yet another night. I assisted her up the steps and went about the business of unfastening her dress. When my fingers worked the buttons at her collar, they came away moist and sticky. I held them to the lamplight. They were damp with blood.
I sat Emily upon the bed and held the lamp closer; there were two tiny pinpricks at the point where her shoulder met her neck. They didn’t appear fresh, perhaps a day or two old. Most likely, her clothing aggravated the injury and reopened the wound.
“What did you do to yourself, my dear Emily?”
Her free hand went to this spot, massaged it, then fell back to her lap, but she didn’t utter a sound.
I removed the rest of her clothing with some difficulty, for she wouldn’t release the crucifix, and I had to work her sleeves around it; then I laid her down on the bed. She clutched the cross to her chest and closed her eyes. As I started for the door, she spoke one final sentence in her calm voice. “Death is coming to us all; it will be marvelous.” My wife then drifted off into the quietest of sleeps.
* * *
? ? ?
A MOMENT LATER, a knock came at the front door, and, knowing it to be my brother come to fetch me for our trip to Clontarf, I felt a profound déjà vu wash over me. I hurried down the steps to let him in before he knocked a second time. The sight of Matilda at his side startled me.
“Why are you here?”
She let herself in with Bram on her heels. “I told you I was going, and I will speak no more of it.”
I turned to Bram, prepared to argue, then held my tongue when he shrugged his shoulders. “Apparently, she doesn’t trust us to see this matter through properly.”
“Perhaps this is for the best; I cannot go.”
Bram frowned. “Why not?”
“Emily has taken ill of late; I’m afraid she cannot be left alone.”
Matilda glanced around the foyer. “Surely your staff can watch over her.”
Until now, I had no desire to share the extent of my wife’s condition, but in light of what she said I thought it necessary to inform them. When I finished my account, the three of us fell silent.
Matilda spoke first. “But who is the man in black? What did she mean by ‘put him back together again’?”
“I have no idea.”
“Did we miss something?” Bram asked. “Something on the body?”
“You’re assuming her words are actually meaningful, she spoke in a delirium. Most likely, she overheard part of our conversation last night and her subconscious twisted it into some kind of false memory, nothing more.”
I knew by the expressions on my brother’s and sister’s faces they did not believe this; they thought her words to be more. And though I wasn’t sure what do about it, I agreed with them. When she spoke, I got the distinct impression her words rang true. Although cryptic, they weren’t of the garbled nature she usually spoke when her illness came upon her. There was a conviction behind them, one that carried hints of the strong woman I married, the woman I hoped still lived somewhere within that mind.
I knew then what must be done.
“Both of you, go to Clontarf. I will arrange for Miss Dugdale’s return to care for Emily, then I’ll go back to the hospital and revisit the body.”
“Will the guard allow you back in?”
“Money opens many doors, dear sister.” I turned to Bram. “How do you plan to get to Clontarf?”
“We’ll walk,” he replied. “It’s but a few miles.”
“Nonsense; take my carriage and driver.”
They attempted to protest, but I told them this was a time for haste, and walking these streets in the dead of night was not the safest course of action. After rousing my driver (who preferred to sleep in the stables with the horses), they were soon on their way. I donned my overcoat and started for the hospital, stopping only at Miss Dugdale’s small home long enough to