CHAPTER FIVE - SEPTEMBER, 1815: SURREY, ENGLAND

I paced outside of the bedroom for hours, unable to sit. My hands shook. I was sweating. I had never felt less like a lady, and I had never cared less about it. It had to be close to dawn. It must have been. A night could not possibly go on as long as this one seemed to, not without it being the end of the world entirely.

"Mrs. West?"

The sound of the doctor's voice triggered more emotions at one time than I thought possible for one person to feel. Relief at his presence, terror at the possibility of bad news, desperate hope for good news, worry that this strange disease would spread to the rest of the family...in that tiny instant, I felt so many things it was a wonder I did not collapse onto the floor with sobs.

"Mrs. West," the doctor repeated. "I am afraid that it does not look hopeful."

I went numb. The doctor gripped me by the arm.

"What can be done?" I said, my throat strangling itself from horror.

"I cannot say, Mrs. West. I have never seen anything quite like this before."

Before I could react, I heard a soft, warbling cry from the next room.

"My daughter," I told the doctor. "She needs feeding."

"Of course," said the doctor.

"Please...tell me if anything changes."

"I shall."

The doctor bowed and went back into my bedroom. I hurried to the bassinet which held the mewing baby.

"Shh, my darling," I hushed her as I lifted her into my arms. "Little Caroline. Little, sweet Caroline. Do you worry about Papa?"

Caroline calmed at my touch and the sound of my voice, and something in her eyes made all my terror melt away. All that existed was this tiny baby, this sweet little girl who stared at me so intently as she fed, whose hand opened and closed against my arm rhythmically.

"Your papa will be perfectly fine, will he not?" I whispered to Caroline. "Of course he will. Your papa is a strong man and a good man. Those men always survive."

I could not believe how much I adored her. It did not matter what was happening around me. The sky itself could have fallen around me, and all that would have mattered was that I kept holding my darling daughter. An embarrassed cough from near the door jerked me out of my peaceful reverie. The doctor stood there, and I could not read his expression.

"When your daughter is asleep once more," he said softly. "Perhaps you ought to join your husband."

Even the feeling of Caroline against my bosom could not stop my blood from running cold. I nodded silently and allowed her to finish her meal. She drifted back to sleep, looking like a perfect angel to me, and I lay her back in her bassinet. The doctor was waiting outside of my bedroom door, and he nodded to me as my heart began to pound.

Thomas lay in our bed, his gray face illuminated by the light of the fireplace. As I approached slowly, I had to work hard not to gasp aloud. His dark brown hair had turned a startling white, and most of it had fallen out just since yesterday. He looked seventy, eighty, even ninety years old, though I knew him to be a mere thirty-two. He acknowledged me with a faint smile and I went to him, holding his hand as tightly as I dared.

"Anne," he said, and his gravelly voice held such love in it that my heart felt it could burst. "Anne, forgive me."

"For what?" I said, trying to put a laugh in my voice.

Thomas said nothing. His eyes closed slowly. I began shaking him and shrieking.

"Thomas! TOM! DOCTOR, HELP!"

But the doctor did not help. He just dragged me away from Thomas. He was speaking to me, but I did not hear it. Caroline had begun to cry in the other room, and my heart split in two from trying to decide whether to keep trying to rouse Thomas or to go to comfort my daughter. I could do neither, and I fainted into a deep blackness.