Felicity Carrol and the Perilous Pursuit

by Patricia Marcantonio

  They ate in the dining room of their house on Grosvenor Square. By the time Felicity had reached the age of seventeen, she had regularly thought up excuses to stay away from their London place, mostly to avoid her father, who spent more time there than at Carrol Manor. His unspoken disapproval of her had thickened into a wall of impenetrable mortar. Her hands were bloodied from the attempts to break through. But because she had wanted to attend William Kent’s funeral, she had decided to stay overnight in London and head back to Carrol Manor the next morning.

  Two days before, her father had returned to the London house from one of his long business trips. She assumed they were for business, at any rate, since he never gave her any reason before departing. Before dinner that evening, she had gotten dressed in her room upstairs and cultivated the stamina she needed. Go and talk to him, she had told herself while brushing her hair, but she’d had to battle the temptation to climb out of her bedroom window.

  In the dining room, they sat at each end of the table as they did whenever they were together, which was infrequent. At those times, Felicity would ask about his work or London politics, to which he would reply in succinct answers. She had even read books on business, hoping that might stir up the chat. It hadn’t. He had told her the subject should be left to men. Her father would only ask her whether she had accepted invitations to social gatherings, and she made up excuses not to go whenever she could.

  That evening, she studied him in the shallow radiance of the gaslights. Gray feathered the sides of his brown hair. He was a man of respectable deportment, slender and stately. A superior gentleman of society. Yet each year, his eyes grew emptier, like light receding down a tunnel.

  Her father’s gaze traveled from his wine glass to the portrait hung above the fireplace and back again. The painting showed her lovely mother sitting on a chair in the garden at Carrol Manor. Felicity had her mother’s hair and eyes, but his resolve. As he regarded the painting, his durable visage dissolved into sadness, and she wanted to rush over and hug him so they could grieve together. The moment concluded quick as the dousing of a candle.

  Felicity sucked in a breath for yet another try at communication. “Today I attended the funeral reception for Lord William Kent. He was murdered most brutally at the British Museum. He had been my mentor at the university.”

  His mouth turned downward at the word university.

  “Did you ever meet him, Father?”

  “No.”

  “Well, he was a fine, generous man and my friend.”

  Her father didn’t answer.

  She sighed. Conversation with him was akin to pulling gold from the bottom of the Thames with her teeth. Still, she put her head down and smiled. Maybe her father was not going to mention the fire or what happened at the Wheaton ball. Maybe he had at last given up his efforts to secure a husband for her. Then again, maybe he had been waiting for the meat course.

  “You are forbidden to perform any more of your ridiculous experiments at Carrol Manor,” he said, staring down at his roast beef and not at her. His movements were precise as a surgeon’s.

  “They are not ridiculous, Father. They are important to my ongoing education.”

  “Education, ha.” He pushed out a solid breath.

  “I have asked John Ryan to see to the building of a new laboratory well away from the house. There will be no more accidents.” She let out her own perturbed breath. Her chest constricted. She should not have taken such pleasure in the burning of his artwork. He was her father and the only family she had left. The same blood rolled in their veins. “Father …”

  He did not look up at her.

  “I do apologize for the destruction of your paintings and tapestries in the fire.”

  “Many of those pieces were irreplaceable, and you were irresponsible.” Clink. Clink. Clink.

  He brandished blame like a broadsword and without so much as a change in his voice. Over the years, she had attempted to build up an armor, but she remained vulnerable to the verbal blows.

  “I am sorry,” she said.

  “I also had a most disturbing letter from Lindsay Wheaton Senior,” he said.

  “Oh.”

  “He complained you treated his son with the utmost disrespect. He said you acted like a person of common birth. In addition …” He set his fork down and threw her what she had termed his “half look,” as if she could be seen only in his peripheral vision. “He claimed you mooed at young Wheaton like a barnyard animal.”

  “I am sure he deserved it.” Really, the young man hadn’t, and her cheeks heated from her treatment of him. She could have explained to her father the reason for the moo. How it symbolized her similarity to prized livestock up for sale, but she was sure her father wouldn’t understand or laugh.

  “Young Wheaton would have made a good husband.”

  “I was angry,” she said.

  “He did nothing to you.”

  “Father, I am cross and humiliated you didn’t tell me you had entered into discussions with the Wheaton family about marriage.”

  “My business is none of your business.”

  “So am I a business deal instead of a daughter?” She was still surprised at the hurt he could cause her.

  Clink. Clink. Clink. “There are plenty of eligible gentlemen who might forgive your loose tongue, although I may have to increase the amount of your dowry. At any rate, there is a house party next week at the Mannings. The family has twin sons, I believe. You will attend and you will behave.”

  His tone channeled indifference. Felicity had grown accustomed to it, but not that night.

  Not that night.

  Not after attending the funeral of her friend, the man she wished could have been her father.

  The setting infuriated her. A family at dinner. Convivial candlelight in a well-decorated room. However, this was a charade of enormous proportions. She placed down her fork. “Father, I will not be going to the house party.”

  He concentrated on the pudding set before him and didn’t ask why.

  Folding her hands on her lap, she would explain anyway. “I no longer wish to be in the company of the foolish young people who populate those functions. The men are interested only in my face and fortune and not what’s inside my head. And the women, ah, the women.” She lifted her hands to make the point. “Porcelain dolls getting everything, except esteem as an individual.”

  “Nonsense.” His eyes were on her at last. “I will not tolerate such indecent language. If you cannot be civil, do not speak.” He displayed such bitterness she could taste it on her tongue like acid.

  She lifted her chin. “I shall speak after our years of silence. So much silence it would pack cathedrals around the world.”

  Her constant hope was that they might become the kind of family she had read about in novels. Close and caring. Sharing and compassionate. But he had never hugged her. Never comforted her. Never laughed with her. A kind word from him would have had the impact of a comet striking the earth. On the other hand, he merely requested she attend those silly social events. Until lately, he had never ordered her to do anything. That left her to become independent and do what she desired. And what she desired was to learn. What she had sought was his love.

  “Father, I only attended those functions to please you, but I can see nothing I do will ever please you. I cannot be what you want. My life will be what I make it. I hope you can accept me as I am and respect my wishes.” Her heartbeat accelerated, but at the same time, she enjoyed the freedom that came with her overdue honesty. If she couldn’t have his love, maybe she could gain his esteem.

  “All this so-called education has done is render you unfit for society.” His hands clenched. “You have proved yourself unfit as a wife or mother, even as a good companion. You are an anomaly. You might as well be a ghost in a Parisian frock.”

  “I am no ghost.”

  He folded his hands on the table. “Fine. Then, pray tell me, what will you do with your life?”

 
Felicity stood up. For a moment, she was unsure how to answer, and the uncertainty compressed her body like the tightest of corsets. The question coming from William Kent had embarrassed her. The same question from her father angered her. What would she do?

  She could become an astronomer like Caroline Herschel, who had discovered several comets, or Mary Somerville, the first female member of the Royal Astronomical Society. Perhaps pursue botany like the American Jane Colden or take after paleontologist Mary Anning, whose discoveries had changed perceptions of prehistoric life. She might even become a physician, teacher, or patron of museums like her dead mentor William Kent. The opportunities excited her.

  “Well?” he said.

  She needed an answer and not only for her father.

  “Whatever the course, I will strive to do my best. But it will be what I choose. Not society. Not you. My future will be my decision.”

  The air turned turbulent with their words. Her father stood up, knocking a wine glass to the floor. The glass shattered. Standing near the door, the servants did not move.

  “I am going abroad for three months. When I return, I expect a substantial shift in your attitude. Either you will find a suitable man to marry or you shall attend a strict women’s institute in Switzerland I have investigated. The institute will turn you into an acceptable young woman of society.”

  Her mind twisted like a leaf in an eddy from the amount of words her father had spoken to her—the most words ever passing between them in one instance. She balled up her hands to stop the spinning.

  “Both of those alternatives sound equally disagreeable, Father. What if I don’t marry or wish to attend the women’s institute?”

  “Then you may find yourself out on the street with nothing but your books and education. And since you are so fond of thinking, you have three months to think about that.”

  “Father, I will prove to you I can accomplish more than you ever thought possible. You will be proud of me, whether you want to be or not.”

  “I doubt it.” Samuel Carrol threw down his napkin on the table and walked out of the dining room.

  Felicity dropped back into her chair. Thunder in the spring did not compare to her crashing heartbeat. She was not worried about his threat. For the past twenty years, she had lived in the shade of her father’s disregard. Compared to that, disinheritance would be a stroll along the Thames on a spring day. Rather, the pressure came from the test she had set for herself as well as for her father. A challenge to demonstrate that her life had reason and merit. A risky and reckless challenge, but that only made it more essential.

  She would hunt down the killer of Lord William Kent.

  From behind her came the lavender scent she had given Helen for Christmas.

  “May I get you anything, Miss Felicity? A cup of tea? Warmed milk?” Helen said.

  Felicity supposed one of the servants had told Helen about the battle going on in the dining room. “Hellie, I would like something.”

  “Anything, Miss.”

  “Please ask Matthew to get the carriage ready. I need to obtain as many past copies as I can of The Illustrated Police News.” She dotted the napkin to her lips. “I shall be waiting outside.”

  “Illustrated Police News, Miss?”

  “I have so much to learn. Oh, and when I return, I will have tea.”

  CHAPTER 5

  The following morning, Felicity was about to step out the front door when Helen Watkins stopped her.

  “Where are you off to, Miss?”

  She wished Helen hadn’t asked that. Felicity turned around. “To the British Museum?” She hadn’t meant for it to be a question.

  “Without a chaperone?”

  From Helen’s expression, Felicity could have been about to walk naked in Trafalgar Square, waving around the Union Jack and whistling “Ode to Joy.”

  “Young women don’t go anywhere by themselves, Miss Felicity.”

  “They do when they want to get someplace,” Felicity replied as a joke.

  Helen didn’t laugh. “You managed to sneak out before.”

  “But Hellie, I went to a funeral.”

  “Please wait until I get a shawl from my room.”

  Helen could be as rigid as her father in some circumstances, but mostly to protect her. “All right, off with you then. I’ll wait in the carriage,” Felicity said.

  More than once Helen had told her she had learned which battles she could win with her young mistress when it came to propriety, and which she could not. Felicity let her win this one.

  The day following their disagreement in the dining room, her father had departed on his trip. For as long as she could remember, he had never bidden her goodbye when he left. He simply informed Helen or the other servants he was going. Normally, her father took his valet with him when he traveled, but this trip he had also asked Horace Wilkins to accompany him. Felicity was ecstatic. That gave her ninety days of freedom to conduct her investigation without Wilkins’s scrutiny. Even if her father had remained in the city, he would not have cared where she went, but she didn’t want to take the chance.

  Helen Wilkins did care about where Felicity went.

  “You are quite stubborn, Helen Wilkins,” Felicity said as the carriage clopped along to the museum.

  “I am when it comes to you, Miss. I won’t have people talking bad about you, not if I can help it.”

  “I realize that and appreciate it.”

  “You can always fire me,” Helen said with a playful sternness.

  “I suppose so.” Felicity returned the stern look. That would be tantamount to firing her own mother—if she had had one.

  Helen sat back and smiled.

  Felicity could not believe Helen and Horace Wilkins were related. Wilkins was closed as a coffin behind a cement mausoleum. His sister Helen was alive, full-bodied as a sun-filled morning after the rain. They must have had different fathers, Felicity surmised.

  “Miss Felicity, I am glad you did not leave home. I feared you might.” Helen put her head down as if she knew she had breached the wall between their stations.

  Felicity reached over and patted Helen’s hand. “I could never leave you.” Felicity could accept the loss of all the money and property, but not of Helen’s friendship and love. “I certainly cannot picture myself as Mrs. Wheaton Junior or twirling a parasol for the rest of my life. Nor will I attend a school that turns out society ladies like sausages. So when my father returns, I should have a bag packed for that day.”

  “I’m sure your father didn’t mean those threats.”

  “But, Helen, that’s exactly what they were.”

  “You’re so young, Miss. Sometimes it takes time to understand who we are.”

  “And so it does.”

  The carriage rolled on, the wheels cracking against the cobblestones.

  “Hellie, when we arrive at the museum, I ask you to give me leeway to walk around by myself. There are things I must do without question.”

  “I am rising above my post, but may I ask why you are doing all this, Miss Felicity?”

  “Because someone has viciously killed my friend, and my goal is to discover the murderer.”

  “Shouldn’t the police solve this crime?”

  “They haven’t found the killer. So what’s the harm if I have a go at it?”

  Helen nodded with faith. “I am always your servant, Miss Felicity.”

  “And I am always your friend.” She took both of Helen’s hands in hers. “One extra item, my dear. What you will hear me say and do at the museum or from here on out may seem quite extraordinary, but trust me. I am not going mad.”

  “I know you’re not, Miss. I just like to think of you as eccentric.”

  Felicity threw herself back in the seat and laughed.

  As they drew closer to the museum, Felicity prepared herself. Time to start putting to use what she had learned. While Oxford and Cambridge universities allowed women students to sit for examinations, they did not award degrees to
females. The University of London did bestow a few degrees to women. But for Felicity, the knowledge she gained was more important than a paper certificate to hang on a wall. When she had first informed her father she wanted to go to the university, he had asked why in a tone not unlike the one he used when inquiring why there were no eggs for breakfast. She told him she had acquired a desire to learn more about the world than she could from tutors.

  “You don’t need an education. You need to be married,” he had replied, then left the room, and she hadn’t seen him again for nine months.

  Promptly, she had enrolled at the university. Her father had never attempted to stop her or even talk her out of it. He just didn’t bother. Neglect did have its advantages. Nevertheless, she appreciated that her family’s assets allowed her such an opportunity.

  At the university, she had taken any class that interested her. And exactly as she had mentioned to Duke Philip Chaucer, everything interested her. For knowledge about the human body, she had attended classes at St. George Hospital Medical School. She wanted to understand what made the world work and took classes in chemistry, mathematics, and physics. She could not ignore the natural sciences and attended instruction in astronomy and history. The study of literature, philosophy, and Latin were essential because they were the heart of humanity. The more she learned, the more her mind expanded to learn.

  Petite of form, Felicity had wanted to improve her body as well as her mind. She detested how women were often described as frail and delicate. So she took fencing lessons, although she did have to pay extra since she was a female. As in everything, she worked to excel in the sport. How she loved to guard and deflect blows with the rapier. The instructor, whose family had taught fencing for years, repeated how the weapon should become an extension of the arm. And she found that it did. One of grace and danger, tip or no on the end. The only aspect of fencing she disliked was the costume for females. The calf-length skirt and canvas shoes made her appear as if she had just stepped out of the nursery. She also rode horses and walked.