“Every Monday,” she continued haltingly, “Papa…he always… It is the day he deals with business away from home. This day was no different. He left the house…left me as I was at death’s door. I confess that in that moment I hated him. I was afraid, and I was angry. I no longer cared what he thought or did. I only knew that, if I were to leave this world, I wanted my mother to see me across that threshold. And his absence gave me that one chance.”
Sophia began to rock, a futile attempt to soothe herself.
“I pleaded once more with the nurse, convinced her that Papa need never know, and that I deserved to have my mother with me as I took my last breath.” A soft moan escaped her throat.
“Of course my mother came. What mother would refuse such a petition? She held my hand for hours. And though she grew fatigued, she wiped my brow and coaxed me to take a sip of broth. Her presence gave me strength. I did not die.”
Sophia raised her dolorous gaze to Tobias.
“Every day after that, I grew stronger. My fever abated. My breathing improved.” She shivered with apprehension as she prepared to utter words that seemed to have haunted her for years. “But in her room, attended only by a maid and a nurse, my mother sickened. You see,” she said bitterly, “my father had been harsh, but he was right. I had been a danger to the family. In my selfishness, I had made my mother ill.”
She looked at her hands. Tobias wondered what solace she hoped they might offer. Certainly, she spoke to them as if they did. “Three weeks after she had tended to my needs,” she murmured, “my mother died alone.”
Sophia grew very still, silenced, perhaps, by the weight of the memory bearing down on her.
Tobias sensed her helplessness and shared in it. He had no words. What was there he could say to undo such great sorrow?
But Sophia was not done. She looked at Tobias, her body sagging with a weariness and resignation that was half a lifetime in the making. Her voice was dull, all her energy and courage spent.
“Now, Mr. Mannerly, you will do me the courtesy of leaving my terrible secret behind when you go. I have told you so that you may understand. And if you are half the man that I believe you are, you would not shame me by repeating any of it.”
The very idea was repugnant to Tobias. “To break your trust thus would be unthinkable! I can only imagine the pain you have suffered to lose your mother at such a tender age, and to do so without a proper goodbye…”
Sophia’s face twisted into a scowl. “You thinkthatis my greatest burden? Do you understand nothing? Ikilledher! In my selfishness, I made demands, and she died for it!” An edge of hysteria touched her speech.
“You were but a child!” Tobias exclaimed. “If your father had not kept you apart, I have no doubt she would have been by your side every day. The fever caused her death, Sophia, not you.”
“No! Do not try to make excuses for me. It was me, my illness, that ended her life. I would have recovered without her visit, and she would still be alive today.”
“You don’t know that. She may have suffered a different disease in a subsequent year. If the tables had been turned, and she had made you ill, would you have thrust such guilt upon her? Would you have wanted her to throw away her life and her chance at happiness because the fates had been unkind?”
“It wasn’t fate,” Sophia insisted. “There was nothing random about it. It was I, and I alone, who went against my father’swishes and made demands because I was a coward. I robbed my father, sisters, brothers of a wife and mother.”
“A coward? You truly believe that? You think your mother did not desperately want to enter that room? She just needed an excuse. She would never, ever have let you die alone. Even if your father had been home, if she’d known you were close to death, not all the bars and bolts in the world could have locked her out of that room. Your father would not have stood a chance against a mother’s love.”
“But I wasn’t dying after all! I was just afraid.” She pressed her palms to her face, dragging them slowly down to her mouth, which opened to a shuddering breath. “If I had been braver, she would have stayed away, as my father wished.”
“Sophia.” Tobias softened his voice. “You were very ill. I suspect your mother knew that. That was why she came. Her comforting presence is what saved you. It gave you the will to fight. She knew the risk. She made the sacrifice willingly. It was her choice. You did nothing wrong.”
Sophia stared at him as if seeing him for the first time. “You think she knew?”
“I am certain of it.”
“She would have come anyway, even if I had said nothing?”
“If you were as ill as you say, I don’t doubt it for a second.”
“I… I…” She choked back the relief. “I am not wicked?”
“No, my darling, far from it.”
“I won’t hurt you too?” Her eyes were filled with a hopeful pleading.
Tobias smiled. “Oh, you will hurt me, in a human sort of way. But I will scold you a little and then forgive you.”
“You won’t…die?” Her words were barely audible, as if uttering them might make the threat more real.
“We all must die, dearest one. But you are no grim reaper. I am quite safe with you.” He gave a wry smile. “Of course, you dotorture my poor heart most cruelly. Fortunately, there is an easy remedy for that.”
