Edith Layton (16 page)

Annabelle was doing sums in her head. “I never needed money, every tradesman knew me, and if not, I could sign my name for everything,” she murmured. “Of course, I usually had some small sum with me, for this and that. And my mama did give me a neat sum before my wedding day, because she worries about me so much. Well, I have most of what you’ll need. But not all.”

“Surely you could ask Miles?” Alyce said. “He
owes you a deal of pin money, doesn’t he? You couldn’t have spent anything while you were ill, and he’s a very generous man.”

“I suppose,” Annabelle muttered, still trying to balance figures in her head.

“Good, then he can give you even more. I knew I could count on you.” Alyce rose from the table. She looked down at Annabelle. “I hope you keep faith and don’t tell him a word of this. I should know it if you did, you know. He could never keep a secret from me. Oh. And if I could have the money by tonight? Thank you, my dear. I feel so much better now.”

Then she wafted from the room, leaving Annabelle to sit baffled and vaguely angry, with no one to tell and nothing to do but swallow her pride and ask her husband for money. She knew it was hers to ask for. But that wasn’t the same as making it an easy thing to do. She, unlike her mother-in-law, hated to ask for favors, especially since her husband had been nothing but charitable to her since she’d married him.

“Oho. So that’s why you married me,” Miles teased when Annabelle, pink-cheeked and hesitant, finally asked him for the money that evening as they were preparing to go down to dinner. “You’re a fortune hunter. Don’t look at me like that. I’m joking,” he said, putting his hands on her
shoulders and shaking her gently. “You could have married the Golden Ball and I know it. I’ve been a dunce. Of course you need your own funds. I should have given you an allowance immediately. As soon as I get to London I’ll set up things with Mr. Greer, my banker. Then you won’t have to come to me for money. Just apply to him. Now, how much do you need straightaway?”

She told him.

His eyebrow rose. But he cut off whatever she was about to add. “Fine,” he said. “Do you need it now?”

She nodded.

He seemed puzzled, but let her go and went to his wardrobe. He opened a drawer and took out his wallet. “No,” he said, as he sorted through it, “I don’t carry that kind of money, but I do have it in the safe downstairs. You need it tonight?”

“Yes,” she said, now ruddy-cheeked. “Please. So I don’t have to remind you, or ask you again. This is hard enough for me!”

“I’ll go down and get it. I’ll be right back. Is that soon enough? Oh, Belle,” he said more gently. He came to her and pulled her into his arms again. “Such a proud lady,” he whispered into her ear. “Don’t look so miserable. I’m the one who ought to be embarrassed for not thinking of it first.”

“Do you give your mama and Camille an al
lowance?” she asked, trying to sound casual about the question.

“I do,” he said, and told her how much.

Her eyes widened. She wouldn’t worry about Alyce’s finances again, though she wondered how such a restrained woman had allowed herself to go wild and play so deep.

“All right? You’re assured that everyone in your world is now fiscally sound?” He chuckled. “I’ll be right back,” he said, released her, and went out the door.

Annabelle sighed. She hated keeping anything from him; it felt like cheating. But she was buying her mother-in-law’s friendship. Perhaps one day she could tell him about it, and they’d laugh. Or sigh. As long as they did it together.

Miles returned with the money and handed it to Annabelle. She accepted it gingerly, as though it were tainted.

He didn’t know what to say, for she looked beyond embarrassed—she looked ill again. “Here, now,” he said softly, putting a finger under her chin and tipping up her downcast head. “Pride is all very well, but I am supposed to support you, you know. I’m the one who ought to be ashamed. I should have made provisions for you immediately. You never should have had to ask it of me.”

“Thank you,” she said quietly.

“Well,” he said, looking uncomfortable, “speaking of funds, I think I’ll just go down and
have a word with Bernard about his latest requests. They’re nothing like yours, my dear. You don’t have a heavy hand on the dice and too many on the cards, as he does.” He chuckled. “Put away your money and your sad face, Belle; I’ll see you at dinner.”

When he left, Annabelle went to her bureau and took out the small store of money she’d stowed in a leather purse. She added the notes Miles had given her and closed it. Then she went to the door, opened it slowly, and looked down the hall. Seeing no one, she stepped out, and holding the money close to her breast, she went swiftly down the hall to Alyce’s bedchamber.

She tapped on the door. Then she stepped back in surprise, because Alyce herself, and not her maidservant, immediately cracked open the door.

“I saw Miles go down on the way to his study,” Alyce whispered. “I’ve been expecting you. Do you have it?”

Annabelle held out the packet.

“Good,” Alyce said, taking it. “Thank you,” she said briskly, and closed the door in Annabelle’s face.

Annabelle gaped at the closed door, as hurt as she was puzzled. Then she straightened. She took a deep breath, then turned, her face burning, and marched toward the stair.

She’d paid a great deal of money but it was worth it. It had bought her a decision.

Dinner was even livelier than usual that night. Camille couldn’t stop praising the twin foals they’d seen that morning and started a spirited conversation on their merits and prospects. Conversation at Miles’s table never flagged, which was one of the things that Annabelle discovered she liked very much about her new family. They talked almost as much as her own mother did.

It wasn’t until later, during a brief silence as Camille and Bernard fell on their desserts, that Annabelle could make her announcement.

“Guess what?” she told Camille gaily. “It was to be a surprise but I can’t hold it in a moment longer. We’re going to London next week! With Miles.”

Miles cocked his head to the side and looked at his wife as Camille gasped. “Oh, that’s jolly good news!” she caroled, “Isn’t it, Mama?”

Alyce looked politely surprised.

Bernard began complaining about being sent off to school with such fun in the offing.

Annabelle shot a glance at Miles. She was delighted to see that he was smiling back at her, looking pleased with her decision.

“I’ll need Nancy to come with me, Miles,” Camille was saying. “I have to have her. Mama wants to get me a fine French maid, but I’d be lost without my Nancy. She knows my likes, and what I don’t like is having to please a new maid as well
as the rest of the new world I’ll be meeting. At least let me be comfortable at home. Say I can bring her, please?”

“I don’t have to be at school early,” Bernard was insisting, “I can go to London first with you, can’t I?”

“How delightful,” Alyce’s cool voice cut in. “I must immediately start to get things in train for such an unexpected journey. Bernard, you will certainly go to school. Don’t you agree, Miles? Camille, you don’t have to bother your brother. I never said you couldn’t bring Nancy, only that we will need to have your hair done by someone expert, in London. Oh, and Miles, I shall need extra funds to get such things done quickly. There will be many such expensive necessities, and so I’ll require a great deal of money too, I’m afraid.”

“You can put it all on my account, as usual, Mother,” Miles said wryly. “My credit is very good, even in London.”

“But I shall need a great deal for the little things, since there will be a great many of them,” Alyce said.

Annabelle shot a look at her, but the older woman didn’t acknowledge it by so much as a blink.

“It’s all very well that your credit is good, but I shall need cash funds,” Alyce went on. “Gratuities for servants, pourboires for dressmakers, incentives for them to get gowns fitted faster. A bit more
money can get one shown the best fabrics, and the latest acquisitions at any glovers or mantua makers. Extra bits for extra service, you know the sort of thing.”

“Thank God, I do not.” Miles laughed. “But don’t worry, I’ll see you well financed for Camille’s assault on the town.”

“London!” Camille crooned. “I can’t wait to be there!”

Annabelle gave her mother-in-law a curious look before she said, “No, neither can I.” And meant it.

S
he couldn’t believe she could be so happy again. She didn’t know if she deserved to be this happy, but Annabelle felt as if she were flying instead of riding in a coach on the way to London. She was still alive after being almost dead, and she grew stronger every day. She’d married for convenience and to save face, and discovered herself married to a man who was becoming more important to her every day. He was handsome, clever, and kind. His touch made her feel things she never imagined, and his words healed her spirit. Most amazing of all, it seemed he approved of her even though she was no longer a beauty or toast of the town she was now driving through. And now she was in her heart’s home once more.
There’d been a time when she’d thought she’d never see it again.

It didn’t matter if she had to hide, this was a place where she could hide and see.

“London!” Annabelle exulted, staring out the coach window. “Just look! Isn’t it wonderful?”

“All that enthusiasm! But it’s nothing new to you,” Miles said with a smile. “That’s for Camille to say.”

“I’m too boggled to speak,” Camille breathed from the other window, watching the traffic, the street criers, the crowds of people, all the bustle and commotion of noonday London.

“I never get tired of seeing it,” Annabelle said. “Look! It’s just the same, even though I’ve been gone for what seems like forever!”

Miles’s smile faded.

“But it isn’t the same now,” Alyce told Annabelle gently. “At least not for you, my dear.”

Miles’s head swung around, he stared hard at his mother.

“My goodness!” she said, one hand to her heart. “What a fierce expression. What did you think I meant, Miles? I was only reminding Annabelle that she’s a married woman now. I was not remarking on how her looks have changed, only her marital state. Still glowering at me? Oh my! You never think I’m commenting on her reputation for flirting? I know she’ll be the most faithful of wives. Oh dear, I’m only making it worse,
aren’t I?” Her eyes began to water. “One has to watch one’s every word these days,” she mumbled into a handkerchief. “And that only makes matters worse. It makes me misspeak. I’d never intentionally hurt your wife’s feelings.”

Not when you do so well unintentionally
, Annabelle thought, as Miles said wearily, “I know, please don’t cry, Mama.”

“He’s right,” Annabelle said, “Don’t fuss, Mrs…Proctor,” she said, hoping she’d remembered the name correctly. “I understood exactly what you meant.”

The other woman’s eyes widened. “‘Mrs. Proctor’?”

Annabelle hid a grimace. “Should you rather I call you Mother too?” she asked quickly.

“Oh my dear, but that makes me feel ancient.”

“Then what would you have me call you?” Annabelle asked, wondering if she was the only one to think this was a very strange conversation to be having after three months of marriage to the woman’s son. But now she realized she’d never addressed her by name before, or had any cause to do so. Their conversations were brief, impersonal, and infrequent.

“Variations of mama won’t do, for you have a mama,” Alyce said. “And as you know, my marriage to Mr. Proctor was not the happiest. I should rather you didn’t call me that. Alyce would be fine, don’t you think?”

“Alyce, then,” Annabelle said, privately vowing to go on as she had been, and never to speak to the woman using any name unless she had to. Alyce had accepted the money Annabelle gave her with only a brief thanks. Then she’d said a cool good night. She’d never mentioned the matter again. But if Annabelle had hoped her favor would win favor, she was very wrong. Nothing had changed between the two of them, except their location.

“Is that Hyde Park we’re passing?” Camille asked excitedly. “I can’t wait to go riding in it. Is it true the best of the bloods can be seen there?”

“Yes, the Corinthians,” Miles said, “as well as other fashionable and would-be fashionable men.”

“No,” Camille said with a laugh. “I meant the horses, not the gents!”

Annabelle and Miles exchanged amused looks, but Alyce scolded her daughter. “The
first
thing you must do is get the right clothes so you can even set foot out the door. We’ve come to introduce you to society, which was your brother’s entire purpose in mar—” She caught herself and, looking at Annabelle, went on, “making the move to bring you to London, after all.”

“Well, that’s all right and tight,” Camille said smugly. “Belle knows all the best places to go to get me spruced up. I’ll get togged out like a royal princess in no time. Then can we go to the park, Belle? I don’t want to stop our walks even though
my rotten brother would only let me take two dogs to London. Both Muffin and Rags will need the exercise as much as we do.”

Annabelle didn’t dare look at Miles, but knew he must be suppressing a smile too. She wondered what Alyce would say about Camille’s plan. A lady could stroll in the park with a pug in her arms or a small spaniel or terrier on a lead. Muffin and Rags were endearing names, but the actual dogs were two big, rangy country-bred retrievers that Camille had saved from extinction. They were too enthusiastic for the hunt and not steady enough for any kind of work. But they were, even so, the best behaved of Camille’s kennel.

“No,” Alyce said, as Annabelle had expected. But what she said next made Annabelle go rigid. “Annabelle cannot, or rather ought not go with you. The purpose of this visit is to make you acceptable to the
ton.
”

Miles’s expression grew thunderous as his mother went on obliviously, “Our Annabelle’s appearance will cause so much talk that you will be quite overlooked, I’m afraid.”

“Mother!” Miles roared.

Camille appeared stricken and looked to Annabelle for help.

“No, she’s right,” Annabelle said, putting up a hand to silence Miles. “I agree. In fact, I made my plans accordingly. I want Camille to have the best time of her life and find a good husband too. But if
her entry on the scene is in the shadow of the appearance of the once beautiful, now ravaged Lady Annabelle, it will definitely be overlooked. I know,” she told him, “I’m not a gargoyle. But I will be commented on, and you know it. It’s not something I look forward to, and in truth, I’m not sure I can bear it just yet. Don’t worry, I won’t go into hiding, at least not for very long.”

He stared at her.

She shook her head. “Miles, I wouldn’t have come here if I planned to do that. It’s just that I’d rather make my grand reentrance after Camille does. I think that would be better even if I hadn’t…had such an interesting illness. At any rate, I might be myself again by the time we introduce Camille. If so, I’ll go with her, and that way I’ll squash all gabble about me so people can concentrate on her instead. And if not? Well, whatever I am, and however I look,” she said with some of her old arrogance, “I’ll deal with it. In the meanwhile, we can do it all anyway. Camille can be outfitted without me being seen with her. The modistes can bring fabrics and patterns to our house, and—”

“But I wanted to go with you to see the shops and the models and everything you told me about,” Camille wailed. “The fashions don’t mean that much to me. I wanted to have fun talking about it with you! You’d know all the people too, so you could tell me about them, and we’d have
such a good time together. Mama, you’re game to go, I know,” she said before her mother could protest. “But Belle knows so much more about what’s fashionable right now.”

“I can certainly learn,” Alyce said stiffly.

“I have the best idea!” Annabelle said, warding off the coming storm. “I know a woman who knows everything about the latest fashions and is a wonderful judge of style, as well as being good company who knows all the latest gossip too. Not only does she have a lot of time on her hands, but she said she’d like to take charge of your come-out. I planned to see her this afternoon if we came in on time. You can come with me. And best of all,” she added as Alyce realized who she was talking about and fell silent, “no one can say my mama will overshadow you.”

Camille grinned.

Miles suppressed the urge to applaud.

Annabelle was as nervous about her appointment with Harry Selfridge as she was about meeting anyone she knew on the way to see him. She’d scheduled a time when he promised there would be no other patients waiting. Even so, Annabelle wore a long pelisse and a coal scuttle bonnet that hid most of her face, and she scurried from her carriage to the office in his neat town house. Miles came with her, for he wouldn’t hear of her going alone.

Harry’s nurse, a tall, thin, dour female, went to tell him of Annabelle and Miles’s arrival. The surgeon came out of his office at once and greeted them anxiously.

“My lady,” he said, taking Annabelle’s hand, trying to peer into the recesses of the shadow of her bonnet. “Please come into my consultation room and tell me what pains you.”

“I’m not in any pain,” she said at once, then laughed. “Well, perhaps I am, but it’s only my conceit that hurts now. I’ve lost my looks, and I’m such a vain creature that it nearly kills me!”

“Let me see,” he said seriously. “If you’d come into my consultation room, take off your bonnet and your coat, so I may?”

Annabelle nodded.

“Miles, would you rather wait outside?” Harry asked.

“Must I?” he asked in return.

The doctor looked at Annabelle.

“There isn’t much my husband hasn’t seen,” she said sadly. “No sense in my hiding from him now.”

Harry’s consultation room was dominated by a long wooden examining table. It also held a bureau with all his implements on view, and a long cabinet with dozens of bottles of liquids, dusty compounds, and what looked like bits of vegetables and seeds. Sunlight streamed in through long tall windows and a skylight overhead. Annabelle’s nostrils pinched at the strong scent of some
herbal potion that filled the room, and her eyes narrowed at the sight of all the medical tools. But she let Miles help her off with her pelisse. She took off her bonnet, averted her eyes from the evil-looking physician’s devices laid out on the top of the bureau, and then stood, head down, in the sunlight.

Miles dug his hands into his pockets and waited, trying to see her as the doctor did. She’d looked healthier to him these past weeks than she did now. Now, silent, stripped of her personality, she looked only as she physically was, with none of her airs and graces to divert him. She seemed very different, and he was appalled that he’d allowed her to come to London at all.

Her head still appeared too large for her slender body, and that proud head looked strangely pathetic adorned only with the meager fleece that had grown back in. Miles felt ashamed of having made any kind of love to her. Clearly, she was a long way from well.

But Harry was delighted.

“Very good,” he said, as he circled around her. “Excellent! Now, if you’d please take a seat on my examining table, so I can have a better look?”

Harry listened to her heart and looked at her hands; he had her cough, he made her flex muscles; he examined her tongue and the soles of her feet.

“Brilliant!” he said at last, with a proud smile. “Everything is as it ought to be. Continue what
ever it is you’ve been doing. I hope Mrs. Farrow sent along a good amount of her specifics for you to take here in London?”

Annabelle laughed. “A satchel full, and almost another filled with her instructions.”

“Good. Be sure to eat plenty of eggs and drink fresh milk, get enough sleep and exercise moderately, and never hesitate to send to me to ask any other questions.” He cleared his throat, and avoiding Miles’s eye, said, “Your courses are returned and regular again?”

“They have, and are,” Annabelle said.

“Very well,” Harry said. “I think you should keep up the doses of cod’s liver oil to give your hair sheen.”

Annabelle made a face.

“I agree,” Harry said. “Vile stuff, but effective. Your hair’s getting thick, so let’s give it back some luster. It will take time, but I see no reason why it shouldn’t be exactly as it was before, by Christmas, at the very least.”

Annabelle sighed. Autumn had only just started, Christmas seemed a long way off.

“But otherwise, avoid drafts, get sufficient sleep, don’t skip meals, and have them at the same time every day,” Harry told her. “You may indulge in drink, in moderation. In fact, beer and ale will be good for you. And see me again in another month. Now, I’ll let you put on your hat
again—though letting sun and air on your scalp will do you more good. Miles, I know you’ve seen all, but at least you can let your lady put herself to rights by herself?”

Miles grinned and went out the door with Harry. Once the door closed, he turned to his friend. “Now, tell me,” he said seriously, “is what you told her the truth?”

Harry looked affronted. “I never lie to my patients, unless they’re going to die, of course. Doesn’t help to tell them that. But your lady is doing wonderfully well.”

Miles cleared his throat. “Well enough for…marital matters?”

“Oh,” Harry said, looking at his friend with an odd expression.

“What’s the matter?” Miles asked.

“Nothing to do with your lady,” Harry said quickly. “It’s just that I’ve never known you to be so mealymouthed when it comes to sexual matters. And you a navy man! Marriage certainly has changed you.”

“If and when you stop chuckling,” Miles said sourly, “do you suppose you might answer me?”

“No, I know of no impediments. She was sick, but she’s not now.”

“Not well enough for childbearing though.”

“Oh, you have a medical practice now?” Harry asked archly. “I’d no idea. But no, I never said
that. She’s healthy, if not in the pink of health as she was when you married her. But if you choose to wait, I don’t have to tell you the alternatives that can bring you some surcease, and your lady similar comfort, if she wants that, of course. Otherwise, I’d suggest you find another…well, never mind what I’d suggest,” he added, as Miles’s expression grew thunderous.

“Then, too,” Harry went on, “often a husband’s attentions will do wonders for a woman’s spirits. And she did say her vanity was bruised.” He looked at Miles. “Shall I spell it out, or would you prefer a book? I have a little volume put by for just such occasions, with illustrations too. It’s by an ancient Hindu chap. It’s not for the ladies, but it is, in a way.”