by Cari Hislop
John was only mildly disappointed to learn the maid was named Anna. Compared with his mental image of the saintly Joan she was hardly worth watching, though his eyes still followed her swaying hips out the door. His fired lust merely reminded him that he couldn’t even think about tumbling a wench without hearing death snigger over his shoulder. Feeling melancholic his valet, Woods, soon appeared mirroring his own expression.
Washed and dressed, John was helped downstairs to the breakfast room where he gently collapsed in the chair next to his brother, James, who stood respectfully with a genuine smile. “I’m glad to see you’re feeling better this morning. I’m sorry I wasn’t here to greet you yesterday, but I understand Agnes took good care of you. You didn’t mention the name of your assailant in your letter. I don’t like the idea of some knave carving up my little brother. Who did this to you?”
“An insolent boil not worth your spit. If I’d ignored him I’d have saved myself an uncomfortable visit to hell. Do I smell fried bread?” Agnes Smirke looked up from her plate in disbelief. “I’ve been dreaming of fried bread swimming in a pool of butter and slathered with strawberry preserves.” A few minutes later his dream came true. “Hmmm, this must be what heaven tastes like.”
James Smirke shrugged his shoulders at his wife’s worried expression and returned to his own food. “John?”
“Yes Agnes?”
“Have you been over imbibing laudanum? You’re not acting like your usual vengeful self.”
John’s eyes narrowed into a familiar revengeful glare, but it quickly faded into mild irritation as he stuffed another piece of fried bread into his mouth. “No.”
“Agnes, please try not to upset John. We’re lucky he’s alive.”
“Luck had nothing to do with it. I died and went to hell. Thank Heavens God sent me back to reform my evil ways. It was unbearably awful. I’d rather eat slugs and worms than go back. Someone pour me a cup of chocolate before I choke on a piece of bread.” It was James’s turn to look at his brother with concern.
“Right…pour my brother a cup Frederick, thank you. Well, we’re just glad you’re alive and well.”
“Speak for your self Love.” Agnes’s muttered words went unheard as she sipped her chocolate and watched her husband take out his snuff box, a sure sign he was bewildered.
“Right…well, I need to go purchase some snuff. Can I get you any more laudanum or perhaps one of those silly romance novels to take your mind off your injuries?”
John wiped his buttered lips as he fought a strange burning compulsion to join his brother. He dismissed it as he contemplated the pleasure of lying on a sofa and meeting more of Agnes’s callers. His Joan might show up to pay her respects. If he went out he might miss her. The compulsion to go intensified along with the need for a sketchbook as he shifted uncomfortably in his chair. He was going to take the plunge. He was going to give in to the need to artistically express himself, but he wasn’t sure if he was excited or excruciated. “I need to come with you. I need to go to the stationers.”
“If there’s anything you need I can…”
“I need to go.”
“What you need is to see my doctor…”
“I’ve had a gutful of doctors. I need Mamma. How long before she returns from France?”
James Smirke sighed in resignation, “Mamma wanted to break the news herself, but considering the circumstances I should probably tell you. Well, you see…” James looked at his wife for help.
Agnes smiled at John’s irritated expression, “Your mother has secretly wed a much younger man and run off to France for a wedding tour.”
Smirke’s bark of laughter turned into a moan as he clutched his chest. “Don’t make me laugh Agnes. It might kill me and then I’ll be stuck in hell forever.”
Agnes made a mental note to be as amusing as possible during John’s visit, “Your mother sent us a letter after the fact. She says she didn’t want her children fretting over her. Personally, I suspect she was worried that you’d kill her lover before she could get him to the altar.”
“Really Agnes, as if our John could do anything so despicable.”
John was too stunned with rage to verbalise that he was most certainly capable of carving up the man. “How could she do this? How could she abandon me for some money grubbing swine?”
“John, you left the nest fourteen years ago; you’re hardly an abandoned infant.”
“She can’t marry a boy. She’s a grandmother for…Aghh.” The effort to swallow angry expletives made John’s eyes water. He needed his Mamma and she was on the other side of the English Channel spending her kindness and smiles on some worthless cavalier. His wounds ached just contemplating the horrible thought of his mother being bedded by any man other than his father. It was sacrilegious. “Who is this fork-tongued fortune hunter?”
“He’s a forty-five year old widow with a healthy heir, spare and several young daughters. She refused him five times, but apparently he sunk into deep melancholy. He loves her.”
“He’s only four years older than our Peter? Your new step father is seven years older than you and you sit there…calm? She’s our mother; she’s married to our father. It’s…it’s disgusting!”
“Father’s been dead over twenty years John. You can hardly accuse Mamma of being improper and she’s still a beautiful woman. If being loved by this man makes her happy who are we to disagree?”
“We’re her children. We’re the ones who have to put up with being associated with this social climber, this nobody. He’ll poison her and take all her money. I’ll never see Mamma again.” John’s final word was a broken hearted wail, “Mamma!”
“The Earl of Belvedere is hardly social climbing by marrying a Viscount’s widow and he doesn’t need her money. I met him some years ago in London; he’s a decent sober sort of fellow. Mother’s perfectly safe. She’ll be back in a month. She’s travelling up to Belgium to meet some French artist named Louis David. She expressly desired that I tell you she loves you.”
John covered his face with his left sleeve, “How did they meet?” The words were dull with resignation. He couldn’t kill his stepfather without ending up in hell. He dropped his arm, his shoulders sagging in despair. Life was Hell.
“He commissioned Mother to paint his children. The children fell in love with her and then Belvedere lost his heart.” He was no longer hungry. “She knew you’d be upset. Perhaps you should lie down for a few hours. Tell me what you need from the stationers and I’ll…”
“No. I’m coming. I’ll just go put on my hat.” He passed a maid on the stairs he’d never seen before and was relieved to learn she was a Beth.
***
As the carriage stopped outside the stationers John felt overcome with a need to be inside the shop. He didn’t wait for the footman to lower the steps. He jumped out of the carriage leaving his brother to hurry after him. Several small bells tinkled against the door announcing his arrival. John leaned heavily on his umbrella as his anxious eyes swept over the occupants. There were three ladies and five gentlemen. On seeing John, three of the men were suddenly uninterested in buying paper and disappeared quickly out the door, an irritated woman loudly resisting her unexplained removal. One of the other two men saw James enter and held out his hand in greeting, “Ah, Smirke how did you find the Waterloo lecture? I’m sorry I missed it, the wife took it into her head that I should accompany her to some boring musical.” The long black poke bonnet inspecting various pencils turned far enough for the wearer to see the conversation.
“You missed a treat Collins. There were soldiers in blood soaked uniforms telling their stories, sketches of the battle and even Napoleon’s eagle. I got to touch it. I was so engaged I forgot my brother was arriving. Have you met my little brother? John?” The poke bonnet turned eagerly to inspect the sullen pretty man leaning heavily on his umbrella. “I’d like you to meet my old school chum Robbie Collins.” John held out his hand, but couldn’t pretend to care. “He’s not well. He
should be in bed. Some evil blackguard ran him through the chest a month ago while he was still recovering from a gunshot wound in his shoulder. Can you believe England spawns creatures capable of such villainy?” James didn’t attach his friend’s sceptical expression with the improbability of his brother’s multiple wounds being undeserved. “It’s a miracle he’s alive.”
Ignoring his brother and the slender looking woman in a dull black poke bonnet, John approached the tempting curvaceous woman at the counter, “Excuse me?” A pretty round face glanced up and shrunk away from his half hearted leer. “Is your name Joan?” The lady silently shook her head, picked up her brown wrapped package and hurried from the store. Sighing in disappointment, John turned towards the smiling shop keeper. “I need a sketchbook.” He didn’t notice the black poke bonnet abandon the quills and pencils and wander across to his side.
“Will this one do Sir? Lawrence, the greatest portraitist of our age, uses one just like it. It’s the softest calf skin protecting a fine heavy paper that will take ink, pencil or light watercolour washes…”
“I don’t care who uses it. I’m not going to sit in the park and pretend I’m Gainsborough. I just want a blasted sketchbook. How much is it?”
“That will be three pounds Sir. Did you need any pencils to go with that?”
The brim of the black poke bonnet lightly came to rest against the back of Smirke’s neck, “I wouldn’t buy that sketchbook if I were you.”
John half pivoted on his umbrella and glared at a long black brim an inch under his nose, completely shielding the occupant’s identity. She was a faceless interfering woman whose figure was hidden under a hip length grey wool shawl and heavy black satin. He wasn’t remotely tempted. “And if I were you Madam, I’d take my nose and…mind your own business.”
“I still wouldn’t buy it, it’s far too precious. Nothing you sketch ever feels good enough for such a cover. I was given a similar one as a gift several years ago and had to tear all the paper out. I’d get that one on the end if I were you.” A small black glove rested briefly on his coat sleeve sending shivers up his arm before pointing towards a cheap black papier-mâché covered sketch book.
“Don’t mind her Sir. She’s an irritating female who erroneously thinks she can draw and paint as well as a man. There’s never been a female artist that’s ever painted a decent picture and there never will. I’m sure you’ll fill any number of fine leather sketchbooks with beautiful sketches Sir.”
John Smirke flushed in anger. “My mother is a damn site more talented than Lawrence, which is why she’s paid more per picture. I’ll take the cheap one.”
The shop keeper gave the young woman a dark look and plonked the cheaper product on the counter. “Will you choose a pencil Sir or defer to Madam’s choice?”
The cheap jibe at John’s manhood set his teeth on edge. He kindly restrained an impulse to whack the shopkeeper over the head with his umbrella. “Just give me one of each and wrap them up before I take my custom elsewhere.”
“You tell him Mr Smirke…he’s always rude to me, but then I’m just a Vicar’s daughter.”
“I don’t care if you’re Satan’s daughter, take your blasted bonnet away and poke it into some other man’s affairs.”
The bonnet merely moved closer. “Smirke is very unusual name. Would you be the depraved libertine who owns Bolingbroke House in Lincolnshire? You resemble his portrait.”
Smirke took a deep breath causing more pain in his chest and increasing his irritation. “Yes, I own Bolingbroke House and if you’re thinking to crawl into my bed…” Smirke sighed with relief. “…I’m not remotely tempted you scrawny pigeon. Fly away and pester some other wretch.”
“As if I’d ever sleep in your hideous red velvet bed; I’d probably wake up thinking I was in a Punch and Judy show. I’d hate to see your beautiful nose grow long, red and ugly. The thought makes me want to cry. Have you married?”
“No…”
“Are you in love?”
“I don’t discuss emotions with strangers.”
“So you’re not in love.”
“I’m not in love. I’m not married, and I’m not going to be sane much longer either unless you go away.”
“Don’t you want to know my name?”
“I don’t want to know anything about you.”
“Why did you ask that woman if her name was Joan?”
“None of your business; go tell your father you’ve been speaking to the Honourable John Smirke and if I’m lucky, he’ll whip you.” John turned back to pay for his purchases.
“Do you think I’d wear black and grey for the fun of it? My father’s been dead for nearly eight months.”
“No doubt he shot himself to escape you.”
“Actually he was giving a sermon. He thumped the pulpit and died right in front of the congregation, slumped over the bible and just hung there like a wet shift drying in the…Oh no, it’s starting to rain.” John tucked his package under his good arm and turned around to tell the woman to go to blazes, but the black poke bonnet had vanished. As he sighed with relief, a keenly unpleasant feeling swept through his insides protesting that he’d just lost something precious.
James Smirke put a hand on his brother’s shoulder, “Who was that?”
“No one and if I never see her again it’ll be too soon. I feel odd…”
“You’re clearly in need of a lemon drop. I’ll run down the street and buy you a bag.” John allowed the footman to help him back into the carriage and sighed in despair at the impossible task of finding the one wretched woman who’d love him. With his luck she was in the Welsh hills speaking in some ungodly Celtic tongue. His heart slumped. How would she fall in love with him if she didn’t speak English? He sighed in disgust as his mutinous heart spewed an uncomfortable feeling that he’d missed something important in the irritating young woman’s conversation. Shaking his head in defiance he forced his thoughts back to the more pleasant subject of finding the mysterious Joan.
Chapter 4
The rest of John’s week passed in relative melancholy, most of the days spent lying on a daybed haunting his sister-in-law. When he wasn’t grilling pretty unmarried female callers for their first names, he was sucking on lemon drops dreaming of adventures he’d have with his imaginary Joan. His inquiries exposed nothing, but how many young women were saddled with abominable names. He couldn’t imagine being romantic with someone named Bertha, Henrietta or Leticia, but then he couldn’t actually imagine being romantic until he understood what the word meant. All it brought to mind were hazy memories of his parents sitting next to each other at the dining table and laughing. It was a senseless word hungry for definition. He couldn’t really comprehend the word charity either, but he was trying. Instead of screaming obscenities at the maid who took forever to bring him a lukewarm morning cup of chocolate, he sarcastically thanked her for bringing it before sunset. It was such a drastic reformation he was sure he was nearing sainthood. His mental halo slipped after pinching his nieces for helping themselves to lemon drops while he dozed through a particularly boring caller, but overall he was quite pleased with himself. When his sneering valet laid out a black silk suit with black waistcoat, stockings and shoes for Sunday’s morning church service John swallowed a protest that he’d look like Satan and meekly allowed himself to be dressed. With his blonde hair tide back with a black ribbon he was quite pleased with the affect even if he did look a little too wicked for comfort.
John wasn’t a stranger to church pews. He’d always found them excellent situations to spy out unguarded lambs, but he’d never actually listened to a sermon until the venomous Reverend Sylvester Lark pointed at him from the pulpit and used him as an example of immoral heartless depravity. John’s ability to take revenge on the God fearing man was scuppered when the wretch died two days after tricking John into accepting the wardship of an eighteen year old Miss J. Lark. The wench had been away at school practically since birth. The girl was doubtless a severe antid
ote bred to save sinners. Seven months before, the wench had been sent to his Lincolnshire home sight unseen in hopes that his vast collection of obscene art would inspire her to run away. His hopes were dashed along with several of his more lurid sculptures. His bank account was the next victim. The virtuous young woman had no qualms about redecorating his home or replenishing her mourning wardrobe. Miss Lark was a royal pain in the backside; her endless letters begging him to come home for a visit almost worse than the bills. Now he’d have to find a kind way to get rid of her. It was too late to offer her in marriage to the Earl of Mulgrave using a large dowry as bate, even if it was tempting. Throwing any woman at Mulgrave would be unkind. John was smiling from the thought of Mulgrave suffering Miss Lark’s company as he took his umbrella and made his way downstairs and out the door; tipping his hat at a cheerful angle he hailed a hackney. His brother’s family attended the evening service, but John was determined to brave the early congregation on his own and swallow his dose of hellfire for the week as quickly as possible.