I close and latch the window. Then I stand there, looking out at the lake, the moonlight like a child’s paper boat floating over the windswept waves. I focus on that patch of white and follow it up and down, up and down. When I’m too drowsy to watch any longer, I drag myself back to bed and fall into it, and I’m asleep within moments.
I wake in what is clearly another dream, with William’s calico cat on my bed, staring down at me. I groan and flop out one arm to pet her. She jumps, the look on her face making me chuckle, as if I’ve tried to plant a kiss on the cheek of a society matron. I’m closing my eyes again when I stop.
This isn’t William’s calico cat. This one has black spots on its face. I blink and lift my head. My wig shifts, and I groan again, reaching to straighten it. I really ought to have dyed my hair and made up some story to explain the shortness of the cut. Now I have to wear this damnable thing to bed, lest the maid see me jumping up with blond locks.
“Are you awake, miss?”
I jump, hands going to my wig. Edmund sits at the foot of my narrow bed, facing the opposite direction. He rises with his gaze still averted.
“Mrs. Landon told me to fetch you,” he says. “I did not think it was proper, but she said I must. You have overslept.”
I blink, not at the words but at his voice. His diction is higher than children I met in the modern world, but I can no longer recall whether that is normal for this time. I suppose it might be for an only child surrounded by adults. It’s the tone that throws me more, each word clearly enunciated but emotionless, as if he’s reading from a script.
Then I realize what he’s said. I overslept. On my first day.
“Sorry,” I say as I scramble up. “I forgot to set my alarm.”
He goes still, head cocked, and while I can’t see his face, I can imagine it screwed up in thought as he tries to figure out what I just said.
Set my alarm.
In a world where one cannot simply set an alarm on one’s phone or even bedside clock.
I give an awkward laugh. “Sorry, that’s what we said in my last position. The little girl I looked after had the funniest ways of phrasing things. Setting the alarm, as if a screaming bell would wake us at the appointed hour.”
“May I leave now, ma’am?” he asks, and the laugh dies in my throat. “I ought not to be in your bedchamber.”
“I will ask a maid to wake me in future. Or, if Mrs. Landon insists, you can simply send your cat in to do the job.”
I say it lightly, trying to coax a smile from him, but he stays motionless.
“I will be in my playroom,” he says. “Our breakfast is served there.”
He rises, and still without looking my way, scoops up the cat and slings the beast over his shoulder. I tense, ready for a meow of indignation, but the calico lies there as limp as a fur stole. She lifts her head to fix me with a baleful look and then rubs her head against Edmund’s neck as they leave.
8
I dress and replace my makeup disguise. So far, the only person I’ve seen who might recognize me is Hugh, and he obviously does not. Yet I must be careful. There is bound to be a portrait of me somewhere in this house, and I don’t need Mrs. Landon taking too close a look at it and then at me.
I find Edmund in his quarters, sitting upright at a small table, mechanically eating his breakfast. At his side, the cat fixes me with a glare as I enter. Edmund glances over, but his gaze passes without focusing as he dips his chin in a nod far too solemn for a child of five.
“Good morning, miss. Your breakfast tray is here.”
“And how is breakfast on this fine morning?”
I wince. My voice is so cheerful it sounds shrill.
He murmurs something I don’t hear and returns to staring out the window.
“So,” I say as I sit across from him. “What shall we do this morning? It looks like a lovely day. Perhaps a walk?”
“If you wish.”
“What do you normally do in the morning?”
He pauses, as if the question requires great thought. “If Papa is not home, I am sent outside to play.”
“By yourself?”
He looks at me then, frowning. “There are no other children here, miss. If Papa is at home, then we play together.”
“And your governesses do not play with you?”
His frown deepens into a wary look that wonders whether I’m mocking him. When he speaks, the words come slowly. “They are busy preparing for my lessons and conducting their own business.”
Their own business is playing with him. A Victorian education hardly requires a half day to prepare lessons. His governesses had used it as an excuse, pushing him out the door for fresh air and exercise so they’d have time to themselves.
“Well,” I say. “I understand you may not wish to play with quite such an elderly lady as myself.”
I pause, hoping for a smile, but he only regards me solemnly, and I resist the urge to add that his father is nearly a decade my senior and apparently a spry playmate.
I continue, “But for today, let us walk about the gardens and yard and take our exercise that way.”
By the time we finish breakfast, I’ve convinced myself that reticence is simply Edmund’s nature. He is a solemn and thoughtful boy, little given to smiles. That pains my heart, but it does not mean there’s anything wrong with him. While I remember a rambunctious and curious infant, there’d been a quietness to him, too.
It’s not me; it’s him.
I steadfastly cling to that until we leave the nursery and come into contact with other people. We pass a couple of maids cleaning the house and Hugh in the yard, and the moment Edmund sees them, he lights up, not exactly bouncing with puppyish enthusiasm but happy and cheerful. They speak to him with obvious affection, and he happily returns their smiles and basks in their gentle teasing. As soon as we pass them, though, that light winks out, and he is once again an automaton of a boy, moving in stiff and dutiful silence.
It is me.
My child does not like me.
He is uncomfortable in my presence, and I get the distinct feeling that he’s silently praying I’ll decide it’s too chilly and retreat inside, leaving him to his own amusements.
I’m trying too hard. My voice is pitched too high like someone ill accustomed to interacting with children. I am ill accustomed to interacting with children. I avoided them in the twenty-first century because they reminded me of my lost son. And now here is my lost son, and I’ve turned into a woman who makes me cringe. High-pitched singsong voice, forced humor, the stink of “trying too hard” wafting from my pores.
Relax. Be yourself.
But what if he doesn’t like the real me, either? What if I reveal the truth on August’s return, and my son is disappointed?
This is my mother? No, there must be some mistake.
I cannot worry about that. I can only be more myself and hope that helps the situation. So on that walk, I relax, and my voice returns to normal, and I do not force jokes on him but simply ask questions to which I genuinely crave answers. And his demeanor changes not at all.
It’s warmer today, and the walk is a pleasant one. I talk about that. I talk about the changing colors and the science behind it. I talk about the animals we see scurrying across our path as they make ready for winter. He answers dutifully and nothing more.