The Decline and Fall of Rowland Graves Page 3

  If she couldn’t put a stop to this whole ghastly affair by making her sister unavailable to him, then the next step was only rational. And the young Margaret Ellery would help her take it.

  The rhythmic clattering of hooves ceased and the carriage came to a halt. Judith nudged the sleeping maid with the toe of her slipper.

  “Wake up, Lucy.”

  “Mmm? Mrs Barlow?” The groggy woman blinked into the light coming in from the carriage window and stifled a yawn.

  “We’re home,” she pointed out, needlessly.

  Yes, home. Time to wait now. And watch. Her plan would either work or it wouldn’t. If it didn’t, well … Judith would simply have to arrive at a new plan.

  * * * *

  Rowland stared from one sombre face to another, his hands hanging helpless at his sides. It was as if he’d taken a stage to deliver a prepared speech, only to find his audience speaking another language entirely. His baffled silence was making it worse.

  “I don’t understand,” he said, with a disoriented shake of his head. “How have I not been approved? Did you not receive Doctor Ellery’s letter of recommendation?”

  The greying, eternally waterlogged-looking Doctor Hooper raised a woolly silver brow at him from his seat at the centre of the long table. “We did. We also received his letter rescinding his recommendation, two days ago. And I suspect you know the why of it.”

  “What? No, I don’t know ‘the why of it.’ I have no idea whatsoever!”

  The other four Fellows, two seated on either side of Hooper, glowered back at him, their faces painted in a variety of expressions, ranging from judgement to disgust.

  Am I in the right meeting? They haven’t confused me for someone else? This is the twentieth of October, isn’t it? As scheduled?

  “No”—Hooper’s voice rolled with cynicism—“I’m sure you haven’t the faintest. Either way, Oxford’s school of medicine has no room for that sort of business. Enough reputations have been tainted already, wouldn’t you agree, Doctor Graves?” The older man’s smirk pushed Rowland past bafflement and into irritation.

  “What in Heaven’s name are you talking about?” He wanted to fling his hat onto the floor in frustration. This professorship was supposed to have been all but secured, today’s meeting a mere formality. He and Elinor should have been making plans to marry and move here already, and this man was turning the entire matter completely on its ear.

  “Oh what indeed, Graves!” The man slapped his palm on the table. “You should know better than anyone what notorious gossips women are. Did you think your various episodes of impropriety would simply be kept quiet for your own convenience? That the daughters of gentlemen would stand for you running amok, taking advantage of their trust for your own gratification?”

  Impropriety? Daughters? Plural?

  “We won’t stand for that sort of thing here,” Hooper went on. “Do you know Doctor Ellery’s letter tells us that one of the young women was engaged to be married? For shame, Sir! We’ve no interest in tainting our halls with scandals of that nature.” He looked Rowland up and down as though eyeing something particularly unsavoury a dog had dragged into his house.

  Engaged to be married?

  There was exactly one person who could be behind this, though he still didn’t understand why.

  Judith Barlow.

  Desperation flooded his veins, pouring out of his mouth.

  “Doctor Hooper, there’s been a mistake!” He stepped forward in his effort to explain. “Doctor Ellery has clearly been misinformed. If you’ll simply allow me to—”

  “To what, Graves? Poison our ears with more lies? I’ve known Francis Ellery for over forty years. I trust him with my very life, and you ask me not to believe his word?”

  Hooper’s accusations hung there, a black storm gathering over Rowland’s head. His chest rose and fell in the condensed silence, the morning light partially silhouetting the table of Fellows, illuminating the condemning bald pates, but providing no warmth. His jaw shifted, tightly held, along with his gut.

  “Perhaps you should consider a different line of work, Doctor Graves.” Hooper filled the space in the room with his final pronunciation. “I don’t think you’ve any future in medicine. At least not here.”

  And with those words, a door was closed.

  So. It would be this way, would it?

  Rowland narrowed his eyes at the array of Fellows who faced him from behind their table. Men who wouldn’t listen. Who had made a decision based on a letter, to which they would hear no rebuttal, and which would affect them for only the span of this meeting, but would follow him for the rest of his career.

  He knew men such as these. It was done.

  Done.

  “Very well,” he said, his voice low, seething. “By your leave, Gentlemen.” He took off his hat in a mockery of the normal respectful gesture before turning on his heel and striding from the room, not waiting to hear a formal dismissal.

  He didn’t even see the halls or grounds of his beloved Oxford, so dark and encompassing were this thoughts at his leave-taking. It was a blessing in disguise that no other soul crossed his path along the way. His angel was back in Bristol and there was no one here to inspire temperance and mercy in him the way she always did. And the portions of Rowland Graves roiling about on the surface on this chill October morning were neither temperate nor merciful at all.

  * * * *

  III

  Paved With Good Intentions

  Five days.

  He had five days to spend alone in a carriage with his thoughts, and this was proving to be extremely unhelpful.

  That was how long it would take to travel back with empty hands to Bristol. What would he tell Elinor when he got there? By what possible means could she persuade her father to see Rowland as a suitable husband now?

  The sound of the carriage wheels ground out his thoughts, refining them as grain against a millstone.

  Medicine had been his life, his calling. To delve deep, to discover the root of an ailment and cut or flush it out, to shake his fist and laugh at the weaknesses of the flesh, the vagaries of Fate. These things drove Rowland on in his quest for knowledge. But more, he truly wished to teach. To help other men learn the ways they could snatch the reins away from Fortune. To be a part of educating others, so that they might heal, might cure. A soul recovered at his hand was a shining reward, but the idea that he could show others, and that his teachings might cause dozens of men, scores, to go into the world and do the same …

  And now it was gone. Thanks to that contemptible Judith Barlow.

  His coachman was shouting something to another driver passing in the opposite direction. Rowland wished he would be silent.

  How could someone as lovely and perfect as Elinor have a sister so vile and pestilent? They’d been brought up in the same household. He and his brother Jonathan weren’t so different. Though his brother was more interested in ships and commerce than medicine, they shared most of the same sensibilities.

  The one thing Rowland was certain of, though, was that it was indeed the elder Barlow sister who was behind this catastrophe. She’d already made use of her wiles to manufacture a sudden, convenient engagement, just before he’d planned to announce his own intentions. It was clear she’d discovered his involvement with Elinor, and she didn’t approve. But why?

  He popped his knuckles one by one as he sat, fermenting in his own ire within the shell of his carriage. Out the window the shadowless light of an overcast afternoon made the entire landscape look as he felt. Colourless. Oppressed. Hopeless.

  And angry now, as well. A slow simmer of wrath, the sort normally doused by Elinor’s patient, calming presence, was bubbling away inside him.

  He reached into his coat pocket and brought out the scalpel. A gift, almost a jest, from Doctor Ellery, given upon his having earned his doctoral degree. Rowland never used it for actual practice; it was more of a sentimental token. Now, though, he applied it to removing non-existent di
rt from under his already immaculate nails.

  Who, exactly, did that shrew imagine she was toying with? First to meddle in his plans for engagement, and now to ruin his career? Daughters of gentlemen indeed! He suspected she knew very well her younger sister was far from unwilling, but to spread a tale of Rowland forcing himself? On both of them? He could see the lies dripping from her tongue, poisoning the goodwill of Francis Ellery. The man had been his mentor and now he would take Rowland for a knave, a defiler of young women. The interior of the carriage felt as if it was growing impossibly hot, despite the grey afternoon.

  With a thump and a dull clatter, the carriage jolted over what must have been a sizable rock in the road. He heard the coachman give a low grunt outside, likely at being jostled in his seat.

  A thin sting made Rowland look down to see a tiny, precise cut spelled out in red alongside the nail of his first finger. He glanced at the scalpel in his other hand before returning a blank stare to the cut. The thin scarlet line was welling up, becoming bloated under his gaze. His attention was rapt as it swelled into a precarious, wobbling ruby bead, swaying impossibly under the motion of the carriage before the tension broke at last and it escaped in a red path down the side of his finger.

  He popped the digit into his mouth without thought. Blood didn’t disturb him. How could it? Who could make a career as a medical man and have trouble with the sight? If he were honest with himself, he found it beautiful, in its own wet, macabre fashion. It was the most vibrant colour a body could make.

  The most vibrant perhaps, but not the loveliest. Not by far. That honour he’d save for the pale delicate blue of Elinor’s eyes. Or perhaps the white gold of her hair. The pink of her lips, or of her …

  Rowland returned the scalpel to his pocket, lest he cut something on purpose.

  His angel was engaged to another man and now his future lay in ruins! How could this happen? How in two weeks could his universe be so upended?

  You know precisely how, Rowland: the vicious meddling of a disapproving sister.

  He squeezed at the tip of his finger and watched as another fat, ruddy pearl grew out of the cut. This time he held his hand upright and looked on as the droplet rolled down over his knuckle before losing volume and momentum in the valley between his first two fingers.

  Other than the dull thud of hooves and the muted rolling of carriage wheels, it was so very quiet within the curved walls of the coach. Odd, he thought, as blood so often came with such a great deal of noise. Crying. Screaming. Pleading.

  Rowland thought of such sounds. And he thought of Judith Barlow, destroyer of dreams. A doctor was supposed to make the pain stop, not awaken it. Not cultivate it like a fine, rare botanical specimen.

  The bloodied hand had become a fist, and now his nails were dirty in truth, with red seeping beneath their edges.

  Five days was too long to spend alone. He needed Elinor, needed her now. He never had these sort of thoughts if she was with him. His dove, his perfect angel, would chase this part of him away. Black, skittering things clawed at him, and her pure light could not come soon enough.

  The light of early evening was bright enough, though low clouds covered the sky, but inside the carriage trundling westward towards Bristol, it was dark as a winter midnight.

  * * * *

  Moonlight sliced the darkness inside the carriage house like a blade as the servants’ door cracked open. He could see her from his place in the shadows, but she couldn’t see him.

  A step, and then another. She was coming closer.

  Rowland caught her up, pulling her fast against him, silencing her startled gasp with a hand over her lips from behind.

  “Does anyone know you’re here?” he asked, as quietly as he was able. His fingers came away from her face, and he released her from his hold.

  “No, my love,” she whispered, straightening her shawl, eyes wide as they tried to adjust to the dark.

  Praying for forgiveness, Rowland seized her up again in his embrace and captured her mouth in a hungry, desperate kiss. He couldn’t stand to be in her presence and not touch her, not after the days of torture he’d spent alone on the road. As always, his angel knew without words what he needed and offered back yielding lips, a caressing tongue, and the faintest of approving whimpers.

  “Rowland,” she said in hushed tones when they finally parted, “we don’t need to meet at midnight in my father’s carriage house simply to trade kisses. What has happened?”

  He set his forehead to hers, gripping her by the upper arms, unsure of how to explain, to tell what must be told. Delays would not improve matters, however.

  “Oxford”—he managed to grind out—“did not go well, Dove. No, not well at all.”

  She held her tongue, waiting for him to continue.

  “I won’t be getting the professorship.”

  “But Rowland, that’s terrible!” Her voice rose a bit louder than it ought to in her concern. “Why ever not?”

  “Shhh, Love. It seems that … it seems that Doctor Ellery has rescinded his recommendation. The Fellows will not approve me for the post.”

  Her palms came up to his chest, stroking in soothing lines over the front of his shirt. “I don’t understand, Love,” she said, “Doctor Ellery chose you himself to follow in his place. He introduced you to Father before he retired. Why would he—”

  “Someone has filled his head with lies, Elinor. Someone has convinced him that I’ve behaved improperly with several ‘daughters of gentlemen’, including one already affianced.”

  The fine layer of grit on the floor crunched under the soles of his shoes as he shifted his stance, waiting for her to understand. He made an effort to loosen his grip on her arms. His angel was no place to leave the marks of his anger.

  “Who would tell him such a thing?” Her tone was wound tight with confusion. It would do him good to remember that a soul as innocent as Elinor Barlow would not immediately see the root of trickery, even when it tripped her up at her feet.

  “A person who doesn’t want us to be together, Dove. A person who wants to make sure your father will never approve of me as a husband, who needs to see my future ruined to do so.”

  “But … but …” She was stepping away from him now, realisation washing over her. “How could she?”

  “I don’t understand it myself,” he said, moving towards her again. “Why this hatred? What have I done to make an enemy of her? Family not agreeing on a suitor for a young lady, this I’ve heard of. But these lies? This sneaking and treachery in the dark? What sort of person does these things?”

  The light was dim to the point of playing tricks on his eyes, but Rowland was sure he could see her shoulders begin to quake. A sniffle then, and a cough. He stepped forward in a rush, folding her into his arms, letting her hot cheek bury into the side of his neck.

  “I’m sorry, Love. Please. Shhhh …” He stroked at her hair, her back. “I didn’t want to tell you. I’m sorry.”

  “She isn’t my sister, Rowland,” she said against his collar bone, almost too quietly to be heard.

  “Oh, Love …”

  “No!” He felt her fingers tightening on his coat sleeves. “There’s no reason! No reason at all for a person to be so wicked!”

  Elinor’s skin was flushed, heated against him wherever they touched, and he knew, in her own way, she was brushing against a bit of the same fury he’d known on his endless carriage ride. A nobler man would have been terribly distraught by the idea of his only love feeling this way, but certain grim, outlying facets of himself were beginning to make Rowland believe he might not be such a noble man.

  If she hates her own sister, this will all be so much easier now, won’t it?

  He pushed the thought down. They were out here in this carriage house to discuss plans. Best to be about it.

  “Elinor.”

  Hearing her name seemed to break her from her spiral of despair and she tilted her face up to him.

  “Do you want us to be together?”<
br />
  “You know I do!”

  “It seems hope is lost for us here in Bristol,” he began, chest tightening in anticipation of how she might react. “Will you come away with me?”

  “To where, my love?”

  A fine start. She had not balked or rejected the idea out of hand. He ploughed ahead.

  “Amsterdam. My cousin Ruth married a printer some three years ago, and her husband set up his business there. I’m sure they would take us under their roof for a time, at least until I could establish myself.”

  “But … Amsterdam?” She sounded sceptical. “Will your cousin not simply relay your whereabouts to your family? And if Judith suspects … will my family not come asking yours about where you’ve disappeared to?”

  “She hasn’t spoken to my father’s side of the family since her wedding. I don’t think they much approved of her choice of husband, either. I’m sure she’ll keep her silence, if I ask it.”

  His angel was still with indecision in his arms. He could nearly feel the churn of her considering.

  “Elinor?”

  Silence.

  “Yes. We’ll do it. We’ll go to Amsterdam.”

  He might have broken her in half, he squeezed her to him so tightly then.

  “Thank you, my love! Thank you!” He all but twirled her about. “Now we must only think of a way to—”

  “I have a way.”

  “You do?” He held her now at arm’s length, blinking into the darkness. It was his turn to be caught off guard.

  “Yes. The feast. Do you remember? At the end of the month? The one Father has planned on Hallowtide?”

  “The one you insisted I had that silly raven mask made for? With the odd name? Where did he get the idea for that again?” He took up her hand and pulled her deeper into the darkened building, peering about for somewhere they could sit.

  “The masquerade. Yes. And it was Mr Ashford’s idea, one of Father’s friends. He spent the last year in Venice; it seems this sort of thing is the latest style there.” Rowland had spied out a low bench against the rear wall and sat, drawing her onto his knee. “If you ask me,” she said, giggling quietly against his ear, “Mr Ashford must have shown Father the bottom of several glasses of wine, Love. He’d normally never agree to an event such as this. At least not after Mother died.”