By the King's Design

by Christine Trent

  Wesley grabbed her arm and roughly pulled her into his room, slamming the door shut behind her.

  He held on to her arm and put his face close to hers. Through gritted teeth he said, “What did you hear?”

  She pushed against him with her free arm and he released her. Enough was enough. She’d been patient with Wesley for years, but rough handling her like this was beyond the pale.

  And before she could quite stop herself, Belle unleashed several years of anger on her brother.

  “How dare you! You are the most arrogant, self-centered man, no, boy, I have ever encountered. One would think you were the spoiled, pampered pet of a rich mistress, as much as you strut about thinking that you’re owed some special place and favor in society for no effort. Even with me you do it. You think you deserve ownership in the shop because you wink at the female customers and make daring suggestions with them. And when I don’t consider that proof of maturity and responsibility, what do you do? Why, you take revenge on me by disappearing from the shop for hours at a time, to meet who knows what tramp or trollop.

  “Is that supposed to impress me? Do you think as I stand here that I’m overcome with remorse at not making you an owner of the shop? Truly? Especially since I just overheard you discussing something that probably amounts to treachery at best, treason at worst.

  “Tell me, Brother, what ingenious plan do you have for achieving the recognition that has so long eluded you? Are you helping to manufacture evidence for the king to use against the queen? Will you aid in seeing that poor woman dethroned?”

  Wesley grew still. “What did you say?”

  “I’m asking you if Mr. Thistlewood is an agent of the king’s. Are you two conspiring to bring false evidence against Queen Caroline so that the king can divorce her?”

  Wesley blinked as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

  “Yes. Yes, that is what’s happening. You’ve rooted us out, Belle.”

  Such imprudent people were always shocked when they were discovered in their foolhardy plans, Belle thought.

  But Belle didn’t like his tone. It was too ... smug. And confident. Quite unlike his attitude just moments ago.

  Hmmm.

  “So what will you do now?” she asked.

  “What do you mean, what will I do? Do you think your sniffing presence changes anything? We’ll proceed as planned. After all, the king wants it, and what the king wants he shall have. Making it none of your concern whatsoever. In fact, I suspect His Majesty would be quite angry if he learned that you knew anything about this.”

  Yes, that was probably true. Belle felt as though she’d been pricked by a sharp pin, and all of the righteous, principled air was released from her body.

  “And what shiny gift has he offered you, Wesley?”

  Wesley slowly smiled. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. Enough, now. Run off and tend to your own affairs, and don’t worry about mine. Things will be concluded soon enough and you’ll find that all’s well.”

  He pushed her out of his room like an errant child, and once again she was facing his locked door.

  Once again she couldn’t begin to fathom her brother’s behavior.

  And once again she fought the desire to run to Put. What could he do about it, anyway?

  11

  To feel much for others and little for ourselves; to restrain our selfishness and exercise our benevolent affections, constitute the perfection of human nature.

  —Adam Smith, Scottish moral philosophizer, 1723–1790

  Friday, February 18, 1820

  London

  Put brushed long strokes of mordant—a combination of alum and water—to the drawers of the secretary-style desk he was building for Belle. The mordant saturated the wood and prepared it for accepting color. Sitting nearby was his own stain concoction of freshly cut brazilwood boiled in water with some more alum and a bit of potash. The ingredients were heated together for just the right amount of time to create a magnificent shade of red-brown.

  Long after he shut up the shop for the day and his workers went home to their wives or to a tavern for a pint, he remained behind to work long into the night in the light of gas lamps. He’d even set up a pallet in the shop’s attic so that he didn’t need to waste time walking home each day while completing the piece. After all, a single intricately carved chair could take up to two weeks to create, making his time frame for the desk very short indeed.

  He was content with the progress, though. Remembering Belle’s delight with the Earl of Essex’s desk at Madame Tussaud’s, he came up with an idea for a double secret compartment for Belle’s.

  He looked out the window at the night sky. The light purple tinges of dawn were appearing above the buildings across from his, and soon the street vendors would be rolling their carts into place and hawking their wares.

  It was probably time to climb the ladder into the attic to catch a few hours of sleep on his lumpy mattress before his employees returned to start a fresh day. But he needed to supervise the drying of the mordant, then the stain needed to be applied in up to a dozen coats, so, once again, he would work twenty-four hours straight without sleep.

  He added more wood scraps into the fireplace and stoked the dying fire to warm his fingers for the work that lay ahead of him, work he knew was a labor of love.

  Mr. and Mrs. Nash were in London, and paid a visit to Belle’s shop for the first time. Frigid February air blew into the shop behind the couple, but Belle was delighted to see them, and apologized for the scraps littering the floor.

  “Never mind, Miss Stirling,” Nash said. “We can see you’ve built yourself quite a profitable business here, eh, Mrs. Nash?”

  “Indeed so. In fact, I think I need a length of this tamboured muslin. My fichus have become quite tattered and I need to have new ones made.”

  Belle cut the requested fabric, adding extra yardage to the cut, and presented it to Mrs. Nash as a gift. “You are too kind to give this to me, Miss Stirling. I’ll not forget it. You must join us for lunch, I insist.”

  For once, Wesley was in the shop, working at something behind the counter. He was congenial to the Nashes, and nodded agreement to look after the shop before Belle could even finish the request. She joined the Nashes for luncheon at the same café where she’d seen Put and that woman dining together. She understood why he picked the place. The food was delicious. Midway through their Madeira-soaked pound cake, Belle and John Nash were absorbed in discussion about the Pavilion’s progress.

  Belle hadn’t realized the extent to which they’d excluded Mary Ann Nash until she interrupted them. “You know, I do believe I’d like to go shopping for some hats and hairpins. After all, what good is a spruced-up bodice if one’s coiffure isn’t covered fashionably? Besides, I’ve never really walked through this area. Mr. Nash, I know you want to take a turn to look at Regent’s Park. Why don’t you and Miss Stirling do so, and I’ll meet you later at the hotel?”

  Mary Ann Nash gathered up her cloak and gloves and left for her shopping jaunt along Oxford Street.

  Nash watched his wife’s retreating back. “I suspect my wife wants to be seen strolling about this fashionable area, no matter that she may snap like an icicle out there, eh?”

  And so Nash and Belle went to view the progress of not only the park but all of the new street between Carlton House and Regent’s Park. Nash offered her a fur-lined blanket to wrap around herself as they started out. Mrs. Nash’s initials were embroidered on one corner and it smelled faintly of her perfume.

  The park and the construction surrounding the area were less than a mile away from Belle’s location on Oxford Street, yet her duties and constant travel to Brighton had prevented her from visiting the area herself.

  Progress on the street and park itself was slowed during the bitterly cold month of February, but work continued on buildings surrounding the area. They rode past the demolition of the Little Theatre in nearby Haymarket, a century-old, decrepit building that would n
ow be replaced on the same site by the new Theatre Royal, designed by Mr. Nash.

  “The new theatre will be shifted just south, to line up with St. James’s Square, you see. I understand the new manager intends to stage Sheridan’s The Rivals as its first production.” Nash smiled as though pleased with that decision.

  As their carriage rumbled along past other partially completed buildings, Belle used the opportunity to broach what she had learned from Wesley.

  “Mr. Nash, if you knew that the king was plotting something dreadful, what would you do?”

  “Have you somehow come into such knowledge?”

  “Yes. I’ve learned that the king is gathering evidence against Queen Caroline in an effort to discredit her.”

  “Miss Stirling, who isn’t in possession of that information? The king has been trying to rid himself of his wife since five minutes after he took his vows. And the newspapers are full of his outbursts and tirades against her.”

  “Yes, but he’s employing others to manufacture evidence against her. She could end up at the tip of every satirist’s pen, if not locked up in the Tower.”

  “I don’t think a queen has seen the inside of a Tower cell since Elizabeth. Besides, the visitors who now tour the Tower would find it immensely entertaining, hardly the king’s goal. The royal couple has already been lambasted by the likes of Rowlandson. One more piece of gossip won’t affect his scribbling one way or the other.”

  Nash gazed thoughtfully at her.

  “Miss Stirling, from where did you get this piece of scurrilous information?”

  “I ... I can’t say. I overheard a conversation somewhere.”

  Nash smiled. “Ah, perhaps your eye was to a keyhole when it should have been on a measuring tape, eh? Overheard conversations are generally misconstrued.”

  Belle reddened. “I assure you, Mr. Nash, I overheard this conversation correctly. In fact, I confronted one of the parties involved, and he confessed as much.”

  “So the exchange involved a man with whom you are well acquainted enough that you could confront him. You’ve mentioned no other men in your life, so who could that possibly be, besides your own brother?”

  Belle didn’t reply, merely turning her head to look out the window.

  “I see that I am prescient. And what could your brother, a mild-mannered lad if I ever saw one, have to do with any schemes of the king? Listen to me well, Miss Stirling. I don’t know your brother, but I can hardly countenance that he would be scheming at the uppermost heights of the kingdom. You, after all, are closer to the king than he could ever hope to be.”

  “Yes, but—”

  “And regardless of the sheer absurdity of your brother plotting such a thing with King George, who has an army of connivers and schemers surrounding him from which to draw, remember what I told you long ago: Mind your tongue where the king is concerned. He pays us well and we benefit even further from our society clientele. No good could come to you as a result of your groundless suspicions.”

  “They aren’t groundless.”

  “Moreover, what of your brother? If such a story got out, do you seriously think the king would suffer for it? No, he would let others, such as your brother, assume all blame. Your wisest course, Miss Stirling, is to stay as far away from this as possible. Believe me, there are many things you don’t necessarily understand about the king.”

  “Such as?”

  But Nash refused to say anything more, and a couple of days later he and Mrs. Nash returned to Brighton.

  Belle, however, made up her mind. She would stop Wesley.

  Saturday, February 19, 1820

  Put’s first thought when Wesley entered the shop was that the boy was gaunt. Was Belle aware that her brother looked ill?

  “I’ve come to check on the desk, Mr. Boyce,” Wesley said. “Have you made something worthy of my sister?”

  “I believe so. Let me show you.” Put removed the burlap loosely draped over the secretary to protect it from the ever-present wood dust in the shop.

  “Handsome,” was Wesley’s entire assessment.

  Put considered throttling him. The desk was a masterpiece of marquetry and function. He showed Wesley its construction.

  “As you can see, I’ve made the bookcase part separate from the drop-front bottom piece for easy transport, but it slides back on easily atop this raised rail.” Put slid the top part of the secretary forward so Wesley could see how it attached.

  Damn the boy, he didn’t seem all that interested, given his great excitement over having the piece built right away.

  “And here’s the truly unique aspect of the desk.” Put pulled down the slanted front of the desk, which served as a working space when open and resting on support rails that automatically popped out from below as the top was opened.

  Inside the working space were a myriad of drawers and slots for holding papers, writing instruments, and whatever else Belle desired. Each drawer had a gleaming brass knob in its center. Put had furiously rubbed and polished each knob until his arms were sore.

  He pulled out a drawer from inside the compartment and removed a thick pin that rattled around inside it. He set the drawer to one side, and inserted the pin into an unnoticeable hole in the wooden divider between the drawer and a vertical decorative column next to it.

  The column popped forward, revealing it to be the front end of a thin compartment. Not wide enough for a book, but certainly large enough to hold some folded parchment or other narrow items.

  Wesley waved his hand in the air in dismissal. “Yes, a common trick. Anyone knows about such secret compartments and could find it in an instant.”

  “Is that so?” Put asked. “Perhaps you should watch further.”

  He pulled the compartment out completely. He’d paid attention to detail everywhere in the desk, and had even carved a design in the sides of this compartment that no one but Belle would ever see. Put handed the entire box to Wesley.

  Wesley peered down into the slot and turned it all around, examining not only the carving but Put’s signature along the bottom of it. He shook his head. “I don’t understand. What am I looking for?”

  Put took it back from him. At the back of the narrow compartment, opposite the column, he slid a thin shaft of wood, meant to look like an immovable support piece. It revealed a narrow space running along the entire bottom of the compartment.

  Wesley reached for it again to inspect the opening. He looked up again in admiration. “No one would ever find this twice-secret space,” he said. “And it’s large enough to hide money or jewelry in it, provided you put some wadding in here to prevent it from jangling around. In fact, it’s an ideal place to lodge one’s personal documents, or a diary. Must say I’m impressed, Mr. Boyce.”

  Put nodded in acknowledgment of the younger man’s praise, then took the compartment back from him, slid the wood shaft back down, tucked the secret box back into the desk, pressing until he heard the click that let him know it was securely in place, and replaced the original drawer he’d removed.

  “I believe Miss Stirling will be both pleased and amused by it. May I deliver it to her for you?”

  Wesley handed him a slip of paper containing an address in Cato Street, not too far from the draper shop. “No. These are my new rooms. Please deliver it here.”

  “Not directly to Miss Stirling?”

  “No, no. I, er, I’ve just found these new lodgings and want to surprise Belle. She doesn’t know about them yet. A gift like this will make her more likely to forgive me for securing us a new place without telling her. You know how women can be, fickle and hysterical.”

  There was something strange in what Wesley was planning, beyond the obvious idiocy of trying to assuage his sister’s wrath over a secret move by giving her a gift, but Put couldn’t quite put his finger on it.

  He thought back to Belle’s visit. Hadn’t she said she herself had mucked up her relationship with Wesley? That he was angry with her? If so, why was Wesley now seeking amends?
This pair of siblings was disconnected from one another.

  But Put accepted the rest of Wesley’s payment for the desk, and agreed to bring it by personally in two days.

  Monday, February 21, 1820

  Put maintained his own delivery wagon, but borrowed a horse from a neighboring smithy whenever he needed to make a delivery. In return, Put had built several beds for the smithy’s growing family. Today, Put brought one of his journeymen, Gill, with him to help with moving Wesley’s secretary. He pulled his wagon up to the address in Cato Street.

  Gill voiced Put’s own thoughts. “Are you sure this is right? Looks like stables to me.”

  Gill scratched his head underneath his hat. Like Put, he despised uncomfortable street clothing. What they wore today for hauling the secretary might look unfashionable and lower-class to any member of society, but for a cabinetmaker it was like restraints.

  Put looked down at his paper and back up at the wide set of doors that stretched the span of the brick building. The numbers matched.

  “This is the place,” he told his employee.

  “Let’s deliver it and get back to the shop so we can get out of these fetters, then.”

  Together they put muscle into lifting the two sections of the secretary out of the wagon and placed them in front of the doors. Put knocked, but got no response. He and Gill banged in unison on the door, and were rewarded with a “You’ll wake last year’s dead!” from inside.

  One of the doors swung inwards and Wesley stepped out. “Welcome, Mr. Boyce. Let me show you where to bring the desk.”

  Gill stayed outside with the secretary while Put followed Wesley inside. Gill was right, this was a stable. And, from the smell of it, had not long ago been divested of its residents.