Intolerable Civility

Chapter Thirteen: No Less and No More

For a week, Cate lay in bed despairing how she was to foil Miss Skinner's plan. It was true her cough lingered, but she suspected that her frailty was compounded by being forced to keep to her bed and eat a diet of gruel and plain toast. It was hard to look after Luke like this too. He wanted to crawl and explore and play. When Miss Skinner wasn't around, Cate got out of bed and crawled around on the floor with him, amusing him by making a tent out of a bedsheet or a rattle out of buttons in an empty powder case. It would have been much more fun for them both if she could go into the gallery, or even the sitting room, but Miss Skinner insisted she keep to her bedroom.

There seemed to be no way to persuade Miss Skinner to back down from her plan. Cate tried, but Miss Skinner was implacable. She could not believe that Cate did not want to leave Wales, would not countenance the idea of staying until the scandal was forgotten, and could not be convinced that Demery did not plan to abandon them both. His leaving for London without Cate was proof of his want of affection for her. Cate did not think it wise to point out that he had no reason to be affectionate to her. That only gave weight to Miss Skinner's conspiracies.

One path lay open to Cate, though she was afraid to take it. She could write a letter to Demery, explaining Miss Skinner's plot, and ask a servant to send it in secret. But that would expose Miss Skinner, and Cate was afraid to do so. Miss Skinner was not always her friend, but she was her only ally. If Cate told on her, she would never forgive her. Besides, that would only give her motivation to tell Sir William the truth about Luke's father. Cate would rather die than let her father know the true extent of her humiliation.

A week into her enforced bedrest, Laurie visited. When the maid announced her arrival, Miss Skinner leapt into action, making Cate lie back against the pillows and dusting some powder over her cheeks to dull their colour. Cate did not know whether to hope Laurie saw through the deception or not. If she did not believe Cate was very ill, perhaps Miss Skinner's plan would not work.

Laurie entered looking the height of health, rosy-cheeked and bright-eyed, with her glossy dark hair lying in fat curls across her brow.

"Mother said you were ill," she announced. "You do not look so bad."

Miss Skinner, keeping vigil in a chair by the bed, cleared her throat. "Catherine hides her suffering."

"Pish," Laurie said. "I can see her right here."

As though bored of the topic of Cate, she wandered aimlessly about the room, sampling the perfume on the dressing table and feeling the softness of the curtains.

"It's rather a nice bedroom though," she said. "If I had one like this, I would stay in it too. Where's the boy?"

"He's in his cot," Cate said. "Having his afternoon nap."

Laurie crossed to the door to Luke's room, opened it, and went through. "Oh, sweetheart." Her voice came clearly through the open door. "You're drooling." A short silence then a soft laugh. "I wonder what you dream of."

There had been a few occasions now when Laurie had displayed interest in Luke, when coming to tea with her mother or during church when they all sat in the same family pew. It unnerved Cate because she knew very well that Laurie disliked her. More unnervingly still, an angry frown appeared on Mrs Demery's face whenever Laurie cuddled or played with Luke. But there was nothing but innocent joy, or perhaps a little wistful sadness, in Laurie's manner towards him, and Cate could not find it in her to refuse Luke a friend.

A moment later, Laurie came back into the room, her cold dark eyes a little warmer than before. "I didn't wake him," she said. "Poor cherub. I hope he doesn't catch your cold."

"I think he is safe from danger now," Cate said. "I am... I am much better."

"The cough lingers," Miss Skinner said. "It's quite terrible at night. I hear her all the way from my room."