The Matter of the Secret Bride

“. . . she is frank and kind-hearted and has much aquirement, with a thirst for more, which it is pleasing to see.”

Bury, Charlotte, The Diary of a Lady-in-Waiting

“Rosalind, if I am going to continue to act as your private secretary, I’m afraid I must insist on my wages.”

Rosalind had just entered her front parlor to discover Alice on the sofa, wearing her old blue wrapper and threadbare cap. The tea table was filled with tidy stacks of paper. Alice herself—bent double in a way that would have caused her fastidious mother to turn faint—scribbled her eccentric shorthand into a battered notebook. A tray of coffee things had been relegated to the nearby chair.

“What—” began Rosalind.

“We’ll discuss that later.” Alice cut her off. “In the meantime, the notice for your at-home days has been placed with the principal newspapers. It’s Tuesdays and Thursdays, by the way, which gives us a full day to prepare, as tomorrow is Wednesday. Mrs. Napier has two reliable girls she can bring in to help Claire with the ladies’ wraps and serving tea and so forth.”

Rosalind tried again. “Alice—” She got no further this time.

“Adam’s men arrived, and Mortimer has had a good look at them and pronounced them more or less sound, and at least one is able to wear one of his spare coats and meet the carriages.”

“I had hoped—”

“I’ve spoken with Mrs. Singh about the need to have plenty of biscuits and sandwiches on hand, and she has already sent to Twinings for some of that special tea blend you like.”

“But . . . ,” suggested Rosalind.

“Now, as to the correspondence,” Alice went on, “I’ve got that sorted.” She indicated the left-hand pile of letters. “These are the ones you need to answer personally.” She tapped a middle pile. “These I’ve penned a polite reply to, and you’ll just need to sign.” She held up the right-hand stack. “These can safely be ignored for the time being. And those over there . . .” She pointed at a smaller pile, which had been exiled to the embroidered footstool. “Those are the current bills. The letters from people I know that you know personally are on the mantel.”

Rosalind was aware she should have been affronted. To open a person’s correspondence without permission was a near criminal violation of privacy. As it was, the sensation that poured over her was a profound sense of relief. She had been dreading the necessity of plowing through the mountain of correspondence that had arrived that morning. A mountain that had surely grown with the arrival of the afternoon post.

“Oh, and I’ve arranged for George to come first thing tomorrow morning with all the dailies. We can read through them to see if there are any hints about the certificate being noised about . . .”

Alice looked up, and this time she seemed to truly see Rosalind.

“Good Lord, Rosalind. Sit down. You look terrible.”

“I am tired,” Rosalind admitted as she sank into her chair. “And you’ve reminded me of something that I had entirely overlooked.”

“I’ll add it to your account,” said Alice. She then hurried from the parlor and returned with a cup of tea.

“Thank you, Alice.” Rosalind drank thirstily.

“Now, what’s happened?” asked Alice. “Has something gone wrong? What is it you overlooked?”

Rosalind took another swallow of tea. “Ronald Ranking.”

“Ranking?” cried Alice. “He shouldn’t frighten you that much. He can’t really make that much—”

“He saw Mr. Poole going into Mrs. Fitzherbert’s garden,” said Rosalind. “He knows Adam and I are involved with Mrs. Fitzherbert and are asking about Mr. Poole,” said Rosalind. “And by tomorrow, he will know that Mr. Poole has been found murdered.”

“Oh, Lord,” breathed Alice. “Have you warned Mrs. Fitzherbert yet?”

Rosalind shook her head. “I must write to her at once.” She paused. “Is there any chance Mr. Ranking is the sort who could be persuaded to delay publication . . . ?”

“Of the fact that a murdered man was seen at Mrs. Fitzherbert’s? I’m afraid there’s very little chance of that.”

“Is there any way to get a message to him tonight? Perhaps with some inducement?”

Alice glanced at the clock. “With all the extra editions being printed about the queen, there should be someone at the Standard until quite late. And even if there isn’t, I could leave something with the night porter.”

Rosalind smiled weakly. “I really should be paying you wages.”

“What you should be doing right now is eating supper,” said Alice. “Mrs. Singh left a cold collation in the dining room.”

This was quite possibly the best news she’d had all day.

Mrs. Singh had risen to the occasion. There was ham, pigeon pie, bread, and a cake with cream and strawberries, and a wedge of blue-veined cheese to finish.

Rosalind’s stomach made a deeply unladylike noise. She wasted no time in helping herself from the array of dishes, once again blessing Mrs. Levitton and her investments, which made employing Mrs. Singh possible.

She was at least as grateful that Alice seemed to understand that she really did need time to eat and to compose herself. But before long, Rosalind could tell her friend’s patience was being sorely tested.

“Thank you for all your help, Alice,” she said sincerely. “I really have felt at my wits’ end.”

“You? Never,” said Alice, but her eyes sparkled. “Now, tell me what happened today. I am on pins and needles. You discover a man has been murdered and rush out of the house, and here I am left to twiddle my thumbs!”

“You have done everything except twiddle your thumbs,” said Rosalind. “Still. We were fortunate, at least at first. Mrs. Cotes, or her husband, I should say, was able to direct us to Mr. Poole’s family.” Rosalind described Mrs. Poole and her brother. “But both of them denied any knowledge of Mr. Poole’s business matters, and on the whole, they were far less sorry to hear of his death than they might have been.”

Rosalind took a sip of her wine, another addition to her table now that she had grown more prosperous. “There is a grown daughter, as well, Mr. Poole’s from a previous marriage, and two boys, both still in the nursery.” She paused, remembering Letitia’s poise and Mrs. Poole’s anger. “There’s a maid in the house, Judith, who says that Mrs. Poole is, or was, a fortune hunter, but I am not sure that can be entirely correct.”

“What does Adam say?”

“Adam wants to find Poole’s will. He’s returned to the White Swan to see if he can discover anything, and to be there in case someone else tries to burgle the rooms. But . . .”

“But the certificate’s still out there.”

Rosalind nodded. “How are we to find one slip of paper in the whole of London? Has it already been put into the hands of someone who plans to bring it out at the king’s divorce trial? Or print it in the papers? Has it already been destroyed? How would we even know?” She drained her teacup. “And until we can be sure what’s happened to it, Mrs. Fitzherbert and her daughters will remain vulnerable to every story, every lie, every threat.”

“In other words, Ron Ranking,” said Alice. “And all the rest of us.”

“If it was just the newspapers, that would be one thing, but it’s the lords temporal, and their ladies, who will be playing at tug-of-war over this. There’s mobs in the street, and Parliament is at odds with the palace. All of it.” With each word, Rosalind felt her spirits depress a little further.

“Oh, Rosalind, it’s not like you to borrow so much trouble.”

“I know, I know. I . . . Mr. Poole’s death has upset me more than I realized. The fact that someone might have been killed over this scrap of paper . . .” She paused, searching for words, but none came.

“And if Mrs. Fitzherbert organized the disappearance of the certificate?” asked Alice.

“Then there’s yet more reason to worry.” Rosalind sighed. “And that’s not all.”

Rosalind told Alice about Countess Lieven and her indirect invitation.

“Good Lord! On top of everything, we’ve got the rivalries of the lady patronesses to contend with? Perhaps you should take a second glass.” Alice moved the wine a little closer.

Rosalind smiled, but only a little. “If I’m to deal with the machinations of Lady Jersey and the countess, I will need to keep a very clear head.”

“What will you do?”

“Besides pray?” Rosalind pushed the remains of her pigeon pie around on her plate. “Look to Amelia to find out if there was an accomplice inside Mrs. Fitzherbert’s house. Look to Adam to find what ended Mr. Poole’s life.”

“And to yourself?”

“I seem to have some correspondence to attend to,” she said. “And then I believe I may write some letters of my own. After that”—now she did reach for the wine—“I seem to have a great many people who want to talk to me. I suppose I had better hear what they have to say.”

“Well.” Alice drained her glass. “I shall take up your cause. I’ll take a note and an inducement to the Standard tonight and put them in Ron Ranking’s hands, if he’s there.”

“I feel I should not send you alone,” said Rosalind. “The streets—”

“Rosalind,” Alice said, stopping her. “I managed for some years under far worse conditions. I will be fine, and back well before bedtime.”

Alice would not be dissuaded, and in the end, Rosalind had very little choice but to let her go. If they were to have any chance at all of saving Mrs. Fitzherbert from unnecessary scandal, they must stay one step ahead of the Standard and its competitors.

Laurel looked in to see if anything was needed. Rosalind asked her for tea to be taken to her private parlor and that the lamps be lit, as the evening was wearing on. Then she went and gathered up all the correspondence Alice had so thoughtfully sorted through and took it to her work desk.

“I will not despair,” she told herself and the sheafs of paper. “We will find a way through this.”

Adam would take no hurt tonight. Alice would come home in good time, entirely unscathed, with a fresh load of gossip and possibilities. These things would happen because they must. Because if she imagined otherwise, both her body and her mind would become entirely paralyzed from the fear.

It is not like you to borrow so much trouble, Alice had said. She was right, and yet imagined trouble seemed to appear no matter which way Rosalind tried to steer her thoughts.

Why? Rosalind demanded of herself.

But she knew. It was because she was in no way certain she could bring this business to a successful conclusion. Because no matter what happened, the world would take notice, and it might not like what it saw. Because if she failed in any respect, she had so much to lose—security, comfort, reputation.

Love. Rosalind closed her eyes. Love, most of all.

She could picture Adam perfectly as he methodically searched through Poole’s room. She saw him patiently righting furniture and sorting papers. He would pause here and there to take note of something that might be significant. No matter what else he was doing, he would keep his face to the door, keep one part of his mind on watch, because that was his habit.

And as Rosalind thought of him at the White Swan, she could not help but think of him with her—beside her on the street, conversing across the table, lying in her arms. Her heart swelled so painfully, she was sure it must break open.

She loved him. She had never loved so surely and completely, not even as a girl, before her father’s ruin and her mother’s madness. She trusted him to the depths of her soul. He was saving Alice, her best friend. And she desired him with every fiber of her being. Yearned for him like a heroine in an opera.

She had thought that this would be enough. Their relationship—this way in which they were together but not answerable to any convention but their own—was complete as it was, and she needed nothing more.

But some part of her had become greedy.

Every time she sent him away in the dark, so he could be seen coming back at a respectable hour, and every time she met him on the street and could only make her curtsy to him and call him “Mr. Harkness,” she felt false. Every day she resented a little more the work of the pretense she herself had insisted on.

Marriage as a whole held no temptations for her. Marriage to Adam—that was a wholly different matter.

The contradiction was agonizing. Rosalind had lost count of the hours she spent berating herself for her foolishness. It was not her heart holding her back, or her mind—at least not her rational mind. But there was some small terrified part of her that looked out at the possibility of marriage and rooted her to the spot. She could not take those steps toward the altar, toward the vow to love and obey, not even in her imagination. Not even when it was Adam waiting for her.

Marriage meant she ceased to exist. Rosalind Thorne was no more. She could not dismiss a servant, could not hold the lease on her house, could not travel, could not earn, could not hold such money as she had without permission. Anyone who wished to withhold any material thing, to deny her entry to a place, or ignore her least request could do so on the grounds that they must speak with her husband first. All she had built would mean nothing. She would be wiped away.

Adam was not her father. He would not leave her. He would not rob her. She knew that.

But the husband’s right existed. Absolute right to her money, her body, everything. The children she bore would be his children. The money she had so painfully accumulated would be his money. Her body became his body.

In taking him fully to her, she risked losing herself.

It was all this that made the small part inside her scream with fear and at the same time robbed her of the ability to speak. She knew her silence hurt Adam. But the one thing she would not do was make any promise to him until she was certain she could keep it.

Absently, she opened her desk drawer and took out the folded letter she kept there. She had drafted it months ago. She was just waiting until the time was right to show it to Adam.

And if the time is never right? What then?

Slowly, Rosalind became aware of the tears trickling down her cheeks. She blinked and dashed them angrily away. She turned her mind and gaze firmly toward the letters in front of her and set to work.