by Lily Dalton
“It is nothing, I assure you,” she insisted faintly, listing to the left. “The others have it much worse than I.” Kate’s hair had slipped from its usual neat knot, and most of it now hung limp around her face. For someone who always took such pride in their appearance, her dishevelment told a different story.
“I don’t believe you, not for a minute.”
“Truly, I have only the mildest of stomach pains, with none of the other symptoms.” Kate let out a sudden gasp. Bending at the waist, she moaned. Perspiration dappled her forehead and upper lip.
“Ah, do you see?” Daphne said, guiding her by the arm into a wooden chair. “You really should be in bed.”
“But I must go,” Kate protested. As soon as she was seated, she stood from the chair again but teetered, lacking balance. “I’ll rest later. If you could please just hand me my hat.”
Shadows, almost as deep as bruises, darkened the skin beneath her eyes.
Daphne scowled at her friend’s continued obstinacy. “I forbid you to go. You can’t even stand up straight, let alone walk down the street.” With a gentle push to Kate’s shoulders, Daphne urged her down again.
“You don’t understand,” Kate declared, throwing a glance at the door and looking trapped. “I can’t remain here. I’ve a certain obligation to which I must attend.”
“Yes, I understand, your family. You feel as if you need to return home. If my family were suffering, I’d want to go home as well. Allow me to send word that you are ill and being cared for here.”
“Not that obligation,” Kate whispered with desperate intensity. She twisted in the chair, refusing to meet Daphne’s gaze. “Not exactly.”
“Then what?”
The young woman balled her hands into fists, looking miserable, and lifted them to her temples. “Please, Daphne, I beg you not to press me.”
Seeing Kate so anguished caused Daphne no small measure of alarm. Clearly there was more at issue here than getting home.
“How can I help you if you don’t confide in me?”
“It is a distressingly private matter,” whispered Kate.
“I have the feeling you didn’t tell me everything. The situation is worse than you led me to believe. Fickett, you don’t think I’ll understand?” She rested a hand on Kate’s arm.
With a sudden jerk, Kate wrenched her arm free. She glared at Daphne, eyes wild and feverish. “You couldn’t possibly understand. You’ve not a care in the world. Everything is so easy for you going from party to ball, your only responsibility to look pretty and marry well—or not. Whatever you decide, because you are wealthy and have that freedom.”
Daphne froze, as if she’d been struck.
Certainly their lives were different. They’d been born into disparate circumstances. But to think that Kate had felt this way about her all along when Daphne had actually dared to believe them close friends. Kate was wrong, of course. No amount of money could buy the one thing Daphne’s heart desired most. Neither wealth nor influence could turn back time and allow her to repair her life’s greatest regret.
“Oh, no.” Kate’s face crumpled and she sank to the bed, her hands covering her face. “I didn’t mean what I said. You have been nothing but constant and understanding, my dearest friend. Please forgive me.”
Daphne sighed, relieved to hear the words, but at the same time she knew Kate did hold that opinion of her in some way. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have said it. And why should her feelings be so bruised, when just a few hours earlier she’d thought the same thing, that she was a spoiled girl compared to Kate, who’d had to work in some form or fashion since the age of twelve?
“Forgive you for what? It’s already forgotten,” she replied, hoping to soothe her, and to show she did indeed understand. But of course she hadn’t forgotten. “I can only imagine you have taken another position at night for extra earnings to pay off your father’s debt. Is that it?”
Was it possible that Kate turned a shade greener? Daphne grabbed up the empty bucket from the floor and handed it to her.
“Of a sort,” the young woman whispered, grasping the edges and staring inside.
“While I hate that you’d exhaust yourself that way, you mustn’t fear that you’d endanger your position here. And surely this employer, whoever they are, will understand. You’re ill. They wouldn’t want you present for duty in this condition.”
“They won’t understand.” Kate closed her eyes, but even so, tears spilled down her cheeks. “He won’t understand. Don’t you see? I must go.”
There was so much pain in Kate’s face, Daphne’s heart nearly broke with the magnitude of it.
“Kate, what aren’t you telling me?” Daphne squeezed Kate’s shoulders. “Have you gotten yourself into some sort of trouble?”
“Oh, yes, Daphne, of a terrible sort—” Kate hiccupped, shoulders hunched.
“Everything will be all right.”
“No it won’t.” She shook her head morosely. “My father is indebted to the most horrible man.” Her words spilled out in a rush, accompanied by tears. “He has threatened to see my family turned out from our home, and committed to the debtor’s prison if we do not comply with his demands. My father, my mother, and my grandmother—who as you know is already frail. And the children! He showed us a signed order from the magistrate, who is his brother-in-law, and said he can use it at any time.”
“Kate, no.” Daphne’s temper caught flame. It wasn’t fair that any person could prey upon weaker souls, by wrongly and falsely enforcing the word and power of the law, but it happened all the time against those who did not have sufficient fortune to protect and defend themselves.
“How much is owed? You must tell me.”
The number Kate whispered made Daphne’s head spin. Kate had been correct earlier that afternoon in saying there was no way Daphne herself could produce the required funds.
“Your family can’t pay off the debt as quickly as he demands!” she exclaimed. “Certainly some sort of an arrangement can be made to pay off the monies over time, on a schedule.”
Kate cried, “Oh, yes, there is an arrangement indeed. My parents don’t know, but last week I sought him out, Daphne, and he has very kindly”—she gritted the words out—“allowed me to work off the remainder of the debt, which is why I really must go.” Suddenly she rocked forward in her chair, and her hands tightened on the bucket. She grimaced in pain.
“Work off the debt?” Daphne didn’t like the sound of that. Not at all! Her eyes narrowed. “Doing what?”
“I can’t tell you.” Kate shook her head vehemently. “It’s too mortifying.”
Daphne’s concern increased tenfold. Now she felt ill as well. “Fickett, please tell me you haven’t—”
“No, not that. I—I haven’t prostituted myself, though he…he certainly extended the opportunity, saying the outstanding amount would be satisfied more quickly if I were willing to do so, starting with him as my first client.” Her lip curled in revulsion.
“Then what, Kate?” Daphne exclaimed, relieved but still alarmed. “You are going to tell me every mortifying detail, so that we can solve this problem.”
“It’s not your problem to fix Daphne,” Kate whispered, looking dazed and rubbing a hand over her face. Perspiration shone on her forehead, and her upper lip. She moaned, appearing one inch away from being insensible. “It is mine, and I must be there by midnight, else he’ll send those men to my home—”
A knock sounded on the door, and the housekeeper stepped in. “The doctor is here to see Miss Fickett. May we come in?”
At that, Kate buried her face in the bucket and retched.
*
“I hope you have a marvelous time,” Daphne urged, perhaps a little too enthusiastically, as she walked Clarissa toward the vestibule from the conservatory, where they’d chosen a fragrant gardenia for her sister’s hair.
She had to get Clarissa and their mother out of the house as quickly as possible.
“I still wish you we
re coming.” Clarissa pouted.
She looked like a princess in blush-pink silk, a color Daphne would never choose to wear as long as she lived. She’d developed an aversion for the color in her youth, when Lady Harwick had oftentimes insisted on dressing her and her sisters in matching pink dresses. Daphne shivered at the memory but reminded herself not to lose focus.
“But you understand how fond I am of Miss Fickett.”
“Of course I do, and I pray her health improves. You’re such a dear to offer to stay and nurse her and the others.” Concern warmed her blue eyes. “At least it’s nothing contagious. Tainted sausages on the servants’ midafternoon tea sideboard!”
Indeed, it was the only reason her mother had agreed to allow her to remain behind at all. Daphne had further persuaded the viscountess with the argument that once she was in charge of her own household she might need to tend to ill servants, and this was the perfect opportunity for practice.
“Poor Kate. She ought to have chosen the mutton.” Daphne forced an easy laugh. “Why, did you see Cook when he left to confront the butcher? I thought I saw smoke coming out from his ears. Thankfully no authorities were called—”
“Like last time?” Her sister giggled. “When he threatened to burn down the butcher’s shop and Wolverton had to travel all the way across town to intercede on his behalf.”
“I remember,” Daphne said, but inside her mind raced and her heart pounded, so hard and rapidly she could scarcely breathe.
She’d told Kate not to worry, that she’d take care of everything, and poor Kate had been too depleted by her illness to do anything but collapse into an exhausted sleep. She simply had to do something. Daphne could no more allow the Ficketts to be turned out into the streets or sent to a debtor’s prison or workhouse than she could allow the same misfortune to befall her own family.
Clarissa said something about Lady Grant’s charming nephew, and hoping she would meet him tonight, but all Daphne heard was the thunderous ticktock of the clock inside her head as the moments passed.
“Er…what about Mr. Donelan?” Daphne asked distractedly, peering hopefully up the stairs. Lady Margaretta, always prompt to a fault, was nowhere to be seen. She considered sending one of the maids to let the viscountess know they were waiting.
“Mr. Donelan has turned out to be a terrible disappointment.” She sighed. “Why don’t we sit, and I’ll tell you everything while we wait?”
She gestured in the direction of a large potted palm, behind which a bench was situated.
“No!” Daphne blurted, catching her hand and drawing her back toward the center of the room. “Ah, I’m certain Mother will be right down. I heard Lady Heseldon has arranged for wandering minstrels and pantomimes. You won’t want to miss a moment of the fun, so the moment Her Ladyship arrives you had best hurry her posthaste into the carriage.”
She prayed Clarissa did not discern the urgency in her voice—an urgency she would be unable to explain. Kate, having sworn her to secrecy, rightfully feared losing her position if it became known that she had spent her nights this past week in the seediest district of London, working as a dancer in a bawdy house. Clarissa had always been terrible at keeping secrets. Not intentionally, of course, but she was unfailingly honest—and, as a result, dreadfully inept at concealment, especially where their mother was concerned.
“Promise me you’ll look after Mother. I don’t want her to spend all evening in a corner chair worrying about me.” Or coming home early. Heavens, no. “Now tell me all about Mr. Donelan.”
Clarissa adjusted the folds of her glove at her elbow. “In all the excitement this afternoon I forgot to tell you that I have heard a very reliable rumor that he is swimming, up to his aristocratic nose, in gambling debts, which of course puts the motive for his interest in me in question—”
“Tell me that’s not true.” Daphne frowned, seeing the depth of disappointment in her sister’s eyes.
“Oh, it’s true all right,” a man’s voice drawled from nowhere, echoing through the rotunda.
Startled, they both whirled round to see a pair of legs, clad in dark trousers and gleaming ankle boots, extend from behind the same potted palm where Clarissa had only moments before attempted to lead her. Two steps in that direction revealed a man they had only just met the year before, a man their grandfather’s investigators had informed them was very likely a cousin, Mr. Kincraig. He sat, half-sprawled on the bench, red-eyed and rakishly disheveled. He always looked like that, libertine that he was. After the deaths of their brother and father, Mr. Kincraig had become their grandfather’s solitary heir and the reason Wolverton and their mother wanted Clarissa and Daphne to marry well, so their futures would not be dependent on his whim.
“It’s ill-mannered to eavesdrop on a private conversation,” said Clarissa, her voice elevated.
Daphne crossed her arms at her waist. “Any proper gentleman would have announced himself.”
“When have I ever claimed to be that?” he muttered, scowling.
Daphne could not disagree with him on that point. There was no love lost between her family and the man standing before them. He had been a disappointment in every respect, to say the least, not only for the scandals in which he involved himself, but his general air of unreliability. He was also rumored to have won and lost fortunes several times over.
“Besides, I wasn’t eavesdropping on your little”—he waved a hand in the air—“female conversation. I nodded off while waiting for you ladies to appear. Where is Lady Harwick? Are the three of you always so vexingly late?”
“Late for what?” Clarissa demanded, faintly alarmed. Certainly, like Daphne, she already knew the answer: he was here to be their escort for the evening. Suffice it to say, they would have preferred to go alone. Sometimes, Mr. Kincraig behaved like the perfect gentlemen. Other times, he did not. There was just no predicting. At least tonight he did not smell atrociously of perfume and drink.
“The Heseldon ball,” he confirmed, nostrils flared in arrogance as he stood to glower down on them both. With his dark, longish hair brushing his jaw and sliding over his eyes, and his devilishly pointed mustache and beard, he looked like a pirate. “Wolverton requested—” He raised a finger. “No, let me reword that—he rather commanded that I present myself to escort the three of you this evening.”
Wolverton did that on occasion, more recently of late, hoping that Mr. Kincraig would abandon the life of a rogue and rise to the family’s expectations. The earl had explained more than once it was in all their best interests to bring him into the fold so that after the earl was gone, the transition would not be so difficult. The knowledge loomed over them always! At any moment, Mr. Kincraig might become master of their lives, though Wolverton had made arrangements, as well as he could, that none of them would be destitute if Kincraig drank and gambled their family fortune away.
“That’s just prime,” Clarissa muttered. “The least you could do is dress properly.”
“What do you mean?” he scowled, glancing downward over his attire.
Daphne gestured in the general direction of his throat. “Your cravat, sir, is an abomination.” She did have to admit, the rest of him looked very fine.
His eyes flashed in response and the muscle along his jaw tightened. He touched his hands to the named item of clothing. “Well, then, since you have both been so kind as to point out the flaw, I would be much appreciative if one of you would repair it.”
They both stood motionless, staring at him.
“Please,” he gritted through clenched teeth.
Clarissa broke ranks first. “Oh, very well.” She reached for the tangle of linen and efficiently set about its rearrangement. “So tell me, how would you know anything about Mr. Donelan’s situation?”
At that, his scowl transformed into a rakish grin. “To whom do you suppose it is that Mr. Donelan is indebted?”
“Why am I not surprised?” Daphne muttered.
Could this night be any worse? She felt like scre
aming out in impatience.
Clarissa froze, her hands falling away. “Mr. Kincraig, is that a bruise around your eye?”
“Ah—” His gaze shifted to the stairs. “Lady Harwick.”
There! At last, their mother appeared at the top of the stairs, a vision in a vibrant yellow gown that they’d had to convince her to purchase. For a moment, Daphne forgot all about Mr. Kincraig, Kate’s situation, and the time.
Though the viscountess had ceased wearing the colors of a widow before Christmas, she’d continued to choose muted shades, evidence of her continued grief over the deaths of the viscount and her son. But tonight her mother looked radiant. Beautiful, even.
“Oh, dear, you’re all staring.” Lady Margaretta blushed. “Do I look like a canary? I’m still doubting my decision, both about this dress and about letting Daphne remain behind this evening.”
“The dress is lovely,” Daphne effused. “You are lovely.”
Her sister nodded approvingly, her eyes damp and shining. “Just as we said at the dressmaker’s shop, canary is your color.”
Even Mr. Kincraig appeared affected. “Indeed it is, my lady,” he said, rushing with uncustomary gallantry to assist her down the final stairs.
“Mr. Kincraig.” Her mother greeted him with a smile, albeit a reserved one, no doubt wishing in that moment that it was her husband or her son who greeted her. Mr. Kincraig and Vinson would have been much the same age, but were of course nothing at all alike. Mr. Kincraig was more akin to a pirate than a gentleman in his complete unwillingness—or perhaps a genuine inability—to submit to any social expectation or practice of manners.
With a start, Daphne remembered the matter at hand, and the time. “You had all best be on your way. You don’t want to be late.”
The footmen reached for the doors, opening them for the party’s anticipated passage.
Clarissa waved a gloved hand. “I’ll tell you all the on-dits tonight when we return—what everyone wore and who asked me to dance.”
“As will I,” Mr. Kincraig added drolly, pressing a hand over his heart, which inspired a dramatic roll of her sister’s eyes. Yet Daphne did not miss the little twitch of a smile on Clarissa’s lips—one that mirrored her own. Even the viscountess smiled.