by R. J. Koreto
Charles grasped for words, which amused Frances. “Mary said she wasn’t telling anyone yet, not even her mother. How did you—?”
“Silly Charles. Did you really think you could keep a secret like that from me? I’d love a niece I could take to suffrage meetings, but I know you’d like a son, and I know Mary would like to give you a son, so I will pray for a nephew. I suppose you’ll name him James after Father, which would’ve delighted him.”
“Thank you,” he said. “We’ll discuss that later. Anyway, where have you been so late? I asked that maid of yours, and despite all my questions, all I got was her usual, ‘I’m sure I couldn’t say, my lord.’ She knows every little thing you’re up to.”
Frances thought of the evening just ended and suppressed a smirk. Not everything. To her brother, she said, “Charles, it’s very bad form to question a lady’s personal maid like that. Can you imagine father doing that to mother’s maid?” She watched him try to control his temper.
“Franny. Stop changing the subject. Mother didn’t get into fistfights with criminals in the homes of London solicitors. Yes, it was quite the topic of conversation this evening, whether the sister of the Marquess of Seaforth was looking for a position as a sergeant major.”
“I’m sure that’s an exaggeration,” she said. “I just ran into some brief difficulties when acting for a client.”
“A client?”
“Yes. I’ve recently become London’s first female consulting detective.” Charles lost all power of speech now. Frances rolled on. “You may have heard that I was attacked by a veteran of the Suffolk Rifles, all of whom perished in the Sudan, as I’m sure you know. You may have also heard that I was looking for an actress named Helen, who vanished thirty years ago. Maybe you even heard that I wrote and directed a play at the Emerald Theatre to uncover a terrible crime. Do take Mary to their production of Romeo and Juliet, and mention my name to the manager, Gilbert Rusk. Also, Mallow and I met the king there by the way, and he was angling for another invitation. And we’ll need to talk next week about you hosting a motion picture party. It sounds like great fun. Now it’s very late, and we both should be off to bed.”
But Charles wasn’t going to be pushed away so quickly.
“Franny, I didn’t understand half of what you said. Thank God. You’ve always made a case for living your own life, and I’ve accepted that as best I could. But when word of your exploits involving physical violence get back to me at my club and regiment, it is no longer just your life anymore.”
She smiled sweetly and spoke softly to contrast his rising voice. “Dear Charles, what did you hear? That a soldier attacked me? But no, he died decades ago. It was just an illusion. That I found an actress named Helen? She was also an illusion. An empty grave in Maidstone? Also an illusion. There was never any danger—illusion again and again.” She kissed him on the cheek three times. “For you, for Mary, and for your child. Know this, that the only reality is love. All else is illusion.”
And with that, she swept upstairs, leaving her brother yet again in silence.
Oh, what an exit. I really am the most marvelous theatrical director.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Once again, many thanks to so many people who help keep Lady Frances rolling along. First, deep appreciation to my peerless agent, Cynthia Zigmund, who’s always in my corner and serves as Lady Frances’s godmother. As always, the fantastic crew at Crooked Lane Books—especially Matt Martz, Sarah Poppe, and Jenny Chen—are not only a pleasure to work with, but they help me improve with every book I write.
My sister, Abby Koreto, stage manager extraordinaire, helped me with the theatre scenes. Martial arts practitioner Bryan Kapustinski made valuable suggestions in choreographing Frances’s fight scenes. For background in the early days of motion pictures, I relied on Filmsite.org, Northern State University’s online “Brief Outline of the History of Stage Lighting,” and Filmreference.com. Any errors or anachronisms are entirely my responsibility.
My family continues to give me the extraordinary support I need to keep writing. Without the continual help, encouragement, and advice from my wife, Liz, there would be no Lady Frances at all.
HISTORICAL NOTE
Lady Frances brushes up against some historical people and circumstances in this book, some of which may look anachronistic but are a matter of record.
I came across the Edwardian musical star Marie Studholme when first researching this book. A beautiful and by all accounts talented singer and actress, she was the toast of London in her day. She is known to have studied jujutsu with Yukio Tani, one of the first Japanese teachers of martial arts in the West. Suffragists also studied martial arts and used them to great effect against the male opponents who attacked them while protesting.
Shaw’s Major Barbara premiered in 1905, so Frances would’ve been familiar with it. Shaw teases Frances about basing Barbara on her. In fact, it is believed Shaw did base some of the characters in this play on real-life individuals, including those he knew personally. The Emerald Theatre is fictional but based on similar venues. The St. James Theatre, where Frances meets with Marie Studholme, was one of London’s leading theatres from 1835 until it was demolished in 1957. A favorite theatre of Queen Victoria, it saw the premier of The Importance of Being Earnest, and later Lawrence Olivier and Vivien Leigh would star together in performances of both Shaw and Shakespeare.
Frances and Mallow meet King Edward VII and Alice Keppel at the Emerald Theatre. Mrs. Keppel was the king’s mistress in the last years of his life. Beautiful and charming, she managed her position with tact and discretion. Outliving the king by nearly forty years, she died just a couple of months after the birth of her great-granddaughter, Camilla, who is now Duchess of Cornwall and Prince Charles’s second wife.
The film studio Frances and Mallow visit is based on real studios. It’s often assumed that motion pictures began with Charlie Chaplin, but the film industry was well under way in Edwardian times, as pioneers worked to develop film, lighting, cameras, and projectors that could keep up with their increasing ambitions. The first commercial feature-length movie, The Story of the Kelly Gang, was released in 1906. Although the British film industry continued to grow and thrive, a few years later filmmakers began gravitating to locales with a more reliable source of sunlight, especially a little town in California called Hollywood.