Anne trembled at his fury. Trying for a tone of calm, she said, “I understand your concern, but Clary is no—”
“How do you know what my mother is? You and your friends . . . the Birkenheads,” he said, spitting their name out of his mouth like it was bile. “In truth, more than Alfred, I blame them for all for this.”
“What? How . . . ?” Anne, puzzled, stared at him alarmed and perplexed. “I do not understand.”
“Do you not know of Alfred’s loathsome, disgraceful . . . habits?” That word too was spat out as if it were some much more disagreeable term.
As she had suspected, he knew of Lonsdale’s predilection for the male over the female. “I will not pretend to misunderstand you, Mr. Basenstoke,” she said, with a haughty rise of her chin. “But I certainly do not see what that has to do with Bertie and Alethea, unless it is because they offered Mr. Lonsdale a place of refuge, which I now understand, given your cruelty, may have been a necessary haven away from your vile disgust.” Or perhaps a protection from actual physical danger; the image of Mr. Basenstoke offering a cup of poisoned tea to Mr. Lonsdale vividly rose in Anne’s mind. She could envision him doing it. Or . . . could she? Poison? That was sly and sneaking. He would be far more likely to strangle Alfred in a passion than poison him.
His expression had chilled to ice. “You know nothing. Go, ask your friends . . . ask your Bertie about his friendship with Alfred. Ask him.”
“What are you saying?”
“I am saying you should ask your dear friend, Mr. Bertram Birkenhead, about his friendship with Alfred, his close close friendship! Ask your friend about the Sacred Theban Club. Men share vital information, you know; we have noticed this foul stain on the face of our city. It disgusts us all, my friends and business acquaintances! If they don’t disband I will personally call on the magistrate to root out such a morally bankrupt institution.”
The carriage arrived. Roger had already turned and was striding away into the shadowy interior, going back to berate and badger his mother, no doubt.
“Mr. Basenstoke!” she called out. He turned and regarded her, his gaunt face a mask of impatience and anger. As much as she wished to rail against him, she must attempt a conciliatory tone if she was to keep him from precipitous action. “I would ask, as concerns Mr. Smythe and your mother . . . I have reason to believe it may not be a problem soon. I agree that she should not marry without knowing more about her fiancé, but . . . give me a day or two. I don’t think she’ll marry in that time.”
“Why do you ask such a favor, my lady?” He strolled back toward her, appearing calmer.
“You know me, Roger; we may not have been close, but you know me to care deeply about your mother, my mother’s closest and beloved friend. Give it a day or two. Be kind to her. Please.” She could not think of another thing to say, because his words about Mr. Lonsdale and Bertie had inspired, in her heart, a sudden trepidation, a violent, lurching doubt. What did she know? What did she not know?
He stared at her through narrowed eyes, but finally took a deep breath and said, “I will not turn Mr. Smythe in . . . yet, and I will never—would never, despite my hasty words—send my mother to an asylum.”
“And you will take no action against this club you spoke of?”
“Why?”
“If we wish to smooth things over with the least amount of nasty gossip concerning Alfred, his purported membership in this club, and if you truly care about your family’s good name, you will help me in this matter. Alfred is dead. Any past he had with the supposed club cannot harm you now, and to stir up trouble will only revive gossip. Please say you will do nothing for the time being.”
Appealing to his familial concerns over gossip had done the task. He nodded, shortly.
“And do not belittle, berate or punish your mother again,” she said, her tone suddenly steely. “She deserves your care and concern, not your anger.”
“You forget yourself, my lady. I have promised not to send her to an asylum. I would never lay a hand on her, but neither will I allow her to make such a grave misstep as to marry so far beneath her.”
• • •
The short trip to the Birkenheads’ townhome was taken up with whirling speculation, fearsome thoughts, worries, frightened wondering. Her friends were home to her, she discovered, as she sent her card in. Trembling, close to collapse, she could go no further than the ground-floor reception room, where, to her surprise, Mrs. Venables was sitting in Quin’s usual chair. The lady was warming herself by the fire, book in one hand, glass of sherry in her other. Anne staggered in and collapsed in the other chair, staring at the fire and seeing not flame but question marks.
“My lady,” Mrs. Venables said, starting up in alarm as she shut the book and set it aside. “Are you ill? How may I help?”
Anne could not respond, she could only stare with unseeing eyes.
“Lady Anne, you’re frightening me,” the lady exclaimed. She pressed her glass of sherry into Anne’s hand and helped her raise it to her mouth. “Take a draught; you look as white as my best notepaper.”
Anne gulped some, sputtered, and sat back.
“Alethea is upstairs; may I summon her for you?” She picked up the bell to ring for the maid.
“No, Mrs. Venables, no, let me sit and think,” Anne said, reaching out and staying her hand, the bell tinkling faintly as the other woman set it down. For the moment, she could not bear to see Bertie or Alethea. She took a deep breath and drank the rest of the sherry, the warming liquid igniting a trail down her throat to her stomach, where it burned. Mrs. Venables refilled the glass and she drank that, too. She sat back in her chair. The whirling had stopped for the moment.
Mrs. Venables watched Anne with a troubled gaze, her clear intelligent eyes clouded by alarm. “My lady, have you heard something that has distressed you?”
She nodded.
“Concerning . . . someone in this household?”
“I was at the Basenstokes’ residence. Mr. Roger Basenstoke is a loathsome man . . . hateful. He disliked Mr. Lonsdale deeply, but more than dislike, he . . . he reviled him, for . . . for his . . . his . . .” She shrugged and shook her head, not knowing how to go on.
“He is one of those who disdain and condemn men who love other men, is that it?”Mrs. Venables said delicately. “And it appears that you know . . . ?”
“That Mr. Lonsdale was one of those men, yes. I have been sorely troubled by his death in this house, among our friends. Mrs. Basenstoke is a dear friend of my mother’s . . . and of me, and she, too, was troubled by his sudden death. She didn’t like the suggestion that Lonsdale’s death was anything but the result of a brief, terrible illness.”
“There has been gossip that what occurred was self-destruction,” Mrs. Venables murmured. She leaned toward Anne. “I have heard it, though I loathe tittle-tattle. It has distressed me, too, for the sake of my cousins, who surely do not deserve how they have been shunned by some in society on the merest speculation. But how did you come to . . . I mean, how did you learn of Mr. Lonsdale’s sad situation?”
“Mrs. Basenstoke learned of his predilection from letters in his room. She summoned me, brokenhearted and fearful of what she might learn. She asked me to help.”
“To help? How?”
“She was desperate for the truth of how he died. I think she, too, feared that he had done away with himself,” Anne said. It was all tumbling out of her. Mrs. Venables was as close to Bertie and Alethea as Anne . . . much closer, in fact, by virtue of old family ties. Perhaps she could help Anne understand where Roger Basenstoke’s nasty insinuations came from. She met the other woman’s sympathetic gaze. Mrs. Venables was calm—serene, even—but there was something there, something she was not saying to Anne.
“I started to ask questions, to try to figure out how it came about . . . his death, I mean. I searched his room, looking for a clue into his fate; I read his journals, and letters from . . . from a gentleman.” She took in a long, deep breath and met
Bella Venables’s frank gaze, in which she saw calm acceptance. “I know of his relationship with Mr. Thomas Graeme.” The lady’s eyebrows rose and a faint smile curved her lips. “But Roger Basenstoke said . . . he implied, rather, that Bertie and Alfred . . .” She shook her head, not knowing how to go on.
Gently, Bella Venables said, “Would you be greatly dismayed if it were true?”
Anne froze and her head spun, dizziness overcoming her again. She put out one hand to steady herself and took a deep breath. “I would be shocked. I have known him for years and never ever suspected. You’re not saying it’s true, are you, that Bertie . . . ?”
“I’m saying nothing,” the woman said. “It is not my place.”
But with that prim refusal to comment she was clearly confirming what Basenstoke had implied, that Bertie and Alfred were more than friends, that there was a relationship between them. “It’s not possible. I won’t believe it.”
“Won’t believe it, or don’t wish to believe it?”
Anne moaned in her throat, trying to grasp what Mrs. Venables was all but saying. “My poor dear Alethea. How shocked she will be when she discovers—”
“Oh, come, my lady, do you think a woman could be married as long as Alethea and not know the truth about her husband?”
Mrs. Venables was right about that; the intimacy of the marriage bed, of the shared secrets, the closeness she envisioned in her own future . . . surely, Alethea must know. “But how can she live with her husband having . . .” She shook her head.
“You’re naïve, Lady Anne,” Mrs. Venables said with a soft smile. “Has it not occurred to you that Alethea not only knows but knew before she wed? That perhaps that is why Bertie and Alethea are the perfect couple?”
Perfect couple; she had called them that herself. Perfectly amicable, perfectly aligned in every way, perfectly in each other’s confidence. Could it be? She was beginning to suspect something she never would have imagined, and as puzzling as it was, it answered many questions.
Mrs. Venables appeared troubled and worried. “I have been so alone in my thoughts, my concerns. It is a relief to speak with someone other than Bertie and Alethea.” She leaped up from the chair and paced to the window, then back, to stand by the fire and warm her hands. She stole a glance at Anne, then back to the fire. “I should have said nothing, but I had no one in whom to confide, not willing to break Bertie and Alethea’s confidence, and now I have babbled. But I trust you, my lady, I know your love of them both. I confess, I feel a certain weight lifted.”
“Weight?”
“The weight of worry, of speculation; when young Lonsdale died right here in Bertie’s home, I worried for my cousin, for what people would say if they found out . . . if their relationship was discovered.”
“What are you saying, madam?”
“Nothing, nothing at all, of course. Nothing.” She paced away from the fire again and covered her face, sobbing into her hands, her breath catching in gasps. She turned back to Anne, her form lost in the shadows of the room beyond the firelight. “I’m profoundly worried for Bertie.” She strode back and collapsed in the chair, burying her face in her hands once again. “He and Lonsdale fought so dreadfully over Alfred’s f-friendships outside of Bertie,” she said, her words muffled. She took them away from her face and clasped them in front of her, wringing them together in agitation. “My cousin was wounded, deeply, by Alfred’s defection. He loved young Lonsdale so intensely. You would not think it, but . . . it’s true.”
“They were . . . lovers?”
“For a time. But Lonsdale fell into an affair with Graeme and then discovered too late that the other man was unworthy. Poor Bertie . . . he was bitterly disappointed in Lonsdale.”
“They fought . . . Bertie and Alfred Lonsdale?” Anne said, caught by the revelation.
Mrs. Venables shook her head. “No, not . . . not fought. I should never have said that. It was arguments, nothing more.”
Still trying to comprehend all she had heard and the possible implications behind Mrs. Venables’s words, Anne frowned and examined her gloves, peeling them off and laying them aside on the table. Her hands were cold. She was icy all over, though her cheeks flamed with heat. What she had learned was difficult to fathom, but it did make sense of some of Alfred’s journal entries, about deep love for someone. “I should go,” she said, her voice sounding hollow and brittle to her own ears.
There was a sound in the hall. “Bella, are you here?” Alethea entered the room. “Oh, Anne, I didn’t hear you come in. Why did you not come up to me? I could use a friend today.” Alethea looked at her, then at Bella Venables, then back to Anne. “What has happened? Why are . . . what . . . ?” She examined Anne’s face. Whatever she saw there was enough. “Who told you?” she said, her tone hollow, her expression dull.
“Roger Basenstoke said something, and then . . .” She glanced at Mrs. Venables.
“Bella! How could you? We trusted you,” Alethea cried.
Anne jumped up. “Alethea, I am your bosom friend from childhood. How could you not . . . I don’t know what to think.” What did she think? Bella had implied much more than Anne would ever have imagined otherwise, and now she was deeply confused.
“Lady Anne came here knowing some of it, anyway, about Bertie and Alfred.” Bella shrugged. “It was out before I knew it.”
“I don’t need this now,” Alethea said. She fled the room, racing upstairs.
“Alethea, Alethea!” Anne cried.
“Let her go,” Mrs. Venables said. “Poor child . . . she has much to worry about.”
“What do you mean?”
“She worries about Bertie, of course.”
“Why?” Anne asked, even as she thought of reasons to worry. She remembered how angry Bertie appeared at Alfred as they argued about Thomas Graeme, and Bertie evicted the young man from his home. She had always thought of her friend as a calm thoughtful soul, but she had never seen him thwarted in a love affair. Being rejected for another could twist a man’s heart and cause him to behave violently.
But she would assume nothing. “What do you mean, Mrs. Venables?”
“Nothing. I just . . . nothing at all.”
“I’ll go to Alethea.” Perplexed and worried, Anne passed a maid in the hall and headed up the stairs. She found her friend, who was in her sitting room on the third floor, perched on the edge of a chair staring into an empty cold fireplace. She looked up when a floorboard creaked, and stared, her eyes empty of emotion, at Anne. “What do you want?”
“The truth, I suppose.”
“The truth? About what? My most intimate life? I owe no one an explanation about that.”
“Alethea, I am your friend, not an enemy.”
“Are you my friend? Then come in. Come, and I’ll tell you all.”
Anne entered and sat down in a chair opposite Alethea. The air between them crackled with tension. Alethea’s lovely face was hard with anger, a look Anne had never seen in all the years they had been friends. “I don’t understand any of this,” Anne said. “Bertie is . . . he’s . . .” She didn’t know how to describe her thoughts.
“A sodomite? Say it, if that’s what you mean.”
“Alethea, stop it! Don’t assume you know what I am about to say. I want to understand. I’m trying to understand. This has all come as a shock to me, and I don’t know what to say.” She paused, but Alethea stared stonily ahead. “Did you always know? Was Bertie like this when you married?”
Her friend met her eyes, her own widening with dawning comprehension. “You don’t understand at all, do you?”
“No, so tell me!”
“It’s both of us. We’re both . . . different. He loves men.” Alethea stared at Anne steadily and said, “I love women.”
Anne restrained a gasp, knowing her friend’s intent was to shock.
Still staring steadily, Alethea went on: “We married knowing who we were, what we were. We married the only other person who would understand, so the world wou
ld not stare and condemn us. My whole life I have hidden who I am, as has Bertie, and now it is all coming out. We will be destroyed, shunned, driven away,” she cried, her voice guttural with a mingling of anger and fear. “And all because Alfred Lonsdale could not keep from visiting that club—”
“The Sacred Theban Club,” Anne said, her tone hollow.
“Lonsdale let that little rat Thomas Graeme seduce him, and wrote him love letters,” she said, her voice hissing with anger. “Alfred is gone, but we are the ones who will inherit his legacy of shame, becoming social outcasts, and after we have devoted so much effort, so much care, to secrecy.” She caught her breath and let out a long sigh. “We will have to leave England, perhaps go to Italy.”
“No, Alethea, you cannot go!”
“What have we to hold us here?”
“Quin, your friends, your family—”
“And censure and gossip and danger. I’ll not let Bertie suffer, Anne. There are benefits to being a woman; I will escape legal trouble. But Bertie . . . he’s too good for this country, and these hideous laws, that force a man to be what he is not.” She shook her head. “Go home, Anne. I wish to be alone.”
Chapter Twenty-six
Anne didn’t sleep, couldn’t sleep. Late into the night she sat by her fire reading Alfred’s journal, rereading the letters, thinking of her friends and trying to decide what to do. How had she been so blind to the truth about Alethea? What had her friend been going through, alone in her own thoughts and feelings, when they were at school together?
She had no answers. Everything seemed bleak and gray and without joy, and she was left questioning everything about life and love and friendship. Even Irusan was out of sorts and pacing, as if he knew something was deeply amiss.
She tried to sleep but tossed and turned. By dawn she was shivering and wretched, with a fever. Perhaps it was because she had eaten little the day before, nor had she rested. Saturday passed in restless aching, confined to bed by Mary, her only comfort Irusan, who would not leave her side. Finally, in the evening she drank some broth and ate toast, entertained by Wee Robbie, who read her more of Gulliver’s Travels, and Irusan, who played with a twist of paper tied to a length of wool, something he normally would not deign to do.
Lady Anne and the Menacing Mystic Page 26