A Scandal By Any Other Name

"Let me go!" Eunice screamed at the top of her lungs.

She began kicking her shoes and thrashing wildly against their strong grips. Her face was a complete mask of madness, her eyes wide and wild, her hair falling entirely out of its neat bun.

"I am a lady!" Eunice shrieked, fighting them like a feral animal. "I am the rightful mistress of this grand house! You cannot treat me this way! Cole! Lucas!"

The guards ignored her screaming completely. They dragged her roughly across the polished marble floor. Her shoes scraped loudly against the stone. They dragged her right out the wide open front doors and hauled her unceremoniously down the wide stone front steps.

They dragged her down the long, winding gravel driveway. Eunice continued to scream and weep, her dress dragging heavily in the dirt. The servants of the house peeked out from the windows, watching the cruel woman who had abused them finally being cast out.

The guards dragged her all the way to the tall wrought-iron gates at the very edge of the vast Kingsley property.

With a final, forceful, combined shove, the two guards threw Eunice completely off the estate.

They threw her out into the dirt road.

Eunice fell hard. She tumbled into a deep puddle of thick brown mud left behind by a recent rain. The dirty water splashed high up into the air, completely soaking the front of her dress and splashing onto her face.

She gasped loudly as the water hit her skin.

Behind her, the gates slammed shut with a loud, ringing CLANG. The iron lock clicked securely and permanently into place.

Eunice sat up slowly in the mud. She was completely covered in dirt. Her dress was heavy, ruined, and clung coldly to her legs. Her carefully styled hair was entirely wild, hanging in wet, muddy clumps around her pale, tear-streaked face.

She turned her head and looked through the thick iron bars at the grand, warm, beautiful house sitting at the top of the hill. Everything is gone.

She sat in the mud and realized the terrible, crushing reality of her situation. She had absolutely no money hidden away. She had no husband to provide for her. She had no son to protect her. Her daughter’s husband won’t welcome her because of the scandal Cole had caused. And now she had absolutely nowhere to go.

Eunice opened her mouth and screamed loudly into the cold winter wind.

She began weeping bitterly in the dirt. She cried until her throat was raw. For the very first time in her entire, privileged life, Eunice Kingsley was finally tasting the exact same bitter, cold, miserable suffering she had forced upon young Delaney for twenty long years.

But the terrible grief and the sudden, complete loss of everything she held dear was simply too much for her fragile, arrogant mind to handle.

As she sat in the dirt, the horrific news of Lucas’s violent death began to etch itself deeply into her shattered senses. Her mind simply refused to accept it. It could not be true. Her perfect son could not be lying dead on a cold slab.

Slowly, Eunice began to lose her grip on reality entirely.

She stopped crying. She looked down at the mud and began blabbing quiet, nonsensical words to herself.

"No, no," Eunice whispered, shaking her head rapidly back and forth. Her eyes took on a strange, distant, completely vacant stare.

"Lucas cannot be dead. He is just late. He is a very busy boy. I have to go find him. I have to tell him to come home for Lunch. We have to eat before we leave."

She pushed herself up from the dirt. Her legs were incredibly weak, and her ruined dress dragged heavily behind her.

Eunice started walking slowly down the dirt road, heading blindly toward the local village.

In the days that followed, the tragic fall of Eunice Kingsley became the darkest, most whispered gossip. She completely lost her mind. She wandered the busy streets, her clothes becoming dirtier and more tattered every single day. She refused to eat the bread the bakers offered her, claiming it was poisoned by Delaney.

Her madness manifested in a truly heartbreaking, terrifying way.

She would walk up to complete strangers on the street. Whenever she saw any young, tall man who had the same dark hair and broad build as Lucas, she would rush forward.

"Lucas!" Eunice would cry out happily, grabbing the startled young man by his coat sleeves. "Oh, there you are, my sweet boy! Why are you so late?"

The young men would try to pull away, deeply confused and frightened by the wild, dirty woman grabbing them.

When they pulled away, Eunice’s mood would swing violently into a furious rage.

"Do not walk away from your mother!" Eunice would scold them loudly, pointing a shaking, dirty finger at their faces. "You are a very naughty boy, Lucas! You must come home immediately and pack your trunks! We are leaving for France or is it Italy? Come now!"

She would harass the young men, screaming at them in the middle of the busy market squares until the constables were forced to gently pull her away.

This tragic, public behavior made the entire Ton completely declare that Eunice Kingsley had officially gone entirely insane.

The story spread like wildfire through the drawing rooms of London, adding even more dark, scandalous gossip to the already ruined reputation of the Kingsley family name.

Finally, a few weeks later, a plain, unmarked black carriage came to pick her up.

The carriage pulled up to the village square where Eunice was sitting on a cold stone bench, muttering quietly to herself about silver platters and French silk. Two large, strong men wearing plain gray uniforms stepped out of the carriage.

The men approached her quickly. They stated loudly to the gathering crowd that her family members had officially ordered and paid for her to be permanently put away in a private madhouse outside of the city.

When the men grabbed her arms to guide her to the carriage, Eunice fought back wildly.

She struggled with all her remaining strength, causing a massive, loud commotion in the quiet square.

"Let me go!" Eunice shrieked, kicking at the men’s legs. "You think I am mad? It is you all that are completely mad! I am the mistress of the Kingsley estate!"

She grabbed the door frame of the black carriage, refusing to be pushed inside.

"I am not insane!" Eunice screamed at the watching crowd, her eyes wide and completely unhinged. "I am simply looking for my son! He is missing! Lucas! Lucas, help me!"

The two strong men finally overpowered her. They pushed her roughly inside the dark carriage and slammed the wooden door shut, locking it firmly from the outside. The carriage quickly drove away, carrying the screaming woman toward a cold, lonely, permanent cell.

In the following weeks, dark gossips started spreading rapidly through London high society. It was widely whispered that her own daughter, Anne, had used the last of her husband’s money to pay the men to take her mother to the madhouse. Anne had done it not out of love, but purely out of selfish shame, desperate to not involve her ownnhusband’s respectable family in the terrible, endless Kingsley scandal.

Eunice was completely abandoned by everyone she had ever known, locked away in a dark room, forever searching for a dead son who would never come home.