Twenty-three:
Love Does Not Judge

Elsie backed away from the doorway enough that Charles could come through and close the door behind him. They stood there for a long moment, just staring into one another's eyes before she broke the contact and looked away. She could not resist the urge to lift up the shawl – which she had taken to using because it made others more comfortable – and smile down at her sleepy daughter. The little lass was a bit milk drunk, half-asleep and kneading at her mother's breast.

Elsie wished it wasn't painful to breast feed, but with her nerves shot, it felt dreadful. She felt like the worst mother ever for even thinking about complaining about her pain, though, so she kept it to herself. She hoped, though, to talk to Lady Cora and see about securing a wet nurse sooner rather than later; Cora would understand, she hoped, even if Charles did not. Cora was a woman, after all, and even if she had never nursed her own children, she might comprehend the pain if it was described. She might have need to see the doctor, though, and have it confirmed that there was something wrong with her for it to hurt this way – but such humiliation was hard to swallow. She had fought so long and so hard for this perfect, strong little girl in her arms, and now she could not fathom anyone telling her that she was doing the babe harm.

"Is she happy?" Charles asked, bringing Elsie's gaze back up to him.

"She's a baby, Charlie," Elsie murmured. "As long as she's fed, cuddled, and in a dry and clean nappy, she's most content."

"Are you happy?" he asked, reaching out and gently touching her arm.

She stopped short and thought about it for a brief moment; after so long, having her greatest wish granted, she should be beyond elated. But every silver lining was attached to a dark cloud, and theirs still hung between them, stark and unrelenting. She was pleased to have Gracie, but she was being punished severely for having her at all. She was pleased to be home, but the spectre of her outright fight with her husband danced between them, mocking them both the idea of moving on and being together again. In short, she could not be happy because she was afraid of her discontented nature.

And she was afraid that he could not, would not, be able to love her such as she was. She was half a woman now, suffering pains greater than anyone should have to endure, and she had to suffer them in secret because he could not see her to be weaker than the Elsie he'd known prior. She could not allow him to be distracted, especially by her. Not when it would be a perpetual problem.

He noticed her hesitation, then looked away. "I am sorry, Elsie," he said very quietly. "I know you must loathe me very much now –"

"No," she whispered. "I couldn't and I don't. But I do blame myself."

"You shouldn't."

She shrugged a little. "You needed me here and I wasn't because I was selfish and cowardly," Elsie murmured. "So I blame myself. It's fine; I am used to shouldering blame for things, Charlie. How many times I've taken the brunt of His Lordship's anger about the staff so you might be spared another annoyance. It must have been a rude awakening, trying to deal with it all once I'd gone. I am sorry." She glanced back under the shawl as Gracie released her nipple. The baby was sound asleep; Elsie hurried to replace the wadding in her nursing corset so she would not leak everywhere, and then she did up her blouse quickly with one hand. Charles was watching her; she could not help but blush. "Nursing is a messy business," she dismissed quietly.

Her nipples ached, her breasts ached, her arms ached… but she could not bring herself to tell him that she was in pain, that each tug of the baby on her nipple made the shooting pains begin anew. Her eyes were shining with tears, trying to hold back the torrent of complaints.

"Oh, love," he sighed, "don't cry…"

"I'm bloody well trying not to," she muttered, pulling the shawl off and gently tucking it around the baby in her arms. She shifted Gracie upright a bit more and began patting her bum gently, until the babe belched in her sleep. "There's my girl," Elsie murmured, praising the sleeping child, who probably didn't even hear her.

"May I hold her?" Charles inquired.

"Aye – I've got to get a candle on and make the cradle comfortable for her," Elsie said quietly. "I've not had a moment's peace between tea and now."

"You should have said –"

She tried to silence him with a glare, but it felt foreign on her face again. "Charlie, I can manage," she said in as firm a voice as she could muster. "Women have been caring for babies for ages, and running households with no help."

"But you have help," he pointed out gently. "You don't have to go it alone; you just have to tell Fiona or me –"

"I should be able to manage it by myself!" she spat suddenly. "No need for you to go out of your way, Charles."

"Elsie, I didn't mean –"

"You never mean it, but that doesn't stop you from saying it in the first place," she pointed out.

"I am not trying to start a row," he said, cradling Gracie in his arms as she lit the candle. She ignored him, preferring to go prepare the cradle that Lady Cora had brought down from the nursery. "Elsie, I know you aren't pleased with being here – that you would have preferred to stay in Scotland…"

"You don't know what I want," she snapped, looking up at him with tears in her eyes. "I wanted to come home ages ago, but Merrie wouldn't let me leave once I hit five months because I must need be in bed to protect the bairn, and then she was born and I couldn't leave because the doctor said not – I was meant to stay till May, Charlie. I'm not supposed to climb stairs or lift anything more than Gracie until then."

"Why?"

She shook her head. "Never you mind the whys, Charles," she said quietly. "Just be glad we're here at all. I wanted to come home; I wrote letters and said I was sorry, but you never replied, and I thought…"

"You never did!" Charles exclaimed indignantly.

"I did so," Elsie argued bitterly. "I gave them to Auntie Merrie to –" She stopped short, recalling the hostility, the anger, that her aunt had projected Charles's way. "Oh god, Charles, I'm sorry – I'm so sorry – I thought I could trust her to send them. I tried to explain, to apologize, to ask you to come because I couldn't leave."

He looked at her sadly. "Elsie, love… it could just have easily have been at this end. I had to discipline someone for misplacing Her Ladyship's mail. It could have been that he kept mine to punish me. He was sacked for getting one of the maids with child. He was very careful to point out that I was no better than he was – getting the housekeeper up the duff. I reminded him that we are married; he did not leave under good terms."

She shook her head and sighed. "I wrote to Fiona, as well – I missed her dreadfully, Charlie. Almost as much as I missed my giant Downton bear."

"I would have," he said abruptly.

"What?"

"Come for you. If I had gotten the letters, nothing short of disaster would have kept me from coming to you," he said, lowering his voice and looking down at the child in his arms. "I love you, Elsie, and it nearly killed me to think I'd lost you over my own stupidity. And I was stupid. I never meant you to think I didn't want the baby – or you. I was speaking out of shock, worry, and… stupidity, really. I am the one who should be sorry."

"Charlie," she said softly, "why don't you put Gracie to bed? You're holding her quite tightly, dear. We wouldn't want her to wake up prematurely and not be able to get her off again…"

"Why did Her Ladyship put you in here, rather than you coming back to our apartments?" he asked as he laid the sleeping baby into the cradle. Elsie fussed over her a minute before she attempted to answer his question.

"Because neither of us were certain you would welcome me back at all," Elsie murmured. "We did leave under strained circumstances and you hadn't answered any of my letters. I was scared you would turn me back out into the cold."

"God, Elsie, never," he whispered, pulling her into his arms and giving her a gentle kiss. "Never," he repeated, his declaration a bit firmer. "I love you."

She flinched and pulled away from him, shaking; the pain of being held was more than she could bear. Her body was humming, thrumming, with sudden agony, and she took a step back, trying to regain her breath.

"Elsie –"

"No," she exclaimed, holding him at arm's length when he moved closer. "I'll be fine, just… don't touch me, please."

"Sweetheart," he said in that gentle, scared voice of his, "should I send for the doctor?"

She scoffed, making a snorting noise as she did. "What is he going to do that hasn't already been done?" Elsie asked bitterly. "It's normal, to be expected after…" She broke off, lowering her gaze so it didn't seem like a challenge to him. "After everything."

"My love, please tell me what's going on," Charles said, his voice thick with emotion. "I can't help if you don't tell me –"

"You can't help any more than the doctor can," she muttered. "I'm sorry, Charles. I'm sorry I'm not a full wife to you anymore – I can never be…" Her voice cracked, broke; she felt like a fraud, a charlatan, offering him promises she could no longer keep.

"Stop, Elsie," he pleaded gently, "and tell me what's –"

She couldn't stand the pity, the fright in his eyes; it was dark, painful, so wrong… "My womb is gone," she finally spat. "I was bleeding too much and the doctor just… cut me open and took it. I – I've been in pain every day since I had Gracie, Charles, and nothing helps."

"Surely something must help –"

"I have medicine," she murmured, "but I don't take it if I can suffer through."

"Elsie, you must take your medicine –"

She went to the bedside table and dug in the drawer, getting one of the small bottles of tincture of opium out. She crossed the room and placed it into his hand; she remembered very clearly the day he had fired a footman for having polluted the sanctity of the downstairs by having gone to an opium den in Ripon and having dared to come back under the drug's soporific effect. What on earth would he say about his wife being no better than that man? She retreated away from him, waiting for the inevitable explosion.

And explode, he did.

"How on earth can you take this while you're nursing our child?" he shouted. "My god, Elsie –"

Her eyes narrowed, her heart beat faster in defense, her anger a palpable thing, looming between them. "I don't take it until I'm in so much pain I wish I were dead," she hissed, her voice lowering dangerously. "The last thing in the world I want to do is hurt our Gracie, Charles, and if you think I would be so uncaring as to put our daughter in that kind of danger, clearly, you are not the man I fell in love with. I only take it when I cannot hold out against the pain. When I take it, I usually fall asleep and Aunt Merrie feeds the bairn from a bottle of sheep's milk. Today, I had no way of acquiring any other milk, so I had to nurse her – and I'm in even more pain now than I was before. So don't you dare tell me that I have no right to relieve my agony, Charles!"

"How can you take this?" he repeated. "Elsie –"

"I don't have a choice!" she exclaimed. "There is nothing else to –"

"But opium?" he shot back. "What would Her Ladyship say, Elsie? You cannot manage a household under the influence of such a dangerous drug – and I cannot believe that you would be in so much pain that you would take such a thing, knowing my disdain for…"

She rounded on him then, infuriated, pained, like a wildwoman. She unbuttoned her shirtwaist, untucked the wadding from her breasts, released the corset's clasps, lowered her skirt so she could remove everything – not even for a moment caring what a fool she might look to him, half dressed and angry. She stood before him in her knickers then, her shift non-existent so she might easily be able to nurse, her arms crossed over her breasts, showing off the scars across her belly, still angry and red weeks after her emergency surgery. He gaped at her, speechless, and she said with no shame, "And as bad as this looks, it is nothing compared to the rest. Don't you dare think you can judge me for attempting to find relief, Charles Carson."

Her anger dissolved when he began to cry. "Elsie," he choked out, "why didn't you tell me – why didn't you just tell me?"

"Because I'm ashamed, you fool beastie of a man," she whispered. "I shouldn't need any of that, but I can't live without it some days and… and I was terrified that you would hate me for –"

"Let me send for the doctor," he insisted. "There has to be something that he can do for you that doesn't involve opium – your scars shouldn't be that color after so long. You might have an infection that's causing you pain, Elsie – please, let me help."

Swallowing what was left of her pride, basically standing naked before her husband, pleading with him not to hate her, Elsie Carson took a deep breath.

And she nodded.

END PART TWENTY-THREE