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When Dr. Wade called the next day he was accompanied by his sister, Eglantyne, who expressed the same concern for Sylvestra as before, coming to her with a kind of silent understanding which Hester now appreciated more than on the previous occasion. Then it had seemed as if she were at a loss for what to say. Looking at her more closely, it now appeared instead to be a knowledge that no words would serve any purpose; they might end in belittling what was too large for everyday speech.
When Sylvestra and Eglantyne had gone together into the withdrawing room, Hester looked at Corriden Wade. He was quite obviously tired and the strain was showing in the lines of weariness around his mouth and eyes. There was no longer the same energy in his bearing.
“Can I help you at all, Dr. Wade?” she asked gravely. “Surely there must be something I can do to lessen the burden upon you? I imagine you have many other patients, both in hospital and in their homes.” She searched his eyes. “When did you last take any thought for yourself?”
He stared at her as if for a moment he was not sure what she meant.
“Dr. Wade?”
He smiled, and his face altered completely. The dejection and anxiety vanished, although nothing could mask the tiredness in him.
“How generous of you, Miss Latterly,” he said quietly. “I apologize for allowing my own feelings to be so obvious. It is not a quality I intend, or admire. I admit, this case does trouble me deeply. As you have no doubt observed, both my sister and I are very fond of the whole family.” A shadow of pain crossed his eyes, and the surprise of it was naked to see. “I still find it hard to accept that Leighton … Mr. Duff … is dead. I had known him for years. We had shared … a great deal. That it should all end”—he took a deep breath—“like this … is appalling. Rhys is much more than a patient to me. I know …” He made a slight gesture with his hands. “I know a good doctor, or a good nurse, should not allow himself or herself to become personally involved with any patient. It can affect their judgment to offer the best care possible. Relatives can lend sympathy and grief, moral support and love. They look to us to provide the best professional treatment, not emotion. I know all this as well as anyone. Still, I cannot help being moved by Rhys’s plight.”
“And I too,” she confessed. “I don’t think anyone expects us not to care. How could we dedicate our time to helping the sick and injured if we did not care?”
He looked at her closely for several moments.
“You are a remarkable wo
man, Miss Latterly. And of course you are right. I shall go up and see Rhys. Perhaps you will keep the ladies company and …”
“Yes?” She was now used to his pattern of seeing Rhys alone, and no longer questioned it.
“Please, do not offer them too much encouragement. I do not know if he is progressing as well as I had hoped. His outer wounds are healing, but he seems to have no energy, no will to recover. I detect very little returning strength, and that disturbs me. Can you tell me if I have missed something, Miss Latterly?”
“No … no, I wish I could, but I also have wished he would develop more desire to sit up longer, even get into a chair for a while. He is still very weak and not able to take as much food as I had expected.”
He sighed. “Perhaps we hope too much. But guard your words, Miss Latterly, or we may unintentionally cause even more pain.” And with an inclination of his head, he went up the stairs past her and disappeared across the landing.
Hester went to the withdrawing room and knocked on the door. She had a fear of interrupting a moment that could be confidential. However, she was invited in immediately and with apparently genuine pleasure.
“Do come in, Miss Latterly,” Eglantyne said warmly. “Mrs. Duff was telling me about Constance’s letters from India. It sounds extraordinarily beautiful, in spite of the heat and the disease. Sometimes I regret there is so much of the world I shall never see. Of course, my brother has traveled a great deal …”
“He was a naval surgeon, wasn’t he?” Hester sat in the chair offered her. “He mentioned something of it to me.”
Eglantyne’s face showed little expression. It was plain that her brother’s career did not excite in her either the imagination of danger, personal courage, and desperate conditions or the knowledge of suffering that it did in Hester. But then how could it? Eglantyne Wade had probably never witnessed anything more violent or distressing than a minor carriage accident, the odd broken bone or cut hand. Her grief would be … what? Boredom, a sense of life passing by without touching her, of being very little real use to anyone. Almost certainly a loneliness, perhaps a broken romance, a love known and lost, or merely dreamed of. She was pretty—in fact, very pretty—and it seemed she was also kind. But that was not enough to understand a man like Corriden Wade.
Eglantyne avoided Hester’s eyes. “Yes, he does speak of it occasionally. He believes very strongly in the power of the navy, and the life at sea, to build character. He says it is nature’s way of refining the race. At least I think that is what he said.” She seemed uninterested. There was no life in her voice, no lift of understanding or care.
Sylvestra looked at her quickly, as if sensing some emotion, perhaps loneliness, beyond her words.
“Would you like to travel?” Hester asked to fill the silence.
“Sometimes I think so,” Eglantyne answered slowly, recalling herself to the polite necessities of conversation. “I am not sure where. Fidelis … Mrs. Kynaston … speaks of it sometimes. But of course it is only a dream. Still, it is pleasant to read, is it not? I daresay you read a great deal to Rhys?”.
The conversation continued for nearly an hour, touching on a dozen things, exploring none of them.
Eventually Corriden Wade returned looking very grave, his face deeply lined, as if he were close to exhaustion. He closed the door behind him and walked across to stand in front of them.
Silently Eglantyne reached out and took Sylvestra’s hand, and Sylvestra clung to it until her knuckles shone white with the pressure.
“I am sorry, my dear,” he said quietly. “I have to warn you that Rhys is not progressing as well as I would like. As no doubt Miss Latterly will have told you, his outer wounds are healing well. There is no suppuration and certainly no threat of gangrene. But internally we cannot tell. Sometimes there is damage to organs that we have no way of knowing. There is nothing I can do for him except prescribe sedatives to give him as much rest as possible, and bland food that will not cause him pain, and yet will be nourishing and easy to digest.”
Sylvestra stared up at him, her face stricken.
“We must wait and hope,” Eglantyne said gently, looking from Sylvestra to her brother and back again. “At least he is no worse, and that in itself is something to be thankful for.”
Sylvestra attempted to smile, and failed.
