"Sir, you and the Mistress are soaked through! Good gracious, you'll both catch your death!"

Medlock spoke after Archie placed Lilias on her feet again.

Archie and Lilias walked quickly hand in hand up the grand staircase.

"That's something we must remedy, mustn't we?" Archie said in jest to Medlock's shocked countenance.

Aisling was hesitant to admit to Mrs. Medlock that the Master and the Mistress did not retreat to separate rooms to bathe.

They both were in Archie's dressing room.

Archie searched out some large towels. Lilias and Archie still laughing at the state of their drenched clothing began to peel the layers of clothing off of each their own bodies. Archie's laughs diminished into a glowing gaze of desire as Lilias stood in her corset and undergarments before him. He then handed her a towel so lovingly and gentlemanly.

"Archie, could you help me? It unlaces at the back. I can't manage it myself." His fingers diligently obeyed her request. He worked at the corset and slipped it off of her body. His hands and long fingers took the opportunity to slide around and rest for some time along her small waist. Her very thin lace chemise was soaked through.

"I'm freezing. " She said. Her skin was like ice from the weather. She removed her soaked chemise. Archie then used his own towel to warm her. He created a cocoon for the two of them wrapping it around them both. Lilias smiled sweetly and held Archie close chattering slightly to express a need for the warmth Archie's body could provide. Her body was pressed against his in longing.

"Are you warm enough?" He sweetly questioned.

"ARCHIE!" Neville knocked at the door.

"Confounded, Neville, I beg for privacy!" Archie replied.

For all Archie's obvious frustration, Neville was clueless of Lilias's presence beyond the door in Archie's hold.

"Very well. You obviously forgot today I must examine you for evidence of more progress to your health, and it's time for your routine therapy exercises. Also, I must introduce you to another form of therapy. In ten minutes time, I must see you in my office."

"I doubt Neville will welcome your presence during this examination, my darling, though I wish it." Archie told her.

...

Archie was asked to lie down on his stomach on Neville's examination table. Neville had created a treatment room for Archie near his own chambers at Misselthwaite. He was stripped up his upper body's garments-his bare back exposed to be examined for evidence of any improvement to his pain and other medical conditions associated with his infirmity. His shoulders, spine, hips, and probable arthritis were all to be examined. He lay with his undergarments covering the lower half of his body and questioned Neville as to who else would be present for this examination and therapy. Archie was taken aback when one of Neville's medical colleagues entered the room. He had arrived at Misselthwaite with new so-called medical equipment to perform a demonstration and test. He wanted to test this new equipment on Archie to discover if it would prove effective on a person with Archie's back condition and limp-the results of which was to have him walk properly and more upright and decrease the rounded deformity of his upper back and shoulders; however, this was not without Archie's enduring immensely agonising contortions to his body first.

Archie agreed to it in hopes that he could walk properly and appear more "normal" in body and have a proper man's posture, good stature, and form. Perhaps it would improve his body, so that visually it would be more appealing for his wife. Though he knew Lilias completely loved him and accepted him as he was, he wished his entire body be more physically attractive and desirable to her. He knew others considered his body beastly when he was seen in public and called him "Quasimodo." He wanted to walk straighter and be rid of cruel remarks-never to be called a "round-shouldered man" again. If he could only surprise her and be that much more pleasing to her. To be as equally handsome as she was beautiful was unattainable, he knew. He would strive to do her justice.

Lilias questioned Medlock as to what exactly was going on behind those closed doors.

"Am I not to be allowed in?"

"Forgive me, Milady. It is not up to me. Dr. Craven insists you are not to be."

The door to the hallway to Neville's chambers and the treatment room was locked.

"Please! May I have the key, Medlock?" Medlock would not refuse her plea.

Lilias scurried down the hallway and soon became witness to Archie's suffering through painful therapy mechanisms and stretching exercises, and the use of new-fangled machinery and devices-quackery, Henri the valet and many of the other servants thought of it and called it, and also Neville's own manipulations of Archie's frame and muscles, all at the behest of a medical colleague of Neville's who he deemed an inventive genius.

Lilias was reduced to tears and could not hold back the urge to shout at Neville to tell him to stop this treatment.

Archie was crying out in agony.

Lilias so keenly felt her husband Archie's distress.

"No!" was her outburst. "Leave him be!" She burst into the room.

"Neville, get her out of here."

"How can you expect him to endure such tortures? He's not some medical science experiment. He's my husband! DON'T TOUCH HIM! I FORBID IT!" Lilias became possessive and threw her body in front of Archie's.

"You cannot forbid me to provide treatment to my own crippled and infirmed brother!"

"Archie, you can't let them do this to you."

Archie spoke through the pain.

"Lilias, I have to try. If it will improve my bodily form, I must. I want to be whole for you-to feel completely human, truly a man and not a beast."

"But, don't you see? I love you truly as you are-body and soul! You are not a beast! Do not submit to their wishes to put you in these torturous contraptions. It isn't safe. I won't have you suffer like this. I won't have you be the first trial subject of this machinery!"

Neville said, "This machinery could be the right therapy for him, Lilias. And the cure for his crooked body!"

Lilias's usual sweet melodic tones were now commanding and deeper.

"Neville, I order you to get him out of this! Set him free of this now! This machinery is nothing more than a medieval torture chamber device!"

Neville, surprisingly, did as she commanded and removed the devices from Archie's body.

"Too soft, too emotional," Neville's medical colleague spoke. "What does a woman know?"

"Get. Out. Of my house." Lilias words were broken up, because she was seething with anger. "And take this hellish equipment with you!"