by Beth Byers
She squeezed his hand as she told him, “I am merely one of the first to tell you so, Harrison.”
“I sent my book to Mr. Aaron as you suggested,” Harrison said, smiling once more at her, and squeezing her hand back. He squeezed rather too long, and she had to pull hard to retrieve it. “I addressed it to Robert Aaron also as you said.”
Georgette listened to Harrison’s monologue on his book until her mind had completely dulled, but he was distracted from the marriage offer, and she could stand to slap an attentive look on her face and pretend to care. Thankfully Marian entered the room soon after Georgette had refilled her teacup and suffered through another cup of boring but respectable tea.
“Hullo,” Marian said, her gaze darting to Georgette before returning to her cousin. There was no question that Marian read the scene correctly. Georgette hid her sigh of relief, knowing that Marian would save Georgette from having to continue to listen to Harrison. “Did you write your letter? I was going to post mine this morning.”
“I did,” Georgette agreed. “A walk does sound nice.” Escaping Harrison Parker sounded even better. Georgette paused with a flash of guilt for not inviting him before. “We’re going to a very odd tea this afternoon, Harrison, if you’d like to go.”
He agreed with a such hopeful expression that Georgette had to force herself to bite back a curse. Had he not completely understood that she was promised to Charles? Any guilt she had was swept away, replaced by a concern that she may have to repeat her refusal of him soon.
Marian grabbed the leashes from the cabinet near the front door and Georgette happily clipped them onto all four dogs. With a quick nod at Harrison, she jumped up and slipped out the front door before he could offer to accompany them.
“So you told him?”
Georgette nodded.
“How did he take it? Were you clear? That last look he gave as you invited him to the tea was enough to make me think you’d decided to throw Charles over for Harrison.”
“No,” Georgette told Marian.
“I’ll still love you and think of you as a sister if you do.”
Georgette wrapped her arm around her friend’s waist. “I am not marrying Charles to be your aunt-in-law, hold you in affection though I do.”
“Are you certain?”
Georgette said simply, “I never once expected a man to ask me to marry him. Let alone two.”
“You have options,” Marian told her. “Now that you’re a famous author, you’ll have more.”
“You realize, of course, that isn’t very appealing.”
“Isn’t it?”
“Now that I can take care of myself and make my life what I want it to be, I’ve discovered that the option of having multiple men offering for me is entirely unappealing. I used to dream of being saved, did you know?”
Marian shook her head, her gaze fixed on Georgette.
“I wanted a man to come along and offer me security. I wanted to belong to someone.” Georgette was surprised by the burn in the back of her throat and her eyes.
“And?” Marian’s quiet voice pulled Georgette from her memories.
“No one ever did.”
“Did you cry?”
Georgette bit down on her lip. “Often.”
“And then?”
“Then I stopped dreaming of it. I realized no one else would save me but me.”
Georgette looked ahead down the cobblestone streets of Bath. The dogs were prancing along happily. It was as though Georgette were not, in fact, vomiting up the contents of her heart.
“So you saved yourself.” Marian squeezed Georgette’s arm tightly. “You’re my hero, you know.”
“I didn’t just save myself and Eunice, you know,” Georgette told Marian. “I learned how to be at peace with being the extra female. The one that no one wanted enough to see her for herself. I learned to like myself anyway and enjoy my own company. I learned all of it before I wrote my first book. The book wasn’t the means to me liking myself—it was simply a way for me to pay our bills.”
“So what do you want now?”
“I want to be loved, of course. For the person I am despite the fact that no one ever loved me back, beyond Eunice and my parents. That person isn’t Harrison—who still doesn’t see the real me, but I find myself surprised to truly believe it might be Charles.”
They stopped at the teashop for tea worth drinking and then stopped again at a dress shop with the loveliest dresses. Georgette was arrested by the ivory lace dress in the window and knew, with utter certainty, that she might actually look lovely in the dress. With the cream lace and the scalloped edges and the way that it would emphasize her slim figure, Georgette thought it might even set off her skin.
What she wanted to do was ask Charles if they could bypass the big wedding, and perhaps even searching for houses, and simply get married. Perhaps her feelings made her seem something of a child, but happiness had been snatched away from Georgette so often that anything other than cherishing that which she’d found left her in fear.
“I want to try on the dress in the window,” Georgette told the shop girl. The moment she saw herself in the mirror trifold, Georgette felt as though she were approaching loveliness. She spun in a circle, taking in the way her dress moved. She twisted to examine the crisscross of laces at the back, meant for decoration but lending an air of beauty found in the details of master craftsmanship.
She knew already she’d buy the dress, but she opened the door to the dressing room to show Marian all the same.
“Yes,” Marian told Georgette instantly. “That is the one. With a little raspberry rouge on your cheeks and lips and your lashes darkened, your lovely pale skin will be emphasized.”
Georgette glanced down at herself and felt pretty for the first time in her life. She’d gone from frumpy to passable to something else. Not truly beautiful but something a little better than average.
“Happiness looks good on you,” Marian told Georgette.
Georgette paid for her dress with a smile before gathering up the dogs with Marian from the front of the shop. They walked slowly back to Mrs. Parker’s house.
“My aunt is coming,” Marian said as they approached the right street, “to the lying tea. She has decided she wants to see you be Jane and is thinking of it as playacting. Aunt Parker has added, however, that it’s disgraceful that a woman of a certain age must lie to keep her unwanted nephew out of her house.”
Georgette flinched. The invitation had been sent to them all, but she’d been hoping that no one but Marian would accept.
“Did you tell her why Edna doesn’t want her nephew in the house?”
Marian shook her head. “I did write to Joseph about it, but I mentioned her circumstances. How she was older and single and somehow convinced you to pretend to be this fake student from her past. She sounds a bit silly.”
Georgette tried not to flinch, given how heavily she identified with Edna Williams. Instead Georgette just said, “She could be wrong about her nephew killing her cousin and still have good reason to believe what she does. Her cousin did die and it did seem like she was a healthy woman, given what Edna said.”
Marian glanced at Georgette. “You think she might be right.”
“I think she’s easy to overlook and that is something that I understand all too well.”
Chapter 6
Charles Aaron
He was going to reach Swindon momentarily, have his meeting, and find Georgette just after tea or thereabouts. He had a solid bet that she’d already discovered the best place to have tea. To be honest, he was craving her odd tea with coffee and cocoa and hoped she’d either brought her supply or knew where to get some. Along with, he thought, a layer cake. His love had taken to indulging often in cake. The result being that Charles also was wanting to indulge often.
Charles approved in the way her cheeks had gone from hollow to round. He approved in the way the light in her eyes shone more often, and the ridiculous indulgences she enjoyed
more than anyone else simply because she had been denied them for so long.
The meeting took far too long and Charles nearly missed the last train to Bath. He had to run for it. Dodging through a line of children who had been lined up by their schoolteachers, their disgusted gasps had him flinching. He leapt on at the last minute and then cursed when he realized he was, in fact, going to miss tea. Charles reached the train car and saw that it was full. Surely the last train to Bath should be nearly empty, but it seemed the universe was frowning on Charles today.
He shrugged and found a place to open his briefcase. The more work he did while Georgette was enjoying her tea, the more chance he’d have to enjoy her company before he was dragged back to London.
When he considered London, he frowned fiercely. He could blame Joseph for his own worrisome thoughts, but it wasn’t his nephew’s fault. Had his nephew’s worries extended to Charles? Yes. But he didn’t want to go back to London without Georgette because of his nebulous jealousy or worries for her safety. He wasn’t arrogant enough to assume she couldn’t navigate her life without him. She’d reached her third decade without his assistance, and he had little doubt she could continue on her own. The truth was, he worried because he loved her. The truth also was, he didn’t want to leave her behind because he missed her. He wanted nothing more than to elope and bring her home.
Was it wrong of him to ask her to set aside the kind of wedding that Marian was planning and elope with him? He wanted to ask her, but he didn’t want her to say yes simply because he had asked. He wanted her to say yes because she’d also rather be together than separate.
With a sigh, Charles reminded himself that they’d be home together soon enough and the delay wasn’t going to ruin him. Not working, however, just might. He opened the manuscript in front of him and told himself to focus on the words on the page.
Georgette Dorothy Marsh
Edna William’s house was nicer than Georgette expected for a retired girls school teacher. Edna had inherited better than Georgette would have expected given their meeting. The house wasn’t a mansion, but it was charming, with big windows, lovely furniture, and books that lined nearly every wall.
Georgette smiled as she introduced Mrs. Parker, Harrison, and Marian to Edna and then to Edna’s friend, Osiris Page. He nodded charmingly, commenting on the weather before turning the conversation easily from one subject to another until he found one that interested Mrs. Parker and Edna both.
His gaze darted to Mrs. Parker over and over again before he started to ask her if they had known each other before. Despite her denials, he ran through option after option until finally Mrs. Parker said he might have known her cousin, who Mrs. Parker claimed was very similar.
Georgette slipped to the side until Kaspar Williams entered the room along with the teacart. He glanced about and his gaze narrowed, lingering on Georgette for so long that she was sure he had discovered the truth.
“Hullo, hullo, Jane. How is your visit going?”
Georgette smiled up at Kaspar. “It is Georgette, you know.”
Kaspar lifted his brow mockingly and he glanced about. “Look at all the friends you have in Bath. You’re a fortunate one, aren’t you?”
She didn’t bother to answer.
Harrison turned to her charmingly. “I rather like Jane. Or Joseph. Even Josephine.”
Georgette shot him a silencing look, but he simply grinned. Harrison’s gaze was lingering again, and Georgette wanted to scold him. She’d helped him get his book to a publishing company, thinking that would be the end of his infatuation, but he lingered too long, as though he had to prove his feelings were connected to more than just his work.
“How funny you should say that.” Kaspar glanced between Georgette and Harrison Parker. “I was just reading an article of my aunt’s about this author named Georgette something or other who wrote under the name Joseph. I suppose she chose a man’s name because it gives her book a better chance. Like George Eliot, you know. Women can’t make it on their own.”
In fact, Georgette had chosen a man’s name to put another layer between herself and the discovery of her actual identity.
Harrison stared with a slowly dawning delighted expression, but Georgette squeezed his arm and shook her head very slightly. He closed his mouth but then his head tilted as he said to Kaspar, “You know, of course, that there are many great women writers.”
Kaspar shrugged. “I think they’re talented despite being female. There’s a reason why there are so many male writers and so few female writers.”
Georgette kept an even expression as she asked, “You don’t think that the reason there are less female writers in history is simply because they were not educated? That generations upon generations of women were looked at only for their value as chattel and wombs?”
Kaspar laughed and dismissed Georgette as he addressed Harrison. “Perhaps it’s because they’re so emotional?”
Harrison held up his hands. “I happen to agree with Georgette.”
“Have you read that Joseph Jones’s book?” Kaspar scoffed. “We should have guessed it was written by a woman the moment we read the trite scenarios.”
“I have read it,” Harrison shot back, “and I quite liked it.”
“What else have you read lately?” Georgette asked Harrison, hoping to avoid further talk of her own books. She already felt like a liar, but to be a liar quite so dramatically was making her extremely uncomfortable. “I’ve been traversing the Hercule Poirot mysteries.”
Had she selected one of the greatest female writers of all time on purpose? Yes, the answer was yes.
“You know,” Marian said, “I just read a book by Edith Wharton. It was delightful.”
“Oh, how fun,” Georgette shot back. “Ethan Frome?”
Marian nodded. “Just so wonderful. I may give it a few days and read it again.”
“I didn’t like that one quite as much as I liked Pearl Buck’s The Good Earth. I have my copy with me, if you’d like to borrow it.”
Kaspar held up his hands in surrender, but it was too late. Excellent books written by women were not rare because of the sex of the writers, and the sheer idea was offensive. The cheek! Georgette had traversed from disliking him mildly to intensely. She feigned a smile and then accepted the cup of tea Edna brought with a true grin and sat to enjoy it. It had that hint of caramel that Edna had suggested in the tea shop and Georgette closed her eyes in joy. She was going to buy so much of this tea that she’d need a suitcase to bring it with her to wherever she went next. The idea that she wouldn’t be returning to Bard’s Crook hit her all of the sudden, and she had to sip her milky sweet tea to hide a sudden sadness.
On her second greedy cup, heavy with milk and sugar, Georgette turned to ask Edna a question but there was a woman’s screech from the street outside.
“Oh,” Georgette squeaked, jumping and spilling tea on her dress. If she had been wearing the dress she’d bought for her wedding, she’d have wept.
The screech was followed by another and then a third as everyone in the room went silent.
“Oh dear,” Edna said, leaping up.
“Surely you’ve heard screaming from the neighbors before?” Kaspar asked. “That Anna Allyn is a handful. Her poor husband.”
Georgette faced Kaspar. “Perhaps it’s poor Anna.”
“You think that sounds rational?”
Georgette scowled at him. “Do you have any idea what kind of husband he is? Do you know him personally?”
Kaspar shook his head. “I suppose I know details but they’re all from my Aunt Betty and now Edna.”
Georgette didn’t let up. “I think that you cannot possibly know the horror a woman knows when she has a cruel, unkind, or terrible husband.”
He held up his hands again in surrender and Georgette looked to Edna, who rose and said, “Sometimes she just needs a word.”
Edna stepped out of the room as Mr. Page crossed to Georgette. “It’s all right, my dear. Mrs. Allyn
is a handful, but she calms down rather quickly when Edna talks to her. I wonder what they did before our Edna moved closer. Our poor Betty wasn’t nearly so gentle with Anna as Edna is.”
Georgette set aside manners as she rose and crossed to the window. Mrs. Allyn was a woman so beautiful that she made every other woman—even the very pretty ones—feel as plain as Georgette.
Mrs. Parker seemed nearly as alarmed as the woman in the street. “My heavens,” Mrs. Parker said when the woman threw something glass onto the street outside. If Georgette were to guess, she’d assume she was seeing the destruction of wedding china.
Edna hurried down the porch stairs of the small house with a spryness and lightness of foot that surprised Georgette. She watched as Edna simply opened her arms and the young Mrs. Allyn threw herself in them.
“Oh!” Marian said. “I love her. Look at that—”
Anna pulled back and said something to Edna. None of them could hear what was being said between the two women, but there was so much tenderness there that Georgette felt herself fighting sympathy tears.
“Aunt Edna is the kind of wonderful that gives you hope in all of mankind,” Kaspar replied. “Aunt Betty as well, though differently, from Edna.”
Harrison glanced towards Kaspar. “Given your recent comments, I wouldn’t have thought you’d say that.”
Kaspar looked between the friends. “I don’t dislike women. I might think they are not as mentally smart as men, but I do think women are far smarter in the heart. Aunt Edna, Aunt Betty—they might not speak Latin, but they make life better. They observe things those of us who have education miss.”
Georgette looked through the window once more. Mrs. Allyn was weeping in Edna’s arms.
“Is Mrs. Allyn’s life truly awful?” Georgette asked quietly.
“I wouldn’t want to be married to her husband,” Mr. Page answered.