Wicked Little Secrets (13 page)

“And she will be,” her aunt said. “But even more lovely is Vivienne’s kind heart and virtuous nature.” She placed her hand on her Bible and closed her eyes. “As it says in Peter,
Whose
adorning
let
it
not
be
that
outward
adorning
of
plaiting
the
hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel; But let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit.
”

Vivienne wished she could shrink into a little ball and disappear under the carpet. In her mind, she saw herself pressed against Dashiell, wantonly kissing his lips in an alley, and now she was planning a secret meeting. A fine example of her meek spirit and virtuous nature.

Then, as if to add more stones to the already crushing weight of her shame, Aunt Gertrude continued, “Little Vivvie has been so good. You would be very proud of her. She hasn’t gone into the square near that terrible Lord Dashiell, but stays at home improving her mind with the book you kindly gave her.”

“Very good.” John gave Vivienne an approving look. “I am quite pleased to hear that it is making a favorable impression. My future wife should be above reproof.”

“Don’t you mean
reproach
?” Vivienne said.

John arched an eyebrow. “Pardon?”

Vivienne blinked. “I thought… that is… Caesar’s wife Calpurnia had to be above
reproach
. Well, at least that is how the phrase is usually translated. Of course, the Roman leader made this decree and then gallivanted off to Cleopatra’s arms.”

Her aunt gasped. “My dear, you mustn’t correct your husband,” she said. “Why, he is the head of your home, your heart, your mind. You must submit to him in all matters.”

“But-but I am… am…” Vivienne swallowed the word
right
and said “sorry” instead. Studying John’s handsome, rigid face, her married life stretched out before her in a flash, a diet of a thousand unspoken words, sentences, paragraphs burning in her stomach.

“Don’t worry, she’ll learn just the way I did when I married Mr. Bertis,” her aunt told John. “How patient he was, and he taught me the true duties of a wife.” Her thinned lips began to twitch and she reached for the bottle of
Dr. Philpot’s Wonderful Nerve Tonic
beside her Bible, taking a quick swig. “Now perhaps you two would enjoy a walk together. The Lord has made a lovely day.”

“Actually,” Vivienne began, trying to sound casual as her heart raced. “I… I thought I might attend a lecture—a ladies’ lecture at the Royal Academy—”

“Certainly not!” John thundered, his face turning red and severe, like her father’s when Vivienne had upset him.

“But it’s just a lecture—”

“I will not be swayed.” John held up his palm. “There is a particularly offensive exhibit at the Royal Academy. For your own sake, you must not attend. I’m shocked that the Academy would allow such obscene nude art to be publicly displayed.”

Vivienne’s mouth fell open.
You
didn’t look so shocked the other day,
she wanted to fire back.

“Nudity!” Aunt Gertrude fanned her flushing face with her fingers. “I almost let my little Vivvie be exposed to… to… naked limbs and ankles and… and nether regions! Vivienne, you may not go!” She reached for her tonic again and took a large gulp. “London is overcome with pestilence and lewdness, I tell you. What are decent God-fearing people to do? That God in his mercy should destroy it like he did Sodom. Oh, Mr. Vandergrift, I am so glad you are here to guide my little Vivvie. You do so remind me of my dear, dear husband.”

Vivienne made a tiny, choked squeak.

Her aunt gazed up at her husband’s portrait. “He was such a fine man.”

A
fine
man, indeed!
Vivienne thought. A fine lecherous old spanker whose secrets could destroy her family and her future marriage. Now how was she going to get to Old Bailey to meet Dashiell? She needed time to think.

From under the chair, Garth growled.

Vivienne pasted a simpering smile on her lips. “Thank you for protecting me,” she told John. “When will you be returning this evening, so that I might properly prepare my hair to fall in curls as you desire? I do so want to make a good impression on the Montags. I must be perfect for you,” she said, swirling around in her tide pool of guilt and lies. But, she reminded herself, some of her words were quite true. She desperately needed to make a good impression on the Montags. In fact, she truly had to be perfect.

Yet first she had to find a way to hush up the man in the blue coat and his horrible mother, or all the beautiful curls falling on her face couldn’t get John to the altar or keep her father from debtor’s prison.

God, after today, I’m not talking to Dashiell ever again. And this time I truly mean it. Then I’m going to be virtuous and meek and quiet for the rest of my life.

***

Where
is
she?

Dashiell drew out his silver watch: 2:49. One minute had elapsed since he last checked the time. She was now nineteen minutes late. He ran his hand across his chin.

What
if
something
has
happened
to
her?

He peered out onto the street from where he was concealed on a footpath two blocks from Old Bailey. The entire block reeked of unwashed bodies and alcohol. The crowd, a curious assortment of Londoners—from well-dressed clerks to vagrant men in tattered rags—pressed the round brick walls of the court and prison, waiting for word from the trials inside. Everyone’s eyes were wide and shiny, drunk with the anticipation of death. The scene made Dashiell think of the human sacrifice rituals of certain indigenous peoples, when the great sky gods came down and filled the bodies of the natives, making them sing and dance about fires.

What was his thinking last night? Kissing Vivienne had turned his brain to mush. He should have never agreed to let her come along. He began to pace, berating himself and letting his overactive imagination run wild with the worst scenarios.
If
anything
happened
to
her
… His hands balled into hard rocks, ready to beat to death some would-be assaulter of his little sister.

“Dashiell,” he heard her call. The sound of her voice washed like clean rain over him.

She rushed down the path, her old green cloak flapping behind her. She stopped and pulled back the net concealing her face, over the brim of her straw bonnet. Her cheeks were red and eyes bright from exercise.

“I’m sorry I’m late.” She pressed her palm to her chest, her words tumbling out between great gasps of breath. “I told my aunt and John that I wanted to attend a ladies’ lecture so I could slip away to meet you. John wouldn’t let me go to a lecture at the Royal Academy on account of the Lawrence James exhibit. So that left ‘The Proper Irrigation for Herb Gardens’ at the London Ladies Flower and Garden Society. It started fifteen minutes ago, and then I had to sneak out the back of the building so my aunt’s groom wouldn’t see me leave. I ran all the way here. I only have forty-five minutes.”

“Why didn’t you let me just go by myself?”

“What if you found out some terrible family secret?”

“First of all, if we find something in the written records, by definition, it’s not a secret. And second, your family’s secrets would only be cute cuddly kittens compared to my family’s secrets.”

She surveyed the rowdy throng clotting the street and ran her tongue across her upper lip, thinking. “I’ll go first, and then you come in as if you didn’t know I was there. ‘What a pleasant surprise to see you,’ ‘Imagine meeting you here’ and so forth.”

“Meeting someone in court is hardly a pleasant surprise. It’s more a question of ‘what have you done?’”

She let out a huff of breath and rolled her eyes. “Just don’t make it look like we planned to meet.”

She replaced the net over her face and hurried out onto the street, wedging herself into the crowd. He followed her, immediately ignoring their agreement to accidentally meet in order to swat several roving male hands from her skirt.

Vivienne pushed her way to the gate, where two young guards stood just inside the bars. She raised her net and gave the gentlemen a wide smile. “Pardon me,” she shouted above the commotion. “I desire to read the court records. I’m trying to determine what happened to my dear, lost Uncle Lionel.”

The guard on the right leaned against the gate. His eyes drifted from her face to her bosom. “Sorry luv, we can’t let anyone in ’less they ’ave business wiv the court.”

She forced herself to keep smiling. “As I told you, I do have business.”

“Well then, we will be down to the pub in an hour,” the other guard informed her. “Maybe we could arrange a li’l something special.”

She felt a strong hand squeeze her shoulder. “How about getting your sad arses sent to Calcutta? Is that something she can do for you? I’m Lord Dashiell, and you
will
let in my cousin.” He sounded so cold-blooded he could have said he had business in the court as the murderer. “Now.”

The guards bolted to attention.

“Yes, m’lord.”

As they passed through the tiny courtyard, Vivienne glanced up at Dashiell from the corners of her eyes.

“Imagine meeting you here!” she said in a syrupy voice, her ruse now in shambles. “What a pleasant surprise!” She flashed him hot eyes. “If John learns of this, I’m going to make you find me another husband. Consider it your cousinly duty.”

“Now there’s a real threat. It would be hard to find some poor chap willing to put up with a lady as ramshackle as yourself.”

“Might I remind you that this was
your
idea.”

“Just the part about checking records, not you tagging along and upsetting the guards.”

The entrance hall was clogged with people. The air was humid with pungent human sweat. The place smelled no better than the adjacent Newgate prison. Dashiell held onto her, pulling her through the crush. Inch by inch, they pushed through the crowded entrance hall, coming to a set of stairs where another guard waited.

Vivienne started to politely explain. “Pardon me, I would like to see
The
Pro
—”

“I’m Lord Dashiell.”

The guard bowed. “Very good, m’lord,” he said and gestured for them to pass.

“Is life always this easy for you?” she marveled when they reached the upper story. “Just ‘Hello, I’m Lord Dashiell’ and you get anything you want?”

“Well, sometimes I follow stray ladies to brothels and get beaten up.”

She studied the brown bruise on his jaw, and guilt pricked her heart. Then she saw the laughter lurking at the edges of his mouth. The scoundrel enjoyed teasing her. Despite being London’s premier rake, at this moment, he didn’t seem very different from the boys she and her sisters tormented back at Birmingham. She wrinkled her nose at him and then tossed her head.

Servants dressed in gray livery were carrying trays hoisted high in the air. They streamed into a dining room where a long table was being set with silver and crystal.

Dashiell approached one of the servants. “Do you know where I might find
The
Proceedings
?”

The man jerked his head toward a door at the back of the hall. “Thems clerks can ’elp you, sir.”

Dashiell led her across the hall and into a paneled parlor with a carved mahogany table running down the center. On its surface were three cut-glass bowls filled with fragrant dried flower petals.

By the far wall, a young man sat with his long legs crossed on a leather sofa. He held the
London
Times
before his face.

Vivienne arched a teasing brow at Dashiell. “Go tell him your name, dear cousin,” she whispered.

Dashiell stepped forward and cleared his throat. The man lowered his paper, shooting him an annoyed look through the lenses of his glasses.

“I’m Lord Dashiell,” he declared in the commanding tone that worked on the guards. “And I would like to see
The
Proceedings
.”

The clerk rose and bowed. “I’m sorry, my lord, but our copies are only for the judges.” Then he sat again and returned to his reading, clearly unimpressed by Dashiell’s peerage or his commanding tone.

Dashiell tugged Vivienne’s arm, pulling her into the corridor.

“What are we going to do now?” she cried, feeling bereft after all she had done just to get this far.

“Show the clerk your adorable dimples and tell him, using that sugary voice of yours, that you’re desperate for his help.”

“What? Oh, you’re incorrigible!”

“No, just expedient.”

Before she could retort, he gave her a gentle shove back into the room.

“Pardon me,” Vivienne said, getting the man’s attention. She clasped her hands at her chest. “It’s quite important that I see
The
Proceedings
.” She gave the clerk a sad smile that was just wide enough to make her dimples come out of hiding. As a personal touch, she added a bat of her lashes. “I’m truly desperate. What do you suggest I do?”

The man flushed and his Adam’s apple bobbed. He glanced about the room as if to check for other clerks, and then settled back on Vivienne’s face. “I’m sure they won’t mind if you take a small look.”

“Oh, thank you! I just need to locate some cases involving an Adele Jenkinson. It would be between the years of 1815 and 1839.”

He nodded. “Why don’t you and your…” He looked at Dashiell, who was loitering by the bookshelves.

“Cousin,” she supplied, flicking her hand as if Dashiell meant nothing to her.

The clerk’s eyes brightened. “Why don’t you and your cousin make yourselves comfortable at the table?” He stepped out into the hall.

“Is life always this easy for you?” Dashiell quipped. “Just smile prettily and get anything you want?”