Mystery Loves Company

by Sheri Cobb South

  “Very likely, but I’m afraid it can’t be helped.”

  Having dealt firmly with the matter of Thomas’s delicate sensibilities, Pickett betook himself up the stairs and finally ran his battered valise to ground in one of the unfurnished rooms. He carried this back to his bedchamber, where he laid it out on the bed, then opened the clothespress and dragged out fresh linens sufficient for an overnight stay. And it was here, a quarter of an hour later, that Julia found him.

  “John?” Her gaze fell on the half-filled bag on the bed. “Are you going away?”

  “I have to make a short trip to Croydon.”

  Her face lit up. “Excellent! I’ll send for Betsy to pack my things. When do we leave?”

  “ ‘We’ don’t, my lady,” he said apologetically, abandoning his packing long enough to take her in his arms. “I’m sorry to have to go without you, but if all goes well, I should be back by tomorrow evening.”

  Twenty-four hours earlier, Julia would have accepted this dismissal with a good grace. But twenty-four hours earlier, she had not been snubbed by the very same people who had once courted her favor, nor been condescended to by Lady Gerald Broadbridge. Suddenly the prospect of being left alone in London, abandoned to the mercies of such people as these, was more than she could bear.

  “Won’t you take me with you?” she pleaded, clinging to him when he would have returned to his packing.

  “I’m going on Bow Street’s shilling,” he reminded her. “I have only enough to cover one fare on the stage, and God only knows what sort of lodgings I’ll be obliged to put up in once I reach Croydon.”

  “I won’t be a burden,” she said coaxingly. “After all, I can pay my own way.”

  It was the worst thing she could have said. “This is not about your money, Julia,” he said in a voice that brooked no argument. “Even if you were to pay your own fare, I could hardly drag you along on the common stage. We’d have to arrange for the hire a post-chaise, and then locate an inn suitable for a lady. I could be there and back by the time all the arrangements were in place.”

  “Your flat in Drury Lane wasn’t suitable for a lady, and yet I lived there quite happily for almost a fortnight,” she reminded him. “We would be together, and that, surely, would more than make up for any discomfort.”

  “But we wouldn’t be together,” he pointed out. “I would be at Washbourn Abbey, and until I finished my business there, you would be obliged to wait at the inn, where you would no doubt be bored to tears. I’m sorry, Julia. Perhaps another time, but not today.” Considering the matter closed, he turned back to the clothing on the bed, picked up a shirt, and began to fold it.

  “But I could help you,” she insisted, clutching at his sleeve.

  “Like you ‘helped’ me by calling on Lady Washbourn?” Recalling his suspicions about the countess, he added in quite another voice, “Speaking of her ladyship, I must ask you not to call on her again until I return.”

  “Oh, must you?” she challenged, her bosom swelling in indignation. “In that case, I wonder you don’t want to take me with you, so you can be sure I don’t do anything of which you might disapprove!”

  “Julia—”

  “I see what it is!” she said accusingly, bright spots of color burning in her cheeks. “You’re jealous! You’re jealous because I’m the one who knew who painted Lady Washbourn’s portrait, and I’m the one who found out she was in love with her husband, and now you’re afraid I may discover something else of importance before you do!”

  “Julia, that’s utter nonsense, and you know it!” he snapped, flinging the shirt into the bag with a force that completely undid his careful folding job.

  “Oh, do I? What other reason can you have for—for shutting me out like this?”

  At this grossly unfair accusation, the dam of his patience ruptured, and a dozen small resentments, each one suppressed for the sake of marital harmony, all burst forth. “Shutting you out? I should like to see me try! For God’s sake, look at me! I don’t even look like myself anymore!” His angry gesture took in everything from the new garments hanging in the clothespress to his newly shorn head. “You’ve got me living in your house, you’ve got me dressing like your first husband, you’ve got your first husband’s barber cutting my hair, you won’t let me eat dinner until I tog myself out like the Prince of Wales, and now you won’t let me conduct a simple investigation—which I was doing very well long before I ever met you!—without getting your fingers on that, too. Good God, am I to have no part of my life that’s strictly mine?”

  His voice had risen in volume with each new allegation, and Julia responded in kind. “If you feel that way, I wonder you wished to marry me at all!”

  “I don’t recall that I was given much choice in the matter!”

  “No, but you consummated it readily enough when you had the opportunity!”

  “What? I was barely conscious at the time!”

  “Well, that explains a lot!”

  He opened his mouth to make some retort, but froze as her implication became clear. Julia saw the stricken look in his eyes, and would have given up every last farthing of the fortune he so deplored, if by doing so she could have called the words back. But they could not be unsaid; once uttered, they hung in the air like an invisible barrier, substantial as any wall and just as impenetrable.

  “I see,” Pickett said at last in a cool, detached voice quite unlike his own. “In that case, my lady, I suppose there is nothing more to be said. I’m sorry I couldn’t oblige you by being impotent, but maybe your solicitor can think of something. Apparently it’s near enough as makes no odds.”

  He snapped the valise shut and hefted it off the bed, then turned and left the room without another word. Everything in her urged Julia to go after him, to call him back, but she stood rooted to the spot. She had played variations of this particular scene before, with her first husband, and although the matters at issue had varied, the ending had always been the same: she had always been the one to beg his pardon, even if it had been Lord Fieldhurst who was responsible for forcing the quarrel in the first place. She refused to set such a precedent in her second marriage, even though a small voice inside her head whispered accusingly that she had wounded her beloved second husband as much as, if not more than, her first husband had ever wounded her. She heard Pickett’s footsteps echoing down the stairs, heard him exchange some word with Rogers (who had no doubt got an earful), and, finally, heard the faint thud of the door closing behind him.

  I will not cry, she told herself as she moved to the window, watching his retreating form until her own breath fogged the glass. She wiped away the condensation with her sleeve and pressed her face to the windowpane, following his departure until he turned the corner and disappeared from view. I will not cry, she told herself as she turned away from the window and approached the bed, which still bore the imprint of his valise on the counterpane. I will not cry.

  She collapsed onto the bed and sobbed until no more tears would come.

  * * *

  Pickett was obliged to take a seat on the roof of the crowded stagecoach for the first part of the journey, and found himself in the unusual position of being grateful for the discomfort this entailed. So long as he was forced to hug his coat closed for warmth, or keep a hand on his hat to prevent its blowing off, he could forget, even if only for a moment, the rift with Julia and the open wound left by her parting words. He had feared from the first that she would eventually come to regret their hasty marriage, but in his imagination it had always been her loss of status in the eyes of Society at the root of her remorse. The reality, now that it had come, was infinitely worse. It was not his social standing that she found lacking; it was himself.

  He had not known she felt that way. He had never even suspected. The early days of their marriage, spent in his Drury Lane flat, had been the happiest of his life, and he had assumed she’d felt the same. If she had found his inexperienced lovemaking clumsy—and he acknowledged that she must ha
ve done—she had never let on. She had given him a bit of gentle guidance when it was needed, and because she had been tactful (or—lowering thought!—had suffered in silence), he had flattered himself that he’d been a quick study. But then, he had no previous experience against which to measure it; she had, and it was clear that he did not appear to advantage in the comparison.

  It occurred to him that, if only he had allowed her to accompany him, he might still be living in happy ignorance, and bitterly regretted his own stubbornness in not acceding to her wishes in the matter. He’d yielded to her in so many other areas—in fact, therein lay the whole problem—surely one more would not have hurt, not if by doing so he might have saved his marriage. Why hadn’t he given in, when he saw how much it meant to her? As if in answer, her accusation came back to him. You’re jealous . . . you’re afraid I may discover something else of importance before you do . . .

  Could she have been right? Was he really that petty? No, he could not believe it. Long before they were married (before they had known they were married, in any case), they had formed an unusual partnership, with her finding out things that, due to the difference in their stations, he would have no way of discovering. It had not troubled him in the least. On the contrary, he recalled, smiling a little at the memory, it had been rather gratifying to see her begin to realize she had capabilities far beyond the merely ornamental, and to think he’d had something to do with that. His smile faded abruptly. At least he had done that much for her, even if he could not satisfy her in other ways. No, painful as it was, he had done the right thing by insisting he make the journey without her, and thereby forcing the ensuing quarrel. It was better, surely, to face the bitter truth than to go on living even the sweetest of lies.

  The stagecoach drew into the yard of the Blue Boar just as the sun was setting. The inside passengers disembarked first, and Pickett and his fellow sufferers on the roof followed somewhat stiffly from the heights. He waited while the bags were removed from the boot, then claimed his valise and followed the crowd shuffling inside to bespeak rooms for the night. He was directed at last to a tiny attic chamber with a ceiling so low that he could not stand up straight without banging his head on the rafters. Far from deploring these primitive lodgings, he felt vindicated; this was certainly no place for a lady, and Julia would no doubt have been appalled at the prospect of sleeping in such humble surroundings. Ruthlessly rejecting the memory of his first week of marriage, when he and his lady wife had blissfully shared a bed certainly no wider than the one this room offered, he deposited his valise at the foot of the narrow cot and went back downstairs to the public room in search of dinner, feeling a small—a very small—sense of satisfaction in sitting down to eat in rumpled and travel-stained clothes.

  The Bull’s Head prided itself on two things: the Yorkshire pudding which was prepared daily by the proprietor’s wife, and the strength of its home-brewed ale. While it cannot be said that Pickett actually tasted any of the former (although as he blinked at the empty plate on the table before him, he realized he must have done so), he was considerably more receptive to the latter. In fact, when he realized with some surprise that his tankard was empty, he asked the barmaid to fetch him another. And then another. And still another. Alas, whatever its fine qualities, the beverage proved insufficient to erase from his mind the memory of Julia, or the last words he would ever hear her speak. For it was obvious he could never go back, not now, not knowing how she felt about him, about their marriage. He must return to Bow Street, of course—he still had a position there, even if he had lost the only other thing that had given his life meaning—but he could not go back to Julia. Never again. Never . . .

  “Sir? Beg pardon, sir, but we’re closing up for the night.”

  Gradually Pickett became aware of someone shaking him by the shoulder, and realized he had gone to sleep with his head on the table. He opened one bleary eye, and saw a young woman who looked vaguely familiar. In one hand—the one that wasn’t shaking his shoulder—she held a pewter tankard. His razor-sharp brain instantly deduced that she must be the barmaid who had been keeping him lubricated all evening.

  “I know who you are,” he informed her, realizing with mild curiosity that his words were oddly slurred.

  “I don’t wonder at it, sir, for you’ve kept me busy most the night,” she said. “But we’re closing now, so you’d best go home.”

  “Can’t go home,” he said. “Can’t ever . . . go home . . .”

  He would have put his head back down on the table, but the girl still had him by the shoulder, and hauled him upright again.

  “You have a room for the night here? Do you need some help getting up the stairs to it?”

  “Upstairs,” Pickett echoed stupidly, and heaved himself to his feet.

  “Do you need some help?” the barmaid asked again.

  “No, thank you,” Pickett said. He took a step forward, and realized he’d spoken too soon, for the wooden floor beneath his feet would not behave as a floor should. It refused to stay still, for one thing, and the boards persisted in crisscrossing one another in a way that made every step a potential hazard.

  “Let me help you, sir,” the barmaid said, slipping beneath his shoulder to support him with his arm draped across the back of her neck.

  His first step had been sufficient to inform Pickett that accepting the girl’s assistance was probably a wise move. He made no further protest, but allowed the young woman to turn them both in the direction of the door. Climbing the stairs presented a challenge, but with the railing on his right hand and the girl on his left, he managed to reach his small room without mishap.

  “There you go,” she pronounced at last, easing out from under him. Deprived of her support, he collapsed onto the narrow bed, where he expressed a fervent desire to die.

  “Nonsense!” she said briskly, tugging off his boots. “You’ll have an aching head in the morning, but otherwise you’ll be fine. It’s the ale, you know. It takes some folks that way, ’specially if they aren’t used to it.” She regarded his recumbent form with a speculative gleam in her eye. “It’s right cold in here with no fire. If you like, I could stay for awhile. Keep you warm, you might say.”

  Drunk he might be, but Pickett was not so far gone that he did not understand exactly what she was offering. He opened his eyes and regarded her sadly.

  “You wouldn’t enjoy it anyway,” he said with surprising clarity, then closed his eyes once more and surrendered to oblivion.

  16

  In Which Julia Receives Surprising News,

  but Has No One with Whom to Share It

  Julia awoke the following morning heavy-eyed from lack of sleep. Granted, she had not slept particularly well in several weeks, but the previous night had been by far the worst. She had tossed and turned all night, and when she had finally drifted off, her slumber had been troubled by unpleasant dreams that were surely no worse than the waking nightmare she now faced. She rolled over in bed (unsurprised to discover that at some point she had reached for her husband’s pillow and apparently passed the rest of the night with it clutched to her breast) and looked at the ormolu clock over the mantel. It was not yet eight; he had said he would return before nightfall. How long, she wondered, might she have to wait? Eight hours, perhaps? Ten? Twelve?

  She wished she might remain abed longer, to sleep away as many of the empty hours as possible, but she knew too well what would happen: sleep, so elusive even during the dark watches of the night, would evade her entirely in the light of day, and she would lie awake reliving in her memory every word of their quarrel. With the clarity that inevitably came with morning, she recalled every one of his accusations, and realized to her chagrin that he had every right to resent her. She had known, of course—although the discovery had come too late to change anything—that she had overstepped in arranging for a barber to cut his hair, but she had not recognized how this relatively minor infraction must appear when taken in sum with the others. She had only wanted to
help him adapt to the new world into which their marriage had thrust him. He, on the other hand, had received a very different message: You are not good enough for me the way you are . . . you must change if you are to appear worthy of me . . . It was the last thing she had meant, of course, but she should have known he might interpret it that way, especially in the light of his past experience with Sophia Broadbridge.

  But she could not blame Sophia for their quarrel, for the blame fell squarely onto her own shoulders. Mr. Colquhoun had tried to warn her, and she had ignored him, certain that she knew her own marriage best.

  With a sigh of resignation, she threw back the covers and reached for her pink satin wrapper. She shrugged her arms through the sleeves, tied the belt around her waist, and made her way downstairs to the breakfast room. The sunlight streaming through the windows hurt her eyes, and she instructed Rogers to draw the curtains.

  “And Rogers,” she added thoughtfully, when he had carried out this request, “what did Mr. Pickett say to you when he left the house yesterday?”

  He gave her a look of wordless sympathy. They had a long history, she and Rogers, dating back to the time of her first marriage. “He merely thanked me, madam. I had just given him his hat and gloves, you know, so he thanked me.”

  “I see,” she said, conscious of a pang of disappointment. She was not quite certain what she had hoped for—some word regarding his return, perhaps, or some message of apology or forgiveness—but it was clear that despite his humble origins, her husband knew instinctively not to air his dirty linen before the servants.

  The butler gave a discreet cough. “Er, madam—”

  “Yes, Rogers?”

  “If you will forgive me, madam, it is not unusual for newly married couples to quarrel. It can be difficult, learning to live with another person, no matter how deep the affection one feels for them.”

  She should have delivered some crushing rebuke designed to put the butler in his place, but she found she could not do so. They were old allies, she and Rogers, dating back to the early days of her marriage to Lord Fieldhurst, and following the viscount’s murder, Rogers had stood in Mr. Pickett’s debt, just as she had; in fact, she suspected that the deference the butler had shown his new master from the day of Pickett’s arrival in Curzon Street went beyond mere professional courtesy.