Dark Season

by Joanna Lowell

  “I itch,” she’d said. “I itch all over. It hasn’t stopped. It’s been days and nights of it. I can’t breathe.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” None of the condemnation he felt was for her, but she whimpered, stuffing her fingers in her mouth. He’d never seen this side of her, fragile, fearful. As children, they’d once cut across a pasture too near a watering hole. She hadn’t cringed before the charging bull.

  He’d tried to ask gently. He’d coaxed. He’d begged.

  “I’ll make this better,” he’d promised. “I just need his name.”

  He should have wrested it from her. He should have known who it was. He hadn’t been paying the right kind of attention. She’d never given the appearance of preferring one suitor to another. Somehow he’d missed the signs.

  He reached Clement.

  “She’s here,” Clement said quietly. “She came in the back entrance. She’s dressing upstairs.”

  “She came alone?” He’d told Louisa not to accompany her, but he’d been worried she would force the issue.

  Clement nodded.

  “Good.” Then it would be any minute now. He moistened his lips with the last of the scotch. His strained nerves had begun to jangle. He wondered how she felt. He hadn’t seen her since Wednesday afternoon, when he’d called on her at Trombly Place to discuss this evening’s entertainment. She had returned to Mount Street the morning after he’d tried—and failed—to seduce her in his study. The joy that flared in his breast when he learned she no longer had a lover had been doused by her rejection. She didn’t want to share his bed. Why should it rankle? He couldn’t blame her. Women had more to lose from those kinds of arrangements. He knew that better than anyone. Well, better than any man. When she’d turned to leave, he’d wanted to follow. Assurances had sprung to his lips. He wouldn’t let anything happen to her. He wasn’t a green boy who couldn’t control himself, whose seed shot forth without forewarning.

  He hadn’t been able to think of a formulation that didn’t sound crass. He’d let her walk away, his body all but splitting open with bottled desire.

  It wasn’t too late to make her a better offer. Instead of inviting her to share his bed for a night, he might ask her to become his mistress. He could establish her in her own apartments. No more stealing. He’d provide for her every need. He’d give her all the jewels she wanted, although he imagined she would prefer books. He’d give her both. Descartes and diamonds. Byron and pearls. With pleasure. For pleasure.

  “More scotch,” he said hoarsely to Clement and passed off his glass.

  Years went by. Decades. There was a lull. The music paused. The pianist launched into Chopin’s minute waltz. The other members of the band had abandoned him, also refilling their glasses. To occupy himself, Isidore observed the pianist. He was a lively fellow, dashing through the waltz in record time; his fingers must have been flying over the keys.

  Suddenly, a woman screamed. The pianist’s fingers slipped and crashed down on a sour chord. A hush fell over the room, relieved by the creaking of the French doors. They were opening, the panes of glass reflecting waving light. Now gasps and rustles broke the silence as the women nearest the doors shrank away. The men too fell back, faces registering bafflement, shock, wonder.

  A woman stepped into the ballroom. As she entered, the cool air from the courtyard came with her. A gust of wind made the doors bang. Another scream, quickly stifled. Candles guttered. Several flames went out. The woman walked forward, the only moving figure in that frozen crowd.

  She was tall, slender, dressed in a gown of black and red silk. The short, ruched sleeves were red, and red silk draped the low neckline, gathered at the lowest dip of the V by a cluster of rosebuds, their red-silk petals edged with green-silk leaves. More silk roses adorned the black fall of the skirt, which stopped short of the ground to reveal flaring red underskirts. Her elbow-length gloves were black. The ringlets piled high on her head were black. Her skin was white. Dead white. Black eyes seemed to fill that small, white face. Black eyes brimming with mystery. And torment.

  Isidore had known what to expect—had ordered the wig, sketched the dress for the modiste—but still his mouth went dry. Phillipa had been smaller, more rounded. Her skin had a warmer, olive tone; her mouth was wider. There was no real resemblance between them. But the differences worked to his advantage. Ella looked like a pale reflection of the original. Attenuated. Shimmering. The way her black eyes sparkled as she looked out across that room, head held high as she endured a hundred appalled stares—he could tell she was blinking back tears. He had subjected her to this. Her eyes grazed his. Returned. He wanted to hold her up, to send all of his strength out through his eyes. But he tore his gaze away. He couldn’t allow her to command his attention. He needed to examine the faces around him, gauge the reactions.

  Footsteps sounded. Daphne, running from the room. He glanced about to see if Bennington would follow. Bennington stood stock-still, staring at Ella. His face had gone whiter than hers. Isidore looked for Luke. The man’s languid attitude had altered. He’d stepped away from the wall, body rigid.

  “What the devil?” The exclamation burst out from the ballroom’s far corner, and the eerie stillness shattered. Commotion reigned. Excited clamor swelled all around. Guffaws. More gasps, now theatrical. Nervous titters. Low murmurs of disgust. Speculations.

  “Awful prank.”

  “Do you suppose St. Aubyn planned it?”

  Isidore pushed through the crowd.

  “My brother says that’s the exact gown she wore, the very one!”

  “It couldn’t be the very one.”

  “How ghastly.”

  “Is it a Worth?”

  “Look at Lord Blackwood.”

  “Poor man.”

  “What if this ensures that he never marries?”

  “I would pay Miss Reed to tap out a blessing so he’d change his mind.”

  “Flora! He might have heard you!”

  “Is she in a trance, do you think?”

  He felt a hand on his arm. “Blackwood.” It was Granville. Breathing hot, beery breath into his face. He smelled like a farmer. He must have stepped in horse dung at Astley’s and was too drunk to care. “What’s the meaning of this? My stomach almost came out of my mouth.”

  “Glad it didn’t.” He removed Granville’s hand. “I can’t say what the meaning is.”

  “Did Mrs. Trombly put her in that gown?” Granville twitched his thick shoulders. Something between a tic and a shudder.

  “I don’t know.” Isidore spoke slowly. “Maybe Miss Reed requested it. Every day she’s been deepening the connection with … ” He broke off. Laughed a low, dark laugh. “All I know is that strange things have been happening. Stranger than this. I wouldn’t have believed any of it a few weeks ago … but now … ”

  He searched Granville’s square-jawed face. Did apprehension dilate the pupils in his hazel eyes? Or was it the play of light?

  “Come to the séance on Monday,” he said. “I think we’ll all learn something.”

  He turned away and continued on toward the middle of the room. Ella stood beneath a chandelier, alone in a circle of light. The band had begun another waltz, but no couples had formed. People ringed around her in clusters, heads together. Watching. Her chin was still high. A defiant angle. He wondered if anyone else could tell how much effort this attitude cost her.

  “Dance with me,” he said, reaching her, holding out his hand. She didn’t take it.

  “I can’t dance,” she said. He made a noise of disbelief and took her in his arms. Together they began to move through the steps of the waltz. She was stiff in his arms, but her step was light, and she turned with him effortlessly, in time to the music. It was odd to look down at the mass of black curls. Some other woman’s curls.

  “You dance well,” he said.

  She looked at him. Another woman, glancing up at a dance partner through such thick, black lashes, would have been playing the coquette. Smil
ing at the compliment. Her lovely eyes were serious. Her red lips did not curve.

  “I know how to dance. It’s that I shouldn’t.”

  What an ass he was. She still mourned her father. There was nothing he could say. I’ll make this all up to you one day. How hollow that would sound.

  They danced in a widening circle as the floor cleared. Still, no one joined them.

  “I felt like a ghost.” She spoke at last, her voice ragged. “When I came through the doors … ”

  He tightened his arms around her. “You’re not a ghost,” he said thickly. “I can feel you in my arms. I can feel your warmth against my body, God help me. I’d like to show you right here and now that you’re flesh and blood.” He tipped her chin up with his finger. She fluttered her lashes, as though she weren’t sure whether she wanted her eyes opened or closed. Fighting with herself. It looked like an absurd affectation. He was convinced of its authenticity. He ground his teeth to keep from lowering his mouth to hers.

  Maybe he should do it. The murderer was watching. It might drive him over the edge, this ghostly vision of the woman who’d loved him, the woman he’d killed, caressed by her betrothed. It might stir his jealousy, and he would slip, give something away.

  He couldn’t do that to her. She was the one who would bear the shame of it. He’d already pushed her so far. He wouldn’t publically claim her as his lover. Not yet. Maybe … when this was all over …

  “Smile,” he said as her eyes opened, fastened on his. “I want him to see us smiling at one another.” She tilted the corners of her mouth. Good enough. He whirled her, watching the crowd that watched them.

  They would pour into Blackwood mansion for the séance; he was certain of it.

  There was only one piece of the act left, for this night, at least.

  “Are you ready?” He touched one of the curls that hung down to frame her face. He’d like to yank it, pull the wig from her head. Her eyes flitted to his hand. She nodded jerkily.

  He’d only heard her play a little, a few bars of the Bach sonata they would play together, now, in full. That day, he had hardly been focused on gauging her degree of musical accomplishment. It was of no consequence, though, if she wasn’t as good as she’d claimed to be. The spectacle would be enough. The waltz ended, and he led her across the room. The crowd parted before them. As they approached the band, the pianist rose and offered her his seat. Isidore watched Ella settle herself on the bench. He couldn’t turn away as she drew off her gloves. Her delicate wrists and slim, white fingers slid free of the black leather. He was sure his intake of breath was audible. He knelt hurriedly by the violin case and took out his violin.

  He stood facing the room. Everyone still. Staring. How many of those assembled had seen him perform with Phillipa? How many of them felt the hairs lift on the backs of their necks as Ella touched the keys?

  She hadn’t misrepresented her skill. She played well. Better than well. Her touch was expressive, ardent. Her posture relaxed as she leaned forward. This was what he wanted to do to her with his caresses. Make her muscles loosen. Make her body bend, supple, unselfconscious. Make her open.

  She was doing it now, opening, her tense, withholding figure swaying with lyrical grace. Music allowed her to transcend the barriers she’d erected. It unified her, body and soul. She flowed forward, and the sound flowed from her fingers.

  He listened to the first sweet notes of the sonata. He let his eyes close, briefly, drinking it in, drinking her in. The notes, so familiar to him, interpreted by innumerable hands, seemed new. She spoke to him through the notes, called to him. He lifted the violin. Waited until the summons could no longer be denied. He had no choice but to answer. He drew the bow across the strings.

  • • •

  Ella forgot the crowd staring at her back. She forgot the heavy, hot wig itching her scalp. She forgot everything but the music. She already knew the Bach well, and she’d practiced every day since Isidore had told her about the party and explained what he wanted. But she’d never played it on piano. The strangeness of the sound only excited her. Her excitement made the notes louder; harpsichord didn’t respond in the same way to pressure. Her playing rose with her emotions, fingers moving deftly across the keys. She wondered, briefly, if she would overpower Isidore, if she should hold back.

  Then the violin entered, the slow, sorrowing phrase pulling through her, turning her inside out so her softest, most vulnerable recesses were exposed to the rasping perfection of his intonation. This was his other voice, a voice she had never heard, the sound his soul would make if it could sing. Darkness audible. She ached with the resonance. It faded, and she played alone again, the notes bright, the tune steady, but somehow transformed. Waiting for the violin’s return. She felt the loss, the brightness of the slow tune she played suddenly bare, translucent. In that second, she looked at him. He stood, body angled toward her, the violin pressed between chin and shoulder. His head was tilted, lips pressed together, the shadows stark beneath his cheekbones. His eyes were open. He glanced up from the strings and saw her. As their eyes met, he moved, slid the bow, the tones emerging full, throaty, and dark, the tight gut-strings bending as his fingers traveled up the bridge. His hair fell across his forehead; his lips parted. Now the sound moved back and forth between them, the melodic lines mingling, infinitely richer, sadder, than before. She leaned closer to the keys, face turned so she could watch him, watch his lean, black-clad form curve, his beautiful hands shaping the notes, as her own hands responded and invited. Neither could overpower the other in this conversation. He sustained the slow notes until they scorched her, and she balanced him, supported his flourishes, and when the music got faster, she matched him, the notes sparkling, her ornamentation transmitting to his muscles, his body jerking, sensitized to each stroke of her fingers. He made the violin purr, bloom. She felt the urgency that throbbed in his phrasing, felt it inside her. This warmth, this intimacy—it wasn’t gentle. She was scraped raw. The black current between them, that force that flowed from him to her and from her to him—now she could hear it too. Now he was everywhere. Surging into her even as she invaded him. The tears she’d held back since she’d first stepped into the ballroom fell now, but she was safe. No one could see. Except him.

  They played the last notes. Sound vanished, but her body still thrummed, still ached. She was afraid to move. She folded her hands on her lap and stared down at the ivory keys. She heard the coughing, sighing, shifting of the crowd behind her. No applause. She felt dizzy. The debutantes smelled so harsh, the alcohols of their various perfumes clashing in the air. She was going to faint, roll off the bench onto the polished floor. She rose. She had a role to play. So what if everyone could see the tear tracks shining on her cheeks? Let them know she was moved. Let them read the pain and wonder on her face. It would be more powerful than any claim she could make, any grand pronouncement. I have made the connection. She is here.

  She pivoted slowly. Her eyes skimmed over the silent men, the whispering coteries of women. They lit on Lord St. Aubyn. He stood in the front of the press of people—his guests—all of them properly stunned, aghast by the evening’s unexpected turn. St. Aubyn had consented to all of it, but he appeared more aghast than anyone. A muscle in his jaw ticked convulsively. Were those tears in his eyes? He looked away from her.

  She had mentioned to Isidore on Wednesday that St. Aubyn’s conscience was not easy.

  Have you considered Lord St. Aubyn? she’d asked. His face had tightened.

  No, he’d said. I’ve taken St. Aubyn into my confidence. Everything I’m planning happens with his knowledge.

  But at Mr. Tenby’s … she’d begun, and he’d interrupted, his voice flat with finality.

  I trust him with my life.

  Clearly, Isidore had trusted Lord St. Aubyn with information he hadn’t shared with her. Yet. He’d alluded to something he needed to tell her before the séance.

  Not here, he’d said, rising from the sofa, casting a meaningful glance
at the open door, a door through which Mrs. Trombly might have entered at any moment. We’ll discuss things elsewhere, later. For now, concentrate on the party.

  She had. She had spent days dreading it. Dreading the moment she would have to push open the French doors and march into a ballroom filled with strangers. Her imagination hadn’t carried her past those doors. She hadn’t had the energy, the courage maybe, to begin to dread all the moments that would follow. Now it was almost over. She needed only to move from this corner across the ballroom and out into the hall. Her coach would be called. She could climb inside and sag and tremble and sob.

  Stare them all down, she told herself. She didn’t glance toward Isidore. She squared her shoulders, lifted her chin, and swept through the crowd. People parted to make way for her.

  Here it was, her dream, perverted. Her dark Season. Her London debut. She had danced in the arms of a man who held her close, as though her body were something precious he wanted to protect. She had done it dressed as a dead woman. The gown she wore, so beautiful, drew attention to the woman she wasn’t. The man who had taken her right hand and spun her through the steps of the waltz, whose fingertips and wrist had rested against her back, who had pulled her nearer than the dance required—he was only repeating what he had done with her, with his betrothed, on the last night of her life.

  She made it into the hall without her tears blinding her. Mrs. Bennington was there, standing by the wide staircase. She was weeping, her small hands covering her heart-shaped face. Ella turned from her sharply, almost banged into Mrs. Tenby. The thin woman’s face was pinched with displeasure. Ella flushed with guilt. These women had been Phillipa’s friends. She bit back an apology and kept going. Other partygoers were in the hall as well, some newly arrived, handing off their coats. Didn’t anyone in London sleep? She moved toward the front entrance against the stream of latecomers. She needed to find a footman.

  A hand on her bare elbow made her start. Skin on skin. She hadn’t taken her gloves from the piano bench. Isidore. He’d come up behind her. She could feel his presence.