The Passion of the Purple Plumeria

by Lauren Willig

  “You’d have done what?” said Kat, wiping her hands on her apron. She closed the door of the bedroom carefully behind her. Her eyes were tired, but she held herself defiantly straight. “There was nothing to do.”

  William took stock of his daughter. She’d changed, his Kat. When he’d sent her off, she’d been seventeen, as strong-willed as they came, but with the round cheeks and the blush of youth on her still, for all her air of assurance. The intervening ten years had hardened her. Her face had lost the softness of youth, all lines and planes, and her spine was uncompromisingly stiff. Her hands, clenched at her sides, were reddened and work hardened, as he’d never thought any daughter’s of his should be.

  He leaned forward and grasped one of her work-reddened hands, squeezing it hard.

  “I’ve come to stay, Kat. For good. We’ll be together at last, you and I and Lizzy—I am only sorry that it’s taken this long.” Remembering, belatedly, the source of his mission, he leaned back in his chair, looking over Kat’s shoulder at the other door. “Is Lizzy here with you?”

  Kat drew her hand away. “No. Why would she be? She’s at school.” Her eyes narrowed. “She should be at school.”

  “She’s not,” said Miss Meadows succinctly. Mrs. Meadows hadn’t taken the other seat. She was standing by the card table, watching the scene with cool detachment. William couldn’t begin to imagine what she must be thinking. “She and another girl—my ward’s sister—ran off from the school. We thought they might have come to you.”

  Kat’s face betrayed none of her surprise. She must, thought William, have grown accustomed these past years to dealing with the unpalatable.

  All she said was, “Won’t you sit down, Miss Meadows?”

  “You haven’t heard from her?” William felt as though the bottom were dropping out of his world. It felt like years since he had stood on Miss Climpson’s doorstep, a withered posy in his hands, full of plans for his grown daughters, both of whom would be overjoyed to see him, prosperous and blooming. They had never given him any reason to suspect otherwise. If they had hidden this, what else? “She said nothing to you?”

  “No,” said Kat, “not since last month. Are you sure she’s not visiting a friend? She usually spends her holidays with the Fitzhughs. This”—Kat’s gesture encompassed the dreary basement apartment, the courtyard with the washing in it—“hardly provides a festive environment.”

  “Is there no other friend she might have gone to?” asked Miss Meadows, since William was largely incapable of speech. “No one other than the Fitzhugh girl?”

  Kat gave the matter due consideration. “Something ovine. Wooliston. That was it. Agnes Wooliston.”

  “She’s the other girl that’s gone missing,” said William dully. “They’ve been gone two weeks now. There must be someone else—another girl, another friend. . . .”

  Miss Meadows took charge. “Did your sister say anything to you? Anything about a romantic attachment?”

  Kat shook her head. “No. Lizzy might have been a bit . . . impulsive at times, but not in that way. It would never have occurred to her. She is,” she said, choosing her words carefully, “very young for her age.”

  William wondered what his older daughter had seen to make her sound quite so world-weary at twenty-seven.

  “No male visitors at the school?” Miss Meadows persisted. “No mention of strange goings-on?”

  William roused himself from his stupor. “What sort of strange goings-on?”

  Miss Meadows waved a hand. “Anything out of the usual routine, that’s all. Unexpected excursions, changes among the staff?”

  “There was a girl who ran off with the music master,” said Kat, “but that was over a year ago. Lizzy was very scornful about his mustachios.”

  Miss Meadows was looking distinctly frustrated. “What about letters? Packages?”

  “I know that Alex—my brother—sent her regular packages from home.” She still thought of India as home. She looked up. “As did Jack.”

  That was news. William hadn’t been aware that his estranged middle son had been in touch with either of his sisters. “Jack sent presents to Lizzy?”

  Kat nodded. “Trinkets and baubles and little things he thought might amuse her. She showed me some bangles he had sent her and a necklace of glass beads.” Her lip curled. “He sent me a parcel too, just last month.”

  “Beads and baubles?” said Miss Meadows.

  “Nothing half so useful,” said Kat scornfully. “It was quite typical of Jack. Here. See for yourself.”

  She fished a piece of paper off the table, the cheap brown paper of the bazaars. The ink had smudged in places, but the hand was unmistakably Jack’s, uncompromising and angular. His very writing was an assertion of will.

  “Let me.” Miss Meadows plucked the paper neatly from her hand. “If I may?”

  His daughter nodded. “There’s nothing there that can’t be seen.”

  Miss Meadows lifted the paper so that it caught the few rays of reluctant light that managed to squirm through the grimed window. “Darling Kitty-Kat—”

  “I hate it when he calls me that,” said Kat.

  “I can see why,” said Miss Meadows.

  “That’s why he does it,” said Kat grimly.

  Miss Meadows perched her pince-nez on her nose and resumed reading. “Things have got a bit hot for me in Hyderabad. I’d tell you where I’m going, but then you’d only send me more Christmas packages, and I’ve enough embroidered slippers to wear until Doomsday.”

  “You sent him slippers?” Knowing his oldest daughter’s feelings towards her half-brother, William was deeply moved.

  Kat shrugged uncomfortably. “I had to send him something. I couldn’t very well send packages to Alex and George and not include anything for Jack, could I? Of course, had I known that he would reward me with this, I would have spared myself.”

  William’s brows drew together. “With what?”

  Kat nodded to the letter. “Read on, Miss Meadows.”

  “I’ve sent a few odds and ends into your keeping. Hold on to them for me, won’t you? I’ll be back to collect them by and by. Your loving brother, J.”

  Kat gestured towards a large crate sitting by the wall. “That’s it, over there. Bazaar trash, most of it. Used cooking pots and old crockery. I can’t think why he went to the trouble of shipping it here, other than to inconvenience his relations,” she added bitterly. “We’ve already had someone calling here, claiming Jack had promised him something. I let him have a look through the rubbish and he soon went away again.”

  William sat up straighter. He had sent his daughter home from India to get her away from men like that. “Was he—importunate?”

  “Oh no,” said Kat. “He was most gentlemanly, all kitted out in the latest rig. I’m sure he wouldn’t have done anything to bloody his tailoring.”

  Miss Meadows regarded his daughter with appreciation. “I like you.”

  The corners of Kat’s lips turned up, fleetingly. “Thank you. But there was really no danger. He just wanted his box, whatever it was.”

  William had an idea what it might be.

  “Jack had a sideline in opium trading—selling it to young bucks with more money than sense.” William turned to Miss Meadows, adding hastily, “He wouldn’t touch the stuff himself, not Jack, but he’d no compunction fleecing those he thought deserved it. I’d thought he’d given it up.”

  “Have you ever known Jack to turn his back on anything which might profit him?” said Kat tartly.

  Yes. His family.

  “He’d not have sent any here, though,” William said quickly. “He wouldn’t endanger you that way.”

  Kat gave him a look.

  “He wouldn’t,” William repeated, and wished he were more sure of it. “That’s not to say there wasn’t another parcel that went astray.”

  Miss Meadows frowned. “Is it your theory that an opium fiend might have attacked the younger Miss Reid in the hopes of discovering a trove of
opiates beneath her bed? Or, perhaps, made off with her in the hopes of blackmailing your son into compliance?”

  Put that way, it sounded rather ridiculous.

  “Jack wouldn’t do anything that might hurt Lizzy,” said William. “He’s that fond of her.”

  As much as Jack was fond of anyone.

  “Yes,” said Kat flatly. “Everyone is fond of Lizzy.”

  Miss Meadows rose, drawing her gloves up over her wrists. “We’ll have to go back to Bath. There’s nothing else for it.”

  “The other family might have heard something from their daughter,” said Kat. She turned to her father. “If there’s any word from Lizzy, I’ll send to you immediately.”

  William looked with concern at his daughter, his firstborn, and said, “Would you like to come back to Bath with us, lass? I can take another room at the inn.”

  “But there’s Gammy,” said Kat. “I can’t leave her.”

  “We could take her with us.”

  “No,” said Kat. “She gets so easily confused. She’s comfortable here.”

  Comfortable? How could anyone be comfortable like this?

  “How long has she been like this?” William asked. He had thought it had been bad when Maria had died, but this—this was what it felt like to know one’s heart was breaking.

  “Four years now,” said Kat dispassionately. “My grandfather’s death did something to her wits. Losing the house finished it off. Sometimes she thinks I’m my mother. Sometimes she thinks I’m her mother.” She smiled a smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “It’s all right. It’s easier for her this way, I think. Half the time, she thinks she’s in India and you and Mother are just courting.”

  William’s eyes stung. From the smoke of the hearth; that was all.

  “Once I find Lizzy, I’m coming back for you,” said William. “We’ll take your gammy with us.”

  Kat smiled. “Of course,” she said.

  He felt like a monster.

  It was a good thing Miss Meadows knew the way, because William was largely oblivious to his surroundings, walking in a daze down the narrow, odiferous alleys. The light was already beginning to fade behind the tops of the ramshackle houses. This was what he’d sent Kat to, the underbelly of Bristol, gin and mud and other people’s washing.

  If he’d known . . . But would he have kept them at home with him? Could he have kept them at home? At the time, it had seemed like a recipe for disaster. There had been a cholera epidemic; little Annie Lennox had been raped by a bunch of arrogant junior officers; his regimental duties were taking him farther and farther afield.

  And there was that house, with a garden . . .

  “I had no idea.”

  “Yes, you’ve said that,” said Miss Meadows, picking her way along with her parasol for a walking stick.

  “I couldn’t leave my regiment.” He had to remind himself of that. “I’d have come sooner, but there was no help for it. I’d no way to earn a living here. My only fortune is my sword.”

  “In other words”—Miss Meadows’s voice cut into his reverie—“you like playing soldier.”

  William rounded on his companion. What did she know of it? “I wouldn’t call it playing. Those weren’t toy swords on the other side.”

  Miss Meadows sniffed. “I should think not. What would be the amusement in that?”

  “It wasn’t amusing—,” William began, and broke off.

  Only, it had been. He’d loved his regiment. He’d loved the camaraderie, the politics, the rush of it all. It was the only employment he’d had and the only one he’d ever wanted. He was a soldier already when he’d met and married Maria. He’d never stopped to consider what it might mean for a family. By the time he had a family, willy-nilly and higgledy-piggledy, there was no going back.

  “I sent them money back.” William hated how defensive he sounded, how mewling.

  It had been precious little he’d sent back, at that, little bits and pieces, scrounged here and there, hardly enough to pay for his girls’ room and board. It didn’t matter, Mrs. Davies had said; she’d more than enough. It was a comfort to have her Maria’s daughter with her, and she liked that scamp of a Lizzy.

  William had accepted with gratitude and a minimum of questions. Money had never been thick in his pocket. Mess fees kept rising every year. There was the boys’ schooling to pay for, their kit, a commission for Alex, a substantial bribe to the Begum Sumroo to take George into her retinue. His horse had gone lame; the price of feed had gone up. There was always something, something that made the coins drain out through the hole in his pocket as fast as it came in. The salary of a colonel in the East India Company’s army was far from munificent. It was enough to keep a man in comfort in India, not enough to spread towards multiple households on two continents.

  Even so, if he had known, he would have found a way, skimped somehow, borrowed, begged. “Why didn’t they tell me?”

  “The school fees at Miss Climpson’s select menagerie can’t come cheap,” said Miss Meadows.

  William cleared his throat painfully. “It’s not that.” They’d told him that Lizzy had won a free place at the school. The details were hazy, but it was a scholarship of some sort. He’d never known his Lizzy to have the slightest academic inclination, but he wasn’t inclined to look a gift horse in the mouth. “The fees were forgiven. She’s a charity girl.”

  The words galled him, evidence, if he needed further, that he’d done a miserable job taking care of his family.

  Miss Meadows gave him a sharp look. “I didn’t think Miss Climpson took charity girls. Her academy is a strictly for-profit institution.”

  “Well, she did this time,” said William shortly.

  Instead of pressing the argument, Miss Meadows regarded him quizzically. “How many children do you have, Colonel Reid?”

  “Not enough to render any of them expendable.”

  Miss Meadows looked at him, both brows raised.

  “Five,” he said heavily. There was no call to behave like an ass, as much as it helped to relieve his feelings. “Three sons and two daughters. Kat’s the oldest, Kat and her twin brother, Alex. George and Lizzy are the youngest. Then there’s Jack in the middle.”

  “Jack and his opium trade,” said Miss Meadows musingly.

  “It was only the once,” said William hastily. “As far as I know.”

  Jack kept himself private. It was only by chance that William had learned that it was Jack who had been funneling opium to that group of idiots who were running a Hellfire Club in Poona—and overcharging them for it, too. Given that those were the men responsible for Annie Lennox, it was hard to hold Jack to account for either.

  But that was the least of it. His son had hired out his sword to the Maratha leader, Scindia, in his uprising against the British, and, when that had failed, he’d turned mercenary, fighting for this petty princeling, then that. As long, of course, as they were fighting against his father’s people.

  What was Jack about now? He’d like to think that the parcels to Lizzy and Kat were by way of conciliation. The baubles for Lizzy—that sounded like a peace offering, right enough. As for Kat and the bundle of bazaar rubbish—well, Jack had never been able to resist riling his older sister. The two were chalk and cheese and always had been.

  “Ouch!” William rubbed his arm where Miss Meadows had poked him with the tip of her parasol.

  She gripped his forearm, hard. “Did you hear something? No, no, don’t stop walking! Keep going on as before. Do you hear that?”

  William shook the cobwebs from his brain. “Yes,” he said. Footfalls. Behind them. More than one person, unless he missed his guess. His hand went automatically to where his sword should have been.

  “They’ve been following us since we left your daughter’s,” said Miss Meadows in an undertone. “I had thought at first that it was coincidence, but they’ve been coming steadily closer.”

  “Footpads?” he said.

  “Most likely.” Miss Meadows wa
s remarkably composed.

  William took a swift appraisal of their surroundings. The alley through which they were walking was far from inviting. Many of the houses had blocked or broken windows. There’d be no help from those who lived inside.

  “We’re five minutes yet from the posting inn,” he said. “Possibly more.”

  Miss Meadows looked at him from under the truncated brim of her bonnet. “Too far to make a run for it.”

  “Too far for both of us to make a run for it.” The footsteps were definitely getting closer, speeding up. William swallowed a hearty oath. There was no way but to fight it out. “If I hold them off, can you go for help?”

  “And let you have all the fun?” Miss Meadows said.

  He realized, with amazement, that she meant it. Her color was high and her eyes were bright with anticipation. She pressed a button on her parasol and eased the casing forward, revealing a glimpse of a long, slim blade.

  “Your brawn, my sword. What do you say?”

  There was no time to say anything. There was the pounding of feet on the pavement and a hoarse cry. The brigands were upon them.

  As one, they whirled to face their assailants.

  There were three of them, all clad in tattered, dirty garments, kerchiefs covering their faces. But there was one thing they hadn’t reckoned with. They hadn’t expected their prey to fight back.

  William saw Miss Meadows fling the casing of her parasol aside and heard the snick of her thin, wicked blade.

  “To me!” she cried, and lunged forward.

  Chapter 7

  “Hark!” said Plumeria. “Do you hear? Those footfalls portend some fell pursuit!”

  Sir Magnifico drew forth his sword. “’Tis they who shall fall! Fell shall be their fall, my lady, never fear.”

  “Do you think me so faint of heart as that?” Plumeria whipped back her cloak, revealing the slim, silver blade strapped to her side. “I fear only that there shall not be sport enough for us both. To me!”