Seven Dials

“Then tell me! From what you are saying, he is sinking into madness. What kind of a priest are you that you won’t hold out a hand to him yourself, and you won’t help me to?”

This time he looked up at her with rage and impotence naked in his face.

“What help have you for madness, Mrs. Pitt? Can you stop the dreams that come in the night, of blood and fire, of screaming that tears your mind to pieces and leaves the shards to cut you, even when you are awake?” His whole body was trembling. “What can you do about heat that scorches your skin, but when you open your eyes you’re covered in sweat, and freezing? It is inside you, Mrs. Pitt! No one can help! Martin Garvie tried to, and it has sucked him into it. When he came to me, his fear was for Garrick, but it should have been for himself as well. Madness consumes not only those afflicted, but those who touch it as well.”

“Are you saying Stephen Garrick is insane?” she demanded. “Why aren’t his family treating him? Are they too ashamed of it to admit that is what is wrong with him?” It was begi

His face was filled with pity so deep it seemed the pain of it wounded him as if he would carry it long after he had finished trying to make her understand it. “From Bedlam?” he said simply.

The word struck a shiver through her flesh. Everyone knew of the hospital for the insane that was like a house of hell. The name of it was an obscenity, an abbreviation of Bethlehem, the most holy town, the asylum of dreams, and this was the prison of nightmares where people were incarcerated in the torture of their own minds, screaming at the unseen.

She struggled for a moment to find her voice. “You let that happen to him?” she whispered. It was not intended as an accusation, at least not entirely. She had admired Sandeman; she had seen a compassion in him too deep to believe indifference in him now, for any reason. What she had seen was real, she had felt it in the dignity with which he had regarded the drunken man the day she had found him.

He looked at her with hurt for her judgment of him, and defiance. “How could I have prevented it? We each have to find our own salvation, Mrs. Pitt. I told Garrick what to do years ago, but I can’t make him do it.”

She was about to correct him, say that it was Martin Garvie she was thinking of, then she realized what he implied. “Are you saying that Stephen Garrick’s madness is his own fault?” she asked incredulously.

“No…” He looked away, and for the first time she knew he was lying.

“Mr. Sandeman!” Then she was uncertain what she could add that would help.

He raised his head to meet her eyes. “Mrs. Pitt, I have told you more than I want to, just in case you can help Martin Garvie, who is a good man seeking to help someone in far deeper pain than he can understand-and he may suffer for it… terribly.” There was a plea in his voice. “If you have the power to reach anyone who can get him freed, before it is too late… if… if that is where he is.”

“I will!” she said with more passion than belief. “At least now I know something, somewhere to begin. Thank you, Mr. Sandeman.” She hesitated. “I… I don’t suppose you know anything about Mr. Lovat’s death, do you?”

The ghost of a smile crossed his face. “No. If you ask me to guess, I should think it is exactly what it looks like-the Egyptian woman killed him, for whatever reason of her own. Perhaps it goes back to something between them in Alexandria. I thought at the time that he did her no injury, but perhaps I was mistaken.”

“I see. Thank you.”

This time he did not offer to walk with her as far as the street, and she left alone, determined to find Pitt as soon as possible and tell him where Martin Garvie was, and persuade him to get him freed, whatever it required to do it.

ALL AFTERNOON SHE BEGAN and half finished tasks in the house, stopping every time she heard a footfall, hoping it was Pitt returning, so she could tell him.

When he finally did come home, as usual he walked in his stocking feet down the passage to the kitchen, so she did not hear him until he spoke. She was so startled she dropped the potato she had in her hand, and spun around to face him still holding the peeling knife.

“I know what happened to Martin Garvie,” she said. “At least I think I do… and to Stephen Garrick. Thomas, we have to do something about it. Immediately!”

His expression darkened. “How do you know? Where have you been? Did you go back to Sandeman?”

She lifted her chin a little. If they were going to have a disagreement about it, or worse, it would have to wait. “Of course I did. He is the only one who knows anything about it.”

“Charlotte-” he began.

“He’s in Bedlam!” she interrupted.

It had the effect she had intended. His eyes widened and some of the color drained from his face. “Are you certain?” he said quietly.

“No,” she admitted. “But it fits all the facts that we have. Stephen Garrick suffered terrible nightmares, far worse than ordinary people’s, and they went on even when he was waking, delusions of blood and fire and screaming. He had uncontrollable fits of temper and weeping.” Her words fell over each other. “He drank too much to try to rid himself of whatever it is that tormented him, and he took opium. Martin Garvie knew all about it, because he was the only one who could help him. But he was losing control of the situation, and he went to Sandeman to ask his advice, but there was nothing Sandeman could do either. And it was shortly after that that Stephen Garrick, and Martin, left Torrington Square early in the morning, without proper luggage, yet did not leave London in any way that we can trace. And the carriage returned to Torrington Square within a few hours, so either they traveled on by public means or they did not go far.”

He stood still, turning over in his mind what she had said. She saw the gravity in his face. If he was going to criticize her for going back to Seven Dials, it was going to be long after this was dealt with.

“Can we get him out?” she said quietly. “Martin, at least, doesn’t belong there. I know he may have gone originally to help Garrick, but he wouldn’t have done it willingly without letting Tilda know. That proves there is something badly wrong.”

“Yes, it does,” he agreed, but she could see he was still deep in thought. “But we must be careful. Someone had the authority to place Garrick there. That can only have been his father.”

“For Stephen Garrick, yes, but he had no right to put Martin there!” she protested. “At least not morally. I suppose he’s a servant, so legally-”

“Yes… I know that,” he interrupted. “But we must be careful.”

“Get Mr. Narraway to do it!” she said urgently. “At least to be there. You need Stephen Garrick because he was in Alexandria with Lovat, and now that Yeats is dead as well…” She trailed off. A hideous thought was filling her mind and she could see it in his eyes also. “Do you think that’s why his father put him there?” she whispered. “To protect him? Is someone from Egypt after them all? Are his nightmares actually terror?”

“I don’t know,” he replied. “But it is possible…”

She heard the unhappiness in his voice. “You don’t want it to be her-do you?” she said gently.

“No… no, I don’t. But it looks more and more like it. I heard what happened in court today.” His face filled with distaste. “I don’t know if it is what Ryerson wants, but his defense is doing everything they can to blacken Lovat’s name. I suppose it is to cause reasonable doubt that there could be many others who wanted to kill him. I can’t see it doing much good. Ayesha Zakhari was at Eden Lodge. Surely anyone else who killed Lovat out of passion would hardly follow him around at three in the morning into someone else’s garden.”