“Don’t let the waves of imagination and stories sway you,” Cecilia told Sarah. “Seeing would be my belief.”
“I suspect I’m too timid to want to see any specters,” Sarah ruefully admitted.
The others laughed.
“You shan’t. Not here at any time with us. They should most likely run before us.”
“Careful, Cecilia, that you do not rile the dead into thinking you have issued a challenge,” James said.
“Not you, too!” protested Cecilia.
“No, but, I learned long ago not to doubt too loudly. There is much in the world we don’t know.”
Cecilia screwed up her face in conflicted doubt. “I should wish to hold my monsters at bay. I fear your tales might make my thoughts and imagination run rampant.”
James shook his head. “You are much too pragmatic, for all your feigned fragility—I am curious why you did not adopt the fragile wife mien when we arrived.”
“You mean, start as I mean to go on?”
“Yes.”
She shrugged. “We were so comfortable with Mr. Stackpoole that I didn’t think of it. You think I should have?”
“If you are determined on your course of action to become a patient at the sanatorium, then, yes, I think so. We don’t know who here might know someone who works at the sanatorium.”
Sarah turned back from setting out Cecilia’s night things. “You want to be a patient there? Even after what I told you about that woman’s death?”
“Mr. Stackpoole told us of the young woman’s drowning during our journey here, without the added embellishment of the ghost story. I am not concerned. Her death was a year ago.”
“Mr. Stackpoole?” William asked.
“Ah, yes. You would not know of the travel companion we acquired yesterday. He is on his way to Camden House as we are. He knows the Earl of Soothcoor, and like those who do know him, he finds it hard to believe him to be a murderer. His mother is a patient in the sanatorium so he thought he would talk to her about Mr. Montgomery’s death.”
A knock at the door ended their discussion. William opened the door to admit a maid with hot water for the Branstokes to freshen up with before dinner. Cecilia immediately slumped against James.
“How lovely,” Cecilia said faintly. “I should love to clean my face and hands. Sarah, can you find my lavender water? I need it, I fear.”
Sarah’s eyes widened, but she quickly recovered. “Right away, my lady,” she said, turning to a valise set next to the window.
“Is there anything else you need?” asked the maid, staring at Cecilia as she leaned on James.
“No, no. My wife is recovering from a long illness,” James said. “Come, why don’t you lay down for a few minutes before dinner,” he said to Cecilia as he led her to the bedstead.
William crossed to the door and opened it. “Thank you. Sarah or I will let the proprietor know if James and Lady Branstoke have additional requirements.”
The maid nodded and curtsied, then scurried out of the room.
After washing up and changing his neckcloth, James dismissed his valet for the evening and told Cecilia he would go on the parlor while she washed.
“I should also like to change my dress,” she said. “I need to proceed in my weakened role and clothing can be part of that role.”
James shook his head. “I don’t like it when you play the weak, unwell female though I’ll own it has served us well in the past. That duality of consideration makes me a hypocrite, and I don’t like that, either.” He ran a hand through his hair.
She grinned at him. “My height and coloring play so well with the role,” she said, waving her hand from her head to her toes in reference to her short and slight stature as well as her paleskin and almost white-blonde, flyaway hair. Sometimes James referred to her as his fae nymph.
James shook his head and left the room, leaving Sarah with Cecilia.
James hadthe private parlor to himself. He’d sent a barmaid for a mug of ale before he’d entered the room and now sat in one of the brown, jacquard-covered wingback chairs that flanked the large fireplace, with the ale mug clasped loosely between his hands. The room had more the look of a gentleman’s library than a parlor. Warm, golden oak paneling covered the walls, a material not common in this part of the country. He stared into the cold stone fireplace. He considered asking for a fire to be laid as rooms chilled with the coming night. Cecilia chilled easily.
