James's mood is a tangible thing radiating from him, even so still as he sits there. Thomas adjusts the positioning of their hands, folding his over the other's and holding it securely. He is distantly grateful that the tremor he is sometimes plagued with (another souvenir of Bedlam) is absent today. A beat of silence before he confirms:
"Yes."
Eventually. But it adds nothing to the tale to say that blood poured over him, that the captain staggered away only to be dragged to the ground by a shrieking mad Stephen, that while Thomas dropped the blade and rushed to Ida the other man had pinned the captain down and forced him to bleed out while his crew struggled to break open the door. Maybe the captain would have lived if not for the intervention.
"Ida was arrested. I don't know what became of her, or her sister and brother-in-law. The three of us were returned here. Stephen... something in him broke during the ordeal. He would not quiet, he could not cope with returning. Even days after we were reprimanded," that's the word he's decided he's going to use, here, yes, because it's the gentlest, and he has a slight worry that James is going to raise his voice, "he would not be calm. It made it impossible to treat the wound in his leg. And they can't-- they won't kill us. Because we are profitable investments."
In Thomas's case, as in Stephen's, annual payments are made. If anything ever happens to his parents, he's been informed there is a lawyer with the bank instructed to carry on. How many years? He has no idea. Maybe it's lies; maybe they just enjoy having them here, purely to feel powerful.
"One morning, I was pulled out and brought to the main house, along with Clinton. They had Stephen with a doctor and I remember thinking, 'Do they need help with bandaging his leg', stupidly." His hold on James's hand is too tight; he cannot manage to get himself to release it. "There's something I'd only heard of in Bethlem, a procedure to quiet a mind without killing the person. I'd never seen it. They-- drill. Holes. Into the front of the skull high on the forehead, through the skull into..." Into. He feels dizzy. It passes. "Into the brain. Until it's enough that Stephen was calm."
no subject
"Yes."
Eventually. But it adds nothing to the tale to say that blood poured over him, that the captain staggered away only to be dragged to the ground by a shrieking mad Stephen, that while Thomas dropped the blade and rushed to Ida the other man had pinned the captain down and forced him to bleed out while his crew struggled to break open the door. Maybe the captain would have lived if not for the intervention.
"Ida was arrested. I don't know what became of her, or her sister and brother-in-law. The three of us were returned here. Stephen... something in him broke during the ordeal. He would not quiet, he could not cope with returning. Even days after we were reprimanded," that's the word he's decided he's going to use, here, yes, because it's the gentlest, and he has a slight worry that James is going to raise his voice, "he would not be calm. It made it impossible to treat the wound in his leg. And they can't-- they won't kill us. Because we are profitable investments."
In Thomas's case, as in Stephen's, annual payments are made. If anything ever happens to his parents, he's been informed there is a lawyer with the bank instructed to carry on. How many years? He has no idea. Maybe it's lies; maybe they just enjoy having them here, purely to feel powerful.
"One morning, I was pulled out and brought to the main house, along with Clinton. They had Stephen with a doctor and I remember thinking, 'Do they need help with bandaging his leg', stupidly." His hold on James's hand is too tight; he cannot manage to get himself to release it. "There's something I'd only heard of in Bethlem, a procedure to quiet a mind without killing the person. I'd never seen it. They-- drill. Holes. Into the front of the skull high on the forehead, through the skull into..." Into. He feels dizzy. It passes. "Into the brain. Until it's enough that Stephen was calm."