Author's Note: "My smiles are gone, my tears have dried." –from The Fever in My Blood Has Died, by George Henry Bokor
Disclaimer: I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.
They were too pusillanimous to bring her the news in person.
They would not have phrased it that way, Violet supposed. No doubt they would say… that they wished to allow her the chance to compose herself before she saw them again, but that would be a lie, plain and simple. It was cowardice that kept them from her door.
Her hands, still holding the heavy linen notepaper, moved protectively to her abdomen. She did not really blame them. She did not wish to face the truth either. She heard a strange sound, a rustling, and looked down to see that her hands shook, as with an ague, and the linen paper was scratching against the taffeta bodice of her gown.
It couldn't be true!
The baronet's daughter who had aimed high found herself gulping for air, gasping for it. Oh, my dear girl, I should have told you… how much I love you! And now she never could. And the baby? The young woman's dear, sweet little girl? How would she do with only a father to love her…?
Violet was afraid. She rose and struggled across to the bellpull. She needed help, she needed… she yanked the tapestry strip to summon a servant, then groped her way back to the table to fall heavily into her chair. She needed to sit down.
From her oaken throne she surveyed her massacred dreams, then winced at the word choice of her own thought. How could this have happened? She was so young!
Probably it wasn't true. Of course not. Violet calmed herself with an effort. She was merely dreaming. Her overwrought imagination… She set the note on the table. When she looked at it again, it would say something else… it would be… an invitation to dinner.
She breathed deeply, her hands once again protectively on her abdomen. Her breast rose and fell as her breathing slowed to normal. She wasn't some ancient crone surrounded by death! She was a peeress; she was strong!
The servant entered. "You rang, milady?"
Violet's head was high as she gave the order: "I require sweet tea."
"At once, your ladyship." The door closed with respectful softness.
She was brave. She picked up the note. "It breaks my heart to have to inform you—"
She dropped the note. It wasn't a dream. Of its own will, one hand sneaked up to press against her gaping mouth. This death made her afraid, as no death before had ever done, as if she were next. The hand not on her lips stroked her rounded belly.
Everything would be fine… once they had brought her sweet tea. The very thing for frayed nerves.
Everything would be fine. It wouldn't happen to her.
Her dear friend Anne might have died bearing her little girl, but it wouldn't happen to her! She, Violet Crawley, would bear a son! A fine, healthy boy, who would be the Earl of Grantham.
And she would live to see it, she promised herself. Not only would she be there to see her son grow up, she vowed, she would live see his children's children as well!
"Réquiem ætérnam dona ei, Dómine; et lux perpétua lúceat ei. Requiéscat in pace. Amen." Tom opened his eyes, and glanced reluctantly over at the confessional. It had been his excuse for leaving the house, but he couldn't bring himself to go in. It wasn't a sin, was it?
He heard the noise of someone entering the pew. Strange. The church wasn't empty, but it wasn't crowded either. Yet whoever it was chose to settle right next to him to pray. He felt the movement as the person eased himself onto the kneeler. Tom turned his head, and saw the new priest, his white head bowed over the beads in his hands. But he was not praying yet. He turned slightly to meet Tom's gaze, and the white head motioned subtly towards the confessional box. "Do you wish to go in there, my son?" he queried softly.
"I don't believe it's a sin," Tom said. He meant to sound defiant, but what had come out was the uneven tone that preceded tears. No! That was done!
Tom thought the priest would scold him for being disrespectful, but the old man said, "Maybe it isn't."
Tom looked down at his folded hands. He wished he felt sure.
"It wasn't your fault, you know," the priest said next.
"I was right there on the bed with her," Tom objected.
"So you know there was nothing you could have done."
Tom sighed. "We thought we would grow old together, Father, and teach our children's children to make wreaths of flowers."
"The Great Physician called your sister to him, and she went home. And that is all."
There was silence between them for a moment, underscored by the soft murmur of prayer from the other parishioners in pews further away
"I haven't wished Brigid back from Paradise," Tom pleaded. "I just—"
"I know, my son," the priest agreed softly. He turned to look at the boy, and his expression was gentle. "Do not be troubled. Remember the words of our Lord: 'Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted.'"
From a sound sleep, she woke to pain. "Sybil!" Who would be calling? It couldn't be that important, it wasn't like when she was at the hospi— "Nurse!"
She came fully awake, alarmed. Was she on duty after all?
She looked down at herself. She wore her grey nurse's uniform, rumpled from sleep. She raised a hand to smooth her wimple, as the Physician's head poked in the door. "Nurse Branson, you must come!"
She looked back at the crowd of people around the bed. "But I still have to—"
"Others will finish that for you," the Doctor ordered. "You're with me."
She nodded and hurried obediently to follow him out.
Tom could feel the light. He opened his eyes, and raised his head from his knees. The grey of false dawn filled the high window. He blinked slowly, as one awakening, though he had not been asleep. Near the bottom of the windowsill, a tiny band of pink heralded the new day: his first full day without Sybil.
He opened his hand. The crucifix of an paidrin beag had made a gouge in his palm, and half-spherical indentations were left in his fingers where the green beads had spent hours pressed into his flesh.
Tom moistened cracked lips. He breathed deeply. It was time. He could tarry here no longer. The family would be awake soon.
He had promised Anna, and she had not failed him. Now it was time for him to do his part. And he would not fail her, nor Sybil, nor any of them. He would do what he must.
Tom rose to his feet and went to the door. His heart was hammering. The doorhandle under his palm was slick with his sweat. He breathed deeply. He could do this, because it was what Sybil would want, and for her he could do anything. He willed himself to be calm. Behind this door, and down the stairs, was the reality he did not wish to face. Tom expanded his diaphragm and filled his lungs with the stale, dusty air of the tower room, where he had woken the echoes with his keening, and performed the difficult and heroic act that his love now required: he contracted the muscles of his arm, swung the door open, and went down the stairs to rejoin his family, where only his composure and his silence would be allowed to wake the dead.
"The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord."
The wall of the drawing room was covered in green silk. Branson stared at the damask wall covering. It would be over soon, and he could go and see the baby. He blinked, and listened to Matthew's offer of help. A hundred times he had listened to the offer from the friends, family, and neighbors of the Crawleys' and responded with the correct, polite phrases, but now, it was Matthew, so he answered with the truth: "My wife is dead; I'm past help. But thank you." He blinked slowly. It was almost over. He stared at the green wall and willed them all to take no further notice of him. Please. No more.
Old Lady Grantham had worried about how Branson might… comport himself. Nanny's stories of funerals she had known in Ireland had been… lurid, to say the least. But his conduct had been exemplary. And now it was over. She suggested to Cora that they should all get some rest. She took her leave of the others. She wanted to speak to Branson again, but the width of the elegant chamber separated them, and she could see he had turned his face to the wall.
The boy was a servant to his marrow. 'Giving room' or 'giving way' it was called. A housemaid caught cleaning, or passing a family member on the stairs was meant to give room in just that way, to escape notice, to save her mistress the bother of greeting her, or making small talk. 'By not acknowledging them,' Violet had been taught, 'you will spare them the shame of explaining their presence.'
Downton's middle-class heir presumptive might not understand his brother-in-law's delicate signal, but Violet did. She therefore gave the displaced Irishman all the help she had to give: she left, without acknowledging his presence.