1843, --- Yorkshire, England...
They came for me late at night, more toward the earliest hours of the morning, when the house was dark, when all the servants were asleep. They must have been family friends, men friends, because when they hustled me out not even the big dogs, the lurchers guarding our house, barked. They were strong thugs and there were four of them. It was no good fighting them. I'm only fifteen and not very big. Their faces were covered with sacks to hide their identities. Naturally, I tried to scream, but one clapped his hand over my mouth, muffling my cry. I bit him, but he didn't yell or swear. He had self-control; I tasted his blood in my mouth before he gagged me.
I was wearing only a thin muslin nightgown, and barefoot, walking, stumbling along on the sharp, chill pebbles of the drive. Before they shoved me into the carriage, they tied my wrists together with coarse twine and, then my ankles. It was late November. It was bitterly cold, but, it hadn't snowed yet. An extremely heavy frost on everything, --- yes, almost like snow. It was sparkling on the tangles of sycamore branches, looking eerie, even wicked,
on the trees that bordered my father's estate like sentinels, and on the blades of stiff, icy grass.
I was my father's only living child. My little brother Adam had died of scarlet fever in the Spring. My mother died eight years ago when she was hiking and fell against a boulder, hitting her head. My father, Baron Edmund Dunhurst Addington, never got over her death. He said she was his jewel, --- yes, his precious decoration, his pride. But, he also said she was wild and willful, like me, too young when he married her, --- my sweet, pretty mother Amelia Langford, youngest of the six daughters of the banker Josiah Langford.
My father is a cold solemn man, very rich, but, he is a miser.
He is stingy, parsimonious and sanctimonious. Never does he give any more than the required Christian tithe to his church, to which he claims to be devoted. And, never did he show any normal parental affection for my brother or me. Any love I received was from our servants, especially after my mother's death, and especially from my kind old Nanny Janet Ruckley,
and my elegant governess Harriet Ivers.
Those who go without love, for any length of time, will seek it somehow, somewhere... It was Thomas Dailey I ran to, the farm boy who delivered messages, who delivered vegetables and hay for our animals. He looked even younger than I did, although I was only two months older. Thomas was ever so handsome, with his thick mop of shiny brown hair and his startling, merry, dark gray-blue eyes, eyes the exact color of a jay's wings.
Things happened fast. We became good friends, then, passionate lovers with that feverish, irresistible flush that a first love can bring. I was sure, absolutely sure, we would wed someday, run away together. We were planning it, saving money. Then, I became pregnant.
When I told Thomas I was carrying our child he was deliriously happy, even more determined than I that we should successfully have a life together. My wise old nanny guessed my secret. I began to show much, much sooner than expected, only one month gone and I was looking puffy already, --- a little round "pooch" under my navel! A midwife-herbwoman called to the house on the pretext that Nanny badly needed herbs for her chronic arthritis confirmed that I was at least expecting twins, if not that rarity, --- triplets! I was very afraid of a multiple birth!
I told Thomas about this. He said we would leave as soon as possible, got money somewhere. I don't know where and he drove a cart to our estate. But, my father's men were waiting, and they beat him. I never saw him again, after our servants told me how Thomas was dumped in our fields and his cart burned to charred boards.
My father confronted me in our parlor, "Do you think I haven't noticed, Lucille?," he said. "Do you think I am a fool? You have put on weight quickly, even in your face. You are wearing your frocks with their waists pulled up high. I suppose you try to have yourself laced in as tightly as possible. The maid who dresses you has been dismissed, as have our other servants who kept your secret, --- your old nanny too, and your governess... You won't need servants where you're going!"
"What are you saying, Father?" I asked him. "I'm carrying your grandchild! I am your heir!"
"You are no child of mine! Nor, is the bastard you carry in your belly my kin!" His eyes were practically popping.
"I am carrying twins, perhaps triplets!"
"Even more shame and sin!," he said.
"You will disown me?"
"Of course, you are no longer pure. I can hardly make a decent match for you now! Who would have you, but some old pauper, perhaps an ancient doddering minister of some remote parish north of, --- of nothing! You are worthless to me, when you could have brought me honor and, --- and, increased my fortune! Now, you are ruined, ruined, ruined!... Yes-yes, I will give your inheritance to the church, this house and land too, to redeem our disgraced family in the eyes of our Lord! Now, get out of here, harlot!"
I ran. I could hear him screaming, --- "HARLOT, HARLOT OF BABYLON, JEZEBEL, DEFAMER OF ALL THAT IS RIGHTEOUS, WOMAN OF SODOM AND GOMORRAH! YOU WILL PAY! MAY GOD'S WRATH FALL ON YOU AND CONSUME YOU IN THE FIRES OF HELL!"
I should have left the house immediately and forever, --- right then! I should have rushed upstairs to pack a bag. At that moment, I didn't know Thomas was dead. I planned to find him... Yes, I was going to do that when the groom came from the stable, meeting me in front of it, saying I wouldn't want to go inside to get my mare Penny, --- because, because, because...
"Spit it out, man!," I said, shaking him a little.
He looked at me, helplessly, his eyes full of tears, sniveling, wiping his nose with the backs of his hands. "Because, Miss Lucy, --- young Thomas, your Thomas... He's dead! He's dead inside! I found hm dead on the bank of the stream, half in the water, Miss Lucy, half in the cattails!"
I rushed into the stable. Thomas was lying crookedly in the straw, severely beaten, his head a mass of matted hair; I could see what was likely the cause of his death, a large wound, as if his skull had been struck with a heavy, blunt object. He had two blackened eyes, bruises everywhere, smashed teeth. Most of his fingers and toes were severed. His strong legs looked broken. He was soaked too, as if he'd also been drowned. I shoved my fists in my mouth, chomping down on my fingers. I sobbed and sobbed and sobbed and sobbed. I don't even remember making my way to my room, but I fell on my bed, crying myself to sleep, slept deeply, exhausted. One of our few remaining female servants eventually helped me undress, when I was still mostly asleep, got me into a nightgown.
Of course, I woke when the kidnappers came... The carriage into which they threw me, with a smelly, threadbare blanket completely covering me, bumped over roads for a long time. I squirmed, finally managed to sit upright. I saw in the distance an imposing building in the dim light and rolling clouds just after dawn. It was a huge edifice, and coldly beautiful, with it's gables and many windows. I knew it was a lunatic asylum, that I would be committed there as a wayward girl. No doubt, I would never leave, no doubt, imprisoned for life, unless, unless, by cunning and luck, I could somehow escape.
(Use the "Search Box" to find other parts to this story.) --- Copyright 2023, by Antoinette Beard
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