House of Bliss

by T T Thomas

  “I’m sorry,” she said, “I’m having a bit of trouble grasping the reality of the cold and merciless dungeon I left yesterday morning with the redemption of that beautiful castle we see before us.”

  “I hope we’ve sprung you loose in time.”

  She looked at him. “In time for what, Lord Chamberlain?”

  “His Royal Highness intends to issue a second Letters Patent as soon as all the paperwork on this Markham case is sorted. King Edward wants to re-activate the old Blissdon land grant and transfer the barony of Porthleven to you—or an individual of your choice. But it would be in appreciation of you personally.”

  Sabrina looked at him, a small smile pulling at the corners of her mouth. “My word…can he do that?”

  It was the Lord Chamberlain’s turn to smile. He looked toward the castle and inclined his head. “Indeed he can.”

  “I believe I would love to restore the old manse,” she said, “but I’m not so certain I wish to be the Baroness. May I think on this?”

  “Yes,” he replied, “it’s a lot to absorb. His Majesty will understand, whatever your decision. And if you wish, he will forgo the reactivation and issuance altogether. In any event, you might want to consider that a substantial award is to accompany the title, which could be used for any renovations to the barony lands and properties.” He smiled. “Something to keep in mind, Miss Blissdon.”

  Part IV

  Chapter 47

  Felicity North felt as though she had walked the soles off her shoes. Her feet ached, her cheeks were wind-burned a fiery shade of red, and the sting of exercise throbbing through every muscle in her body made her wince. Still, she kept moving.

  She had awakened with the certain feeling that she had been a reckless woman. Careless with people’s feelings, thoughtless with their lives, incautious with her own life.

  Those conclusions had sent her out the door to walk the streets until she found answers. She continued walking, stopping at a street vendor around noon. She purchased a container of tea and a bag containing a large slice of buttered, fresh-baked soda bread and took the food to a bench.

  As she sat, she thought of Sabrina. She missed her. Yearned for the person Sabrina had been in their private hours. But given the realization Lena Thornbrook had more of a magnetic pull on Sabrina than Felicity understood or even knew about, at first, Felicity had behaved badly once she knew.

  Moreover, Felicity recognized her own weakness. She wouldn’t have called it that at the time but confessed to herself that the speed with which she’d taken over Sabrina’s place in the household and corset business after the arrest was suspect. Bel had indeed implied as much.

  A survey of her conscience found it wanting. Unfamiliar with either jealousy or envy, she felt enveloped in both. The alternatives had felt simple: If she couldn’t have Sabrina, then living Sabrina’s life would have to do.

  She mindlessly brought the bread to her mouth but set it down in the napkin on her lap again. The appetite worked up from walking had dissipated in the consciousness of a truth: She was the definition of opportunist and thief, plain and simple.

  She’d not wished anything bad for Sabrina, but when it had happened, had she not been right there, ready to pick up the slack engendered by Sabrina’s absence? Yes.

  And Bel seemed to grasp that—as an older sister would. Although Bel had not scolded Felicity outright, she saw Bel’s barely concealed anger and heard the disapproval in her tone.

  Felicity picked at the still warm bread and savored the rich sultana raisins buried within. She thought back over the recent months—to her early days in London, fresh off the train from her childhood countryside and all the familiarity of her first 24 years.

  London had been a foreign country to her. She had been eager to flex her freedom muscles but not inclined to think things through. She flirted and seduced peril and adult issues with the mind of an incautious and bold youth.

  She recalled her shock to discover Bel in such terrible living conditions, and with a child. In her ardent desire to fix their lives, she had contributed to their danger with her brazen presumptions.

  She was only meant to find safe harbor for Sophia with Sabrina—not seduce her. She was meant to work for Sabrina—not run her dynasty.

  After gazing at what she could see of some gardens behind a gate, Felicity finally turned and retraced her steps all the way back to Sabrina’s residence, arriving before dusk. In her worn out state, Felicity went straight to bed with her own guilt and remorse. Before drifting off to sleep, she made a brief plea of a prayer.

  Please. Was there any help? Must make it up to Sabrina. And to Bel. But how? A little guidance, perhaps? Please, God?

  Felicity awakened before dawn to the sound of raindrops hitting the roof. She put on a better pair of walking shoes borrowed from a trove of things Sabrina no longer wore and added a dark blue raincoat and a pair of galoshes. She passed Sabrina’s door, her mouth pursed into a thin line of regret. Bel’s door was shut and the house was quiet so everyone was still asleep.

  On her way out, she paused in front of the umbrella stand. She chose a large, black one with a long pole, stiff ribs, and a wide canopy. She recognized it as Sabrina’s. But Sabrina had several, so Felicity helped herself to the black one.

  Once she got outside the door, she saw that the rain had become a heavy downpour. She slid the tight cover off the brolly but caught the little finger of her left hand on the sharp, metal ferrule, the tip of the pole above the canopy. It was sharp edged and tapered as a knifepoint.

  Good Lord, leave it to Sabrina to carry a veritable weapon during a deluge.

  When Felicity spotted a small stream of blood running down her palm and onto the unopened canopy, she set the contraption on the porch.

  After stanching the blood with her handkerchief, she picked up the umbrella more carefully and stuffed the cover into her raincoat pocket. Might not even need it by noon, but the gray skies above suggested otherwise. Oh, well. Off to find herself on the muddy, slippery streets of London. And again, same as yesterday, no destination, merely a direction.

  She must let Sabrina go; help Bel make a life for Sophia. Begin walking in her own shoes, find out who she wanted to fall in love with; find happiness that didn’t involve subterfuge or delusions or unkindness. Become a full and honorable woman.

  Traversing old, worn, rain-slicked brick streets, wandering down pretty but empty, wet lanes and treading through the puddles as rain-splashed carriage wheels threw up more water was a cool, liquid balm to her fevered brain and burning heart.

  Walking. It would clear her mind.

  Chapter 48

  “Morrowgate, a block or two before Phantom Way,” he told the driver. “Fast as you can.”

  It was a ruse he’d used many times, but this evening his destination was special. He took three different hansom cabs. Each time, he waited for the driver to pull away then quickly rounded the corner and hailed another operator. He exited the third cab at Morrowgate Terrace and walked the few blocks to Phantom Way.

  The alleyway was dark but Glyver saw the Blissdon house lit up on the ground floor. Finding the gate locked, he climbed over the stone wall, dropped to the turf and made his approach along the periphery of the property.

  How perfect. First, he’d wake Bel and cover her mouth with the bandana in his pocket. Then she could watch as he drove his knife into that conniving sister of hers. And the baby. Killing George Markham’s daughter would be easy. Yes, he would make Bel view it all. They thought he hadn’t known about the baby. Could he do that? Could he kill a child? He damn well should.

  But maybe not the child. The fear of it would be enough to let Bel feel what he’d felt all these years. The rage, the powerlessness, the terror of feeling out of control. Afraid to be unmasked, revealed, and shunned for the man he was.

  After that, they’d go downstairs to the library, surprise Sabrina and that nosy companion of hers, Lena Thornbrook. He’d get rid of all of them. Gone. No more h
umiliations. No more Bel to cuckold him. No more Sabrina to run her posh corsetry business for society women and whores with money inherited from that divorce lawyer father of hers. No more craven whores to kill. There was that molly boy doctor, of course, but he’d be too busy doing all the autopsies to cause any more trouble.

  They’d tried to make a fool of Hugh Glyver hadn’t they? All of them. He publicly dismissed the ignominy that accrued to his name, but privately, a deep mortification ravaged his mind and became hatred and vindictiveness. He wanted justice for the harm they had all caused him.

  His son or daughter would grow up without him, but his wife would see to it that the story handed down would put Glyver in the hero role. She would tell the child it was a tragic accident. She would convince his child that Glyver’s spirits soared upon learning he would become a father. A lie, of course, but a good one. Glynnis would make it up for her own sake, her own reputation, and the child’s.

  As he waited in the shadows, he thought about each of his targets. A free-form soliloquy of farewell.

  Markham, always getting away with things, permanently titled, constantly respected and interminably poor. Yet himself, wealthy and accomplished, got none of the respect he felt he deserved. Markham, devious and duplicitous. Endlessly coming to Glyver at Oxford years earlier to get him out of some scrape or another.

  Glyver didn’t know how he kept his composure when he heard a rumor the title was ill-gotten, a fraud. He had listened to the “I’m a Baron” dribble for years. But he leveraged that information, by God, by sending the anonymous letter to the Crown two years earlier. All the waiting was tiresome, and it had taken time. If the rumor were true, better yet. And all the while, Markham, coveting Bel, giving her the child.

  Bel. She had ruined his life. He had loved her. Desired her beyond words. Coveted her over sanity. He thought she appreciated how he had improved her life. But, no. She embarrassed him in front of society, with her sensuous beauty, her quiet, reserved mannerisms, her learned mind.

  He saw how other men looked at her. Of course, the comments were about her exceptional intelligence, but the unspoken refrain was about her alluring looks, her body, her abundant proficiency in the boudoir. He heard it. He heard it in his mind, but that did not disabuse him of its veracity. He hid his tormented opinions because he knew it would make him appear a cuckold.

  And she never said a word about his inconsistent performance as a husband. But he knew she must laugh behind his back. He couldn’t bear the shame of it. Maybe the birth of his unborn child would dispel any rumors of his recurring impotence. Did people know? They must. Glynnis knew, of course.

  But Bel…that’s where it all started. He could only perform in anger, anger at how Bel winsomely seduced every other man with her eyes. The way she lowered her lids, then looked up from under them, a trait of seeming shyness for which every man fell madly in love with her.

  His madonna had become his whore.

  Blissdon’s father, the barrister. Those sins would be visited on the daughter. He handled Bel Glyver’s divorce with finesse, manipulating a divorce settlement of such a modest sum that Glyver either had to accept or face ostracism for declining.

  Glyver smiled at the cleverness of how he’d haunted Sabrina Blissdon’s whorish clientele to death. The added ability to perform sexually with the prostitutes both pleased and infuriated him.

  And most importantly, confounding everyone about the corsets. Bel had not worn those same corsets while married to him, but he knew from his inside contact at the Tornage House that she had been the recipient of more than one House of Bliss corset after she began seeing Sabrina Blissdon. He sneered. And none of them ever made the connection.

  Yes, a shame that Fluffy Frannie had to lose her life in payment for her information services to him. Ah well, he’d paid her well.

  He knew who Bel had been waiting for that night at the Tornage house. He had watched, week after week, while Sabrina Blissdon entered the Tornage house to court the woman she called Annabel North—his Bel Glyver. He had watched them go into the Chinaman’s den to lose their inhibitions in opium. He watched them walk down streets together, and he could see that Bel, a whore, had fallen in love with Sabrina Blissdon, a wealthy whore monger.

  Tonight. It would all end tonight. He had tried. He’d tried to limit the damage. Initially, ruining Bel and Sabrina Blissdon had been his goal. But Markham using Bel’s whore services was beyond the pale. He knew then they all had to die. And that naïve Miss Felicity West. Felicity North. She may not deserve to die, but she was a witness so she could not live.

  And the stupid, stupid Mendicott. He almost ruined the whole plan with his peculiar obsession with Sabrina Blissdon. “Those women,” Mendicott called them. “They are sinners.”

  Glyver shook his head. What had that fool been thinking—that he would somehow warrant a big promotion by floating the preposterous idea that Sabrina Blissdon had tried to murder Bel? That had never been part of the plan. Glyver let out a low, sinister laugh. The crazy angle had given Glyver more time though. Time to ensure Mendicott hoodwinked Markham, set up Markham to think Mendicott worked for “the Baron.”

  Using Mendicott to attack Bel had been Glyver’s idea, but he allowed Markham to believe it was his own brilliance. Greedy bastard. Glyver smirked into the darkness. Giving Mendicott Markham’s club tie had been insurance, not that Glyver ended up needing it. But if Bel had grabbed it the night of the attack…or even seen it, all fingers would point to Markham.

  Glyver sighed with self satisfaction. Certainly, Mendicott was stupid, but he had been handy at times. Especially after each whore’s death. No witnesses. No evidence. No one cared.

  From his position in the hedges, through a narrow, open space between the draperies inside the front windows, Glyver saw Lena and Sabrina sitting in chairs facing one another next to the fireplace. They had turned off all but a small table lamp. He could see the women’s profiles in the firelight. They did not appear to be saying much.

  He checked his belt and his coat pocket. He had both his revolver and his dagger. He didn’t intend to use the revolver, but he would if he had to. He stood up, flexed his arms and began to move toward the house.

  Sabrina had returned from her visit to Windsor Castle in time for tea with Lena and Bel. Ten minutes before their repast began, Jeremy showed up with Chief Superintendent Carstairs.

  The news was alarming. Hugh Glyver had shot George Markham and Chief Inspector Mendicott to death earlier in the day on the wharf.

  At this news, the three women became deadly silent and their faces paled.

  Jeremy had summed up the situation. “It appears all three men were involved at various levels of sabotage toward Sabrina, Bel and amongst themselves. But Hugh Glyver was the mastermind and the ultimate double crosser,” he said. “The meeting at the wharf was an ambush, and only Glyver survived it.

  At that point, Jeremy had turned over the meeting to the Chief. He gave them the highlights of a day, ending with the news that Glyver had escaped police pursuit. Until Glyver could be found, the Chief had ordered around-the-clock police surveillance of Sabrina’s house, and the first shift would be on the grounds within a quarter hour of his departure.

  At half past six, Jeremy had gone upstairs for a catnap, as had Bel. Walters had delayed the full tea until 8 p.m. to await Felicity’s return and give everyone a chance to absorb the news.

  “Darling, are you worn out?” Lena reached over to touch Sabrina’s arm.

  Sabrina placed her hand atop Lena’s. “No more than you, my love,” Sabrina said. “I’ve had to work at staying alive, but you’ve been doing yeoman’s duty sleuthing around to save my life.” Sabrina mixed both of them another cocktail.

  She paused halfway to handing Lena her drink. “I’m in shock.”

  “So am I. It was Glyver all along.”

  “It was all three of them,” Sabrina said. “Now the Mendicott interactions make sense. But if you hadn’t found out about Markham�
�s background…”

  Lena gave her a mysterious smile. “I had a lucky break.”

  “Oh? And what was that?” Sabrina asked.

  Lena took Sabrina’s hand and stared into the fire with an absent-minded, faraway look in her eyes. She had never told Sabrina about Jean Marie. She sensed Sabrina staring at her.

  “Well, are you going to tell me or…?”

  Lena focused and turned to her. “I was able to get into the records I needed to discover the truth about Markham’s birth and his identity when I ran into an old friend in Penzance.”

  Sabrina sat up straighter. “I didn’t realize you knew anyone in Penzance.”

  “I do,” Lena said. “Her name is Jean Marie.”

  “Oh, really?” Sabrina leaned toward her. “Is there more?”

  Lena looked at her lover. “Yes. Sister Jean Marie. She’s a nun.”

  Sabrina visibly relaxed and fell back into her chair again. “Oh, dear, you may have given me a fright.”

  Lena raised an eyebrow. And waited.

  Sabrina shifted in her seat. “A nun. Can’t say I was unhappy to hear those words.”

  They sat in companionable silence for a while, Sabrina with her eyes closed. “I’m still concerned they’ve not found Glyver,” Lena said. She looked around. “I’m glad we’re not here alone.”

  “We’re safe here,” Sabrina said, stretching, legs out straight, arms above her head. “The guard detail will be here any minute.”

  Lena smiled and looked back into the fire. “And I found out something else. About your father.”

  Sabrina jumped up and clapped her hands like a child. “Oh what? Tell me, Lena before I burst. What did you learn?”

  “Well, he was your father, for starters.”

  “What a relief. What do you mean, ‘for starters’?”

  Lena opened her mouth to explain when a loud crash at the rear of the house startled them. They heard a shot ring out, and a man moaning.