in a dreamy yearning for what could not be.
At last they arrived. Max and Roberts descended and assisted the ladies in following. But as they neared the door it swung open violently.
‘Randall!’ Miss Whitmore exclaimed, instantly distressed.
‘Oh Miss!’ the butler cried. ‘Thank the heavens you’re home. It’s your papa, Miss.’
Miss Whitmore rushed ahead through the door, and Max did not wait for any invitation and hurried after her, trailing Miss Bromley and Roberts behind.
The butler was fretting, wringing his hands as he fell in step beside Miss Whitmore. ‘He’s been up since an hour after you left, Miss, wandering and talking nonsense. And haven’t we had a time of it, keeping him from injuring himself! Indeed, we have.’
Max hastened to follow Miss Whitmore and Randall, and the five of them charged up to the first floor, where the housekeeper’s voice could now be heard. ‘Mr. Whitmore, I beg you—! Heaven forfend Miss Whitmore should return to find you’ve had another fit!’
‘Papa!’ Miss Whitmore called out as she went. ‘Oh, Papa!’
She burst through the doors to the drawing room ahead of everyone, but Max and the rest soon followed.
Mr. Whitmore was within, wearing only a bed shift. He stumbled about the room, knocking things from the tables and shelves. Miss Whitmore saw this and let out a cry of misery, then hurried to his side and began coaxing the gentleman to sit.
Max hesitated, uncertain what to do, but then his attention was drawn to Roberts, who made an inarticulate noise of shock.
It struck Max as very unlike his friend to react in such a way. Roberts had worked in the hospital where Max had met him, and before that had experienced a situation on his ship, the HMS Triumph, which by all accounts had been truly hellish. The lieutenant was no stranger to illness or how it caused unsettling behaviour in an invalid.
Miss Whitmore had Mr. Whitmore by the arm. Roberts stepped forward and took his other arm, and together they guided the gentleman to an armchair, where he resisted sitting for a moment. Then the strength seemed to leave him and he allowed himself to be made to sit.
Max watched as Roberts stared at the gentleman’s face, which, Max owned, was quite grotesque. His mouth was fatly swollen and deformed, disfigured by large ulcers, saliva wetting it most distastefully.
‘How long has he suffered from this swelling?’ Roberts asked Miss Whitmore. ‘The sores?’
Miss Whitmore’s eyes filled with tears. ‘Since his first attack,’ she said. ‘Tis a symptom of the cardiac insufficiency.’
Roberts grunted and began assessing the gentleman’s limbs and hands.
‘Summon the apothecary at once,’ he barked at the housekeeper, who jumped.
‘Miss Whitmore?’ the woman said.
Miss Whitmore nodded quickly. ‘Yes, Mrs. Gale, and Doctor Sinclair, too, I should think.’
Roberts gave a firm shake of his head. ‘No, we shan’t need him, I daresay.’
Miss Whitmore blinked in confusion. ‘How can you say so, sir? My father is very ill.’
Roberts glared around at everyone. ‘Indeed, he is, but unless I miss my guess, your surgeon and your apothecary are more to blame than his cardiac insufficiency for all that.’
Miss Whitmore gasped and stumbled. Max leapt to catch her elbow, supporting her to a chair.
‘I didn’t survive the debacle on the Triumph to fail to recognize mercury poisoning when I see it,’ Roberts declared.
‘Mercury poisoning?’ Miss Whitmore breathed.
‘Indeed,’ Roberts said. ‘I shall confirm my suspicions with the apothecary when he comes, but I’d wager my left foot I’m right.’
So they all sat down to wait.
***
‘It’s dropsy!’ Mr. Hadden, the tall, thin apothecary, declared. ‘A well-known side effect of cardiac insufficiency!’
Lt. Roberts glared at him most fearfully, however. ‘Answer my question, man! Do you or do you not mix mercury into the tonic you have been prescribing for Mr. Whitmore?’
‘Oedema!’ shouted the apothecary stubbornly. His hair, unwashed and overly long, flapped about his face with each exclamation. ‘A weakened heart may cause oedema, also known as swelling!’
‘At the mouth, you quack?’ Lt. Roberts countered, infuriated.
‘Answer the question at once!’ Max put in.
Mr. Hadden scowled at him, but he said, begrudgingly, ‘And if I did mix in some mercury, what of it? Quicksilver has a long, respected history in medicine, I’ll have you know. Ataxia, apoplexy—’
‘Save us your litany of jargon phrases!’ Lt. Roberts snapped. ‘You’ve been poisoning the man!’
Emilia gave a cry of distress at that. ‘Oh, Papa!’
Lord Ceastre came to her side, then, and took her hand. Dizziness threatened and she clung to him like a rock in a wild river—misery and guilt threatened to