The Apothecary's Daughter Part 43

"But Charlie is more important than the shop. Father would not disagree."

He stared at her. "You have not told him?"

"Not yet. I fear what it will do to him."

He knelt before her to look into her eyes and gripped her hand. This was not the topic he had imagined discussing from this position. "Tell him, Lillian. You cannot bear this on your own. I will do all I can to help, but I fear it is not a great deal."

Lilly was sitting in a chair beside Mrs. Kilgrove's bed when the woman's eyes fluttered opened at last.

"Mrs. Kilgrove? " Lilly reached out and grasped her spidery hand. The old woman turned watery eyes in her direction.

"Rosamond?" she whispered hoa.r.s.ely. "I knew you'd return." Her head lolled to the side, and Lilly had to rise and lean over the bed to hear her murmur, "You did the first time, after all."

Lilly's heart hammered. "What do you mean, Mrs. Kilgrove?"

But the old woman did not answer, merely squinted toward the bedside table. "Why do the candles wear blue halos?" Her eyes closed and she said no more.

Mrs. Kilgrove was seeing things, Lilly realized. Had even mistaken her for her mother. No doubt what she had said about Rosamond's return had been wild imaginings as well.

Despite the poor woman's hallucinations, a tentative, fluttering hope filled Lilly's breast. She tamped it down, lest it fly away at any moment. Fearing the old woman might yet take a turn for the worse, she waited and prayed. Her father came, brought by Charlie's racked confession. There was nothing he could do, but it was still a relief to hear him confirm everything that could be done for Mrs. Kilgrove had been done. Later, the vicar came to pa.s.s an hour with her at Francis's behest, offering words of comfort and prayer in his mellifluous voice.

That evening, Mrs. Kilgrove again opened her eyes. She turned to Lilly with a weak smile. "How nice to wake with someone beside me. Haven't known that comfort since my John died a day back agone."

"I am glad to be here," Lilly said. "Do you know me?"

Mrs. Kilgrove frowned. "Foolish girl," she whispered. "Have I not known you since an infant?"

"Yes, but you've been unconscious." She did not add delirious. "How do you feel now? "

"Queer. My head aches." She slowly moved her gaze across the room. "And everything seems rather a yellow."

"Mrs. Kilgrove, do you remember the pills you took the ones I sent over?"

She squinted in attempted concentration. "I don't a to help me sleep?"

"Just so, and to calm your stomach. I am afraid there might have been one or two wrong pills in the lot. Do you remember taking any silver pills?"

She winced. "La.s.s, I am near eighty years old. I am happy to remember my name, much less the color of a pill I took a when was it.

"Three nights gone."

"Three nights? Some pills a" Her eyes drifted closed once more.

The next morning when Mrs. Kilgrove awoke, Lilly and Charlie were both with her. Charlie sat in a bedside chair, the woman's cat on his lap. When he saw her eyes open, his voice shook. "I am dreadful sorry, Mrs. K." Tears filled his wide blue eyes.

Mrs. Kilgrove turned her head toward him and reached out a shaky hand. "No need. I don't blame you, Charlie. You may be small in the attic, but you have a big heart."

Charlie bit his p.r.o.nounced lip and ducked his head.

"Mrs. Kilgrove, will you take some water? "

The woman turned sharp eyes in her direction. "Why is there no tea?"

Biting back a smile, Lilly rose to prepare some. While she was at it, she set a pan of broth to warming on the stove, broth Mrs. Mimpurse had kindly sent over, firmly believing the invalid would regain consciousness as well as appet.i.te. Lilly certainly hoped she was right.

Francis Baylor was on his way to visit Mrs. Kilgrove and, if he were honest with himself, to see Lilly, who stayed so loyally by the woman's side. He knew he was a fool. Graves, a good-looking, Oxfordeducated physician, was courting her, was he not? Francis sighed. Still, he would do anything to help her.

From the corner of his eye, he glimpsed Dr. Foster disappearing into Ackers Stables and Smithy, the establishment of Bill Ackers, the county-appointed constable of the neighbor villages.

His stomach seized at the thought of what trouble Ackers could bring down on the Haswells, and he knew the man was more than capable of doing so with relish. Francis changed course and crossed the road, stepping surrept.i.tiously near the open stable door.

"Will you fail in your duty, Ackers?" He heard Foster say, voice sharp. "There has been a crime, man. A devilish crime."

Francis blew out a puff of air. Worse than I feared.

"You'd like'at, would'n ye?" Bill Ackers spoke in a voice pa.s.sed down from generations of family members who'd never ventured beyond Wiltshire. "Haswell's dippin' in yer pockets, innum?"

"No. He is nothing to me."

"Now, long as the woman lives, there's been no murder, mind. And no one's gawpus enough to believe *at young dummel meant to harm the old ghel."

"It is a fine thing when a body can poison an innocent person in your village, Ackers."

"Now, Foster. Let's not jarl. You know I'll be watchin'. And when summateruther happens, I'll see to it, I will."

"I am very glad to hear it."

There was a pause. Thinking the conversation at an end, Francis was about to move away when Dr. Foster spoke again.

"Perhaps, Mr. Ackers, we might discuss this further at the Hare and Hounds? I for one grow thirsty standing here."

"If yer buying, I'll go along," Bill Ackers said. "Always were a fair-minded man."

A robin red breast in a cage

Puts all heaven in a rage.

WILLIAM BLAKE, AUGURIES OF INNOCENCE.

CHAPTER 39.

A s Charlie was finishing his breakfast of eggs and sausages the next -morning, Lilly slipped briefly from the kitchen, then returned with arms full. "I have something for you, Charlie."

Still chewing, Charlie's gaze tracked her progress across the room. At her mother's old place at the table, Lilly set down a bandbox with bored-out air holes. Antic.i.p.ation p.r.i.c.kled within her as she watched her brother's face. Though his memory was poor, she thought she saw a glint of recognition in his blue eyes.

He swallowed his bite and said, "I had somefing very like it once.

"Indeed you did. I am pleased you remember."

A flick of white batted against one of the holes and disappeared.

Charlie's eyes grew wide. "Am Ito have a puss?"

With effort, she kept her voice calm. "Open it and see."

Still he hesitated.

"Go on."

Charlie carefully removed the lid. A young cat, older than a kitten but not fully grown, lifted his grey head and put two white paws on the edge of the box. He sniffed the air, and when Charlie offered him his fingers, sniffed those too.

"Hallo, boy." Charlie looked up at her anxiously. "He is a boy, innum? "

"I am no expert on such, mmm, identification, but Mr. Fowler a.s.sures me this is indeed a male."

"Good. *Twould be a queer fing to call a girl-cat jolly."

Her heart warmed and ached at once. "Is that what you will call him?"

He nodded. "Does he look like the first jolly, Lilly? I can't remember."

"Well, I do remember, and he looks a great deal like your old Jolly. I daresay this lad is his grandson or grandnephew."

"Oh, *at's fine! Fine! "

But then Charlie's smile faded. He faltered, "But she said I weren't ever to have another."

"Shea" Lilly hesitated, then said gently, "Mother is gone. But Father and I want you to have it."

"But what if he runs away again? "

Lilly answered thickly, "Then I shall help you find him. And you will love him and care for him better than anyone in Bedsley Priors. As I love you."

The cat put its muzzle close to Charlie's face, sniffing his cheek and mouth.

Lilly smiled through her tears. "He seems to like you a great deal already."

Charlie stroked the cat. "I fink he does. Or the milk I drank wi' breakfast."

"Look how gentle you are with him."

"Mrs. K. taught me."

A movement caught her eye, and Lilly looked up to see her father leaning against the doorjamb. Their gazes met for several ticks of the clock, and she saw that hers were not the only eyes filled with tears.

Three days later, just before closing time, Bill Ackers strode boldly into the shop. Lilly felt her heart jerk as wildly as from foxglove itself. Ackers was a big, broad man in his late twenties with arms strong from his smithy work and years of starting and breaking up fights. Broom in hand, Charlie froze, staring up at the man.

"Charlie Haswell, there thee bist. I've come for ye."

Charlie's mouth drooped open. "She died, did she, Mr. Ackers? Poor Mrs. K. gone to the churchyard?"

"Not yet, she ain't. No thanks to you and yers."

"Thank G.o.d," Lilly breathed.

"There's still wrongdoin' to be answered for, lad. That's why I'm come to take ye in."

"To the blind house, Mr. Ackers?" Charlie asked.

"Aye."

"Mr. Ackers," Lilly protested, panic rising. "If anyone is to blame, it is I."

"You poisoned Mrs. Kilgrove then?"

"No one poisoned Mrs. Kilgrove. That word conveys such vile intent, does it not? A mistake has been made, I own. She swallowed one small pill of the wrong sort. Not poison. Not for a healthy stout person. But for an eighty-year-old woman a"

"I have it on good authority that givin' a person the wrong medcine is a crime, Miss Haswell, no matter the old ghel's age. And seein' how it might yet lead to her death, can ye deny it?"

"No. Of course it is wrong. And I do not expect all consequences to be waived. But it is my fault, the shop is my responsibility."