by Bianca Bloom
I did not know how to answer this. I wondered that she even brought up Lady Smith, tainted as that lady was by scandal and disgrace.
“Lady Smith is the ugliest woman I have ever seen, of course,” she said. “And she does not have decent taste herself. But she had been able to purchase the services of a capable ladies’ maid, at least before she was banished for abusing one of her sister’s children.”
It had been a scandal that rocked all of London, and yet I rarely heard about it. Most people who came to my shop were too well-bred to talk about Lady Smith, a horrid woman whose banishment was more of an inevitability than a surprise.
Apparently, Miss Culpepper was not at all concerned about that sort of thing. “Mrs. Yarrow is also ugly,” she was saying, “But she knows how to wear the latest fashions even better than Lady Smith did. Indeed, I know that I shall certainly outshine all of these ladies if I can only find the right wardrobe to complement my natural beauty.”
It was rather a strange statement, because one could not have said that the young woman was long on natural beauty. Indeed, if anything, her only beauty was that of youth. Her skin was untouched by the sun, her hair still long and fair without a trace of grey. Her face was unlined, and her health appeared excellent. But she was not favored with the kind of features that would have made her stunning. Indeed, I reasoned, Viviana was likely to grow into a much more handsome woman, though the thought of Vivi growing old enough to marry was enough to keep me awake at night. At least, I reasoned, I would be able to turn down any of her suitors. It was only if she turned twenty one without having married that I would have to marry, as she would be legally free to make a match just as rash and unsuitable as her mother’s had been.
The young lady, however, did not seem to be worried about her upcoming marriage to Luke Barlow. More fool her.
“I think this hat should do for summer,” she said. “Of course, when I got to Bath I shall need several more. Lady Washington will be there, and she always has a new hat every day. I could hardly imagine, but as my family is quite ten times as old as hers, I am sure that I may afford to do the same. Lady Washington, after all, is still not received in the best dressing rooms, in spite of her forty hats. Mind you, I am thinking of taking at least ten for my trousseau, and if you are very lucky I might well purchase them all from this shop, provided you can supply both the quality and variety that I am seeking.”
Many years ago, when I had dared to mention that some of the Tory politicians were liars and thieves, a corpulent gentleman within hearing had decided to call me a “nasty woman.” I supposed this to be in contrast to a gentlewoman, but could not help feeling rather proud of that particular epithet. Apparently, this man was so unused to women speaking truth in his presence that he found the very idea of it “nasty.”
This woman, however, was thoroughly nasty, which was rather unfortunate. Because I could tell right away that she was exactly the sort of woman who would see nothing morally wrong with vicious gossip, and yet be smart enough to hold her tongue around anyone she really wished to impress. Did she wish to impress Luke Barlow? Whatever the case was, she had certainly seemed to make an impression.
“Ouch! That hat pin is much too close,” she yelped, glaring at me.
I smiled. “But of course. My apologies.”
She yanked the pin out, looking at the hat. “Very well, then. I shall take it, even if you should have used much more care with the pin.”
I was tempted to take the money from her and throw it to the floor, but I forced myself not to spit as I manufactured a smile and stood tall. “Thank you ever so much. We shall have to give you one of our best boxes.”
31
When I came upstairs, I was so angry that I became just as taciturn as my mother. But after throwing several pieces of clothing into a bag, I managed to tell her and Viviana that I was off to Bath on business. It would only take a few days, and I would be back soon if they could mind the shop in my absence.
Just what the business was, I did not say. In fact, for myself I was not quite sure. I only knew that the detente that I had come to depend upon for many years could not last. Luke Barlow was in London, and he appeared poised to marry again. There were many steps that I would need to take if I wished to stay safe from him.
But I had underestimated the effect of being in the city of Bath. As soon as I fancied that I smelled the River Avon, so much cleaner and more romantic than the old Thames, my spirits lifted a bit. When I went to an inn that my neighbor had recommended, asking for their smallest room, I realized with some surprise that I would be quite able to afford my little holiday. To think, if I had only been willing to spend a small sum of my profits, I might have taken two holidays a year, rather than my customary one week at the end of September! And for the last two years, I had not even taken that, preferring ahead to let Viviana go on with her gran while I joined them only for their final two days. We could never afford to do much for amusement, but simply watching the late sunsets was usually enough. The city fairly gleamed in autumn, and even in late summer it was already sparkling. Now that I was in Bath on my own, the days seemed to spread out before me.
Except, I recalled, they could not. If I were one of those ladies of luxury, I might simply loll about and take the waters, but I was faced with far more serious decisions than which great lady to call on. I had a very clear objective in my journey, and I must not let fine weather and beautiful views of the sea distract me from my aim. After taking tea at the inn, I set out to find Mrs. White, one of the only clients whom I had ever viewed as anything more than an acquaintance. Though Mrs. White was much wealthier than I, she did not come from money, and I knew that I could depend on her secrecy.
When I saw her, I apologized for dropping in uninvited, but she would hear of no such thing. She was a tall and thin woman, but she fairly engulfed me in her embrace. Her hair had gone grayer since I last saw her, but since it was the color of straw to begin with she hardly looked any different. After the usual pleasantries about children and summer plans, I asked her if I might have a word with her husband. After all, though he was retired, I heard that he had been a highly skilled solicitor in his day.
“William is in his study,” she said, a little too loudly. She was hard of hearing in her right ear, and had a tendency to shout and then ask if I could still hear her.
“Might I have a few minutes?” I asked. “I shan’t wish to trouble him long, and am happy to charge any fee that he requires.”
She waved that away with her right hand and a grand smile. “He won’t take your money, my dear Mrs. Allen!” she nearly yelled. “I’m sure he has a moment for you, though.”
She insisted that I come with her to the study before she had even asked her husband. “Mrs. Allen,” he said, rising, and greeting me as an old friend. We had only met a few times before, since he could not be bothered to shop himself and rarely went into society.
“Mrs. Allen has a legal question, my dear. I shall leave you to it,” said my friend, striding out of the study and closing the door behind her.
“I am sorry to trouble you, Mr. White,” I said, though the truth was that I knew how he would respond to my politeness.
“Take me away from the papers,” he grumbled, slamming one down on his desk. “I tell you, those fools in London have not the slightest notion of anything. I never should have retired.”
“Well, I am thankful that I have your professional mind at my disposal,” I said, then froze. Did I really want to tell a professional what I was thinking? The identity of Mrs. Allen had served me well over the years. Only Rachel and my mother knew that Vivi’s father lived, and that in the eyes of the law I was still married. To absolutely everyone else, I was a young army widow, and had all the respectability that went with this status. By telling Mr. White, I would be jeopardizing my position in society. None of my clients would want to buy a hat from a slattern, or worse, from a divorcee.
“Go on, then,” said the man. “Out with it. My r
usty old mind will not know what to make of your troubles if you tell me nothing.”
My troubles must have shown in my face, and I endeavored to look at least a little bit less grim.
“This must go no further,” I told him, still leery of confessing anything to a man who had not taken my money. After all, that must mean that he thought I owed him something, when I would have greatly preferred that he feel he indebted to me.
“Mrs. Allen,” he said. “I was known as one of the most discreet men in town, now, was I not?”
All I could do was nod. “But that is not saying a great deal, sir.”
He gave a chuckle that turned into a cough. “No, I suppose not, considering the way things are run in town! Much better to be here, that much is certain. You have chosen well.”
I looked down at my hands. “In fact,” I said, “I have chosen only to escape from town. That is what I am seeking.”
“I see,” he said. “Is it debt, then?”
My cheeks flushed. “I know how to run my shop, thank you very much. I have troubles enough without extending credit to whose who do not deserve it, Mr. White.”
He raised a hand. “Yes, of course. I am sorry if I spoke out of turn. It’s just that I’ve found that the troubles that send my wife’s friends to me tend to be debt, children, and men. You are a widow with a daughter who is still young, as I recall.”
This made me raise my eyebrows, but Mr. White only shook his head. “Please, give me a little bit of credit. I may not go to and fro with my wife, but that does not mean that I know nothing of her friends.”
“Of course,” I told him, settling into my chair. “I do not have debts to speak of, and my daughter is quite well, thank God. But I am afraid that I am not a widow.”
“Ah,” he said. “I don’t know why it’s necessary for you to maintain that. Mrs. White and I have long felt that a woman bringing up a fatherless child deserves credit, not censure, and yet the only way she can hold her head high in our circles is if the child has the name of a dead man. Rather stupid, that.”
“You misunderstand me, Mr. White,” I said, my throat growing dry as I prepared to reveal my secret to the man. “I am not a widow, nor am I a woman with a fatherless child. In fact, I have a husband, and we were married well before my daughter came into the world.”
32
“Well,” he said, finally laying down all of his papers and looking me straight in the eye. “That is a surprise. You’re a married woman, then, Mrs. Allen! But it still does not explain to me why you rang the bell of an old and distempered solicitor.”
With a start, I realized it did not. “Yes, of course. I recently saw my husband with a young woman whom he apparently wishes to marry. We shall both be implicated in bigamy if I do not manage to divorce him right away. But I do not know how to go about it, and I beg you to give me the wisest course of action.”
He did not answer right away. When he did, it was with a solicitor’s typical caution, not the brashness that I had seen from him only a moment ago.
“You are quite sure that your husband means to marry this young woman? The man in question is undoubtedly your husband, and their plans are marriage and nothing else?”
I thought of the lovely young thing in my shop, going on about her trousseau. “Yes. I am quite sure on both points.”
He looked down at his desk, then glanced at his pen, but made no move to make any notes of what I was saying. I was thankful for all this. The longer the conversation remained only between the two of us, the longer I might manage to keep my horrible secret.
“I am prepared to find all the evidence of their plans I can,” I said. “After all, they will not be able to marry legally unless I divorce the man first. And if I do divorce him, I highly doubt his bride will wish to pursue the marriage, though I must admit that is not my first concern.”
“You sound as if you wished to protect her, Mrs. Allen.”
I thought on it for a moment. I despised the woman, and she had certainly shown nothing but contempt for me. And yet, this was not quite enough for me to despise her. I had been taken in by Luke Barlow, with his excellent manners and his eagerness in the boudoir. If I acted quickly, I might ensure that this woman would not suffer what I suffered. And any woman who came after her would at least be legally able to marry the man, even if his character might give rise to other concerns.
Mr. White, however, had other concerns. He leaned forward in his chair and looked at me carefully. “And you have no reason to believe that the original marriage was not valid? It sounds as if you were very young, Mrs. Allen. Did both of you have permission from your parents?”
“We were old enough,” I told him. “Twenty one. We should have known better, at least in the eyes of the law.”
He shook his head. “Well, at present, let me be the one to worry about the law. And I’m forced to inform you that you must take the opposite course.”
I opened my eyes wider. “What, reconcile with the man?” After a decade apart, I knew not how I would begin, and I certainly did not want to go begging my former husband to accept me after he had turned against me when my need was greatest.
Mr. White was rubbing his eyes, and even if his words had been gentler than they were, I would have known the situation was confounding just by his manner. “No, no reconciliation is needed. But a woman trying to obtain a divorce in this country must either have an unlimited purse or die in the attempt. You’ll not believe how many women who have been killed by their husbands, there very same men that the court would not allow them to divorce. Insufficient grounds, they say.”
I thought of my old neighbor, a Mrs. Lind. She was not killed by her husband, but a woman who was supposed to be her nurse began carrying on with the husband. Mr. Lind beat his wife whenever he was drunk, which was most of the time, and he laughed in her face when she told him to stop seeing the nurse. Then the pair of them, mater and nurse, ran off to Scotland. Whether it was to marry or to simply live in sin outside of London’s reach, I had never known. And even with all that, I was not sure if Mrs. Lind had ever been able to get a divorce from the scoundrel. She had tried, but what the solicitor was telling me had been true for her. Since her husband had not been quite as violent as he might have been, the fact that he had gone off to live with a comely younger woman was of little interest to the courts.
“Then what were you meaning by the opposite course, sir?” I asked again, the weariness from my long journey beginning to tell on me.
He sat back in his chair again, folding his hands over his great belly. “Well, you must try and get him to divorce you. I’m sorry if that sounds shocking.”
I laughed. “Not as shocking as it seems difficult. I don’t wish to have any contact with the man, but I would rather divorce him than force him to divorce me. Particularly when he was the one who grew too ashamed of me to continue the marriage.”
“A sad story, but one I have heard before,” said Mr. White. “Some men have no honor.”
I waited for a few moments, hoping that he might say that he had changed his mind, and that he had found some alternative. Apparently, this was not to be, and so I sighed and attempted to chart a course that would lead to a discreet divorce.
“If I wanted to sever the bond of marriage,” I asked quietly, “What would I do?”
Mr. White harrumphed. “Well, there is no discreet way to ask this question, so I’m sure you will forgive me. Is there evidence that you could get to him? Evidence that, in your eyes, at least, the marriage has ended?”
It was not a shocking question, and I thought on it. The problem was that my paramour in the city insisted on perfect secrecy, and when I was there, I thought it fit to maintain that for my own purposes. We had never written any letters that a court could object to, and we certainly had not been seen in public together.
“I have no evidence, I am afraid.”
The man frowned. “Well, Mrs. Allen, I’m going to have to trust that you know what you’re doing. Unless you
find a way to create some documentation for that man to take with him to a judge, your marital status is all but assured.”
33
At first, I went out walking simply so I could ponder the solicitor’s words. Of course, I had plenty of men who might be able to provide the sort of proof that would convince a judge, but they were all of them far too discreet. I could never imagine a single one of them intentionally providing me with a letter, or even a traceable present.
The clouds had faded away, and it was a fine sunny afternoon in Bath. An odd one, though, because I seemed to be the only person who was alone. All of the workmen were laughing with each other. The women selling parasols yelled back and forth to each other across the sand. Many large parties passed, and the children ran about in sweaty and boisterous packs.
All of the men that I saw seemed to be in company, and I knew not how I would ever manage to lure one of them away. Most of the men I passed near the Royal Crescent gave me only a brief glance, as was socially acceptable. It was well that they glanced at a lady, to reassure themselves that they did not know her and would not be giving any offense by failing to acknowledge her. But after that, they were expected to pay attention to their companions once again.
There was one particular man who did not do so. He was in a larger party, but I could feel his eyes on me, and I froze in his gaze.
Many women talked a lot of rubbish about men using their eyes to remove garments from the women around them. To me, though the men at the opera stared, they seemed rather focused on the parts of the women that were already uncovered. Our necks, for example, or our faces.
But with this man, there was no mistaking his looks. In fact, because he did not actually make any attempt to speak to me, our encounter felt even more illicit. I could read all of it in his eyes. The way that he was removing my hat and pulling my hair out of its confines, sending it spilling down my back. The way he was taking off not only my jacket, but also my dress, followed by my shift, until I was wearing nothing at all, the curves of my body that had been hidden by cloth now completely exposed to him.