Chapter 79: Chapter 79: Suspension Bridge Effect
Lillian Donovan’s breath hitched, and for a moment, she thought she might faint again.
Mrs. Donovan, however, reacted quickly. She turned to the attending physician who had just examined Lillian Donovan and asked, "Does her condition require medication?"
The attending physician, a balding man in his early forties, was taken aback by the sudden question. After a moment’s thought, he rubbed his chin and mused, "Heart problems can be either major or minor. Has she had any imaging scans done?"
"We have. All the cardiac examinations have been done, and they found nothing wrong at all."
"If nothing is wrong, then the focus should be on managing her lifestyle, not medication. Besides congenital causes, arrhythmia is often triggered by daily diet and habits. For instance, excessive caffeine from coffee or strong tea, staying up late, alcohol consumption, strenuous exercise, or emotional distress can all be triggers."
"First, she should regulate her diet and maintain a consistent sleep schedule. If her symptoms improve after a few days, then there’s nothing to worry about. If they don’t, we’ll need to run tests on other organs to see if an issue elsewhere is affecting her heart."
"What if she takes medication to alleviate the symptoms? Are there any long-term consequences or side effects?"
"Oh, there certainly are. Different medications have different side effects. The most common include nausea, vomiting, dizziness, headaches, insomnia, and depression. Take propafenone hydrochloride, for example. While it can control heart rate, improper use can stimulate the nervous system, leading to neurological dysfunction, mental lethargy..."
No one could really process what the doctor said after that. The clinical terms "neurological dysfunction" and "mental lethargy" echoed in their minds.
When they recalled Arabella Donovan mentioning insanity just moments before, a shiver ran down their spines, despite it being the middle of the day with the sun shining brightly.
Arabella Donovan wasn’t thinking about that, however. She was simply puzzled. "Mom, does our family, or Great-Uncle’s family, have any history of hereditary heart disease?"
"No... I don’t think so?" Mrs. Donovan said, turning to Lillian Donovan with uncertainty.
"No, our family has no history of heart disease," Lillian confirmed.
"That’s strange. Great-Uncle had asthma. If you were going to inherit something, Aunt Lillian, it should have been that. Why are you having heart trouble instead? But if it’s not hereditary, then it must be due to external factors..."
"That’s right," Mrs. Donovan chimed in, catching on quickly. "I remember you don’t care for alcohol or coffee, you drink very little tea, and you rarely stay up late. Have you been dealing with something stressful recently? Maybe the psychological pressure is what’s making you feel unwell?"
"Not really any pressure, it’s just..." Lillian Donovan pressed her lips together, her heart still racing with fear as she carefully recalled the events of that period. "The few nights before my heart started acting up, I kept having nightmares. I’d dream that someone was knocking on my bedroom door in the middle of the night. I’d jolt awake, drenched in a cold sweat."
Mrs. Donovan and the others exchanged glances, unsure of what to make of the situation.
Arabella Donovan, however, was reminded of something a pilgrim had told her a few years ago. He had come to the mountain temple with a Gyrfalcon and had spoken of the method used to break the birds.
To put it simply, you don’t let the bird sleep. You wear it down, torturing its body and mind to break its will. In the end, it either dies or is tamed.
It was remarkably similar to certain ancient interrogation techniques. A prisoner would be locked in a dark room, unable to tell day from night. The moment they drifted off, a noise would be made outside to startle them awake. If they managed to fall asleep, they’d be doused with water.
After a few days of this, both mind and body would collapse. Even a man of iron would be forced to beg for mercy.
"They say you dream at night what you think about by day, and you had the same dream for several nights in a row, Aunt Lillian. Could it be that something similar actually happened? Something that made such an impression on you that you keep dreaming about it."
Arabella Donovan’s words served as a reminder to Mrs. Donovan. After all, the prime suspect in all of this was the man who shared Lillian Donovan’s bed.
"You and Julian share a room, don’t you? When you jolted awake, was he there next to you?"
"...He was. I even asked him if he’d heard anything, but he said no."
’Could it be that he’s the one knocking on the door in the middle of the night, or making some other noise to wake you? Of course he’d say he heard nothing when you asked. How else could he create a tense atmosphere to make your heart race and your adrenaline spike, tricking you into thinking you have a heart problem?’
Lillian Donovan’s eyes narrowed. The mere possibility felt like a hammer blow to her skull, turning her thoughts to mush.
In fact, after voicing that thought internally, Arabella Donovan herself paused, stunned.
’This situation is a bit like... what was it my brother mentioned the other day? The suspension bridge effect?’
The suspension bridge effect refers to the phenomenon where a person’s heart races involuntarily when they are in a frightening or precarious situation.
If they then encounter an attractive person, they might misattribute their racing heart to feelings of attraction, leading them to fall in love.
’Come to think of it, wasn’t that exactly how Lillian and Julian first met?’
Back then, Lillian Donovan had just joined the company incognito to take over, knowing very little about the business. She was inevitably overwhelmed and constantly on edge.
Julian Croft appeared at the perfect moment, like a savior. He stood by her side, guiding her step-by-step as she found her footing, creating the illusion that they were partners fighting side-by-side. How could she not grow attached? How could her heart not flutter for him?
And now, he was simply repeating the same old trick: manufacturing a crisis only to swoop in and solve it, all to win her trust and affection.
When the time was right, he wouldn’t just be secretly feeding her drugs to make her lose her mind.
He could probably give her actual poison, and with a few sweet words, Lillian Donovan would likely swallow it without a second thought.
Lillian Donovan’s face turned ashen. She remembered those nights, waking up drenched in a cold sweat, only to find Julian Croft right there beside her. He would comfort her, hold her until she fell back asleep... and then she would be startled awake again, comforted again, fall asleep again... on and on it went.
At the time, Lillian Donovan had felt nothing but gratitude and a little guilt. Now, a bone-deep horror washed over her.
’Does he even see me as a human being?’ she thought. ’Or rather, is he even human? How can he be more terrifying than a monster that devours flesh and blood?’
The shock hit Iris Donovan and her brother just as hard as it hit their mother. How could anyone cope with suddenly discovering that the father they had admired their whole lives was not the gentle, considerate, and reliable man he appeared to be? That he had another family he cared about, and that he had laid hands on his own relatives, even murdering the grandfather who had doted on them most.
Any one of these revelations would have been enough to shatter the sheltered world they had always known. To have them all thrown at them at once was utterly devastating.
Arabella Donovan’s attention was still focused on Lillian Donovan, so she didn’t notice the siblings’ distress. But Eloise Donovan did.
She stepped forward and took both of their hands, silently offering her support.
It was just like the unconditional trust and acceptance her family had shown her when she’d suddenly found out she wasn’t a true child of the Donovan family and had been lost and confused.
The atmosphere in the room was tense and delicate. Just then, the two people who had been sent out to buy things finally returned.
"Lillian, you’re awake! You really scared me to death just now."
