by Karen Odden
A Lady in the Smoke is a work of fiction. Names, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
An Alibi Ebook Original
Copyright © 2016 by Karen Odden
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Alibi, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.
ALIBI is a registered trademark and the ALIBI colophon is a trademark of Penguin Random House LLC.
eBook ISBN 9781101886403
Cover design: Caroline Teagle
Cover photographs: © Sandra Cunningham/Trevillion Images (woman); © Colin Hutchings/Shutterstock (train)
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Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
A Note to the Reader
Dedication
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Chapter 1
LIVERPOOL STREET STATION, LONDON, MAY 1874
My mother’s nerves were brittle as a porcelain teacup worn thin around the edge, which is why she took an extra dose of laudanum before we boarded the train home that day. I doubt anyone around us on the crowded platform could have guessed that she had a tincture of opium and alcohol running through her veins at half-past eleven o’clock in the morning. Looking at her, they’d see only a well-dressed gentlewoman, her face tranquil, and her fair hair beautifully arranged under an expensive hat.
But I knew. In the ten years since my father had died, I’d learned how to recognize when she’d taken an extra sip from the brown bottle she kept in her reticule: by her dreamy silence, by the faint smile that came and went without cause, and a certain softness to her chin, like a blur in an unfinished portrait.
I glanced sideways. Yes, she was very different now from what she’d been a mere ten hours ago, when we were alone in our rooms—her voice hard, her face contorted with fury—
A shriek cut through the dull roar inside the station, and our train rounded the corner, the racket of the wheels driving the pigeons off the rafters and into a whirl of feathers. The engine came to a halt, belching steam and filling the air with the smells of coal dust and burnt oil.
“Up train to York,” bellowed the stationmaster, “running express to Hertford and stopping at all points north!”
Railway servants in red uniforms rushed to the first-class carriages with sets of wooden steps, and passengers started to disembark. In a few minutes, we’d be on our way out of this godforsaken city.
“Lady Fraser! Lady Elizabeth! Oh, my dears!” shrilled a woman’s voice.
I kept my face averted. I didn’t want to see anyone I knew. Please. Please just let us get on this train and be gone.
“Lady Elizabeth! I say, Lady Elizabeth!”
I sighed and turned to see a plump woman trying to shift her way through the crowd. What was her name? Miss Rush. She was one of my distant relations who had been at Lady Lorry’s ball last night. Her round face was splotched pink with the effort she was making to reach us, and I felt a pang of pity. She must exist on the farthest fringe of society, for apparently no one at the ball had felt there was any social currency to be gained by telling her the rumors about us. Otherwise, Miss Rush would have been watching us slyly and leaving us quite alone.
“Are you taking this train home, then?” she asked breathlessly as she drew near.
I forced a smile. “Yes, we are. And you?”
“Oh, yes.” Miss Rush gave a quick, curious glance at my mother, who was staring into mid-air. Then she gazed wistfully at the train. “But of course you are riding in a first-class carriage! Alas, when one is retrenching, every farthing matters, as you know—but, then”—a little, tentative laugh, and a wave toward the second-class carriages, close behind the smoking engines—“you wouldn’t know, my dear—but no matter! I’d have endured any sort of travel for such a ball! I didn’t see you dancing very often; but when you’re married, I’m sure you’ll have a ball just as beautiful.”
I winced and looked away. The first passengers were being helped aboard, and people around us were beginning to push forward. I took my mother’s arm and said apologetically, “I’m afraid my mother is very fatigued. We should go to our—”
“And your cousin looked just as a bride should with her new husband!” She leaned forward as if she were about to confide a secret. “I’ve heard that Americans are brash and uncouth, but he wasn’t dreadful at all! In fact, he was—”
I let the crowd draw us apart, raised my hands helplessly, and called over my shoulder, “I’m sorry we must go. I wish you a pleasant trip home.”
“Oh! Of course! Goodbye, dear.” She smiled brightly, like a child pretending not to be hurt, and gave a little wave as we turned away.
Something inside me shriveled at my selfishness, for not taking her hint and inviting her to share our compartment. But if I had to listen to her prattle on about that wretched ball for hours, I’d throw myself off the train like one of those mad people I’d read about in the papers.
“Miss?”
One of the railway servants for the first-class carriages had his gloved hand out, waiting to help me aboard.
Mama was already inside, and as I stepped up, I could feel the vibration of the train under my feet. I followed Mama down a corridor so narrow that it was a good thing bird-cage crinoline skirts were no longer in fashion. Our compartment was the middle one of three and quite spacious, but the windows were small, and the green velvet cushions lumpy and frayed. On the backward-facing wall was a painted advertisement for Hudson’s Dry Soap that featured a busy harbor at sunset. Mama took the forward-facing seat near the door; I sat down between her and the window and closed my eyes. Even at rest, the train trembled with a fierce energy. Something near my ear rattled, and I opened my eyes to see one of the windowpanes jiggling against the frame. I put up my gloved hand to still it.
Through the dirt on the glass, I saw a figure on the platform that looked familiar, and my heart jumped.
Could that be Anne?
But my friend was supposed to be with her brother Francis at Venwell, their family estate in Scotland, for another fortnight.
I found the least grimy part of the window and peered out. The woman had Anne’s dark hair, coiled in the same style Anne always wore and the same slim shoulders wrapped in a blue coat. As she turned her head to look at the train, my hand was already up to wave—
&nbs
p; But it wasn’t Anne. Of course not.
The disappointment pushed like a weight at my chest. I leaned back against the velvet, watching the young woman disappear into the crowd of people, all shoving and bumping against one another, like sheep in a shearing corral.
If I’d had Anne with me last night, I could have borne it. When that first pair of ladies darted looks at me and raised their fans to hide their mouths, Anne would have raised her own fan and whispered things that would’ve helped me swallow down my growing discomfort. But the entire Reynolds family was avoiding the Season because of an awful article about Anne’s brother that had appeared in the Courier a few months ago. So I’d stood alone, half-hidden by a marble pillar, and tried to keep the color from mounting to my cheeks while I wondered what on earth people could be saying. I was an heiress with a respectable dowry of ten thousand pounds per annum. I was twenty years old, not unattractive (though I lacked the fair beauty of my mother), with a name and title that stood well up on the list of landed gentry, and no scandal attached to me. As such, I was considered a fine catch in the marriage market—as Anne and I joked dryly, much like tenderloin at the butcher. And it was only my third Season, so it’s not as though my goods were rotting.
I had opened my dance card and noticed that it was oddly empty. And then, as I stood with my gloved hand pressed against the pillar, I heard Lady Nestor say that she had it on good authority that my family’s fortunes were slipping, and my ten thousand pounds per annum was soon to be a thing of the past.
I felt a sick churning in my stomach, and the ballroom suddenly seemed unbearably hot. I slid farther behind the pillar, resisting the urge to find my mother then and there, to ask whether what Lady Nestor said was true. I forced myself to compose my face, to remain where I was, and wait the two agonizing hours until we were finally back in our rooms.
And then there were two more agonizing hours listening to her rage at me that yes, it was true—and wasn’t I sorry because now I would pay for my stupidity—I, who was selfish—selfish—selfish—always—
Our carriage rattled as heavy cargo doors slammed closed; the stationmaster blew his whistle again and made the last call for people to board. I turned to look at my mother. She gazed vaguely at the soap advertisement, her gloved hands resting on her reticule, the laudanum smile hovering around her lips. I didn’t know if I preferred her screaming at me or completely absent like this.
Over the years, I’d learned that when there was a raw edge to her rage, it was often because she had missed her laudanum, or because she’d drunk more than a glass or two of champagne. But her accusations from last night still hurt me, and frightened me too. I wasn’t such a fool as to believe that my personal charms were enough to preserve my place in the marriage market. Without a dowry, I would no longer be one of the choicer cuts of beef. I wondered bitterly what I’d be now. The skirt steak, perhaps, in need of a hearty sauce to conceal its indifferent quality.
I swallowed the lump in my throat and looked back out the window, wishing desperately that the train would pull out of the station. What on earth was taking so long?
The handle to our compartment turned with a sharp click, and the door swung in. A heavy-set, well-dressed gentleman entered our carriage and stowed his briefcase on the rack overhead.
How strange! We’d reserved a private compartment—at least, I thought we had. But perhaps this was part of our change of fortune, a small way that my mother chose to retrench, as Miss Rush put it. My mother merely smiled distractedly at him, and I didn’t want the fuss of calling a porter, or whomever one called in such cases. Without taking a bit of notice of us, he sat down opposite, facing the rear of the train, placed his hat on the seat beside him, folded his hands across his chest, and closed his eyes.
He would’ve caught Anne’s painterly eye. His bald head was egg-shaped, narrow at the top, and fuller at the bottom; he had eyebrows as bristly as Mr. Jaggers’s in Great Expectations, and his thin lips turned down sourly. He remained utterly still, except for his jowls, which shuddered as the train began to move.
Rain knifed against the windows as we pulled out of the station. Finally, after several weeks away, we were going home. I’d never liked London, with its rotten yellow air; its hordes of people and cabs and carriages that fought for space on the streets; the working men who walked with their shoulders hunched, as if merely getting through the day was a burden on their backs.
And the gossip that filled the air like mosquitoes over a swampland.
I’d never come here again if I could help it.
As the train sped up, the silver telegraph lines above dipped and curved faster than my eyes could follow, and the wooden poles blurred together. The rhythm of the wheels lulled me into a sort of stupor, and eventually I slept.
Then came a high-pitched screech of metal wheels on the iron track, and I was flung across the compartment before I could put up my hands.
Chapter 2
My forehead smacked against the opposite wall, and I fell backward, my hands clawing for purchase on something—anything—as my eyes flew open.
The carriage behind smashed into ours, and I pitched forward again, a scream searing my throat. Our carriage groaned and creaked, and, to my horror, it began to tip sideways. I clutched at the armrest on the seat, but something heavy hit me from behind, and everything went black.
I don’t know how long I was unconscious. When I woke, the carriage was still. I was in a heap on the tilted floor, my forehead was throbbing, and everything, even my hand on the wooden board, was a blur. I blinked hard, and the walls came into focus. The paneling was splintered, and the side window was blown to bits, with only a jagged edge of glass remaining. The air outside was dark with roiling gray smoke. Groggily, I pushed myself to sitting and instantly felt like I was going to be sick. I took a few deep breaths and swallowed hard; then I turned to find Mama. She was slumped beside me. The bald man and his briefcase were gone, and we were alone.
Then, above incoherent screams and the sounds of doors slamming open, came audible shouts of “Fire!” and smoke was burning the back of my throat and stinging my eyes.
How close was it?
I half-slid, half-scrambled to the window and looked out.
A gust cleared the air for a moment, long enough for me to see the curve ahead. The two black engines and a tender had run wholly off the rails and up against an embankment. The half-dozen carriages behind were accordioned haphazardly across the tracks. Brilliant fire leaped from the second engine, the long orange fingers having already caught the first few carriages and reaching for the next. Black smoke billowed into the air, and as I watched, sparks flew onto the rooftop of the carriage in front of us, landed, and began to burn. I tore my eyes away, my heart thudding in my chest.
Mama lay limply on the floor between the seats, her skirts awry, her leg twisted under her, her open eyes two black holes in her face.
“Mama! Mama!” I shook her, hard, too frightened to be gentle.
She blinked. She was alive. I sobbed in relief. “Mama! The train is on fire! We have to get out!”
A splotch of red appeared on her cheek, as if it had welled up from inside her. I had a second of panic, and then I tasted the metallic tang of blood at the corner of my mouth and put a hand to my face. It came away smeared with red, and I felt a rush of relief as I realized the blood was mine, not hers.
I put my hands on Mama’s shoulders, and pulled her to sitting. “Mama, please!”
Her expression was dazed, but I wrenched myself to my feet and attempted to lift her. She made it only as far as her knees before she reached over and groped for her reticule—the useless little jeweled bag. Its handle was stuck around a spring that had torn through the velvet of the seat, and she tugged at it feebly.
“Never mind it, Mama! Never mind it!” I threw my arm around her waist and dragged her toward the corridor. This side of the carriage was broken as well, and dark smoke and bits of ash were filling the air, so I could barely see. I
cried out, expecting to find people from the other compartments—but there was no one—and no human voices near us—just the roar and snap of the fire. Everyone else had already fled. As I stepped into the corridor, my foot landed on nothing, and I tumbled backward, my palms scraping against jagged wood. Panic rose in me as I realized that parts of the carriage floor were gone, and Mama was like a dead weight on my arm—
“Merde! Give her to me!” came a heavily accented voice. From behind me, out of the smoke, emerged a man who reached over and seized my mother by the waist. He was tall and broad, with a face as heavily bearded as a gypsy’s, and black eyes that glittered dangerously. God knows where he came from, or how he knew we were in there, but he wrapped one big arm around my mother to lift her over his shoulder, threw his other arm around me, and got us all the way to the steps at the end of the carriage. Before I could touch the railing, the man slapped my hand away from it. “No! Metal’s hot!” With nothing to balance me, I stumbled down the stairs; he shoved Mama into my arms. “Vite! Vite! Get away from the train! Go!” He sprang off the steps and ran toward the next carriage.
Pieces of hot orange ash quivered in the smoke. I gasped, but there was nothing to breathe except the scorching air. I half-carried, half-dragged Mama along, the lick of the heat chasing us into a grassy field. Mama limped badly, but I didn’t slow until we’d reached a place where the air was almost clear and dozens of people crouched on the ground.
Thank god we still had our travel cloaks on. The wind was chilling; there was no shelter nearby; the nearest trees were too far to reach on foot. Exhausted and shaking, I found a rock for us to sit against and wrapped my mother in half my cloak and all of her own. She shivered against me and dropped her face into her hands. But I watched the horrible scene before me, unable to look away.