there in a weak beam of
sunlight. The rain had finally stopped. “The steps at Hastings House were wet
and slippery and Miss took a terrible fall.”

“Jesus, Beatrice,” Bertie cried. He lifted his arms as to
embrace her only to drop his hand into his lap as if afraid to touch her
battered body. “Come inside now. We’ll take care of you.”

“I can’t,” Bea said, reaching out to lay her hand over his,
giving his fingers a gentle squeeze. “I have to leave, Bertie. I have to leave
now.”

“What? Henry has agreed? But you needn’t leave now… You’re
injured…come inside…I’ll send for Dr. Nelson, Bumble Bea.” Bertie’s words
tumbled from his lips between gasping breaths and Bea realized he was trying to
hold back tears. Poor Bertie.

“Please, Bertie,” she implored. “I must get to Idyllwild.”

Bertie looked into her eyes and Bea wondered what he saw in
them. Nothing, she thought. He could see nothing, for there was nothing inside
of her for him to see. She met his eyes, watched as his warm blue eyes hardened
with resolve.

“Yes,” he whispered. “We will leave now.” He looked at
Gerald hovering in the open door. “Have Abby pack a bag for Bea, and Simmons
one for me. Grab whatever you will need. Quickly now.”

Gerald ran to do his master’s bidding, leaving Bea and
Bertie sitting in the carriage.

“What happened?” he asked softly.

Bea looked out the window to the gray clouds in the sky
before answering.

“Henry refused me.”

Bertie did not speak. What was there to say?

They sat together in silence, their hands joined upon the
seat between them while servants converged on the carriage, hefting their bags
onto the boot in the back. The carriage jumped and rattled and still Bea and
Bertie sat quietly together.

The door opened and Abby joined them, sitting in the seat
across from them, her pretty face troubled. She did not speak.

“We’re ready, my lord,” Gerald said as he lifted the
carriage steps.

At Bertie’s nod, Gerald closed the door. Slowly the carriage
began to roll out of the muddy stable yard.

Beatrice closed her eyes.

She slept, a deep, dreamless sleep. She awoke curled into a
ball upon the carriage seat once more, the blanket tucked securely around her.
It was nearly dark. She looked over to see Abby and Bertie watching her. She
thought they looked odd, as if they were floating above the seat before she
realized that her right eye was swollen almost shut, her temple throbbing. She
attempted to move, to sit up, but her limbs were weighted down somehow.

“Bertie,” she whispered.

“Hush, Bea,” he said, leaning across the space that
separated them to brush back a lock of her hair that had come loose from the
knot atop her head. His hand was infinitely gentle and Bea turned her face to
nuzzle into its warmth. She winced at the pain that pulsed through the other
side of her face, her eye, her cheek and temple.

“You’ve slept the day away, miss,” Abby said softly. “My
lord says we’re near to the inn where we will spend the night.”

Bea closed her eyes again and allowed sleep to overcome her
once more.

When next she woke she was in Gerald’s arms as he carried
her through the night into a shadowy structure. She heard the wind blowing
through the trees, crickets chirping wildly. She smelled fresh-cut grass and
loamy, rich soil. She smiled and looked up at the stars in the dark sky. Home,
she thought, and allowed her eyes to close once more.

Beatrice spent the night in a strange world of pain and heat
after Abby bathed her and dressed her wounds. She thought she must have caught
a fever. Chills raced along her spine. She was briefly aware of Bertie sitting
beside her, whispering to her in the dark of night. She knew Abby had climbed
into bed with her to hold her as her body shivered with cold. She wondered if
she was dying but could not bring herself to care.

In the darkest hours of the night she thought she heard a
deep, soothing voice. Simon. She tried to open her eyes, to see his beloved,
solemn hazel eyes, to beg his forgiveness, to tell him how much she loved him.
She was afraid she would die without him knowing that she loved him, that she
was sorry for her deception, sorry right down to her soul. More importantly,
she was afraid she would never be able to tell him that she forgave him for that
terrible night. She wanted to tell him that she understood he had been driven
by unbearable anguish. She was afraid that if she died without him knowing that
she forgave him, he would never forgive himself.

Her fever-induced dreams were filled with images from her
past. She saw her father riding toward her on a giant black stallion, but when
he neared, it was Simon calling out to her.

“Whore. You bartered your body for a burned-out hovel.”

She turned and ran and suddenly it was snowing so hard she
could barely see. She ran into the woods, desperate to reach home. She smelled
smoke and broke through the trees to watch in horror as Idyllwild burned before
her eyes.

“No!” she cried, thrashing about in an attempt to
disentangle her limps from the blankets that were twisted around her.

Strong hands grabbed her, held her down.

“Bea, hush, it is only a nightmare.”

Yes, she thought, recognizing Bertie’s voice above her, his
hands gently soothing her.

“A nightmare,” she murmured. “My life has become a
nightmare.”

She dreamed she was in a crowded ballroom, dancing with
Simon. Then he was kissing her passionately, his hard hands upon her breasts,
between her legs. She leaned back from his embrace to draw air into her lungs
and when she looked up it was to see Henry’s blue eyes staring down at her, his
hands upon her.

“My sister,” he whispered as his head dipped toward her, “my
whore.”

She struggled in his arms, trying to get away from him, from
the wicked way he looked at her.

“No!” she moaned, thrashing about. “No, Henry, no.”

“Oh miss, shhh. There is nothing to fear.” Beatrice
recognized Abby’s soft voice, knew that the girl was crying, wanted to comfort
her, but she was just so tired. She was so very tired. She rolled away from the
soft hand on her heated brow and slept again.

Finally, Bea awoke to feel the warm sun on her closed
eyelids. She heard birds chirping, smelled roses in bloom. She rolled from her
side onto her back, carefully stretching her cramped muscles, rolling her stiff
neck. Without opening her eyes, she took stock of her aches and pains. Her foot
was still sore. Both knees felt tender and bruised and she thought the left
might be bandaged. Her right hip throbbed painfully. She tried to move her
right arm and winced as pain shot through her shoulder. There was a steady
pulse of pain in her head.

She opened her eyes to find that she was lying on a low,
narrow bed in a pretty room with blue walls and lacy white curtains gently
blowing in the breeze from the open window. She did not recognize the room but
knew she was not at Idyllwild. The smell was different, the sounds foreign. She
looked around and found Abby sitting in a chair beside the bed sleeping
upright. She looked so peaceful there, a soft smile upon her lips, her lashes
brushing her round, pink cheeks.

As if she felt Bea’s gaze, Abby’s eyes popped open.

“Oh miss, you’re awake!” the girl cried before running from
the room.

A minute later she was back with a sleepy Bertie and Gerald
trailing behind her.

The three of them rushed about the room, bringing Bea water,
carefully lifting her head to drink, gently patting her hand, feeling her
forehead. She saw the relief in Bertie’s eyes and realized that her friends had
thought she might be seriously ill. She remembered wondering if she were dying,
feeling as if fire consumed her, the chills that had rattled her bones, the
haunting dreams. She was sore this morning, but clearheaded and anxious to be
on the road once more.

Amid protests and gentle admonishments to rest, Bea rose
from the bed to find that her legs were weak and her vision blurry. She held
herself still until she was able to focus once more.

“Abby,” she said, holding her trembling hand out to the
girl. “Please help me to dress. I’d like to go to breakfast and be on our way.”

“Yes miss,” she agreed. She looked to Bertie for
confirmation and Bea saw him give her a quick nod.

An hour later they were on the road once more. Bea sat
quietly beside Abby and watched the countryside go by outside the small window.
She felt her weariness, her sorrow and anger melt away with the miles, until by
evening when they stopped at another small inn she felt a soft smile upon her
lips. As she stepped from the carriage with Gerald’s assistance, she looked up
to the darkening sky, saw the crescent moon, breathed deeply of the cool night
air and felt hope drift through her.

Later that night as she lay in the big bed above the taproom
with Abby softly snoring beside her, she thought about the day ahead. They
would reach Idyllwild in the early afternoon. She imagined the first sight of
home, the moment when she would be on the land. First the carriage would turn
onto the long drive and amble through the shady wood. Then she would see the
sun streaming before them as they broke through the forest. Out before her, all
around her would be the softly rolling hills, the fields of tall grass and
wildflowers blowing in the wind. The carriage would crest a small rise and up
ahead would be the cottage, standing serenely atop a gentle knoll, sunlight
bouncing off her windows, warming her weathered gray stones. She pictured the
ivy trailing up and around the chimneys, across the stones, wrapping around the
house like so many arms cradling her.

“Home,” she whispered as she rolled onto her side away from
the sleeping girl. Tears rushed to her eyes, hovered and fell, rolling slowly
down her face to land on the pillow. She did not sob, did not make a sound, she
simply allowed her sorrow to escape with her tears, to fly away into the quiet
night.

So many mistakes, she thought on a sigh. How had she not
seen the curve in the path she had chosen? How could she have thought that she
could come to know Henry and not love him? She was amazed at her arrogance, to
think that she had believed she would spin a web around him to secure his affection
without being caught in the silk threads she had woven. She should have known
the very first time she looked up into his face, Papa’s face, that she would be
trapped, held by his merry blue eyes and rumbling laughter.

And Olivia? She had not imagined meeting her sister when she
had embarked on her mad scheme. But she had. She had seen her and loved her
instantly, had sensed their shared dreams and sorrowed to see how Olivia’s had
been burned to ashes through carelessness and neglect. She wondered if Olivia
had seen the curve in the path, had known that Beatrice’s dreams were destined
to burn away to ashes as well.

Finally, she allowed herself to think of Simon. To admit
that he did exist, that he lived and breathed, that he would go on living
without her. She wondered if he would ever come to understand what she could
not understand herself. She wondered if already he understood the desperate
need that had driven her for nine long years, the desire to find her place in
the world once more, to live and breathe with the knowledge that she was safe,
home. She thought that perhaps he did understand, that somehow he had
understood her all along even while she had traveled down that path blissfully
unaware of the upcoming curve.