“Yes?”
“We sometimes forget what we do not wish to remember.”
“You think she is in pretense.”
“I think I would exercise great caution.” A long pause. “If she is not soon recovered, you may be wise to write St. Alban yourself.”
She missed someone.
The emptiness caverned through her, ratcheting her heartbeat, as she faced the oval-shaped mirror on the bedchamber wall. A stranger stared back at her.
Brown, copper-streaked hair. Messy and tied in a braid across her shoulder.
A thin face, sharp jaw.
Brown eyes.
She knew herself, but in an absent way—like a face she’d passed once in a carriage but had long since forgotten. Her chest swelled. Hours ago, a younger maid had entered Meg’s chamber with a white muslin dress draped over her arm. “In case you should feel strong enough for dinner,” said the girl, with a tentative smile.
Meg had driven her away.
Then she’d scrambled into the dress—not because she intended to venture downstairs or partake of dinner, but because she needed something more than the thin cotton nightdress if she was to escape at dark.
A spasm of panic—then longing, then pain—awoke in the bottom of her stomach. Her hands quivered. They needed someone to still them. The one she missed.
The one who wasn’t here.
Mother. Father.
She framed her face. Then traced the four-inch gash across her forehead.
Brother. Sister.
Tears.
Friend. Husband?
She was someone. She had lived among people who cared for her, cherished her, and belonged to her. Hadn’t she? Why had they not found her?
Dr. Bagot had said she’d been beaten.
That she’d sustained not only blows to her head but hand-print bruises on her arm, burns on her skin, and a broken nose. Her clothes were ripped, frayed, and singed. Her feet bare. Had she been robbed? Assaulted by a highwayman? Why would anyone injure her this way, then situate her under the elm, alone, as if hoping she’d be found?
Rubbing her arms, she shook the cobweb of questions from her mind. No matter. She did not need answers. Not tonight. She had one thing to think of now: running.
Where, she didn’t know.
To what, she had not strength to imagine.
But she could not stay here. Not in this chamber, with the white mantel and pink bed curtains and potted begonias and perfect oil-painted portraits. Not with a wrinkled maid who sneezed too often, or the younger one who smiled too much. Or a doctor who deemed her mad.
Or a gentle-toned lord whose kindness would doubtless wear thin.
Perhaps already had.
Squaring her shoulders, she backed away from the mounted looking glass. She was doing the right thing. She would not be locked away for what she could not remember. Too many days had passed already, and the last thing in the world she could bear was an asylum.
She had to go home.
