Chime

22 How Is Mister Eldric?

Eldric took ill. He took ill on Blackberry Night, and kept to his bed.

How do you suppose this witch reacted? Can you guess what she might have thought?

Such a relief!

That’s what she thought.

The very sight of Eldric would curl the witch into a shriveled pea of embarrassment.

A witch does not make a good friend.

Let’s remind ourselves how this particular witch works: She is near a person, she is jealous of that person, that person falls from a swing and bashes her head.

The witch meets a person on Blackberry Night. There ensues a shriveled-pea of a situation, and that person falls ill.

How is it that I am always surprised?

I was alone at breakfast the first day, save for the Brownie. I was relieved. I began a new story for Rose.

I declined to answer a letter from Cecil.

I was alone at breakfast the second day, save for the Brownie. I was relieved. I finished the story.

I declined to answer a second letter from Cecil.

I avoided breakfast the third day, because I was sure to see him. I declined to answer a third letter from Cecil.

I was alone at breakfast the fourth day, save for the Brownie.

A strong young man might have a cold for a couple of days, three at the outside. But four days?

“You doesn’t got no appetite?” said Pearl, clearing my plate. I shook my head. I was wedged tight inside my rib cage.

I rose. The Brownie rose too. But just now, I’d rather look at the Brownie than at the poached eggs, quivering in their cups. “How is Mister Eldric?”

Poached eggs? What kind of person would invent such a thing?

“He don’t be well, miss, an’ that Miss Leanne, she be making him worse.” Pearl’s words poured out, as though they’d been pressing against a dam.

“She don’t let Mister Eldric rest. Such a deal o’ rubbish she been fetching him, bits o’ sea glass an’ shells an’ driftwood, but to her it don’t be rubbish. She setted Mister Eldric to making—I doesn’t know what-all, miss.”

A regular person wouldn’t stand there, looking at Pearl’s hands, thinking she might be making Puree of Christ. A regular person would say something. She would sound as though she cared. “How does he look?”

You’re an idiot, Briony: There must be something more regular.

“Mister Eldric’s face?” said Pearl. “It minded me on your stepmother’s face, miss, when she been took ill.”

Eldric, as ill as Stepmother? Did he look as—as reduced as Stepmother had? Like bread scraped of butter, milk skimmed of cream, cups drained of ale.

“Mister Eldric, he be working hisself hollow,” said Pearl. “If you’ll pardon the liberty, miss, Mr. Clayborne, he best fetch Dr. Rannigan, an’ that right quick.”

“Thank you, Pearl.” How calm I was. I was too big for my skin. “I’ll see to Dr. Rannigan.”

See to Dr. Rannigan. What did that mean? Ought I to consult Father? Mr. Clayborne? My decision-making machinery was jammed. The Brownie followed, lacing his grasshopper fingers in distress. He had a nasty habit of picking up my thoughts.

I looked into the parlor, into the library—empty, empty. I knocked on Father’s study door. Silence, empty. Time snarled in on itself.

I spoke aloud. “What should I do?”

“It be early yet, mistress,” said the Brownie. “Could be tha’d catch the doctor at breakfast.”

“You’ll come with me?”

Why on earth did I speak to the Brownie?

“O’ course, mistress.”

Perhaps he’d worn me down.

And now I was speaking to him, although it was yet another betrayal of Stepmother. I’d already betrayed her in so many ways. Going into the swamp, frolicking about rather than working out how to apprehend her murderer.

Out we went, the Brownie and I, into the snarl of time, twisting and tangling through the village to Dr. Rannigan’s house.

His housekeeper said he was attending another patient.

“Do you expect him back soon?” I said.

His housekeeper was sure she didn’t know.

“Might he have stopped at the Alehouse?”

His housekeeper said it was not her place to remark upon the doctor’s attachment to the demon drink, and that I might perhaps take myself off, as she had work to do.

“How dare he!” I said to the Brownie, which made no sense, but the Brownie, being the Brownie, understood. Dr. Rannigan was our Dr. Rannigan. We needed him now.

I sat on a stile outside the doctor’s house and waited. The Brownie waited, crouched at my feet. “I missed you,” I said.

“It were a worry, mistress, when tha’ setted tha’ lips an’ didn’t say nothing.”

I missed you. What had made me say that? But it was true, especially in the last few months of Stepmother’s life, when she grew worse and I grew better.

“But I’m afraid,” I said. “We could easily hurt someone again.”

I saw the world those last few months as though through a magnifying glass. The world shrank to a three- inch circle. It was reduced to bits of lint and flakes of paint and nibblings of fingernails.

“But mistress,” said the Brownie. “Us never hurt nobody.”

“That’s what I thought,” I said. “But I know differently now.”

“But mistress!”

I slid from the stile. I didn’t want to speak of Stepmother and Mucky Face. “Perhaps Dr. Rannigan’s finished with his patient.”

I knew what kinds of arguments the Brownie would offer; I’d offered them all myself. I hadn’t the patience for them now. The day was taking forever. Where was the loose end of time?

The Brownie and I peered into the Alehouse. No Dr. Rannigan.

He was at none of the usual places. He wasn’t playing at draughts with the mayor; or discussing herbs with the apothecary; or in the teashop, reading the London Loudmouth. We returned to Dr. Rannigan’s house and peered in the garden shed. His guns were still hanging from the wall. So he wasn’t out shooting pheasant, although hunting season had just begun and Dr. Rannigan loved to hunt.

Back to the Alehouse, where Dr. Rannigan and Cecil sat sharing a table and a plate of fried fish. Cecil saw me first.

“Milady!” One coiled-spring move, and he stood before me. He was stronger than I’d thought, faster than I’d thought.

“Not now, Cecil. I must speak with Dr. Rannigan.”

“But Briony—” Cecil blocked my way.

“Let me pass, Cecil.” I was shouting. “Let me pass!”

All at once I was looking into Dr. Rannigan’s patient cow eyes, holding his hand, walking with him through the Alehouse door, hearing him tell me to stay in the Alehouse, to sit and rest. Hearing him tell me I looked tired. Watching his rumpled back cross the square—

The world leapt back to its mad pace. The day had passed while I wasn’t looking. Shadows leaned against the windows, candles sprang into flame.