“When I first arrived here, I dove into reading. I must’ve kept the town bookseller in business with all I bought. So many of those purchases were medical books, because my illness still seemed like such a mystery to me. I thought I would make peace with it if I could just understand.” Della looked out at the water, her face a murky mixture of expressions.
Andrew had no idea how this was an answer to his question, but he was still unwilling to interrupt. They reached the lake’s edge, and she stood there for a moment. Her gaze focused on the toes of her boots, just inches away from the gently lapping waves.
“I learned so much, but I never really came to understand. It’s anillness with no cure, and that is difficult to fathom. But I learned something important about medicine, about doctors.”
Della shifted, letting her walking stick fall to the ground beside her. She raised one foot and fiddled with the laces on her half-boots while she still held onto Andrew with the other hand. He had no idea how she balanced like that. She wiggled out of one shoe, and Andrew nearly choked when he caught sight of her stocking slipping down her leg. Once again, he had no understanding of what was going on, but no desire at all to stop it.
“They all take an oath. It is supposed to be sacred, this promise they make. To do no harm.” She wrestled her other boot off and tossed her stockings aside, presumably so they wouldn’t get wet. “Of course, I can only speak to my own experience with this one doctor, but he has no respect for that oath. At least when it comes to me, anyway.”
“What do you mean?” Andrew finally asked. He held onto her as she dipped her toes in the water.
Della hissed, as if in pain, and Andrew’s arm reflexively tightened. He expected her to take a step back, free her feet from what had to be bone-chillingly cold water. She didn’t. She stayed right where she was.
“He has done me harm, whether he intended to or not. He continues to do so, every time that I see him. Just because he has this strange... loyalty to my mother. They think they can fix me at all costs, no matter what I want.”
He watched as she wiggled her toes in the mud, turning the clear water a dirty brown.
“And what is it you want?” he asked, finally.
The wind blew the hair around her face into frizz, and he suddenly worried that she’d come out here without a cloak on. She stepped back out of the water, twiddling her toes again in the grass in an attempt to dry them off.
“I wanted to dip my feet in the water. So, I did. Even though ithurt.”
“All right, then.” It was a simple enough wish, and he was glad to have been here to support it.
“You asked about my parents yesterday. If they kept any important documents here. I didn’t think so, but it occurred to me that my mother always prefers rooms in the west wing of the house. I’d always thought that she wanted to be as far away from the rest of us as possible, and that very well may be, but do you think she could be hiding something there?”
Andrew gathered up her boots and stockings, then handed her the fallen walking stick. He turned around and headed back toward the house with her still on his arm.
“I suppose we could find out.”
Chapter Thirteen
Hell, now shehad to deal with the blasted stairs. Della was immensely proud of herself for making it back to the house in one piece after her little stunt at the lake, but she’d somehow forgotten that just beyond the front door were those damned steps. It was not always such an exhausting trip. If it were, she’d have moved to a chamber on the lower floor long ago. It was just on days like today, days where she felt as if her limbs were weighty and unyielding, that it became such a Herculean effort to move.
“Do you need a moment to rest?” Andrew asked, still holding her hand against his arm. He must’ve seen some anguish on her face at the thought of climbing back upstairs. Or perhaps he was just perceptive.
“Just a moment,” she admitted. “If you would hand me my shoes.” Della broke away from him and sat on the ivory velvet bench near the sideboard, the only pieces of furniture in their entry hall. Andrew passed over her boots, and she sighed in relief as she slipped her stockings over her aching toes. She did not even bother pulling them up or tying the ribbons. Nor did she notice Andrew’s eyes widen at the sight of her bare ankles. Della tied her boots as tight as the laces would go, just to prevent any swelling.
It was reckless, what she’d done, but she refused to regret it. She’d needed that dip in the water to wash away someone else’s sins.
“Shall we go digging for secrets?” she asked him. Della stood up onher own, without the help of her walking stick, just to test the stability of her legs. They seemed sturdy enough, even though her toes still throbbed.
“It seems this house is full of them, metaphorically speaking. Stands to reason there’s some physical proof somewhere.” Andrew once again offered his arm, and she took it in one hand and her walking stick in the other.
“Speaking of secrets...” Della started. Something had been nagging at her since her conversation with Gwendoline earlier in the day. She briefly wondered if she had the courage to ask him about it, but then she thought of the shock of cold water on her toes, and she decided just to dive right in. “I was speaking to Gwendoline this morning, telling her about an old friend of mine. She disappeared, in the eyes of society. I realized that everyone in London must think the same of me.”
Andrew nodded. They took the stairs slowly and carefully, and the conversation helped pass the time.
“How did you find me?” she finally asked. “I thought I’d never see or hear from anyone again, but then your first letter arrived.”
He laughed, just a bright chuckle that was entirely too brief. Della thought she could see his cheeks blushing out of the corner of her eye.
“My mother. She often... overhears things, working in her position. You know how some pretend the servants aren’t there, capable of listening. It took her a while, but she discovered where they’d sent you. When I went abroad, she made me promise to write weekly, no matter where I was. And she made sure your letters got to me, and mine to you.” He was fully blushing now, and so was she. Della tried to assure herself it was from the exertion of the stairs, but that was difficult to believe.
“I am grateful to her, then.” They’d reached the landing, and she led him toward the essentially abandoned half of the house. The hallway had been dusted recently, because of her parents’ trip.Otherwise, this wing existed in darkened silence. Midafternoon light streamed through the windows, and all of the furniture and carpets were faded because the curtains were always left open.
At the end of the long hallway, Della opened a creaking door. The bedchamber within was shadowed, but sparklingly clean. She sat on a beautiful carved wooden chair near the door, exhausted from the walk. Andrew threw open the curtains her mother had clearly left closed. While she rested, Andrew searched. He opened the wardrobe, sifted through the trunk in the corner, and examined the drawers in the bedside table. He was meticulously careful, and Della appreciated it. No matter what they found, if her mother came back into this room and saw even a hair out of place, there would be consequences.
