by Molly Tanzer
I watched them go, heart pounding. The sight of my master’s broad shoulders tapering into his muscular backside… it never failed to affect me.
Mr. Blythe was not a man many would call handsome. For starters, he was more than five and forty, going grey, and on top of that, he was far too hairy to be the hero of a romance. His features were not regular enough to make up for any defects in his figure, and his expression was perpetually sardonic, even when he was being genuinely kind. Even so, there was something about him that drew the eye.
And, in my case, the heart.
It was not just me, I promise you—though I cannot do him justice on the page, I tell you truly that men and women alike were completely fascinated by Mr. Blythe. He was possessed of an uncanny pull or gravity, as if he were a moon and mankind itself a tide.
“I’ll just go, then,” I said vaguely, to Reed.
“Shall I have someone send up your supper?”
“No, I can manage. I’ll fix a tray.”
“Good night, then, Rasa.”
A knowing smile hovered at the corners of Reed’s full-lipped mouth. I frowned back at him, annoyed, but Reed didn’t care twopence for that. He broke into a grin, shrugged, and smugly settled back into his chair.
“I’ve been there,” he said, eyes flickering to the parlor door, “and I don’t envy you.”
“I can’t imagine what you might mean,” I said, and stalked out of the foyer.
But I picked up my skirts and fled to the kitchen once I was out of his sight, cursing Reed, and Mr. Blythe, but mostly myself.
Lately, something had changed, and I found it increasingly difficult to suppress my sensations whenever my master was about. At least Mr. Blythe had failed to notice my burgeoning affections. Surely he would have asked about it, had he suspected anything, and I could never lie to him.
I laid out the meal in my master’s chambers, then went to refresh myself in my own. A quick check in my glass revealed why Mr. Blythe had wished to meet with me after his clients departed. I looked flustered. The king of composure himself, he had early on taught me how to conceal and redact. I had learned my lessons well, if I do say so myself—though I could only do so much. Given the obvious state I was in I should have asked me in to chat, had I been he.
“Ah, there you are,” he said, a plate of pie and chicken already on his lap when I entered. “I expected to find you already nose deep in all this. Or perhaps you wish to speak with me before you eat?”
The pie in particular looked very tempting, but my stomach fluttered at the thought of taking a bite. I was not on edge for being alone with him in his rooms, not entirely at any rate; no, I was more concerned with telling him of Tom, and my failure. I did not think he would be angry with me, but neither did I wish to disappoint he whose esteem I cherished most.
“Very good champagne over there,” he said through a mouthful of chicken wing, indicating the location of the bottle with the bone, “pour us both some, and unburden yourself. I hate to see a hungry woman. What is it? Are you in some terrible danger? Or are you… in love?”
“Neither,” I lied, my education at his hands serving me very well indeed. “It’s only… I was recognized tonight. When I was out with my friends.”
“By whom? A client? They know they’re never to approach you after—”
“Not a client.” I did not usually interrupt my master. “Do you remember, earlier this year, when a Mr. Bewit hired you to put him up for Brooks’s? The boy in the shop, the one I hoodwinked into getting at that wig. Tom Dawne is his name. He recognized me.”
“The boy… yes, all right, I remember,” said Mr. Blythe, chewing thoughtfully. “Must have a mind like a bear trap. It’s been half a year and you were gussied up in pants and a tricorn at the time, weren’t you? You looked a treat.”
“Yes, it’s extraordinary.” I sipped at my champagne. It was good. “He says I’m a shocking duplicate of the real Callow Bewit. In fact… he thought I was Callow Bewit, when he first saw me, I mean. He came up to me, threw his arm over my shoulders, and hailed me as a comrade. Only after he got a good look at me did he realize his mistake.”
“How interesting,” said Mr. Blythe. “When Mr. Bewit mentioned he had a son about your age, I asked about the boy, and after hearing he was long-limbed and chestnut-haired I knew exactly how to affect the whole operation. It was so perfect, was it not? Of course, it was a risk, bringing Mr. Bewit’s name into it at all… but it was too tempting to hide the man’s involvement in plain sight. Having Mr. Mauntell accuse his rival would be the quickest way to turn all suspicion away from the source, to my mind. Once anyone took the time to think about it, it would beggar belief that a man would hire someone to impersonate his own son in the course of ruining a rival, for who would voluntarily attach their name to a scandal?” He chuckled over his own cleverness. “Queer though,” he continued, turning thoughtful, “how did your shop boy come to know the real Callow Bewit?”
I swallowed a gulp of champagne, doing it a disservice by not really tasting it. “Yes, well… turns out, he’s been working for Mr. Bewit. The wigmaker dismissed him after the whole affair. Apparently he felt his apprentice’s involvement tarnished the shop’s reputation.”
“Mr. Bewit never told me that.” My master was as discomfited as I about this turn of events. “I could have done something about the affair, if I’d only known. Well! I’m really quite astounded to hear it. The poor boy—dismissed! What a terrible shame. He must be close to your age, he would have been late in his apprenticeship. How devastating for him.”
“It was. That’s why I was so anxious to tell you.” I kept my eyes firmly focused on where my fingers gripped the stem of my wineglass. “I fear Tom’s reputation is not the only thing tarnished by this. You must think me a terrible bungler. I can’t see what I would have done differently, but—”
“You mustn’t blame yourself,” he said gently. I looked up. “Mr. Bewit was my client. If anyone is to blame, I am. By all accounts you performed your part brilliantly. You looked astounding well in those trousers, as you always do, and I watched you practice your rôle before you set out to pay the call. Really, my dear girl, you mustn’t be so hard on yourself.”
“If I had managed the deception more artfully—”
“Nonsense. What would you have done differently? If you can think of something, well, you know for the future. But really, all we can do is be as careful and precise as possible. Mistakes happen. I have made my fair share of errors, with far worse consequences than any you might have made here. At any rate, it seems as if this unfortunate apprentice made out like a bandit. He’s in service to a gentleman now, and is probably much more comfortable than in some shop.”
I was feeling better now, and much hungrier too. As I rose to get myself a plate, I said, “You’d think. At first it seemed fine enough, to hear him tell it. He’s insinuated himself deep in Mr. Bewit’s confidence. But now that the real Callow Bewit’s come home, he’s found himself gone rather out of fashion.”
“I see. Well, perhaps we could get him his apprenticeship back.”
“I offered, but Tom—”
“Tom, is it?”
I looked over my shoulder to see Mr. Blythe smiling at me knowingly. I blushed, mortified that he would think me susceptible to the charms of a mere pup. I esteemed the lad’s pluck, but while he was handsome enough, and possessed of a perfectly fine figure, Tom’s manners had revealed him to be the sort of young man who knew vastly less about the world than he thought he did. The clumsy, artless way he’d wrangled a second meeting, when he could have just asked! Had I not felt so responsible for his misfortunes I should have laughed in his face.
“He told me to call him that,” I snapped, trying not to flounce back to my chair with my plate in one hand and the rest of the bottle of champagne in my other. With as much dignity as I could muster, I poured us both another glass, and tucked in. “What I was trying to say is that he isn’t sure what he wants. He said he needed ti
me to decide, so we’re meeting again, on Thursday.”
“Are you now.” Oh, how his amusement rankled! “I hope it’s not for supper, I had promised Mr. Raleigh you would attend his bacchanal. He says no one in London peels a grape like you. Or looks so fetching in a tunic and stola.”
“Yes, I remembered. Tom and I aren’t meeting ‘till ten.”
Mr. Raleigh had been my master’s master’s client, before she retired. An aging scholar of ancient Rome, his revels had been quite the event a quarter century ago. Now, at eighty, a bottle of claret, a light meal, and a pretty girl draped in purple was all he wanted in the world, and he was usually tucked in and asleep in bed by half nine. “Of course, if you think it will go later… or you need me… I could always cancel?” I tried not to sound too hopeful.
Mr. Blythe set aside his plate and leaned forward. “I think it’s a good thing, your going out with a young man, even if he’s not entirely to your taste.”
“Oh?” My heart seemed to stop, then start again much too quickly. “Why is that?”
He sighed. “I fear you don’t get out enough.”
“I go out with you four times a week even when it’s not the season!”
“Oh, I know things here keep you busy… I simply mean you don’t get out enough with young people your own age.”
“I was out tonight!”
“Yes, and I was very glad of it—that’s why even though the Cranleys wanted so much for you to be a part of our gathering I told them you couldn’t make it. You hadn’t taken a night off in a month, you know.”
“And I took one. So what’s the problem?”
“There’s no problem… I just mean that your friends, it’s not as if you’ve ever told me any of them were particularly… interesting… to you.”
“Interesting?” I suddenly realized what he was about. “You think I need a romance?” I heard how the word sounded in my mouth, like something dirty. I would give myself away if I wasn’t more careful.
“Need is such a funny word. Let’s say… I think it would be good for you to have a bit of fun in your life.”
“I do have fun!”
“Enjoying your work is a different matter entirely. I’m ever so glad you do—don’t get me wrong. You’ve been an ideal apprentice. Much better than I ever was, trust me. But I think your diligence and enthusiasm has allowed me to exploit you a little, my dear girl. You are so eager to learn, so hungry for knowledge and experience… but your most excellent work ethic makes it too easy for me to forget that you are still young. Young people should enjoy their youth.”
“It’s not as if my youth did me any good,” I said lightly, but the shadow that passed over my master’s brow gave me pause. I did not want to upset or worry him. “I am listening, Mr. Blythe. Really, I am.”
“If you don’t like this Tom Dawne, then to the Devil with him,” said Mr. Blythe. “But the next young man who falls into your lap… don’t make that face. You’re not used to young men; so few of them can afford us. But, even so, young men can be fun… in their own very particular way. Perhaps they haven’t as much knowledge or experience or refinement as the gentlemen to whom you are accustomed, but they have their charms. Look at Reed—you liked him well enough, for a time.”
“I still do!” My affections for Reed had not waned as my interest in our mutual master waxed. I had awoken in his bed, his familiar arms around me, not three mornings back—and it was not the coldness of the winter nights that had induced me to join him.
I did not mention this to Mr. Blythe, however… which in itself was telling.
Feeling suddenly exhausted, I smiled weakly as I set aside my plate and made to rise. “I fear, however, I should retire, before it gets much later. For all your talk of youth’s virtues, you seem to have more stamina than I could ever hope for.”
“I’ll be dropping like a stone the moment you depart, trust me.” In spite of his remark, he leaped out of his chair with the vigor of a man half his age. “Good night, my dear apprentice. Sleep well.”
“And dream of young men?”
I let him help me to my feet, and as I stood, I saw something in his eyes that startled me. For all his earlier joviality, he was quite serious now. It took my breath away, being so close to him, as he looked so earnestly into my eyes. For a moment I dared hope he was on the verge of confessing something to me, something that would negate his earlier words about me finding some young man with which to entertain myself.
“Miss Rasa,” he said, “I admit I adopted you out of the selfish desire of finding someone to carry on my legacy—of training a young person in the arts I myself was trained in from a young age. To that end I have educated your mind as best I could, given my own imperfect education; trained your body; taught you to appreciate discipline; and made you a virtuoso in the arts of pleasure, entertainment, and deception. What I mean to say is, I have shaped your soul, and technically I legally possess your most attractive physical person. Even so,” he kissed my knuckles, “I would never seek to control you—not your actions, and certainly not your dreams.”
He led me to the door, and I walked through it best I could on buckling legs.
“Good night, Miss Rasa.”
“Good night, Mr. Blythe,” I whispered, but he had already shut the door behind me.
The days leading up to Tom’s Thursday engagement with Miss Rasa were some of the most exciting of his young life.
Though it wounded his pride to follow Mr. Wallace’s advice, Tom had deigned to open an account at the slightly seedy but satisfactorily discreet bank of Merchant and Mills. They treated him quite respectfully indeed, when he announced the sum he planned to deposit, even going so far as to assign him a private banker.
On Mr. Courtenay’s advice, Tom elected to take out a modest loan against his principal. His account would pay quarterly interest amounting to what an up-jumped wigmaker’s apprentice considered a more than satisfactory sum for him to spend per annum on accommodations, food, clothing, entertainments, and whatever else he might want… but at the same time, Mr. Courtenay suggested it might be nice for Tom to have a little extra, just to get himself set up in the world. Seeing the wisdom of this advice, Tom signed where he was told, electing not to mention that his account would be reduced by more than half in just a few days. The interest on the loan would be more than payable out of his own income, once he got on his feet. He would just have to be… frugal.
After pouring over that morning’s broadsheets, Tom took a few tours of what lodgings were available, purse heavy in his hand, and settled on a modest suite of furnished rooms in an inexpensive but sufficiently fashionable neighborhood in Covent Garden, and took his landlady’s advice on the hiring of the staff he required. Mrs. Miggins assured him both the cook and scullery maid were respectable, not given to idleness, stealing—nor, in the maid’s case, flirting with any gallant visitors that a young man such as himself might entertain. As for a male servant, Tom longed to hire one but knew he could not afford the expense; anyways, Mrs. Miggins employed a ragged youth to run such errands as her tenants needed. Satisfied, Tom paid her a year’s rent, sent the boy in a hired cart to retrieve his things from 12 Bloomsbury Square, and got acquainted with his new staff while he waited.
He slept well that first night, exhausted from moving and the strain of the previous evening’s exertions, but none of the next few evenings were as restful. It proved too tempting to have so much money at his disposal, and everything in London to spend it on, especially at Christmastime.
It made sense to eat at home, for his cook produced better and cheaper meals than he might get out. This, he considered “economizing,” as he knew very soon he must live on the interest of only ₤2500. But while Tom knew that wine was also cheaper drunk at home, that he would not do.
Being at his leisure was a brave new world for Tom. Though he had enjoyed quite a bit of freedom to pursue his interests while working for Mr. Bewit, he had never been allowed to fully indulge his own tastes. Given o
ver completely to his own discretion Tom quickly found it challenging to not stay out all night drinking champagne and claret, or to see every show at every theatre.
Women, however, he needed no willpower to resist. Tom remained too proud, as well as too suspicious of disease, to indulge his desires with prostitutes. And anyways, always at the back of his mind was Miss Rasa—or Miss Alula Bewit, whatever she ended up preferring he call her, once he revealed he knew her secret. He was incapable of comparing her to every girl he met, preferring the sway of her hips to every whore’s stride and the appearance of her natural features to every debutante’s powdered countenance.
But it was no longer with pure excitement that Tom looked forward to their meeting. In truth, he resented that the meeting he had so ardently desired would now include a necessary reduction in his style of living. As he bought such necessaries as new shoes, a fur-lined cape, and a few new hats, stockings, gloves, and—of course—wigs, he wondered how it was possible for any gentleman to keep within his income. As he was fitted for the new coat he wished to wear when he next met Miss Rasa it occurred to him that he had spent more of his loan in four days than he had planned to spend in a month. He would need to do better—much better.
Unless…
Tom pushed the unworthy thought away. He would not rob Miss Rasa of a single farthing; why, he was so kind that he had already resolved to take the ₤500 charged him by Mr. Wallace out of his own share. Mr. Bewit’s dying wish was for his long lost daughter to use the money to escape her tyrannical master, and Tom would not ruin her chances of freedom. Mr. Blythe sounded like a very dodgy sort—mild Mr. Bewit would never have lightly called any man a devil. Likely poor Miss Rasa needed every shilling. Slaves had to pay for their freedom—so might she. How much of what was hers would she need to give up before she could step out of his house a free woman?