The Dead Travel Fast

took but a moment to kindle a bright fire to banish the chill from the room.

“You ought to have something to eat,” I told him.

“In the morning.”

I hesitated at the door. “If there is nothing I can get for you, then I will bid you goodnight.”

“You look different,” he said suddenly. I turned back. He was sitting on the edge of the bed, one boot still on, the other in his hand.

“So do you, Charles.” I went to him and knelt swiftly, drawing off his other boot. I put them aside, a little distance from the hearth so as not to damage the leather. I took his hat and his coat from the bed and placed them on hooks by the window. I drew the curtains closed and by the time I was finished, he was fast asleep, sprawled over the bed, fully clothed.

I took up a coverlet, another of the great furry robes that abounded in the castle, and draped it over him. He murmured something unintelligible, but it sounded like my name.

The next morning I went to Charles’s room just as Cosmina was approaching his door with a tray for breakfast.

She did not seem entirely pleased to see me.

“I thought your friend might be hungry. It is the day for laundry and poor Tereza is run off her feet this morning.”

“How kind of you,” I said, embarrassed that she should wait upon Charles. She was of the family, after all, and it was my fault he had come. If there was a burden to be borne, it ought to be mine.

“Let me take that.” I lifted the heavy tray out of her hands, but she released it a trifle reluctantly. She turned and tapped her way down the corridor as I kicked lightly upon the door. Charles answered, rested and in good spirits it seemed. He was half dressed, wearing the same breeches and boots of the night before and a clean shirt open at the neck. He held a razor in one hand and a towel in the other.

“Thank God,” he said upon seeing the tray. “I was about to gnaw upon the bedposts.” He waved me in and went back to his ablutions, shaving carefully as I watched.

“You will forgive the impropriety, I am sure,” he said lightly as he caught my gaze in the looking glass. I turned away and began to uncover the dishes.

“There are bread rolls and a maize porridge called mamaliga. It is rather tasty. The maid ought to have brought it, but she has not been herself of late. Her sister died a fortnight ago.” I was chattering from nerves. This new Charles was a stranger to me, cool and aloof where my Charles had always been kind and undemanding.

He turned from the looking glass, wiping at the traces of shaving soap with his towel.

“I will pour out the coffee. It is Turkish-style, quite thick and very bitter. Cosmina did not bring sugar. I will go to the kitchens for you and fetch some.”

“Theodora,” he said, his voice low. I did not look at him.

“There is new butter for the bread rolls. You might like a bit of that, and here is some honey for the porridge.”

I reached for a spoon for the little honeypot, but he took it from me. I put my hands behind my back and stepped away.

“I ought to be rather angry with you, you know,” he said mildly as he sat to his breakfast.

“Angry with me? Whatever for?” I plucked irritably at the withered basil tied to the window latch.

“You have been here the better part of six weeks and you have not written a single line.”

“I wrote to Anna.” I heard the note of sulkiness in my voice, but I could not help it. Something about Charles’s presence had aroused my petulance.

“And Anna wrote to me. She was not at all pleased to hear about the dead maid, and she said your letters have been peculiar. She wanted me to come and take matters in hand.”

“Matters here are not yours to take in hand,” I retorted, now thoroughly annoyed. I did not like the familiarity with which Charles referred to my sister. It bespoke a conspiracy between them I could not like.

“You’ve no call to be crabbit,” he said mildly.

I took a deep, slow breath and strove for patience. “I am sorry. I did not mean to be ill-tempered. Not when you have come so far to fetch me.”

He folded his arms over his chest and raised his chin, affecting a rather mulish expression. “Sit down, Theodora. I cannot think with you flitting about. And I did not come to fetch you.”

I obeyed and took a chair, sagging into it in my relief. I had feared a scene, imagining myself a reluctant Helen, dragged back to Sparta by an importuning Menelaus. “But why else-”

“Oh, I came to see you, partly to ease Anna’s mind, but also because there is unfinished business between us.”

He went to his leather bag and withdrew a notecase. He dropped it into my lap and resumed his seat, rubbing his hands together in anticipation as he looked over the food.

“What is this?” I asked. The case was thick with Scottish banknotes.

“The proceeds of the sale of your last two stories,” he explained, spreading the bread rolls thickly with sweet butter. “You did not leave your bank details. Most irresponsible,” he finished severely. “But the money belongs to you and have it you shall.”

He continued to eat, chewing serenely while I fumed.

“That is absurd,” I said finally. “You might have sent it to Anna or held it yourself. You could have made arrangements with any of the Imperial banks and I could have collected the funds in Hermannstadt,” I pointed out.

“That horrible little hole I travelled through last week? Don’t be absurd,” Charles rejoined. He sampled the mamaliga. “You are right. It wants a bit of honey.” He spooned on a modest amount and tried it again. “Better. Besides, I told you, Anna was worried. I thought it far better to come and see you for myself, and allay her worries. I would have already come and gone had it not been for the disasters along the way.”

“How long have you been away?” I asked.

He made a gesture of impatience. “Forever and twice as long. I was actually in Vienna attending to business when Anna wrote to me. It ought to have been an easy matter to travel here, but my pocket was picked,” he said. “I lost my money and my papers. I could not purchase a ticket on proper railways then, not in the Austrian Empire, so I had to travel illegally. I fell in with a rather dashing crowd of Gypsies who let me ride with them as far as Zagreb.”

I felt a little faint. “But if you lost all your money, how was it you still had mine?” I asked, brandishing the notecase.

“I carried your money in my bag for security. My own funds were upon my person, and before you ask, no, I was not going to spend a pound of your money,” he said firmly.

“Of course you wouldn’t.” Charles would have sooner starved than touched a penny of what did not belong to him.

“Once in Zagreb, I met up with a shepherd at the market who promised to take me as far as Belgrade. From there I met up with a band of travelling musicians who were bound for Klausenberg.”

“Klausenberg is a day’s journey too far,” I told him, rather unhelpfully.

“Yes, I realise that now, but at the time, I simply wanted to get out of Belgrade. I could not rest unless I was always pushing onward. In Klausenberg, I met a farmer who said he would take me a few miles down the Hermannstadt road. And that is how it went. Every day, pushing onward, meeting someone kind enough to get me a little further on my way.”

“Charles, I am so sorry,” I murmured. “I never imagined that what I did would lead to this horrible journey for you.”

He stared at me, his eyes showing some hint of the old spaniel softness. “Horrible? It was the adventure of my life.”

“Adventure?”

“I rode with brigands in Serbia. I slept under the stars. I drove a herd of sheep to market. I have met the most extraordinary folk. I have never felt so alive in my entire life. Not that I wish to repeat the experience,” he finished