Beatrice lifted her head to stare at her daughter. “Unnecessarily!”
“Well, if he is out of danger…”
“That you can say such a thing tells me you have no understanding of my position! Of what it means to be a mother. Of what it means to be the one who must ensure that her children not only live but thrive. Each time your brother’s health fails him we use up more of our meager funds. Do you imagine your father’s wild journeys, grubbing around in the dirt of foreign countries, provided us with comfortable means? I am here to tell you it did not. It is true that the doctor’s fees nibble only slowly at what there is, but just as an infestation of moths may make but a small impact initially, the end result is ruination. What will happen when the day comes Charles is dangerously ill and there is no more money? And before you speak of the earnings you provide from your work, do you imagine such sums color the costs of running this home in any meaningful way? Again, they do not. Your refusal to seriously consider marriage means we must keep you, that is the plain fact of it. It is not a simple matter of a gown here or a new pair of boots there.… The one way in which you could, in truth, improve all our circumstances would be to marry well.”
“Mother, I—”
“No, do not speak, Hecate. I have not the strength to endure your selfish protestations this evening.”
Hecate had heard such charges before but she had never seen her mother deliver them with tears in her eyes. She had not the heart to argue with her. Seeing her so beaten down by the demands, emotional and practical, being made upon her, saddened her deeply. Was her mother right to call her selfish? What, in fact, had she herself done to help the family? To help Charlie? She took a handkerchief from her pocket and passed it to her mother, who took it somewhat warily.
“Mother, when Father proposed to you, were you certain? I mean to say, how did you know you were making the right decision, in marrying him?”
Beatrice looked taken aback by the question. She dabbed at her eyes briefly while she considered her reply.
“Your father was employed by the foreign office at the time and expected to have a diplomatic career. His family are respectable, well thought of.… My own father approved the match, though I think my mother had higher hopes for me. And of course, there was my younger sister to be considered. She could not marry ahead of me. I … disliked being a bar to her happiness and advancement, particularly as there was someone who wished to marry her.”
“Uncle Bertram?”
“Yes. It has been a highly successful marriage,” she pointed out, evidently still pleased that she had in some way enabled it.
“So, it was the practicable choice, to marry Father? The responsible choice?”
“It was that, yes.”
“But did you … When you agreed to become his wife, did you love him?”
The air in the room seemed to fizz. Hecate could not read her mother’s expression and waited anxiously for the answer. When at last she spoke, Beatrice had regained her more customary composure. Her voice was level, almost matter of fact. Which made her words all the more surprising. Hecate had been half expecting something about love growing from friendship, or affection deepening with the shared joys of family life. Her mother, however, had something quite different to tell her.
“I adored your father from the outset. The first time I met him, I thought perhaps I was sickening for something, I experienced such a giddiness. To be in his company was to know complete happiness and became my greatest wish. The strength of my feelings toward him terrified me at first and then, once I was certain they were returned in kind and in sincerity, I was the happiest girl in the county. We have shared that love for over twenty-five years and it has not diminished one iota. Oh, I know you see us as a couple in their middle years, perhaps too accustomed to one another’s company. You will come to understand that not everyone makes public their feelings. We do not all of us see it necessary to do so. Your father knows precisely how I feel, because it is how he himself feels.” She smiled then, and Hecate was aware it was in part due to the look of amazement she could see on her daughter’s face. “So you see, I was fortunate, for the right choice was also, for me, the happiest.”
Hecate sat back in her chair heavily. She did not know if her mother’s declaration of such a grand love was helpful or not. In some ways, it would have steered her toward a sensible choice more readily if Beatrice had spoken of a personal sacrifice of some sort. And yet, there were more people than herself to consider. Had she the right to refuse to help her family when she had the means to do so? John was not wealthy, but he had a respectable, well-to-do family behind him and a good position at the cathedral. He would keep her, she would no longer be a drain on the family resources, and she would be able to help with Charlie’s medical bills. More than that, she could ease her mother’s burden and put her mind at rest. One thing was certain, she could not make a decision at that moment. She got to her feet.
“Come, Mother, let me help you to bed. We both are in need of sleep, I believe.” She offered her arm and her mother rose and took it and together they went upstairs.
The rain worsened through the night. After breakfast, Hecate had Stella show her how to twist her hair into a French plait. It required several attempts, but she mastered it. It was somewhat off-center, but this was not apparent if she chose to wear it pulled forward over one shoulder. Her mulberry wool hat sat atop it much more securely, the pin working through the braid. She donned her Mackintosh and was on the point of going to fetch her bicycle when her father emerged from his study.
“I have a meeting at the museum,” he told her, putting on his top hat and plucking his umbrella from the hall stand. “Won’t you walk into town with me? Forgo your bicycle ride, just this once?”
“Very well,” she said, taking his arm. “For you.”
They left the house, striding down Hafod Road together, keeping close to benefit from the shelter of his umbrella.
“I have arranged to speak with Inspector Winter later today,” she told him.
“You plan to tell him of what we learned during our visit to Brockhampton?”
“It is vital that he understands what is happening, at least as far as we ourselves understand it. He must be made to see that while the spirits are being raised, no one in the city is safe. And the connection with the activity of the Essedenes’ curse at Piedmont Abbey and Lord Brocket’s ancestor is too strong a link to be ignored.”
“You think you have found a way to convince him? He is not like you and I, daughter, nor even John. His faith lies in the tangible. His actions proceed from evidence, not theories.”
“As a matter of fact I have already done so. At least as far as my communication with the lost souls goes. His acceptance of such a thing has helped further persuade him of our theories regarding the Essedenes and the murders in the cities. We cannot stop the earl on our own. We need his assistance, and he ours.”
“We should surely convince him more easily if we knew the earl’s goals. I still fail to see his purpose,” said her father, steering her around a large rainwater puddle without causing them to slow their marching pace.
“Did you not say that he unsuccessfully ran for the post of prime minister?”
“Yes, he did. Narrowly lost, as I recall.”
“I imagine having Embodied Spirits carefully placed in positions of power might assist him in that particular ambition, might it not?”
“Indeed it might. And consider how difficult it would be to remove such a person from office once legitimately installed, if he were to be supported by a cabal of such spirits,” her father pointed out.
“Nigh on impossible, I shouldn’t wonder.”
Edward stopped, turning to her. “An unassailable position from which he could wreak havoc without possibility of being voted out!”
They stood wordlessly for some time, the sound of the rain beating upon the umbrella accompanying their splashing footsteps, both united in their thoughts.
“Hecate! Mr. Cavendish!” John’s voice broke into their meditation. He was driving the cathedral gig, Bucephalus’s mane wet from the journey, his head shaking rain from his ears. John pulled the reins and brought the little carriage to a stop alongside them.
Hecate stepped out from the shelter of the umbrella to speak to him. “You are out and about early.”
“I have been sitting up with an elderly parishioner in Mordiford.”
“They were unwell?”
“Mr. Mitford died shortly after dawn.”
