Incognita (Fairchild Book 2)

by Fixsen, Jaima

  “May I bear you company a little while? I hoped to speak with you.” He turned his smile from Mrs. Morris to the mother. Her firm mouth softened and her eyes flicked anxiously to her daughter. Seeing his way now, Alistair addressed himself to the older woman. “I’ve been searching your daughter out for days.”

  “I must arrive at the church early to mark the attendance,” the mother said, glancing from him to Anna. Alistair couldn’t tell if it was his attempts to charm or her daughter’s obstinate frown that swayed her, but he read in her eyes the instant she made her decision. “Anna, you can spare a moment. Why don’t you walk with—”

  “My name is Beaumaris,” he said with a bow.

  Anna Morris turned to her mother. “I thought you needed my help.”

  “I’ll have it, if I need it,” her mother said. “You won’t be more than a few minutes behind me.” Despite her sugar-glazed smile, the message to her daughter was still a command. Anna Morris scowled, but she did not protest. Her mother gave a satisfied nod. Opening her sunshade with a snap, she marched down the steps and into the street. Anna watched her depart with flinty eyes.

  “I’m sorry to displease you,” Alistair said, approaching and offering his arm. She ignored it, clasping her hands behind her back as she thumped reluctantly down the last two steps.

  “If you were really sorry, you’d leave. I told you to stay away.”

  “Why? You didn’t even know who I was. Whom were you expecting?”

  Her eyes tightened. “I had no notion. At the masquerade you told me your name was Jasper Rushford. I didn’t recognize Beaumaris, which is the name on your card and your letters.”

  Damn. He’d forgotten about that.

  “Which one are you?” she asked. “Or have you a third name you keep for Sundays?”

  “Beaumaris. But why should my letters scare you?” He hadn’t written them to sound threatening. Only someone with a dire secret would read a threat in a courteous letter from a stranger.

  “You’re imagining,” she snapped.

  He wasn’t, but he would leave it for now. Ahead, her mother’s dark blue umbrella wove left and right, moving forward at twice their pace. Soon they would be well behind. Alistair stepped over a dip in the pavement where a puddle congealed, dark as ink. His mouth was dry and he’d been standing too long in the sun. It made his fingers feel tight and swollen. He was getting soft. The sun today was mild compared to the blistering heat of Spain.

  Explanations first. “We were at a masquerade,” Alistair said. “I didn’t think you were telling the truth.”

  “No, I see honesty isn’t at all the thing,” she retorted.

  “I’ve done badly,” he acknowledged with a nod. “I mistook you for something quite different. I came to apologize.”

  She stopped and turned toward him, lifting her chin, ignoring the shop boy who skidded around them with a curse. “Whatever for? Apologies are unlikely to change my opinion of you, nor should you care whether I think ill of you or not. If you hadn’t intruded on me, I wouldn’t have thought of you at all. We are strangers.”

  “Who share one thing, at least—a grievance with Tom Bagshot. You lost him, and he waltzed away with my intended.”

  “Yes, I heard.” Her lips twitched. “I didn’t love him, so I have no reason to be grieved, merely offended that he preferred another. I admit I was upset that evening at the masquerade, but it wears off, I assure you.”

  “Thank you for the advice,” he returned, just as sweetly.

  “My pleasure. It’s always gratifying to see the mighty humbled.”

  He grunted. They waited for a gap in the line of passing carriages and this time he took her arm instead of waiting for her to bestow it. Letting her step alone into a busy street would make him look bad, so she did not protest. Out loud anyway. Her hand was stiff.

  “They don’t draw you very well in the newspapers,” she said. “I hadn’t realized it was supposed to be you.”

  “I like to think I’m much better looking,” he said, trying to make light of it.

  She turned her head to look at him better, and her eyes were not kind. She ought to be softening by now. “Why are you apologizing? I wouldn’t have known you’d lied about your name if you hadn’t come.”

  His ankle teetered on the edge of a deep rut, reminding him of the need to mind his steps. Before he answered he looked at her. He’d been certain that night at the masquerade that she knew perfectly well the subtext of their conversation. Now that she’d been identified as a respectable, if déclassé widow, he wasn’t so sure. Was she naive enough to have missed his rather brutal innuendo? Or was she taking revenge by playing him now, making him come out and admit it?

  “I insulted you and mistook your character,” he said, deciding to go with the truth.

  “Oh? How, exactly?” she prompted.

  She was baiting him, so there was no need to say it.

  “Nothing complimentary,” he said, hedging.

  “I understood that at the time. You thought I wanted Tom for a protector, didn’t you?”

  Cornered, Alistair had to fight back a blush. It was uncomfortable, having their dance floor banter rehashed in a Hans Town street.

  She laughed, but it was bitter. “You weren’t that far wrong. I thought he would make me a tolerable husband, chiefly because he’d be a good protector. The duties aren’t that dissimilar, you know.”

  “True. But one is sanctioned and one is not. I misjudged you. I can only offer my profound apologies.”

  “I’m afraid they are far from profound,” she said.

  Alistair grinned. Her ready comprehension didn’t put him in any better light, but he was relieved all the same. “I’ll try to do better. Let me rephrase. Will you forgive me and endeavor to forget my gross errors if I plead guilty to being a scoundrel-dog?”

  She looked at him, then away, fastening her eyes on something in the distance. “I can’t see that it matters. It is kind of you, I think, to offer me an apology. But I’m afraid I have little use for it.”

  A dismissal, clearly. They walked in silence for some time, then Alistair asked, “Does your frown have to do with me, or your brother-in-law?” She didn’t seem to have been taken to the bosom of her husband’s family, and now that he was dead, Alistair imagined the situation was fraught with difficulty. A good reason to be on the lookout for a husband like Tom Bagshot.

  “Neither,” she lied. “My mother thinks I will be cheered by doing good works, but I’m afraid the prospect of them only makes me gloomy.” That explained her simple dress.

  “It doesn’t cheer you?”

  “Not at all. I’m entirely selfish, though it is a worthy endeavor.”

  “What are you doing? Sewing for the poor?”

  “Not today.” She made a face. “Collecting for the Aldgate dispensary.”

  Aldgate was as a particularly insalubrious part of town, but he hadn’t heard of a dispensary there. A wagon rumbled by, stirring up a cloud of dust. He nudged her clear of it, raising his hand to shield her face.

  “No grazes,” she said, looking at his fingers. “No bruises either. Remarkable, given the turn up I saw the other day.”

  “I’m a swift healer,” he grinned. “But I have a few marks left. Just not where you can see.”

  She stiffened and withdrew her hand from his arm. “I don’t know what you think you will gain by approaching me. I’m not interested in casual amours, and have no intention of inspecting your bruises.”

  “I didn’t invite you to look,” he countered.

  “Didn’t you?” she asked.

  “No. I was only stating that they were there.” But he shouldn’t have mentioned them, not to a respectable lady he’d already offended. Usually he was more adroit.

  Her stride quickened. “Don’t be obtuse. I understand you perfectly well, but since I prefer plain speaking, I will tell you this: I am not to be imposed upon. Not by you, or anyone else. I won’t fall for flattering smiles and pretty complime
nts.”

  “Have I given you any?”

  She ignored him. “It doesn’t need to be in what you say—”

  “Mrs. Morris,” he interrupted, reining in his temper. “You are a beautiful lady. I won’t deny that. But there’s a difference between admiring a painting and wanting to buy it. You assume too much.”

  Her lips pinched together and her chest rose, but he wasn’t done saying his piece. “I made a mistake and am honor bound to correct it. You said Tom Bagshot could have helped you. I wanted to find out why, because perhaps I might be able to assist you. I was rather an ass that evening, after all. That’s all. No more. Finis.”

  “You’ve made yourself perfectly clear,” she said, with a brittle smile. “So will I. I don’t need your help.”

  “Just mine? Or have circumstances changed? Do you not need help at all?”

  “If I did, I wouldn’t turn to you,” she said, stopping in front of the church on the street corner. “My mother is inside. Thank you for your escort. I wish you a good day.” Without waiting for him to bow, she spun away and stalked off.

  *****

  Anna hastened over the flagstone path, her eyes fixed on the heavy chapel doors, her feelings as jumbled as her own bureau drawers. If she picked through the tangle she might find a reason to make sense of it all, but she doubted it. They were a magpie hoard: everything soiled, broken and cheap.

  He had guessed the truth about her, right from the first. If she wasn’t so angry, she’d be terrified. Instead of listening to his apologies she should have congratulated him on his perception. And if Captain Beaumaris could sense her secret in a three minute conversation at a masquerade, her problems were bigger than she thought. She’d never get Henry back.

  She shivered, despite the sun pressing hot against her shoulders. Ignoring the greasy feeling in her middle that always accompanied these reflections, she ducked into the shadowy church without even glancing at the rose windows. Her face wore a trained smile, but she didn’t trust it for more than an exchange of nods with the soberly dressed crowd inside. Her mother sat at a table, recording the names in a book in her precise hand. As she passed, Anna picked up one of the pamphlets stacked to the side.

  “Ah-ah,” her mother said, and Anna’s hand halted in midair.

  “This isn’t included in my five pounds?” Giving her mother a look (which she ignored, naturally), Anna dug a shilling out of her purse. “I’ll take three of them,” she said.

  Clutching her handful of papers, she found a seat on the far side of the room.

  Today they were listening to Dr. Henry Clutterbuck, one of the physicians working at the Aldgate dispensary. Anna had nothing against the poor—her visits to the dispensary had shocked her more than she could say—but it depressed her that she was blue as megrim, when thousands of souls faced privation, disease and ignorance. Real problems. What was the matter with her?

  Dr. Clutterbuck and the vicar were moving among the attendees—there were a good number gathered today. Her mother would be pleased. Knowing it would be some time before both the earnest and skeptical found their seats and the vicar and Dr. Clutterbuck began speaking, Anna glanced down at her pamphlets. She stopped after the first paragraph. Vaccination again. She was already convinced of the advantages conferred by the procedure, and though it seemed miraculous, she’d heard it discussed so often the topic was now only mildly interesting. Last month the pamphlets had been about phlebotomy. Anna was ashamed to admit it, but she’d read them over twice with ghoulish satisfaction. She’d been bled only a few times in her life, but it had been hard to muster the correct look of suffering, when all she wanted to do was watch and prod the creature on her arm. The fact that he—there must be female leeches of course, but Anna felt the male pronoun was more accurate—was disgusting did not make the animal any less interesting.

  She turned the pamphlet over on her lap and glanced out the wavy glass of the arching windows. She ought to be cheered by the sunshine but all she could think of was how hot the sitting room at home would be by the time they returned. She would stay with her mother as long as possible. The old stone church never warmed much.

  If Captain Beaumaris could peg her correctly after a single dance—she could ignore whatever had happened since to change his mind—her brother-in-law probably knew Henry was a cuckoo’s egg. Her husband had known, she’d made sure of that. Even if Anthony hadn’t confided in his brother, a man didn’t usually go to the devil without a reason. Frederick had to suspect. He wasn’t stupid. Sometimes she’d considered telling him the truth, but she knew it would make no difference. He hated her already and nothing would make him give up Henry. Not while he had all that money. She’d miscalculated terribly.

  Anna clasped her hands tighter and firmed her lips against the sudden desire to cry. Someone tapped on her shoulder and she managed to compose her expression enough to greet Mrs. Longswill, who’d just taken the place on the pew beside her.

  “How are you, my dear?”

  “Well. How kind of you to ask.” Only half attending, Anna brought out the required questions, learning that Mr. Longswill was again feeling poorly, that Mrs. Longswill had been terrified to vaccinate her family, but had trusted Edward Jenner, even with half the doctors in London calling him a fool. And now, years later, Dr. Clutterbuck said the same things, and wasn’t she glad—so glad—she’d had it done to all of them.

  “A great thing, my dear. A great thing, if we can get a lancet on every one of the poor. Of course so many resist the idea,” said Mrs. Longswill. The plume of her bonnet was askew, swaying lopsidedly as she nodded.

  “I don’t think many of them can read the pamphlets,” Anna said, looking down at the stack on Mrs. Longswill’s lap.

  “But they can listen. Hear the testimony of their betters. What more can they need?”

  “Nothing, I’m sure. Will you assist with recruitment at the dispensary?”

  Mrs. Longswill turned even more solemn. “My dear, I really think I must.”

  Much longer of this and she would crack. Mrs. Longswill was a good woman, a worthy soul, and all Anna could feel was a curdling self-pity. It blanketed her like a dark cloud, never mind the sun filling the windows.

  “How is your boy?” Mrs. Longswill asked.

  Anna nearly closed her eyes, but saved herself at the last moment. “Full of frisk. I took him to the park the other day and nearly toppled over from fatigue by the end of it.”

  The happy light in Mrs. Longswill’s eyes would kill her if she didn’t look away. “I think we should encourage them to get started, don’t you?” Anna said and set her face to the front of the room, saying nothing until the vicar took his place.

  She’d always liked the vicar’s gravelly voice and the way his white wig and clerical collar stood stark against his dark robes, but try as she would, she couldn’t hold on to his words today. They slipped by her ears like pebbles through water, splashing and rippling, nothing more. Anna shifted on the hard bench, reflecting that at least the note writer had turned out to be him—the man from the park and the masquerade, who’d told her his name was Jasper Rushford. She liked Beaumaris better.

  Her first thought on seeing that unfamiliar name, scrolling across his neat pasteboard card, had been much worse. She’d been reckless in choosing her lovers, very reckless, and it would be no more than she deserved if some man exposed her. Never mind that it was long ago. You couldn’t wash that off with a splash of soap and water. Captain Beaumaris was insulting and a nuisance—luckily the nursemaid was blaming Henry’s foul language on the footmen—but he wasn’t dangerous to her.

  Had he told her his Christian name? No, but it was written on his card. She cast her mind back. Alistair Beaumaris. He’d signed his letters in that style, closing with ‘Yr obedient servant.’ Well, she got the joke there now. The man was none of the three: not hers, not obedient, and certainly no one’s servant. It hardly mattered. She wouldn’t see him again. There would be no more elliptical notes to terrify her.<
br />
  Anna paused, her eyes tracing the edge of a leafy shadow moving across the whitewashed north wall. Lovers didn’t feel like the right word for those men. They might have used it for her, but she’d viewed them more as stud horses, chosen for convenience and a single purpose. She’d been all kinds of a fool, but she really should have taken better note of who they were—then she wouldn’t have panicked upon receiving Beaumaris’s card. Of course, at the time, she’d been so wild with rage at her husband, she hadn’t really cared who she bedded—she only wanted them for the child they could give her, a child she could flaunt in Anthony’s face.

  That fit of temper should have cured her of all others, the same way a blistered chest drew phlegm from the lungs. There’d been a good pamphlet about that once.

  She couldn’t call those men lovers—not when she could hardly remember their faces. She hadn’t needed that many. Four had been enough. They’d all been rather the same, save for the footman. Despite his lustiness, he had been sweet, smoothing her hair back from her face and looking at her with a steadiness that threatened to make her cry. Certainly he was the handsomest of the lot. Also the most tender, but in theory, as dangerous as the others. No lawyer in his right mind would represent her claim if the truth got out.

  When she’d spied Captain Beaumaris’s dark silhouette in the street today, fear had turned her innards to water and stolen the air from her chest. Relief followed once she saw his face, but he could have been one of the four. The footman, James, was still employed by Frederick. He’d never told, but who knew what the others might do if they ever turned up? Hopefully they’d forgotten, but she could never be sure. Thankfully, it had only been Beaumaris and his misplaced apologies this time. She couldn’t afford any trouble.

  If only she had resigned herself to her lot, accepted imprisonment in the country and behaved herself. She would have no secrets to hide then, only the continual shame of her husband’s disgust. Of course, she never would have had Henry. She couldn’t regret him. Even if she never got him back, she would still have those early moments—the elbows and knees jabbing from inside her swollen belly, a tight purple face and a feeble first cry. Warm milky skin and fuzzy down hair and a pulse beating on the soft crown of his head that she watched carefully, afraid his soul might spill out. Before tears could roll past her lashes, Anna sniffed, blinked and focused on the earnest face of Dr. Clutterbuck. No help there. Her eyes followed the arched roof heavenwards, tempting her with thoughts of lifted burdens and soaring wings, but the memory of her sins kept her mired to the earth. She was failing. She’d lost her son, and he was her heart—or what was left of it. She felt like she’d been bleeding since watching him skip up the stairs of her brother-in-law’s house.