Page 113 of Enslaved
Asylum? Dear God, they’ve put me in the madhouse!
“How many other patients are in here?”
“There are more than fifty inmates,” came the reply, “but you won’t be allowed to mix with the others until you learn to behave yourself. You are to be kept in solitary confinement for the first few weeks.”
Weeks? Dear God in Heaven, don’t let me be here weeks!she cried silently. But Diana realized her chances for escape were very slim while they kept her isolated. They took her from the room and put her in another down a long passageway. It was furnished in a Spartan manner with a cot, a commode, a table, and a chair.
Diana’s knees went weak when she saw the tray on the table. It contained a jug of water, a bowl of gruel, and a thick slice of bread. She was ravenous and so thirsty her throat was sore. She heard the key turn in the lock when the women departed, but all Diana could think of was food.
After she ate the last mouthful of gruel and licked the spoon, a dull, lethargic feeling came over her. She found it difficult to think coherently and it gradually dawned upon her that they had drugged her food to keep her docile. She crawled onto the cot and lay staring at the ceiling. “Mark … please. You’re the only one who can help me,” she whispered. Sleep beckoned. She tried to keep her eyes open, tried to fight the sedation, but it was a losing battle.
Mark Hardwick was not about to squander valuable hours sleeping, as long as there were still avenues to investigate. Mr. Burke packed his valise while Mark changed his clothes. Within the hour he was on his way back to London. He took one of his coachmen along so they could share the driving on the hundred-mile journey from Bath.
In Grosvenor Square they pulled up before the Davenports’ elegant house, where the Earl of Bath ran up the steps and gave his calling card to the majordomo. His discerning eye noted the servant was not the same man who had opened the door to him almost a year ago when he came to buy the library.
He was shown into that library now and the minutes stretched out while the servant went to inform the Davenports of their caller’s identity. Mark Hardwick relived the encounter with Diana when sparks had flown between them. Her presence was almost tangible in the room and his hope soared that she was close by.
The Davenports’ entrance broke through his reverie.
“May I be of service, your lordship?” Richard asked formally.
“I’ve come to see Lady Diana,” he stated bluntly, crushing the urge to take Davenport by the throat.
Richard caught his wife’s eye before he answered.
“I’m afraid she isn’t here. She didn’t return to London with us.”
“May I inquire where she is?” Mark Hardwick challenged in a tone that clearly said he would not be put off.
“Lord Bath,” Prudence said stiffly, “I don’t want this bruited about, so it is in the strictest confidence I tell you that she has gone again.”
“Gone where, madam?” he said implacably.
“Why, gone wherever it was she went to when she disappeared before, I presume.”
The woman was lying; Diana would never leave him of her own free will. He was not going to play cat and mouse with this pathetic pair. “I believe you are concealing her whereabouts,” he stated flatly.
“That is a lie!” Prudence cried. “The girl has been a sore trial to me since her father died. I am trying to live down the scandal of her first disappearance. Why would I stir it all up again?”
“If she is not here, you should not object to a search of the premises.”
Richard straightened his shoulders. “Lord Bath, my profession is the law. In this country a man’s home is sacrosanct!”
“But this is not your home, sir. This house is Lady Diana’s, and therein lies your motive!”
“Motive?” Richard looked affronted. “I could sue you for slander.”
“You do that. Perhaps you could explain to the judge why I smelled opium in the house in Queen Square.”
“Opium!” Prudence looked shocked enough to faint. “My good sir, I am a martyr to hip pain, which is the reason I went to your wretched town of Bath in the first place. What you smelled was laudanum. I cannot sleep without it.”
Laudanum! Christ, she has an answer for everything.
The Earl of Bath realized the futility of interrogating them further. He quit the house, but not the vicinity. He questioned the neighbors about Diana. All agreed they had not seen the young woman for almost a year. Mark Hardwick waited about most of the day hoping to question the servants who worked for the Davenports. Finally he spotted their coachman, James, and took him to a pub in Shepherd’s Market for a couple of pints of best bitter.
“My digs is over the coach ’ouse, ye understand, not in the ’ouse, so I rely on gossip from t’other servants. When young Peter come an’ told ’em Lady Diana had been found, I drove ’em to Bath. It rained cats ’n’ dogs, so we stopped at an inn in Chippenham about twenty miles away.”
“Did you drive them to Hardwick Hall the next day?” Mark inquired.
