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“I’m sorry,” she whispered, trying to control herself. “He doesn’t mean it. I know you are saying what is best for Robert. We must face the truth, if that is what it is. Will you help me to tell him, please?”
“Of course.” Hester nearly offered to do it for her, if she wished, then realized that if she did, afterwards Dagmar would feel as if she had let her son down out of her own weakness. It was necessary for Dagmar, whether it was for Robert or for her own peace of mind, to tell him herself.
Together they moved towards the door, and the doctor turned to follow them.
Bernd swung around as though to speak, then changed his mind. He knew his own emotions would only make it harder.
Upstairs, Dagmar knocked at Robert’s door, and when she heard his voice, pushed the door open and went in, Hester behind her.
Robert was sitting up as usual, but his face was very white.
Dagmar stopped.
Hester ached to say it for her. She choked back the impulse, her throat tight.
/> Robert stared at Dagmar. For a moment there was hope in his eyes, then only fear.
“I’m sorry, my darling,” Dagmar began, her words husky with tears. “It will not get better. We must plan what we can do as it is.”
Robert opened his mouth, then clenched his hands and gazed at her in silence. For a moment it was beyond him to speak.
Dagmar took a step forward, then changed her mind.
Hester knew that nothing she could say would help. For the moment the pain was all-consuming. It would have to change, almost certainly be in part replaced by anger, at least for a while, then perhaps despair, self-pity, and finally acceptance, before the beginning of adjustment.
Dagmar moved forward again and sat down on the edge of the bed. She took Robert’s hand in hers and held it. He tightened his grip, as if all his mind and his will were in that one part of him. His eyes stared straight ahead, seeing nothing.
Hester stepped back and pulled the door closed.
* * *
It was the middle of the next morning when Hester saw Bernd again. She was sitting in the green morning room in front of the fire writing letters, one or two of her own, but mostly to assist Dagmar in conveying apologies and explanations to friends, when Bernd came in.
“Good morning, Miss Latterly,” he said stiffly. “I believe I owe you an apology for my words yesterday. They were not intended as any personal discourtesy. I am most … grateful … for the care you have shown my son.”
She smiled, putting down her pen. “I did not doubt that, sir. Your distress is natural. Anyone would have felt as you did. Please do not consider it necessary to think of it again.”
“My wife tells me I was … rude …”
“I have forgotten it.”
“Thank you. I … I hope you will remain to look after Robert? He is going to need a great deal of assistance. Of course, in time we shall obtain an appropriate manservant, but until then …”
“He will learn to do far more than you think now,” she assured him. “He is disabled; he is not ill. The greatest help would be a comfortable chair with wheels so that he can move around …”
Bernd winced. “He will hate it! People will be … sorry for him. He will feel—” He stopped, unable to continue.
“He will feel some degree of independence,” she finished for him. “The alternative is to remain in bed. There is no need for that. He is not an invalid. He has his hands, his brain and his senses.”
“He will be a cripple!” He spoke of it in the future, as if to acknowledge it in the present made it more of a fact and he still could not bear that.
“He cannot use his legs,” she said carefully. “You must help him to make all the use he can of everything else. And people may begin by being sorry for him, but they will only remain so if he is sorry for himself.”
He stared at her. He looked exhausted; there were dark smudges around his eyes and his skin had a thin, papery quality.
“I would like to think you are correct, Miss Latterly,” he said after a moment or two. “But you speak so easily. I know you have seen a great many young men disabled by war and injuries perhaps far worse than Robert’s. But you see only the first terrible shock, then you move on to another patient. You do not see the slow years that follow afterwards, the disappointed hopes, the imprisonment that closes in, that ruins the … the pleasures, the achievements of life.”
“I haven’t nursed only soldiers, Baron Ollenheim,” she said gently. “But please don’t ever allow Robert to know that you believe life is so blighted for him, or you will crush him completely. You may even make your fears come true by your belief in them.”
