CHAPTER 22
Eva opened the door to her house slowly. She peeked inside, half-expecting to see it ransacked again.
Rebecca pushed the door wide and walked past her. “Let us unpack quickly and go to the village. I want to see if any mail came while we were gone.”
Rebecca went above, but Eva strolled through the house, letting its familiarity seep into her soul.
They had not been gone long, but the spaces felt a little strange anyway.
It was not the house. Nothing had changed here.
She had, however, and not only because of the ball and other experiences. Her heart had changed.
She gazed out the window, to the spot where she and Gareth had sated their desire in the garden. That was supposed to have been the last time.
When she embarked on this affair, she assumed it would be brief.
She thought he would make it so, being who he was and who she was.
A dalliance for him and a chance to know a woman’s carnality for her.
That was all it was to be. Simple. So simple that she astonished herself with her own sophistication.
Now—not simple at all. She never guessed that the risk to her reputation would be the least of it. She never expected to love him, and to feel real pain because he would never love her. What sensible woman would?
She went down to the kitchen to see what provisions she needed to buy.
She could hear Gareth saying that romantic love did not exist, that it was something made up to create an excuse for indulging in sensual desire that would itself pass.
He did not use those words exactly, but he had given fair warning. She had understood him well enough.
Perhaps for him it already had passed, or was passing.
He had not seduced her. There had been no honor be damned.
She had had to seduce him in her chamber.
And he had been willing to stand aside and allow another man offer to keep her as a mistress.
What friend wouldn’t defer to practicalities, should such an opportunity arise?
Rebecca waited upstairs, impatient to walk to town. They set off.
“I wonder if Mr. Fitzallen is back yet,” Rebecca said. “Do you think he is?”
“How would I know? He may have journeyed somewhere else. We may not see him for weeks. What do we care if he is back or not?”
“I was just making conversation, Eva. You do not have to bite me for it.” She pointed to Eva’s arm. “You have your sketchbook. Are you planning to stop along the way to draw? Not on the way there, I hope.”
“I thought that after we visit the post office, and before we do our shopping, we might call on the sisters Neville. You can read, and I can draw. They have some nice figurines, well made, that will keep me busy for an hour or so.”
“That will be fun. I think I will enjoy my time there more if you are with me.”
What a sweet thing to say. It touched her that Rebecca wanted to share more time with her.
“Jasmine can at times be too motherly,” Rebecca continued. “If you are there, I do not think she will give advice that was not requested.”
“She does that often, does she? And here I always found her so shy about her opinions.”
“One cannot anticipate what her opinion will be. She can surprise one, and that can be vexing.”
“What surprising opinion did she give you that you found vexing?”
Rebecca blushed. “I am not clever, am I? Not if you guessed there had been such an opinion recently. I wrote to them, and she wrote back two days ago.”
“What did she say? Hopefully that you should never become a courtesan, no matter how much London had bedazzled you.”
“I wrote to Ophelia while I was in town, and, along with telling her of the sights we had seen, I also mentioned meeting Mr. Mansfield and Mr. Trenton while at Sarah’s house, and how Mr. Mansfield then turned up in London.
I mentioned how Mr. Trenton suited me far better, but cousin Sarah kept throwing me at Mr. Mansfield.
Jasmine wrote back with a long lecture on the matter.
I thought that bold, since I had not confided in her. ”
“I hope she did not lecture that you should not marry at all.”
“She took no position on marriage, but she did take a position on Mr. Trenton and Mr. Mansfield. To my surprise, she favored the latter most decidedly. She warned me about entanglements with writers, and poets in particular. Her warnings were very . . . forceful.”
“I would think Miss Neville looked kindly on writers.”
“Wouldn’t you? Her vehemence on the subject leads me to wonder about the soundness of all her advice now.”
Eva would be happy to see Rebecca less influenced by the sisters Neville, but not out of rebellion against sensible advice.
No letters waited for Rebecca at the post office. Her spirits sank. She retreated into silence while they walked to the home of the sisters Neville.
The ladies in question received them. Eva discovered that they did not stand on ceremony with Rebecca. They did not sit for the obligatory fifteen-minute chat. Rather Ophelia waved them into the library after perfunctory greetings, and they went about their own business.
For two hours Rebecca read and Eva drew one of the figurines, a small bronze depicting Hercules fighting the Hydra. Although small in scale, the sculptor had modeled the forms as professionally as if it were ten feet high. The exercise challenged her, since both figures twisted in action.
A servant brought in lemonade and little cakes, set the tray on a table, and invited them to partake. Eva set aside her sketchbook and joined Rebecca at the table.
“They have the best cakes,” Rebecca said, taking one. “Even if I did not love their library, I would probably visit just for these.”
While they refreshed themselves, Rebecca told Eva about the book on mythology she was reading. As she did so, Miss Neville entered the library. She did not come to join them. Instead she strode to the bookcase in front of the table that held the Hercules bronze.
“I particularly find the story of Jupiter and Danae peculiar,” Rebecca said. “He often visited his lovers in different forms, to escape his wife Juno’s detection. With Leda, for example, he became a swan.”
“That does not bear contemplating too much,” Eva said. At the bookshelf, Miss Neville pulled out a book, perused it, and returned it.
“No, but at least it makes some anatomical sense if one does, scandalous though it might be.”
“Better if one does not, all the same.” Eva wondered just how much her sister knew about the anatomical sense of lovers’ joining. It sounded like more than one might expect of a nineteen-year-old innocent.
Miss Neville had found her book. She turned to go. Then she stopped, angled her head with curiosity, and stepped closer to the Hercules.
“Yes. Well, with Danae, Jupiter took the form of a shower of gold. How could a shower of gold impregnate a woman?”
Eva barely heard her. Instead her attention riveted on Jasmine Neville, who had bent toward the chair Eva had used for her sketching. She then straightened, holding Eva’s sketchbook in her hand.
“I expect since he was a god, he would arrange for the gold to do whatever he chose it to do,” Rebecca mused after a sip of lemonade.
Miss Neville began flipping the pages of the sketchbook much as she had done when Eva visited her last time. Eva trusted she would approve of the more recent drawings, the ones done in London.
The ones done in London.
Eva jumped up and rushed toward Jasmine, almost tripping over a stool on her way. She ran up to her hostess, hand outstretched, ready to grab the sketchbook before Jasmine reached one particular drawing.
Too late. She saw the page turn to reveal a drawing of a naked, sleeping man. She noticed Jasmine’s reaction. Eyebrows up, eyes narrowing, head angling.
Then those eyes looked at her. Right at her. Right through her.
“I see you were busy with your studies while in town, Miss Russell.”
“Yes. I did quite a few drawings. Of sculptures and such.” She took the sketchbook, closed it, and tucked it under her arm.
“The and such appears to have inspired your best efforts.”
Had Jasmine recognized the and such? Eva had not finished the head and face in any detail, and the angle of that face might make it unrecognizable in any case. She hoped so, but the frank expression in Jasmine’s eyes suggested one person in Langdon’s End now guessed the truth.
“I also called on Mary Moser. Thank you for your letter of introduction. She received us, and asked after you. She told me to find a way to draw from life.” She hoped Jasmine would take that as a full explanation of the drawing.
A small, fleeting smile suggested Jasmine found the excuse amusing. “How did you find Mary’s health?”
“Not well, I am sorry to say. I think she expects the end soon.”
“Thank you for telling me that. I will write to her at once.” One more open-eyed, direct look, one more glance at the sketchbook, and Miss Neville departed.
Eva returned to the table. “Are you done eating all the cakes? Let us go and finish our errands.”
For the next hour, while they shopped for food and sundries, Eva tried to accommodate the idea that her reputation—her entire world—now rested in the hands of a woman known for outspoken opinions, radical ideas, and indifference to how society exacts high tolls on prohibited behavior.
* * *
Gareth returned north in one of Lance’s carriages. He carried cargo that could never be transported on a horse.
He did not return to Albany Lodge right away, much as he wanted to.
He intended to call on Eva as soon as possible.
He had not been present when she left Langley House three days ago.
He and Ives spent that day tracking down the paintings Zwilliger had put out for sale.
Then they devoted a good deal of time forming a strategy that might bring this investigation to a close quickly and successfully.