When Harrison opened the door Aurora walked past him before he could object. “Mr Joe arranged for me to collect some books when we return from Spring Gardens this evening,” she said, opening the library door. “I wish to inspect them.”
“Very well, Miss,” said Harrison with a bow. “I will inform him and Miss Celia that you are here.”
Aurora could already hear Celia’s excited voice from the landing. She crossed the library to the cabinet; the key was where she had left it. Faint with relief, she removed it with shaking fingers and put it into the deep pocket in the seam of her dress. Then, labouring to draw sufficient breath, she seized the pile of books that lay on the table and opened the first one.
“Aurora!” trilled Celia, entering in a rustle of silk and holding out her hands. “How fine you look!”
“Thank you,” replied Aurora. Her breathing had almost returned to normal. She put down the books and smiled amiably. “But not as fine as you.”
Celia was wearing a gown embroidered in shimmering shades of brown and silver. From her corseted bosom to her trailing hem, from the lace on her sleeves to the silver adornments on her shoes, she sparkled with wealth and newness. “Oh, nonsense! Your hair is beautiful. And is that a new hat?”
Aurora had spent a long time attending to her hair, cursing the cramped quarters and lack of a dressing-table, and wishing Hester were there to help her. But the result had brought the unsmiling remark from Edward that the style was surprisingly flattering, considering it was also fashionable.
“If Joe is not in love with you already, he will be before this evening is over!” smirked Celia. “Your beauty will attract the attention of all who pass by!”
Aurora fervently hoped not. She might never have set foot in Spring Gardens before, the admission price being too high for Mrs Eversedge’s means, but any one of her parents’ acquaintance could be amongst its visitors this evening. If she should see someone she recognized, she would have to rely on the unexpectedness of the company she was in, the stylishness of her coiffure and the wide brim of her hat to persuade them that she was not Catherine Eversedge’s eldest girl after all, but merely a young woman who bore some resemblance to her.
She turned as the door opened and Joe came in, smiling and wishing her good evening. In place of his usual worsted coat he wore a dark suit edged with gold. From its wide sleeves hung ruffles adorned with lace, and his waistcoat was embroidered as luxuriantly as any Aurora and her sisters had observed on titled gentlemen in St James’s Park. The suit, like Celia’s gown, looked newly delivered from the tailor.
“I trust you are recovered?” he asked. As he made a small bow, his admiring eyes remained on Aurora’s face. She had to struggle to control her feelings; she was flattered, because she was made of human flesh and could not help it. But blushing like a maidservant would not do.
“Quite recovered, I thank you, sir,” she told him. “And I thank you also for looking out these books for my brother. I will take them home later, when I have explored every part of Spring Gardens.”
He gave a short laugh, holding out his arm. “You may begin to explore the Gardens tonight, Aurora, but several more visits will be necessary before you can say you have explored every part. The area is perhaps larger than you are aware.”
“Perhaps,” agreed Aurora, taking his arm. “But I would still like to see it all.”
“Then I look forward to many more visits there in your company,” said Joe politely, with another slight bow.
Aurora did not speak; her neck and cheeks felt hot.
“Joe has been there many times.” Celia threw Aurora a knowing look as she took her brother’s other arm. “He knows there are alleys so well hidden a man and a woman may very easily separate themselves from their companions!”
The Thames lay, silvered by the evening sun, between the landing stage where the carriage deposited them and Spring Gardens. Aurora had been up and down the river on boats before; it was a swift means of London travel, especially in winter when mud or flood made some streets impassable. But she had never been on a boat like the one that ferried her and her fellow pleasure-seekers to the gates of the Gardens.
Many of the passengers seemed the worse for drink, and those who were not might as well have been, from the high state of their excitement. There was much flirtatious behaviour; Aurora’s face was examined by so many strange men she pretended to object to the river breeze, and put up her fan. Celia seemed not to mind who looked at her own countenance. Neither did Joe seem averse to ogling the elegant young women clustered on the benches, or standing in the prow holding their hats on and laughing.
This wealthy society into which she had blundered, Aurora thought ruefully, had lessons for her. Like the Theatre Royal, another place of entertainment to which the admission price was set to exclude the lower orders, Spring Gardens lent itself to vanity, intoxication and a loosening of propriety. If she were to pretend to be, or even one day actually become, a member of this society, she must revise her own conduct.
Joe was in high spirits. “Supper begins at nine o’clock,” he told Aurora as they showed their tickets and entered the gates. “Before we sit down to sup, there will be music. Perhaps even a singer. I confess I do like a singer, especially a lady, do you not?”
Aurora did not reply. She was barely conscious that he had spoken. How she wished that Flora and Eleanora could see this! It was scarcely believable that London streets and the river Thames were only yards from where she stood. It was as if she had entered fairyland.
Before her stretched a long walkway edged with trees hung with lanterns. To the left and right spread alleys between banks of foliage – secret, overarching and utterly charming. There was a place for an orchestra and pavilions where food and drink could be purchased. Beneath an awning, tables were laid out for the grand supper. Everything sparkled – the evening sunlight between the branches, the lights, the decorations, the finery of the ladies and gentlemen. Everywhere Aurora looked there were people strolling, laughing, chattering, meeting old acquaintances and being introduced to new ones. There was much curtseying, fluttering of fans and tossing of heads amongst the young ladies, and much bowing, strutting and banter amongst the young men. To Aurora it seemed like a dance performed by hundreds of lavishly dressed dancers, moving to an accompaniment of orchestral music, and washed by waves of many other sounds.
“Astonishing!” she breathed. “I had no idea!”
“Spring Gardens are the envy of the world,” Celia told her importantly.
“Of course.” They had begun to make their way along the main walkway. It was slow-going, such were the crowds, but Aurora did not mind. “I do not think I have ever seen a more charming place!”
“And here is a charming person,” said Joe drily. “Someone you know, Aurora.”
Approaching them, waving her fan and showing all her teeth, was Mrs Fellowes. “My dears! And Miss Drayton too! What luck!”
Joe bowed and waited while Aurora and his sister curtseyed to the older woman. Then, smiling, he asked, “You are without Mr Fellowes this evening, madam?”
“I am,” sighed Mrs Fellowes. “He says he is tired of the Gardens. But I will never tire of them, and I told him as much. ‘Go alone, then,’ said he, so I took him at his word. Though I have my friend Mrs Partridge with me.” She scanned the crowd. “She is probably getting us some refreshment. She will not wait until nine o’clock, I fear.”
“Then I am of Mrs Partridge’s mind exactly,” said Joe gallantly, turning to Aurora. “Will you join me in seeking some refreshment?”
Aurora accepted, aware at the corner of her vision that Mrs Fellowes and Celia were exchanging meaningful glances.
“Let us step this way,” said Joe, offering his arm.
“What about you, Celia? ” asked Aurora.
Celia smiled archly. “I shall go with Mrs Fellowes to find Mrs Partridge, who is always full of interesting stories. We shall all meet again for supper. Fare you well.”
Joe bought two glasses of wine. With one in each hand, he led Aurora along a twisting path, screened from all the others, where they came upon a large tree with a wooden bench set around it. The bench was already partly occupied, for here was an opportunity for girls and their admirers to escape their chaperones.
Aurora sat down and took a sip of wine. “Delicious!”
“It should be, considering what I was charged for it.” Smiling amiably, Joe flipped the back of his coat as he sat. Aurora was reminded of how Edward had done the same with the coat of his green suit when he had sat down in her mother’s parlour on that momentous day. Rich men – even Joe, who usually dressed so plainly – did not like to crease their fine clothes any more than rich women did. Aurora’s heart quailed at the thought that she had already failed to conduct herself like a rich woman; she was sitting on her new, expensive, neatly ironed ribbons.
“I suppose the patrons of Spring Gardens must pay what is asked, once they have entered,” she observed. “The prices are no doubt agreed amongst the traders.”
Joe raised his glass. “So you are a businesswoman now, as well as everything else, are you?”
Aurora’s heart gave a thud. She tapped her fan gently against her chin, pretending to ponder modestly upon his words. “Everything else? Whatever can you mean?”
Amusement gleamed in his eyes. Blue eyes, but a greyer blue than Aurora’s own, which her father used to say were the colour of God’s own canopy. “You are clever,” he began, “and fair of face and figure, and” – he sipped his wine – “you are a good sister to your brother, as well as a most excellent companion to Celia.” He became more serious. “Indeed, I have become concerned that my sister is demanding your company too much. Does your brother not wish you to be more often at home?”
“Not at all.” Aurora’s heartbeat had subdued itself, but she nevertheless opened her fan and put it up. If Joe could see her whole face, he might discern the falsehoods to come. “My brother spends many hours writing and reading, during which I can be of no use to him. Thanks to your generosity, he has a plentiful supply of books, and as he cannot walk far, he is as happy as is possible on his couch. And the servant is there to tend to his needs.”
Joe nodded. “But does he not wish for conversation with you? One cannot talk to a servant.”
“Oh, we converse a great deal,” Aurora assured him. “I am usually at home in the evenings. Tonight is an exception.”
“And the night we met you at Drury Lane? Was that an exception too?”
Aurora fanned herself vigorously. She knew she must provide a plausible explanation for her apparent neglect of a dying man. “Joe,” she said, putting down the fan and regarding him as seriously as he was regarding her, “as I have confessed, my brother is in hiding from creditors. He cannot make his whereabouts public. Neither can he go out, though he is too ill to do so, anyway. For myself, I cannot do the first thing, but I can do the second, and I have his blessing to do so. He knows I crave the company of others, and being so lately arrived in London, our friends are far away.”
Joe nodded. He seemed satisfied. “Where, exactly, are your friends?”
“In the West Country,” invented Aurora. “Not far from Bath.” It was the first place she thought of. Her mother had recently begun to voice her wish to visit the city of Bath, where she hoped the spa water might relieve her swollen seamstress’s finger joints.
“I know your parents are both deceased, but do you have other relatives?” enquired Joe.
“No,” said Aurora quickly. “My father was considerably older than my mother, and the last of his family living. My mother’s parents have also passed on, and although she had a sister, we have never had anything to do with her. I do not believe my aunt ever married. I do not even know if she lives still.”
She was pleased with this fabrication, which had come to her instantly. At a stroke, grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins had been obliterated.
Joe pondered her answers. “Then soon, you will be utterly alone in the world.”
“That is so.”
“What will you do, when your brother … when you are finally alone?” he asked.
“I have not decided,” seemed the safest reply. “I may go back to Bath.”
“And face your brother’s creditors?”
She shrugged. “I must bear whatever comes to me, I suppose.”
“The Lord will provide,” agreed Joe. He shifted on the bench a little. His expression had become earnest. “Speaking of the Lord … my sister tells me you have been brought up in the Protestant faith.”
Aurora could guess why he was questioning her so carefully. From Miss Drayton’s point of view, marriage to Joe Deede would be far, far preferable to being left to make her own way in the world. Because she had no family to object, she could take the irrevocable step of converting to Catholicism in order to become his wife, as his father had done in order to marry Joe’s mother.
Aurora began to despise herself for continuing this charade. To mislead a man in such an important matter as love and marriage, to lie before God like the worst sinner ever consigned to damnation, was despicable. She wished she really were lonely Miss Drayton, who cared so little for her religion that she might be persuaded to abandon it for a rich husband. As it was, she found herself wilfully deceiving a man innocent of everything but falling in love with her.
“Yes, sir, that is true,” she told him. “But I have never been very strict in my religion. My brother is more so.”
He caught the sorrow in her voice, though he could not know its real cause. “Does speaking of such things cause you pain?”
“Forgive me, sir,” she said, bowing her head. “I am merely distressed by the thought that before I can make any plans about where to go or anything else, my dear brother must be buried, and in a Protestant churchyard.”
He nodded towards her wine glass, which she had set beside her on the bench. “Then drink, and let us walk a little while, before we meet the others for supper. The exercise will give us an appetite.”
Aurora was relieved to end the conversation. When she had finished her wine she took Joe’s arm and they set off along a different alley from the one they had taken before. It emerged into the main concourse, where the crowd had increased. “How will all these people be fed?” asked Aurora in wonder.
“It is managed somehow,” Joe assured her. “And you must understand that not every visitor will have the means to purchase a supper ticket.”
“Oh! I hope this entertainment is not proving very expensive for you!”
“Not at all. It is a very great pleasure to provide you with an enjoyable evening,” he said stiffly.
Aurora was again assailed by guilt. She squeezed his arm. “You are a good man, Joe Deede,” she said warmly. “You are altogether a better person than Aurora Drayton!”
He began to respond with a pleasantry. But suddenly he stopped, transfixed by something ahead. Aurora found her hand clasped more tightly to his side. “Good God!” he exclaimed in an outraged whisper. “The effrontery of that man!”
Aurora followed his gaze. Her heart jumped so violently she had to put her hand on her breast. Not three yards away, walking towards them with the rest of the throng, were Edward and Richard. They appeared as they had when she had first seen them in St James’s Park: two young gentlemen, finely dressed, extravagantly bewigged, wearing their swords with a confident air.
Her cheeks had instantly reddened, and she put up her fan. She must not betray she had ever seen either of these men before. Her brain raced as she tried to piece together the events of the evening. Edward had left their lodgings while she was still dressing, reminding her he was going to meet Richard at Will’s Coffee House. He had not been wearing this finery then, so he must have returned to change after she had gone to Mill Street. What mischief was he up to?
“I know not who the taller man is,” said Joe, “but the shorter one is the son of my father’s greatest enemy, now deceased, I am glad to say. The son is as great a villain as his father was, and as great an enemy of our family.”
Aurora tried to recover her wits, and remember to be Miss Drayton. “But, Joe,” she said as mildly as she could, “we are in a public place. It must be merely by chance that your path has crossed this man’s tonight.”
“That is so. You are quite right.” He patted her hand again. His voice was calmer, but his chest rose and fell rapidly. The sight of Edward had greatly unsettled him. “We shall ignore them.”
But as Aurora might have predicted, Edward was not of the same mind. He approached boldly and removed his hat. “Mr Deede, indeed!” he cried, with an exaggerated bow. Richard, grinning, bowed equally low. Aurora could not fathom this nonsense.
“Good evening, Mr Francis.” Joe did not bow, but regarded both gentlemen with suspicion.
“Allow me to introduce my friend, Mr Augustus Hoggart,” said Edward, indicating Richard. “Augustus, this is Mr Josiah Deede, of Mill Street, Mayfair.”
“Odd!” exclaimed Richard foppishly, his fingers cupping his chin. “I would have thought Mr Josiah Deede, the esteemed attorney, to be rather older.”
“This is the esteemed attorney’s son,” Edward told him. His eyes then travelled back to Joe, who was still regarding him and Richard coldly. “Mr Deede, may Augustus and I have the pleasure of being introduced to your fair companion?”
Joe gave an impatient sigh. He could not, for courtesy’s sake, refuse. “Gentlemen, this is Miss Aurora Drayton, of Covent Garden.” His grip on Aurora’s arm did not relent. “Miss Drayton and I are on our way to meet the rest of our party for supper, and must take our leave. Fare you well. Come, Aurora.”
Before she had time to make a curtsey, Joe tried to pull her away. But at that moment Mrs Fellowes and Mrs Partridge appeared. Pushing herself eagerly between their shoulders was Celia, whose face, already pink from excitement and the heat of the evening, turned pinker when she saw the two strangers. “Oh, Joe!” she cried. “You have met someone you know! Do introduce us!”
Again, courtesy would not allow Joe to refuse. “My sister, Miss Celia Deede, and our friends Mrs Fellowes and Mrs Partridge,” he announced, without looking at the two men. “Ladies, this gentleman is Mr Hoggart, and this is Mr Francis.”
Celia’s expression changed. “Mr Edward Francis?”
“The very same,” replied Joe bitterly. “I would have walked past him if he had not insisted otherwise. But come, Celia, we must to supper. My dear Mrs Fellowes, Mrs Partridge, will you join us?”
This time he succeeded in moving the party of ladies on. Edward and Richard glanced at each other and began to walk towards the supper tables too. Joe ignored them, but Celia could not contain her delight at falling into the company of the famous Edward Francis, whom her father and brother had spoken of with such contempt, and whose fortune had landed so spectacularly in her own lap.
“What are you doing here, Mr Francis?” she asked him pertly. “I am surprised you can afford the price of admission! Or did your friend pay for you?”
“Celia!” admonished Joe. “Do not debase yourself in speaking so.” He turned to the two older ladies with apology. “Mr Francis’s family has long been at enmity with ours, and Celia has not encountered him before. Though I have.” He looked sidelong at Edward. “However, I confess myself bewildered as to why he has decided to adhere to our party.”
“I am grieved to hear that,” said Edward. “I would have thought my motive would be obvious. You are in the company of four charming ladies, and Augustus and I are in the company of none. Will you not share them with us for a little while?”
Mrs Fellowes succumbed immediately to this flattery. “Why, Mr Francis, I believe you are flirting with us!” she trilled. “But you would be far better to flirt with Celia and Aurora, you know – Mrs Partridge and I are spoken for!”
“Quite so, madam,” agreed Edward, bowing. He took a step nearer Aurora. “Miss Drayton, you must be at a loss to understand the cause of Miss Deede’s animosity. I confess I am too. Now that I have seen her for the first time, I consider her a very pretty, amiable young lady. As, no doubt, her brother considers you.”
“Enough, sir!” Joe could no longer keep his countenance. “I insist that you remove yourself from our company. We have not invited you to join us for supper—”
“More’s the pity!” put in Richard. “I like nothing better than supping in the company of ladies!”
“And we will not invite you,” continued Joe with contempt. “You, sir,” he said to Richard, “are as conceited a puppy as your companion. I will not allow either of you to make free with my sister, Miss Drayton or our friends. I bid you both farewell.”
Compressing his lips, he strode on, followed by Celia and the others. But Aurora had freed her hand from Joe’s grasp. She fell into step with Edward and Richard, a few yards behind the others, avoiding Joe’s sight by mingling with the increasingly dense crowd. “Are you completely deranged?” she hissed at Edward.
“No, I am merely bored with Samuel Marshall’s company.”
She could not show her anger in her face in such a public place, but she thrust it into her voice. “You came to spy on me, did you not? You do not trust me. Admit it!”
“We came to protect you,” said Edward calmly. “My distrust of Joe Deede grows daily. I am afraid I cannot find him as innocent as you profess him to be.”
Aurora’s indignation did not abate. “Your arrogance…” She stopped, and glanced coldly at Richard. “The arrogance of you both is breathtaking. Will you risk destroying everything I have tried to do, in order to spy on your own spy?”
Edward drew breath, but she was too incensed to let him speak.
“Why involve Richard?” she asked. “Oh, I know why! You thought two pairs of eyes would be better than one, did you not, in case you missed a coquettish glance, or some lover’s sign I might have given Joe Deede?”
Edward’s eyes glittered, but he kept his countenance. Taking her elbow, he drew her into an alley so rich with blossom they were immediately invisible to passers-by. “It was necessary to bring Richard, whom Joe Deede has never seen and whose identity he does not know,” he told her firmly. “Being in the company of a droll young fellow, a part I think you will agree Richard plays very well, made my running into your party more plausible than if I had appeared alone.”
“But why did you have to appear at all?” demanded Aurora.
“I had to satisfy myself that my suspicions of Joe Deede are well founded. My appearance clearly disturbed him, did you not see? He is no more at peace with his father’s sudden inheritance than I am, though he pretends otherwise. He is as suspicious of me as I am of him. I will wager he knows about the key. He may well know about the letter too. He is waiting to act. You are in danger of discovery, and more.”
Aurora barely listened. “Edward, hear this,” she commanded coldly: “I refuse to continue in this enterprise if you will not trust me to accomplish my task alone. You said I have the attributes of a good spy, did you not? So I would thank you to allow me to discharge my duties. Now, Joe will be seeking me. I must return to my party.”
He did not release his grip on her elbow. Aurora turned to see Richard guarding the entrance to the alley. She turned back to Edward. “I insist, sir, that you let me be!”
She watched the purposefulness of his expression disappear, and resignation take its place. “Very well,” he said, letting go of her arm. As he contemplated her his eyes filled with a soft light. “But do me the honour of remembering, in your dealings with the Deede family, that it is I – not Joe Deede – who loves you truly. If disaster should befall you, my remorse would last past death.”
Aurora gave him a final indignant look, then brushed past Richard and stepped out of the alley. Joe was scanning the crowd with a pained, restless expression. “I am here, Joe,” she reassured him. “I was detained by people getting in my way.”
“Did those two men speak to you again?”
“Of course not,” soothed Aurora. “They are gone. Let us enjoy our supper in peace.”