“Of course not, Mrs. Gale. And thank you.”
“I’m glad you come, ma’am. The master, he’s not well. I wanted to write to tell you, but I didn’t have your address, and I didn’t dare ask him. He’s not been right since your ma died, but then I guess you know that.”
“He is still grieving, Mrs. Gale.”
“Aye, that I know. It’s why he drinks so much.
Grace picked a tarnished round disk out of the jewelry box and held it to the light. With her fingernail, she scratched the surface. The gleam of silver shone through.
“What’s this?”
“It be a button, ma’am. You see the two holes in the middle. Your ma told me it come from the costume she wore to play Juliet. She told me it was one of a pair specially made. Unique, like.”
“My mother played Juliet?”
“Yes, ma’am. She told me it be her favorite role. When she was first married and you were just a babe, she’d tell me about the roles she’d played—and who with.” Mrs. Gale’s plain face puckered into a smile. “She missed the stage, but the master, your father, he don’t like to hear nothing about it. Whenever he was around, your ma never said where she come from, and then when you got older, she made me swear not to ever say. But, ma’am, you be grown now, and it’s time you knew. You got her voice. I don’t forget hearin’ you sing when your mother was alive. Gave me goose bumps.”
“My mother sang?” Her mother had always encouraged Grace to develop her singing voice, but never had she joined in.
“Dear me, yes. She had a beautiful voice, but your father never wanted to hear her—or you for that matter, but you knows that.”
“My mother told me it was because the noise gave him a headache.”
“Your singing weren’t never noise, ma’am.” Mrs. Gale bobbed a curtsy. “I’d best get supper ready. The master don’t like it being late.”
“Yes, thank you, Mrs. Gale.”
Grace rubbed the button between her fingers. Her mother had played Juliet? On impulse, she picked up the box and dumped the contents onto the bed. The heat and clamor and wonder of the stage flashed before Grace’s eyes. She plunged her hand into the mound of jewelry, let the ropes of heavy gems wind around her fingers, brushed her fingers across smooth stones and rough edges. Now that she held the jewelry, she could see the pieces were not real. The paint was scratched and peeling, the weight too light. She picked up and gripped the button from her mother’s Juliet costume in her palm. How could she not have known? She saw again her mother’s face when she watched the actor perform Hamlet at Bath’s Theatre Royal all those years ago. She had been transformed—another woman entirely whom Grace had not recognized.
The future spread before Grace, rich and obvious.
“Grace?” the door opened, and Percival walked in. He’d been very kind to her the past three days while they stayed with her father. “There is an hour of daylight left. Shall we take a walk? The rain has stopped.” He came farther into the room. “What’s this?”
“My mother’s jewels.”
“Good lord! It looks like Aladdin’s cave. Surely they are not real.” He picked up a tiara studded with egg-size rubies and sapphires.
“Of course not, Percival. Don’t look so avaricious.”
“Why would your mother have such a gaudy collection? She could never wear them in good society.”
“I think, Percival, that we must pay a long overdue visit to your mother when we return to London.”
Chapter 16
Reputation is an idle and most false imposition;
Oft got without merit, and lost without deserving.
Othello (2.3.259–60)
Ned had never in his life crossed the river to Lambeth to find the big tent in which Mr. Astley produced his circus. He thought he was well versed in theatrical effects and splendid productions, but Astley’s Amphitheatre was a whole other world. He had never seen anything like it—the noise and the color and the heat made the Theatre Royal, with its measured speeches and rich costumes, look almost staid by comparison. At Astley’s, everything seemed to be moving at once. Acrobats slipped up and down ropes and stood on horses galloping at speed around a sawdust-covered ring; a curtain at one end of the ring opened to reveal sumptuous pantomimes and even staged battles; troops of performing dogs barked and twirled. The vast amphitheater was almost brand-new—built just a few years earlier in 1804 after its predecessor was also destroyed by fire. That morning, Alec had told Ned that he was crazy to go over the river looking for a girl. There were plenty of them at Covent Garden. What did he need a special one for?
It was thanks to Louisa that Ned learned where Olympia had gone after the fire. Louisa had come by the building site a few weeks’ earlier, looking for Mr. Kemble to take her back once the theater was built. Her arm had healed, and her brashness and bosoms loomed as big as ever. She’d sidled up to Ned and pecked him on the cheek, right in front of the lads on the building site. They’d had a good laugh at his expense.
Louisa told Ned that Olympia was gone over the river to Astley’s Amphitheatre. She didn’t say how she knew, and Ned didn’t ask. He thanked her and moved off, hoping she wouldn’t follow, but she pursued him right to Mr. Kemble’s office and wouldn’t leave until he went upstairs and asked Mr. Kemble to see her. Thankfully, he refused, and Louisa flounced off.
Olympia was standing in the middle of the ring, dressed in a top hat striped red and blue and wearing a skirt that fell just above her knees. The costume she wore for the breeches roles revealed far less of her than this costume, and Ned blushed to see her. She skipped around the ring, clapping, bowing, gesturing expansively with both arms at the performers as they tumbled and twirled and twisted. Her wide smile looked false to Ned.
After the performance, he waited outside the small tent where he’d seen the performers go to shed their sweat-soaked costumes. Absently, he pulled out the silver button he wore on a cord around his neck and rubbed his fingers over it, loving as always the feel of its serrated edge. Ned too had rough edges—too rough for someone like Olympia, he knew, but still he had to see her.
When she emerged, makeup gone and dressed again in a sober brown gown that blended with the beaten earth, Ned barely recognized her.
“Olympia!”
She turned at her name and stared blankly at Ned, her face lined with exhaustion. Then, recognition dawned, and she turned quickly away. Ned’s heart sank. She took several steps and then paused, her narrow shoulders slumping as she turned back.
“Hello, Ned,” she said quietly. “I didn’t expect to see you here. How did you find me?”
“Louisa.”
“She came a few weeks ago. I asked her to promise not to tell anyone from the old days, but I should have known not to trust her.”
“I’m glad she told me, Olympia. I’ve been that worried about you.”
“Why, Ned?”
The question took him by surprise. Didn’t she know why? How could she not know? He stepped closer to her and tried to take her hand, but she kept both hands behind her back.
“Are you happy here?” he asked.
“I don’t mind it.”
“Kemble’s got the theater well underway. Will you come back?”
“I don’t know.”
“I can see to it, Olympia.”
“Mr. Kemble’s taken to consulting with you about who he hires, has he?”
“No, but . . .” Ned didn’t know what to say.
Olympia shook her head ruefully. “Don’t mind me, Ned. I’m that weary.”
“The theater’s comin’ along faster than anyone thought possible,” he said in an attempt to get her to smile, to see again the Olympia he remembered. “We’ve just started, but Mr. Kemble thinks we’ll be ready to open in the fall.”
“And Mr. Kemble is always right.”
“We have to hope he is this time.”
Olympia’s eyes widened as she looked past Ned. He turned to see the general shoving his way through the crowd
. A woman, the spitting image of Olympia in twenty years and as many pounds, followed along behind. They both stopped next to Olympia.
“Ready?” the woman asked.
Olympia rose on her tiptoes, her breath warm against Ned’s neck. He leaned into her. “I’m to be married,” she whispered in his ear, and then, without meeting his eye, ran off to meet her mother.
The general hung back. “Stay away from her,” he growled.
Ned only just managed to keep his hands at his sides. Smashing a fist into the general’s nose, squashing it even more, would be the most satisfying thing he could think of doing at that moment. The general waited, almost as if he was hoping Ned would react so he could have him clapped in irons—maybe pressed into the navy. That would serve him right for setting his sights on Olympia.
An elephant—laden with an elaborately tasseled saddle and led by a man dressed in a flowing robe—lumbered toward them. The gray wrinkled skin hung slackly from the beast, and streaks of blood dripped down its flanks from under the saddle. Massive, trunk like legs ending in rounded feet lifted up and set down, each time shaking the ground under Ned.
By the time the beast had passed, the general was gone, and Ned faced the same solitary future he always had. But now, the shell he’d built around his heart to protect it was shattered.
* * *
Augusta Knowlton acknowledged Grace’s curtsy with a complacent nod. “At least no one can say that we are not a well-formed family,” she said. “You, of course, don’t have your mother’s beauty, but you have her figure and her coloring, and when neatly dressed, you do very well. Unquestionably, your mother was never loath to flaunt her good looks.” Augusta patted the seat next to her on the sofa in her cramped sitting room. “Sit here next to me and we shall have a chat before dinner is served. Percival will continue to stare out the window with his back to us. Beastly manners.”
Grace perched at the opposite end of the sofa from her aunt. “You are well?”
“Middling. At my age, robust health is too much to expect. Percival tells me that you plan to stay in London permanently. You are pleased with this arrangement?”
“Yes.”
“I hope you realize how hurt I was that you did not invite me to your wedding.” Eyes sharp as flint shards made Grace think of Lady Macbeth reading the letter from her husband, announcing his untimely elevation to Thane of Cawdor.
“It was a very small affair.”
“That is obviously not the point. I should have been invited. I never expected my only son to go behind my back. The first I heard of your marriage was the note you left me on your wedding day. Abominable behavior. And then you go off to that dreadful Clevedon place to see your father. A lesser person would be offended.”
“It was you, Aunt, who told me I should be married.” Out of the corner of her eye, Grace saw Percival’s shoulders tense and then shake ever so slightly.
“That is as may be. However, I do not believe I am being unreasonable to expect Percival to consult with me about his choice of bride, particularly in light of our connection.”
“He was, perhaps, carried away with passion.”
For the briefest of moments, a glimmer of humor lit Augusta’s eyes and then, finding unfamiliar territory, disappeared. “You have your mother’s odd wit.” Augusta’s toad-green turban trembled.
“You approve the match?”
“No. I’d have stopped it if given the opportunity.”
“Then I suppose I must be grateful that the opportunity did not arise.”
“Impertinent. Just like your mother. The truth is that I have no control over whom Percival chooses to marry. He is of age.” She pursed her lips. “Your note inviting yourself to dinner implied that you have something that you wish to consult with me about.”
Grace could not fault her aunt for beating about the bush. She closed her fingers around the handle of her fan. “I need to ask you what my mother did before she married my father.”
“Did? Whatever can you mean?” Augusta snapped open her own fan and sliced at the stifling air. A faint blush crept up her neck and spread across her cheeks. Grace waited, the silence stretching for several more seconds, during which time Augusta looked anywhere but at Grace. Finally, she threw down her fan. “We shall go in to dinner now.”
As if on cue, Percival sidestepped several chairs and small tables to take his mother’s arm and help her to her feet. Grace saw no need for such attention. Augusta was about as helpless as a jackal. Percival went forward with his mother into the dining room, and Grace had no choice but to follow. Whatever her aunt knew, she did not appear inclined to share it, which only deepened the mystery of her mother’s past.
As a footman in faded livery seated her at the small Pembroke table in Augusta’s dining room, Grace kept her gaze fixed on a pair of heavy candlesticks.
“You are comfortable, Mama?” Percival asked after helping her into her seat.
Augusta smiled tightly. “Pour me a glass of wine.”
“You have not answered my question, Aunt,” Grace said.
Percival glanced over at her, his eyebrows raised. He didn’t need to say anything. In the carriage coming over, Grace had established with Percival that she would broach the subject of her mother’s background.
Percival poured wine into the three glasses, then took a sip and smiled at his mother. “Excellent vintage, Mama. I’m glad you still have some of Father’s stock of French wine left. Shocking that we cannot get more these days, although I suppose it is unpatriotic to say so.”
Aunt Augusta motioned for the footmen to bring forward the first course—a smooth white soup. “This is not an appropriate topic of conversation for the dining table.”
“I have a right to know what my mother did before she married,” Grace said.
Aunt Augusta’s spoon clattered into her bowl, sending a splash of soup across the tablecloth. “A right? If that’s how you feel, then I suggest you ask your father.”
“You know that he and I are no longer on good terms.”
“Hardly my concern.”
Grace caught Percival’s eye. He shrugged. She clutched her own spoon, her knuckles white. For the rest of the meal, she ate to suppress her physical hunger while her whole being ached to know more.
Chapter 17
When sorrows come, they come not single spies, but in battalions.
Hamlet (4.5.75–76)
Ned’s days started at dawn and rarely ended until well into the evening. He delivered messages to and from gentlemen eager to contribute to an edifice being talked about as the greatest theater that London had ever seen, and acted as Mr. Kemble’s eyes and ears at the building site—cajoling foremen, keeping an eye on the workers, making sure building materials didn’t go missing at the end of the day. The harder he worked, the more chance he had of forgetting about Olympia. Every night, he fell exhausted onto his narrow bed, not even rousing when Alec came reeling in, stinking of gin and whores.
“Yer working too hard, Ned,” Alec said one afternoon when he convinced Ned to knock off early and meet him at the tavern for a mug of ale. “Miz Gellie’s got some new girls in—real lookers, a few of them. Daisy’s gone off sudden, like—don’t know where—but there’s plenty more to take her place. How about you come with me tonight? I ain’t got to be over at Drury Lane until tomorrow.”
“I’m fine here,” Ned said, raising his mug. “I’ll take another and then be on my way home to my bed.”
“You’re not a monk, man! What’s wrong with you? Yer not still pining after Olympia?”
“I just don’t want to throw my money away at Mrs. Gellie’s.”
“What else you got to spend it on?” Alec grinned. “I seen plenty of gentleman at her place. Her girls are good enough for them. Why not you?”
“I told you, Alec, I ain’t interested.” Ned took a long swig of ale. He wouldn’t admit it to Alec, but he sometimes wished he could feel like going to Mrs. Gellie’s.
“Ah, well, more�
��s the loser you. I’ll be off now.” Alec drained his mug and slammed it down on the scarred table. “Here’s to that theater of yours gettin’ built. I’m content enough over at Drury Lane.”
“Mr. Kemble says we’ll be ready to open in September.”
“I wouldn’t bet money on that.”
Outside in the street, a woman screamed. The two men jumped up and rushed to the door. A cloud of acrid smoke blotted out the sky. Dread clawed at Ned’s heart as he followed Alec into the street, suddenly full of people running toward them, some yelling ‘Fire!’
“Move it, man!” Alec yelled. “The smoke’s comin’ from Drury Lane.”
“Can’t be,” Ned said. “Not again.” He and Alec dodged the people coming toward them and dashed along the narrow street toward the fire.
* * *
“Well, my dear, it appears that God has a sense of humor.”
“What are you talking about, Percival? And stop pacing around the room. You’re making me dizzy.”
Percival leaned against the mantel of the front parlor. “The fire needs stoking, my dear. Shall I call Betsy? It is cold in here, and we can’t have you risking your health.”
“My health is perfectly fine, and I prefer a cooler room. Are you going to tell me your news, or will I be reduced to guessing? If so, I’d just as soon not do so. I was pleasantly occupied with my reading before you burst in.” Grace held up a slim volume.
“Hamlet is it? I take it that you are still hoping to play Ophelia. It would be something to see you throw yourself around the stage with your hair unpinned.”
“You’ll have to wait awhile longer before you see that,” Grace said. “You’ve told me often enough that you have no connections at Drury Lane, and Mr. Kemble’s theater is a long way from being finished. But I gather you did not come barging in here to talk about Ophelia.”
“My dear Grace, I never barge.”
“Well?”
“Quite. I am gratified to learn that you hold no aspirations for Drury Lane. If you had, then my news would be doubly painful.”
“Please get to the point, Percy.”
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