Diary of an Accidental Wallflower

by Jennifer McQuiston

  Geoffrey fidgeted with his napkin. “So I electrified his doorknob.”

  “What?” Clare and Lucy exclaimed in perfect, horrified synchrony.

  “His doorknob. I electrified it.” He looked up, and something akin to pride shone in his eyes. “It was a copper doorknob, you see. A near perfect conductor. We were studying batteries in science, and so I made a ripping good one. Good enough to knock Lord Peter on his nobbish arse.” He grimaced. “But the headmaster touched the knob first. Got knocked on his arse instead, and didn’t come around for ten minutes.” He looked at Lucy, his expression sheepish now. “That was why I got expelled.”

  “But . . . why would you do such a thing?” Clare demanded.

  Geoffrey swallowed. “Because the rumors are about you.”

  “Me?” Clare gripped the delicate handle of her cup. She couldn’t make sense of it. After all, it was her family that was the embarrassment here. Lucy, with her mannish shoes, and Geoffrey with his pranks.

  And Mother’s indiscretions . . . she could scarcely bring herself to think of it.

  But she had always guarded her own image amongst the ton. She had cultivated her reputation and chosen her friends with the sole purpose of engendering the right sort of gossip. Ever since her first ball, of her first Season, she had ensured that if anything was to be said of her, it should be of the vein that her taste in fashion was immaculate, and that her heart floated well above the reach of those gentlemen of less exacting pedigrees.

  “You,” Geoffrey offered in quiet confirmation. “And Father. Or rather, the rumor is that Father isn’t your real father.”

  Clare slumped back in her chair, breakfast now forgotten. The room seemed to spin on a broken axis. She’d seen whispers about things far less calamitous inspire the slow social downfalls of any number of girls. But this was not a nameless, faceless bit of malice, bandied about the retiring room at some obscure ball and easily dispelled with a laugh.

  Oh no, nothing that simple.

  This was a rumor generated by a future peer, a classmate of Geoffrey’s and likely the son or brother of someone she knew.

  And her heart was not slapping against her ribs because of outrage.

  It was because she couldn’t help but wonder if it might be true.

  Lucy had gone quiet but she was staring at her, no doubt looking for evidence. There was plenty to be had. Because even if the rumor wasn’t true—even if someone had conjured this bit of gossip for no reason other than their own sordid entertainment—Clare was the dark-haired daughter. The brown-eyed sibling. A notable anomaly in a towheaded, blue-eyed family. She was the ambitious Westmore, the athletic child, everything her siblings and her father were not.

  “Does Father know about this?” she whispered.

  “He knows why I was expelled, of course. The headmaster was most explicit in his descriptions. At least I’ve escaped any official charges. There are some benefits to being only thirteen.” Geoffrey began to look worried. “But I couldn’t tell Father why I did such a thing. It can’t be true.” He hesitated. “Can it?”

  Clare wished she could be as confident. Uncharacteristically, she found herself without words, without reassurances. It wasn’t even the first time she had considered such a possibility, that she was somehow different than her siblings.

  But it was the first time she had encountered that question posed by someone else.

  And worse, it was the first time she had considered it with the recent evidence of her parents’ presumed faithlessness in hand.

  A flurry of activity and the quick shuffling of servants pulled Clare’s attention away from such a distasteful thought. She turned in her chair, only to battle a jolt of surprise as Father walked in, looking disheveled and exhausted. He was wearing the same clothing he’d worn yesterday—albeit far more rumpled than before.

  “Good morning,” he told them, stifling a yawn.

  Lucy, thank God, managed to keep all mention of brothels to herself. But as Father shuffled to the sideboard and began filling his plate, she leaned in over the table, her blue eyes filled with worry and suspicion. “Do you think it could be true?” she asked, the stark urgency in her voice shaking Clare from her stupor. She shot a worried glance toward their father’s hunched shoulders. “Not the bit about the overnight accommodations, but the other?”

  Clare straightened her shoulders. “It isn’t true,” she said firmly.

  And even if it was, she couldn’t imagine ever asking their mother the question.

  Truly, there wasn’t enough Madeira in the world.

  Chapter 19

  The imported soprano was already running through her scales when Daniel stepped through Lady Austerley’s front door. By the sounds of things, the singer was in possession of a set of vocal cords that implied a future danger to even the most stoic of tympanic membranes. The noise followed him up the stairs and into the dowager countess’s bedroom—an impressive feat, given that Lady Austerley’s rooms occupied a suite on the third floor.

  He set his bag down on the bedside table, wondering if a bit of the cotton batting he used for packing wounds could be repurposed for ear protection. He’d never been one for music, the cost of an opera ticket and his evening hours being too dear to waste.

  His ears now told him such frugality had been an excellent decision.

  The dowager countess greeted him with a smile. He greeted her with a frown and a frankly clinical eye. The old dragon was wearing rouge tonight, for Christ’s sake.

  And a corset again, if the stiffness of her posture was any indication.

  “Lady Austerley,” he sighed, “need I remind you that you are technically an invalid?”

  “Oh, posh and nonsense. ’Tis only a little musicale, Dr. Merial. Hardly an event worth worrying over.” She struggled to rise from her prone position on the bed, her skirts a froth of netting and lace that would hardly have been appropriate on a woman even fifty years her junior. The maid rushed to help her, putting her shoulder beneath the older woman’s arm and heaving up. The effort left them both panting and disheveled, and Daniel found it difficult to watch. After all, he knew what this evening would cost her, even if she refused to acknowledge it herself.

  “All right, then,” she said crossly and waved the maid away. “I can manage myself now.”

  The servant began to fuss about her own hair, several strands of which had come down in her struggle to help her mistress sit up. Her efforts made Lady Austerley roll her eyes. “No need to try so hard to impress him, child,” she scolded. “He’s not shown the slightest bit of interest in you to date. Tidying your hair isn’t going to suddenly convince him you’re a raging beauty.”

  The poor, put-upon maid flushed the sort of red that normally made Daniel think of a high fever. His lips twitched in sympathy. The dowager countess was an outspoken old woman, and there was no getting around her tongue when it lashed out. But despite her sharp words, he knew Lady Austerley cared deeply for her servants, even if she occasionally harangued them. They wouldn’t have been so concerned for her health otherwise.

  And the maid did have a habit of forgetting her duties whenever he came into the room.

  “Now then, Dr. Merial.” The countess’s eyes held a lively gleam, and she placed a hand on her chest, the gnarled fingers splayed as if in promise. “As always, I appreciate your medical opinion, but I’ll only be sitting downstairs, enjoying my guests and listening to a bit of music. And I am feeling as healthy as a horse tonight.” She eyed his bag. “Or at least I will be, once I’ve had the draught you’ve brought.”

  “Not all horses are healthy.” Daniel unsnapped the top of his leather bag. “In fact,” he added, “a good many of them are bound for the knackers.” He thought of Lucy Westmore’s obsession with London’s cart horses. Maybe he should toss Lady Austerley into the girl’s path. He could think of less worthy crazed quests, and someone needed to take the dowager countess on as a project. He glanced toward the door as the soprano began to run through a n
ew scale.

  A little boredom was clearly a dangerous thing in an old, wealthy, dying woman’s hands.

  The laugh that seized Lady Austerley seemed to squeeze from her chest, like air from a bellows, and he glanced back at her sharply. Her sense of humor—grown pinched with age and experience—was one of the reasons he enjoyed visiting with her so much. She not only welcomed such cheek from him, she gave it back, tenfold. But tonight her laugh sounded moist and suspicious, and he knew that if he placed his auscultating device to her chest he would hear the sounds of congestion typical of a failing heart.

  Daniel reached into his bag and pulled out a bottle. “This may help with the difficulty you are experiencing drawing a proper breath.” He winced as the soprano downstairs hit a particularly offensive note. “I doubt it will help with that, however.”

  “You’ve no ear for music, Dr. Merial,” she chided. “This particular soprano was very expensive. And I have it on authority that the cost of the entertainment is all that matters to my guests.” She looked sideways at the maid, who was fluttering at the window, closing the drapes. “But in the interest of safety,” she whispered behind a cupped hand, “I’ll admit I’ve instructed my housekeeper to put away the crystal.”

  “An excellent idea.” Daniel poured her a careful dose. Then, considering the slight wheezing he could still hear on the edge of the dowager countess’s exhalations, he added a finger more. She dutifully drank the draught, then sat a quiet moment on the bed, eyes closed and age-splotched hands gripping the coverlet.

  “Now then,” she said. “Is everything quite ready for my guests downstairs?”

  The maid drew aside the curtains she had just closed and peered out at the darkening streetscape. “I certainly hope so, my lady. The first carriages are starting to arrive.”

  “Heavens, child, do you think that will make my nerves settle any faster?” She flicked an impatient hand at the servant, though her eyes remained squeezed shut. “Could you please go downstairs and tell our soprano she can stop her preparatory squawking now? And make sure everything is properly prepared on the refreshment table. I am worried about the punch.”

  “The punch?” The maid blinked. “But . . . it has been made according to your explicit specifications.”

  “I know. I’ve changed my mind.”

  “Less wine, then?” The girl looked a tad relieved. “Oh, I am so glad you think so, because it seemed that the four bottles you instructed me to tell the housekeeper was a bit much—”

  “It needs more gin.” Lady Austerley cracked open an eye and impaled the poor girl with the force of her gaze. “A good deal more gin. And possibly some rum, too.”

  In spite of himself, Daniel chuckled as the exasperated maid left to do her mistress’s bidding. “Lady Austerley, it sounds as if that punch is going to be rather strong. I must caution you not to drink it yourself. The effects of liquor and atropine can be unpredictable when combined.”

  Both eyes opened, and she gazed up at him. “Oh, ’tis not for me. I suspect, given the sound of that soprano, my guests will need some additional fortification. And my poor maid needs a task to keep her busy. She’s a sweet thing, but good heavens, she makes me nervous, the way she hovers about and moons in your direction.” Her hand crept out to brush his, found his fingers, and squeezed. “Plus, you have a way of calming me that she doesn’t. Will you stay with me a moment, Dr. Merial?”

  “Of course.” Daniel helped her settle back against her mound of pillows, arranging her until she was nearly horizontal. He hoped it would help her breathe easier against the constricting corset, at least until the drug began to work its magic.

  “Ah, that is better.” She closed her eyes again and clasped her hands over her chest.

  Daniel sank down in the overstuffed chair beside Lady Austerley’s bed, where he usually sat when he came to read to her. History told him the medicine would take effect quickly, but until it did, she often felt worse. “Would you like me to read? It is Saturday, after all.”

  “No, I am too excited over my musicale. Tonight I need a better distraction than a sordid novel read by a handsome man.” Her hand waved about, though her eyes did not open. “Tell me about your experiment.”

  “Which one?” he asked, though they’d been over this particular course of inquiry enough that he knew precisely what held her interest.

  “You know very well which one.” One eye cracked open again, and he could see with relief the pupil was beginning to dilate. “The one with the frogs. Is it going better than the last time, when the creatures kept flinging themselves out of their bowl?”

  “Much better.” He leaned back in the chair and placed one foot over his knee. Though his concentration had floundered a bit since becoming entangled with the Westmores, he’d thrown yesterday’s frustration into an all-night binge, and his focus had paid off. Last night he finally had the breakthrough he’d been hoping for. It was not yet complete—there were several more variables to test, and he still needed to write a formal summary of his findings to present to the Lancet. He knew his arguments must be irrefutable after the last rejection they’d delivered.

  His first instinct this morning had been to tell Clare of his findings. His second had been the mind-numbing realization that he couldn’t.

  Not anymore.

  “In fact,” he admitted to Lady Austerley, “I’ve had a bit of a revelation.”

  “You’ve decided to put a cover on the bowl?” the dowager countess asked, too innocently. This time both eyes cracked open, and he could see her pupils were dilated—but not too dilated. He exhaled in relief. Getting the dose right was tricky, especially when her worsening condition required constant recalculations. “I would have thought you intelligent enough to think of that weeks ago, Dr. Merial. In fact, I recall telling you that very thing.”

  He grinned. There was nothing wrong with the woman’s memory. “No, actually I’ve moved on from the frogs. I am convinced that as subjects, they lack some important characteristics to model the effects in humans. This time I tried the device on myself.”

  She blinked at him in alarm. “Is that safe? I had thought you would employ someone when you were ready for that sort of thing. I have offered to invest in this grand device no less than ten times, so lack of funding is no excuse for such callous disregard of your person.” She harrumphed. “And I assure you, the world would suffer greatly from your premature loss.”

  “As I’ve told you before, Lady Austerley, I cannot accept your generous offer. You know as well as I that financial payoffs are not my primary motivation.” He frowned. “Whether I fail or succeed, I won’t invest someone else’s funds when disappointment is the more distinct possibility.”

  “But I thought you said you’d had a revelation,” she huffed. “And how on earth can you record your findings if you are . . . if you are . . .”

  “Unconscious?”

  “If you are dead!”

  He smiled to hear the concern in her voice. As far as distractions went, he supposed this qualified rather well. Better than the current novel they were meandering their way through, at any rate. She’d even forgotten to worry about the guests downstairs. “I used small doses of chloroform, so I was guaranteed a quick recovery. And I carefully noted the start of each dose, and again the time I was sentient enough to look back at my watch.”

  “Each dose?” Her lips thinned. “You’ve done this more than once?”

  “Four times.” At her strangled objection he added, “My conscience won’t permit me to risk it on another human—even a paid human—without trying it on myself first. I had a sense that my limited success with the frogs was distracting me from the real purpose, which was to use the drug properly on a human. I was correct.” He leaned in conspiratorially. “It turns out that frogs are too easy to render insensible. I suspect it is the surface area of their skin.”

  She snorted. “Or else the thickness of your own head.”

  Daniel laughed out loud, glad he’d been able
to tell someone. He stood up and pulled out the auscultating device he kept in his coat pocket. Leaning over the countess’s bed, he said, “Let’s have a listen now, shall we?” He helped her sit back up, then placed the flared end of the wooden device against her chest. Long used to the request, she inhaled slowly, as if testing the air and finding it to her liking. “Good,” he murmured, readjusting the piece. “Again?”

  When he again nodded his approval, she gingerly inched her legs over the side of the bed. Her respirations were now much steadier than a few minutes ago, when she’d struggled to draw a proper breath. She waved his offer of an outstretched palm away with an annoyed hand, as if she was brushing away a gnat.

  “Now then,” she said, pushing herself to standing without any assistance at all. “I’m feeling much better, and the guests have already started to arrive.” She shook out her bunched skirts. “Will you walk me down?”

  “Of course.” He offered her his arm. As they began the slow, shuffling process of getting Lady Austerley down to the stairs without taking a tumble, he gave in to the urge to finally ask the question that had chased him here. “And would you . . . ah . . . would you like me to stay for the musicale? Just to be safe?”

  A sharp bark of a laugh shook her thin frame. “Have a mind to expand your musical horizons, do you?” She cast him a shrewd, sideways glance as they walked. “I don’t think the soprano would hold much interest for you, Dr. Merial. My maid is far prettier, and you’ve scarcely looked in her direction, though she’s more than made her hopes for it clear.” Her lips tipped into a wrinkled smile. “Or is it, I wonder, someone else? The girl. What is her name? Miss Westmore. The one who inspired you to borrow Cousin Bette.”

  “She’s coming tonight?” he asked, praying he sounded surprised. His eagerness to stay here at number 36 Berkeley Square tonight had nothing to do with the fact he knew Clare would be in attendance. Nothing at all.

  Perhaps if he said it out loud, it might even make it true.