It would have been predictable. It would have been manageable.
How did one manage a blood-soaked husband and a vicious ghost?
How did one manage magic?
She stayed there, on the floor of her childhood bedroom, weeping for herself and her arrogance and her fears, until the light changed to a darkening golden glow. Only an hour at most remained until sunset, and for a moment, she considered remaining right where she was. Augustine would leave the surgery soon, if he hadn’t already. And as soon as he was gone, the surgery would be safe for her. She only needed a bed. In the morning, before he arrived, she could buy a seat on the mail coach to Camhurst.
But no, she could not stay in this house past dark. Its empty walls held as many memories as Lindridge Hall held ghosts, and she did not want to be run out for trespassing. She looked wild, her hair tumbled down from its chignon, her dress muddy and torn. Trembling, she sat up and pulled her hair down, then plaited it. She did her best to disguise her ruined dress.
And then she went back out into the streets of Larrenton and walked the familiar path to her husband’s surgery.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
IT WAS FAR too fast a walk. She remembered with consuming clarity how long it had felt to hurry through the streets to meet Augustine that second day, and the third, eager to test her skills against his needs and find herself well suited. She had been enamored from the start. She had been fixed upon him. A part of her still rose in welcome to see the familiar door of the surgery.
It was only three steps away that she seized up once more, staring at the building. What if he hadn’t left yet? What would she say to him? What would she demand? Could she just bow her head and continue on, and allow the both of them to sidestep the anger that filled her? She had to manage only another day—surely that was not so difficult?
She could do that. She would do that. It was not so hard, to pretend for a fixed duration; it was only eternity that she could not bear.
She entered the surgery.
The hallway was empty. The door to Augustine’s office was mostly closed, though she could hear within the low murmur of conversation. He was with a patient, then. Relieved, she hobbled to the kitchen. She would tell Mr. Lowell that she was here, and ask after dinner, and hope that Augustine would leave without knowing to check on her.
Mr. Lowell, however, was not in the kitchen, and Jane eyed the kettle with longing before easing herself down into one of the chairs. A few minutes. She just needed a few minutes off her feet, and then she would get herself upstairs and washed. Dinner could wait.
She woke up to the sound of the front door closing.
Grimacing, she sat forward, rubbing her neck. She must have dozed off, exhausted after the previous sleepless night. But that would have been Augustine leaving, or Mr. Lowell arriving, and—
“Jane.”
Augustine stood in the kitchen doorway. By his expression, he hadn’t expected to find her there. Anger flooded her, and fear, and confusion, and she thought she must look like a cornered, hunted animal. She wasn’t ready. She wasn’t ready to see him, to speak to him.
Damn him. Why couldn’t he be in his corrupted house, bedding down with his secrets and spirits?
“Hello, Augustine,” she said. It was a struggle to keep her voice light and even. She did not want to. She wanted to scream. “Where is Mr. Lowell?”
“Off to bring you home,” Augustine said.
Jane flushed with guilt. She said nothing.
“How did you get here, Jane?”
“I walked.”
Augustine stared at her, then seemed at last to see how disheveled she was, how her skirts were muddy and her cheeks wind-chapped. “Stay there,” he said, then filled the kettle and set it to heating. He disappeared into the supply room, emerging with bandages and compounded unguents.
“Augustine, don’t.”
“You must be blistered. That is not an easy walk.” He knelt before her, reaching out for her ankle.
She jerked away, as if his hands were still drenched with gore.
“Jane?”
He did not know what she had seen, what had happened to her. She did not want to tell him, not yet, not ever if she could help it. And yet she had no other explanation for why she shied from his touch, though her feet throbbed, though he was a doctor.
She wanted to scream accusations, but instead Jane placed her foot into his hands.
He gently pried off the scraps of her house shoes and washed her swollen, blistered feet. She had not realized how badly they hurt until that moment, and she found herself choking down pained sobs. He did not falter and made no comment on her poor choice of footwear, her impulsive flight from Lindridge Hall. By and by, the wounds stopped bleeding and the dirt washed away.