A Sinister Establishment

by Lynn Messina

  Even England’s most zealous pedant had his limits.

  She smothered the giggle that rose in her throat and marveled again at the wonder of marrying a man whose thoughts aligned so perfectly with her own. Yielding partially to sentiment and partially to the strain of mischievousness she didn’t know she possessed before confronting the Duke of Kesgrave in the Skeffingtons’ darkened library, she decided to comply with his request to make a change to the ceremony. Clearly, he had not thought the matter through, for if he had paused for even a moment to consider the impact on their guests, he would never have made the suggestion.

  Patiently, Bea listened to Mr. Bertram’s seemingly endless litany of vows—obey, serve, love, honor, keep, forsake—and agreed to abide by them all. Then she announced she had one minor alteration to make.

  The minister looked up from his prayer book and raised a quizzical brow. “An alteration?”

  Bea nodded soberly. “I would like to add a vow.”

  Much taken aback by this presumption, the clergyman tilted his head to the side and sought to confirm that he had heard her correctly. “You would like to add a vow?”

  “I would, yes,” she said, her tone mildly conversational as if discussing something utterly benign like the weather. “If you would be so kind, please say, ‘Wilt thou vow to cease investigating the horrible deaths that keep crossing thy path?’ Then I will answer, ‘I will.’”

  The effect this entreaty had on the company was immediate—of course it was. To tinker with the Book of Common Prayer was already an intolerable impertinence but to suggest such a shocking addition was the height of impudence! The temerity of inserting the wretchedness of death into a joyful event! The audacity of undermining the sanctity of marriage with irreverent humor!

  Mr. Bertram glowered fiercely at the bride before directing his passionate disapproval at the dowager for allowing such disrespect to prosper in her drawing room. Her grace opened her mouth to protest the unspoken accusation but failed to say anything coherent. Flora giggled knowingly, Lady Abercrombie clucked censoriously, and Russell called out, “I say, Bea, that’s not quite the thing.” Nuneaton murmured, “Brava,” while Uncle Horace looked around as if not entirely sure what had just happened.

  But it was Aunt Vera’s response—a gasp of horror so deeply felt it seemed to rise from the tips of her toes—that caused Bea to look up at her husband and grin impishly.

  Chapter Two

  To say that Beatrice flinched every time someone in her new home addressed her as “your grace” would be overstating the case. When, for example, Kesgrave brushed an errant lock out of her eyes, smiled down at her—his own normally kempt appearance in equal disarray from recent activities—and asked softly, “Are you happy, your grace?” she did not recoil in the slightest. No, indeed, the very opposite, for she responded by pressing her body closer to his and demonstrating the extent of her delight.

  No, the first hint of a wince happened many hours later, when the housemaid who delivered her breakfast tray greeted her with an excess of deference, dropping into a deep curtsey, avoiding eye contact and punctuating every utterance with “your grace.”

  Good morning, your grace.

  Your breakfast, your grace.

  Plum cake, your grace.

  Tea, your grace.

  Your grace, your grace, your grace.

  By the time the young woman had left the room, the languid peace Bea had felt upon waking in Kesgrave’s arms had been replaced by a fluttery agitation she could not quite squelch.

  She made a determined effort, of course, smiling brightly when Kesgrave returned to the bedchamber dressed informally in breeches, a white muslin shirt and waistcoat. It helped, no doubt, that her pulse quickened at the site of his handsome figure and while he was in the room, she could think of nothing but how lovely he looked without his shirt….

  Eventually, however, rationality returned and with it the keen understanding that the deference displayed by the maid had not been excessive. The very opposite, in fact: It had been exactly in line with her due as a duchess.

  Assailed by the consequence, Bea had flinched.

  An hour later, when another maid entered the extravagant dressing room employing her title with daunting repetition, Bea blanched visibly, a reaction the servant was too well trained to notice. To her surprise, the young woman held in her arms a gown from Bea’s own wardrobe in Portman Square, and although Bea was relieved to don something worn and familiar, she was just as uneasy with the effortless way the garment had appeared in her new home. She’d imagined—naively, it seemed now—paying a call on number nineteen to pack her belongings herself while Flora peppered her with questions about the wonders of Kesgrave House and Aunt Vera bemoaned the difficulties of overseeing a very large staff.

  Without question Bea was grateful to be spared the obligation of performing the chore, but she could not fully embrace the convenience of having someone else perform it for her. It was, she thought, a reasonable indication of what life would be like with the duke, and while many women would eagerly welcome the prospect of a path strewn with rose petals, she couldn’t help but feel that being spared discomfort was in itself a type of discomfort.

  Naturally, the utter ridiculousness of the complaint—imagine chafing at the notion of too much ease!—struck her forcefully, and as she submitted to the maid’s ministrations, Bea resolved to confront her fate with unwavering stoicism. The elevation in her station warranted adjustment, to be sure, but ultimately the changes would be superficial, for it was not her innermost self that had to alter. She had earned Kesgrave’s ardent regard by simply being herself, and it would be illogical of him to wish she were someone else now.

  No, all he required was that she grow accustomed to the unmatched grandeur of his existence. It was an attainable goal, easily accomplished with only a small amount of effort, unlike earning her aunt’s and uncle’s approval, a difficult task made impossible by the prejudices the pair had borne against her and her parents for decades. For the vast majority of her life, she had striven to make herself worthy of their love, shrinking deeper and deeper into herself in the hopes of one day becoming so inoffensive she would please them.

  In comparison, learning to tread lightly on rose petals was a stroll through Hyde Park on a spring afternoon.

  Bea felt truly reassured by the thought, and yet when the maid finished dressing her hair and said, “I am done, your grace,” she cringed.

  She simply could not help it.

  And when she looked at her image in the mirror—at her plain brown hair arranged in elaborate curls that framed her narrow face—she felt a wild compulsion to tear out the pins one by one and stamp on them with all her might until they were dust on the floor.

  It was too much, the incongruity of her appearance, her cheeks suddenly flushed, her curls suddenly shiny, her eyes suddenly bright. It was almost as if she were staring at a stranger, and to experience that sensation on this morning, when she had woken up already feeling slightly altered, made Bea feel as though she had been supplanted by someone else: a bride, a wife, a duchess.

  ’Twas a dismaying sensation, as unanticipated as it was unwelcome. If anything, she had worried it would be Kesgrave who would be vaguely transformed by their union. With the obligatory courtesies of courtship behind him and the manifold privileges of a husband before him, it would not be wholly inexplicable if he began to perceive her as something of a possession, as one more thing he owned like the lavish house in Berkeley Square or the many estates that dotted the countryside.

  The insidious idea had wormed its way into her consciousness late in the night after the last candle had flickered out and her eyes had fluttered shut. Reasonably, she knew the fear was unfounded, and yet her exhausted mind could find no way to reconcile feeling so possessed with not actually being possessed.

  But it was morning now and Kesgrave was as familiar as ever—even the curled lock of blond hair had fallen perfectly into place on his forehead—while sh
e looked a little bit like someone else.

  Throwing a tantrum over her slightly altered appearance would do nothing to alleviate her disquiet. Indeed, it would only exacerbate it, for what a fine picture it would make, the new duchess indulging a fit of temper as her first official act. What a flurry of gossip it would cause in the servants’ hall and rightly so. Poor, beleaguered Kesgrave, tethered to an irrational termagant who could not glance into a looking glass without kicking up a fuss and venting her spleen on an innocent assortment of hairpins that had been in the family for generations.

  How quickly the once great name had been corrupted by an unsuitable bride.

  It would never have happened if he had adhered to the original plan and brought home the beautiful and unbearably elegant Lady Victoria.

  Oh, but the humiliation would not end there, with the officious and appalled chatter of the domestic staff. There would be other consequences, for the maid—Dolly, her name was Dolly—would find the exhibition deeply agitating and assume she was somehow responsible for the outburst. Determinedly, Bea would assure her that she had done nothing wrong, but the girl, trained in deference from the cradle, would be unconvinced by the truth. The housekeeper, equally unmoved, would terminate the girl’s employment unceremoniously, and now Bea, on her very first morning of her very first day as a duchess, would be responsible for the penury and inevitable life of privation of one perfectly lovely young maid who had the misfortune to perform her duties with slightly more skill than her new employer could handle with equanimity.

  Bea realized she was being absurd again, for if there was one advantage to her new station if was the ability to override housekeepers. As the Duchess of Kesgrave it was her prerogative to keep on her staff all the egregiously competent maids she wanted. All the same, it was a salutary reminder of how drastically her situation had changed. Miss Hyde-Clare could stamp on as many hairpins as she’d like to no effect. Not even Aunt Vera would raise an eyebrow, except perhaps to note the impropriety of a young lady jumping in response of anything other than the bidding of her betters and bemoan the frightful cost of hairpins.

  Imagining her relative’s familiar disapprobation soothed Bea’s nerves considerably, and she managed to contain her apprehension long enough to thank Dolly for her efforts. She even congratulated the maid on her enviable proficiency without mentioning sow’s ears and silk purses.

  Pleased with the compliment, Dolly tilted her eyes down as she curtsied. “My pleasure, your grace.”

  Bea flinched.

  Bristling with apprehension, she nevertheless straightened her shoulders and stiffened her spine with a resolution she was far from feeling. In the adjoining dressing room, the clock struck eleven, and although it was foolhardy to ascribe malevolence to an inanimate object, she felt quite convinced the timepiece was mocking her timidity. The morning was half gone, and she had yet to emerge from her bedchamber.

  It was insupportable—the cowardly display.

  Surely, she was made of sterner stuff than her poor showing would indicate. She recalled the terrifying moment in the Skeffingtons’ library when she believed the Duke of Kesgrave was seconds away from bashing in her skull with a candlestick. On that occasion, she had resolved to meet death without cowering.

  How, then, could she cower now while meeting the household staff?

  To even compare the situations was lunacy, she knew, for a vicious murder bore no relation to a slightly awkward interaction with one’s retainers. That her mind linked the two indicated a diminished ability to produce lucid thoughts.

  The room itself did little to improve her mental acuity. Its sumptuous furnishings—the rosewood chaise longue with brass inlay, the tufted window seat with embroidered silk, the gilt mirror with its scrollwork top—spoke of lavish wealth and five hundred years of Empire. Everywhere she looked, she was reminded of rose petals.

  She could not calmly remain there, waiting for Kesgrave to strew her path. It was the height of hypocrisy, was it not, to claim to desire discomfort and then immediately shrink at the first hint of it.

  Inhaling deeply, she rose to her feet and strode purposefully to the door.

  If it were done when ’tis done, she thought, then ’twere well it were done quickly.

  After a moment’s consideration, she settled on the servants’ quarters as her destination. She would first attempt to earn the approval of the housekeeper before taking on the gargantuan challenge of ingratiating herself with the butler, Marlow, whose mien was as intimidating as his size.

  If she and the duke had held true to their original wedding date, then the new mistress of Kesgrave House would have arrived in Berkeley Square to find the household staff assembled in a neat row to meet her properly.

  Nothing, however, about their courtship had gone according to plan—and a good thing too, Bea thought, for the rules governing social interactions did not allow for a spinster to woo a duke. But, as always, it was the servants who suffered for the lack of conventionality and, it must be said, consideration. Having had the presence of mind to ensure Bea’s mother’s bracelet was present at the proceedings, the groom failed to account for other, more mundane matters and overlooked the step wherein he alerted the household staff of his immediate nuptials.

  In consequence, Mrs. Wallace had turned a bright pink yesterday upon discovering that she was greeting the new Duchess of Kesgrave in her second-best apron.

  Flustered, the estimable woman swiftly regained her composure, welcomed her warmly and provided a light collation in the drawing room, complete with the tea cakes she recalled Miss Hyde-Clare…er, that was, the duchess enjoying the last time she had visited them.

  It was a minor slip, almost too small to be noticed, but the housekeeper’s color rose again, and although her expression did not reveal her thoughts, Bea was convinced the other woman held her responsible for the regrettable breach in etiquette.

  And Kesgrave!

  He had done absolutely nothing to improve the situation. Rather than soothe his housekeeper’s nerves with banal decorum, the notoriously high-in-the-instep duke had chosen that moment to become irreverent and flippant, mortifying Beatrice with his obvious impatience to be alone with her. She had barely raised the hot brew to her lips before he was putting her teacup on the table and insisting she must take a tour of the house.

  “As Mrs. Wallace can attest from intimate firsthand knowledge, Kesgrave House is tediously large, with dozens and dozens of rooms,” he had said, standing with such grace and purpose, Bea felt her stomach flutter in anticipation. “My forbearers were a pompous lot who sought to cow their detractors with an overwrought display of abundance. A deplorable practice, I assure you, for the brighter the plumage, the slighter the bird. Therefore, I am now burdened with an exceptionally large house with an excessive number of rooms, and if we have any hope of concluding our tour before nightfall, we must begin now. I am sure Mrs. Wallace understands.”

  Oh, yes, Mrs. Wallace had understood. Her visage revealed not a hint of comprehension, but she perceived exactly the reason for his haste, and Bea’s cheeks turned a seething shade of scarlet in response.

  ’Twas excruciating, having the servants know her business, and somehow the housekeeper’s studied blandness was more painful than the meaningful look Lady Abercrombie had darted in her direction when Kesgrave announced their intention to leave the luncheon the dowager had laid immediately following the toast to their happiness.

  Her eyes firmly fixed to the floor, Bea allowed the duke to lead her from the room.

  True to his word, Kesgrave had provided her with a cursory tour of her new home, drawing her attention to noteworthy rooms (“My study, of course, with its generous use of mahogany to spur deep thinking”) and notable artworks (“The Origin of the Milky Way, one of three paintings Correggio did based on the myth of Hercules, which my grandfather acquired on his grand tour”).

  She was still challenging his claim that the third duke had smuggled the large Grecian urn in the second-flo
or hallway out of the Palais des Tuileries by requiring his footman to impersonate a hunchback (“Naturally, I would not expect the Duc d’Orléans’s valet to have seen a man with a hump before but presumably he was familiar with the porcelain vase that occupied the lintel in the drawing room”) when Kesgrave paused beside the open door to his bedchamber.

  “And now, my love,” he said on a sigh of deep satisfaction as he pressed his lips softly against her forehead, then her cheek. “And now I promise you will have no cause to take issue with my propensity to be slightly too thorough.”

  Although her heart tripped in excitement, she managed to say with arch condescension, “Slightly, your grace?” before murmuring in the wrong order the names of three warships that had appeared in the Battle of the Nile.

  For once, he had made no effort to correct her.

  Having delivered her to the marital bed, the tour had served its function well, but that was where its practical usefulness ended, for as she stepped into the corridor now, she realized she had no idea where to go. She remembered a grand staircase, elegant white marble lined with a delicately carved balustrade, but did not know if it lay to the left or the right.

  She could not even recall where the Grecian urn was.

  Near the Gainsborough landscape of the cows drinking from a pond. What had Kesgrave called it? The Watering Place.