A Modest Independence

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A Modest Independence Page 38

by Mimi Matthews


  He hadn’t written yet. Not a single letter.

  As for herself, she’d put pen to paper at least a dozen times, but on each occasion, after writing no more than a few sentences, the memory of their last meeting had stopped her.

  Perhaps we should give it some time, he’d said.

  Time for him to recover from the hurt she’d given him.

  Or time for him to forget her and find someone else.

  “I’m finished.” Ahmad’s voice wrenched Jenny from her thoughts.

  Her gaze dropped to his. “Already? That didn’t take long.”

  “It’s only the hem.”

  “And the sleeves and waist and bodice.” She was marked all over with chalk and fairly riddled with pins. “Do you suppose it will be ready in time?”

  “For your visit to the pyramids next week? Yes. For your driving lesson today? No.” He got to his feet. “Mira will work on the skirts this afternoon while I finish the jacket.”

  Jenny clasped Ahmad’s hand for balance as she stepped off of the footstool.

  Moments later, Mira joined Jenny in her bedroom to assist her in removing the needle-ridden garments.

  Mira’s health had improved greatly since they’d settled in Cairo. Jenny had seen that she got enough rest and never pushed herself too hard. It was enough for her to occupy herself with her little sewing projects—trimming out the gowns that Ahmad made or helping to alter the seams and hemlines.

  “It’s much warmer today,” Jenny said as Mira helped her into a day dress. “I wonder if Abdullah wouldn’t prefer to give me my driving lesson earlier?”

  “Shall I go and ask him, madam?”

  “No, indeed. I’ll dash off a note and have one of the boys take it round. Is Karim in the kitchen?” The cook’s young son was forever hovering about begging sweets from his mother.

  “I’ll fetch him.” Mira exited with the habit over her arm, shutting the door behind her.

  Jenny sat down at the little inlaid writing desk in the corner and pulled out a slip of paper. The silver nib she used on her quill was usually kept in the same deep drawer. She reached inside, searching for it amongst the notecards, gum sealing wafers, and half-empty bottles of ink.

  “Drat,” she muttered. Why was it that the thing one was looking for was never where it was supposed to be? She stretched her arm further to the back of the drawer, feeling about with her hand.

  Her fingers closed around a small wooden box.

  And her heart stopped. Indeed, for one aching moment, she couldn’t quite catch her breath.

  She knew what it was. There was no reason to torment herself. No reason to take it out of the drawer and look at it. If she had any sense, she’d leave it alone.

  But she couldn’t leave it alone. Couldn’t prevent herself from drawing out the box, opening the lid, and staring at the diamond engagement ring Tom had given her.

  Her throat closed on a swell of emotion.

  That night in her hotel room at Shepheard’s, he hadn’t proposed marriage. He hadn’t proposed anything. But he’d left the ring when he’d gone. She’d only realized it later when she’d finally finished crying.

  Had it been a mere oversight? Or had he meant something by it?

  Jenny had no idea. All she knew was that a gentleman didn’t give a lady such an item on a whim. He gave it to her because he had feelings for her. And because he hoped that someday she might reciprocate those feelings and consent to be his wife.

  Was that what Tom had intended?

  After six weeks with not a single letter from him, Jenny had cause to doubt it.

  Upon moving into her new house, she’d placed the ring in her writing desk drawer and tried to forget about it. Perhaps she had for a while. And yet, seeing it now, it seemed the most heartless thing to hide it away. As if it were a rejection of Tom and the tender feelings he’d had for her.

  But what else was she to do? She couldn’t wear it. They weren’t engaged. She had no right. And putting it on her finger, even if only for a second to see if it fit, would have far too much meaning.

  Jenny touched the fine gold chain at her throat. Images of her mother’s medallion danced at the edges of her memory, her stomach trembling with the familiar feeling of nausea.

  She wouldn’t forget what it felt like to be powerless. And she’d never lose sight of how important it was to maintain her independence.

  But love was important, too.

  Tom was important.

  She unfastened the clasp of her necklace. It slid from her neck, pooling into her hand in a heap of Venetian gold. Her eyes fixed on it for a moment.

  And then, with surprisingly steady fingers, she threaded Tom’s ring onto the chain.

  When she’d finished, she once again fastened it round her neck. The ring dropped to fall in the hollow of her bosom, a light but significant weight hidden beneath her bodice.

  It was enough for now.

  If there was one thing Jenny disliked about Ahmad and Mira’s sartorial creations, it was the unforgiving nature of their silhouettes. A corset cinched within an inch of its life wasn’t at all conducive to riding sidesaddle on a donkey as one trotted across the Egyptian desert.

  She’d said as much to Ahmad this morning after Mira had helped her into her new riding habit.

  In answer, Ahmad had turned Jenny toward the pier glass in her room. “Look at yourself,” he’d commanded.

  She’d looked. And she’d continued looking for a good long while.

  Jenny slowed her donkey to a walk, squinting her eyes against the blazing sun. She didn’t think herself a vain woman, but when wearing the riding costume Ahmad designed for her, she wasn’t far from believing herself the most fashionable—and beautiful—woman in existence.

  “Nearly two months in Egypt and you haven’t seen the pyramids?” Mrs. Clancy brought her donkey alongside Jenny’s. “I can’t understand it.”

  Jenny smiled. Mrs. Clancy was one of her closest friends in Cairo. A half-Egyptian lady married to a retired British soldier, she lived in the house next door and from the first had taken Jenny under her wing. “I’ve seen them, of course,” Jenny said. The pyramids were visible from several places in the city. “But I haven’t visited them.”

  “Why ever not?”

  “There’s been no time.”

  “You spend too many hours at that school.”

  Jenny shrugged a shoulder. “I enjoy the company of the children.”

  “If you fancy children, you must have some of your own.” Mrs. Clancy’s donkey pranced beneath her. “But first we must find you a husband.”

  Jenny’s smile faded. All her married women friends in Cairo were keen to play matchmaker. “No, thank you. I’m quite content on my own.”

  “Hmm.” Mrs. Clancy didn’t look convinced.

  Ahead, Mr. Clancy waved his arm back and forth to get their attention. The guide they’d hired for the day to take them to Giza rode along at his side. The remaining servants trailed behind Jenny and Mrs. Clancy.

  The pyramids were only ten miles from Cairo. To reach them, they and their donkeys had had to cross the Nile by ferryboat—a journey of half an hour. Six miles more, trotting through small villages and across several ploughed fields, brought them to the desert. There, a horde of Bedouins accosted them, offering their services as guides and attendants.

  Their own guide hired several of them to accompany them the remaining two miles to the pyramids.

  “Shall we gallop?” Mrs. Clancy didn’t wait for Jenny’s answer before urging her donkey forward.

  Jenny gave her own donkey its head. The rotund little fellow stretched out his neck, his hooves pounding over the sand.

  Their party finally stopped in the shadow of the Sphinx. Jenny saw it up close for the first time, looming ahead, more magnificent than anything she’d ever beheld. A
servant appeared at her side to assist her down from her donkey. She stood on the sand, gazing upward in awe at the enormous limestone statue, as the Clancys, their servants, and the hired Bedouins milled about her.

  After a long moment, she fumbled for her reticule, withdrawing her battered Bradshaw’s. She flipped through the dog-eared pages. Marseilles, Malta, Alexandria, and Suez. Calcutta, Allahabad, Delhi, and Jhansi. And in the back, the page folded carefully, the section on Darjeeling. Everywhere she’d visited with Tom on her grand adventure. Each city marked with little notes made in smudged ink.

  Elephant, she’d written on the Allahabad page. And on the page about Darjeeling: the hill of mist and fog.

  Jenny numbly turned to the section on the pyramids of Giza, her eyes drifting over the paragraph on the Sphinx, but her heart was no longer in it.

  Perhaps this was why she hadn’t been able to bring herself to visit any monuments since her arrival in Cairo. She’d stayed within the bounds of the city, her activities far more domestic than adventurous.

  Because what were adventures without Tom?

  Jenny wasn’t immune from the wonder that lay before her. The Sphinx was beautiful and majestic. The pyramids were breathtaking. But she had no one special to share them with. No one who belonged only to her and to whom she belonged in return.

  She was alone.

  It was what she’d always wanted. To be free and independent, accountable to no one but herself. And she was all of those things now, as much as any woman. Free to go where she wanted and do what she wanted. Free to live in the manner of her own choosing.

  But Tom wasn’t here. He was gone, possibly forever.

  And she loved him.

  She loved him.

  North Devon, England

  August, 1860

  Greyfriar’s Abbey had a strip of private beach below the cliffs, only accessible by a steep—and rather treacherous—footpath. . During his brief stay, Tom had taken to walking there alone. Well, not entirely alone. Justin’s dogs, Paul and Jonesy, usually insisted on accompanying him. Their intermittent barks were the only sound outside the roar of the wind and the sea and the screech of circling seagulls.

  A lead on Alex Archer had brought Tom back to Devon three days ago. He had anticipated learning something new. Instead, he’d found himself right back where he started.

  Finding his former friend was proving to be more difficult than Tom had imagined. Wherever Alex had gone after he broke his apprenticeship, he’d somehow managed to cover his tracks with extraordinary efficiency. He’d simply vanished, leaving behind no trace of himself at all. As if he’d never existed in the first place.

  For all Tom had been able to discover, he might as well not have.

  There were no orphanage records any longer. No one alive outside of Justin, Neville, and Boothroyd who seemed to remember him.

  Even Tom, with his better-than-average memory, wasn’t certain whether he could accurately recall what Alex looked like anymore. He’d been tall, like Justin, with raven-black hair. As for his face…would Tom recognize it if he ever saw it again?

  He thrust his hands into the pockets of his trousers as he strolled farther down the beach. The wind off of the sea rustled his hair. He was in his shirtsleeves, his black cravat loosened at his neck. Ahead of him, Paul and Jonesy frolicked in the sand, running and jumping at each other as they tussled over a large stick.

  The cliffs of Abbot’s Holcombe loomed in the distance. As a boy, this had been the extent of his world. From the orphanage and down the coast to Greyfriar’s Abbey. He’d wanted nothing more than to have control of that world. To be safe from the whims of fate and the cruelties of men.

  His world was bigger now. It stretched across London. Across England. Wherever he went within its boundaries, he could navigate with confidence and authority. It was a variety of power, he supposed, to have such control over one’s surroundings.

  It was something he hadn’t had when he’d been traveling with Jenny.

  Had keeping that control meant more to him than she had?

  You don’t have to go away tomorrow, she’d said. You could stay here a little while longer.

  But he hadn’t stayed. He’d left her there.

  Tom rubbed the back of his neck, muttering an oath at his own stupidity.

  She was safe, at least. He still had charge of her accounts. And Ahmad sent the occasional wire. According to him, Jenny was settled and happy. She wasn’t in any danger. And she certainly wasn’t fading away of unrequited love.

  Tom wished he could say the same for himself.

  Ahead of him, Jonesy sprang to attention. He dropped his stick, raising his great black head to look up at the cliffs beneath the Abbey. And then he gave an enormous baying bark, the likes of which would have done a bloodhound proud. Paul soon joined in the cacophony, the pair of them charging across the beach.

  Tom turned to look after them, his face to the sun.

  Justin and Lady Helena were gone for the day. Tom hadn’t expected them back until dinner.

  But it wasn’t Justin or Lady Helena. It was someone else. A lady, making her way down the cliff path, her voluminous skirts clutched in her hands.

  It was Jenny.

  Tom’s mouth went dry. For the barest instant, he lost the capability of rational thought. He could only stand there, frozen, as if he’d seen a ghost.

  The next thing he knew, he was moving toward her, crossing the distance between them in long, purposeful strides.

  She hopped down from the cliff path, brushing off her black jacket bodice and giving her skirts a shake. She looked poised and elegant, her skin golden from the sun. “Good morning.”

  Tom came to a stop in front of her. The beat of his heart was an agony. He couldn’t think for how hard it was pounding. “Good morning.”

  A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth as she gazed up at him. “You look very well.”

  He stared down at her. Her thick hair had half-fallen from its pins. Curling tendrils framed her face in a wild auburn tangle.

  She was more beautiful than in his memory. More beautiful even than that blasted pencil sketch of her he’d spent so many hours gazing at. Indeed, as she stood before him, she didn’t seem quite real. He half expected to feel Neville nudge at his shoulder and tell him to wake up.

  But this wasn’t a dream.

  A dream couldn’t have done Jenny justice. Couldn’t have created a vision so warm and vibrant and breathtakingly real.

  “What are you doing here?” he asked.

  “I’ve come home,” she said simply.

  His breath stopped. “Have you?”

  “For a while. I only arrived in London yesterday. I’d intended to visit you at your office, but Mrs. Jarrow said you were here. She said you had personal business to attend to.”

  “Ah.” Tom belatedly ran a hand over his rumpled hair. He wished he were better prepared to see her. That he’d had time to shave and put on a fresh suit. Not that Jenny seemed to notice. She was looking up at his face, her eyes fixed on his. “I’ve been searching for Alex Archer,” he said. “I told Thornhill and Cross the truth about him. They’ve asked me to try and find him.”

  Her mouth curved. “That’s wonderful. Have you had any luck?”

  “I thought I might have, but it was another dead end. I’d planned to return to London tomorrow.”

  “Then I’m glad I came today. I wouldn’t like to have missed you again.”

  The wind gusted down the beach, rippling through the sand and stirring the hem of her dark green skirts. Paul and Jonesy trotted off to resume their battle over the stick.

  “Where are Helena and Mr. Thornhill?” she asked. “I went up to the Abbey, but Mr. Cross said they’d gone.”

  “They drove into Abbott’s Holcombe with Giles.”

  Her brows lifted. “Giles is still here
?”

  “For the moment. He leaves for London at the end of the month. He’d have already gone, but Lady Helena didn’t think he was ready to face the full force of society yet, let alone resume his seat in the Lords.”

  “Is he going to resume his seat?”

  “I doubt it. He’s still keen on returning to India. He’ll likely sail back after the monsoons, sometime in November, I expect.”

  “I thought he might.”

  “What about you?” Tom asked. “Have you brought Ahmad and Mira along?”

  “I left them in Half Moon Street. They needn’t escort me everywhere now I’m in England. Not at my age.”

  The reference to her aged condition almost made Tom smile. But he didn’t feel very much like smiling. His heart was slowly forming into a lead weight in his chest. He hadn’t seen her since May. Hadn’t kissed her or held her in his arms in months. And here they were, together at last, and talking as politely and civilly as if they were two well-bred strangers.

  He’d threatened her with just such a fate on the train to Cairo.

  If we ever meet again someday in London or Devon, it shall be as common and indifferent acquaintances.

  A petulant thing to have said. Ridiculous, too, because in reality it was impossible to be indifferent to her. Worse than impossible. Indeed, he didn’t think he could bear it, being near her and having to pretend that she didn’t matter to him.

  “Jenny, I—” He broke off. “May I still call you Jenny?”

  Her brows knit. “Of course you may. Why shouldn’t you?”

  “It’s been a long while. I didn’t like to presume.”

  “Nearly three months.” She folded her arms at her waist and began to walk toward the shoreline. The waves lapped against the sand, covering it in a froth of seafoam. “You never wrote to me.”

  Tom kept pace at her side. She was close enough that her skirts brushed his legs. Close enough that he could smell the faint fragrance of her perfume. Her warm, feminine presence provoked a storm of emotion within him. “No, I didn’t.” He paused before admitting, “I wanted to. Rather badly.”

 

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