A Bloom in Winter (24 page)

So why couldn’t she will herself to break his gaze, to look away? Why did she want more than anything for him to take her into his arms?

“Thank you,” she finally managed, casting her gaze downward.

He still held the offending newspaper in his hand. “Why did you leave so quickly? I thought we had an . . . understanding?” He blurted out the words as if they had been on his mind for months.

They probably had.

For a panicked moment, she wanted to deny she knew what he was talking about, but she felt enough shame at the way she had left without a word to him that she knew she owed him an explanation, or at least a response. If she could.

Droplets of rain started coming down and still they stood. Finally she said, “You know of the argument, correct? Of what Rowena did?”

“She didn’t mean to—” he started, and she held up her hand. “Don’t defend her to me. I’m trying to answer you . . . ”

He subsided.

“After the argument, I was taken upstairs to talk to Lady Summerset.” She bit her lip as he waited. The rain came down harder, but neither of them wanted to move, afraid to break the fragile spell that bound them together. She fought with herself. His eyes were as dark as coal, and filled with more pain than she ever could have imagined. The sure knowledge that she was the cause of his pain lacerated her. She’d never meant to hurt him.

“I learned some things that made a—
friendship
—between us impossible.”

He let go of the paper then, but the rain had taken away its ability to fly and it sank to the ground. He moved closer and she put her hands between them. He reached up and took hold of her elbows. She could feel the warmth of his fingers through the light wool of her coat.

“What things? What things did you find out, Prudence? Didn’t you know I would have helped you? Stood by you?”

She shook her head, tears forming behind her eyes and spilling over. They were undetectable since the rain was already covering her face.

“If you want to know how impossible it was, ask your fiancée!” She spit the words out from the depth of her pain and his head snapped back as if he’d been slapped.

“Maybe I’ll do that,
Mrs. Wilkes
.”

They stared at each other, and Prudence felt the chasm widening between them, and though she knew it was for the best, it still cut deeply, painfully, into the part of her that had been holding on to hope that maybe there would come a time when they could still be together.

And then he kissed her. His lips smashed against hers, hurting her at first, and she knew he meant to hurt, needed to hurt. Then he made a noise deep in his throat and everything changed, his lips changed, became gentle, kissing away the pain, and though she didn’t want them to, her whole body and heart responded to him. She kissed him back in a way that she had never kissed anyone back.

Not even Andrew.

Gasping, she pulled away. They stared at each other, and his eyes were filled with things unsaid, things that could never be said, and Prudence turned and ran. She heard him call her name, but she couldn’t turn back.

*   *   *

Victoria ran diagonally across Trafalgar Square to the National Gallery. It had taken her a little longer to reach the Gallery than she had anticipated and she saw Mary Richardson pacing at the top of the steps. The skies over the square were gray and ominous, as if they threatened a downpour at any moment.

She’d learned from Martha that Mary Richardson had been jailed several times in her zeal for women’s suffrage and Victoria swelled with pride at the idea that this dedicated person wanted to meet with her.

“I’m sorry I’m late,” Victoria said. “I didn’t get your message and—”

“It’s fine, it’s fine, you’re here now. I knew I could count on you. We only met that one time and all I could think of was that you were a young woman a person could count on.”

Mary’s pale skin was even paler than Victoria had remembered and her dark eyes seemed to look right through her. She seemed agitated, though Victoria couldn’t think why. She wore a long, dark coat and held one of her arms so stiffly to her side that Victoria wondered whether she’d hurt it somehow. “What did you need to tell me?” Victoria asked.

“Not yet, let’s go inside. You’ll understand better then.”

Because it was a free day, the Gallery was filled with people, and for a few minutes Mary and Victoria followed the crowd. Then they left the crowd and walked into a room filled with Dutch paintings.

Victoria tilted her head and regarded a small one by God-fried Schalcken titled
A Man Offering Gold and Coins to a Girl
. “I’ve never been much of a fan of the Dutch school of painting. The colors are so very depressing.”

“Do you know what’s depressing?” Mary said, continuing her walk around the room. She didn’t seem to be looking at any of the paintings in front of her and Victoria wondered why she had chosen to meet at a museum if she didn’t want to look at pictures.

“It’s depressing that money is more valued than human rights. The government is filled with such hypocrisy. If men could figure out a way to profit from suffrage, women would have had the vote long ago.”

Victoria nodded. “I agree. I—”

“You have heard of Emmeline Pankhurst, haven’t you?” Mary went on as if Victoria hadn’t spoken. “And her daughters? She is the head of the WSPU and such a sincere person. Absolutely tireless in her work for women.”

Victoria nodded as Mary continued her aimless, unseeing walk through the Dutch Masters.

“She was taken last night from a train platform after a meeting in Glasgow. They treated a woman of such character as they would a common criminal.”

Mary bristled like a dog, and it was on the tip of Victoria’s tongue to ask whether she was all right, but clearly the woman was
not
all right. She wished Martha were there, or even Prudence, who had the ability to calm crying children, lovelorn girls, and even mad dogs. Surely she would know what to do with Mary Richardson, who seemed to grow more and more agitated as the minutes passed.

“They’ve taken Mrs. Pankhurst from us; now it’s time to take something of value from them.”

“What?”

Mary shook her head. “Never mind, never mind. Here, come
with me.” Mary took her arm and they left the Dutch room and went through several other displays until they came to the Spanish room.

“Stand here. Pretend to be studying the Madonna. On my signal, create a diversion.”

“What?” Victoria asked, confused, but Mary had already walked away from her side. Ice formed in the center of Victoria’s stomach and she stood exactly as she had been instructed. What was Mary going to do? Part of Victoria wanted to run, but her limbs seemed frozen. She studied the Madonna as though her life depended on it. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Mary take a sketch pad out of her reticule and begin sketching as she sauntered around the room. Not far from where Victoria stood, two guards sat, watching everyone who came into the room. At the door was another museum attendant, helping people find their way. Mary appeared to notice none of these things as she walked.

Victoria felt very conspicuous just standing in front of the painting, but fear kept her rooted. She frowned and squinted her eyes at the Madonna, as if studying the brushstrokes. Surely someone would notice that she wasn’t moving? But no, this was what people did at museums.

Sweat beaded on Victoria’s forehead and her muscles cramped from tension. It occurred to her that she could just walk away. No one would connect her with whatever Mary was about to do, with whatever act of protest she had planned. Mary’s words ran through her mind, that Victoria seemed the kind of woman she could count on. Victoria’s legs began to tremble and she felt her chest grow tight.
Oh, no. Please, no
.

Just then Mary gave her a nod and walked resolutely toward
a canvas. Victoria watched and it seemed as if Mary were walking in slow motion. At the same time, she pulled an ax out of the sleeve she had held so protectively against her side.

It was when she saw the ax that Victoria screamed. The detectives and the attendant turned toward her and the moment they did, the sound of shattering glass filled the air. The detectives looked up to the skylight in the center of the room, puzzled.

Still Victoria screamed. Behind the detective she saw Mary striking blows with the ax against a painting of the Venus.

The detectives and two attendants turned then and went after Mary. One of them slipped, while the other successfully grabbed her ax. It was then that Victoria turned to run. The attendant who had slipped tried to redeem himself by grabbing onto Victoria, but she eluded his grasp and made her way to the stairs. She could hear Mary screaming in the background. She nearly threw herself down the stairs and finally the front doors of the museum came into view. Her only hope was to get outside. Maybe she could blend in with the crowd.

But she couldn’t breathe. She slowed, her legs shaking as she felt her lungs closing off.

She heard people yelling behind her and felt herself being grabbed from behind.

“That’s her! They came in together!”

Victoria opened her mouth to tell them she hadn’t meant for it to happen, that she had only screamed because she saw that Mary had an ax, but she couldn’t speak. Black spots floated in front of her eyes and everything went black.

*   *   *

It was dim when Victoria opened her eyes. She lay on a bed of white sheets and blankets. The room was so small she could
probably lie down and touch three of the walls at once. The scent of bleach and camphor couldn’t overcome the smell of human urine.

She was definitely not at home. The door opened and she shut her eyes like a child afraid to look under the bed.

“She still hasn’t come to yet,” said a woman.

“She’s very lucky. She might have died. I’ve never seen someone struggle so hard to breathe,” a man’s voice said. “There’s nothing more we can do except alert the wardress when she has recovered.”

Wardress?

“Yes, Doctor.”

The door shut again and Victoria heard the unmistakable sound of a lock being shut. Her eyes flew open. She struggled to sit up before realizing that her arm was handcuffed to the top of the iron bed frame. She stared at the cuff for a moment before a scream rent her body.

The door opened. “What’s wrong? What’s wrong?” a woman with a starched cambric nurse’s cap cried, hovering over Victoria. Victoria could see a man in a dirty white coat behind her.

“Shut her up. She may trigger another breathing attack,” the doctor said.

The nurse slapped Victoria. Victoria stopped screaming and looked at the woman in horror. “You hit me.”

“I did and if you scream again, I might do it again.”

Defiance and fear took over and Victoria began screaming again. It was the doctor who moved in and hit her twice more as Victoria kicked her legs and screamed at the top of her lungs. The doctor made like he was going to hit her again, but the nurse who had disappeared after slapping Victoria the first time came back, holding a bottle and a rag.

“Hold her down!” she commanded.

Another young man crowded into the room and between him and the doctor they managed to hold Victoria still. The nurse put the rag over her nose and mouth and for the second time in a day everything went black.

“L
et me know as soon as she comes in,” Rowena instructed the butler before going into dinner.

Rowena entered the dining room with a smile on her face, although the last thing she wanted to do right now was smile. She wanted to wring Victoria’s neck. How dare she make her worry right now? It wasn’t as though Rowena didn’t have enough on her mind, especially now that pressure was mounting from both her family and Sebastian’s to name a wedding date.

To make matters ever so much more complicated, Sebastian had informed her he bloody well wasn’t ready to call off their engagement yet and further, as she had been the one to get them into this mess—and because he had so nicely gone along with it and saved her hide—she could put up with it a while longer. She conceded that this was only fair, but she wished she knew his plans. Why on earth would he not want to cancel the engagement? He had to be under as much pressure as she was to name the date.

And now Victoria was grievously late. She had gotten a note earlier and had left in a hurry, only saying she would be back before tea. Now it was suppertime and her aunt and their guests were wondering where Victoria was.

Sebastian stood as she entered the room. The dining room
here was far smaller than the formal one at Summerset, but just as elaborate, with a Chippendale dining room table and chairs for twenty as the centerpiece.

With an entire room watching them, Sebastian pulled out her chair for her. “Did you have a good day, my darling?” he asked as she took her seat. He briefly laid his hands on her shoulders before scooting in her chair.

Inside, Rowena winced at the endearment and the caress, but she managed a sweet smile. “Yes, thank you . . . darling.”

“How sweet they are!” Kit’s mother exclaimed from her seat toward the end of the table. “It almost restores my belief in true love.” She beamed at them, but Rowena caught a wicked glint in her eye.