The audacity of this man! He has arrived at my home without my permission carrying with him no less than a dozen white tulips. Where he got them is a mystery, as is his being here at all. I have refused to come down stairs and the flowers were subsequently brought to me by a bewildered, and yet thoroughly amused, Hanny.

"He has told me he will not leave until you speak to him. He has asked for a walk but is willing to settle for a chat in the parlor if you are opposed...?" She trailed off, waiting for my response.

"He will be waiting for quite a while."

"Come now, Merritt. He's just come for a stroll. I've left him quite lonely downstairs with only Mrs. Zanderfield for company and we both know she has the conversation skills of a disgruntled cat."

"It's terribly inappropriate."

"It is merely a walk."

I huffed and tried to think quickly, search for an excuse that she might accept, one that perhaps Desmott might accept. I settled on, "We have not even been formally introduced."

"No one objected when he arrived at St. Agatha's to retrieve you. You, my friend, are a special case. No need to cite propriety as an excuse, such an argument will not hold."

"I didn't ask to be a special case. I don't want to go on a walk with him. I am not even of walking age. I have not been brought into society, not publically. It is not right. If my mother were here she would object—"

It was Hanny's turn to sigh. "Perhaps, but she is regretfully not here—nor is Lizzie, whom I'm certain would be equally as austere. But you have been left with myself and Mrs. Zanderfield as your guardians for the day—aren't you the luckiest of girls?"

I pursed my lips and tried not to let the flippant way she spoke on my mother sting too much. It has been three years worth of suppressing my heartache with thoughts of my own protection. I never had the time to mourn before and now the loss is far enough from me that it would be silly to weep for it now.

"I will not go." I whispered. "Not today."

"Then tomorrow?"

I thought of Rosalie Gressil, almost sitting in his lap, the way his eyes had scanned her body. That odd sense of anger rose up in me, not hurt, but a sort of desire that bordered on possessiveness. I looked towards the door and said simply, "No."

She perched on the edge of my bed, flouncy her skirts about her as she did. "What can it hurt to at least speak to him?"

"What can it help?"

"He is an eligible bachelor."

"And I am an ineligible bachelorette."

"How so? No man has taken your affections."

"I am not in society."

"That does not matter." Hanny argued, "Not now. Not with who you are."

"But it should matter to Mr. Desmott. He is a gentleman, in charge of a theater and certainly capable of acquiring a finer lady than myself."

Her brow furrowed and she reached for my hand. "It would appear that he does not think so."

I pulled away from her touch. "Regardless, I am busy today. You can tell him that I am not in."

Hanny scoffed and stood up. "I am not a housemaid. You may tell him yourself or you may keep him waiting inevitably. I will no help you avoid the attentions of a handsome man when I myself have no such attention."

I laughed, "You are a nun."

Hanny pursed her lips into a pale pink line of annoyance. "Not yet, not entirely."

"Then perhaps you should go on a stroll with Desmott," I said with a shrug of my shoulders. 

Her posture straightened and she seemed to grow a few inches. "Perhaps I will. It would appear that I, unlike you, am perfectly eligible."

I closed my eyes and forced myself to stay quiet, I didn't want to argue with her. I resolved to spend my day inside. Seeing Desmott would only make things worse for me. 

Hanny lifted her chin and crossed her arms over her chest. "Is this how it must be? You pretending as if a stroll in the park with a man, any man, is not appealing?"

I leaned forward and hissed, "Well, of course it is appealing."

Hanny collapsed onto the bed in front of me and clasped both of my hands in hers. "Then let us go. Oh, please, Merritt. Let me chaperone. I have been trapped in this house for ages. Lizzie is away visiting her aunt and Gabe is on business. You have spent your days out with Dr. Abaddon. Do no leave me stranded here in this desolate house for one second longer, not when the weather is so blessedly agreeable. Let us go? Even if it is just so we can get out of the house."

I sighed and leaned back against the pillows. "If you insist. Will you at least tell him to wait half an hour so I can change?"

Hanny sprang from the bed with more zest than my own corset would allow. "I'll go right away. You can call if you need any help with the dress."

"So you can button a dress but you cannot not inform a gentleman that I am indisposed?"

She smiled wryly. "My job description is of my own making."

I shall continue this tale later as I am sure more will transpire. For now, I must get dressed lest I keep Desmott, or worse, Hanny, waiting a second longer.

I only have a spare moment to recount this, for I am being awaited in the parlor and shouldn't keep them waiting. 

The events of this day have already been so strange and I feel the need to unburden myself here before much more can occur. Forgive me if this account is clumsy, I have no time for my usual elaborations.

Desmott stood up when I first entered the parlor. "I thought you might keep me waiting forever."

Hanny stood as well, smoothing her skirts as she did. "We were just playing cards."

I eyed my friend. She is three years my senior and far more prepared to be someone's wife than I. If Desmott were here for feminine companionship, he would be quite the fool to choose me over Hanny. I raised a hand to stop him from any other form of greeting and gestured to the cards on the table between them. "Why, don't stop on my account. I can sit and read, I don't mind playing chaperone."

Hanny, surely sensing what I was trying to do, leaned down and flicked her fingertips against the surface of the table, jostling it just enough to scatter the cards and ruin the game. "No need. We just finished."

Desmott frowned but rather than dissuade her, spoke to me. "How about the walk in Hyde Park we discussed?"

"You discussed a walk in Hyde Park. I rejected you."

He smiled at me, his dark eyes glistening with the sort of mischief that was not suited for a man of his station. "And I disregarded your rejection, Miss Holbrook—that is how we ended up here. With me standing in your parlor and you fetching your shawl so we might walk." He eyed me, waiting to see what I might do. After a split second he spoke again. "And, might I suggest, you take your lip from between your teeth lest you cut yourself."

I reluctantly did as he suggested, embarrassed to have been caught hurting myself without my knowing. "Perhaps if I bleed it will count as an excuse not to go out."

He shook his head. "Never."

"Allow me." Hanny walked passed us and into the hall just outside the parlor where she retrieved our shawls.

I thanked her upon her return and tried to school my gaze to stay as far from Desmott's as I could. His attitude was relaxed; less troubled than the man I'd seen in times past. I found myself, regardless of my desired disinterest, wanting to know what had brought about such a change.

Desmott thanked Hanny for the game of cards and for her willingness to walk with us. She in turn smiled and informed him that she would play him again whenever he called on us again. That was the last time the two spoke to one another, after that his attention was focused solely on me. 

We walked together down the cobbled pathway towards the park, it was a few blocks away but the weather was fair. We were careful; keeping our arms clasped in front of our bodies and our shoulders a moderate amount of space away. Hanny walk with us, never more than a step behind as to make it clear that we were not alone. Such things were reserved for the promised or the married, of which we were neither.

The walk to Hyde Park was spent in relative silence. Twice Desmott tried, and failed, to begin a conversation with me—both times with the weather. "It is splendid weather for a stroll, is it not?" and "This morning I worried we would have rain, what with the clouds looming so near, but the sun has held it's ground." 

I counted both as meager attempts, especially since I knew that he had more he wished to say. You didn't bring a girl flowers and refuse her rejections just to speak to her about the weather. He received no response and, eventually, the silence shifted from strained to comfortable. Contemplative.

When we reached Hyde Park we stayed to the parameter paths, steering clear of the riders and the other strollers. We continued in silence until I no longer found it contented. I'd long since bored of this walk and was more than ready to return home to the safety of my bedroom. If you have seen one flower, you have seen them all. 

I finally relented. "May I ask what it is you brought me here to say?"

Desmott shot me a sidelong glance and nodded. "I was merely waiting on your surrender."

"Surrender at what?"

"Your determined silence. As if you believed we might go through an entire stroll without speaking." He sighed and shook his head at me as if I were a headstrong child.

I was defensive. "I did not want to go on this stroll, so it is you who must do the talking. I already told you, I have nothing more to say."

"I am unsure what should be said." The thought seemed to his own benefit, as if it was only a personal musing and not meant for my ears. He turned and looked back at Hanny who met his eyes as if in challenge. Something seemed to pass between the two of them, a sort of brazen understanding, but before I could comment on it Desmott was speaking to me once more. "I did not mean to upset you at the hospital the other day. I regretted my tone almost as soon as we'd finished speaking but you were with Lucius and I felt it was not the time to interrupt—"

"Is this all so that you can apologize again?" 

He ran a hand through his hair and pressed his lips together as he thought of what to say. Childishly, I jabbed at him with my words once more. 

I sighed and shook my head. "I do not understand why you are so very concerned with what I, of all people, think of you, Mr. Desmott. We are strangers. If you do not secure my forgiveness it should not affect you. I am nothing. No one."

He frowned. "It does not affect me."

I looked at him squarely. "Clearly it does or you would have heeded my request for you to keep your distance. You are so interested in apologizing that you sin time and time again trying to right just one simple wrong."

"I would not need to keep asking if you would merely step off of your high horse long enough—"

"Did you bring me from my home so that you might publicly insult me, Mr. Desmott."

"Leviathan." He said sharply. "It's Leviathan. Apparently you are already privy to my real name, perhaps we should drop all pretenses and—"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

He hurried his pace, moving so that he was slightly ahead of me before he came to a stop, forcing me to halt directly in front of him to keep from running into him. "But you have to. Certainly you do." He turned his attentions to Hanny again, speaking directly to her. "You and Gabriel Farley. Whatever scheme this is, I only brought you here to urge you to stop before you have wandered too far into the lion's den to retreat. There is no evidence of your pasts, you are clearly one of his and if Lucius discovers—"

I looked between the two of them. "You are spouting madness." I found that my voice was strong, steadier than it should be. "I ask that you separate yourself from us. We can find our own way home."

Desmott met my eyes, his earnest. "Listen to me. I don't know what part you play in all of this. You're not like them. You're...I don't know. But you should not remain here, not with Lucius and certainly not with these people. Despite their...supposed best intentions, they have put you in danger. That is why I am begging you to leave now. Get out of town. Lucius is a patient man, he is even more longsuffering when in pursuit of your kind—"

Hanny stepped forward and grabbed my elbow. "Merritt, I believe we should turn back. Mr. Desmott is clearly unwell."

He stepped forward, his speech and body language growing progressively more animated. "I am fine. I am on to you. I have spent days looking up your names and trying to find so much as a trace of evidence that you, Miss McCall, even existed before you showed up as a nun—"

"That is quite enough, Mr. Desmott." Hanny kept her voice down, trying not to attract unwanted attention, but the way she said his name, like a curse, stole my breath away.

"I'm trying to save your life—her life." He jabbed a finger at me and I stepped away from him. "Now, I don't know why you're here—" 

My foot caught on a loose paver, and then on my skirts, and I found myself reeling backward.

I did not have time to cry out, I merely acted instinctually, reaching out and grabbing Desmott's jacket to try and stop myself from falling. I succeeded only in pulling him down with me, causing both of us to land in a heap on the pavement. He'd had enough sense to twist so that I was not crushed under his weight; this meant that he had taken the brunt of the fall and that I ended up lying against his chest.

I lifted my head, dazed from the whirlwind of it all. I cried out in pain. My very skull hurt, a burning at the side of my face that nearly took my breath away. I sat up, but felt dizzy and had to brace my hands on his chest to keep myself from falling once more. For a second, I smiled, believing that this was my pain. I was feeling something. For the first time, I was feeling something. 

But then I looked at him; saw Desmott looking at me, wide-eyed. There was red staining the collar of his dress shirt. It was not my blood. I was not the one hurt. The back of his neck and right side of his face had struck the paver I had upturned in my fall and he was bleeding. 

He was looking at me, dazed, as if I'd just slapped him.

I hastily pushed myself away, up and out of this odd embrace. As soon as our bodies lost contact the feeling of his pain left me and found him. I saw it hit—the way he winced and recoiled from me. There was an instant, when our eyes met, and I knew that he knew what I'd just done. 

And I thought, certainly this man will berate me. He will shout it to the papers—he will tell everyone in Hyde Park. He will shame me for being a monster. Perhaps I shall even be seen as some sort of witch. I watched as he opened his mouth, to yell or whisper, I shall never know—

"Levi?" We both turned to see the owner of the voice. Rosalie Gressil. 

I wish I could write eloquently of the relief, sheer and utter relief, that I felt at the sight of her. A distraction. A diversion from this mistake, this blunder that I now faced. As I am now, words fail me. 

"Levi what on earth has happened to you?" She knelt on the ground next to him and hurriedly pulled out a clean handkerchief. I watched as she dabbed at the blood. "Are you quite alright?"

He was not speaking but I knew it was not from the pain. His gaze had not drifted from me. Even as I stood next to Hanny, trembling for the fear of what I'd done, he kept his dark eyes on me. To my surprise, they were not unkind. Rosalie turned to look at me over her shoulder, there was a look on her face as well and I wondered how much of this she had witnessed.

"Did you get in a fight?"

Hanny was the only one of us with sagacity enough to speak. "No, of course not. Merritt tripped and they both fell."

"If Merritt tripped, why on earth is poor Levi the one on the ground?" She stood and offered him her hand.

He did not take it. Rather he slowly sat himself up and looked down at himself. It was clear that he was processing this entire thing—looking from the blood on the ground to me and then back to the blood. There has been a moment when he did not feel the pain, and then again a moment when he suddenly did. Desmott may not be a doctor like Lucius, but he is not in any way a thoughtless man. He knew that I was the cause.

He stood up and slowly dusted himself off. A couple strolling came upon us and the gentleman asked if we were all right. I did not speak, waiting instead to see what Desmott would say.

"We are perfectly fine, it was merely a trip." Desmott flashed them a dispassionate smile and looked to me, "If the lady is quite well then I most certainly am." When I could not force the words from my mouth, Desmott cleared his throat. 

I pushed myself to speak, to sound embarrassed, but unphased.  "Yes. Perfectly fine, thank you."

The couple passed and Rosie crossed her thin arms. "Something is not right."

Desmott turned to her. "No need to overreact, Rosie. It was only a trip and we are fine."

She strode over to him and pressed her gloved hand against his neck. It came away bloody. "I am not overacting. You are quite injured and something has clearly transpired here."

I spoke again, my voice empty and dry. "I stumbled and fell."

Rosie turned on me. "Why were you fighting?"

"We weren't." I answered. 

"I am not blind, Miss Holbrook. I would certainly appreciate it if the two of you would stop acting as if I did not just witness some form of—"

"Of what, Rosie?" Desmott demanded.

"Might I ask that we cease such discussions until after we have exited the park?" Hanny said. "I think we have caused quite enough disruption."

"We should return home." I said, "Desmott is still bleeding and needs a bandage. Perhaps even a doctor."

Rosie hooked her arm through Desmott's and pulled him back towards the entrance of the park. I followed slowly behind them, trying to get Hanny to speak to me. She was silent, her jaw tight and her gaze straight ahead. This day had not gone as any of us had planned, but she seemed more unnerved that I was.

I have so many questions and she has yet to answer any of them, even now that we have returned home. Desmott and Rosie are in the parlor awaiting tea and I am supposed to be changing my dress. I managed to tear a hole in my nicest gown, something that might have gone unnoticed if there wasn't also blood on the collar and hem. 

I must go and try to corner Desmott before he can get well enough to excuse himself.  I need to try to cover my tracks with him before he becomes even more curious than he already is. I have worked hard to protect myself from people like him and my secret shall not be undone because of one fall.