In clear embers, tracing a view
As quickly as she’s able, Karen assembles something resembling formal attire and makes her way to Castle’s study at front of the house. As Mrs. Nelson warned when Karen first arrived, the environment is altogether frigid and unwelcoming. Deep gray walls rise high over polished wood floors. Dark prints hang like shadows and offset pale squares where neighboring frames have been removed. Along this main corridor a door stands open, and she can see the reflection of a fire in the high gloss of the deep-stained oak.
It is Plato’s cave and she can perceive nothing beyond it.
Karen catches sight of herself in the great hall mirror. Her cheeks flame pink and her eyes are stern. She has made a small concession to fashion, taking down her hair to braid the knot and loop two long locks over her ears. The pale gold of her hair will make do for her lack of a thin gold chain or even a brooch at her neck. The dress itself cannot be made any better or worse. She has pinned her only pelerine over the slope of her shoulders. The starched white linen does go some way to create contrast with the deep slate color of her dress.
There are thoughts she cannot quiet that demand a route of escape. If she is dismissed for attacking the master of the house, where can she go? The long voyage back to Vermont is beyond her now. Karen thinks of stealing aboard a ship bound for England and starting life again as … As a woman without reference or family; with a misplaced accent and without two halfpennies to rub together. No, there is no way to plan for what may come after.
There is only now.
“If this ends tonight, so be it.” She whispers, voice brittle. Smoothing damp hands over the sharp pleats at her waist, Karen casts a final look to the mirror. Her reflection draws up to make full use of her height, and she steps inside.
The room is small for all the grandeur of its trappings. Rich wood paneling and shelves of jewel-colored books consume what light is issued from the oil lamp on the table. Before the blazing hearth are two high-backed chairs in deep green velvet. The one farthest from the door is empty. Its nearer partner, back like a great wall, is occupied by an unseen body. The grey dog Pilot reclines between these chairs, eyes closed and ribs moving with the staccato breath of canine dreams.
In the firelight, Karen makes out a well-bandaged foot propped on an ottoman. Leo sits on the cushion beside it, tying lengths of ribbon around the woefully swollen ankle. Mrs. Nelson sits just inside the door, her hands cradle a teacup and saucer that rattles when she spies Karen. Leo looks up to the sound and greets Karen with a smile.
“Miss Page is here!”
There is no response, only hears the shift of papers and the crackling fire. The moment goes so long, Karen steps back as if to leave.
“You stay.”
The voice is familiar and dark, deep and unfathomable. She shivers.
As if approaching a lean wolf, Karen gives wide berth to the chair and its resident. She takes the seat opposite Mr. Castle. To see him now confirms some details remembered from the alley and rewrites others. Castle’s beard is dark and his hair – too-long and curling – falls across his forehead; large serious eyes and a humorless set to his (admittedly plush) mouth. The bruises along the points of his cheeks and across his neck are diminished in the room’s low light. He slouches in the seat – one long leg extended to accommodate the wrapped foot – but holds his body as an enthroned pasha or sultan. On his thigh rests an open book, its sheets of cream paper covered in familiar handwriting.
Her journal.
Karen feels exposed. She is aware of the bare skin of her throat and sympathizes with deer under the gaze of a wolf. Castle lifts his eyes to meet hers once before returning to the journal. Dinah arrives with a refreshed pot of tea on a tray accompanied by whiskey in a glass. The fire burbles, the dog snores lightly. Karen waits.
“You’ve taken great pains with Leo,” he says, but does not look up. He continues, “She is bright, but wild without parents nearby.”
The girl makes a squeak of protest but is silenced with a sharp look.
“She’s made great strides under your care.”
Karen accepts a cup of tea from Dinah and nods curtly. “Thank you, Mr. Castle.”
He does not acknowledge her response, instead continuing to leaf through her book.
“So, what is your story, Miss Page? “
“My story?” She gives the open book a glance of panic. Does he mean to humiliate her by making her read the work out loud?
Castle studies her from under his brows. He catches the dart of her eyes to the journal and closes it softly. Smoothing his hand over the cover he speaks in a softer tone.
“Your background. Your people. Who permitted you to travel so far from home?”
Karen, already on guard, bristles at the idea of being permitted to do anything. She swallows, takes a firm hold of the cup and saucer in her lap, and fixes him with a look of frost.
“I was brought up by my aunt, Mrs. Marion James of Burlington, in a house finer than this. I was sent to Lowood school and received a thorough education – better than I could hope for otherwise.”
“And the rest of your family?”
“Dead.”
He does not flinch. “Do you remember them?”
Neither does she. “No.”
Castle lingers over this, scanning her for emotion. Karen remains stiff and upright, dealing back as harsh a look as he offers her.
“And why are you not with Aunt Marion of Burlington?”
In her ear comes a whisper: “Stop these lies, wicked girl!”
Karen hears the sound of a hand meeting tender skin with force. Aunt Marion rises in her mind’s eye; brittle and greying at the temples, her be-ringed hand still curled from the strike. A sour-faced boy hovers behind her wide skirts – her cousin and the family’s only son. There had been an incident – an exchange of childish threats until Marion had entered the room. Karen feels the sting and throb as if freshly slapped. She shakes her head to return to the present.
“She sent me away, sir.”
“Why?”
The past materializes again behind Karen’s eyes. Marion’s thin, high voice wraps tight around her.
Wicked girl!
“She disliked me.”
Castle looks to the fire. “What sort of education does Lowood afford?”
“It is a charity school, Mr. Castle. Pupils are prepared for lives of service – “
Mrs. Nelson nearly leaps from her seat to rescue the moment. She gives a strangled chuckle before launching in, “We’re quite grateful to have Miss Page. Her capabilities far outshone the breed of teachers here in the city. She is essential – “
Castle waves a hand to silence Mrs. Nelson’s chatter, “Don’t bother. I’ll judge her myself,” and then, with a keen look to Karen, “I have Miss Page to thank for my injury.” He lifts the journal and uses it to indicate his wrapped ankle.
Mrs. Nelson makes a puzzled sound and Leo looks down at his foot as if seeing it for the first time. Karen draws a deep breath through her nose and prepares for the axe to fall.
“Have you been discovered yet, Miss Page?”
“Sir?”
“As the vigilante of the Five Points docks.”
Karen cannot help the small laugh that escapes her. She gathers herself before replying, “The sad truth is it would take more than one vigilante to extinguish the crime of New York City. I have not the time to manage both Leo and villains.”
At the mention of her name, and the humor of her governess’ words, Leo giggles. Castle catches a wisp of the girl’s mirth and cannot fight a smile, though he disguises it beneath his beard.
“Leo Lioness,” Castle says, tapping the girl’s knees with Karen’s journal, “You must behave so Miss Page may take on true nee’re-do-wells. She has the fierceness for it.”
And now he addresses the closed book itself, holding it halfway towards Karen. His eyebrows raise quizzically, “Miss Page, your pupil brought this to me. Did you write the tales inside?”
There it is. Now he will moralize Karen’s firing as a tale of a woman too bold to be trusted with a young lady’s education. Instead, he remains silent, watching for Karen’s reply. She inhales deeply before responding.
“Yes sir.”
“Copied from newspapers?”
“No sir, from my head alone.”
He is surprised at this. She can see him rearrange his thoughts. Decide something.
“That head on your shoulders?”
He does not wait for her answer. He opens the book again and looks down at the page under his fingers. She can make out a figure sketched in the margins. She knows this passage well:
The thief’s knives sliced deep, cleaving flesh from bone with the barest touch. The thief took no pleasure in the sharpness of his blades, caring only that they would do as he needed. The assailant gave a fierce cry and staggered back, clutching the great wound. Blood rushed over his fingers and stained the fabric of his uniform permanently. His injury would not allow him to lift the cutlass in his hand, though he slashed weakly.
Foe defeated, the thief drew up one knife so its brilliant, fouled blade made an arc of light in its downstroke. A moment more, and the assailant’s head splashed into mud of the street. His body soon to follow.
She wrote it six months previous in a cold and empty room under the eaves at Lowood. The mice and spiders in residence there had been company enough as Karen poured her tale onto page after page. The figure sketch ensured the positions of her combatants were correct.
In the warmth of Castle’s study, that time seems more fiction than fact. She prepares for her final act. He will reveal her attack hours before, accuse her of corrupting Leo, and send her from the house with that deep roar she knows he holds in check.
Instead, he takes a moment to study the book, then Leo’s face. Something flickers beneath the sternness and bruises. He meets Karen’s eyes a final time.
“You may go.”
Adele materializes and wastes no time in bundling Leo from the room. Mrs. Nelson clucks as she arranges crockery on a tray for Dinah to carry away. Karen spends the moment of activity gathering herself. Her legs are weak and her heart is still racing. When she finally stands and makes to sweep from the room, she is stopped at his armrest by the appearance of her journal.
Karen pauses, accepts the volume without a word. Below the ringing in her ears she hears his voice, “There is an intensity here to be feared.”
She does not answer, choosing instead to grip the journal to her waist and hurry from the room. When Karen sinks into bed later, she drowns in the emotions of the day. The anxiety of the last hour ebbs, resolving in a low thrum in her extremities. Castle was different, as Leo and Mrs. Nelson promised. His demeanor had improved since the bellowing disaster in the lane, but only by the barest margin.
His physicality, however...
She revisits the sight of the man reclined in his wing chair, legs spread and her book balanced on one strong thigh. In her memory his large, wide hand and long fingers stroke her words. The quirk of his eyebrow belies a smile that does not meet the bowed line of his mouth. And when she thinks again of his eyes she finds the dark heat of smoldering coals.
The warmth that sizzles along the lines of Karen’s body has nothing to do with feather-filled duvets and a glowing hearth. Though it frightened her that evening, she conjures back the sensation of his arm over her shoulders. The weight of him against her. Karen turns in the bed, attempts to shut out these thoughts. But then he addresses her from his fireside throne.
“There is an intensity to be feared.”
The rumble of his voice is low; her hands are cool and quick; Karen trembles as she falls into a deep sleep.