Chapter Nineteen
T hree days after meeting the duke, Viv sat at her desk at dawn, a letter from her aunt Louisa before her. Putting aside the letter and pulling her wrapper close against the morning chill, she watched pink wisps of cloud flee to the east across a pale golden sky.
Aunt Louisa had warm praise for Mr. Larkin and strongly advised Viv to move forward with her plans for marriage, pointing out that Lady Melforth would soon be in need of a professional nurse rather than a companion, and that Viv would need an establishment of her own if she did not wish to abandon her dreams and return to her mother’s crowded household. The advice made perfect sense, and if Viv were truly betrothed to Mr. Edward Larkin, the support of her kind and resourceful aunt would be invaluable. As the matter stood, Viv’s stomach knotted at the thought of seeing Aunt Louisa later in the morning when they were to take Lady Melforth for the doctor’s recommended ride in Aunt Louisa’s landau.
The falseness of Viv’s position now struck her as an evil. She had passed from one small deception to an ever-growing string of them. What began with putting pebbles in her purse to deceive a potential pickpocket had led to firing a pistol at Mr. Larkin and becoming betrothed to him. In the beginning the pretense had been necessary to preserve her position as a companion and a writing partner for Lady Melforth. Now the book was finished and at the publisher, and with her palsy, Lady Melforth needed Viv more than ever, yet each day Viv piled lie upon lie, alienating Newberry, and involving her aunt and uncle in her deception. It was time to tell everyone that her betrothal was at an end, but she hadn’t ended it. She had planned to end it, but when the opportunity arose, she had not acted. She didn’t understand herself. Did she love him? Surely, she could not love a man she did not truly know. But it was impossible to deny her part in the kiss in the street. In the heat of that moment, she had known herself, unafraid and seeking, curious and alive, and she had wanted to go on kissing him, hungry for more, until the jarring piano note had brought her back to herself. Now he had simply vanished. Vanished was perhaps too strong a word, but he had stopped calling and sent no messages. She should count herself lucky.
She looked at the ring on her finger. She had grown used to the feel of it, as she had grown used to a certain energy she had in Lark’s presence, an eagerness to show him that women could handle whatever London threw at them. But she had got things wrong. He was not the man she thought he was. She did not know the real Edward Larkin or Lark. That man, whoever he truly was, had abandoned their betrothal as if he had tired of a game, and returned to his other life, the one he’d had before they met, a life that included the Duke and Duchess of Wenlocke.
When she looked back on their ruse, she saw how very careful he had been in presenting himself. He never claimed to be a man of rank or fortune. Rather, he allowed her to think that his circumstances were similar to hers. He let her believe he was a gentleman on the edge of fashionable society, perhaps a younger son, obliged to take a paid position, constrained to marry advantageously. The story he told of his dead parents and his maiden aunt was so conveniently vague that she could not place him in any rank of society.
Then their visit to the duke had unsettled what little she thought she knew. When she examined, moment by moment and point by point, the exchange between the duke and Lark, she could only conclude that in the duke’s study as in Lady Melforth’s drawing room on that first day, her pretend fiancé had slipped into a role.
He let the duke know what role he played by his careful announcement to the duke’s butler, by the way he introduced Viv, and then by the way he set her up to tell the duke that she regarded him as a lax employer. If she knew anything true about her betrothed, it was that he was good at pretending. That first day when he’d made his sham proposal, she had thought him an actor. Now she considered the possibility again.
At that point, her tumultuous thoughts took another turn when she considered the duchess, who greeted Lark with genuine delight and relief, as if she had been waiting for him to return from a great journey. Her warm welcome did not fit what Viv knew about the condescension with which exalted persons like dukes treated ordinary people in their employ. Rather, it seemed to Viv as if her grace’s taking Lark’s hands in hers had broken some resistance in him. He and the duke stood measuring each other, two strong men, slightly at odds, squaring off, neither willing to yield. By welcoming Lark, the duchess had changed the mood, made them both bend a little.
Viv shivered in the thin wrapper. Her ruminations on the mystery of her betrothed always led so far before her thoughts ran into a wall of unknowns like the angry bear of a man in the park, the effect on her betrothed of the Penitent Women’s Hospital, and the puzzle of what he wanted from the duke.
Outside her window, the clouds were breaking up. She folded her aunt’s letter and tucked it away. She was foolish beyond permission to moon over a man she meant to break off with, and she needed to find a way to tell her aunt the truth.
*
At the unfashionable hour of eleven, Lady Louisa’s well-sprung landau, pulled by a pair of magnificent black horses, wound through Hyde Park. To see the two old friends side by side on the seat of the landau made Viv realize how frail Lady Melforth had become. She was far from the commanding figure Viv had met in Bath the previous September. Under the influence of a mild April sun, a light breeze, and cheerful conversation, Lady Melforth unbent so much as to smile from time to time. Her smile had changed from a broad, confident parting of the lips and turning up of the corners, to something more like a bared-teeth grimace. Only a softening of her eyes made the expression recognizable as a smile. At least the trembling hand relaxed as the ride progressed.
If Lady Louisa noted the shocking change in her friend, she gave no sign of it, but kept the conversation to happier times. “Aurora was always our leader,” Lady Louisa confided to Viv. “We thought her quite daring. One night, she led us out of a very dull ball, where gentlemen were scarce, through a garden and a mews to the site of a famous elopement, the very window from which the heiress, Miss Tudbury, descended to run off with her dashing lieutenant of the Guards.”
“What became of you all? Did you resolve to elope? Did you return quietly to the ball?” Viv asked, doing her part to keep the conversation light.
Lady Louisa smiled. “I’m sure I had Miss Tudbury in mind when I told my papa, your grandfather, Viv, that I would marry my Oswald, a mere baronet! By the time my brother Richard married your mother, Papa was quite used to his children going their own way in matters of love.”
“You would find me a sad case, now,” said Lady Melforth, “if I tried to lead you anywhere.”
“Not at all,” said Lady Louisa staunchly. “You may be at a low ebb momentarily, Aurora, but I know your spirit. You will rally. You must make use of my landau as often as you like when Oswald and I return to Atwood.”
“Are you leaving London, Aunt?” Viv asked. So far there had been no opportunity for a private moment to confess the truth.
“Tomorrow. But we will return to celebrate when your book comes out. ”
Lady Melforth, who seemed not to hear them, looked down, plucking at her gown, and made no answer. Viv’s spirits sank, but she reminded herself that the actual proofs must cheer her ladyship. Viv was counting on it.
Lady Louisa turned to Viv with a determined look. “And, now dear girl, you must tell me your wedding plans. Oswald and I quite liked your Mr. Larkin.”
Viv offered her aunt a faint smile. Lady Melforth was perhaps not fully attending, but Viv did not want the truth of her deception to add to her ladyship’s distress. They had reached the park’s southern gate and turned toward Mayfair, and Viv thought of a perfect way to shift the conversation, the Women’s Penitent Hospital.
“Ma’am,” she said to Lady Melforth. “Can you endure a few more minutes of shaking?”
“If you really think it does some good.”
“That’s the spirit, Aurora,” said Lady Louisa.
Viv turned to her aunt. “Aunt, may we take a turn along Grosvenor Place? I want to ask you both, from your knowledge of London about an institution there that I came upon in our Green Park walk.”
“You’ve made me curious, dear girl,” said Lady Louisa. She spoke with her coachman, who turned the horses at the appropriate corner.
“Here,” cried Viv, as they came upon the Women’s Penitent Hospital. “Do you know anything of this place?”
The coachman stopped the carriage. Viv’s companions stared first at the hospital and then at her. Except for the large signs proclaiming the nature of the building, it might have passed for a block of apartments or a tradesman’s warehouse. A pair of stone obelisks marked an opening in the iron railing separating the building from passersby. Viv was not entirely ignorant on purpose of such a place, but she could see nothing in its plain brick and stone exterior to overset her pretend fiancé.
After a shocked silence, Lady Louisa spoke. “I have to say I know more of its charitable supporters than of its inmates. What do you say, Aurora? Aren’t the Duke of York and the Marquis of Hertford benefactors?”
“What is your interest in this place, Viv?” Lady Melforth demanded. “I thought you meant to show us a museum or an exhibition hall. You didn’t mention the Penitent Hospital in the book, I hope.”
Viv had a fleeting thought that her ladyship must know that Viv had not written about the hospital, but then she remembered that Sarah had taken the draft to Dodsley before Viv could revise that section.
“Of course, not, but our sixth walk ends just across the way, and when I looked about, I could not miss those signs. I suppose it made me curious about the hidden lives of other women.” There seemed to Viv a great gulf between the three ladies in silk in the open landau and the world behind the hospital door. Those other women were perhaps a subject for another book about London. For a moment, Viv only half heard the conversation around her.
“I suspect that many a young woman who has been debauched and abandoned may have recourse to such a place,” said Lady Louisa.
“Is that how they come to be here?” asked Viv, returning her attention to her companions. “Is it a program, as the sign proclaims, of voluntary admission?”
“Really, Viv,” said Lady Melforth. “What an odd topic to take up! I am tired now. I want to go home.”
Before Viv could answer, the ladies’ attention turned to the opening of the hospital door. Three men emerged, the tallest of them, Viv saw at once, was the Duke of Wenlocke with his unmistakable wheaten hair. A somber man in a clerical black coat bowed to the duke and withdrew. Then duke turned and strode toward them, speaking to a thin man trying to match the duke’s rapid stride.
Viv wanted to sink. It made no sense that the duke should be there, that he and she should be drawn to the same place, but instantly the thought occurred that he must have come on some business connected with Lark. She didn’t care to be caught gawking at the place. She bowed her head, hoping the brim of her bonnet would conceal her face until the men passed by.
“Viv.” Her aunt tapped her wrist gently. Viv looked up, blushing, to find the duke standing at the side of the landau, regarding her with frank curiosity.
“Miss Bradish, ladies, taking the air?” His piercing blue gaze seemed to read Viv’s mind, and her cheeks burned.
She barely remembered the civility that was required. “Your grace, may I present my aunt Lady Louisa Atwood, and my friend Lady Melforth.”
They exchanged bows, and the duke introduced his companion, Mr. Finch, a wispy, thin sort of young man, perfectly the gentleman in appearance, but perfectly dutiful. Everything about Mr. Finch proclaimed him to be a sort of secretary. She was mulling over how unlike Mr. Finch and Mr. Larkin were when the duke began speaking to her companions. “A pleasure to meet you, Lady Louisa, and you Lady Melforth. Your fame as the Traveling Viscountess precedes you.”
Lady Melforth offered the duke one of her diminished smiles.
“My wife regrets that we missed your dinner party, Lady Melforth. She would be happy to see you after so many years. May she call on you?”
Again, Lady Melforth smiled, and Viv could not help sending the duke a grateful look.
Lady Louisa said, “Your grace, I understand that your book collection played a part in Miss Bradish’s betrothal to Mr. Larkin.”
At Mr. Larkin’s name, meek Mr. Finch started and cast a quick curious glance at Viv.
Wenlocke caught Viv’s eye with a kind of warning, and she steadied herself. “A modest part, but one I am glad we could play. If you will forgive me, ladies, I must bid you good day, my business is pressing. I hope my wife may call, Lady Melforth.”
Lady Melforth nodded, and with a brief bow, the duke and his companion turned away.
“Extraordinary meeting him here. I suppose he must be a benefactor,” said Lady Louisa.
“I didn’t think you had met him, Viv,” said Lady Melforth.
“Just briefly in passing the other day,” Viv admitted. Her aunt Louisa’s glance said she was not fooled for a minute.
“We must get you home, Aurora.” Lady Louisa signaled to her coachman, and the carriage began to move.
As Lady Melforth sagged back in her seat, there was no more talk until they reached Henrietta Street. There, in passing from the carriage into the house and attending Lady Melforth up to her room, the opportunity for Viv to confess the truth passed.
*
Once Lady Melforth was comfortably settled for a nap, Viv went to her room. She would write to her aunt without delay and put the letter in the afternoon post. At least, then, one person would be undeceived.
The empty desk momentarily dismayed her. For weeks the sheets of paper she had folded into little booklets of twelve leaves had held her stories about their walks. Most pages had been marked with her pencil notes where changes needed to be made. She reminded herself that when the proofs came, she would have another chance to make corrections and perhaps to restore her friendship with Lady Melforth.
She opened the drawer and withdrew pen, ink, and paper. She didn’t know quite what to say, but she trusted that the words would come.
Dear Aunt Louisa,
I write to thank you for your kindness to me. From the time you brought me to Bath and introduced me to Lady Melforth. I have had opportunities I little dreamed of in Weymouth. Today, I am especially grateful to you as the publisher’s proofs of our London guide are expected this afternoon. It is not possible for me to exaggerate the benefits of Lady Melforth’s guidance and generous support. As her companion, I have learned so much about the course I long to pursue as a writer, and remain eager to continue the work.
I am glad, too, that you could meet Mr. Larkin. In his own way, he has contributed to my writing. Nevertheless, Aunt, I must tell you that we have decided to end our betrothal….
Viv put down her pen. Some explanation was needed, one that would not lead to further inquiry or further deception. And yet Viv did not know what to say. The ruse was not entirely her secret, but Lark’s, as well. She could hardly reveal that they had been complete strangers, and that she’d shot him as he tried to help her. Or that, in the event, she had felt a particular duty to bring him to a doctor, as her purse, for which he’d endured an injury to his clothes and his person, had been full of gravel.
She might write that she and Mr. Larkin had decided they did not suit. Her aunt would accept such an explanation, but not without feeling wounded that Viv was concealing something. Aunt Louisa and Uncle Oswald had seen how Lark routed the Strydes. And unfortunately, Aunt Louisa had now met the Duke of Wenlocke and heard him proclaim his gladness to be a part of the match.
That was another wrinkle in Viv’s plan to undeceive her aunt. She twisted the ring on her finger. She had no idea what Lark had said about their engagement to—she still had to call the duke—his employer. The duke’s appearance at the Penitent Women’s Hospital had deepened the mystery of Lark’s connection to him. By stealing a glance at her, the duke’s companion, Mr. Finch, seemed to confirm that he, too, knew of the betrothal. Viv could not believe that their meeting there had been a mere coincidence. From the building, Lark had gone directly to the duke in great distress of mind. Her instinct said that the duke was now helping her absent fiancé in some way.
A soft knock on her door interrupted her worried thoughts. She tucked her letter away, and went to the door. Jenny stood there, looking unsettled. “The Strydes are here, miss. No one could keep them out. They’re waiting in the upstairs drawing room to take tea with Lady Melforth.”
“Is her ladyship awake, Jenny? Does she know they’re here?” Viv’s letter would have to wait. She would simply send it in the morning directed to her aunt at Atwood in the country.
“Yes, miss.” Jenny hesitated. “’er ladyship is that flustered, miss.”
“I’ll go to her directly, Jenny.”
Jenny bobbed a curtsy and turned to go. Then stopped. “Oh, and, miss, there’s a package for ye from the printer. Shall I bring it up?”
Viv nodded and gave her appearance a quick glance to make sure she was equal to the Strydes’ scrutiny. She took a deep breath and stepped out into the hall.
*
Neither the Strydes’ encounter with the London police nor the seriousness of Lady Melforth’s condition lessened their determination to secure their place as her near relations. For half an hour, Mrs. Stryde made insistent inquiries about the consulting doctor and the level of care her ladyship was receiving. Even in the face of such an onslaught, Lady Melforth’s tremor was gone for the moment, and her eyes were bright. And Viv was glad of their earlier carriage ride.
“Eustacia, do stop,” said Lady Melforth. “I am quite able to judge a physician’s skill, and of course, I have Newberry, on whom I may rely without doubt.”
“But, Aurora.” Mrs. Stryde cleared her throat. “Don’t you think, propriety calls for a skilled nurse, rather than a male doctor?”
“I have Sarah and…Viv.”
“To be sure, but won’t Miss Bradish be leaving you soon to marry?”
All eyes in the small party turned to Viv.
“We have set no date,” she said.
“Your young man is still dillydallying, is he?” said Mrs. Stryde. “No announcement, no word to your parents? One wonders whether you mean to marry at all, Miss Bradish.”
“I am simply glad to be of use to Lady Melforth while I can be.”
“Yes, well, Aurora,” said Mrs. Stryde turning, “we have done some looking and some careful screening of potential candidates, and we believe we’ve found the very nurse for you, a Mrs. Coates.”
“Thank you, Eustacia. If I find myself looking about for a nurse, I will consider your candidate. For now, I shall go on as I have been doing. Viv, will you ring for Sarah? I should like to return to my room. Oh, and please see my cousins out.”
Viv rose and crossed to ring the bell, with only a little pang at being left out of her ladyship’s confidence once again. Her ladyship was and was not herself. She could be imperious and strong when facing the Strydes, but the former warmth of understanding and friendship between her and Viv had cooled.
In the hall as the Strydes prepared to leave, Mrs. Stryde turned to Viv. “Your days here are numbered, Miss Bradish. You had best make your conjugal arrangements while you can.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Stryde. I will take your advice to heart.”
When they were actually out the door, and in the carriage, and when it began to pull away, Viv breathed again. The Strydes were a very good reminder that if Viv did not wish to be ruined, she would be wise never to reveal the nature of the deception she and Mr. Larkin had practiced. She would tell her aunt that they had decided they did not suit.
She returned to her room to take up her letter and found the printer’s package on her desk, wrapped in string and brown paper and addressed to her in a hand that was not Dodsley’s, the printer’s, she thought. For a moment she simply rested her hands on the package. She had imagined weeks earlier that she would open it with Lady Melforth and share some celebratory cake from Mrs. Brandle or perhaps even champagne. But now Viv merely wanted to see that the book existed, that unlike her betrothal and her tie to her ladyship, the work had not vanished.
She pulled the ends of the strings and unfolded the paper. The book had come from the printer with a dark-green cloth binding and a gold-edged square of paper with a sepia-toned print of a London street on the cover. She paused to admire the handsome binding, feeling the thrill that notes and jottings could be transformed into such an object. She opened to the title page, and sat down hard, her heart hammering, her breath sucked out of her. It had been changed.
A L ADY’S G UIDE TO L ONDON IN T WELVE S ELF- G UIDED W ALKS
A F AITHFUL D ESCRIPTION OF R OUTES AND P LACES
T O A SSIST W OMEN IN K NOWLEDGE OF THE M ETROPOLIS
W RITTEN BY L ADY A URORA M ELFORTH, T HE T RAVELING V ISCOUNTESS
L ONDON: P UBLISHED BY D ODSLEY & S ON, 86 S TRAND
A VAILABLE AT B OOKSELLERS IN E NGLAND, W ALES, I RELAND, AND S COTLAND
One had to look carefully. Title and type and layout all looked the same. Only a single line of the original seven was missing, the line with Viv’s name. Where her name had been there was a space. The gap looked intentional as if meant to separate the title and the author’s name from the lines about the publisher and the booksellers .
It could not be deliberate. It had to be a mistake. Dodsley had got it wrong, or thought Viv’s name unnecessary when Lady Melforth’s name alone was sufficient to sell books. Viv steadied herself. She must not jump to the conclusion that she had been deceived or used. She opened the book and paged through to the walk on Babylon Street. There were her words telling the story of having her purse with its false contents plucked from her arm. She had not been written out of the book. The title page must be in error.
Viv turned next to the preface and experienced a second, deeper shock. Lady Melforth wrote of being called upon by her public during an extended stay in London to give an account of traveling in the great metropolis. In response therefore, she had endeavored to describe from actual experience how a lady traveler whether native or foreign might safely navigate London’s streets. A brief sentence thanked those in her household and on her staff for their support and assistance. Viv had seen a very different version of the preface before the dinner party.
She jumped up and began to pace. With astonishing rapidity, scenes from the previous weeks flashed in her mind. Lady Melforth insisting they finish the book, her coldness at the dinner party, Sarah’s sitting at Lady Melforth’s side with pages in her lap, Lady Melforth’s sending Sarah, not Viv, to Dodsley with the final drafts, Newberry’s telling Viv he had read the front matter of the book, and Viv’s empty desk with Sarah’s note on it. Viv stopped dead, facing the empty desk and a most unwelcome conclusion. At some point, Lady Melforth had decided to treat the work as if it had been hers alone, as if Viv had had no part in it. That couldn’t be right, but what else could explain the changes? It was theft. Lady Melforth was willing to put her name to Viv’s words.
The idea devastated her, that her friend, the woman who had encouraged her, the woman she’d laughed with, could serve her such a turn. Viv had urged Lady Melforth to keep writing even though her hand shook and she couldn’t get around in the way she was used to travel. Together they had planned the walks. Lady Melforth had encouraged each of Viv’s outings and together they had strategized on everything from which points of interest to include to the best words to describe a scene. In every case Lady Melforth had encouraged Viv. Those times had been full of laughter.
But the laughter had stopped. Viv could see that now. She had offended her ladyship or disappointed her. She recalled the dinner party and her aunt’s cheerful assumption that Viv was very much a partner in the writing of the book, and Lady Melforth’s cold response. Now Viv’s cheeks stung with mortification. She had done something wrong. She had made her ladyship feel that Viv was using her, taking advantage of the Traveling Viscountess to gain a reputation of her own. She shuddered to think that she appeared to her ladyship like the clinging Strydes, that she had missed the hints to remain in her place.
She opened her desk drawer. There was the Toby pistol, her ladyship’s gun, one she had used long ago in Italy against bandits. She had lent it freely to Viv that day, sending Viv out into London’s streets to become an intrepid female traveler. And Viv had done it. She pushed the gun aside and reached for her pencils. She would not remain in her place, where she was invisible, where she had no prospects. She had come to London to escape her place, to learn, to establish herself as a writer, to win her independence. She could not go back to the house of her mother and stepfather.
There had to be a compromise. Without Lady Melforth there would be no publisher, no curious public, but without Viv there would be no words on the page, no stories of pickpockets or shopping or the river. Viv had contributed to their guide, and she would have recognition for her part in it.
She would correct the proofs and take them to Dodsley in the morning. She would sit at her desk and light her lamp and take up her pencil. She opened the book. At once she saw a new difficulty. Her drafts were gone, carried to Dodsley by Sarah. Viv had only her notebooks with jottings from each of the expeditions. She would begin with those, make as many changes as she remembered if she had to work all night.