Chapter Nineteen #2
“This is important,” Elswyth said, mostly to herself.
“It proves she did have a lover. Perhaps Persephone threatened to expose the affair. That could have been the reason he killed her. It could mean I’m right about the Reaper being a nobleman.
This could be the reason why she doesn’t fit with the rest of the Reaper’s victims. She threatened to ruin him, and he killed her. ”
Mrs. Rose cleared her throat. She set down the bouquet, which had started to fade back into death. “You know, this is not what I imagined when I graduated from etiquette school. Alas.”
“Mrs. Rose—”
She shook her head and then picked up the rubbish bin with a grunt.
“No, no. I shan’t hear any more of this talk.
I shall fetch us lunch. And then we will talk about something else.
Do try to wrap up any more grim revelations before I return.
” With that, Mrs. Rose hurried off toward the kitchen, lugging the rubbish with her.
Elswyth stood at the vanity for a while, looking at the bouquet and making sure she hadn’t missed any flowers.
Then she moved to the writing desk and started reading through Persephone’s letters once more.
There was no passion in those letters, nothing to indicate an actual romance had occurred.
If Persephone really had taken a lover, wouldn’t there be more evidence?
Letters, correspondence—and where were the rumors?
The court loved its rumors. Hyacinth Thatcher had said that she saw Persephone in the garden with Captain Burr, but now Burr was dead.
“Is she gone yet?” a voice came. Elswyth jumped out of her desk chair.
Behind her, Silas Blackthorn stood on the balcony, leaning against the balustrade and smiling.
All around him summer light made him seem larger than life.
His coat was draped over his shoulder, and he wore only a canvas shirt, tight around his arms, sleeves rolled up to the elbow.
His forearms twisted as he folded them across his broad chest, the muscles and tendons flexing.
Suspenders kept up a pair of simple trousers, cutting a fine figure down to his black boots.
“Silas! What are you doing?” Elswyth sputtered.
“Calling upon a lady friend of mine. What does it look like?”
“In my bedroom? If Mrs. Rose sees you…”
“Which is why I so tactfully waited until she was gone. A man is nothing without his manners, after all.”
Silas stepped into her bedroom. Shame flooded her; the room was filthy. He looked around, a smug expression on his face. “My, my. This is where you get dressed, then? The mind races.”
Elswyth scowled. She moved toward the door and quietly slid the lock into place. “This is frightfully inappropriate, Blackthorn. You are lucky I do not scream for my uncle. Why on earth did you not just come through the front door?”
“As if Mrs. Rose would allow me. I’ve been writing for weeks, asking for a call with you. I even showed up unannounced, tail tucked between my legs. She shooed me like a dog every time. She’s rather convinced I have ill intentions toward you.”
Silas moved to the bed, where he flopped down and rubbed the sheets. “Ooh… comfy.”
Elswyth frowned. She pushed the letters she’d been reading back into the desk drawer and then quickly hid a pair of bloomers that were draped over the chair.
“Floral print… interesting choice,” he said.
“Really, Sir Silas, what is the reason for this? If this is some kind of attempt on my honor, I assure you, I am not interested.”
Silas grinned. “Curious that should be your first thought. It is duly noted. No, Miss Elderwood, I’m afraid I come strictly for business.”
“And what business do I have with you?”
“Why, we are both Dr. Gall’s assistants, are we not? I would conclude that we are colleagues. Friends, even.”
“I think I would sooner be friends with the corpse flower,” Elswyth said dryly.
“Oh, but if you died, I would miss our banter,” he said. “Who else could I regale with my wit? So many of my peers are too daft to understand it.”
Elswyth rolled her eyes. “I’m sure your cockiness is ambrosia to the sort of women you court, but it will win no favor with me.”
Silas smiled, first in his eyes, and then with a gentle quirk of his upper lip, and then it bloomed across his face. For a moment, he was all white teeth and dimples, all shining amber eyes. Elswyth turned away.
“We shall see about that, Miss Elderwood,” he said. He pushed himself up from the bed and began moving about the room, picking up an empty flower pot and examining it. “No, I’m afraid this errand is my own, not Dr. Gall’s. In fact, I think it would be better if he never learned of it.”
“An errand? Of what sort?” Elswyth said.
“I’ve misplaced something… Well, one could actually say that it was stolen from me. I was hoping that you could help me get it back.”
Elswyth blinked. “Me? Why?”
“What do you mean?” Silas asked.
“Why would you invite me? Why not one of your adventuring peers? One of your… I don’t know… ‘Good old boys.’”
Silas shrugged. “Because I find you intelligent and capable. Beyond that, you are an immensely powerful floromancer, which is exactly what I need.”
“How convenient for—”
“And I enjoy your company,” Silas said, cutting her off.
Silence settled over them for a moment, but Silas did not hedge or attempt to take back what he’d said. He just sat, waiting for Elswyth to respond. When she did not, and instead stood frozen in place, Silas said, “Is that so difficult to believe?”
“No, it’s only—Well, I had supposed that you did not like me very much,” Elswyth said.
“Like is such a flimsy word. Perhaps I do not like you. Perhaps I find you hopelessly irritating. But perhaps I also find your intellect stimulating and your bleak humor a welcome reprieve from the falsities of society. Besides, the issue of my feelings for you is immaterial, because I need your help.”
Elswyth found that her mouth was dry. She didn’t know what to do with Silas’s sudden change in bearing toward her. “With what, exactly?” she said.
“All in due time. Can I count on you?”
Elswyth looked over her shoulder, listening for any sign of Mrs. Rose. “I would consider it. But I’m afraid Mrs. Rose rarely leaves my side. And my uncle and his steward are terrified to let me into the city unsupervised. I will not be able to leave without them noticing.”
Silas stopped investigating Persephone’s bouquet and moved toward the balcony. “That did not stop me, did it? Surely one as clever as you would be able to circumvent a few stodgy old chaperones. Meet me at Trafalgar Square tonight, at midnight.”
Silas took his coat from where he’d left it draped over the balustrade and began putting it on.
A thousand questions came to her mind. “But what shall we be doing? What shall I wear—”
Then Silas Blackthorn jumped from the window.
Elswyth gasped. One minute, he was leaning on the guardrail. The next, he was gone, flipping over the side, headfirst. She ran to the balustrade certain that she would see him smashed upon the ground.
Instead, she watched him lower slowly down—a stalk of ivy extended from the sleeve of his jacket, attached like a rope to the balustrade.
He landed gently on the street outside and then retracted the vine.
It released the stone and then slithered back to him.
She watched it coil around his wrist, vanishing into the sleeve of his coat.
“And don’t be late. Good day, Miss Elderwood.”
And with that, Silas stepped away, donning his hat and disappearing into the passing crowd.
Silas stood before the monument at Trafalgar, waiting.
Elswyth spied him from across the square, a head taller than any around him.
Even at midnight, the square was busy. Constables patrolled the edges, where starving people lingered, hands outstretched, begging for alms. Malcontents lingered in the square, too, jeering at policemen and then vanishing into the alleyways.
The riots over the Reaper murders had only grown worse in the past days, and the news sheets talked of little else.
Sneaking out from under Kehinde’s watchful eye had been difficult, and she’d taken care to ensure he did not know she was gone.
At that very moment, a false Elswyth lay in her bed, made from a cage of carefully crafted branches, complete with long red hair fabricated from wooly fern.
In the right light, it would look convincing—she hoped.
Elswyth walked briskly across the square. She wore a light riding cloak of deep green, set over a simple gown of emerald wool. Perhaps she had taken too long picking her gown. Perhaps she had agonized over her makeup, her hair—but that was of no consequence. She certainly did not do it for Silas.
When Silas spotted her walking across the square, he smiled. Again, with that slow smile: the eyes at first, then the teeth, then the dimples. Even when he let it fall, it lingered as a smirk. His eyes never moved from her as she walked toward him.
“Miss Elderwood. You are late. I almost thought you wouldn’t come.”
“Mr. Ogunlana is a light sleeper, and he surely doesn’t want me sneaking out of the house,” Elswyth said. “I had to climb out the window, down the wisteria vines. I still do not know if I fooled him. He could be out hunting me this very second. And I have seen the way he hunts.”
“Then I suppose it would be best not to delay. Shall we?” Silas said. To her surprise, he extended an arm.
“You want me to take your arm? Isn’t that quite familiar?”
“We would do well to blend in. If we were a married couple, we would attract less attention than an unwed couple walking side by side. But if that makes you uncomfortable…”
“I suppose it is only logical,” Elswyth said. She made sure her hood covered her scar and then took his arm. It would not do to be recognized, and her scar made her easy to spot.