Chapter 14 The Engagement Trap #2
For one exhausted, bruised, bitter minute, I wonder if safety is supposed to be enough. Maybe this is what growing up in a hostile century means: not choosing happiness, but choosing the cage with the cleanest straw.
Then I remember James’s face when he said I love you, quiet and wrecked and true.
So, no.
Apparently I am still committed to making choices that would alarm any sensible career counselor.
At dusk, I see the same man pass twice beneath the front windows.
Brown hat. Gray coat. Hands in pockets.
The third time, Kitty steps out of the alley behind him and kicks him hard in the ankle.
He yelps and spins. She vanishes before he can catch her.
I am at the servants’ entrance five minutes later despite Mrs. Finch’s ban on stairs, agitation, and independent thought.
Kitty slips inside with a basket over one arm and righteous fury in every sharp line of her face.
“You’re meant to be abed,” she says.
“You’re meant not to assault strangers outside ducal residences.”
“He ain’t strange. He’s been watching the house since morning.”
My stomach sinks.
Beatrice, behind me, goes very still. “Who is he?”
Kitty shrugs. “Runner, maybe. Hired eyes. Seen his sort near Covent Garden. Paid to watch doors and count who goes in.”
“By Thornbury?”
“Maybe. Maybe the old lord with the face like spoiled milk.”
Hartwick. Lovely. His aesthetic is spreading.
Kitty lowers her voice. “There’s talk in the lanes. Men asking after you. Asking what medicines you carry. Asking which ladies send for you.”
Cold crawls up my spine.
“Why?”
“Dunno.” Her eyes flick to my bruised face. “But it ain’t for kindness.”
Beatrice grips the banister. “We must tell James.”
“He is already chasing ten disasters,” I say.
Kitty snorts. “Then give him eleven. Men like that don’t stop because you’re tired.”
There is wisdom in that, which is very annoying coming from a teenager who still has dirt on her hem.
Before I can answer, Mrs. Finch appears at the top of the servants’ stairs.
“Miss Hartford,” she says, in a tone that suggests I have personally betrayed furniture, “Lady Carrow has sent her carriage. Her ladyship is seized with violent pains and asks for you at once.”
Beatrice turns sharply. “No. Absolutely not.”
“She is one of Lady Pemberton’s circle,” Mrs. Finch says. “The messenger says Dr. Thornbury has been delayed.”
Of course he has.
There is the trap. I can feel its edges.
And still.
Violent pains.
A woman asking for help.
I press a hand to my ribs. “I’m going.”
“Emma,” Beatrice says.
“Send for James. Tell him where I am. Kitty, you come with me.”
Kitty’s eyes widen. “Me?”
“You notice things rich people pay servants to ignore.”
She straightens, pleased despite herself.
Beatrice looks ready to lock me in a wardrobe for my own good. “You can barely walk.”
“Then I’ll sit aggressively.”
* * *
Lady Carrow’s townhouse smells of lavender, coal smoke, and fear covered badly by money.
She is in her bedchamber, a thin woman in her forties with damp hair clinging to her temples and one hand pressed to her abdomen. I have met her twice in drawing rooms, where she spoke of embroidery with the fixed desperation of someone who either loves embroidery or is being held hostage by it.
Now she is curled on her side, breath shallow.
“Miss Hartford,” she whispers. “Thank God.”
Her maid hovers near the washstand. A half-empty glass sits on the bedside table beside a folded paper of powders.
My instincts sharpen.
“What have you taken?”
The maid twists her apron. “Only the draught sent after dinner, miss. For the spasms.”
“Sent by whom?”
“A boy brought it. Said it came from your direction.”
Kitty, standing near the door, goes still.
No.
I step closer to the table. The label on the small bottle is in my hand.
Not my handwriting.
Close enough to fool a frightened household.
My heart drops through the floor.
Lady Carrow moans, body tightening. Her pulse is rapid, skin clammy. Her pupils look wrong. The smell from the glass is bitter beneath the sweetness.
Poison? Too much laudanum? Antimony? Something meant to mimic incompetence with period-appropriate cruelty.
“Boiled water,” I snap. “Clean cloths. Send for another physician—not Thornbury. Dr. Pierce if he can be found. And send to Ashbourne House again.”
The maid runs.
I work with what I have. Water. Charcoal from the hearth crushed as fine as Kitty can manage. Keep her awake. Keep her breathing. Try to make her vomit without drowning her. Monitor pulse. Pray, which is not evidence-based but suddenly understandable.
Lady Carrow claws weakly at my sleeve. “You said it would ease me.”
“I did not send that draught.”
Her eyes roll toward me, unfocused. “Your note…”
“Not mine.”
The door bursts open.
Dr. Thornbury strides in with Lord Hartwick behind him.
For one absurd second, I want to applaud the punctuality of evil.
Thornbury takes in the room: me at the bedside, Kitty with charcoal-blackened fingers, the bottle on the table.
His face arranges itself into horror so perfect it should be framed.
“What have you given her?”
“Nothing that came from that bottle.”
He snatches it up, reads the label, and turns it toward the room.
Miss Hartford’s Soothing Draught.
The maid gasps.
Hartwick’s eyes glitter.
Lady Carrow convulses once beneath my hands, then goes terribly still.
I feel for her pulse.
Nothing.
For a moment, the entire room narrows to two fingers at a silent throat.
Then Thornbury says, loud enough for the servants in the hall to hear, “Good God. She has killed her.”
And every face turns toward me.