The Asylum (38 page)

At first I could barely walk, but after a perilous descent to the tack room below, the worst of the stiffness had begun to wear off. I declined, with a shudder, Bella’s offer to fetch an invalid chair, and settled for an umbrella instead. Everything looked exactly the same, even to the distant figures labouring by the boundary wall, but the sour, acrid reek grew stronger, reminding me of the fogs around Gresham’s Yard. I made my way slowly down to the far corner of the asylum and stood gazing at the devastation. All that remained of the old house was a jagged, roofless shell. Wisps of smoke still curled from the wreck of the tower; the surrounding trees were blackened and scorched.

I shivered, recalling my last glimpse of Dr. Straker, and thinking how much ruin and anguish would have been spared if Felix Mordaunt had never made that will, or, indeed, if he and Rosina had never met . . . but then I would not be standing here, with my writing case in my hand, trying to decide what
I
should do about those wills. The rain had all but ceased; I lowered the umbrella and drifted into a reverie, from which I was woken by the sound of Frederic’s voice.

“Miss Ferrars, I am delighted to see you up and about so soon.”

His suit was stained and crumpled, his face grey with exhaustion, but he smiled nonetheless. There was an air of quiet resolution—or was it resignation?—about him that I had not seen before.

“Mr. Mordaunt; I was sorry to hear of your uncle’s death.”

“You need not be; he was in constant pain and would not have lived much longer. And . . . he was not an affectionate man. Or, as I discovered this morning, a prudent one. He had been withdrawing large sums for many years, with no explanation and nothing to show for the money. The estate is mortgaged to the hilt; the sale of the asylum will barely cover its debts.

“So much for my promise to provide for you,” he said wryly, “let alone . . . But enough of this. There is so much I don’t understand, about you, and Miss Ardent, and why Dr. Straker acted as he did . . .”

“It was for these,” I said, handing him the wills and the marriage certificate. “And all for nothing.”

We talked most of the day by the fire in his private sitting room. I gave him Rosina’s letters to read, but said nothing of what I had felt for Lucia, who was lying, still unconscious, in the infirmary, only a few doors away. We were now, as cousins, on intimate terms. I had wondered if the discovery would change his feeling for me, but it plainly had not, and the memory of his impassioned declaration hovered between us.

I offered to burn the wills, thinking he might salvage something from the wreck of his fortune, but he would not have it.

“No, Georgina, the estate is yours by right, moral as well as legal, and if anything can be salvaged, you shall have it. Uncle Edmund was a thief and a hypocrite—when I think of all those lectures on morality!—and I will not profit from his wickedness. Not, I fear, that there is likely to be any profit. An asylum is a business like any other, and when the world hears of Dr. Straker’s crimes, its reputation will be lost. And to think I worshipped that man . . . the ruler of a madhouse, and he was mad himself.”

“Frederic,” I said hesitantly, “have you told anyone else about—what you saw last night?”

He shook his head.

“Then I think the secret should be ours alone. Not because of the asylum’s reputation; but if word of that machine gets out, someone else will try to build one.”

“But then the world will believe he was a great man.”

“I think that is the lesser of two evils,” I said. “Perhaps he began with the best intentions. But with so much power in his hands . . .”

“And the patients he killed? What of them?”

“We cannot disclose that,” I said, “without revealing
how
they died. And then more lives will be sacrificed to someone else’s ambition.”

We both fell silent, staring into the flames.

“I see what you mean,” he said at last, “about keeping silent. Dr. Straker acted alone, so there is no question of defrauding the buyer.”

“Then I shall sign the property over to you. I insist upon it, Frederic; I have a small income of my own, and I will not see you left with nothing.”

“Then I shall insist upon sharing with you—if there is anything to share.”

Another silence followed.

“What will you do now?” he asked. His tone was studiously matter-of-fact.

“I shall go first to Plymouth, to see Mr. Lovell about the transfer—and find out how much of my money Lucia has stolen. And then I suppose I must call at Gresham’s Yard to collect whatever is left of my belongings. So far as Uncle Josiah is concerned, I have been away only a few days, and it would be pointless trying to tell him otherwise; he will be huffish enough about having to pay another boy to help him in the shop.”

“And then?”

“Then I shall return to Plymouth. Mr. Lovell kindly invited me to stay with his family at Noss Mayo, and if the invitation still stands . . . Don’t misunderstand me, Frederic; I know Mr. Lovell only through the pages of my journal, but he was kind to me, and I should like to rest for a while in a place where I can walk, and think, and be alone, and say as much or as little about myself as I choose. And you, Frederic? What will you do?”

“I shall look after things here until the asylum has been sold. And then, with luck, the new owners will keep me on.”

“But Frederic—”

“I know, I know; I should go out in the world. But this is all I know, and if I have a vocation, it lies here—or somewhere like this. I can at least try to ensure that, in future, no superintendent ever wields such power; if I achieve nothing else, I shall not have lived in vain.”

Though he strove to repress it, the note of desolation was unmistakable.

“Frederic,” I said gently, “you told me, five days ago, that you loved me, and I fear that your decision to remain here has—something to do with that.”

“Yes,” he said simply. “I did, and I do. But it is impossible, for every possible reason, and so—”

“No, Frederic; it is impossible only for one reason. I love you as if you were my brother—but not as a woman should love the man she is to marry. If I did, I should not care a straw about money, or Mordaunt blood, or anything else. But I do not want you to cherish false hopes of me, and lose the chance of happiness because of it. You have a loving spirit—I said so at the beginning, and I feel it all the more deeply now—and you ought to marry. You will always have me as your friend, your cousin, but I cannot be your wife.”

“If I had been—if I had stood up to Dr. Straker at the very beginning . . .”

“Frederic, Frederic, there is nothing you could have done, or not done; you must believe me. Perhaps you feel that you have given your heart to me, and can never love anyone else, but you will—it is why you must go out in the world, as you put it, even if your work is here . . .”

“You sound as though you speak from experience,” he said, with a touch of bitterness.

“No, only from intuition. I don’t know that I will ever marry, Frederic; after everything I have lived through here, I cannot imagine . . .”

Unsure of what it was I could not imagine, I trailed off, leaving him plainly unconvinced. Frederic, I wanted to say, I loved Lucia as a woman is supposed to love her husband, though I have only the evidence of my journal for it. And yes, she is my half sister, but I did not know that, any more than I knew that she meant to deceive and betray me. And though I may never remember what I felt for her, I believe she showed me something of myself; something that perhaps explains why I cannot return your love as you would wish.

But then I feared he would simply be shocked to no purpose, and so I did not speak, and another awkward silence followed, until a man I had not seen before, a Dr. Overton, came in to say that Miss Ardent was awake, and asking if she might speak to Miss Ferrars alone.

“Please tell her I shall be along in a few moments,” I said.

“Surely you do not
want
to see her?” said Frederic as soon as Dr. Overton had gone. “Should we not send for the police and have her arrested at once?”

“No,” I said, “I should like to speak to her before I decide—for my own part, I mean. But how can she possibly remember me, when I recall nothing of her?”

“I think,” said Frederic, “that Dr. Straker was deluded about that machine, as about so much else. It was sheer chance that he did not kill you. Now really, should you not spare yourself this encounter?”

“No, I want to speak to her.”

“Then, if you are quite sure, may I see her first? I have something to say to her myself.”

They had put her in the very same room where I had woken on that cold November day a lifetime ago. She was deathly pale, and her face had been scrubbed clean; the resemblance was still plain, but I was far more struck by the differences in the shape of her eyes, the set of her lips, the curve of her cheekbone; so much so that I wondered how anybody, excepting Uncle Josiah, could have mistaken one of us for the other. Standing there in the doorway, I thought of what I had said in my journal about the likeness increasing every day, and I understood just how closely she had studied me.

“Georgina,” she said, in a small, chastened voice, “will you sit by me for a little?”

I moved the upright chair—the one Dr. Straker had always occupied—closer to the bed, and sat down beside her.

“I can’t remember anything of—what happened,” she said, “but Mr. Mordaunt told me that you risked your own life to save mine, and saved me again when you might have left me to burn. Why did you do that?”

“Because I could not bear to watch you die, without at least trying to save you. Not out of any feeling for you—I have none. You deceived me and betrayed me, and left me here to rot.”

A long silence followed.

“I have not had a moment’s peace,” she said at last, “since I sent that telegram in your uncle’s name. It was done on the spur of the moment, and then—I was afraid to go back.”

“I would have shared with you,” I said, “if there had been anything to share. But Edmund Mordaunt is dead, and the estate is bankrupt; you and your mother had already bled him dry.”

She stared at me, horror stricken—or so I would have sworn.

“I knew, I knew, I
knew
you would have shared. But my mother said you would be bound to find me out. And now I shall be sent to prison for years and years—as I deserve.”

She burst into heartrending sobs and buried her face in her hands. I knew better than to trust in this show of contrition, and yet I longed to comfort her, and felt cold and heartless for restraining myself.

“Lucia,” I said when she was quiet again, “why did you not go on the stage, as you said you wanted to? You are a consummate actress; you could have made your fortune, and been admired for your talent, instead of lying and deceiving your way through life.”

“I wish I had,” she said, “but it is too late now.”

“How much of my money did you steal?” I asked.

“Only your allowance. My mother said I must not risk going to see Mr. Lovell until . . .”

She lowered her eyes and let the words trail away.

“That was your mother—Mrs. Fairfax—the woman who tried to befriend me in Plymouth.”

“Yes,” she said faintly.

“And where is your mother now?”

“In London. At the hotel where we—the one in Great Portland Street.”

“Where you went every day on those walks of yours. To plan how you might ensnare me.”

“And now I must pay for my wickedness. Oh, how you must hate me!”

“No more tears,” I said firmly. “I hated you last night, when I said he might tear your heart out for all I cared, but that is gone now, like the fortune you set out to steal. As for sending you to prison: your mother’s fate is not for me to decide, and if Mr. Mordaunt decides to have her charged with blackmail, she must take the consequences. But for myself, I should rather see you on the stage than in a cell.

“You will write me a full account of every wrong that you and your mother have done me. You will promise, in writing, never to commit another crime. Mr. Mordaunt will witness your signature. And you will keep Mr. Lovell informed of your whereabouts. Fail me in any particular, and your confession will go to the police.”

“I promise,” she said in a very low voice. “If I may have pen and paper, I will begin at once.” Her face was ashen; she looked utterly spent.

“You should rest now,” I said, “and begin in the morning.”

“I am truly sorry, Georgina. If only—I wish I had been worthy of your love. I shall try to deserve your trust.”

“I wish I could believe you,” I said. I rose stiffly to my feet, suddenly aware of my bruised and aching body, and stood looking down at her. She held my gaze with dark, pain-filled eyes, the very picture of remorse, and it seemed for a moment that I could truly remember, could see and feel her trembling in my arms, on our last night together in Gresham’s Yard. But then my mind was shrouded again, as if a curtain had fallen between us, and I left the infirmary without looking back.

About the Author

J
OHN
H
ARWOOD
is the author of two previous novels of Victorian Gothic suspense. Aside from fiction, his published work includes biography, poetry, political journalism and literary history. His acclaimed first novel,
The Ghost Writer,
won the International Horror Guild's First Novel Award. He lives in Hobart, Australia.