The Silent Cry - Anne Perry [19]
“We have prepared a room for you next to my son’s,” Sylvestra continued, “and arranged a bell so that he can call you if he should need you. Of course, he cannot ring it, but he can knock it off onto the floor, and you will hear.” She was thinking of all the practical details, speaking too quickly to cover her emotion. “The kitchen will serve you meals, of course, at whatever time may prove most suitable. You must advise Cook what you think best for my son from day to day. I hope you will be comfortable. If you have any other requirements, please tell me, and I shall do all I can to meet them.”
“Thank you,” Hester acknowledged. “I am sure that will be satisfactory.”
The shadow of a smile touched Sylvestra’s mouth. “I imagine the footman has taken your luggage upstairs. Do you wish to see your room first and perhaps change your attire?”
“Thank you, but I should prefer to meet Mr. Duff before anything else,” Hester replied. “And perhaps you could tell me a little more about him.”
“About him?” Sylvestra looked puzzled.
“His nature, his interests,” Hester answered gently. “Dr. Wade said that the shock has temporarily robbed him of speech. I shall know of him only what you tell me, to begin with. I should not like to cause him any unnecessary annoyance or distress by ignorance. Also …” She hesitated.
Sylvestra waited, with no idea what Hester meant.
Hester took a breath.
“Also I must know if you have told him of his father’s death.…”
Sylvestra’s face cleared as she understood. “Of course! I’m sorry for being so slow to understand. Yes, I have told him. I did not think it right to keep it from him. He will have to face it. I do not want him to believe I have lied to him.”
“I cannot imagine how difficult it must be for you,” Hester said. “I am sorry I had to ask.”
Sylvestra was silent for a moment, as if she too was stunned even by the thought of what had happened to her in the space of a few days. Her husband was dead and her son was desperately ill, locked in his own world of isolation, hearing and seeing but unable to speak, unable to communicate with anyone the terror and the pain he must feel.
“I’ll try to tell you something about him,” Sylvestra replied. “It … it is difficult to think of the kind of things which would help.” She turned to lead the way out of the room and across the hall to the stairs. At the bottom she looked back at Hester. “I am afraid that because of the nature of the incident, we have the police returning to ask questions. I cannot believe they will trouble you, since naturally you can know nothing. When Rhys regains his speech, he will tell them, but of course they don’t wish to wait.” A bleakness came over her face. “I don’t suppose they will ever find who did it anyway. It will be some pack of nameless ruffians, and the slums will protect their own.” She started up the stairs, back very straight, head high, but there was no life in her step.
Following after her, Hester imagined that Sylvestra was barely beginning to lose the numbness of shock, and only in her mind did she turn over and over the details as their reality emerged. Hester could remember feeling the same when she first heard of the suicide of her father, and then, within weeks, of her mother’s death from loneliness and despair. She had kept on worrying at the details, and yet at the same time never really believed the man responsible for her family’s ruin would be caught.
But that was all in the past, and all that needed to be retained in her mind from it was her understanding of the changing moods of grief.
The Duff house was large and very modern in furnishings. Everything