Dr Bond had been a godsend. Over the past week he had barely left the boy’s side, and Edward knew that although it did nothing to ease Juliana’s terror at the thought she might
lose her child, at least she knew he was in the safest of hands. Bond had promised her he would not leave until the boy was well again. Edward had nothing but the utmost respect for the doctor; for his own part, he wasn’t sure he would have been so generous of spirit in defeat.
‘It is very kind of you to call on us.’ Juliana looked strained, but Edward was glad that they had visitors. It was good for her to see others cared, and the Chard Williams had clearly become fond of James during his lessons there, for this was not their first visit since he had taken ill. ‘I am sure that when James is well enough, he will enjoy your cakes a great deal.’
‘I know he likes them,’ Ada Chard Williams said. Her face was almost as tight with worry as Juliana’s. ‘It was the least I could do. Is there any improvement?’
‘It’s hard to tell,’ Juliana said, carefully sipping her tea, ‘but Dr Bond seems confident he will recover.’ Her voice was hollow and Edward knew she wasn’t convinced. He couldn’t blame her for that. Neither was he.
‘Let’s hope the fever breaks soon,’ he said.
‘I’m sure he will soon be running around and tiring you both out as boys do,’ Chard Williams said.
‘It’s his dreams I cannot stand,’ Juliana admitted. She glanced up at Edward, who stood behind her with one hand on her slim shoulder. At least she had not shut him out in her grief; they were still able to take comfort in each other. ‘He talks of such horrible things – “dead girls in the river”, he keeps saying, though why, I cannot begin to understand.’
Ada Chard Williams’ eyes widened and she visibly shuddered. ‘Children do have such imaginations, don’t they? Maybe I could speak to him? I’m very good with the young ’uns.’
‘That is kind of you,’ said Juliana, ‘but I could not bear for anyone else to catch his sickness. And he is barely conscious most of the time.’
‘Dr Bond says it is most likely his memory playing tricks on him from his fall in the water,’ Edward cut in. ‘For that, I will never forgive myself.’
‘He keeps saying he doesn’t want us to throw him in the river,’ Juliana was speaking as much to herself as their awkward guests. ‘Why does he think I would do that?’
The Chard Williams exchanged a glance and Edward gave them a small, sympathetic smile. Even Walter Andrews was uncomfortable when he visited now. Edward knew that he felt like he was intruding on someone else’s pain, however well-meaning his intent.
‘We should probably get back,’ Ada Chard Williams said. ‘We have taken up too much of your time already. Mrs Kane, you really should get out in the fresh air for a walk while he’s sleeping – you must take care of yourself, you know. You will need to stay healthy for when he gets better.’
Juliana smiled gratefully. ‘Yes, yes of course you’re right. Perhaps I shall.’
Edward knew she wouldn’t; she had no intention of leaving the house, not while her child’s life hung in the balance.
When the Chard Williams had left, Edward made fresh coffee and took the pot and one of the small cakes the tutor’s wife had brought up to Thomas Bond. The doctor was half-asleep in a chair beside the bed where the boy was lying, sweating and shivering. James had always been small for his age, but he seemed to have shrunk over the past few days. His arms were stick-thin and the dark hollows around his eyes amplified the pale, waxy sheen on his skin. Edward’s heart
sank yet again. If Dr Bond was one side of the bed trying to save the boy, then Death was surely on the other, trying to drag him down to the depths.
‘How is he?’ Edward asked as Bond took the coffee and cake and placed them on the table. He didn’t touch either.
‘Not good,’ Bond said. He was obviously exhausted. ‘I am trying everything I know, but the fever refuses to let him go; indeed, I fear it is getting worse.’ He rubbed his unshaven chin, but appeared oblivious to the two days’ growth of stubble. ‘His pain is increasing. He can keep down neither food nor water, and that has made him very dehydrated. He is still delirious, but he no longer vocalises his dreams.’
‘I’m glad about that at least,’ Edward said. ‘I fear his ramblings remind Juliana of Harrington’s death. They’re strange dreams for a child, don’t you think? I haven’t said anything to his mother, but I wondered if perhaps his grandfather told him stories of some of the cases you two worked on? The Whitehall case, and those like it? Or maybe he overhead Charles talking – children always listen when they shouldn’t, after all.’
‘It’s entirely possible,’ Bond said, looking down at the floor, ‘but if he did so, it was not in my company.’
‘I hope you don’t think I was suggesting—’ Edward started, but Bond immediately started shaking his head and held up a hand to stop him.
‘I know you meant no accusation. I’m sorry – I think we are all feeling the strain. Perhaps we should get James to a hospital? I truly don’t think there is very more I can do here …’
Edward leaned over the child and stroked his damp head tenderly. ‘Juliana trusts you, Thomas, and so do I. No one has been more of a father to him over the years than you.’ His throat tightened with emotion. How could James have come
to this state? And gone downhill so fast in the past week? None of it felt real – but real it was. The wheezing, uneven breaths counted out the seconds as James struggled to hold onto his life. His eyes moved behind his closed lids as his dreams continued silently.
‘Should I prepare her for the worst?’ he said quietly.
For a long moment, Bond said nothing. He looked old and tired, as if he carried all the worries of the world on his back. Whatever the outcome, he and Juliana owed many debts of gratitude to this fine man.
‘I shall try one more medicine,’ Bond said softly, ‘but if there is no improvement after that, then yes, I think we should all expect the worst.’
*
Little James died at just before noon the next day. It was not a peaceful death. From the hours just before dawn until he took his final breath he was racked with stomach pain, his frail body doubled over and his limbs tensed so tight that Edward could not believe they did not snap. His weak screams were worse than if his cries had torn through the house. Though he was lost in his delirium, nevertheless he called out for his mother to make it stop, and every time she squeezed his hand and told him through her tears that she was with him, he called for her again, for he was so confused in his terror and pain that he didn’t know she was there. Juliana could not comfort her baby in his last moments, and the tragedy of that, for both the boy and his mother, broke Edward’s heart.
The hours seemed endless. Walter Andrews arrived at some point. Kane could not remember when, or who let him in, but he joined the gathering around the soaking bed where James lay writhing and Edward watched the horror that they
were all feeling settle onto the ex-policeman’s face. The boy’s agony and suffering were so unbearable to see that when the moment finally came, Edward could not fight the wave of relief that came over him. It was done. It was over.
Then Juliana filled the house with her grief. She screamed her pain: every animal that had ever lost its young, every mother who had ever lost her child. She was broken, and there was nothing Edward Kane could do but hold her.
Rain fell as we stood round the small grave, the drops pattering steadily against the leaves of the overhanging trees. The humid air was still and overhead the sky was an endless grey. The priest committed James to the ground and Kane steadied Juliana, who let out a small sob of anguish that rippled out across the graveyard and almost made the trees shiver. I could not see her eyes behind her heavy veil, but I knew they would be red and sore, as they had been ever since James had fallen ill. I tried to feel something – there should have been myriad emotions raging inside me – but I could not. There was nothing but a pleasant emptiness. I had taken too much laudanum and smoked too much of the poppy over the past few days, trying to free myself of the boy’s agonised shouts for his mother, but I heard them still, over and over in my head as I lay in bed, so often that I had almost convinced myself that his spirit had returned home with me, that he was haunting me. Perhaps he was.
‘She is selling the business,’ Walter Andrews said softly as we watched Juliana take a handful of earth and throw it onto the coffin. ‘Kane tells me they are going to go to America.’
‘Perhaps that is wise,’ I said. I searched my heart for some pain at the news. I had fought so hard to have her, to keep her in my life, and now, after everything, I would be losing her anyway. She would be gone. There was only numbness. ‘She
has had too much tragedy in London. Kane has a good life there, I imagine. It will be easier for her to heal.’
‘Hebbert is going to join them there rather than stay in Australia. That will be some comfort to her.’
‘So, they will all be together again. That will be nice.’ I felt a prick of bitterness at that. Perhaps the drugs were finally wearing off. So I was to be quite alone. Hebbert, whom I had saved from justice, would be with his family, and I, who had gone to such great lengths to protect us all, would be left alone to face my fate. I watched as Juliana held onto Edward Kane’s arm and leaned against him. It was not just for physical support, I could see that. James’ death had not diminished her love for the American – if anything, it appeared to have made their bond stronger. My stomach, already queasy from the laudanum, twisted into a knot as they approached.
‘Thomas,’ she said, ‘I wanted to thank you for everything you did. Before … and after.’
I took her hand and squeezed it. ‘I am so sorry. I wish I could have saved him.’
She managed a wan smile. ‘No one could have tried harder. And you made everything, well, a little easier.’
After the boy had died I had taken over all the arrangements. Juliana had seen this as a sign of my love for them both, but the truth was that I could not risk another doctor examining the boy’s dead body. Not that such a thing had been suggested. My reputation was without tarnish, and the boy was known to have been sickly – there were none who would suspect anything other than a fever had carried him off. There was no call for a second opinion. It was exactly as I had hoped it would be – but even so, it was a relief that the boy was finally in the ground.
‘When are you leaving?’ I asked, directing the question at Edward Kane. I could not look at Juliana, and I was not sure why she suddenly filled me with unease. It was as if perhaps she would somehow
know
.
‘Soon. The house can be packed up when we’re gone. We can trust Barker to run things sufficiently until the sale is completed.’
Barker was on the other side of the grave talking to the Chard Williams. We all looked so awkward, standing around the grave: this dispirited group mourning a child.
‘Are you coming back to the house?’ Kane asked.
‘Yes, of course,’ Andrews said, ‘but we will not stay for long. I know this is a very difficult day for you both.’
Juliana had drifted off into her own private world of pain, and as Edward Kane led her away I wondered if she too had embraced the laudanum to dull the echo of those awful last cries. I waved Andrews on and took a moment by the grave. Two men stood a few feet away, sheltering from the rain under a tree. They leaned on their shovels as they chatted, waiting to get to work sealing James into the earth. I looked at the first James Harrington’s gravestone. I had killed them both. The thought was still a strange one.
I had administered the poison slowly at first, nervous that my actions would be discovered, but the boy, already weak, was really very ill and may not have survived anyway. But I could not take that risk; if he lived, then so would the part of him that was a monster and I could not allow that. I was strong, a grown man, and yet I struggled to control the beast that cursed me. What would the boy have become? He was not like me – his
Upir
had clearly been inside him, a part of him: symbiotic, not parasitical. No wonder it fed him with images
of what his father and I had done.
Girls in the river
. I shuddered slightly as I remembered the phrase he had repeated, over and over. But they had not been girls – that implied innocence. I would not touch the innocent.
I gestured to the waiting men and they hurried over and started shovelling. I watched as the damp earth thudded into the hole, scattering against the wood. It was a relief. I had not enjoyed watching the boy in pain and I did not like thinking about what I had done. But there could not be two of us; that was something I could not allow. And the fever would have killed the boy anyway, I was sure of that. I had just helped it along.
*
The wake at the house was a sombre affair. I could not grieve James as the others did, not burdened with my terrible knowledge, knowing what he truly was, but even I felt the emptiness in the house that his absence brought. I kept expecting to see him playing quietly in the corner of the room, or hovering by his mother as he used to before he had become more confident. Before Kane had arrived.
I made polite conversation with Andrews, but the laudanum was wearing off and I felt old and weary. We were spokes on a broken wheel. Everything was changing, and even though it was Kane who had ultimately brought all this misery upon me, I found that a part of me was unhappy about the prospect of his departure. The young were leaving England and there would be only old men left behind: Andrews, Moore and me. Looking into the future was like staring into a grave. Moore might have the energy and enthusiasm of a much younger man, but Andrews had already retired … and what was left for me? I would be sixty years old soon, the woman I loved,
the woman I relied on to keep me strong, was leaving to start a new life. My only constant companion in my old age would be the monster on my back.
I would have taken my own life if I had thought the beast would allow it.
I spent the day alone at home. Walter Andrews had gone to some cousins in Cornwall for a full week, and I had met Henry Moore the day before Christmas Eve. He had invited me to join him for dinner, purely out of pity, I was sure, and pity does nothing to encourage a fine appetite or good humour. I had claimed exhaustion and left as soon as we had drunk our first brandy.