Lady of Milkweed Manor Read online

  “Well, I’d better toddle back to the ward. Just you let me know if you ’ave any trouble, Miss Charlotte.”

  “Thank you.”

  Sally left, closing the door softly behind her.

  Charlotte closed her eyes. “Thank you,” she murmured, but she was no longer thanking Sally.

  Her son suckled a few minutes more, his pink-fair skin and red lips bowed over her white bosom. His little hands, which had bundled into fists, now relaxed open. Eyes closed, he fell asleep, his mouth popping off in a wet sigh of satisfaction.

  “My sentiments exactly,” she whispered and held him close. She leaned down and kissed his temple with the fine, downy brown hair. She studied his profile. So like his father. Was it possible for an infant to so resemble a man, or was she imagining it?

  “If circumstances were different I should have named you for him. But as it is . . .”

  Tears filled her eyes and, though she squeezed them shut, hot wet streaks escaped and seared paths down her cheeks, alongside her nose, rolling under her chin.

  Oh, dear God, she silently entreated. Please, please make a way. I know I do not deserve your mercy, but this little one does. Please watch over him. Please show me how to provide for him—make a life for him. I cannot do it without you. Please, make a way.

  Daniel sat on the periphery of a group of gentlemen. The club was busy this night. He had met with the secretary of the Manor Home for Unwed Mothers earlier about the reduced funding over the last six months and possible ways to cut expenses. One of Daniel’s least favorite topics. The man had just bid him good evening and Daniel drank the last of his tea, somehow enjoying the disjointed hum and drone of deep male conversation though not participating himself.

  “How is your wife, Harris?” someone asked. The voice was familiar.

  Daniel looked up. Charles Harris must have come in during his meeting with the secretary—he had not noticed him there before. Harris was seated with a group of men, speaking with Lester Dawes, a physician who had been a year ahead of Daniel at university and with whom he had a passing acquaintance.

  “Katherine is . . . well, how are we putting it delicately these days? Great with child.”

  “Let’s see, you two have been married, what—eight months? Nine?” Dawes said. “Someone did not waste any time.”

  Harris, perhaps hoping to direct attention away from himself, caught Daniel’s eye across the narrow room. “And you, Taylor, how is that lovely French wife I’ve been hearing about?”

  Daniel was dismayed when all those dark and silvery heads turned his direction. He swallowed. “Fine, I thank you.”

  “I am beginning to believe Mrs. Taylor is just a creation of our dear friend’s imagination.” Dawes grinned indulgently. “I have not laid eyes on her this half year at least.”

  Daniel felt compelled to speak. “Mrs. Taylor is also expecting a child.”

  “Well, well,” Harris said.

  “Lot of that going ’round these days,” a portly man muttered meaningfully.

  Then a clearly inebriated dapper gentleman, a Lord Killen, Daniel believed, spoke up. “I say, Taylor, my wife tells me she saw you, em, consulting with that vicar’s daughter, Miss Lamb. Is it true?”

  “Is what true?” Daniel realized this must be the husband of the ladies-aid volunteer who had seen him talking with Charlotte at the Manor.

  “You know, what they are saying about her. Laid up, you know, ruined and all that.”

  Daniel brought his empty teacup to his lips to buy himself a moment. When he spoke, he feigned a casual tone. “I am not personal physician to the Lambs, but I have, as you say, consulted with Miss Lamb on a few occasions about a simple malady. And when I saw her, she appeared quite the same as ever.”

  “What?” the portly man asked in disbelief. “When was this?”

  “I’d say the occasion in question was about two months ago.” He turned to Lord Killen, whose wife had reported the meeting.

  “Does that seem right to you?”

  “About so long ago, yes.”

  Harris was looking at him closely. “This malady you saw her for. Is she quite recovered?”

  Daniel stared at him, no doubt severely, then forced himself to take a deep breath. “Yes. When last I saw her, she was recovered quite nicely. The picture of health.”

  “And when was that?”

  He looked at the man meaningfully. “Six days ago now.”

  “She is . . . back to her old self?”

  “As much as one can be, yes.”

  “Well, I for one am glad to hear those rumors put abed,” Harris pronounced. “I was always so fond of Miss Lamb.”

  “As am I,” Daniel agreed quietly.

  “I still say there is something afoot,” Killen said. “I have not seen her these many months. And when I asked her father, he was quite rude in not answering me.”

  “Her father is always rude when not making sermons,” Daniel said.

  “Even then on occasion,” Harris added.

  The gentlemen began talking of other things, and Daniel soon left them.

  Mr. Harris followed him out into the gallery. “Charlotte told you, then?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Do not play me for a fool. You know what I mean. Miss Lamb. She told you.”

  “Miss Lamb has not uttered your name, Harris. She has told me nothing, but this very evening someone revealed your part in her fall.”

  “Who?”

  “You did. Your words, your looks have said it all.”

  “It is not as it appears, Taylor.”

  “And how does it appear? That a supposed gentleman has ruined a young gentlewoman, then left her to fend off the wolves for herself and his child? That not one thing has been done to make amends?”

  Harris glared at him, anger beading in his dark eyes. “My hands are tied here, man. If but I could, I would. You force me to say what I would conceal from everybody . . . from every man in that room.”

  “I force nothing.”

  “You force me to admit I have no money. Nothing. I am holding on to my family estate by the thinnest thread. The fire, the repairs have brought me to the end of my means. The only cash I have is what my wife sees fit to allow me of her father’s money and that is but a pittance, doled out in careful drops to keep me on a short tether.”

  “Bit late that. Why not tell her? Charlotte is her young cousin. Would she not feel some pity for her sake if not for yours?”

  “You do not know my wife. I would lose everything. I would be in even less of a position to help Charlotte than I am now. Perhaps in time . . .”

  “You could give the child a name.”

  “I cannot. As I said, Katherine is expecting her own child any day.”

  “Congratulations,” Daniel said dryly.

  “Thank you. Contrary to appearances, I am looking forward to being a father.”

  “You already are one.”

  Harris studied the floor for a few moments, then asked quietly, “I have no right, I realize, but could you tell me . . . the babe is healthy?”

  “Yes, extremely so.”

  “A . . . girl?”

  “A son.”

  Harris stared at nothing, shaking his head. “A son,” he breathed.

  “Yes, a son who will grow up in shame and poverty while you play at cards and live in comfort in a fine house—no, make that two fine houses.”

  Anger flashed in the man’s eyes. “Taylor, you overstep yourself.”

  “No, sir. It was you who overstepped yourself some nine months ago when you took advantage of a girl half your—”

  “Lower your voice! She is not half my age, and I will not stand here while you throw out unmitigated charges against me. Has she accused me of anything?”

  “No. She refuses even to identify you. That girl has idolized you for as long as I have known her—though I cannot fathom why.”

  “That’s right. You wanted her for yourself, but she refused you.”
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br />   “Her father refused me, yes, but that is neither here nor there.”

  “Well, here is your chance, then. Perhaps you ought to set her up somewhere, support her yourself.”

  “I am a married man, as well you know.”

  “As am I, but you would have me do the same.”

  “I am not the child’s father.”

  Three older men came out, putting on their coats and eyeing the two of them curiously. Harris glanced at the men, then back at Daniel, saying a bit too loudly, “Well, who can say with women today. One never knows.”

  Daniel swung at the man’s face, but Harris was quicker and stronger and caught Daniel’s hand in a grip strengthened with constant horsemanship, no doubt, and rough compared to Daniel’s sensitive, skilled hands. Harris squeezed Daniel’s hand painfully tight.

  “A pity to break a surgeon’s hand—do you not think?”

  “Physician,” Daniel said through gritted teeth and stomped on the man’s foot.

  Harris howled and reared back. He released Daniel’s hand and pulled back his arm, thick hand clenched in a fist.

  “Mr. Harris!” A young manservant ran up the salon steps, clearly panicked.

  Mr. Harris faltered and swung around to face the newcomer. “What is it, Jones?”

  “It’s her ladyship, sir. The babe’s come early, and she’s having a hard time of it. That man-midwife says something isn’t right.”

  Fight forgotten, Harris winced. “I told her to have a physician. But she insisted on Hugh Palmer, some accoucheur popular with her friends.”

  “Please, sir,” the servant Jones begged. “He says come at once.”

  Harris paled. Clasping Daniel’s arm he urged, “Taylor, I know you despise me, but please, for my wife’s sake . . .”

  “Of course.”

  They arrived to screaming. Charles Harris cringed and his expression faded to an ashen mask of panic. “Good heavens.” He swiveled to face Daniel. “Please help her.”

  Daniel took the stairs by threes, his medical bag swinging with each upward lunge. Harris followed close behind.

  Hugh Palmer, an elfin-faced beauty of a man, met them at the door, his expression grim. “You are too late.”

  “Too late!” Harris exploded.

  “The child has come,” the accoucheur announced, “after much struggle.”

  Daniel noticed the blood on the man’s hands and the fatalism in his voice.

  Harris cringed again. “Then, why is she still screaming?”

  “The child is . . . I did my best to revive him, but I fear he is not long for this world.”

  “No.” Harris bolted past the accoucheur, through the sitting room and into the lying-in room. Daniel followed. A monthly nurse was trying to keep a wild-faced Lady Katherine from leaping from her delivery cot.

  “Where is my baby? Give me my baby! Charles! Oh, thank God you are here. They have taken our baby, Charles. They have taken our baby!”

  Harris rushed to his wife’s side, and Daniel looked around the room. The nurse nodded toward a table near the door. Daniel jogged over and laid his ear on the chest of the swaddled babe. The skin was warm but he could hear no heartbeat. He struck the soles of the infant’s feet to stimulate crying, to no avail. He began blowing small puffs of air into the tiny mouth and lungs. Laying his long hand on the child’s abdomen, he applied gentle pressure at regular intervals to mimic exhalation.

  “What is he doing? Is that my baby? What is he doing to him?”

  “Hush, Katherine. Lie back. That is Dr. Taylor. He’s an excellent physician. Everything is going to be fine.”

  Daniel doubted the words.

  The nurse approached and quietly suggested they move the baby to the sitting room, out of view of the missus. Daniel complied.

  “The physician is going to examine the babe in the other room, missus,” the nurse soothed. “He’ll be back soon.”

  Daniel carried the newborn to the sitting room and took a chair near the fire to keep the babe warm. He continued his attempts to rouse the child. There was little hope of success, but he had to try. For the devastated mother, for Harris even, and for himself. Daniel bitterly assumed the male midwife had disappeared, far from the wrath of father and misery of mother. He wondered if the man even had any hospital training. Accoucheurs were all the rage with the aristocracy, and Daniel, like most physicians, found them a threat—to their own practices, yes, but also to the medical hierarchy and standards of care.

  The nurse paused in the doorway. “Shall I give her some laudanum, sir?”

  Daniel paused momentarily in his task and sighed. “Please do. And do not be stingy.”

  The nurse disappeared into the other room, and a short time later Lady Katherine’s heartrending shrieks quieted to pitiful sobs.

  Harris joined him. “Well?”

  Daniel shook his head. “Only the faintest of heartbeats. I am afraid we are losing him.”

  Harris stared blindly at him. “Dear God, no.”

  The accoucheur reappeared in the doorway, leather bag in hand. “Do not blame providence. I find women who live in affluence and luxury often endure prolonged suffering and more difficult births than the lower orders of women.”

  “How dare you . . .”

  Harris lurched forward, raising his arm to strike the man, but Daniel called out, “Harris, don’t.”

  Slowly, Harris lowered his fist and his voice. “Get out of my house this instant,” he growled.

  The young man inclined his nose, turned on his heel, and left the room.

  Daniel continued his ministrations on the child. “If we were at the lying-in hospital with my warming crib and stimulants, maybe, but in any case, there is so little I can do.”

  “Go then, in my carriage. Or send my man for whatever you need. Spare no expense.”

  When Daniel did not move, Harris exclaimed, “Good heavens, man, why do you sit there?”

  The nurse reappeared. “Her ladyship will sleep ’til morning I’d wager. I gave her a hefty dose. Poor lamb.”

  Charles Harris swung his gaze to Daniel, steely resolve and desperation flinting in the candlelight. “Take my son to that hospital of yours, Taylor. Take us both.”

  After the copulation concludes, butterflies fly away

  [to] areas with an abundance of milkweed….

  —MORGAN COFFEY, CORONADO BUTTERFLY PRESERVE

  CHAPTER 13

  Charlotte sat up in bed. She’d heard a sound, a moan. This was not the wail from the French woman above stairs; this was a male cry. The sound vibrated with anguish. It struck her deeply somehow, as though she’d heard the sound before. But how could that be? She didn’t think it was Dr. Taylor. And she barely knew the other men about the place.

  She looked down at her little son, asleep beside her, a feather pillow keeping him close. She’d retrieved him from the little crib at the foot of her bed for his last feeding and they had fallen asleep together. She had awakened only long enough to secure the spare pillow on his other side to make sure he would not fall from bed. He slept peacefully still, undisturbed by the sound. She stroked his head lightly, needing to touch him but hoping not to wake him.

  When the sound didn’t come again, she settled back against her pillow. What was it the cry had reminded her of?

  Then she remembered. And that memory she had so often pushed away reasserted itself. Lying there, looking down at the profile of her newborn child in the moonlight, she let the memory come.

  That night Charlotte had also awakened to a sudden sound. Someone had called out in pain, she was sure, and her mind quickly identified the familiar voice. Mr. Harris. Lightning flashed in her bedchamber, and for a moment she hesitated. Perhaps she had imagined it or it had only been the wind. She should stay in bed. Safe. But she couldn’t sleep, wondering if Mr. Harris was ill.

  He had come to stay at the vicarage two weeks before, after the Christmas Eve fire at Fawnwell. What a night that had been. Fire brigades and people from all over Doddingto
n had come to help. Charlotte herself had run over and was soon put to work hauling pitchers of tea and water for the volunteers. There was little they could do to stop the fire tearing at the south wing with fiery claws. In a matter of hours, the south wing was a black, smoking heap of rubble and skeletal ribs. At least they had managed to keep the fire from spreading to the north.

  Still in her bed, Charlotte heard Mr. Harris moan once more. Rising, she quickly wrapped her white dressing gown over her nightdress, quietly opened her door, and stepped out. The upstairs rooms were arranged around a square court, open to the ground floor. She stepped to the balcony railing. A faint light from below drew her eye and compelled her toward the stairs.

  She found him slumped in a chair before a dying fire in the drawing room, staring at a sheet of paper.

  “Mr. Harris?” she whispered.

  But at that moment, a loud clap of thunder shook the vicarage and he didn’t hear her. He crumpled the letter in his hand, dropped the tumbler he’d been holding in his other, and held his face instead.

  “Mr. Harris!” She flew to his side, kneeling before his chair, reaching for the spilled glass and turning it aright on the floor. Her hands were tentative on his knee, entreating him to notice her presence. “Are you ill?”

  He looked at her with strange wonderment. “Charlotte? Did I wake you? Pray forgive me.”

  “There is nothing to forgive. Has something else happened? Mr. Harris, you look very ill. Should I send Buxley for Dr. Webb?”

  “No. There is nothing he can do for me.”

  “What, then?” She spied the crumpled letter. “Have you received bad news?”

  “Yes. Bitter news.”

  “Your mother?”

  “No. Mother is fine—still staying with friends in Newnham. Doing as well as can be expected for a woman forced from her home.” He rubbed both hands over his face, clearly distressed.

  “Is there nothing I can do? Is there something you might take for your present comfort?”

  “If you mean brandy, I have had plenty . . . with little relief to show for it.”