A Lady in Disguise

by Sandra Byrd

  “How do you do?” he replied.

  “And his wife, Mrs. Lisbeth Lockwood.”

  “How do you do?” she said. “Please call me Lisbeth!” Her hair was a tumble of ginger curls, and she looked as jolly as her husband. My dressmaker’s eye told me that she might, just barely, be with child. We chatted comfortably along the way; I took by her conversation that she had married her husband before the military service in which he had sustained his wounds.

  The driver took us to the Lyceum with all speed. We arrived ahead of the crowd so that Lord Lockwood could deliver a faux sword to one of the actors.

  Captain Lockwood did not walk well or quickly so we took our time disembarking from the carriage. That gave me time to view the beautiful Lyceum Theatre in its full.

  We walked up the few steps, Lord Lockwood helping his brother, and then into the foyer. The room was covered with gold-flecked wallpaper; the carpets were red, and the lamps glowed already, though it was only early dusk.

  As we reached the door, I heard the cries of the sweets seller, the meat seller, the cigarette seller, and wondered where they slept at night.

  “Come along.” Lisbeth took my arm as she saw my face dim. “Do not be dour; this will be a night of good fun.”

  I smiled again. I suspected that life was difficult for her and her husband, with his wounds and their complete dependence on his older brother for his maintenance. All properties went to the oldest brother in titled families, of course, but many of the other resources were also divided according to his will. It did my heart good to see Lord Lockwood speaking to his brother so kindly.

  We got them settled into a comfortable box very near the lower floor, and then Lockwood leaned toward me. “Come with me to deliver the sword?” His eyes twinkled with promised fun.

  “Oh, yes!” I excused myself and Lisbeth winked. I winked back and squeezed her hand as I passed by.

  We made our way through the labyrinthine passages backstage. A few actors recognized Lord Lockwood and waved to him as we passed, calling out a greeting. He waved back—with his right hand; the sword was in a sword-belt. With his left, he held on to mine, which I did not mind in the least.

  Once backstage, he delivered the new sword and safety blade, and then we began toward our seats once more. I knew as many of the backstage crew as he did. I had lived backstage all my life.

  I took the teasing calls of “Traitor!”—to Drury Lane, that is—in good spirits. One actor, who had indicated his interest in me, asked if I’d be by again soon, or if he could come to call. I waved at him brightly but did not have time to answer as Lockwood firmly led me away. Because we had tarried to talk, we did not make it through the passage before the first act began.

  “Come.” Lord Lockwood pulled me into a cozy room aside the backstage. We could hear all that was going on but were hidden by a thick velvet curtain barely restrained by gold cords. We stood there, waiting till we could dash on ahead of the second act.

  “I cannot hear the lines at all!” I said. Drat.

  Young ladies do not use such language, filtered through my mind, and I smiled. Yes, Mamma.

  “You smile?” Lord Lockwood asked. He was very close to me in the tiny space, close enough that I could count the freckles in the constellation near his eye, the freckles that I, unaccountably, adored.

  “It’s just that I cannot hear the lines.” I wanted to reach up and touch the tendrils of hair that rested against his starched, white, upturned collar, above his tie.

  “Let’s recite them, then.” He took both my hands in his and the warmth of his hands seeped into mine. They were a comfortable fit; an intimacy passed through us like a tidal current. I had a suspicion he did not mean the lines from Act One.

  I nodded and held his gaze as he softly spoke Henry’s lines.

  “Lovely Katherine, if you will love me well with your French heart, I’m happy to hear you confess it in broken English. Do you like me, Kate?”

  What did I want him to know, and was I even certain of my feelings? “I do.”

  “An angel is like you, Kate, and you are like an angel.” He drew nearer to me. “Could you love me?”

  I must know. “Do you speak as Henry or as Lord Lockwood?”

  He smiled but even doing so did not lose his intensity. “As Thomas.”

  I whispered, “Thomas. I do not yet know.”

  He raised one of my gloved hands to his lips. I was particularly thankful that Mother Martha had used a thin skin for this pair, as I could feel him press gently against it.

  “I can’t allow you to lower yourself by kissing the hand of one of your humble servants.” I urged him toward the response I desired. He did not disappoint.

  “Then I will kiss your lips, Kate.” He waited, as he’d done the first time.

  I nodded and he leaned forward and kissed me gently. His lips lingered longer than I’d expected and it felt better than as I’d imagined during my dream at Winton Park. I fell down an entirely new, and welcome, rabbit-hole. His heady-woody-lovely sandalwood enveloped me even as he pulled away as things grew more urgent. I leaned forward and kissed him back and then pulled away while holding his gaze and my breath.

  “I’ve long waited for that,” he whispered.

  “I, too. I shan’t forget it, ever.”

  He smiled and ran his thumb along my jawline. “Do not fear. I shan’t allow it to be forgotten.”

  I looked down for a moment to compose myself, and then we returned to our seats ahead of the second act. Neither Captain nor Mrs. Lockwood asked us to explain. Thomas looked flushed, and so did I; I could feel the heat in my face. I avoided catching his eye, but we were both wrapped in the gauze of that kiss. When the play came to the fifth act, and the words were spoken, a delightful emotional tension bonded us. He felt it, too. I sensed it.

  After the play, we drove to his club for the benefit dinner being held. Normally, gentlemen’s clubs did not admit ladies—in fact, the Garrick, where he also held membership, admitted ladies under no circumstances. Other clubs did for benefit events. This was one such evening.

  Lord Shaftesbury, Seventh Earl of the same, hosted this event and so nearly everyone was in attendance and prepared to, as was said, do their bit for the charity. He was widely loved and admired for his charity work on behalf of the poor. Thanks to my sewing skills and the fact that I was allowed to retain the overrun fabric from the gowns commissioned me, I was dressed as finely as any woman there. “I am seriously delinquent in the jewels department,” I whispered to Mrs. Lockwood.

  “As am I,” she said. “But for my wedding ring, and I rather doubt among these baubles that would count for much.”

  Lord Lockwood introduced me to everyone as Lord Palmer’s granddaughter, and when I could, I politely spoke up and said I was also the daughter of Inspector Andrew Young, lately passed. I thought Lockwood quelled a smile, but I would not have half of me dismissed to push forward the other. I noticed odd and off looks sent my way once in a while; sometimes a man or two stared. I couldn’t help but wonder if it was due to my class. Certainly, I could not be told apart. Perhaps it had been the mention of my father? Did they know my mother was among the actresses they would have enjoyed seeing perform, but would not have invited to the benefit?

  I also could smell, very faintly but definitely, the rare and expensive Turkish tobacco Lockwood had scented on my feather. That same tobacco the Collingsworths had been smoking.

  There were also several young ladies present who preened in front of Thomas and were not pleased to see me. By their glances, I surmised that they considered me a novelty and a passing fancy.

  Was I?

  Lord and Lady Tolfee were in attendance and she was most gracious and warm, introducing me to a friend or two of hers and her husband. “I shall look forward to seeing you soon,” she said.

  The Twin Ball, I knew she meant. I had not told her of my Cinderella gown. Would people imagine that I thought of it to represent myself, or was just nodding toward this
year’s pantomime?

  I had not told anyone that I had donated Winton Park and that I was no longer heiress of a grand country estate. I would, soon enough. Life would turn normal. Later this very evening I would return to Cheyne Gardens and pick up my sewing again with my red, rough hands.

  Thomas and I stood apart from the others, talking intimately to each other about books we’d read and our favorite childhood memories. Captain Lockwood joined in with a few funny memories from their boyhood and Lisbeth smiled and chatted with me about her girlhood, which sounded rather like the one my mother experienced. She patted her abdomen once or twice; I caught her and smiled warmly, and she blushed.

  When it came time to eat, I sat across from Lord Lockwood, and whenever he could he lifted his eyes to me and did not look away, or he lifted his wineglass to his lips and nodded in my direction. I blushed the first time. The second time, I answered him in like manner.

  Please, please, I prayed silently as we ate. Don’t let midnight ever arrive.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  LATE JULY, EARLY AUGUST, 1883

  Thomas returned to Hampshire to assist his mother with the midsummer managing of their agricultural holdings and other duties as required of the lord of the area. He told me he would return for Lady Tolfee’s Twin Ball. “And then, we shall talk,” he promised.

  “Haven’t we talked?” I asked the night he’d dropped me off at my door.

  “Not really,” he’d said with a gentle smile. Captain Lockwood and Lisbeth had waited in the carriage for him; and Mrs. W was on the other side of the door so he’d simply kissed my gloved hand, letting his lips linger while we looked into one another’s eyes, and bid me good night.

  The next week found me aflutter. I had finally been summoned to meet with Papa’s solicitor, Mr. Pilchuck. I removed the investment certificates and receipt that Francis had passed along to me from the desk in Father’s study. I looked at each one—they were made out to Papa as owner and signed by a company representative—and placed them into a long leather envelope. I hoped that Mr. Pilchuck would be able to look them over and confirm that all the companies were in good standing and had been long and honorably associated with Papa’s investments. They were important, and I would sort out why.

  I remembered Francis’s unspoken accusation against Papa and the investment certificates, that he had not come by the money cleanly. I did not know. I also had come to the tentative conclusion that Inspector Collingsworth was involved in dirty deeds of some sort himself.

  Had Papa been, too, partners in misdeed as well as on the force? Was Collingsworth taking care to cover for Papa so both their indiscretions and, perhaps, illegal activity would not come to light? Or, had Papa uncovered Collingsworth’s misdoings?

  A sorrowful thought pressed against me. Was Francis involved, too? I can protect you like no one else can, he’d said. Just what had he meant?

  I joined Ruby on the front porch. “They’re going to grow fat, you know, under this kind of over generosity.” She shook a few more bread crumbs toward the juvenile pigeons. “It may be time they found their own food.”

  She smiled at me, brilliantly beautiful now her hair was nearly grown in and she was under the care of people who loved her. “It’s as much for me as for them, miss.”

  My heart squeezed. I understood. I should not like to see her leave when that time came.

  “I must be gone for most of the day, but Mother Martha will oversee your work,” I said, the day heating up as the hour marched on.

  “Will we be working on the Cinderella dresses?” she asked. A fissure of anxiety ran through me. We must get started on the costumes, but the Twin Ball dresses were not complete.

  “No, the Twin Ball dresses,” I said. I sighed. “I should not have agreed to go. We would then have Lady Tolfee and Lady Mary’s dresses completed by now.”

  Ruby put her hand on my arm. “It’s most important to us, miss, that you go. It’s why we’re working so cheerfully. To see you go and have a wonderful time. It’ll almost be like we’re there with you.” She returned to the sewing salon, and I prepared myself for my visit with Mr. Pilchuck. Mrs. W would accompany me to his office.

  Midafternoon, the hired carriage delivered us to his offices in the City of London, where all financial transactions occurred. Mrs. W remained in the reception room whilst I accompanied Mr. Pilchuck’s secretary, a tall, thin, dour man, back. He knocked on the door. “Miss Young, sir.”

  The door was pushed open and I walked into the room. I expected Pilchuck to stand and greet me. He did not stand. He simply motioned for me to have a seat across from his desk.

  “Miss Young,” he began. “While normally it would take me six months or so to sort through the postmortem accounts of a client, I have, of late, accelerated this to bring the matter to a complete close.”

  His tone was so far removed from the fatherly tenor of the last visit. I held the leather envelope containing the investment certificates to my side.

  “I had certainly expected to hear from you sooner. Fortunately, I am a woman with an income and was able to provide for myself, in however tenuous a manner, whilst I waited for your tardy response.”

  He nodded, but did not acknowledge my admonishment.

  “First,” he continued, “I must tell you that I received notification that Winton Park has been fully, legally, and completely transferred from you to the Cause.” He pushed a paper toward me; I scanned it quickly and nodded. He placed it into the top of a large stack of towering boxes, hastily arranged, it seemed, near his desk.

  “Some fathers would not have wanted their daughters to have given away such a large property. Your father had never mentioned it to me, and I must remind you that I find this a perhaps foolhardy thing to have done.”

  A flutter of doubt. Had I done what Mamma had wanted but not what Papa would have wanted?

  “Some husbands would not take kindly to understanding that their wives had given away valuable property before the marriage. That money could also have served as a dowry.” Mr. Pilchuck looked down his nose at me, with a mixture of disgust and fear. Why?

  “The property was mine to do with as I pleased.”

  “The Cause is a worthy organization,” he not-quite-agreed.

  His first kind words. I smiled. “Thank you.”

  Pilchuck handed over a stack of papers. “You’ll find all of the details on your father’s accounts herein. There are two bank statements, information on his few investments. You’ve just reminded me that you sew for a living.”

  It sounded so . . . desperate. “I do.”

  “Good. After death duties were paid and some other invoices and accounts he had outstanding, there is just a bit left over from that sale of some arable acreage between Winton Park and the neighboring estate, but not much more.”

  “Sale of arable acreage?” The hair on the back of my neck rose to attention. “I had not heard of this.”

  “Oh yes,” he said. “Six months or so before his death. The trust allowed the trustee to make such a sale if it were for the benefit of the trustee or the property.” He mentioned the exact sum on the receipt I had found in Papa’s papers, and I withdrew it from the envelope and handed it to him.

  He looked at the receipt. “Yes. Via barrister H. A. Colmore Dunn.”

  Colemore Dunn! Thomas’s barrister, and friend. Colmore Dunn had not mentioned this to me. Perhaps it wouldn’t have been polite.

  Perhaps he’d been told not to.

  Yes, yes, Dunn’s name was on the receipt. I supposed I hadn’t put them together because the first half of his surname had been left off.

  “Who was the purchaser?” My hands trembled, and I kept them held together, in my lap, to steady them. Even before he answered I knew the answer. A fact that had been deliberately hidden from me.

  “Viscount Lockwood,” he said. “Your father hadn’t told you?”

  I shook my head.

  “Perhaps he didn’t want to burden you with the details,
my dear,” he said. “You’re a woman, after all. Gentlemen of all classes do not discuss their financial dealings with, or in the company of, women. I only do now as you have no one attached to you with whom I might discuss this. It was well within his rights to sell some property to finance your ongoing maintenance.”

  I reeled. Thomas had bought some of my land and had not even told me, not during any of our discussions about Winton Park! Worse, Papa had not told me!

  One comforting thought crept forth—my father could not have been the recipient of a steady flow of ill-gotten gains if he had needed to sell some of Winton Park’s acreage to pay the death duties or maintenance on either property.

  “I am well able to manage my accounts,” I said. “About my written enquiry. The King Street property.”

  His face blanched. “Yes. As an especial favor to you, and because you are a young woman alone, I made some enquiries. I’m sorry to say that was a grave mistake on my part, and perhaps yours. Within a few days of floating the query down some legal and professional channels, some . . . gentlemen . . . arrived at my office. They informed me in no uncertain terms that it was privately held property. That people, meaning myself, Miss Young, should not be concerned with ownership or activities of property to which they had no attachment. Or else.”

  He’d been frightened off?

  “They next asked me how long you’d owned your house in Cheyne Gardens, and if I knew how your parents had come by the funds to purchase it.”

  I swallowed. Were they coming next for Cheyne Gardens? “And your answer was?” I did not even know the answer to their question. No one had shared information about the family finances, of course, with me then or at any other time.

  “I replied I did not know where the funds for the original purpose had come from. I had not handled that transaction, mostly just those associated with your trust, as I had worked with Lord Palmer, your grandfather. I was not your father’s solicitor long; I understood him not to need one. I primarily handled affairs related to the trust and your grandfather’s papers.” He glanced at the stack of boxes. “Out of regard to your grandfather, I did not mention the recent sale of acreage with its proceeds returning to your father.”