“I’ve no idea. Probably Mother put it there herself. No one else in the household would have. Even the staff in Town know how important the blasted thing is.”
“Even if the dowager has become reliant on the counterpane and has taken ownership of it, perhaps some part of her mind still connects it with you,” Simon said. “If she knew you were setting off on a journey, perhaps she thought you ought to takeit.”
Archie paused. It would be easy enough to agree with that assessment, but these were the people to whom he did not lie. “That would be a sound theory if Mother knew who I was.”
“Oh, Archie,” Effie said. “Is she that much worse, then?”
“Yes,” Archie said tersely. “She no longer recognizes me at all.” There had been days, as recently as six months ago, where he would join her in her breakfast room, and she would say, “Good morning, Archibald dearest,” as if nothing were amiss. Those days had become fewer and farther between until there were none left. He thought of it like watching a boat disappear over the horizon: it would bob in the waves and come in and out of view before it was well and truly gone. And even then, you kept staring, long after you knew it was futile.
“I’m so sorry,” Effie said with real dismay in his tone.
“Likewise,” Simon said. “What a bloody terrible business.”
“It’s all right.” It made it easier, in a way, to love her, than had been the case in recent years, when he’d still been trying to hold her to the standards to which he thought a mother ought to adhere. He hadn’t understood then that her behavior wasn’t personal.
Though he did wonder if one could reasonably love someone who had lost her mind. Was there any ofherleft to love? What happened when one’s mother walked the earth in corporeal form yet existed only as a memory?
Goodness. This was too much philosophy for Archie, who had never been a scholar. What happened was that it felt bloody awful. He knew that much.
“Well, we shall just have to turn back, then,” Effie said.
“I’m afraid we will, though I do recognize how absurd it is to do so over a tattered piece of fabric.” Archie sighed. “It will add two hours to our trip.”
“Yes,” Simon said, “but think how quickly Effie got ready. It all comes out in the wash.”
“Thank you,” Archie said quietly. “And I’m sorry.”
The boys waved away his apologies, and soon enough they were headed back the way they’d come.
“Would you like to come in?” Archie said when they came to a stop in front of the house on Hanover Square. He didn’t want them to, but he felt he ought to ask.
“Yes,” Effie said vehemently. “It’s long past time I paid my respects to your mother.”
“She’s unlikely to recognize you.” Archie and Simon and Effie didn’t interact with each other’s families overmuch, mostly because their families were, frankly, tommyrot. But not Mother; she was the exception. Or she had been.
“All the better,” Simon said as he climbed out of the coach. “That way she won’t remember the time we showed up for dinner at this very house utterly foxed.”
Effie groaned and held his head. “We were so jug-bitten. If she does remember me, I shall make my apologies again for that appalling lapse.”
Archie winced at the memory. “I don’t know that I’ve ever seen her so angry.” Father yes, but not Mother. She had been angry on account of the fact that she’d also had other guests at the table. It had struck Archie as a fair sort of anger. Mother had only ever gotten angry at Archie over behaviors, things he could control. She never scorned him for the way hewas.
“And I should enjoy seeing Miss Brown,” Simon said. When Archie looked at him, perplexed, for he couldn’t remember Simon and Miss Brown ever meeting, Simon added, a touch defensively, “You probably have not noticed that Miss Brown is very well read.”
Apparently, he had not. He had been too busy noticing that Miss Brown was his and Mother’s savior, their angel of mercy. “All right, here we go.”
The house was, as he’d feared, in a minor uproar. Archie’s letting himself in attracted a harried footman. “My lord.” He skidded to a halt in front of them. “We did not expect to see you back so soon.”
“Angus.” Archie held out the counterpane. “I didn’t expect to be back, but I realized this had sneaked its way into my things.”
Angus’s shoulders visibly relaxed. “Very good. I’ll summon Miss Brown.”
“No need. I’ll say hello—and goodbye again—to Mother. Featherfinch and Marsden would like to greet her. I assume she and Miss Brown are in the music room?”
“They are, my lord.”
Miss Brown would be trying to engage Mother in some singing. Strangely, although Mother had forgotten so many people and events, she remembered the words to every song she’d ever learned.
All seemed calm when they entered to find Mother and Miss Brown sitting side by side at the pianoforte. Miss Brown turned at the sound of their arrival, and Archie held up the counterpane. Miss Brown had a similar reaction to Angus, sighing in obvious relief and shooting Archie a grateful smile. She laid her hand on Mother’s arm. “Look who is here, my lady, and what he has brought.”
