And a little while later, he had himself wheeled into Isabelle's room. She was as silent and removed as ever, but he lay in the bed they rolled next to hers, and he talked to her about his visit with Sophie.

“She's a wonderful girl. I can see why you're proud of her,” he said, as though she could hear him, but he still hoped she did. And then he lay there for a long time, thinking strong thoughts for Isabelle, willing her to reach out and live again. He was tired when they wheeled him back to his room. His frequent visits to her had ceased to cause comment among the nursing staff. They had come to accept it as a loving gesture he made. No one asked the reason for it, or wondered what had happened between them, and there were a number of nurses who believed that if anything could bring Isabelle back, Bill could.





Chapter 8




Sophie thought a lot about Bill on the way back to Paris, and she could understand why her mother had liked him. He seemed like such a decent man, and she felt so sorry for him. One of the nurses had told her he would never walk again. He seemed to be very philosophical about it, and he was devastated that Isabelle had gotten injured while she was out with him.

As they landed in Paris, Sophie's thoughts shifted to her mother and brother again. She felt torn now as to where she should be. She had decided to go home for a few days, and then she wanted to go back to London again to see her mother.

She took a cab from the airport, and the house was strangely quiet when she arrived. There was no sound in the house, and as she walked upstairs, she saw that it was dark in her father's rooms. And when she walked into Teddy's room, she was shocked by the condition he was in. He was running a high fever, seemed nearly delirious, and the doctor had just been there, Teddy's nurse explained. She said that if the fever didn't come down that night, the doctor would put Teddy in the hospital the next day. Just thinking about it, after seeing her mother, was almost more than Sophie could bear.

“What happened?” Sophie sat down in a chair, looking drained, she felt as though she had grown up overnight. Teddy didn't even know she was there. He had been sedated, and was in a deep sleep.

“I think he's upset about your mother,” the nurse said in a whisper. “He hasn't slept properly in days. He won't eat, he won't drink.” She and the doctor had discussed starting him on an IV, but he had objected and cried so much when he heard them, that they had agreed to let it go another day, if he would promise to at least try to eat and drink. He looked as though he had lost weight to Sophie.

“Where's my father?” Sophie asked, running a hand through her hair, looking more than ever like Isabelle. She seemed to be resembling her more and more in the last few days.

“He's out for the evening,” the nurse said, without comment. She hadn't seen him since the previous day, but she didn't say that to Sophie. “How was your mother?” the nurse asked, looking worried.

“Still the same,” Sophie said, and thought about Bill. “No one knows what will happen. They said she could be in a coma for a long time, and still recover.” Sophie looked hopeful as she said it, but they had also told her that Isabelle could die at any time. All they could do was pray and wait. “I'm going to go back in a few days.” The nurse nodded, and then took Teddy's pulse again. It was fast and thready, and she frowned as she made a note for the doctor of what it had been. It seemed almost certain to her that they were going to be obliged to hospitalize him. And Sophie agreed. It seemed safest for him.

Sophie waited up for her father that night, to discuss Teddy's condition with him, and she was surprised at midnight when he wasn't home. She asked the nurse if he knew Teddy was ill.

“I spoke to him this afternoon in his office,” she said without expression. “I'm sure he'll be home soon.” But at three o'clock, Sophie was still awake and he wasn't in. She had called the hospital in London earlier, to check on her mother, and there was nothing new there either. For a moment, she'd almost asked to speak to Bill, just to say hello, but she was embarrassed to call him, and hung up without asking for him.

Sophie woke up, still dressed and sitting in a chair in Teddy's room the next morning, just as she had seen her mother do so often when he was ill. She hadn't even intended to, she'd been waiting for her father, and finally fallen asleep. She thought he had probably been careful not to wake her, and didn't know she was waiting in Teddy's room.

The boy was awake as she left the room to find her father, and he looked a little better. The nurse said the fever had broken, but he still didn't seem at all well to Sophie. And as she walked down the hall to talk to her father, she was surprised to see that his doors were open, and when she looked in, there was no one there.

She turned to the maid with surprise. “Did my father sleep here last night, Josephine?” The woman shook her head and disappeared down the stairs. It was not an answer she thought appropriate to give his daughter at her age. But Sophie could see for herself that he hadn't. The shades and curtains were drawn, the lights were off, and the room was undisturbed. No one had been in his bed. And for an instant, she panicked. What if something had happened to her father? They would be orphans, she suddenly realized. She couldn't imagine where he'd been. An hour later she called his office, and he sounded perfectly calm when he answered. He hadn't seen her since she left for London, and she was astonished he hadn't been home with Teddy. It seemed irresponsible to her.

“Teddy has been sick,” she said with a tone of accusation, as though it was his fault, but he seemed unconcerned.

“I know. I spoke to Marthe yesterday afternoon. The doctor came to see him, and I spoke to him today.” He was not about to accept a hint of reproach from an eighteen-year-old girl.

“You didn't come home last night,” Sophie said tersely, and he almost laughed at the tone of her voice, but she was not amused.

“I'm well aware of that. I was with friends out of the city, it got late, and I thought it more prudent to stay there than drive home.”

Sophie assumed he'd been drinking, and given what had just happened to her mother, she had to agree with him about driving home when he was tired.

“I just spoke to London,” he said quietly, “there's no change.”

“Oh.” Sophie's spirits were further dampened by that news. But she was still upset that her father hadn't come home the night before. If something terrible had happened to Teddy, they would have needed him there. And no one knew where he had been. But he wasn't the least apologetic, and Sophie suddenly found herself wondering if he stayed out all night regularly. She'd never been aware of it before. And she couldn't help asking herself if there were things about her parents she didn't know, particularly since she'd met Bill. It still seemed odd that she had never heard of her mother's friendship with him, and it occurred to her that she never ventured into her father's rooms at night or in the early morning. Maybe there were other times when he hadn't been there. He went out a great deal in the evenings for business, and her mother rarely went with him anymore. Sophie suddenly had a sense of her whole life unraveling, not just because of what had happened to Isabelle, but because of what it had exposed. Sophie had always thought her father was godlike, and now she was wondering if he had secrets of which she was unaware. Perhaps there were more reasons than just Teddy that had kept her mother at home, and her parents sleeping in separate rooms.

“Will you be home tonight?” she asked her father, sounding nervous, feeling more like his wife than his daughter, but she was feeling very insecure. There were too many frightening things going on.

“Yes, I will. I'll be out for dinner. But I'll be home before you go to bed,” he reassured her.

“If Teddy has to go to the hospital, I'll need you to be there,” Sophie explained.

“The doctor seems less worried. I think Teddy's just had a shock and he needs time to recover from it.”

“We all have,” Sophie said sadly. “When are you going back to London?”

“In a few days. There's nothing I can do there. They'll call us if there's any change.” But if she died, Sophie thought, no one would be with her, and if something happened to warn them of it, it would take them hours to get from Paris to London. Sophie wished she could just stay there, but she knew Teddy needed her too. And now that she realized that her father stayed out all night at times, she didn't feel she could leave. It was hard to know what was the right thing to do. Her father seemed far less troubled by it than she was.

Her father left for a meeting then, and Sophie spent the day with her brother, reading to him, telling him stories, and talking to him about their mother. She was doing the best she could, but they both knew she was no substitute for Isabelle. She felt like a zombie by the time her father came home after dinner. He seemed in good spirits, and sat down in the library to smoke a cigar. Sophie had heard him come in and found him there. She was surprised he hadn't come to find her upstairs. He had always been so pleasant to her and so interested that she was surprised by how distant he was being these days, particularly with her mother so ill. But suddenly, as she watched him, she wondered if his previous interest in her had been more show than real, and perhaps even to annoy Isabelle, and make her feel less important to him. Sophie had always been treated as his little darling, and he had been as cool and distant with his wife as he was now with Sophie.