“I watched from the street as they left the theater, I watched one of them get caught pickpocketing a man, I watched the man lunge at the pickpocket with a punch, I watched the man disappear through a door in the air before his punch hit, and I watched him reappear in the middle of the street, right in front of a moving carriage.”
Dear God. This sounded like the same man from last night. “Did he . . . kill him?” I asked, wincing.
She nodded steadily, her eyes distant and stuck in the past. “That was the most horrifying truth to realize. Not the fact that these powers existed, but the fact that there were people who did such awful things with them. When I returned to your home, I tried to pretend the nightmares weren’t real, but the harder I tried, the more vivid they became—it nearly drove me mad.”
I remembered mornings when she came downstairs pallid, exhausted, and reticent. She would assign Rose and me work that required plenty of writing and little talking, then spend hours looking out the window, endeavoring to keep awake. It finally made sense.
“Eventually, it became too much. Your mother was concerned for my health, and we decided it best that I leave.”
“Where did you go? We wrote you many times.”
I could see her withdraw into her memories as she rose again, walking stiffly to a streetside window.
“When I was sent back home, my parents demanded an explanation, so I poured out everything. They sympathized and told me all would be well.” There was a cold anger lacing her words that made me freeze, almost frightened to hear more.
“But they had decided I was mad,” she continued, shaking her head in disappointment. “My two sisters also work as governesses, and my father could not risk my condition becoming known. I don’t blame them, but I can never forgive them. They bundled me off to Belgium and shut me in a place worse than a prison—an asylum.”
“No! They couldn’t have!”
She clutched the windowsill to slow her trembling. “I cannot tell you the particular horror it is in such a place. Surrounded by strangers, treated like a dangerous, deranged criminal, I was made to drink vials of concoctions that kept me sick and sleeping most of the day. Of course, as I slept, I was forced to dream more. Sometimes it was pleasant. Mostly it was not. I did not know what I hated more, my waking moments or the dreams. I wanted to escape from both. But then, I dreamt of . . . I dreamt of you and Rose, Evelyn.”
“Of course,” I said, nodding.
She whirled to face me, the light from the window turning her into a silhouette.
“I’ve recently become aware of my healing ability,” I said. “Rose’s, as well.”
The smallest bit of tension seemed to leave her body. “I was afraid I would somehow have to prove your abilities,” she said with a slight laugh.
“No, there have been many chances for that over these last days.”
Again, her eyes filled with guilt. “I am so sorry, Evelyn.”
“It is not your fault!”
“When I saw the two of you healing patients, it was the first time I had seen someone using their gift for good. I felt the slightest bit of hope and clung to it. I made an effort to better understand my power. I kept a diary of my dreams to remember more details. I discovered that when I dream of someone who is sleeping, I enter their dreams instead. I even found I could sometimes control whom I dreamt of. But then I dreamt of him.
“The scientist. The one I dreaded most. Cold, empty, heartless. In my dreams he sought others with powers, convinced them to aid his experiments, and performed atrocious tests on them without remorse, all in the name of research. And in my dream, he was discussing Rose with his two partners: a giant and the murderer I’d seen in London.”
“Calvin Beck,” I said, strangled breath wrenching itself from me. “He . . . has a power? What is it?”
Miss Grey shook her head. “I never witnessed it. I dread the possibilities. Perhaps it is the lack of a conscience.”
My head felt cloudy, stormy. Not only did Claude have an abnormal amount of strength and the other man the ability to travel anywhere, but Dr. Beck had a mysterious advantage, as well.
“I tried to warn you,” Miss Grey continued, “but the caretakers refused to send my letters, and it was impossible to escape. Out of desperation I tried what I assumed was impossible. I entered your dream, Evelyn, and endeavored to speak to you. But I lacked the proper control.”
“No. You have been wonderful. I simply didn’t realize.” It was my turn to stand and pace, trying to push away thoughts of what if. “How did you come to me now?”
“I met Emily Kane. She was a young girl recently transferred to the ward. You see, the asylum itself held a number of gifted patients who were also deemed mad by their families. Emily and I were not friends—not exactly. She was almost as insane as they wished her to be. She was too scared to leave, no matter what I said, but she used her fascinating ability to help me, God bless her.”