Chapter Fifteen #3
“So what would you have me do? Go door to door and grovel for pity, hoping that some in London would forgive me?”
“That is one course of action. Convince enough ladies that it was an accident, and you may be able to garner some pity.”
“But it was not an accident, was it? It was a deliberate attempt by Miss Forscythe to ruin me. So why not tell them the truth? Anyone with eyes can see that she is a schemer. I can’t have been the first woman to be victimized by her.
I have no qualms about revealing what I saw in the hedge maze now. ”
“That is a battle you will not win, I’m afraid. It is your word against hers, and she has everything you don’t: wealth, popularity, status, beaut—”
Mrs. Rose stopped mid-word. Her eyes flicked down Elswyth’s naked body, following her scar from her face, to her throat, to her left breast. It coiled around her heart in a bramble and then reached out in new branches, up to her left arm, down her belly.
Lacy red lines flowed over her hip, ran down her thigh, and finally ended on her left foot.
Mrs. Rose pretended that she wasn’t looking, but Elswyth didn’t blame her. She could appreciate a degree of natural curiosity, and Mrs. Rose had been much more tactful about mentioning her scar in recent weeks.
“Venus Forscythe is a schemer, you’re right about that, and she’ll scheme circles around you.
No, it’s better to avoid her for now. Perhaps, if she thinks she’s won, she’ll get bored with you and move on to some other newcomer to terrorize.
She might think that she invited every agreeable match to that dance, but for every one she invited, I shall find you ten more.
She may be clever, but she’s never met Madame Vivian Rose! ”
Mrs. Rose posed dramatically as she said her own name, and Elswyth couldn’t help but laugh. She saw a hint of amusement in the woman’s expression.
“Still, you must admit that my marriage prospects are not what they were a week ago.”
Mrs. Rose inclined her head. “That may be so—but they are not nonexistent. In fact, there may be ways that we can use this debacle to our advantage.”
Elswyth raised an eyebrow. “Somehow, I doubt that.”
Mrs. Rose smiled slyly. “No news may be good news, but no press is bad press, as they say. Not that long ago, you were a newcomer, just another face in a sea of identical, droning debutantes. A thousand boring sheep in ostrich feathers and kidskin gloves. But now, well, now every gentleman in London knows your name.”
Elswyth laughed. “They know me, certainly. At best, they know me as an imbecile who accidentally wore a gown of poison ivy, and at worst, they know me as some kind of malicious witch, hell-bent on poisoning every gentleman in London.”
“And you don’t think any of them are at least curious about you?
A beautiful young woman… possessing mysterious gifts and motivations…
There are so few compelling emotions, Miss Elderwood, and curiosity is one of them.
Why, yes, a good helping of curiosity can easily become love, with the right encouragement. ”
“You think that the morbid curiosity of some man would turn into love? Even if it did, what man in their right mind would propose to a woman who might poison him?”
She shrugged playfully. “My darling dear. Men don’t want what’s good for them.
They never have. In fact, most of the men I know are actively trying to poison themselves with drink or gambling.
They crave a bit of danger; it makes them feel alive.
And you’ve just established yourself as a very dangerous woman—and a quite notorious one at that.
Oh yes, I do think that there will be some men who are quite titillated by you. ”
“So what do you suggest? I admit to poisoning Lord Forrester? Confirm their suspicions that I am some sort of man-hating witch?”
“Heavens, no. That would make their curiosity dry up in a snap. They can never know your motivations. Keep them dangling on a thread, unsure of what your next move will be. A little curiosity, a little fear… These things can be intoxicating.”
For a moment, Elswyth entertained the possibility. Then she frowned.
“You forget, Mrs. Rose. What you say may be true, but it is all dependent upon one small factor: beauty. Men may say they want a bride unlike any other, but that bride must be beautiful, above all. Beauty is the difference between unique and strange. And I am not beautiful.”
Mrs. Rose pressed her lips into a line. Then she stood and moved to the doorway.
“Come, come,” she said. She vanished, and Elswyth reluctantly stood from the bath, the perfumed water flowing off her, running in rivers over her scar.
She toweled off and grabbed the nearby robe, and then followed Mrs. Rose into the main chamber.
Mrs. Rose took her by the hand and sat her forcefully in front of the vanity.
“What do you see?” Mrs. Rose said.
Elswyth appraised her appearance. “Myself?”
“There’s that exceptional mind at work again. I mean what do you see.” She gestured to different parts of Elswyth’s face.
Elswyth sighed. “I don’t know. Fair skin. Freckles. Red hair. My scar.”
“And are you beautiful?” Mrs. Rose said.
“No,” Elswyth said.
“Why not?”
“Must I say it?”
“Pretend you are writing one of your papers. Can you actually explain why you are not beautiful?”
Elswyth looked at her own face. “It comes down to symmetry. A beautiful thing is symmetrical. I think my face perhaps was symmetrical, before the scarring. But now it cannot be.”
Mrs. Rose turned Elswyth to face her. To Elswyth’s surprise, she took a small pad from the vanity and began to wipe away the layer of arrowroot powder that Elswyth used to cover her scar.
“One of the very first things you learn when learning to dress well, or do hair, or any aesthetic pursuit, is that too much symmetry is boring. Yes, the bones of symmetry must be there, but if something is too perfect, it lacks interest. A little asymmetry—a hat on one side of the head, a beauty mark on the chin—these imperfections fascinate people.”
“It’s hardly a beauty mark, Mrs. Rose,” Elswyth said.
And it wasn’t; the scar was as red and angry as ever.
It crawled from her neck to her jaw, then fanned out in fractals, touching her lips, her nose, her eye and eyelid, until dying just below her hairline.
There was, in no possible scenario, a way she could be beautiful.
“No, it’s not. It is intense and severe—not unlike your personality.”
“Why, thank you,” Elswyth said dryly.
Mrs. Rose began drawing Elswyth’s hair away from her face. She separated it into sections and then began to braid them together, leaving the scar exposed. Elswyth was about to object, but Mrs. Rose spoke over her.
“I think we have been too focused on making you pretty,” she said. “Pretty is only one part of beauty, which is only one part of allure. Is a mountain range fair? No. Is the ocean merely pretty? No. But it is beautiful. They are not symmetrical, but they are stunning. Imposing. Iconic, even.”
When the braid was finished, Mrs. Rose took Elswyth’s chin and angled her face to catch the light.
And yes: There it was. One eye like old forest moss; the other like a storm cloud.
Hair the color of an autumn wood. A nymphlike face, angular and severe, with high cheekbones and a sharp nose.
And her scar, twisting and curling, not dulled by powder, like a lightning strike.
Mrs. Rose’s face joined hers in the mirror, a fire burning in her eyes. “If we cannot make you a lady, then we shall make you a legend.”
When Mrs. Rose had finished, Elswyth was left alone in her room.
Her powders and tonics were strewn across the vanity, and swatches of tulle and lace lay on the bed.
Elswyth sighed, moving to the bathroom. She closed the door behind her and faced the sink, washing some of the makeup from her face.
It was dark in the bathroom; the only light came from the moon, shining through the open window and onto the tile floor.
Elswyth examined herself for a moment—her gray eye was slightly reddened by exhaustion, and the green one seemed tired as well, with a violet shadow beneath it. She splashed cold water on her face again, holding her hands there, then brought them down.
Something moved behind her, reflected in the glass of the mirror. A small, dark shape, flickering across the room.
She turned quickly, searching. The tub stood at the center, four claw feet and a half-full basin. The armoire, in the corner, with the linens. The toilet, the cabinet, the far window on the wall.
The room was still again. But she was sure that she’d seen the dark shape. Too large to be a mouse and not moving like any animal she’d seen before. She waited for a moment—nothing happened. It’s only a mouse again, she thought. The house is full of them.
Another flash. The little shadow appeared in the corner of her vision, almost human in shape but no taller than a foot in height. She shook her head. Was she going mad? A mouse, she thought again. It must be a mouse.
Then the chittering sound again. Like branches creaking in the breeze. Not like any mouse I’ve heard, she thought. She ran to the open window and latched it shut. Whatever it was, it wouldn’t get away. Not this time. The clicking sound echoed in the room again, like the slow call of an insect.
A crash; the sound of something shattering. She jumped, her heartbeat rising, turning to the source of the sound.
On the far wall, several potted plants rested beneath the tall windows. One of them had fallen off its perch, the ceramic shattering on the floor, spraying dirt across the room.
Elswyth frowned and moved to it, about to clean up the mess. But something was strange—in the ruin of the ceramic pot, amid the dirt, there was no plant. She was sure that pot had held a Mandragora specimen.
She looked at the next pot. No, there was the Mandragora. But it was in the wrong pot—that one had held St. John’s wort, hadn’t it?
And the Mandragora leaves—were they moving? Yes, it looked like they were shifting, burying themselves deeper into the pot. A small chittering sound came from within, beneath the soil.
Elswyth concentrated vitae into her hand.
She sprouted thorns from her fingertips, and then fabricated witch-hazel beneath the base of each thorn—one of Kehinde’s tricks.
Gas filled the space between thorn and finger, the same mechanism the witch-hazel plant used to shoot its seeds as quick as bullets.
Tension built at her fingertips, the thorns ready to burst. With her other hand, she slowly reached toward the Mandragora pot, ready to pull the plant from the soil.
The pot holding the Mandragora exploded. Dirt flew into her eyes, and she stumbled backward.
A shadow bolted from the ruins of the pot and toward the door. Elswyth thrust her hand downward. The thorns burst from her fingers, spraying across the room, landing in a line against the hardwood floor.
The thing yowled, almost earth-shattering in its volume.
She clapped her hands over her ears. How could something so small produce such a sound?
The scream slowly faded, followed by that strange clicking sound again.
The creature had skidded across the floor, thrown back by the force of her witch-hazel thorns.
Elswyth stepped forward. The room was dark, and the creature was just a smudge of black on the white tile. It twitched, trying to pull itself away from her with small, humanlike arms.
Elswyth summoned foxfire to her hand. The mushrooms illuminated the room before her and the creature with it, where it lay in a pool of green blood. “That,” she said, “is certainly not a mouse.”