Rosy pulled out her handkerchief to dab at her eyes. “When I came in to check on him, he’d already sent his manservant to fetch the doctor, and he asked me to get Geoffrey. So I did. Then he sent me to fetch him some ale. By the time I got back with it, the doctor had come to examine him.”
She sighed. “Geoffrey sent me on another errand, but I couldn’t stand not knowing what the doctor had to say, so I hid outside the door and just . . . sort of eavesdropped. Papa told the doctor he mistook his bottle of laudanum for his bottle of tincture of rhubarb and took too much. The doctor tried to give him other medicine, but it was no use. Papa had been ill already, and the laudanum was the last straw, I suppose.”
Good Lord, Diana had no idea what to make of this. Why had their father been taking laudanum anyway? “Was there an inquest?”
“No. Geoffrey said the doctor ruled it as accidental, so there was no need.” Rosy slanted her gaze up at Diana. “You know. On account of the laudanum he took wrongly. The bottle was empty, so the doctor took it and the tincture of rhubarb away with him in case there was an inquest later, and he had to testify. But Geoffrey made the doctor promise not to tell Mama about the laudanum.”
“Did you tell her? Or ask her or Geoffrey about the laudanum?”
“Are you daft? And risk Geoffrey being angry with me? No, thank you. I’d rather eat worms.” Rosy’s gaze turned troubled. “But lately, thinking of Papa . . . well, I just want to know what laudanum is and why it would make Papa so sick that he died.”
Diana only knew that any amount of laudanum could be dangerous. When combined with strong drink, who knew what could happen?
The poor man. No wonder Geoffrey didn’t talk much about his father. It must still be painful to know that the man had become dependent on laudanum to get through his days. That was what she assumed had happened anyway. Because what fool mistook laudanum for tincture of rhubarb?
But what was she to tell Rosy?
The truth, of course. The dear girl had endured enough worry as it was. “Laudanum is given for pain mostly, but it can also act as a poison if you take too much of it. No doubt when your father . . . er . . . made his mistake with the tincture of rhubarb, it was, as you said, ‘the last straw.’”
“Then why doesn’t Geoffrey want Mama to know about it?”
What had he said? Because they don’t know it. And I’d prefer to keep it that way. Hence my refusal to tell you.
But that made no sense. Their father was dead regardless. There was little point in hiding a vice that part of good society already indulged in. Diana had always thought it a dangerous habit—and clearly she’d been right to do so—but no one generally considered it shameful. Or not too shameful anyway.
Then again, Geoffrey had strange ideas about such things. Who knew what he’d decided it meant?
Rosy was still eyeing her, patiently waiting for an explanation Diana didn’t have. “Honestly, I don’t know why your brother wants to keep it from your mother. I’m afraid you’ll have to ask him. Anything I could say would be speculation.”
“I can understand that, I suppose.” With a sigh, Rosy looked down at her hands. “There’s something else I need to know. It has nothing to do with Papa.”
“All right.”
“Did you . . . tell my brother that I danced with Lord Winston last night?”
That was quite a shift in subject, but one that made sense, given Rosy’s current situation. “No. I saw no point.” Diana kept a close eye on Rosy. “How was it? Did you find him as interesting as before?”
Her face lit up. “He’s very funny. I like that about him.”
“Me too.”
Then Rosy caught herself. “But Lord Foxstead is funny, too. He was so kind to me. I just think he’s a bit old. He’s almost as old as Geoffrey.”
Diana bit back a laugh. Foxstead was probably in his late twenties, not old by most people’s reckoning. But Diana could see how he might seem so to a woman fresh out of the schoolroom.
Sometimes Geoffrey seemed older than he was. It was the weight of the world he kept placing on his own shoulders. One of these days she might actually get through that tough exterior of his and find out what made him so wary and why he didn’t wish to marry right now.
Unless he just didn’t wish to marry her.
She stiffened. If that were the case, to hell with him. She was a pretty woman with much to commend her. If he couldn’t see that, it was his loss. She refused to waste her life waiting for him.