The Asylum

Rosina Wentworth to Emily Ferrars

Kirkbride Cottage,

Belhaven

East Lothian

Friday, 18 May 1860

Dearest Emily,

I am so sorry to have left you in suspense, and can only hope that you received the notes I scribbled from King’s Cross and Dunbar. I am safe, and well, and happier than I ever imagined possible. And now I must gather my wits, and try to tell you everything as it happened.

Last Sunday was the longest of my life. I had intended to feign illness, and keep to my room to avoid my father, but there was no need of feigning; I was sick with dread and could eat nothing all day. I had, at least, the consolation of knowing that Lily had made a great impression upon the people in Tavistock Square, a widowed physician and his daughters, who live very quietly, and do not seem to move in any of the circles Clarissa and I used to frequent; they said she might start with them as soon as she liked. But such was my disordered state of mind that, when Lily offered to take my clothes to Felix’s lodging, I tormented myself all the while she was gone with visions of Felix running away with her instead of me—all the more unpardonable as I would never have escaped without her help.

Lily and I said our farewells that night. At five o’clock on Monday morning, I dressed, put on my cloak, and crept downstairs. Alfred had not taken up his post until eight the previous day, but the front door is always locked overnight, and Naylor keeps the key, so I had decided to leave by way of the area below. I stole across the first-floor landing—my father’s room is just along the corridor—and went on down into the gloom of the hall. The blood pounding in my ears sounded appallingly loud; I thought I saw movement in the shadows behind a pillar, but nothing emerged. Moving as quickly as I dared, I entered the foyer and passed through the narrow door that opens onto the servants’ staircase; I had to leave it ajar to see my way down.

The only light came from a frosted pane of glass above the area door; the rest of the passage was in darkness. I had slipped the upper bolt, and then the lower, and was turning the handle when a voice at my back said, “You can’t do that, miss; master’s orders.”

Naylor was standing a few feet away. The light fell upon his pale, smirking face, red lips parted in triumph. I wrenched open the door and darted up the steps; his hand seized my shoulder and came away with my cloak, in which he became entangled, gaining me precious seconds in which to open the area gate and slam it behind me. I heard Naylor shouting at the top of his voice; I saw Felix beginning to run toward me from a hansom twenty yards away; I heard the clash of the area gate and the thud of Naylor’s boots close behind me.

“Run to the cab!” cried Felix as he passed, but I could only turn and watch. He planted himself squarely in Naylor’s path; Naylor, who was at least a head taller, tried to dodge around him, but Felix stuck out a foot and tripped him. He was up again in a moment, flailing savagely; one blow struck Felix across the mouth and sent him staggering back. Naylor seized him by the collar and made to fling him to the ground, but Felix twisted from his grip with a rending of cloth, and it was Naylor who fell heavily; I heard the crack of his head striking the cobbles. A paper fluttered from Felix’s torn coat pocket as he turned toward me, and this time I did not hesitate. We ran side by side for the cab, and Felix lifted me bodily in.

“Victoria Station, the boat train, fast as you can!” shouted Felix as he jumped up beside me and the cab jolted forward. Looking back through the window, I saw Naylor picking himself up off the pavement, and another man emerging from the house.

“Let us hope he heard that,” said Felix, dabbing at his mouth with a handkerchief. Two minutes later we were rattling along Weymouth Street, with no sign of pursuit.

We had intended to breakfast at King’s Cross and take the ten o’clock express to Edinburgh, but Felix thought it would be too dangerous to wait, with the hunt already up. If my father dismissed my note about running away to Paris as a blind, the Scottish express might be the next thing he thought of. Worse still, the paper Felix had lost was a letter from his solicitor. And so we took the first available train to Leicester, travelling as Mr. and Mrs. Childe, and made our way north from there in a series of steps, arriving very late in the afternoon at Dunbar.

From the moment we set out, it seemed absolutely right and natural to be sitting hand in hand with Felix; I never once felt—and have not since—that I was travelling with a man I barely knew. Felix kept a wary eye on the platform whenever we stopped, but my anxiety diminished as London receded behind us, until I felt only a sublime assurance that all would be well. I slept much of the way from York to Newcastle: a sleep of utter contentment in which I dreamt I was lying in Felix’s arms, and woke to find it true.

Dunbar, as you may know, is right beside the sea, very popular in the summer, but in May almost deserted; the coast is very wild and beautiful. The man who brought us from the station happened to know of this cottage, which sounded perfect: about a mile farther up the coast, a little way from Belhaven village, looking toward the sea. I wanted to drive out and see it at once, but Felix said we should think about it first, and so we took rooms in a lodging house near the castle.

And now for my confession. I have hesitated a great deal over whether to tell you, but I resolved this morning that I would. If our situations were reversed, I would want you to speak freely and trust in my love, knowing that I would never judge you harshly; and so I should place the same trust in you.

Felix had said on the train that he thought I ought to stay in a separate lodging until our three weeks were up, but I refused to be parted from him. “We may be snatched away from each other at any moment,” I replied, “so every moment together is precious.”

“But we must keep apart until we are married; you are under my protection, and I would never want you to regret—to feel that I took advantage of you.”

We said no more at the time, but in the evening, after we had dined—we were the only guests in the house, and took our supper in front of our sitting-room fire—he returned to the subject. His arm was around my shoulders, as it had been much of the day; my fingers were twined through his hair; every so often he would kiss my temple, or my cheek, and whenever our lips met, my breathing would quicken and I would twine myself closer still, and then Felix would sigh, and quiver, and gently draw back.

“You know,” he said, “if we take that cottage, it will be even harder to keep apart, living alone under the same roof.”

“I do not want to keep apart from you,” I said. “My reputation is lost forever, so far as people like the Traills are concerned, and I do not care a jot. The proprietor thinks we are married; we are pledged to each other; I am wearing your ring; and if my father should trace us; well, I do not want to die without knowing . . .”

“But my darling, even at the very worst—suppose I were to be arrested for abducting you, and assaulting Naylor, and you were carried off to your father’s house by force—it would be terrible, but we would only have to wait until you were of age; he wouldn’t dare harm you.”

“My father is capable of anything; he thinks the law applies only to lesser mortals. I have never quite shaken off the fear that he murdered Clarissa. Not with his own hands, of course, but by hiring footpads to force their carriage over that cliff. I shall never forget the look on his face when he told me she was dead.”

“But the authorities said it was an accident. You remember I heard talk of it myself in Rome: a young couple tragically lost when their horse bolted.”

“I shall try to believe it. I can only pray that she died happy—as happy as I am now,” I added, moving closer again. “So let us take that cottage tomorrow—we will be safer away from the town—and have no more talk of keeping apart.”

“Rosina—you do understand what that means?”

“Not—not exactly, but I think I can imagine. I have trusted you with my life; why should I not trust you with—in every way?”

His arms tightened around me, but then he drew a long breath and disengaged himself, his expression suddenly sombre.

“Rosina, there is something I must say to you. I meant to tell you when we next met in London, but there was no time . . .”

“Anything, so long as you are not married already.”

“No, not that, but . . . I have not always lived celibate. If only I had known we were to meet, I should never have looked at another woman, but alas . . . I have made no promises, and broken no vows, but I have been—intimate before this; I wish with all my heart I had not. So you must think on whether you still wish to marry me. No matter what you decide, I shall protect you with my life so long as there is blood in my body—”

“All I desire of you,” I said, “is to be certain that you love me with your whole heart, and that there is no other attachment—nothing in your past that could ever come between us.”

“I swear it by all I hold sacred. If there is anything—anything at all—you wish to ask of me, you have only to ask it—only—”

“Only?”

“Only that—if you really can forgive me—might it not be better to begin life together anew, without looking back?”

He rose, made up the fire, and left the room, murmuring something about the landlady and breakfast. I realised, staring into the red glow of the coals, that he had told me nothing I had not already divined. But if I knew everything about every woman he had ever embraced, would I feel any more secure in his love? Or would that knowledge prey upon me, no matter how firmly I tried to push it away, until I grew jealous of every kiss, every caress . . . ?

A coal burst in a shower of sparks, vanishing upon the instant. “You are right,” I said as his shadow fell across the couch. “Let us begin anew.”

Felix had warned me that the act might be painful; I had always vaguely assumed (I suppose because of all the talk of sin and shame) that it would have to be done in complete darkness, but we left the candles burning, and came to it so tenderly, and so gradually, that the pain was no more than momentary. We made love until dawn (now I truly understand why it is called making love), so rapturously, and with such exquisite caresses, that I feared we might wake the landlady with our cries. Marriage—between people who truly love and adore each other, I mean—must be like a secret society (I can write this, since you and Godfrey belong to it): how could anyone be ashamed of such delight, such ecstasy of body and soul, the heart overflowing with love?

We woke in each other’s arms, and drove out to Belhaven in a daze of happiness. I had never seen countryside so beautiful, or colours so rich and radiant; everything—the songs of birds, the scents of blossom, the tang of the sea—seemed so

alive,

like the first day of spring after a long drab winter, but infinitely more so.

And the cottage itself is ideal—only a hundred yards from the shore, and hidden from its neighbours by a coppice of trees. A woman from the village comes in the mornings; the rest of the time we have the house to ourselves and can do exactly as we please. Felix knows how to make tea and fry a beefsteak: we supped last night in bed, upon bread and cheese and potted meat and cake, and were utterly content.

I must finish here; we are about to walk into the village to catch the afternoon post. I dare not read this letter over, and can only remind myself that if I were in your place, I would want to know everything. We are to be married—I have only just thought to mention it, such is my conviction that we are married already—on Monday, the fourth of June, in Dunbar, if we are not discovered. I should have loved to have you and Godfrey for our witnesses, but it is such a long way, and perhaps you may feel—I must not entertain such thoughts, or I shall lose my nerve, and tear this up instead of posting it. May we come to you at Nettleford, as soon after the fourth as will suit? I long to embrace you, and will write again very soon. Have no fear for me, dearest cousin; I am blessed beyond measure.

All my love to you, and to dear Godfrey,

Your loving cousin,

Rosina

Kirkbride Cottage,

Belhaven

Wednesday, 23 May 1860

Dearest Emily,

I burst into such tears of joy when I read your letter that Felix thought something terrible must have happened! Your loving words mean more than I can say until I embrace you on the ninth. And to know that Lily is safe in Tavistock Square—truly, my cup runneth over.

We have been here nine days now, without the slightest alarm. No one else knows where we are, except for Mr. Carburton, Felix’s solicitor, who is to write care of the post office in Dunbar. Because of the letter he dropped in the struggle with Naylor, Felix decided he must write to Mr. Carburton to explain the circumstances of our elopement, and warn him against believing anything my father may say. If my father should call at the office, Mr. Carburton is to tell him that we will shortly be married, but nothing more.

Felix has also written to his brother, as he feels is only right, though Edmund is bound to disapprove of our marriage, believing as he does that no Mordaunt should ever marry. Edmund remains bitterly opposed to the sale of Tregannon House, despite Felix’s assurance that the proceeds will be equally divided—which is all the more generous of Felix, since he has had to borrow against his own share and is anxiously awaiting the deed of sale. Mr. Carburton will forward the letter, as Felix does not want Edmund to know where we are until we are married.

But that is the only cloud on our horizon, and most of the time we scarcely notice it. The weather, for the most part, has kept wonderfully mild and sunny: we walk for miles along the coast, with scarcely another human being in sight. Those last fearful days at Portland Place already seem like a distant nightmare, apart from the odd superstitious moment when I have to pinch myself to make sure I am truly awake, and free, and happy beyond my wildest imagination. Felix has the most extraordinary vitality; he scarcely needs to sleep, and often I wake to see him scribbling verses by candlelight, or gazing at the stars. And then, if he hears me stirring, he turns to me with a look of such delight that my heart overflows. His mind teems with ideas: sometimes his thoughts tumble over one another so fast that I cannot keep up with what he is saying, but I feel I always understand the music, even when I miss some of the words. He dreams of finding, or even founding, a community—apparently there are several like it in New England—built upon love and respect, a brotherhood of the spirit, he calls it, in which women would enjoy the same rights as men, and property would be held in common, for the benefit of all. To me he seems the very embodiment of that spirit, always so ardent and loving, filled with the joy of life.

Until the ninth—Felix sends his warmest and most heartfelt thanks for your invitation, and joins with me in hoping that all is well with you and Godfrey—

Your loving cousin,

Rosina

Kirkbride Cottage,

Belhaven

Friday, 25 May 1860

Dearest Emily,

Alas, I spoke too soon. I was unwell yesterday morning and so did not accompany Felix when he walked to Dunbar to see if the deed of sale had arrived yet. He returned, looking very grave, with a disturbing letter from Mr. Carburton, enclosing another, even more distressing, from Edmund. My father, it seems, went straight to Marylebone police station on the morning of our escape and had warrants sworn against Felix for abduction and assault. He then stormed into Mr. Carburton’s office, demanding to know where we were. Mr. Carburton, of course, knew nothing of what had happened (he did not receive Felix’s letter until Friday), but he was sufficiently alarmed to write to Edmund at Tregannon House, telling him of my father’s visit. This was Edmund’s response:

Dear Felix,

I have long despaired of your profligate ways, but I never imagined you capable of such an outrage as this. To have abducted an heiress (even if she accompanied you willingly, it is still abduction), and assaulted the loyal servant who sought to defend her honour: these are acts so heinous that I can only suppose—I might almost say hope—that you have altogether lost your reason. I have been in communication with Mr. Wentworth, whose wrath would scarcely be appeased by seeing you hanged, and pleaded the only thing I could plead: that you ought to be confined as a lunatic rather than as a felon, but he is adamant, and will not rest, he says, until you are locked up in Newgate.

There is, nevertheless, a faint chance of your avoiding the disgrace of a prison sentence. You must ensure that this foolish young woman is returned to her father’s house at once—unless, as I greatly fear, you have already debauched her. If Mr. Wentworth refuses to take her back, then I suppose we must make provision for her. You yourself, however, must not accompany her to London, but return home at once. Maynard Straker has very kindly offered to come down and examine you as soon as he is summoned; assuming—I cannot see how there can be any doubt of it—that he is prepared to issue a certificate, we can declare you unfit to plead, and arrange for your confinement here.

As for your unconscionable scheme of selling the roof from over our heads: I have written to Mr. Carburton, apprising him of the facts of the matter, and advising him not to act upon any further communications from you, or to advance you any further funds, as you are plainly not of sound mind.

I urge you, once again, to arrange for Miss Wentworth’s immediate return to her father, and to present yourself here without delay. Fail in this, and I dare not answer for the consequences.

Your aff^ct brother,

E. A. Mordaunt

Mr. Carburton, for his part, advises Felix to “consider very carefully whether you still wish me to draw up a deed of sale, since your brother will certainly contest your fitness to sign this or any other document pertaining to the sale of the estate. This would place me, as a trustee of the Mordaunt estate, in a most invidious position, since I cannot, of course, act for one member of the family against another. I do most earnestly counsel you to come to terms with your brother before you proceed.”

“What does he mean, ‘come to terms with your brother’?” I asked. The day was overcast, the fire unlit; our little sitting room seemed, for the first time, cold and drab.

“He means—though being a lawyer, he will not say so plainly—that he agrees with Edmund: he thinks I am as mad as my father and should meekly present myself to his friend Straker to be certified and shut away like poor Horace—as soon as I have delivered you to the nearest police station, that is.”

“That is monstrous—absurd. No one could possibly believe you mad.”

“You forget the family history, dearest. Edmund regards my desire to sell that wretched mausoleum as proof in itself.”

“All the same . . . do you think, if we were caught, that you really might be sent to prison?”

“If you were able to swear that you came away willingly, and that Naylor was as much the aggressor as I, probably not. But you would be locked away in your father’s house—that is what they are counting on—in no position to swear to anything, leaving them free to blacken my character. So yes, I might very well be convicted and imprisoned, assuming that Edmund did not contrive to have me certified, which would be far worse—but fear not, my darling; in ten days’ time we shall be married in law, and that will draw most of their teeth.”

“Most?”

“Well, they could still have me arrested and thrown in gaol to await my trial. And then, if your father had you kidnapped—it would be illegal, but he might still risk it—they could contend that I was insane at the time of our marriage, and try to have the marriage annulled. Until you come of age in November, we must be on our guard. But don’t look so alarmed, dearest: we shall be gone long before then. I shall call at the shipping agent’s this afternoon, and see what sailings are available.”

“Shall we not see Emily, then, before we leave?” I asked, striving to conceal my disappointment.

“Your cousin’s house is likely to be watched. But,” he added, studying my face, “I know how much it means to you; we shall find a way of throwing them off the scent.”

“Must you go back today? Is it safe? What if Mr. Carburton has told your brother that he is writing to you at Dunbar?”

“I was on my guard from the moment I opened the letter—which I did in the post office, thinking it was the deed—and saw nothing suspicious; I am certain I wasn’t followed. There is always that danger, yes: the devil of it is, I must be able to communicate with Carburton about the sale, and so if we move, the same difficulty will arise. And it will be easier to prove our three weeks’ residence if we remain here. From now on, I shall go to Dunbar alone; if I have to run for it, that will give me a better chance of escaping. You must try not to worry too much; the only danger is at the post office, and I shall be watching like a hawk.”

“But if Mr. Carburton has taken your brother’s side? . . .”

“That is why I must go back: I have decided to consult a medical man and have him write me a certificate of sanity. Unusual, I know, but if you can be certified insane, why not the reverse? I shall send it straight to Carburton, with instructions to draw up the deed of sale and advance me a further two hundred and fifty pounds. I am the heir, after all, and he is already acting for me; I think, when it comes to it, he will have to do as I ask. And now I must be off; it may take me several hours, but the sooner it is done, the sooner we can set sail.”

Watching him stride away across the grass, I realised that, in spite of the threat hanging over us, I no longer wanted to live abroad. We had talked a great deal—or rather Felix had talked, and I had listened, utterly content in his embrace—of faraway cities like Rio de Janeiro: places he had never seen, but could conjure, with the utmost vividness, from fragments he had read and pictures he had glimpsed, as if recalling a vision of heaven. And yet it had never seemed quite real to me; reality was the bed we lay in, the sun on the coverlet in the mornings, the salt air wafting in from the sea, the beating of his heart against mine. I had said to myself, “I can be happy anywhere Felix is happy,” and believed it, but now, newly conscious of the damp stains on the wallpaper and the musty odor rising from the carpet, I envisaged a bleak procession of furnished rooms and lodgings, and my spirit rose up in revolt and said, “No, I want us to live here, in our own country, and have a house of our own, a place where our children can grow up amongst friends, and music, and laughter, not as strangers in a strange land.” Yet when we had talked in Regent’s Park, the prospect had seemed wholly delightful. What had come over me? I reproached myself for inconstancy of feeling and for putting my own comfort above Felix’s, but I could not recapture whatever it was I had felt that day.

I emerged from my reverie to find that Felix had vanished from sight. I had locked the front door behind him, but what of the others? The house was surrounded on three sides by trees, which until then had looked peaceful and sheltering, but now seemed alive with shadows. The front windows looked over a low stone wall, beyond which was an expanse of meadow, then a long curving line of pale sand, and the sea stretching toward the horizon. If you went out by the kitchen door at the back, you could pick your way through the trees—the copse was very much overgrown, and choked in places with nettles—past the collapsed remains of another wall, and scramble down onto the Edinburgh road, in clear view of the village. We had never gone that way to Dunbar, having always taken the path along the coast.

I went around the ground floor, making sure that all the windows were latched and the kitchen door bolted. Fear prickled at my spine. I went on upstairs, forcing myself not to look back, and into our bedroom. Not a soul was in sight; only the ragged meadow, and an iron grey sea fading into mist. My head ached dully, and there was a griping in the pit of my stomach, which might have been apprehension, or simply the discomfort I had felt all day. I was shivering, too, but reluctant to light the fire, telling myself it was not really cold enough and trying to suppress the voice that whispered,

The smoke will give you away.

In the end, I got into bed fully dressed, wrapping the chill bedclothes tightly around me until the shivering diminished, and I began to drift in and out of uneasy dreams, starting awake whenever the hall clock chimed, or a bird’s claws scrabbled on the sill. Two o’clock struck, and then the half hour, and then three. And then I must have fallen into a deeper sleep, from which I woke with the impression that someone had been knocking at the door below.

I threw off the bedclothes in a panic, wondering how long Felix had been waiting, and was halfway to the landing before I came fully awake and realised that it might not be Felix at all.

The sound was not repeated. I crept back to the bedroom, knelt down beside the bed so that I could not be seen, and crawled toward the window. My skirts chafed against the carpet—or was that footsteps on the gravel beneath? Very slowly, I raised my head.

A man was standing just inside the front wall, no more than ten yards away, looking up at the house; he seemed to be staring directly at me. A stocky, powerfully built man in a dun-coloured suit like a uniform, with a cap of some sort protruding from his side pocket. His head was completely bald, lumpish and irregular in shape, the skin so transparent that it gleamed like polished bone. Down the left side of his face, a livid scar ran from temple to jaw, narrowly missing the eye.

I dared not move. He stood as though he had a right to be there, his eyes flicking back and forth over the house, but always, it seemed, returning to me, with a chill as palpable as the draught from the casement. At last he turned and walked away, pausing for one more glance at the window before he disappeared behind the trees.

Had he seen me? He had turned to the left, as if to go around the outside of the copse and rejoin the Edinburgh road, but there was no way of telling. He could be lurking amongst the trees, waiting for me to emerge. Any minute now, Felix might be approaching from the other direction, oblivious of danger.

Unless they had captured him already.

The hall clock began to strike, startling me to my feet before I realised what the sound was. If the man was still watching, he had certainly seen me now. Five o’clock. Felix had been gone nearly four hours.

If he

had

seen me, and Felix was already in their hands, they would have broken down the door by now. Which meant . . . The thought was lost in a wave of panic, but I knew well enough what it meant. My only hope of escape was to slip out by the kitchen door, seek another way through the coppice, and pray that I could find Felix before they did.

There was no one in sight. I went over to the closet, pulled on my walking-shoes and cloak with trembling hands, and went downstairs as quickly and quietly as I could.

Was there anything I could use as a weapon? I could think of nothing more formidable than the poker, and one thought of the scar-faced man was enough to dissuade me. I crept into the kitchen and sidled up to the window. Misty grey cloud hung low over the treetops; again there was no one to be seen, but any number of men might have been lurking amongst the trees.

No help for it. I drew back the bolt and lifted the latch. Silence, except for the terrible pounding of my heart. Inch by inch, I eased the door open, willing the hinges not to creak, and looked out through the gap. Nobody sprang at me, but the floor beneath my feet felt very strange. It began to sway, and then to revolve; the door slid through my hand, and darkness engulfed me.

I came to my senses with my cheek pressed against cold stone and a throbbing in my temple. For a moment I had no idea where I was, only that I was lying sprawled across a doorway with something digging into my shins. How long had I been lying here? Shivering, I rose stiffly to my feet and looked around.

The overgrown garden was deserted; nothing stirred in the shadows beyond. Keeping close to the wall, I moved toward the far corner of the house and peeped around. Still there was no one; only the low front wall and a glimpse of meadow. Twenty paces away, across a stretch of ragged grass, loomed the edge of the coppice.

The ground was uneven and littered with dead foliage, so I had to watch where I trod. Five paces; ten; I was almost there, when a voice on my left cried, “I seen her!”

I began to run, tripped over my cloak, and fell. Footsteps pounded toward me; I picked myself up and turned, hopelessly, to face my pursuer—and realised that he was Felix, calling my name.

“Rosina! What on earth . . . ?”

I gabbled out my story, but he seemed strangely unperturbed.

“One man alone, you say? No one you recognised?”

“No, but—”

“Well, then, he couldn’t have known who you were. You see—I was thinking about it on the way back—they would have to send someone who could identify you: Naylor, for instance. Even your father wouldn’t risk kidnapping the wrong woman. And now we must get you indoors, my darling; you are shivering, and white as a sheet.”

“Felix, you don’t understand; they will be back any minute—”

“No, dearest, they won’t, because they don’t know where we are. We haven’t been followed on any of our walks; I’m certain of it. You were anxious—all my fault; I shouldn’t have alarmed you so—and out of sorts. Your scar-faced man, however menacing he seemed to you, was most likely an innocent wayfarer in need of sustenance. And remember, you were fast asleep; you might very well have dreamt the knocking, and even your sinister visitant himself.”

Calmly ignoring my protests, he led me back to the house and put me to bed as tenderly and efficiently as Lily would have done. Only after he had got a good fire going, and mixed me a glass of hot spiced wine, did I think to ask how he had fared in Dunbar.

“All is well, my darling. The physician I consulted was a little nonplussed by my request, but after fifteen minutes’ conversation he agreed readily enough. And then, while I was looking for a notary, I remembered my will—the one Carburton persuaded me to sign a few days after my father died, leaving everything to Edmund as the next in line—poor Horace isn’t allowed to manage his own affairs. So I found a solicitor instead—a Mr. McIntyre, in Castle Street, well away from the post office—and had him draw up a new one, leaving the entire estate to you. It is drawn ‘in anticipation of marriage,’ as the lawyers say, so it will still be valid after we are married.”

“But dearest, you have promised to share with your brothers; it is not fair to them—not even to Edmund, abominably as he has behaved.”

“Well, that is the point, in a way. As soon as the will was signed and sealed, I wrote to Edmund, telling him what I had done; but I didn’t enclose a copy, and I didn’t tell him who had drawn it. So, at least until the estate is sold up and divided, it would be very much against his interest for me to die.”

“Felix—are you afraid he might try to have you murdered?”

“No, but it will show him that I am not to be swayed by his threats: that, and the certificate of sanity I sent to Carburton along with my instructions about the sale. One copy of the will is in Mr. McIntyre’s strongbox; the other is for you to keep. And now you must rest, and promise not to dream of any more scar-faced men; we would not be here now if I thought there was the slightest danger.”

Reassured by his certainty (and doubtless by the hot toddy, which he insisted I finish), I agreed that I could easily have dreamt the scar-faced man, and by the time I fell asleep, I almost believed it myself.

It is almost midday on Friday; I have let my pen run away with me again, but I will abide by my principle of doing what I should want you to do (or rather posting what I should want you to post) in my place. I am still in bed, at Felix’s insistence, still headachy and uncomfortable, but with only a few scrapes and bruises to show for yesterday’s fright. He blames himself for alarming me unnecessarily by rushing home whilst he was still upset over Edmund’s letter. For my part, I feel ashamed of getting into such a panic over a harmless stranger, as he surely was. In ten days’ time we will be safely married, and then, God willing, I shall embrace you on the ninth.

All my love to you, and to dear Godfrey,

Your loving cousin,

Rosina

Kirkbride Cottage

Friday, 1 June 1860

Dearest Emily,

Once again I had to reassure Felix that the tears I shed over your letter were tears of joy. It is such a delight to know that Godfrey is his old self at last—such a long and anxious time it has been for you—and eager to return to his work. And such a relief that neither you nor your neighbors have seen anything suspicious.

All is quiet here, too. The man with the scarred face has not returned, not even to trouble my dreams. And Felix is in wonderfully high spirits; he told me last night that our love has brought him a happiness beyond anything he could have imagined. “Before I loved you,” he said, “even at the best of times, there was always a grey cloud hovering somewhere about my heart. At the worst, it was Stygian darkness; I could scarcely lift my head from the pillow, and longed only for oblivion. But now I am filled with light; I have fed on honeydew and drunk the milk of paradise, and the cloud is banished forever.” He says it is why he needs so little sleep; he feels light in every sense, and can easily believe that human beings could soar like birds if only they had sufficient faith, as with the disciple who was able to walk on water until he grew fearful and began to sink.

Yesterday afternoon we walked along the coast to a place called St. Baldred’s Cradle, a steep, rocky cleft at the mouth of a river. Felix insisted upon climbing the outer cliff, though he did not so much climb it as run straight up a spur of jagged rock, fifty or sixty feet high, and then leap from crag to crag along the top, waving delightedly whilst I watched with my heart in my mouth. He assured me when he came down that he could not possibly have missed his footing, but I do wish he could learn to be just a

little

fearful, if only for my sake!

As yet he has heard nothing from Carburton, but in Dunbar this morning he had a strong presentiment that he should call at the shipping agent’s. There he learnt that a ship called the

Utopia

will be sailing from Liverpool for Rio de Janeiro on the twenty-ninth of June. It seemed to him such a good omen that he reserved a cabin for us; the passage money does not have to be paid until the fifteenth, and he is certain the deed of sale will have reached him by then.

I confess that my heart sank at the news—it seems so terribly soon—but I am determined to subdue my misgivings. Felix is so elated by the prospect that I cannot bear to disappoint him. “We shall never have to endure another winter,” he said when he came in, “because in Rio it is warm and light all the year round.” Even though he is certain his melancholia will never return, it would be unpardonably selfish of me to try and keep him here, where the winters would remind him of that terrible darkness. All I could bring myself to say was that I should hate to be separated from you forever, to which he cheerfully replied that of course we should come back for visits. And perhaps when we have stayed in Rio for a while, he will be happy to live somewhere closer—Spain, perhaps, or the isles of Greece (he read me those wonderful lines from

Don Juan

the night before last)—so that we can spend whole summers in England—by which, of course, I mean Nettleford, and take a house close by, and see you every day.

All my love to you, and to dear Godfrey,

Your loving cousin,

Rosina

Kirkbride Cottage

Tuesday, 5 June 1860

Dearest Emily,

Well, we are married according to law, though the ceremony itself was a miserable affair, conducted by a dour and (I thought) disapproving clergyman in the presence of two paid witnesses who shuffled their feet whenever there was a momentary silence. I wept at the cheerlessness of it all, and even Felix was quite cast down; though the day was fine, we were in no mood for celebration, and were about to return home when he noticed a livery stable and suggested we hire a dogcart for the afternoon. A brisk drive along the coast restored our spirits, and a mile or so beyond the village of Skateraw we came to a little bay that was quite deserted. We tethered our horse near a grassy hollow, where the same thought came to us both: that we had been married not three hours, but three weeks. We made a bed of our cloaks and lay down, sheltered from the wind; and afterward, holding Felix in my arms while he slept (such a rare delight) with the sun’s warmth on my skin, I felt as though we had been taken up to heaven without the need of dying, floating in perfect light.

Only four days until I embrace you at last. We shall take the London express on Friday morning and stay in the Great Northern Hotel that night, so that Felix can see Mr. Carburton about the deed of trust. I feel a little apprehensive about staying so close to Great Portland Street, but Felix insists that, despite what he said the other day, there is not the slightest risk of his being charged with abduction. “I was upset by Edmund’s letter,” he said, “and not thinking clearly; you are my lawful wedded wife, and if anyone accosts us, I shall have him arrested then and there.” He will call at Mr. Carburton’s office on Saturday morning; as soon as that is done, we shall drive straight to Paddington, and should reach Nettleford by six at the latest. And then my happiness will be truly complete.

Your loving cousin,

Rosina

Station Hotel,

Durham

Thursday, 7 June 1860

Dearest Emily,

I have been staring at this page for the past hour, wondering what I shall say to you, and trying to imagine your replies, but all I can hear is my own voice telling me how unutterably foolish I have been. I should have known—but how

could

I have known? Felix—I must try to set it down plainly, from the beginning.

This morning—it seems a century ago—I accompanied Felix to Dunbar. “The law is on our side,” he said, “and I refuse to skulk.” The day was bright but chilly, and rather than go into the post office with him—he was certain, as he had been every day for the past week or more, that the deed of sale would have arrived—I waited on a bench in the sunshine. I was feeling perfectly content, and not in the least apprehensive, when I happened to glance at an alleyway across the street. Standing just inside the entrance was the man with the scarred face, his gaze fixed upon me. He was wearing his cap this time, with the peak drawn low over his brow, but the scar was unmistakable. As soon as our eyes met, he withdrew into the shadows and disappeared.

I sprang up and hurried into the post office to warn Felix, who was engaged at the counter. For the first time ever, he betrayed irritation. “It is just some local farmer or the like,” he said curtly, and returned to his interrogation of the postmistress. The man was nowhere to be seen when we emerged, and we walked home in uncharacteristic silence, Felix brooding (I presumed) over the absence of the deed of trust; I feeling wounded and uneasy, glancing frequently over my shoulder and receiving (so I felt) disapproving looks from Felix.

“You must forgive me, my darling,” he said as we came up to the house. “I am out of temper with Carburton, not with you. Shall we walk on a little?”

“No, thank you,” I said, “I have a slight headache. But you must keep on; I shall be quite all right.”

If he had insisted upon staying, I should have forgiven him completely. But he kissed me perfunctorily, and strode off in the direction of St. Baldred’s Cradle, leaving me to make my own way indoors.

Wishing I had a piano, which I had scarcely missed until that moment, I wandered restlessly about the cottage. Felix had always come from the post office in high good humour, saying the deed was sure to arrive tomorrow, but I had never been with him at the moment of disappointment. He should not have been so dismissive, but then I should have been more sympathetic; no doubt he was right about the scar-faced man, who would surely have followed us if he had any sinister intent. And this was our last day at the cottage; we must not leave here on a sour note.

Felix had been gone about a quarter of an hour; I ran downstairs and out to the front gate, meaning to follow him; but what if he had circled inland? The wind had dropped, and the sun’s warmth was comforting, so I sat on top of the wall to watch for his return.

Several minutes passed; I grew restless again and was about to go back indoors, when I heard the clatter of wheels and the jingling of a bridle coming up the lane behind the trees to my left. I darted toward the house, but before I could reach it, the vehicle—an open carriage, with the driver perched on a box, and a veiled woman in a dark cloak and bonnet seated within—had turned the corner and pulled up at the gate.

Half-fearful, half-curious, I remained in the doorway. The driver got down to help his passenger—whose bonnet concealed her face—descend. It is someone come to see the house, I thought. The landlord has told her that we are leaving tomorrow.

She spoke softly to the driver, who resumed his seat and took up the reins again. As she turned and began to walk toward me, I saw that she was heavy with child. I saw, too, that there was something familiar about her; something that chilled my blood and settled like ice around my heart.

She was Clarissa.

Not an apparition, not an hallucination, but my sister, smiling in a fashion I remembered all too well.

“So, Rosina, you are Mrs. Mordaunt now? Felix will have to choose between us.”

I did not feel anything at all; I suppose I was incapable of feeling, even of thought. I invited her into the house—what else could I do?—I think I even offered her tea. She looked as striking as ever, despite her condition. The gown beneath her travelling-cloak was a rich, pale blue satin, abundantly trimmed with lace, whereas I was dressed as plainly as a girl of fourteen: anyone coming into the room would have taken me for the parlourmaid. Her eyes seemed even larger and darker than I remembered—kohl, perhaps, and belladonna, but so cleverly applied I could not be sure—her hair more abundant, the lines of her face if anything finer. She had kept her old trick of regarding you—regarding me, at least—with every appearance of interest, tinged with a derision as subtle as the hint of rouge about her cheekbones. But the old mockery had taken on a new edge—wry, bitter, undeceived—along with a cool resolve I had not seen before. Only her hands betrayed any agitation, twining and untwining beneath the fringes of her sleeves.

I listened as one listens in a nightmare, powerless to move or speak, whilst she explained that the woman who had died with George Harrington had been her maidservant, an English girl she had engaged in Dover. Clarissa had caught them in flagrante, as she put it, a week before the accident (while they were still in Florence); she had left him that same day, taking everything she could lay her hands upon. She supposed the girl had decided to call herself Mrs. Harrington when she and George moved on to Rome.

In Siena, travelling as Caroline Dumont, a young widow, Clarissa heard the news of her own death, and decided then and there to leave Clarissa Wentworth in her grave. She did not say whether she suspected my father of having anything to do with the accident, but once she had made the decision, there was no going back on it. And then, at a masked ball in Venice, she met Felix Mordaunt.

Their affair, which lasted about a month, ended when she took up with a Mr. Henderson, a wealthy American of forty or so. “Felix was a younger son,” she said coolly, “with no obvious prospects: he never mentioned that he was the heir, or I might have stayed with him.” I remember, as she said this, glancing at a pair of crossed daggers on the wall behind her, and picturing myself, quite unemotionally, taking one of them down and plunging it into her bosom. Something must have showed in my face, however, for she added, “You would have done the same in my position. I had no choice. I sold what I had to sell, for the best price I could secure; it was that, or starve.”

They parted, she said, on good terms; Felix went on to Rome, whilst she remained with her American suitor in Venice, where she very soon discovered that she was expecting Felix’s child. She had hoped to pass it off as Mr. Henderson’s, but his suspicions gathered as the months passed, and once again she found herself alone. Soon after that, she learnt from a new acquaintance that a certain Rosina Wentworth—it was the talk of London—had followed her late sister’s example by running away with Felix Mordaunt, the heir to the Mordaunt estate.

With no other prospects in sight, she returned to England and made her way to Tregannon House, thinking she would find us there. Instead, she met Edmund Mordaunt. “He did not like me any more than I liked him, but we had interests in common. His man had only just traced you, and Mr. Mordaunt was hesitating over whether to pass the information on to our father. He feared that if Felix were to be carried off to prison, he would do something wild, such as deeding the entire estate to you.

“Edmund Mordaunt was seeking a way of prising you and Felix apart; and, of course, being a very moral and upright man, he felt some obligation toward me, as another of the women his brother had ruined. And so, reluctantly, he gave me your address.”

She had been Felix’s mistress; she was carrying his child. I knew that I ought to be angry, but anger would not come; as at that moment when you have cut yourself badly and time seems to freeze. You know that the blood will spurt, but all you can see is white, severed flesh; and then the pinpoint drops begin to form.

“What do you want?” I said dully. The question sounded foolish as soon as uttered; not only foolish, but beside the point.

“Money, of course. Or perhaps we could all live happily together in one of those Ottoman countries where a man is allowed more than one wife; it would certainly suit Felix. And now, Rosina, it is your turn for confidences; you must tell me how you met him.”

Her expression changed; she shrank back in her chair. I discovered that I was on my feet, with no memory of having risen, frozen by the realisation that it was not Clarissa who had deceived me, but Felix. My hands fell slowly to my sides.

And even Felix had not lied. “I have been intimate before this.” If he had added “with your sister,” then of course I should never . . . but he had not known; he could not have known she was my sister, any more than Clarissa could have known that I, of all the women on this earth . . . Lily had warned me, as you would surely have done if I had waited for your reply, instead of rushing headlong into Felix’s arms. My father could not have forced me to marry Mr. Bradstone. I had deceived myself.

If it had not been for this monstrous coincidence . . . but no; not entirely. That first intimate smile, when he first caught sight of me at Mrs. Traill’s: the memory I had tried so hard to suppress, for fear it would make me jealous. “I do beg your pardon. I mistook you for someone else.”

He had been drawn to me because I reminded him of Clarissa.

I was still standing motionless, staring down at her, when I heard the front door open, then the sound of whistling in the hall. Felix appeared in the doorway, smiling his warmest smile and saying, “My darling, I am so . . .”

The smile faded and died.

“Caroline,” he stammered at last. “What—what on—”

“She is not Caroline,” I said. “She is Clarissa; my sister, and the mother of your child.”

His face crumpled; lines appeared where none had ever been, like cracks opening in a wall at the point of collapse; he seemed to shrivel beneath my gaze, until the last remnants of the man I had loved had crumbled into dust.

His mouth opened, but no sound came out; he took a step toward me, stretching out his arms in a gesture of hopeless appeal.

“Do not touch me!” I said in a voice I scarcely recognised. “You have no claim upon me:

she

is your wife. I am going upstairs to fetch my things; I do not wish to speak to either of you, ever again.”

Felix made another attempt to speak; for a moment I thought he would try to grasp my arm, but his hand fell away, and I left the room without a backward glance. My hands were steady, my eyes perfectly dry; I went up the stairs like an automaton, gathered the few remaining things I had not packed—including ten guineas in gold that Felix had given me to keep in case of an emergency—put on my travelling-cloak, and closed the lid of the valise.

He was waiting, ashen-faced, near the foot of the stairs when I came down.

“Rosina, I beg of you—”

Again he made as if to touch me, and again his hand fell nervelessly to his side. I was aware of Clarissa hovering at the edge of my vision, but neither of them spoke again, and a moment later I had closed the front door behind me.

I did not weep then, and have not since. Tomorrow I shall take the train to London, and thence to Plymouth. It means I shall be with you a day early; I hope you will not mind. I do not know what I shall do—only that I should like to see you first.

There is no point in posting this. Perhaps I shall burn it—or keep it to remind me of my unutterable folly.