He put his dispatch aside and raised an eyebrow as she walked over to the window, fiddled with the cord of the yellow brocade curtain, dropped it, walked back to the coffee table, and picked up a teacup, only to set it down again with a sharp clatter without drinking from it. She shook her head, bit her lip, rubbed her temple as if it pained her, and then she jumped up again and repeated the entire procedure as she stalked to the window.
“I beg your pardon. Who are we talking about?” He had been too absorbed in the latest document that Castlereagh had sent regarding the Polish question. It was a tricky business that really required all his attention. Now there was Evie, doing her best to distract him. Something was evidently wrong, judging by her pale cheeks and swollen eyes. Had she been crying?
Evie stopped pacing and pulled herself up straight in front of him. She drew in a big breath. “I saw a woman that looked like Catherine.”
He looked at her blankly. “Catherine?”
Evie’s eyes darted away. “You know. Your wife.”
“My wife?” His mind refused to follow.
She cleared her throat. “My sister-in-law and friend.”Before he could say anything, she rushed on. “When I was in the carriage on the way home, I saw her walking along the Kohlmarkt. I followed her in the carriage. I swear it was her. Catherine.” She drew in a trembling breath. “She’s alive.”
Aldingbourne was not amused. “Stop making such jokes. Catherine died eight years ago.” An all too familiar black streak of grief shot through him as he said the words. After all this time, it still shook him. He closed his eyes briefly as he pushed his emotions down. He’d become good at that, too. Clamping down emotions. Bottling them up deep inside, with a lid on top.
Evie shook her head with a vehemence that sent her curls flying.
“But I swear on my life, Julius. It’s not a joke. It was Catherine. She’s happy and healthy and very much alive.”
“Impossible.” He picked up the documents again, but the paper between his fingers trembled.
“It was the same figure, the same hair. Even the birthmark on her cheek. Do you remember? Only Catherine had that.” She pointed to the right side of her cheek. “That slightly heart-shaped one.”
That detail was unexpected, as was that agonising wrench in his gut, like someone twisting a knife. How could he have forgotten that adorable heart-shaped mole on her cheek? How could he have forgotten… her face?
“I’d recognise it anywhere, even after all this time,” Evie mused. “Except when I went to talk to her, she did not recognise me at all. It was excessively odd.”
Something else shot through him, but this time itwasn’t grief, but anger. He struggled with it until he managed to suppress it like he did all his emotions. His sister was merely being thoughtless, that was all.
“It is not uncommon for two people to look alike,” he bit out in a measured, cold tone. “I grant you that the woman must have looked like Catherine. Maybe she even had the same mole on her cheek. A coincidence. These things happen. I dare say that if we search long enough, each of us will find another person who looks exactly like us, down to the last detail. Somewhere in this world, Evie, there is a woman who looks just like you. Why shouldn’t there be? With all the millions of people living on this earth, chances are good that you have a twin somewhere, too.”
Evie shook her head with a stubbornness he was all too familiar with. “Must you always be so rational and cold?”
“One must be rational in situations like this. What other choice do we have?”
“I know it was her, and not another person who merely looked like her. ItwasCatherine. I don’t know how to explain it. The woman not only looked like her, but she alsofeltlike her.” Her voice trembled.
Something snapped inside him. He slammed the document down on the table with a vehemence that made her jump. “Enough! You will cease this talk. Catherine is dead. She is buried in our family crypt. I placed her body in the casket myself.” He would never, ever forget the feeling of her cold, broken body in his arms when he placed her in that coffin. It haunted his dreams to this day. With an iron will, he pushedthe memory aside. “It is a fact, it is what is true, and anything else is beside the point and a fantasy. I do not want to hear another word about you having seen Catherine.”
“But—”
“Evie!”
She folded her arms over her chest and pouted.
He stood up, towering over his sister. “Evangeline,” he began sternly. Then, as he saw her eyes fill with tears, his voice softened. “I know it’s been difficult. You’ve been lonely, and like any young woman, you desire romance. Your betrothed, Hartenberg, blast the man, isn’t helping by being perpetually absent. I am certain after what happened to our friend Atherton who found his lost love Mirabel after all these years, it must have filled you with ideas of finding lost love and epic romance and whatnot”—he waved a pale hand about tiredly—“and while we are all exceedingly happy that Kit and Mirabel have finally found each other, you must understand that this was an exception and that these things don’t normally happen in this world. Pray, cease to attempt to recreate the same fate for me. That Catherine has been alive all this time, wandering about in the streets of Vienna is a fairy tale, a fantasy. Would that it were true. But it is not. So please, Evie. Please! Desist from this, as it leads to nowhere.” His voice turned rough and gruff. “Such talk like that is—exceedingly difficult to bear.” He swallowed painfully. “It merely stirs up old grief and anguish.”
His sister’s head snapped up and she looked at him with troubled eyes. “Oh, Julius.” Now she was about to cry in earnest. “I am so thoughtless. I apologise. I do! It is not my intention to cause you distress and pain. Far fromit.” She threw herself impulsively around his neck. “I did not think. Pray, forgive me. I shall not insist on speaking about this any longer. Surely you are right, and there must be some sort of logical explanation for the physical resemblance between this woman and Catherine. I shall not dwell on it. There. I’ve already forgotten it.”
He patted her back awkwardly and tried to smile, but only managed a grimace.
Evie sat in the armchair next to him. “But you are quite vexatious, Julius. You’ve become so hard and cold most of the time, and anyone who doesn’t really know you would never know it’s merely a shell surrounding you. I know you were never as romantic as me, but you didn’t used to be so cynical, either. It troubles me that sometimes even I begin to believe that this is what you have become, cold and proud, without any emotion. It isn’t true. I know it isn’t. You’ve merely repressed all emotions and ceased to acknowledge you have any feelings at all. But what kind of life is that? It’s not a good way to live at all.”
Aldingbourne wearily pressed both his thumbs between his brows.
She lifted a hand. “I see you find this subject distasteful as well, so I shall no longer expound upon it.”
“Thank you.”
