Читать книгу Lord Libertine - Gail Ranstrom - Страница 6

London, May 25, 1821

Panic licking at her heels, Isabella hurried down the long dingy second-floor corridor of Middlesex Hospital, the man sent by the Home Office leading the way. He indicated a door and she stepped through into a ward with twenty or more beds. The odor, something foul and fetid, hung ominously in the air.

“This way, Miss O’Rourke,” her escort said, directing her to a curtain along the far wall.

She slowed, reluctant now, after all their urgency. He’d tried to prepare her, the man from the Home Office—Lord Wycliffe, she thought he’d said. He told her she might not recognize Cora, and that she needed to brace herself and be strong. She glanced up at him again, hoping for reassurance and finding none.

She wished she could have waited for Mama to return from looking for Cora in the park, but Lord Wycliffe had said there was no time to lose. She’d left her sister Eugenia to bring her mother and Lilly to the hospital when they returned. Then Lord Wycliffe had brought her here. To identify Cora. On the way, he’d told Isabella what had been done to her—she’d been beaten, dishonored, disfigured and cast off in a dust heap at the end of a blind lane, where she’d been found by the morning watch. Now, so close, Isabella was afraid of what she’d find.

She swallowed hard.

“Do you need a moment, Miss O’Rourke?”

She shook her head and proceeded slowly. Lord Wycliffe stepped ahead and drew the curtain back for her. He touched her shoulder as she went forward. “I shall wait for you, miss.”

Only the meager light able to penetrate a filthy window illuminated the bed, but there was nothing of Cora’s in evidence. Where was her cloak? Her gown or slippers?

Isabella stepped closer. The occupant of the bed was swathed in bandages wound around her wrists and neck. Her head was turned away, and Isabella summoned the last of her courage before she touched her shoulder. “Cora?”

Slowly, painfully, her sister turned, and a sob broke free from Isabella’s chest. She had thought she was prepared for anything, but she hadn’t been prepared for this…this parody of Cora. And it was Cora—her honey-blond hair caked with dark, stiff blotches of blood, her forehead missing a large triangle of flesh, her eyes—those sparkling blue eyes—dull now and nearly swollen shut, and her lips cut and distorted.

The tortured lips parted, and a faint sigh emerged. “Bella…”

She took Cora’s hand. “I am here, Cora. You will be all right now. I am here and I will take you home.”

“Not…going home,” she said, and a glistening tear trickled down her puffy cheek.

Isabella nearly choked with the effort to hold her sobs back. “Please, Cora…”

“D-don’t pretend.”

Isabella could no longer stem the flow of her tears. Her pain and grief welled up and spilled over.

“Be…brave,” Cora whispered. “Avenge me, Bella.” Cora stopped for a moment when her swollen lip cracked and a fine line of blood appeared. Then she blinked and started again. “He lied about everything…was not who he said.”

“Who was not? And how shall I know him?” she asked. “If he lied about his name…”

“A gentleman. Tonnish. Charming, dark hair and dark eyes…taller than Papa was.”

“That is not enough, Cora. I need more. You must hold on. You must get well, and we will—”

“His kiss,” her sister sighed, closing her eyes as if remembering. “Always…always wets his lips after his kiss. As if tasting…and he tastes of…something bitter.”

“But—”

Cora opened her eyes again and the sheer intensity of her gaze immobilized Isabella. “Promise, Bella.”

“I…I promise. I swear it upon my life. Rest now, Cora. Mama will be here soon, and we…we…”

But Cora’s hand slackened and her face froze in a concentrated study of Isabella, as if entreating, even in death.

“No…” Isabella moaned as her knees began to buckle. “No…no…”

Lord Wycliffe came forward and braced her. “Come away, Miss O’Rourke. We shall wait for your mother in the matron’s office.”

But at that very moment, her mother and sisters rushed through the ward toward them. “Bella! Bella! Say it isn’t our Cora! Say there has been some awful mistake.”

“Mama…”

Isabella tried to stop her mother and sisters from going to Cora’s bed, from seeing what had been done to her, but they swept Isabella aside, knocking her back against Lord Wycliffe. A long keening wail broke over the ward as her mother threw herself over Cora’s lifeless form. “My baby! Oh, my darling child! Bella, how could you? How could you have let her come to this?”

“I didn’t know—”

“It was your duty to know!” Mama buried her face against Cora’s chest and sobbed, her words barely distinguishable as she said, “Itshouldhavebeenyou. Why couldn’t it have been you?”

The words, stark in their sincerity, cut into her heart and made it impossible for her to breathe. She turned away from the gruesome scene, and fresh tears rolled down her cheeks. Eugenia and Lilly clutched each other tightly, but Isabella had never felt so alone in her entire life.

Lord Wycliffe, a complete stranger, offered her the only comfort she could find. He slipped an arm around her waist to support her and murmured some indistinct platitude. Grief, anger, pain and loneliness filled her as she silently renewed her promise.

Rest in peace, Cora. I will avenge you.