by Lev AC Rosen
Violet and Ashton nodded as Mrs. Wilks escorted Fiona out of the room.
“Did you tell Fiona what she was in for?” Violet whispered as their supper was served.
“I may have taken poetic liberties,” Ashton said.
“Let’s eat,” Violet said. “I want to change into my night dress.”
“I bought you a new night dress,” Ashton said, grinning wickedly.
“Oh no. Is it horrid?”
“I suppose that depends on how you feel about lavender bows.”
Violet cocked her head. “I don’t feel any way at all about them. As long as it’s comfortable.”
“Oh,” Ashton said. “Well, yes, of course it is.”
“Will the bows make me look ridiculous?”
“Perhaps a little.”
Violet shrugged. “A small price to pay.”
“You are changing, sister, into someone quite different.”
“Perhaps being a man has taught me a little about being a woman.”
“No,” Ashton said. “No, I don’t think that’s it at all.”
XXI.
WHEN Ashton awoke and went downstairs, he was happy to find the tree up and decorated with gifts underneath it, but also sad, because his father wasn’t sitting there, examining all the presents and trying to figure out what his children had gotten him. There were gifts under the tree from him—sent from America, Ashton assumed—as well as a long letter, but toys and words were no replacement for their father.
Ashton made a mental note to thank Mrs. Wilks for laying it all out. He was shirking his responsibilities as man of the house, and he knew it. It was difficult to think of himself as an adult. True, he lived alone in town, but he spent his days writing poems and his nights playing on the town. He had even coaxed Antony into coming with him to some art shows, theater, and poetry readings, after which they would go to Ashton’s bedroom, where Ashton would write poetry about the lines of Antony’s thighs.
Ashton sat on the floor in front of the tree and stared at the presents. They couldn’t open them until Christmas Day, or Mrs. Wilks would be quite upset, but he could inspect them, and guess what they were. The tree shone with glass and copper ornaments, several made by Violet. When wound, they performed little clockwork routines, such as a man twirling his cane, or Father Christmas digging into his bag of toys. On top of the tree was a shining angel, ash branches in her hair and violets in her hand.
Christmas was in a few days, which meant the next few days would be filled with baking, decorating, and caroling. Ashton and Violet would have to string the house with ivy and hang cookies and berries on the tree. They would go caroling tomorrow, and to the masquerade pageant at the church that evening. He wondered if Violet could stand to do all that in a corset.
Ashton loved his sister dearly, and understood her passion and her unwillingness to be forced into the role society had carved for her: woman, keeper of the home, wife and mother. Ashton wasn’t all that fond of the role society had set for him, either. But he had seen more of the world than Violet had—his gender had afforded him that much—while she had worked away in the basement, with no company but himself and Jack. Now she was out in the world, and he enjoyed watching the effect it had on her. She had always been fearless, but before, it had seemed that she was fearless because she didn’t know better. Now she was fearless because she chose to be. She was growing, like a flower moved from a greenhouse to the outdoors.
And it seemed distinctly possible that she was falling in love. He doubted she knew it. She hadn’t read much about love, he thought, aside from the poems he’d read aloud to her, and she probably hadn’t really paid attention to those. She was probably as willing to listen to his advice on matters of the heart as he was eager to hear her recite the proper way to fix a horseless carriage. She’d have to learn in her own way.
“Oh! For a moment, I thought you were your father,” Mrs. Wilks said, appearing in the doorway.
Ashton turned and stood. “Sorry, no,” Ashton said.
“Well, of course you’re not. I laid out all the presents he sent us, though. The presents you sent up a few days ago are here, too.”
“My presents are here, too!” Violet called from upstairs. She bounded down the stairs in her nightgown and a housecoat, a bushel of poorly wrapped packages overflowing her arms. “Sorry!” she said, coming to the foot of the stairs. “I meant to put them down here last night when no one was looking, but I forgot.”
“That’s all right, dear,” Mrs. Wilks said, taking the packages one by one from Violet and placing them under the tree.
“I hope everyone likes them,” Violet said.
“I’m sure you picked out lovely presents,” Mrs. Wilks said.
“Oh no, I made them.”
“You made them? Where?”
“Violet set up a little lab in one of the empty rooms in the town house,” Ashton said, standing. He shot a look at Violet, who had the decency to look momentarily ashamed.
“Still tinkering with your mechanics?” Mrs. Wilks asked.
“Well, yes,” Violet said. “I don’t see what’s wrong with it. Everyone should have a hobby. And I think you’ll agree that the perambulator I made for your cousin is far more useful than a needlepoint doily.”
Mrs. Wilks raised an eyebrow and smiled a little. “It is at that. Just mind you don’t get grease stains on your nice new clothes.”
“Of course not,” Violet said, looking a little surprised. Ashton was surprised, too. He had expected a nervous lecture from Mrs. Wilks on how ladies who invented didn’t find husbands.
“As long as you behave like a proper lady, I’m sure I don’t mind what your hobbies are,” Mrs. Wilks said, seeing the surprise on their faces. “You’re a very clever girl, Violet. I just want you to pay as much attention to being a girl as you do to being clever.”
“Your present I worked especially hard on, Mrs. Wilks,” Violet said, kissing Mrs. Wilks on the cheek.
“I’ll be glad to see it, then. Now, we’d best have breakfast so you can go and change. I imagine there’ll be visitors from the neighborhood today, and with your father gone, you two will have to host them.”
“When is the church masquerade pageant?” Violet asked.
“Tomorrow night, dear,” Mrs. Wilks said, patting them both on the back to herd them in the direction of the dining room. “Tomorrow you can go caroling, if you’d like.”
“Sissy Travers already sent me a note telling me as much,” Ashton said. “She’s gotten quite the group together. You will come this year, won’t you, Violet?”
“I can’t sing a note,” Violet said.
“Neither can Sissy, and if she doesn’t mind her own lack of musicality, she certainly won’t mind yours.”
They were in the dining room now, but did not sit. Mrs. Wilks sighed and pulled out a chair for Violet. “It amazes me how you can both still get so caught up in your own banter that you forget where you are and what you’re doing. Or do I need to ask you to sit down?” Mrs. Wilks said. “The cook will bring out the buffet in a moment. And Violet, you must go caroling. It will make the neighbors positively glow in astonishment to see you dressed up and so pretty. I’m not sure they know what you look like without grease on your face.”
Violet stuck her tongue out at Mrs. Wilks, who sighed again.
“I suppose I can’t expect you to become a complete lady so quickly,” Mrs. Wilks said, and walked to the kitchen to check on the cook. Ashton chuckled.
“Why is Christmas so busy?” Violet asked. “Was it always so busy?”
“We have to receive visitors, maybe go visiting ourselves, go to church, go caroling, give to charity, and finish decorating the tree and house. It has always been this way.”
“Has it?”
“In the past, you just shut yourself up in the lab for long bouts.”
“I miss Father,” she said.
“Me, too.”
“I think Mrs. Wilks does, as well.”
; Violet paused. “The duke’s cousin, Cecily, seems to be in love with me,” she said. “She wanted to visit over Christmas.”
Ashton burst out laughing. “The one that Jack is in love with, whom you have me write those fake love letters from?”
“Yes.”
“I must visit Illyria. It sounds more like a farce than a college.”
“I don’t know what to say to her. I like her, and wish we could be friends, but—”
“But you are not the man she loves.”
“Yes.”
“I think you should do what you can to be her friend. Then, maybe, after she learns the truth and her heart is broken, she can look back and realize you were good to her, despite the lies.”
“I suppose. She asked me about my sister. It was very awkward. And she is the duke’s ward. I told her I don’t think its appropriate for us to be so close, but really I’m afraid it will draw the duke’s attention.” Violet looked down at her lap. Ashton smirked, but there was a flutter of worry in his stomach. He said nothing, though. They both worried when they thought about Violet’s kiss with the duke.
“The cook will be out in a moment,” Mrs. Wilks said, emerging from the kitchen. “She hasn’t had to cook a proper meal in a while, so she’s moving a mite slower than usual. Violet, does Laetitia normally have breakfast?”
“Oh,” Violet said. “I don’t think so, no.” Mrs. Wilks looked at her quizzically. “She’s very Scottish.”
“Well, I’ll ring her bell anyway,” Mrs. Wilks said, and went back into the kitchen.
“It’s Christmas,” Ashton said. “Let’s try to be merry, and forget all about Illyria, at least for a little while.”
Violet took her brother’s hand, and squeezed it.
* * *
THE next few days passed in a blur of holly and snow. Violet felt as though she were experiencing Christmas for the first time. In the past, she had opened presents and caught snowflakes on her tongue, but spent most of the day making ornaments for the tree or, one year, a pair of huge feathered wings which opened at the push of a button for the angel to wear in the Christmas masquerade pageant. But this year, she sang carols and visited the neighbors, bringing them cookies she and Ashton had baked. They all cooed over her and told her how pretty she looked and what a fine young woman she had grown into, and those neighbors with eligible sons told her they would make sure their sons paid particular attention to visit her and her brother over the holiday. Violet found it all breathy and strange, wonderful and uncomfortable. Never had she been the center of such attention. She sometimes wanted to shout at them “I am a genius!” when they told her she was pretty, as though their noticing only her beauty made her dumb in their eyes, which was what she most feared.
“I suppose it is nice of them to pay me compliments, though,” she said to Ashton as they rode home in the coach.
“Let them tell you you are pretty at first, then talk to them about machines you’ve invented and let them see your cleverness. No matter how coated in oil you are, or if you’re holding a wrench aloft, no one sees genius. They see pretty or ugly. Be thankful that you are pretty.” Violet bit her lower lip and furrowed her brow. She couldn’t see a flaw in Ashton’s logic, but she didn’t like it, either. “I bought a present for Antony,” Ashton said gently. “You must tell me if you think he will like it.”
“Are you still at that?”
“He is a kind and gentle boy,” Ashton said.
“But won’t taking up with a coachman bring scandal on the family?” Violet refrained from also asking if Antony felt quite as invested as Ashton seemed to.
“Taking up with a man of any profession, stable boy or barrister, would bring scandal on the family. Which is why I am very discreet.”
“You aren’t in the least bit discreet.”
“I am discreet when I need to be. Everyone may know of my proclivities, but I do not advertise them. I do not hold hands with Antony in public, or propose marriage to him. That is the way it is with men like me, and the way it will always be.”
“That seems unfair.”
“Most things in life are unfair, sister. Now, you must come with me to my room and tell me if you think he’ll like the present.”
The present was an exquisite silk scarf, a pair of leather gloves, and a duster, all of the highest quality. Violet fingered the scarf and told Ashton she knew Antony would love them, but the idea of him giving this beautiful present to the coachman saddened her in some small way. Ashton had no way of fighting for his equality as she did. If he were to perform some grand gesture, as she was currently undertaking, it would still never give him the public acceptance he deserved. It would only result in his being ostracized, and most likely imprisoned.
She didn’t sleep well that Christmas Eve, but fretted on her pillow, uneasy without knowing why.
* * *
FIONA knew why she was uneasy. Mrs. Wilks was in every shadow, behind every corner, apparently watching her. “Is that how a lady’s maid behaves?” she asked when Fiona slept in one day, or when she helped herself to a drink of brandy at supper.
Fiona had thought this was going to be an easy bit of work. Play lady’s maid for a few weeks to some rebellious young rich girl. Good money, room and board in the winter, and maybe even a gift. Sure, the girl’s hair had been strange, but easy to cover, and she seemed like a nice enough young lady, as rich girls went: she didn’t judge Fiona for being an actress and was perfectly polite, if a little odd. Rich people were usually odd, though, so that wasn’t unexpected.
But the house, that was unexpected. Servants, who were supposed to be her chums, eyed Fiona fearfully and scurried away from Violet as if she were a ghost. The only one who seemed to have any authority was Mrs. Wilks, a jumpy storm of a woman who felt no one could do anything properly, so she did it all herself, with a cloud of discontented sighs and visible disapproval.
This is not how good houses were run. At least, not in the plays that Fiona performed in. When she played a maid in those, she usually wore a much more comfortable outfit and talked about her mistress with the other servants. Sometimes she said something funny under her breath, always getting laughs from the audience. More often than not, she and a cook’s boy or stable boy ended up rolling about together onstage, which was great fun if the men playing those parts were good-looking and not mollies. Sometimes she rolled around with them offstage.
But that was not the case here. Here, when she tried going down to the kitchen late at night to pour herself a drink, Mrs. Wilks was already there, asking her what it was she thought she was doing. When Fiona told her she was just looking for a drink, Mrs. Wilks looked scandalized and told her to go to bed. Told her to go to bed! Fiona hadn’t been told to go to bed by anyone since she was six. But Fiona trudged back up the stairs, because what else could she do? She worked for that horse-faced idiot. At least for now.
This was not at all what she expected. So, on her third night, Christmas Eve, when she really couldn’t go any longer without a drink, she crept slowly down the stairs to the kitchen again. She wasn’t an expert at sneaking—usually it was her job, and her gift, to draw attention to herself—but she found it wasn’t so hard to do. The manor did take on an eerie air at night, but she had walked the streets of London alone after dark. If she could survive the drunks and murderers there, she could certainly survive anything this place could put her through.
The kitchen was blissfully empty. She poked around quietly, looking for a bottle of spirits: ideally scotch, but anything would do. And then she heard a noise. Crouching against a shadowed cupboard, she tracked the room with her eyes. There was no movement in the kitchen. Then the sound came again: a loud clanging from the wine cellar, then a woman’s voice, muffled but clearly angry.
Fiona walked over to the cellar door and pressed her ear against it as the sounds continued. Well, there was no liquor up here, so it was probably down below, where good families kept it. Which meant she’d have to go down there anyway if she w
anted a drink. May as well investigate the commotion, too. She pushed the door open slowly. It creaked softly, but was drowned out by the steady, frustrated clanging. She crept down the stairs the way she’d been taught to onstage; arms up in the air, legs bent into nearly right angles and lifted carefully before being placed down again, but found that it made quite a bit more noise than she expected.
There were two doors at the bottom of the stairs. Light shone out from under the one that the noise was coming from. The other, Fiona reasoned, must be the wine cellar. She opened that door first. It was a grand affair as she had expected, but filled with rather more wine and rather less scotch than she was hoping for, but she found a small bottle of something that smelled like scotch. After a few swigs, it tasted like scotch, too, so that was good enough.
After finishing half the bottle and taking another for later, she wandered back out of the cellar. There was still light and noise and swearing coming from behind the other door. With her ear pressed to it, she recognized Mrs. Wilks’s voice. Sensing that she was about to discover something that would allow her to drink as much as she liked, Fiona pushed the door open.
Mrs. Wilks stood in the middle of a great stone room, a fire roaring behind her and a table in front of her laid out with gears and metal parts. She was in a simple housedress, the sleeves rolled up, and her hands stained with grease and oil. Her hair was pushed back into a tight knot, and she wore large round glasses too big for her face.
“—and fuck it all!” she was saying as she threw a piece of metal on the table. It made a clanging noise. Fiona smiled and leaned against the doorframe, the bottle of liquor swinging in her hand. Mrs. Wilks looked up. “Shit,” she said.
“An’ good evenin’ to you, Mrs. Wilks,” Fiona said. Her Scottish accent grew stronger when she drank.
“I—,” Mrs. Wilks began to say. Then shut her mouth. Fiona looked at what she held in her hand—a long column of smooth bronze with a rounded tip on one end, and what seemed to be a series of interlocking gears on the other. She looked back up at Mrs. Wilks, who sighed. “When Violet went off for the season, I thought I would come down here and clean up,” she said, “but as I was cleaning up, I found that … I enjoyed putting things together. I liked the way the gears all fit into one another to make things work. And, since Violet was gone, I … thought it wouldn’t harm anyone if I studied what it was she spent all day on.”