Chapter 17
The bell above the door chimed softly as they entered, the sound nearly lost beneath the layered rustle of fabric and quiet conversation that filled the shop.
The air within the modiste’s was warm and faintly scented with starch and pressed silk, bolts of cloth arranged in careful order along the walls, their colors shifting subtly in the filtered afternoon light.
“Miss Barker—no, I must correct myself,” the modiste said at once, appearing from behind a screen with a practiced smile. “Your Grace. How very pleased I am to see you. I do apologize for the incorrect address. It will not happen again.”
Arabella inclined her head, returning the greeting with ease. “You are very kind. We have come only to look, if that is not an imposition.”
“An imposition?” the woman repeated lightly. “Never. One does not refuse a duchess, nor her friends.”
Jane laughed softly as they moved further inside, her gaze already moving over the nearest display. “We shall be very restrained,” she said. “At least for the first five minutes.”
Cissie did not bother to promise as much. She had already crossed toward a table where several lengths of gauze had been laid out, her fingers hovering just above the surface. “You must tell us what has come in recently,” she said. “Particularly anything suitable for a masquerade.”
At that, the modiste’s expression brightened further. “Ah, yes. There has been a great deal of interest in that very subject. If you will allow me—”
She gestured toward a side room, where additional fabrics had been arranged with more space to examine them. Jane and Cissie followed at once, their conversation rising and falling in quick succession as they disappeared beyond the doorway.
Arabella lingered a moment longer.
“I shall join you directly,” she said, though neither of them paused long enough to answer.
The main room settled into a quieter rhythm as she moved toward one of the display tables, her gloved hand brushing lightly against a length of pale blue silk. The fabric caught the light in a way that suggested movement even in stillness.
“Something for evening wear, perhaps?”
Arabella turned slightly at the voice, offering a polite smile to the assistant who had approached. “I have not yet decided,” she said. “Though I suspect my friends will do so on my behalf if I delay too long.”
The woman smiled in return, then stepped back, allowing her space.
Arabella moved slowly along the table, her attention drifting from one bolt of fabric to the next, though not with any great urgency.
There was a quiet to the moment that she found unexpectedly welcome, the absence of immediate expectation allowing her thoughts to settle more easily than they had throughout the day.
She reached the far end of the room before she became aware of the voices.
They were not raised, nor particularly hushed. Simply positioned at a distance that suggested privacy rather than secrecy, carried through the thin partition that separated the main room from a smaller adjoining space.
“I do not say that it is improper,” one voice remarked, measured and composed. “Only that it is… concerning.”
Arabella stilled, her hand resting lightly against the edge of the table.
“Concerning?” the second voice repeated, sharper in tone. “You are being overly generous. It is entirely irregular, and I think we may say as much without fear of contradiction.”
Arabella did not move. The voices did not falter.
“The marriage was concluded in what, a matter of days?” the second woman continued. “Such haste is never without cause.”
“There may have been circumstances we are not privy to,” the first replied.
“There always are,” came the answer, edged with quiet certainty. “That does not make them any less questionable.”
Arabella’s fingers tightened slightly against the wood before easing again. The conversation had not been intended for her. That much was clear. And yet, now that she had heard it, she could not pretend otherwise.
“I am told,” the second voice went on, lowering slightly though not enough to obscure the words, “that His Grace was placed in a position where refusal would have been… inconvenient.”
The phrasing was careful. The implication was not. It was clear, then, that they, and probably most of the ton, had been made aware of what had transpired that fateful morning when Mrs. Penbury found them out.
“That is speculation,” the first woman said, though there was less conviction in it now.
“Is it?” A pause. “The source is considered reliable.”
Arabella’s gaze fell on the heavy curtain shielding the women, though she remained where she stood.
“And who,” the first asked quietly, “would claim such insight?”
There was a brief hesitation, as though the answer required some consideration.
“Her half-sister, I believe,” the second said at last. “The one who has not been received nearly so well. It would seem she has been… forthcoming.”
The words settled with a weight that did not require emphasis.
Arabella felt it then. Not sharp, not immediate, but steady.
Recognition.
Not of surprise, but of confirmation.
“She would have reason to resent the situation,” the first woman said carefully. “That does not make her account accurate.”
“Resentment does not create detail,” the second replied. “Only reveals it.”
There was a soft rustle of fabric, the suggestion of movement within the adjoining room.
Arabella straightened slightly, her posture aligning with the same quiet composure she had carried into the shop.
The conversation continued, though she no longer followed every word.
It was not necessary.
She had heard enough.
For a moment, she remained where she was, her gaze resting on nothing in particular, the sounds of the shop returning gradually to the forefront.
The faint murmur of voices from the side room where Jane and Cissie had gone.
The soft movement of fabric being lifted and set aside.
The quiet efficiency of the staff as they attended to their work.
All of it continued as it had before. Only now she had a clarity that left little room for uncertainty.
She turned at last, moving back toward the center of the room with unhurried steps. The assistant glanced up as she passed, offering a small, polite smile that Arabella returned without effort.
“Have you found something that interests you, Your Grace?” the woman asked.
“Not yet,” Arabella said. “Though I think I may require a closer look.”
The assistant inclined her head, gesturing toward the adjoining room. “Your friends are just through here.”
“Yes,” Arabella said, her tone even. “I believe I shall join them.”
She paused only briefly at the threshold, the sound of Jane’s laughter reaching her clearly now, bright and untroubled.
Arabella allowed herself a single breath, and then she stepped forward.
Arabella did not enter the adjoining room at once.
Instead, she paused just beyond the threshold, her hand resting lightly against the carved edge of the doorframe.
Around her, the modiste continued in its quiet industry.
A seamstress crossed the front room with a length of pinned muslin draped over one arm.
Somewhere toward the back, drawers opened and closed with soft wooden knocks.
The bell above the door chimed faintly as another customer entered, and still the world did not shift in the slightest for what had just been said.
None of it loud enough to drown out the two women who had been carelessly discussing who else, but her.
“That is what I was told,” the sharper-voiced woman was saying. “And I do not repeat such things carelessly.”
“You may not intend to,” the other replied, softer but no less intent, “but it has been said often enough that one begins to wonder how much of it is invention.”
“There is no invention in it,” the first insisted, lowering her voice just enough to suggest discretion without losing conviction. “He was found in a state that left very little to interpretation. And she—well.”
A faint, knowing pause.
“She was not precisely in a position to deny it.”
The second woman hesitated, her fingers stilling against the ribbon. “You speak as though she had no choice.”
“I did not say that,” the first returned. “Only that the situation… resolved itself rather conveniently.”
“Convenient for whom?”
“For her, certainly,” the sharper voice replied. “To secure such a match under those circumstances—one might almost admire the efficiency of it.”
A breath of quiet amusement followed.
“And for him?” the other pressed.
There was the faintest shift, as though the answer required more care.
“For him, it was less a question of preference and more of necessity, from what I understand.”
The second woman’s brows drew together slightly. “You speak with a great deal of certainty.”
“I heard it from her sister,” came the reply, quick enough to suggest satisfaction. “Miss Charlotte Barker. She did not say it outright, of course, but one does not need to be told everything plainly to understand what is meant.”
Arabella’s fingers tightened once against the doorframe before easing again.
Of course.
The name settled cleanly into place, not as revelation, but as confirmation.
Her father’s silence had never been absence—it had been decision. Distance maintained where it suited him, attention withheld where it did not. And Charlotte—
Charlotte had learned early that sweetness carried further than spite when properly arranged. That a suggestion, lightly delivered, would be taken up and repeated far more eagerly than any accusation spoken outright.
Arabella exhaled slowly, the motion controlled enough that it did not draw attention.
So that was the shape of it.
Not invention. Not entirely.
But guided.
It ought to have angered her more than it did.
What she felt, instead, was something colder and steadier.
Decision.