Lost Among the Living(15)

I sorted through my memory. If Dottie had ever mentioned a man of business, I didn’t recall it. She gave the impression of being an entire civilization contained in one woman.

Mr. Wilde’s hand was deft, and in moments he was handing me a cup of tea on a saucer. “Mrs. Forsyth speaks quite highly of you,” he said.

I took the cup. It isn’t hard, Manders, I heard Dottie say. Just try not to spill it. If a one-handed man could pour tea, then I supposed I could as well. Was this what the Baineses had been so suspicious of? A man with a withered hand? “I doubt that very much,” I told him.

Mr. Wilde gave a small laugh as he poured his own cup. “She says you’re not entirely stupid,” he amended. “From her, that’s high praise. I know you were the wife of Alex Manders. I must say how sorry I was to hear he died in the war.”

“Thank you,” I managed. He must know of Alex through Dottie, I thought, since he was her man of business. There was no way he could have known Alex in person.

“I could not fight, myself,” Mr. Wilde said. He set his teacup gracefully on the desk and sat in his large desk chair. He raised his withered arm slightly, letting the gloved hand dangle. The upper arm, I saw, was as thick and strong as its mate, but below the elbow the arm seemed to nearly vanish, pinned into the tailored sleeve. He did not take his eyes from me. “A defect from birth. I tried to enlist, of course, but they told me I could not fire a gun. I asked how they could be sure, since I’d never tried, but they would not be convinced.”

I held my cup and saucer in my lap and looked back at him. His eyes were kind, his expression intelligent, but there was something about him I did not like, something that resided behind his gaze. “I’m sorry to hear that,” I said.

“My wife is not,” he replied, lowering the arm. He let the silence stretch out, comfortable in it, seeming in no hurry to open Dottie’s note and reply to it. I took a reluctant sip of tea.

He leaned back in his chair, the withered arm resting at his side. “Tell me, Mrs. Manders,” he said, “does Mrs. Forsyth have you doing errands for her all day?”

“It’s my job, Mr. Wilde,” I said, putting my cup down again.

“It seems somewhat beneath your station as Alex’s wife.”

“I’m his widow. And there are girls with worse jobs than this.”

“Quite true,” he agreed. He watched my face, and I felt certain he guessed at how desperate I was for money, the exact reason I’d taken the job. He reached out and touched the edge of Dottie’s letter on the desk, tracing it slowly with his fingertip, his gaze turning thoughtful. “May I ask you something?”

“Do I have a choice?”

He gave me a smile at that. “I apologize. I’m a lawyer, and we like to ask questions. My days are usually very quiet. You are quite the most exciting thing to cross my threshold all week.”

The words hung in the air, suspended. My tea seemed to have congealed to paste in my stomach. I wondered if Dottie would dismiss me if I stood and left.

“You mustn’t worry,” Mr. Wilde said into the silence. “My questions are not so very personal. I simply wondered if you plan to be a ladies’ companion forever.”

“Forever?” I could not keep the dismay from my voice.

“Yes.” Mr. Wilde picked up the envelope with his good hand, stood it idly on end. “You’ve never thought of it? You’re an intelligent girl. Mrs. Forsyth is in the prime of health, but she will not live forever.”

I leaned over and set my teacup on a side table. “Are you asking,” I said slowly, “whether I expect Dottie to leave me something in her will?”

He did not answer that. “My job,” he said with a lawyer’s evasiveness, “is to look after the family. To protect it from harm.”

“Is it?” I said. I was being impertinent, I knew, but I was stung and I could not help myself. “It seems to me the harm to the family has already been done.”

“Ah,” Mr. Wilde said. “I believe you’re referring to Frances.”

“There are rumors in town.”

That made him smile. “Oh, yes. Mad girls in chains, killer hounds, ghosts. It’s quite ‘The Fall of the House of Usher,’ is it not? Such is the imagination of the English countryman. I admire the locals their creativity, but don’t believe everything you hear. I’m part of the rumor, myself—I believe I play the role of Mrs. Forsyth’s evil accomplice, helping to keep Frances in chains and cover up her murders at the inquest. I don’t suppose you heard that part?”

It was the easy superiority, the cold condescension in his tone, that gave me a chill when he spoke to me. “No,” I said.

He nodded. “A man with a withered arm is born to play the villain, you see. But since you’re attached to the family now, would you like to know the truth?”

“I don’t—”

“Frances was a sweet girl,” Mr. Wilde said. He looked at my expression and smiled. “Does that surprise you, after what you’ve heard? She was certainly intelligent, and I believe she never meant harm to anyone.”

“Yet she was mad,” I said.

He finally took up Dottie’s letter and slid his finger under the flap, opening it. “She was . . . afflicted. There is no other way to describe it.” His gaze stayed on me and not on the letter in his hand. “The spells started in childhood. That was before my time with the family, but by the time Mrs. Forsyth engaged me as her man of business, Frances’s spells had progressed.”