DISCLAIMER: Joss owns the characters and makes the money. I right the wrongs of the Evil Writers who refused to get Buffy and Spike together where they belonged.

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NOTE: Dr. Gull was a real person in 1880's London. He was a suspect in the Jack the Ripper case.

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Chapter 5 – The Crash


William’s romantic dreams crashed to the ground when he arrived home. He was late to tea, which Betty served every afternoon promptly at five o’clock. His mother sat on the horsehair sofa, jabbing her needle back and forth through her latest canvas, an ugly rendition of a litter of black and white kittens tangled up in yards of black yarn.

“Where have you been, William?” she asked in her sweetest voice. “I waited tea for an hour.” She jerked a thread taut.

William kissed her on her cheek. How could he have been so thoughtless? His invalid mother was alone and waiting for him while he was – yes, there were no other words for it -- lusting after a woman of questionable virtue and consorting with her in a sordid drinking place. His only comfort was lying to his mother so that she would never know to what depths her son had sunk this afternoon.

“Forgive me, Mother. I met Charles Bloxham and we were going over the choir program for Christmas services. I didn’t notice the time.”

His mother cast him a quizzical look, but made no comment. She rang the bell cord for Betty. “Bring William some tea, Betty. I’m certain he’s famished.”

William sat on the opposite end of the sofa and loosened his black silk cravat and collar. The stiff collar had cut a red mark into his neck. He shouldn’t loosen his clothing in this fashion, but the room was so blazing hot. His mother pretended not to notice, but continued sewing pulling each thread hard and tight.

The fire roared in the grate, banked hot and high to keep Mrs. Pratt warm and comfortable. The room, with all its decorations and squirming vines wallpaper, felt close and especially suffocating this evening. While he’d been gone that day, his mother threaded black ribbons into the Christmas decorations. The entire room had been stitched into an oppressive net formed of black organza and tulle strips.

His mother poured his tea and handed him a cup and a plate of soft, crumbling cake. “I’m so pleased that you’ll be going to the Underwoods’ party. It will be good for you to get out with the younger people.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Mother,” he said. The last thing he wanted to do was spend time with the sons of his mother’s church friends. He’d only agreed to go to be near Cecily and that prospect no longer seemed tolerable. His mother looked hurt and he realized his words had been harsh and impatient. It felt good to say what he wanted, but he must retract his inconsiderate words. He patted her hand. “You know that I’d rather spend time with you than those fools, Bloxham and the Harburys.”

Ann raised her hand to her mouth and coughed into her handkerchief. A splash of blood dotted her black-edged handkerchief. “I want you to go out and enjoy yourself, William. And, I believe was thinking of Miss Underwood and not the Harburys.”

Cecily. Miss Harlan whisked every thought of Cecily out of his brain for the entire afternoon. It showed what a bad influence she was, that she could make him forget the excellent young woman he’d selected to be his bride. He should be concentrating on Cecily and arranging his marriage before his mother … No, he wouldn’t think about that. He wouldn’t think about Miss Harlan either, or her green sparkling eyes, or the springy curls of her yellow hair or the exciting squeeze of her hand while they were dancing.

His mother wasn’t finished discussing the subject of Cecily Underwood, as William knew no subject could be finished until she pried some concession out of him, but she approached the matter indirectly. “Dr. Gull visited this afternoon. He said I won’t be around much longer.”

William frowned. He didn’t much like this Dr. Gull. His fingers were too long and icy white and his handshake clammy. “Nonsense. Dr. Gull doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”

“We must be practical. I’m not getting any better. It might be different if Sophronia and Helene were still with us. I want to see you settled before …”

Before she died. She didn’t say the words and William wouldn’t say them either. She used the threat of those words to get her way, to get him to do things that he didn’t want to do. He resented the mention of his dead sisters, too. He missed his older sisters, but he tired of the constant mention of the dead. He was here. He was alive. “You shouldn’t talk like that, Mother. It’s tempting the fates. Besides, you’re my best girl.” He stirred his spoon around and around in his cup and thought about Miss Harlan until his mother’s upraised eyebrow brought him back to himself.

“I believe it would be acceptable for you to wear your dark gray suit to the party.”

William gritted his teeth and said nothing. She meant that he could finally take off his black mourning suit to court Cecily. He should have cast off mourning years ago. He determined to wear his tan suit with the plaid waistcoat and a pink cravat. Yes, he’d kick off mourning with a great bang and he didn’t care what anyone thought. Not his mother or Cecily or that harridan, Mrs. Underwood.

After Betty took the tea things away, he picked up the family bible and read to his mother, while she stitched and punched her needlepoint. The hall clock thudded loud ticks, dragging the minutes away, one after another in a slow parade that tortured him. He’d been sitting in his mother’s parlor, in just this fashion, for three years since his father’s death, drinking tea and eating biscuits off fragile bone china plates, listening to the rasping pull of worsted thread through his mother’s needlework canvas and reading the Bible in the evening. It had been tolerable while Sophronia was still alive, but after her death, he and his mother slid into a dark pattern of stultifying routine. He should be grateful that his mother was still alive for him to read to, but he couldn’t feel his blessings this evening. He only felt restless and annoyed.

At last, the clock struck ten and his mother rose to go to her room. She kissed William on the top of his head. “Good night, son. Think about what I said.”

After banking the fire and locking the front and back doors, which Betty always neglected to do, he went upstairs to his own room. His mother had been in his room again while he was out. She’d tied black ribbons on his bottle of bay rum and on the handle of his hair brush. He swore under his breath and ripped away the ribbons. His temper rose and he swiped the bottles and brushes off the top of his dresser. They crashed on the floor and room filled with the sickly sweet smell of bay rum.

“I’m not dead. I’m not dead. I’m not dead.” His eyes filled with tears of frustration.

The next morning after a restless night that included a most appalling incident caused by thinking too long about Miss Harlan’s physical attractions, he forced his temper back into regular order. He rose and dressed himself and came down to breakfast at exactly nine o’clock, as he always did. He sat down at the head of the table, where his father once sat, and picked up his newspaper.

Betty served his breakfast, holding the silver salvers of eggs and bacon for him, and placed the silver toast rack next to his plate. The toast was cold. She poured his tea and left the room without speaking.

He opened the newspaper. It was one of his few pleasures. Being the man of the house, no one else touched it before him. The front page carried a sordid story about a girl killed in Kensington. Her body was found with bites and gashes about her neck. The reporter intimated that the perpetrator had interfered with the girl. He hated such violent stories. He wished the newspaper would print cheery stories, but the editors preferred to write about death and mayhem.

Since his mother wouldn’t be down for another half hour and Betty had ceased her hovering and returned to the kitchen, he reached into his pocket and took out the tin bird. He couldn’t give it to his mother as a Christmas gift. It was stolen. He should return it to the store this morning. Returning the bird would be the correct thing to do, but he didn’t want to do the correct thing. The bird reminded him of Miss Harlan, bright and shiny and fresh. The store wouldn’t miss it. They had dozens of others. He’d keep the bird. It would remind him of the girl that he would never see again.

He shouldn’t even be thinking about her. Miss Harlan was a dream, a silly young man’s dream. If what he felt for her was love, it would pass. He would stop thinking about her, buckle down and marry the serious and suitable Cecily. That would be the mature thing to do. It’s what his father would have done. It’s what his mother wanted.

He opened his handkerchief. His mother had embroidered his initials in black curlicues on one point. The initials were so ornately shaped, he couldn’t make out the “W” and “H”, only the large “P” of his last name. He wrapped the bird in the handkerchief and tucked it back into his jacket pocket.