A Mad and Mindless Night by Elizabeth Cole

Author:Elizabeth Cole [Cole, Elizabeth]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Elizabeth Cole
Published: 2016-12-19T16:00:00+00:00

* * * *

As he spoke, Ash watched with concern as the joy drained out of Nora’s face. “It’s not a gift,” she mumbled.

“Are you sure? It’s a rare skill—not even a skill. You can’t learn memory.”

She shook her head. “No. I was born with it. I don’t mean I remember being in the cradle,” she added. “Just that all my memories are crystal. They don’t fade, and I can recall any of them, at any time, whether I want to or not.”

“Edmund knew about your talent?”

“He depended on it. Edmund doesn’t like to have the messages written down. Or anything written down, in fact. His explicit orders were for me to keep it all in my head. He gave me some paper for working things out with the codes, but he checked everything. I couldn’t even sneak one piece to write a letter to someone—not that I could have posted it anyway.”

“You kept everything in your head?” If so, that was astonishing to Ash.

“Yes. The symbols for the code, the messages that were sent, even the names of the few people he spoke to. He used me as a secretary. My duty was to remember all the signals and tell him how to translate words into the code and send it back. In truth, Edmund never liked being a signaler, though it would have been easier if he made himself a reference book.”

“But he didn’t, because he thought it might fall into the wrong hands.”

“I always thought he was being overcautious. He did get more stringent about it once Mrs Kingfisher came to the house. Perhaps he was more worried about her leaving with the information than me leaving with the information.”

“How did Edmund learn of your memory, if he never met you until after your husband passed?”

Nora took a deep breath. “Albert must have told him. There’s no other way.”

Ash tilted her head up so he could look at her face. “You’re angry about that.”

“I don’t think he did it deliberately.”

“But you’re still angry.”

She said in a frustrated tone, “He wanted to reconcile with Edmund, and told him too much. If he just kept quiet about it all, about my invention and the payment and my memory, none of this would have happened! I would never have been taken away, and locked up, and made to follow Edmund’s every stupid order. I wouldn’t have had to plead with servants who just shook their heads and told me that I had to be mad to even argue that I was sane…”

Ash pulled her closer. “Enough. You don’t have to say anything more.”

But Nora clearly wanted to say more. She’d been kept silent for too long. “I spent whole nights not able to sleep up there in the attic. I’d talk to Albert—as if he could hear me—and ask why he had to tell his brother anything. Why he couldn’t have just stopped talking and come home to me. Instead he died there. He left me without any warning.”

“I’m sorry it happened that way.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.