The Elsingham Portrait

Three


Kathryn came slowly up out of the drugged sleep. She became aware of unfamiliar odors: the acrid tang of woodsmoke and the heavy sweetness of hothouse flowers. And then comfortable sounds: somewhere near, an open fire crackled cheerily, and a woman’s voice was humming softly a familiar lullaby. Eyes firmly closed to retain as long as possible this unaccustomed sense of luxury and ease, Kathryn stretched drowsily. She felt a fullness and a warm immediacy of life in her body. Even in this unusual relaxation, she was richly aware. Usually when she woke to the shrill of the alarm, it was with a sense of pressure and tension. Get up, wash, dress, eat, catch the bus to the Library—don’t be late, don’t catch cold, you can’t afford to miss work . . .

As the accustomed fears and tensions took over, depression like a groping gray fog sent its tendrils into her waking consciousness. There was something unpleasant she had to face—

Her growing unease was checked by the sound of a door opening and a deep voice speaking quietly.

“Good morning, Bennet. Still at your post, I see. This is not the pleasant vacation I had hoped to give you.”

“No matter, my lord. I was pleased to be here with her ladyship.”

There was a rustling of skirts, then the woman’s voice, closer, subdued. “She’s still sleeping. Isn’t she the bonny one? The pain’s been bad, I think. Her ladyship has been very restless in spite of the laudanum.”

The deep voice showed concern. “Poor Bennet! You’ve had no rest at all, have you?”

“Master John, she touches my heart, the poor bairn. She’s that fearful and thrawn—”

“Don’t go all mystical Scot on me, Bennet,” the man said with a teasing note in his voice.

“I mean it, sir. She’s that terrified of something, she pleaded with me not to leave her. Like a child she sounded, frightened and alone. And she sent that Irish woman dresser of hers packing last night, and that artist fellow too. I know a little of what’s been said, Master John, but her ladyship is not what they hint! She’s—innocent!”

The man’s voice hardened, became a little remote even with this trusted servant. “I wish you were right.”

There was a brief silence. Kathryn waited in the comfortable lethargy of laudanum, hearing, yet not completely involved. This was a very interesting dream! She really ought to be up and getting ready for the cold bus ride to the Library, but surely just a few minutes more wouldn’t hurt . . . She had never had a dream so vivid—!

The man’s voice, so deep it set up a little quiver of resonance in her body, was saying quietly, “Did her ladyship seem—rational to you, Bennet?”

There was a longer pause. A tiny needle of alarm thrust itself into Kathryn’s calm. ‘Rational’? Whose rationality was being questioned?

The woman’s voice came slowly, delightful with its hint of Scots’ burr. “As to that, sir, ye’ll ken I’m no authority. Her ladyship had the shock of a bad fall and a broken arm . . . and then the drug from the doctor—”

“Stop hedging, Bennet,” the man said sternly. “I know you have always been reluctant to speak ill even of people you don’t like—but I must know—”

“She’s nothing like I’ve been told, sir,” the admission came reluctantly. Then, more firmly, “But that’s to say nothing, Master John! Malicious tongues distort the truth, as I’ve told you often and often! This woman’s like a wee bairn lost in the dark!”

Kathryn could hardly catch the man’s next words, so low was his voice. “Would you say she was—mad, Bennet?”

‘Mad’? But that meant—insane! Kathryn’s eyes snapped open. This dream was turning into a nightmare.

No dream. She was lying in the lovely pale green and white bedroom she had thought was part of the dream. Near the four-poster stood the plump, sweet-faced woman servant of her dream, and beside her, the tall figure of the golden-haired man, elegantly dressed in the fashion of the late eighteenth century. It was the man who had caught her as she fell down the stairs. Both these people were staring at her with worried faces. Kathryn stretched out her free arm toward them.

“Oh, please help me! I’m not insane! It’s just a nightmare—a bad dream!” She struggled to sit up in the feather bed, giving her broken arm an agonizing twinge.

Bennet tutted worriedly and hurried over to support her shoulders.

“Now, now, milady, you mustn’t fash yourself . . .” She turned her head to the man. “You’d best be leaving us, sir.”

“I’ll send for Anders,” Lord Elsingham began, but Kathryn cried out, “Please! Don’t go away! Stay just for a moment. I must talk to you . . .”

His lordship moved reluctantly toward the bed. He superintended the placing of pillows behind Kathryn’s shoulders so that she could face him sitting up, for which courtesy she felt deep gratitude. “Get her some hot chocolate, Bennet. And some bread and butter.”

“Aye. That’ll give her strength,” agreed the woman. “I’ll make it myself,” and she hurried from the room.

Kathryn raised her eyes to meet Lord John’s wary look. “Thank you for listening to me,” she began with some difficulty. Her free hand was clutching the coverlet so tightly that her knuckles showed white, and the beautiful green eyes were wide with fear. His wariness gave way to compassion.

“Don’t be afraid, ma’am. If you are ill, the best doctors shall treat you. A few months’ rest in Ireland, and your memory will be restored.”

Kathryn tried to smile her gratitude for his concern, but the situation was much too serious for anything but straight dealing. Hadn’t she pleaded with this man before, begged his understanding, only to receive a crushing rebuff? What in God’s name had the beautiful Nadine done to arouse in her husband such unrelenting hostility? For Kathryn was forced to accept the reality of the situation at last. She was locked into the body of a beautiful woman who had lived two hundred years before Kathryn was born.

Lord Elsingham was staring at her with that look of wary hostility slightly tempered by concern. Obviously he was a good man, compassionate even where he could not trust. Could the truth, the integrity, in Kathryn reach out and convince such a man against all the evidence of his mind, memory, senses? The girl drew a deep, ragged breath and faced his challenging eyes.

She did not know that something in her manner, the agonized yet direct glance of her eyes, most especially her choice of language and the manner of her speaking—so different from those to which Lord John was accustomed, had created an unwelcome problem for him. He did not want to make any re-evaluation of his judgment about his wife. During the last year he had been hurt too often, too deeply, by the beautiful Irish termagant he had married. “Marry in haste; repent at leisure.” Her abruptly changing moods, her outrageous displays of temper and bad manners in public, her licentious behavior, had burned too deeply. He had promised himself that never again would he be tricked by the exciting wanton who had been his wife for one tempestuous year. Thinking of the ugly scenes, the malicious rumors, the scornful laughter, his expression hardened.

Kathryn noticed the grimly-set jaw and her heart fell. For a minute he had seemed almost ready to accept her, to listen without bias. She hurried into speech with a sense that her cause was already lost. Deliberately she tried to make her language that of the 1970s. Oh, if only she knew more about the real Lady Elsingham! She would perhaps be able to demonstrate that the mind within this beautiful body was not Nadine’s.

“Sir,” she began, low-voiced, “If I do not address you in the proper way, it is because for two hundred years my American countrymen have owed no allegiance to the British crown. “We ‘colonists,’ as you called us, found your taxation without representation unbearable, and we fought you and finally defeated you with the help of France.” Trying not to notice his frown, she hurried on. “I am only a librarian in New York’s Uptown Library, not a history major—but I did go to Radcliffe College and my minor was American History—so I do know something about the details of the American Revolution of 1776-1783—”

“Very convenient.” A rather scornful smile twisted his lips. “Since this is only the year 1775, no one will be able to verify your claims for some time. But at least you are remarkably consistent. Those are the dates you quoted me last night. There is no coherence in your story . . .” if nothing else, his tone implied.

Kathryn’s face whitened. She had lost him! Still she held her voice steady. “I have no defense against your suspicions, sir. And I am aware, believe me, that my statements are impossible to substantiate. I can only swear that what I tell you is the truth as I know it. Perhaps there is philosophical justification for the theory of alternate realities. What I know as reality is that I am Kathryn Hendrix, of the Barton Apartments, New York City; that my Social Security number is 565-48-4743, and that, as the American soldiers who fought in two world wars and two police actions could tell you, is all I am required to tell the enemy on capture: name, rank, and serial number.”

The big man’s eyes were the cold gray of a winter sea. “I feel I must warn you against this game you are playing, Nadine. Dr. Anders was disturbed by your wild talk. He even hinted that he feared madness . . . For your own sake, lest your situation become worse, why not accept with good grace the fact that you have lost whatever game you are playing, and salvage what you can from the wreck of our marriage?”

Kathryn felt a sudden, irrational surge of pity for the tall, proud man standing beside her. It was plain his wife had wounded more than his self-esteem. He must have loved his Nadine very deeply to have been so vulnerable to her actions. As I thought I loved Don, she reminded herself. Kathryn knew all about that pain!

Lord John was speaking in a steady voice. “You’ll be happy in Ireland. I’ll see to it that you do not lack for any luxury, so long as you live quietly and do not disgrace my name. Surely you can be discreet if it is to your advantage—”

Kathryn’s head had begun to ache, and her arm was one solid throb of pain. She said wearily, “I can’t convince you, can I? You aren’t willing to give me a real test. Surely there must be something I can do that your Nadine could not? Mathematics? Languages? I was taught French and Latin, psychology, civics, library sciences. . . . Question me! I’ll do anything to convince you. Anything to get myself off the hook, as we say in 1974.”

Lord John was frowning. Kathryn, searching for a way to hammer home her knowledge of the science of the future, went too far. “I’m not a physicist, but I know that in 1942 Dr. Fermi developed an atom bomb, and in 1969 the United States landed the first two men on the moon,” she concluded proudly.

“You can’t expect me to take this seriously? Atom bombs and men on the moon? I don’t believe in witchcraft. And you would be well advised not to let anyone hear you laying claim to such forbidden skills.”

“Witchcraft? Is that what you think—?” began the girl, but Lord John interrupted, sternly.

“What else? Do you have some rational explanation for your claim of a miraculous flight through space and time from the future? On an ‘atomic’ broomstick, perhaps?”

Kathryn felt the surge of anger this man seemed capable of arousing in her. She said hotly, “That is unworthy of an educated man. I’ve read a great many romantic novels about the sense of justice and fair play so dear to the English, but apparently they were just that—romantic lies. You have a completely closed mind! You are what we call in my time a male chauvinist pig! You’re unwilling to listen to anything outside your own narrow circle of belief—!”

Lord John’s lips had set in a smile of cold distaste. He bowed ironically. “Congratulations, Nadine! It’s reassuring to see you restored to your normal sprightly temper. I’ll leave you to rest and recuperate your strength—” Then, struck by the look of despair on her face, he said more gently, “Forgive me. You and I are fated to quarrel, are we not? But surely you’ve learned to know me well enough this past year to be sure I won’t throw you out of the house with a broken arm, child. I won’t send you to Ireland until it is mended, and your fever healed.” He tried to smile. “Those novels you read must have been very exciting! Try to rest, Nadine. I’ll speak to you again in a few days, when you have recovered from this—mental disturbance.”

And he was gone from the room before Kathryn, startled by his change of manner, could find anything to say.