“Come, he wants to see you in his office.”

“Me?” I felt for the towel and dried my face. “I’m just washing up, and—”

“I haven’t time for this.” She yanked me along, and my hip rammed the stand, sending the bowl and pitcher quivering. “And Dr. Thornhill won’t be kept waiting.”

How noticeable my weakness was as my legs clambered down those steps, hardly able to keep up with the wiry little nurse pulling me along. She was like a tide sweeping forward, not to be stopped by my slower pace.

We finally paused before the closed office door, facing one another, toe to toe. I couldn’t read what lay behind her face, her snapping gaze full of so many thoughts. “Well, now. Here you be.” With a final pinch to my arm, she shoved me into Thornhill’s office. The scent of lemon on wood struck me again. “Here she is, Doctor,” and Duffy was gone.

The door shut and my skin crawled in the silence. I was alone with the tall tower of command in his velvet-trimmed frock coat, his eyes finding flaws on every inch of me. I’d been in this office before, but how small the place seemed with him in it.

I tried to picture this man appealing to the lovely Rosamond, him asking for her hand—what she had seen when she accepted him.

How different he must look now. The world had hardened him. Worn down his spirit and accentuated his flaws. His white hair was combed back, giving undue emphasis to the thick gray eyebrows that hovered over his sharp-eyed gaze. New circles had formed beneath his eyes, and his skin was weathered.

He turned on me, his usual calm hardened into something else entirely. “Miss Fletcher.” Two steps and he was nearly on top of me, his voice quiet. “I’m going to ask you one time, and I expect the truth. Where is she?”

I leaned away from his face until my neck hurt, my mind working to keep pace. “Who? Where is who?”

“I know you take it upon yourself to decide who belongs at Hurstwell and who does not, but there are things you cannot possibly know. Bridget Hurley is not just under our care for mental disturbances but for medical concerns as well. With her disappearance . . .”

Bridget—missing?

“Are you aware that she receives a special tincture every day for her blood sugars and without it she may well go into shock? Three days is all she has without that medicine—three days. She’ll go into fits, suffer permanent neurological damage, and possibly die. I’ll be held responsible, yet you will be the one living with her blood on your hands.” His eyes narrowed. “Do you realize that by helping her escape you may have also sentenced her to death?”