A Passionate Performance

by Eileen Putman

Not even me, Justin thought dully as a searing pain tore through his gut.

  “You were but a lad at the time,” Aunt Agatha said haltingly. “I wanted to shield you. I did not want you to know that your mother was responsible for your father’s death.” She clutched her glass. “We allowed you — and the world — to think that the mysterious Marie Antoinette killed Oscar. The evidence pointed to Lady Greywood, of course, and she made it her penance not to correct that impression. It has taken a toll on her health.”

  “Now, Agatha,” Lady Greywood said. “It was for the best.”

  Aunt Agatha shook her head. “I see now that all of our lies just made things worse. I tried to finish the task of raising you Justin, but I wronged you by depriving you of the truth that was your right to know.”

  Tears trickled down her wrinkled cheeks. Justin had never seen his aunt cry. It tore a hole in his heart.

  “I shut the door on that time, when I should have opened it to let out the demons,” Aunt Agatha said hoarsely. “I have been a miserable woman for it. And I watched you change over the years into a pattern-card of your father, wondering how I could stop you from bringing about your own destruction.”

  The roaring in Justin’s ears was as if a waterfall had broken loose after being dammed up by years of silence — and illusion.

  “No,” he said roughly. “I was never like him.”

  Was that true? He didn’t know. Perhaps he had been more like his father than he knew. Perhaps his own masquerade had, in fact, become reality. He glanced at Sarah, saw the stricken look on her face, felt his heart constrict in pain. What had he done?

  Resolutely, Justin turned to Lady Greywood. “You were correct: I had a plan. I meant to exact revenge for his death. You were the target. I thought you had killed him.”

  Profound regret filled him.

  “I am deeply sorry,” he said. “I thought to drive you to confess by duplicating the events leading up to the ball. What I have done is unspeakable and cruel.”

  “I do not blame you,” Lady Greywood said. “It was your legacy, after all.”

  Aunt Agatha studied him. “We have all paid the price, it seems, for my secrecy. And Clarissa — well, you see what became of Clarissa. She did not wish to confront the reality of what had happened and I — foolishly — tried to force her to face the truth about Oscar. It put a wedge between us. She stopped speaking to me. I did not understand her world — I still do not understand it, exactly. Sometimes I think Clarissa truly believes that she shot Oscar. I suspect she blames herself for Arabella’s death as well. Clarissa was the one who found her, you know. She has not been the same since that day.”

  “But I have Silvester,” Aunt Clarissa said quietly from her rocking chair. “Arabella sent him to me. And he is ever so much nicer than Oscar.”

  ***

  “I do not know what is to become of you, Miss Armistead, but I wish you luck.” Harriet Simms eyed Sarah with a slight smile.

  That any of them were able to smile after the night they had endured was remarkable in itself. But there was an air of relief in the household today, as if the shedding of burdens had added years to their respective lives. All seemed eager to move on, perhaps to make up for time lost to the weight of lies, and by midmorning the company had begun dispersing. Justin and Harry had gone for an early-morning ride, but they, too, had plans to leave.

  Sarah’s tale of duplicity was hardly as epic as that of the Trent family, but she had quietly gone to each of the women this morning and apologized for the deceptions in which she had been a part. After the disclosures of last night, her confession had barely registered.

  Lady Greywood had departed with an admonition that Sarah never allow herself to forget her principles — especially in the presence of men such as Lord Linton. The countess did not seem entirely convinced that Justin had not in fact become the rake he had pretended to be in his quest for vengeance. Although, Sarah noted thoughtfully, Lady Greywood had unbent slightly when she allowed that redemption was not entirely unthinkable, even for a rake. The hint of a smile hovering at her mouth lifted years from her features.

  Aunt Clarissa had turned the full force of her violet eyes on Sarah as she bid her adieu. “Silvester and I will miss you,” she said, climbing into the carriage. “He is an excellent judge of character. He knew that you possessed extraordinary strength. Alas, it is a quality that I seem to lack.”

  With that, she sat back against the seat of the traveling coach.

  Miss Simms hung back for a moment, and Sarah was surprised to see her holding out something. “Clarissa wished you to have it,” she said.

  Sarah recognized the dried bouquet of violets as the arrangement Aunt Clarissa had kept by her bedside at Lintonwood. Save for the yellow iris — perhaps lost in the fray that long-ago night — it was the exact duplicate of the corsage Justin had given Sarah for Lady Hogarth’s ball. It was no doubt the very corsage that Aunt Clarissa had flung at Justin’s father fifteen years ago. Perhaps she had retrieved it as her lover lay dying. It was her only memento of the man who had called her Violet.

  “You may not wish to keep it,” Miss Simms said apologetically. “But Clarissa has decided she no longer needs this...souvenir and wishes to bestow it on someone who may understand its significance.” Her eyes were misty as she regarded the woman in the carriage, who was chatting happily to some unseen presence. “If she is willing to let go of the past, then perhaps she will allow the present to come in a bit more.”

  Sarah was struck by the affection in the woman’s gaze, and it occurred to her that Aunt Clarissa and Miss Simms had between them a very strong connection. “I am sure she will improve under your care, Miss Simms.”

  “I never told her the truth, you know,” Miss Simms said quietly.

  Sarah eyed her blankly.

  “I was governess to Lady Greywood’s daughter during the time the countess allowed Lord Linton and Clarissa to meet in the house. He would sometimes arrive at those assignations early, ahead of Clarissa. He was a relentless flirt. Foolishly, I imagined myself in love with him.”

  Miss Simms sighed. “He had the most extraordinary blue eyes. He seduced me, of course. It was the greatest mistake of my life.”

  Dear lord, Sarah thought. Was there no end to the secrets in this family?

  “Like most of London, I also concluded that the mysterious Marie Antoinette killed him. But unlike everyone else, I knew that Clarissa had worn the costume — not Lady Greywood. I had overheard Clarissa talking about her costume the day before the ball. And so I was certain it was she who shot Linton. Afterward, I asked Lady Greywood to recommend me to Clarissa as her companion. In my grief and anger, I meant to make her life miserable for killing Linton. I was filled with rage. I meant to destroy her.”

  Sarah’s mouth fell open. “But you have stayed with her all these years.”

  Miss Simms nodded. “Clarissa has a beautiful soul, Miss Armistead. She could not have killed Linton, for she would never harm a fly. She gleaned that I had been hurt by some man, and she went out of her way to make me feel cared for, even though she was struggling with great grief herself. Eventually it ceased to matter to me who had caused Linton’s death. Time taught me the truth about him. Clarissa taught me the truth about love and generosity.”

  “I see.” Sarah was at a loss for words.

  “Silvester has been with her since Linton’s death,” Miss Simms said, her expression wistful. “I gather he is everything that Linton was not. Perhaps one day she will send him back to the spirit world and seek her comfort among the living.”

  With that, Miss Simms walked to the carriage and settled herself beside Aunt Clarissa. The two women waved as the carriage rolled away down the drive.

  “Well, that is settled.”

  Sarah turned to see Aunt Agatha staring after her sister’s carriage, an intrigued expression on her face. When she saw Sarah looking at her, however, she frowned as if suddenly recollecting something.

  “Justin! Harry!” s
he called. Both men were walking toward the house from the stables. They quickly joined their aunt, who eyed them sternly.

  “Sarah’s part in all of this has been deplorable, but I do not entirely blame her.” Aunt Agatha stared pointedly at the cousins. “She has had to make her own way in the world under difficult circumstances.”

  Harry was resolutely studying the ground. Sarah did not dare look at Justin, but she could feel his eyes burning into her.

  “You realize, of course, that she has been woefully compromised as a result of your schemes,” Aunt Agatha declared. “Each of you is at fault. Therefore, one of you must marry her, preferably within a fortnight.”

  A stunned silence followed this decree. Sarah wanted to sink into the ground in embarrassment. Certainly, she would be no party to any such arrangement. She racked her brain for the words to say so without sounding churlish to the woman who had been only generous, despite Sarah’s own perfidy.

  “Miss Armistead will marry me.” Lord Linton’s clipped voice broke the silence.

  Harry grinned in obvious relief. “Perfect solution,” he agreed. “Rich as Croesus, he is. Ain’t going to quibble over every little bill from the modiste.”

  “Excellent,” Aunt Agatha pronounced. “I cannot pretend I am not satisfied. Sarah will make you a fine wife, Justin. She may even be the making of you.”

  “Hear, hear,” Harry said, slapping his cousin on the back.

  Sarah felt the heat of Justin’s gaze, and she mustered the courage to search his eyes.

  She could detect no affection there, no hint behind that careful mask that he was aught but a man who had lived his life in the pursuit of revenge and now had nothing to take its place, no compass to steer him clear of the rocky shoals of his own misguided quest.

  Under her scrutiny, the mask dissolved for the briefest of moments. A sudden wave of emotion swept his features.

  Confusion, regret, sorrow — all were mirrored in those grey depths. But not love.

  In a man consumed by revenge, there would not be room for love. The fact that Justin’s revenge lay around him in shambles did not mean that he was any more able to love.

  In her life, Sarah had found it necessary sometimes to make compromises. This was not one of those times.

  “I am deeply honored,” she said in a clear, firm voice. “But I will not marry either of you. I have decided to resume my acting career.” She turned to their aunt. “Lady Claremont, I am most grateful for your generosity and forbearance, neither of which I deserve.”

  Sarah managed a polite curtsy before quickly crossing the drive to Aunt Agatha’s lumbering coach, which had been provided for Sarah’s return trip to London. It took her best acting skills, but she managed to ascend the carriage steps with poise and dignity. Only after a footman closed the door, did she sink into the squabs, utterly drained. As the carriage pulled away, she saw that Aunt Agatha, Harry, and Justin were staring at her in speechless wonder.

  It was an exit worthy of a great actress.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Justin allowed the lavender-scented missive to float from his fingers to the desk. He had been home only a fortnight, but already Aunt Agatha had shocking news.

  “Marrying Throckmorton?” He stared at the letter in bewilderment, unable to imagine what his aunt and the elderly neighbor who wore his heart on his sleeve had in common. “Has she taken leave of her senses? The man will fawn all over her. Aunt Agatha always detested sentiment.”

  Anh lit the incense on the jade altar. “People often shun that which they fear most. Perhaps your aunt has decided that the rewards of true affection are worth the risks.”

  Justin eyed his butler suspiciously. “If that bit of philosophy is meant for me, you are wide of the mark.”

  “As you wish, my lord.” Without expression, Anh handed him the hollow bamboo stick.

  “I do not know why I put up with your rituals,” Justin groused. “They never reveal anything useful.” With a sigh of resignation, he shook the bamboo until one of the smaller sticks inside fell out onto the carpet.

  With great ceremony, Anh tossed the wooden blocks to confirm that the choice was correct. “That is not true, my lord. The sticks foretold the change, did they not?”

  It was the first time either of them had made even a veiled reference to the life-altering revelations that had occurred at Aunt Agatha’s. Since Justin’s return to Lintonwood, life had assumed its normal routine. Except that it was anything but normal. Sarah was gone.

  Change. It was a perfectly ordinary word for the extraordinary transformation that had occurred in him since she had entered his life. When Justin reached for the anger he had carried around for so long, it was no longer there. Forgiveness, once unthinkable, had taken its place. He could not condemn Aunt Clarissa for what she had done, nor Aunt Agatha for keeping the painful truth from him. Lady Greywood deserved only his deepest regret for the pain he himself had added to her life.

  Most of all, Justin could not hate his mother for what she had done out of weakness, desperation, and rage at the man who had destroyed everything he touched.

  What had Sarah said? Women do not shoot their lovers. But what about their oppressors, their tormentors, the instruments of their degradation? His mother had answered that question with one, resounding shot.

  Memories washed over him. His mother’s tearstained face, her cries in the night, the bruises that did not fade. Her gently rounded stomach and its promise of new life, a life spawned not by tender lovemaking but by Oscar Trent’s relentless imposition of his will upon a woman unable to fight him. A doomed life, as it turned out.

  No, he could not hate his mother, his aunts, or Lady Greywood. It was time he acknowledged the real target of his anger: his father. Facing that pistol in his father’s study so long ago, Justin had truly wished him dead. Scant hours later, the wish was fulfilled. Symbolically, at least, he had been a party to his father’s death. He saw now that avenging him would never have put to rest his own guilt, anger and despair at never gaining his father’s love. Rather, it would have engraved those empty emotions on his soul forever. His father was doubtless laughing from the grave at the bitter legacy he had settled on his only son.

  Justin shook his head. There was anger enough to go around — at his father, at himself. Did it burn within him still?

  A great weariness filled him. Without the prism of revenge to distort his vision, he saw how little he had to offer a woman like Sarah. For all his wealth, his title, his skill at trifling parlor tricks, he had nothing. She had been right to refuse him. He had proven himself an empty, embittered man.

  Anh was studying him as closely as he studied those wretched bamboo sticks. Justin did not believe in their power, yet recent experience had underscored his profound lack of knowledge about many matters. And Anh was looking at him as if a great deal remained to be revealed.

  “I still do not understand how you persuaded young William to return to school,” Justin said carefully, determined not to give the man the satisfaction of directly broaching the subject of Sarah.

  Anh’s face was impassive. “I simply told him that as Miss Armistead’s future husband you would pay his education expenses and provide for his sister in the manner she deserved. He seemed quite satisfied.”

  Justin stilled. “What?”

  The ghost of a smile flitted over Anh’s features. “It was what the sticks foretold.”

  “Best throw those dashed sticks in the river,” Justin growled. “Miss Armistead refused my offer.”

  Not that it had been much of a proposal, he reflected ruefully. With Aunt Agatha and Harry looking on, he had been as tense as a fox surrounded by watchful hounds. The words had not come out the way he had intended.

  Anh did not seem surprised. “When there is disharmony among the elements, balance is not easily restored. It requires patience to find the center and see more clearly.”

  “Not my strong suit.”

  Anh regarded him. “Sometimes what on
e needs most is obscured. Sometimes, regrettably, for years.”

  “Stop this nonsense. I weary of these pronouncements. Your facile art bears no resemblance to truth.”

  “Then you will not wish to know what the sticks show.” Anh reached for them.

  “Wait.”

  Anh eyed him expectantly.

  “Very well, then.” There was no art so seductive, Justin decided, as the promise of light to a man overwhelmed by darkness. He dared not trust in it. Or hope. And yet...

  Silently Anh handed him the bamboo container. Justin shook it, and another stick fell onto the carpet. Its choice was confirmed in the usual manner, and the ritual continued until all of the sticks had been chosen. Anh studied them carefully, then eyed Justin in surprise.

  “It seems, my lord, that you are destined to take to the stage.”

  ***

  Rose McIntosh had stolen her Venetian talc, along with the elderberry Sarah used to darken her eyelashes. She had no doubt that Rose was also responsible for the mysterious disappearance of her wig. Fortunately, Sarah still had in her possession the wig she had worn for Lady Hogarth’s ball, which meant that her Ophelia now bore an uncanny resemblance to Marie Antoinette.

  All because Mr. Stinson had seen fit to give Sarah the part of Ophelia after Rose ran off with a Manchester swell who turned out to be nothing more than a conniving knave with a taste for women of Rose’s ample proportions.

  When Rose returned to the fold, chastened and without a feather to fly with, Mr. Stinson had made a heated speech about feckless actresses and had handed Rose the role of the Player Queen, a demeaning comedown. Further absences — by anyone in the company — would not be tolerated, he had warned, looking at both of the women.

  Since then, Sarah’s possessions had been disappearing one by one. Transforming herself into Ophelia had become an exercise in suspense — she never knew whether she could scrounge the necessary paint and accessories. Fortunately, next week they moved on to another town and another play. A change of scenery would do them all good.

  Sarah fingered the locket around her neck. As much as she had put the past behind her, she hadn’t been able to put Aunt Clarissa’s gift away in a drawer. One day, perhaps, she would. For now, it felt wrong to do so. The two women, Arabella and Clarissa, had been connected by blood and by so much else besides. Sarah felt connected to them as well, though they belonged to a past she was trying mightily to forget. One day, perhaps, she would.