“I tell you, I saw it,” I mumble. I’m still searching the streets for signs of the carriage and the lady. They are nowhere to be seen, and I can’t be certain I saw them at all. But one thing I am certain of: That was Miss McCleethy in the vision. Whoever this lady was, she knew my teacher.
Father rescues me from exile in my room, asking me to join him in the small study on the second floor. It is filled with his books and papers, his maps of distant places where he has traveled on various adventures. Only three photographs sit on his desk—a small daguerreotype of Mother on their wedding day, another of Thomas and me as children, and a grainy photograph of Father and an Indian man making camp on a hunting expedition, their faces grim and determined.
Father looks up from his birding journal, in which he has made a new entry. His fingers are stained with ink. “What is this I hear about carriage drivers gone amok in the streets of London?”
“I see Grandmama could not wait to share the news,” I say, sullenly.
“She was quite concerned about you.”
Do I tell him? What would he say if I did? “I was mistaken. In the fog, it was difficult to see.”
“In the Himalayas, men have been known to lose their way when the clouds roll in. A man might find himself disoriented and see things that are not there.”
I sit at Father’s feet. I’ve not done this since I was a little girl, but I have need of comfort just now. He pats my shoulder gently as he tends to his journal.
“Was that photograph on your desk taken in the Himalayas?”
“No. It was a hunting expedition near Lucknow,” he offers without further explanation.
I gaze at the photograph of my mother, searching for some of me in her face.
“What did you know about Mother before you married her?”
Father winks. “I knew she was foolish enough to say yes to my suit.”
“Did you know her family? Or where she lived before?” I press.
“Her family died in a fire. That is what she said. She didn’t wish to discuss so unpleasant a memory, and I never insisted.”
That is the way of my family. We do not talk about the unpleasant. It does not exist. And if it pokes its ugly head out of its hole, we cover it quickly and walk away.
“She could have had secrets, then.”
“Mmmm?”