by Juliana Gray
“Of course!” Stefanie had replied cheerfully, lifting her teacup in salute. “The easiest thing in the world. Healthy, wealthy, and wise!”
That was yesterday morning, however, with a civilized breakfast spread out before her and a decent cup of tea spread out inside her. This morning, the picture was altogether different. Stefanie opened her eyes in a bare little bed to a bare little room, no breakfast within sight, no tea within scent, while a cold rain rattled against her gloomy window glass. She did the sensible thing. She rolled onto her empty stomach and went back to sleep.
An instant later—it seemed like an instant, anyway—a furious knocking started up in Stefanie’s brain. She cracked open one eye.
To her mild confusion, the knocking seemed to be coming from the door instead of her head. Well. How terribly rude.
She said so.
“How terribly rude!” she called out. “There’s no need for that sort of thing!”
A slight pause in the racket. “Sir?”
Oh. Her voice. Of course. Stefanie cleared her throat and added a little heft. “There’s no need for all that knocking. I shall be up in due course.”
“Sir!” Knockknockknock. “Sir John, he says you’re to come downstairs directly this moment, he’s to leave for chambers in ten minutes!” Knockknockknock. “Come on, now, sir! He’ll have me head if you’re not dressed and ready!”
Stefanie heaved herself up and shook her head. She glanced at the plain white clock on her plain white nightstand—seven forty-six, how ghastly—and then at the plain white nightshirt covering her torso. Her wits began to gather themselves.
Slowly.
Slowly.
Oh, Lord. Now she remembered.
The long, wet day of travel yesterday, crushed up against the massive thighs of the Marquess of Hatherfield. The steely glare from that steely china doll, Lady Charlotte. Sir John, buried in papers. The train, the carriage to Cadogan Square. The austere supper of bread, cheese, and Madeira with a silent Sir John in the Gothic dining room (Lady Charlotte had flounced upstairs to take supper on a tray). The rain, the rain. The itch of her glued-on mustache. The dull black necktie, sinking her further into gloom.
The rain.
The weight of all these recollections sank into her dismal mind. Really, it was a wonder she could stir herself at all this morning.
“Coming,” she called, sotto verve.
Knockknockknock. “Now, sir! They’ll have me head, they will!”
Stefanie swung her legs to the floor and summoned herself. “You may tell Sir John,” she said, quite deeply and quite clearly, “I shall be downstairs, dressed and shaved and ready, in exactly three minutes.”
Another slight pause. “Very well, sir.” Footsteps, in blissful retreat.
So much for the knocking, then. Now for the toilette.
The shaving part was easy, as she had no actual whiskers to whisk off, only a bristling dark mustache to glue on. (She had thought it rather dashing, yesterday. Now she cordially hated the itchy thing.) Instead, Stefanie found her black trousers and thrust her legs into them; she found a shirt and buttoned herself in. She applied jacket and necktie in swift strokes; she splashed her face with icy water and slicked back her auburn hair with oil. Toothbrush, tooth powder. Dabs of glue, then the mustache. Shoes. Damned buckles.
She clattered downstairs at double time and came to a perplexed halt at the bottom of the steps. “Sir?” inquired a passing footman, bearing a tray.
“The breakfast room?” she gasped.
“If you’ll follow me, sir.” The footman moved off at a stately pace. Stefanie jogged behind him. The scents trailing through the hall made her want to swoon: rich and meaty, toasty-browny, spice and milky. Tea and all good things. Stefanie adored breakfast. On Sunday mornings, when Miss Dingleby allowed the lesson schedule to relax a trifle, Stefanie might linger over the table for an hour, stuffing herself silly, a dollop of this and a fat sausage of that. Tea and more tea. That dreadful section of grapefruit, upon which the governess insisted.
Stefanie’s belly made a prolonged and undignified sound, to make its intentions clear.
The footman swerved to the left, and Stefanie followed him into an elegant breakfast room, plated at one end by a set of French doors that allowed in as much light as the weather and the surrounding houses would permit. But Stefanie’s eyes didn’t linger curiously at the gray view of Sir John’s courtyard garden, not when a sideboard full of breakfast stood promisingly to her right. She veered foodward and snatched a plate.
Sir John’s voice ground into the air behind her. “Why, good morning, Mr. Thomas. At last.” The last two words bit deep.
“Good morning, Sir John. A trifle gloomy, wouldn’t you say?”
“My dear young man,” said Sir John, in a way that suggested she was anything but. “Whatever are you doing?”
“Gathering breakfast, of course.” Stefanie placed an egg in her cup and hovered between the sausage and the kidneys. “The most important meal of the day, according to that American fellow, whose name escapes me. The chap with the electricity.”
“Indeed.” Dryly. “Which is why I so deeply regret that you will miss it.”
“Miss it? Whatever for?”
“Because we depart this house for my chambers in four minutes, Mr. Thomas.”
A faint titter.
Stefanie turned from the sideboard, plate in hand, mouth open to object, and only then did she realize that the room contained three occupants. Sir John at the head, gray of hair and flushed of face. Lady Charlotte, exquisite at his right, like a pastel drawing of a medieval shepherdess.
And the Marquess of Hatherfield.
He sat to the left of Sir John, with his back to the sideboard, wearing a pale gray suit of fine wool that stretched and stretched across the width of his shoulders. But he had turned his head in her direction, and Stefanie’s gaze drifted to a halt somewhere in the middle of his amused blue eyes, the fresh-scrubbed skin of his cheeks and neck. He looked delicious and dewy and edible, every muscular, lovingly crafted inch of him, and he seemed to be suppressing something in his throat.
Something rather like a prodigious bout of laughter.
“I beg your pardon, your lordship,” Stefanie said. “Were you going to say something?”
He dabbed at his lips. “Benjamin Franklin.”
“Benjamin Franklin?”
“The American chap. With the electricity. Though he was not, in fact, a notable proponent of breakfast, merely early hours in general.”
“Oh, right. Of course. Thank you.” Stefanie eased herself into a chair and signaled for the footman to address her with the teapot. “In any case, I shan’t be above ten minutes, Sir John, I promise. Thank you, my good man.” This to the footman, who set down the teapot with grave ceremony. She poured herself a cheerful cup and bent close to inhale the scent. “Have you any fresh toast? This seems to have cooled.”
Another titter.
Stefanie eyed Lady Charlotte from the rim of her teacup. She had spent all day yesterday enduring her ladyship’s telling titters, her superior giggles, and really. Enough was enough.
“Something amuses you, Lady Charlotte? Or does the old lace itch something dreadful this morning?”
A slight movement of his lordship’s shoulders at her side.
“Not at all,” said Lady Charlotte. “I was only observing the expression on Sir John’s face.”
Stefanie turned in surprise to Sir John. The chandelier overhead, wired for electricity and blazing with unseemly enthusiasm, illuminated his face in lurid detail: the purpling skin, the wide-open eyes, the outraged brows, the staggered chin.
A gulp of hot tea, which had been on the point of swishing itself comfortably down Stefanie’s esophagus, spilled over into her windpipe.
“I say,” said the marquess, pounding her back. “Nasty thing, tea.”
Sir John rose from his chair and tossed his napkin atop his empty plate. He pulled a gold watch from his pocket
—quite needlessly, for a clock ticked away on the nearby mantel—and consulted the dial. “My chaise departs this door every morning for Temple Bar at eight o’clock precisely. Precisely, Mr. Thomas. In consequence, if you yourself are not present on the front doorstep at precisely eight o’clock, you shall be obliged to make your own way to my chambers. We begin work at eight thirty, Mr. Thomas.”
Stefanie nodded helplessly to the rhythm of Hatherfield’s open palm on the back of her drab black coat. Through her watering eyes, she saw Sir John stride out the door in a flash of electric light against his gray head.
“I suppose we ought to have warned you about my uncle’s punctual habits.” Lady Charlotte smiled benevolently.
The tea had finally found its way out of Stefanie’s lungs. “Really. A matter of a few minutes. Is he ordinarily so inflexible?”
“How unfortunate it’s raining. You won’t find a cab, poor fellow.” Lady Charlotte spread another slice of toast with the thinnest possible layer of butter. “But no doubt the walk will lift your spirits.”
“Your concern touches me deeply.”
“Lady Charlotte is renowned for her generous spirit,” said Hatherfield. He folded his napkin neatly and laid it next to his plate.
Lady Charlotte turned to him. “Are you leaving, James?”
For some reason, the intimacy of Hatherfield’s given name on those flawless rosebud lips made Stefanie’s innards revolt. She set down her fork.
“I’m afraid I must,” Hatherfield was saying, “loath as I am to leave poor, young, unsuspecting Thomas trapped between your playful claws, my dear.”
There was an odd silence. Stefanie glanced up from her tea.
Lady Charlotte’s gaze rested to Stefanie’s left, on Hatherfield’s rising body. Her lips had parted slightly, her eyes had grown wide and uncertain.
But the expression lasted only an instant. In the next, Lady Charlotte turned to Stefanie herself, all softness and solicitation. “Yes. Poor Mr. Thomas. You must have an umbrella. I shall see to it myself. Must you leave your breakfast behind, however? A horrid shame. Tyrannical Sir John. He really is impossible.”
The Marquess of Hatherfield was on his feet. “Indeed. On second thought, I perceive a splendid solution to this unfortunate dilemma.”
“You do?” said Lady Charlotte.
“You do?” said Stefanie, setting down her empty teacup.
“I do. Mr. Thomas, you may finish your breakfast at your leisure, and ride in perfect dryness and comfort to Sir John’s chambers.”
“Really, James? Are you going to head out into the rain and fetch him a hansom yourself?” asked Lady Charlotte dryly.
“Not at all. I shall simply take him there in my own hansom, which awaits us in the street outside this very moment. Mr. Thomas? Does this suit you?” Hatherfield turned to Stefanie and made a little bow.
Stefanie returned Lady Charlotte’s astonished gaze with a wink. She finished her toast, dabbed her mouth, and rose from her chair, all the way up to the tip of Lord Hatherfield’s straight golden nose.
“How very kind, your lordship. I should like that very much.”
The rain crackled earnestly against the window of Hatherfield’s hansom, filling in the silence. He settled into the corner and crossed his arms. Young Thomas had his—her—hands twisted together on his—her—lap. She stared at the window as if counting the raindrops on the glass.
“Nervous?” he asked.
“Me?” She turned to him. “No, not at all. I’m not the nervous sort. I was only reflecting.”
“Of course you were.” He paused. “May I be so unpardonably rude as to ask the subject?”
The subdued light in the vehicle softened her face, making her sex so obvious it took him by the chest. In the breakfast room, she had looked so sturdy and young-laddish, with her brave cheekbones and bristling mustache and short, sleek hair. He’d had to concentrate to shift the image in his mind, to see her properly, as she really was.
Here, now, it was much easier. Hatherfield wanted to reach across the few feet of damp space and take her hand.
Take more than that.
She was still looking at him, not replying. Good Lord. Could she read his thoughts?
“I was thinking about my family,” she said. “My sisters.”
“Left behind?”
“Yes.”
“Ah. You must miss them a great deal.”
She opened her lips eagerly as if to say Oh, very much! But at the last instant she checked herself. “Oh, a little, I suppose.” She shrugged and looked back out the window. “They’re only girls, after all. Not much company for a young fellow like me.”
“Ah, no. Of course not. I quite understand. Have a few sisters myself. All that nonsense about dresses and ribbons and lapdogs. Appalling rot.”
“Yes, quite.” She sounded as if she might choke.
“We men, on the other hand, have much weightier things to discuss. Politics, for example. Tell me, what’s your opinion of this Corrupt Practices Act? I don’t think there’s enough bite to it, myself.”
“No, not at all. Much more bite is required. Corrupt practices are . . . simply . . . dreadful things.”
“I quite agree. Any sort of subterfuge undermines the trust.”
“The trust?”
“Yes. The public’s trust in its political institutions and services. Disguise, underhanded dealings, it’s all most distressing. Most un-British, wouldn’t you say?”
“I . . . yes. Most un-British.”
Hatherfield uncrossed his arms and stretched one hand along the back of the seat. “The worst sort of punishment should be reserved for such devious malefactors. Nothing’s too severe for them, really. It makes my fingers tingle with eagerness to deliver the proper justice.” He wiggled the fingers in question to emphasize his point.
At which time Thomas’s spine went stiff as a pole. She turned back to him and shot him a look of such haughty severity from those green blue eyes, it nearly pinned him to the seat. “You’re up early today, your lordship,” she said crisply.
“I beg your pardon?”
“The hour. I thought idle young aristocrats such as yourself were only just retiring as dawn breaks over London.”
“Ah, well.” He spread out his hand. “I’m sorry to disappoint you, then. But habits are habits.”
“You make a habit of rising at seven o’clock in the morning, in order to secure a breakfast at Sir John’s table? Are Lady Charlotte’s charms so terribly irresistible?” Her eyebrow rose, as if she’d just delivered a blow of mortal proportions.
He laughed. “No, no. Charming as the lady is, the habit is of much longer standing than my acquaintance with her. No, the thing is, I row.”
“Row?”
“A boat.” He motioned with his arms. “In the river, each morning.”
“In the river?” Aghast. “Each morning?”
“Yes, indeed. Bright and cheery. Up around Putney Bridge. A number of boathouses there. I belong to one.”
“But . . . why on earth?”
The expression on poor Thomas’s face was priceless. Such a mixture of horror and bemusement, eyebrows perched high on her forehead, jaw dipping low. How plump, those parted lips. Hatherfield could almost see the tip of her tongue, beckoning within.
She’d just asked a question. What was it? Oh, right.
“Exercise, Mr. Thomas.” He plucked at a piece of invisible lint on his trouser knee. “I find I’m rather addicted to it. And the early hour, if you care to gaze upon it, is really quite good for the soul.”
“The soul.” As she might say the tooth fairy.
“Yes, the soul. Even in London, even in the incessant drizzle.” He nodded to the window. “Just you, in a light little well-behaved racing scull, and the water, and your own muscles working in rhythm. Not another care in the universe.”
Her eyes were on his face, now. He rather liked them there, earnest and curious.
“Aren’t you cold, out there?”<
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He shrugged. “A little. But the exercise warms one up wonderfully. And then breakfast, of course. You have me there. Sir John lays a much earlier table than my own family. I take shameless advantage.”
“They don’t seem to mind.”
The hansom lurched around a corner. Hatherfield glanced outside. They were turning into the muddy Strand now; almost there. Somerset House slid past in a monumental charcoal blur. “No, they don’t,” he said. “He does have a kind heart, Sir John, under all that bluster. You might wish to consider cooperating with those early hours of his. It’s not that hard, really. A little discipline goes a long way.”
She made a little noise of laughter, a delightful bell-like sound. “Oh, that’s easy for you to say, you paragon. You’re accustomed to rising at dawn.”
“So I am,” he said, “but that doesn’t make it any easier.”
“Then why torture yourself?”
Why, indeed? Why torture himself? Why rise at dawn every morning and push his body through a wall of pain, beyond the limit of human endurance, beyond memory and conscious thought, out there in the fog-shrouded Thames with no one to see or hear him?
Because it was better than lying sleepless in his bed, staring at the ceiling.
Hatherfield felt Thomas’s gaze on his face, this stranger with her elegant bones and white unmarked skin, all buttoned up in her sober man’s suit, on her way to begin a day’s work in the chambers of Sir John Worthington, Q.C., in Temple Bar. The two of them in his own carriage, masks in place, outer shells fully hardened to protect the secret centers within.
What was she doing there? Why? A hot little flame burned inside Hatherfield’s chest, a most uncharacteristic desire to know her, to look inside her secret center.
Dangerous business, secret centers. Who knew what he might find?
“It’s not torture,” he said. “You only have to retire at a decent hour, set your alarm clock—you do have an alarm clock at your bedside, don’t you, Mr. Thomas, working man that you are?—for half four in the morning . . .”
“Half four!”
The hansom made another sharp turn, jolting them both. Hatherfield put out an instinctive hand to steady her. The clattering rhythm slowed.