Page 38 of Now Comes the Mist

I can’t help laughing at that absurdity. “Have you lost your mind, Mina?”

“Such things happen. Devoted husbands go astray. Men are not like us. I often think they are weaker-willed and less steadfast.” She hesitates. “Sometimes I worry Jonathan is only marrying me out of habit and only wants me because I am comfortable and familiar to him.”

I stare at her in disbelief. I have never seen her in such doubt, not when it comes to her beloved Jonathan. “How can you say that? Surely you can hear how wrong that sounds.”

Mina gazes out the window. “We’ve known each other almost twenty years,” she says softly. “I was six when I came to live with Aunt Rosamund and met her neighbor Mr. Hawkins and his adopted son. To me, Jonathanwas never just the boy next door.” A smile touches her lips. “We were like-minded from the start. He knew he would be a lawyer one day, and he never scoffed at my intention to find a living as a governess, the way other men might have done.”

I roll my eyes. “Yes, indeed. How dare you hope to earn money and secure independence for yourself, Mina? I should hope Jonathan never scoffed at something so logical!”

“You know how traditional some people are,” she says, smiling again at my irreverence. “They do not hold such modern ideals for women as you and I do. I have my aunt to thank for that. She never married and taught me to be self-sufficient whether or not I found a husband.”

“And you listened and came to me, and I would still be a mannerless hoyden if not for you. But now youhavefound a husband, one who loves you not because you are familiar, but because of all you are: kind and good and true. I think you know I’ve never liked Jonathan as much as you would wish. I am jealous that he will take you from me, but even I know that he would never forsake you. Why allow a few delayed letters to bring you such pain and doubt?”

“I can’t tell you why,” Mina says quietly. “I can’t explain this dread. This fear that I may never see him again and that our kiss goodbye was our last.”

“Wait and see,” I reassure her. “In a month or two, when we are dancing at your wedding, I will remind you of this and we will laugh.”

She brightens a bit. “Perhaps it will be atyourwedding.” Her eyes hold such hunger for Jonathan, and for the safety and comfort of marriage and children. I think of how everything she desires is what repels me most, and my heart feels a tug toward the cliffs and the bench in the shadows, but I pull myself back. I must be here, in this moment, for her sake.

I take my handkerchief back and gently dab at her face. “Jonathan will do everything in his power to come home to you. I know it as surely as I know my own name. He would fight any danger with his bare hands, despite being the soft, coddled lawyer’s clerk he is!”

But instead of smiling, Mina takes my comment seriously. “He did not go without protection. He brought a weapon with him—a kukri knife that his explorer father had carried back to England and left him when he died. Mr. Hawkins and I laughed when Jonathan packed it, but perhaps he had a presentiment … perhaps he sensed that the journey would be difficult.”

“I would have laughed, too,” I say as brightly as I can. “Were you and I to travel, we would think of packing warm scarves or hardy boots, buthere your Jonathan brings a knife that was likely stolen from some poor man in South Asia who needed it.”

This time, she does smile, but I know it is only to humor me.

“Cheer up, darling,” I say as the carriage pulls up in front of our lodgings. Mamma is already at the door, waiting for us. “I promise that his silence is not for lack of loving you.”

Mina only has time to give my cheek a grateful kiss before stepping into my mother’s embrace. I follow her, heavy with the weight of all we have said … and left unsaid.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

We are merry that night, sipping wine and gossiping like a trio of naughty, dissipated sisters. Mamma fusses over Mina like a mother hen, and Mina is all sunshine in her presence, even responding to her inquiries about Jonathan with a calm “I haven’t had a letter recently, but I hope I shall soon.” I am cheered by their chatter and determined to enjoy our time together, knowing that soon, such evenings will only be things of the past. But I cannot help my growing impatience as the moon rises ever higher.

Mina lays a concerned hand on mine. “Are you tired? You seem out of sorts.”

“Lucy hasn’t been sleeping well,” Mamma explains as the servants clear away the dishes. “At least she hasn’t been sleepwalking as often lately, have you, my pet?”

My eyes meet those of Harriet, but my maid’s face remains expressionless as I say, “Of course not. But Iamrather tired, and I think I will go rest.”

“You should too, Mina,” Mamma says. “Agatha has prepared the room next to Lucy’s.”

Upstairs, I slip on my nightgown, plait my hair, and blow out the candles, heart pounding with anticipation. But as soon as I get into bed, the door opens and Mina climbs in with me. And for the first time in all my years of confused love and longing for her, I feel a twinge of irritation. “What are you doing? I thought you would be exhausted and slumbering away by now.”

“It’s tradition. Have you forgotten?” Mina asks, hurt.

My annoyance fades at once. We always share a bed on our first night inWhitby and have done so ever since she first became my governess five years ago. It was a way to keep me from sleepwalking, since she would wake me up if I did … or so my fourteen-year-old self had explained to my approving mother. And every summer since then, on numerous occasions, I have watched Mina sleep, her pale lashes fluttering against her cheeks, thinking of how I wanted nothing more in life than the privilege of seeing her dream.

But now, with the stranger waiting for me on the cliffs, Mina’s face seems vague and intangible and imaginary, a palette of blues and greys in the shadows. She looks more like a painting from my dreams, meant to fade with the coming of day, than a woman.

“We can’t break tradition when this is our last summer holiday together.” She hands me a silver bracelet. It is simple and cheap, the kind of trinket I would never buy, and indeed, it would not even be sold at the shops Mamma and I patronize. But to a former governess of modest means, it must have been an extravagance indeed. The locket opens to reveal a photograph of Mina, her heart-shaped face solemn within waves of golden hair. “I hope you like it. You, Jonathan, and Aunt Rosamund are the only people to have my photograph.”

“Oh, Mina, thank you,” I say, touched.

She shows me an identical bracelet on her own wrist. Inside is a photograph of me, a rather bad one taken on my eighteenth birthday. I am looking off to the side, with a slight smile playing on my lips. “Now we will always have each other, even when we’re not together.”

She means when we are both married, of course, but I cannot help thinking of death, the ultimate door that will part us forever. I want to say something, anything, but I have no words.

---