The Phantom of Linkshire Manor:
Published in Bound in Skin: A Collection of Gothic Romances Both Modern and Traditional (CatScratch Books). To order, please see the Publications page.
Anna emerged from the carriage onto a cobblestone path slicked with rain. The doctor stood at her side, holding an umbrella and digging through the back of the carriage for his satchel, immune to the sight of the looming mansion before him. But it had left Anna speechless the moment she’d sighted it. A shadow, a castle, a ruin, towering amidst a sprawling landscape. She could see few details in the storm’s darkness, just the hint of spires jutting toward the clouds and a handful of arched windows lit by candles.
“Come along, then, Anna,” Dr. Edwards said, hanging his satchel from one elbow, the dripping umbrella still in the other, as he proceeded to the mansion’s imposing French doors. Anna caught her breath and followed along in his dry halo, clutching her own satchel with white knuckles.
A woman opened the door before they could knock. She had a thin face that may have been handsome in youth, lithe limbs, and grayed hair pulled into a tight knot at her neck. She nodded politely to Dr. Edwards and ushered them in out of the storm, letting the door slam against the roaring wind. Another servant, this one young and slight with wispy blonde hair, took the doctor’s umbrella, hat, and coat. She moved silently and with her head lowered, as if attempting to make herself invisible.
“Thank you for coming, doctor,” the older woman said, lifting a candle off of a nearby table. “I dreaded to call you out on such a night, but the master became ill so sudden… I did not know what to do.”
“Nevermind that, it’s perfectly all right,” Dr. Edwards said. “Let’s go have a look at him, shall we?”
Anna did not try to hide her roaming gaze as it sought out the ornately-framed paintings in the foyer and analyzed the speckled marble tiles beneath her feet. She followed the woman and the doctor up a wide stairway, her hand caressing the time-worn railing. She could sense the young maid’s eyes on her as she passed, filled with a familiar curiosity of the town’s first lady doctor. They were led down a hallway lit by only a pair of sconces at either end. The floors creaked from time to time, but their feet made no sound on the plush carpets. The woman reached the patient’s room at the end of the corridor and opened the door.
Dr. Edwards approached the bed while Anna took a moment to examine the room. The furniture was minimal: a writing desk and chair, a wardrobe, a plush reading chair beside a small nightstand, and the bed. But the pieces were fine, many exquisitely carved, their craftsmanship apparent even to Anna’s untrained eyes. The fabrics of the bed and draperies on the window were rich and trimmed in the most delicate of laces. A fire burned in the hearth, providing the only light besides the housekeeper’s single candle, and a great deal of warmth. Though at first it was a welcome change from the chilling winds of the storm, Anna soon began to wish that the maid had offered to take her overcoat as well.
“Anna.”
She pulled her thoughts back to the doctor and the patient, and hurried to his side.
“Check his vitals, dear,” Dr. Edwards ordered. He turned back to the woman as Anna obeyed, opening her satchel on the small side table while the doctor began asking the woman about symptoms, diet, and health history.
Anna kept her ear on the conversation as she looked down on the patient. She had expected the master of Linkshire Manor to be old and crippled, but she instead discovered a somewhat young, if very ill, man lying in the bed. She doubted he could be much past thirty. Though his forehead was beaded with sweat and his breath slow and labored, he had few wrinkles to mar his complexion and his features were still sharp and strong. His square chin prickled with the start of an unshaven beard. His black hair was speckled with grays and brushed the base of his ears, making it slightly longer than was the popular style.
She went through the tests mindlessly, having done them a hundred times. She checked his pulse with her fingers against his thick wrist and found it frightfully quick. She glanced at the doctor, who was still speaking with the servant, but did not bother to alert him. She knew he would have already checked this.
The man’s skin was hot and clammy. Anna opened his chapped lips and peered into his mouth and throat as well as she could, finding it dry and irritated. She proceeded to his eyes, carefully lifting one lid with her thumb.
The pupil was dilated, only a hint of a gray-green iris rimming the blackness. Anna pursed her lips and checked the other. She had time to deduce it the same before both eyes snapped open of their own accord and an iron grip clutched her wrist.
Anna gasped, lurching back from the bed, but the man’s hold on her only tightened, that black gaze watching her, desperate.
“Camille,” he whispered, his voice thick and gravelly.
Anna shivered and flinched as the vice on her wrist tightened, amazed that a man so weak with illness could be yet so strong. She licked her lips and shook her head.
“Camille…” he whispered again, his other hand reaching up to grasp her opposite elbow, anchoring her to the side of the bed.
“My name is Anna Forrester…” she started, but it was all she could say before the doctor was at her side, coaxing the man’s fingers off of her. He released her without argument, his hard gaze meeting the doctor’s as his head collapsed back onto the pillow.
“There, James, it will be quite all right,” Dr. Edwards said, gently pushing Anna behind him as he leaned over the patient and examined the pupils for himself. “How are you feeling?”
Either the master did not hear him or he could not answer. His gaze had drifted up toward the firelight dancing across the ceiling, his breathing had returned to struggled rasps. His strength fled as he quickly fell into another bout of sleep.
“Anna?”
Anna glanced at the doctor but he did not take his attention from the patient. Clearing her throat and forcing her heart to steady itself, Anna began prattling off Mr. Rothwell’s vitals. The doctor nodded to himself, but he was frowning when she’d finished. With a sigh, he finally backed away and wiped some sweat off his own brow with a handkerchief. The action reminded Anna of the room’s heat and her suffocating overcoat.
“Well, doctor? Will he be all right?”
Anna turned toward the housekeeper, surprised to see she’d been joined by another servant, a rounder, balding man with a brow creased from years of hard work and frowns. Anna had not heard him come in.
Dr. Edwards’s face betrayed nothing. “I’m afraid I’m unable to give an adequate diagnosis at this time. His symptoms are somewhat unusual and require me to perform some outside research before I can accurately deduce the type and cause of his illness.”
The housekeeper paled, her eyes glancing at the master.
“What can we do in the meantime?” the man asked.
The doctor nodded his head as if he’d expected the question. “I think it will be best if my assistant stay here and keep a close eye on his progress for a time.”
The man stiffened, his face darkening. “Your assistant…?” he trailed off, refusing to look Anna in the eye, but everyone knew what he was thinking.
The doctor waved the concern away with a wave of his hand. “She’s quite capable, I assure you. James will be in good hands.”
“But… Dr. Edwards…”
“Female physicians are becoming quite common in the cities,” Dr. Edwards interrupted, and it was impossible to tell if he was lying. He waited only a moment for the servants’ reactions, before continuing, “If there will be no further objections, then I would like to have a brief word with Anna before I go.”
The two servants looked uncomfortable, casting stray glances at the doctor and the master caught up in his distressed dreams, before they deserted the room. They left the door open and Anna was sure they had not gone far.
“Now, then, Anna, I hope you understand the need for this arrangement.”
She nodded. “You will write me immediately should you find anything?”
“Of course.”
“Should I send for you if he gets worse?”
“No, no… there’s nothing I can do for him that you can’t. You may as well send for the parson at that point.”
Anna’s stomach tightened with nerves. Though she had been Dr. Edward’s apprentice for nearly seven years, she had never been strayed far from his shadow. Nevertheless, her anxiety filled her with determination. Dr. Edwards clearly felt she was ready to tend to her own patients and she would not soon disappoint him.
“Now then, be on good behavior,” he added with a fatherly wink, before gathering up his tools and organizing them in his satchel. He tipped a hat that wasn’t on his head to Anna before leaving the room. Anna heard the protests of the servants in the hallway and listened to them following the doctor down the stairs and out the front door. The rain was still pelting the windows as she put away her own instruments. Before she left the room she performed one more inspection of James Rothwell. The symptoms were unchanged, though she thought his breathing had somewhat eased. Her heart jolted to look at him, expecting his hands to grasp her again at any moment. But the patient remained asleep, perhaps even peaceful.