London, September, 1846
As midnight approached, the thick, yellowish fog had spread throughout the city. It was now no longer possible to see more than a few feet in any direction, and the glow of the hissing gas lamps at the occasional street corner made no inroads against the almost impenetrable shroud of mist. It was no longer safe for pedestrian or carriage to be abroad on such a night. Yet there were a few of each still groping their ways to various destinations.
One of these was seventeen-year-old Fanny Hastings. The pretty red-head clutched her gray cloak about her and made her way along the winding, cobblestoned street in which she found herself. Since reaching Central London from Brenmoor an hour or so earlier, she had wandered about aimlessly. She had literally fled from Brenmoor Castle where she had been a maid in the employ of the Marquis of Brenmoor. As she clung to the small valise which contained all her worldly belongings she tried without success to chart a path for her future.
Now the result of her impetuous action was all too apparent. She was alone and friendless in the great city of London, which she’d only heard told about in grim tales by Marsden, the butler at the Marquis of Brenmoor’s. And that worthy gentleman had not painted a warm picture of the teeming metropolis.
“London is a sinful city without a heart,” the tall, dignified Marsden had warned her. “Best to avoid it altogether and be on the safe side!”
Marsden had been her superior in the busy household of the Marquis to which she’d gone on the death of her mother. Because her mother’s cousin, Lily, had long been the cook in the grand mansion, it was there Fanny had gone when her mother’s death had left her completely alone in the small country village where her widowed parent had toiled as housekeeper for the elderly scholar, Timothy Creighton.
Fanny, young as she was, might have carried on in her mother’s footsteps as housekeeper for the fine old gentleman had not the same fever which carried her mother off also killed the old man in the early part of December. His tight-fisted nephew came to sell the house and settle the estate, and Fanny was given a few shillings and a stagecoach ticket to Brenmoor Castle on the outskirts of London.
Lily Kendall, a stout, kindly woman in her middle years, had taken her first startled glance at Fanny and exclaimed, “You must be Mary’s child! You’re the very image of her!”
Tears in her eyes, she’d admitted, “I am, dear cousin. I have come to you because I had nowhere else to go!”
The matronly spinster had taken her warmly in her arms and said, “And why should you turn to anyone else when Lily Kendall is alive and well! Don’t you worry no more, the Marquis will give you a position!”
And so he had. Fanny, after a warm dinner and a good night’s rest on a cot in a small attic room, had found herself nervously presenting herself to the Marquis the next morning with Lily standing in the background to give her any needed support.
Her Aunt Lily had warned her that the Marquis was often of uncertain disposition in the mornings. He was also a widower and a veteran of the French campaigns under Wellington. He had married shortly after his soldiering and his titled, frail wife had given him three sturdy sons.
The Marquis had not married again and was hardly likely to now that his three sons were full grown with the eldest twenty-four and the youngest twenty-two. His adoring wife had dutifully borne him an heir each year until her own health, sadly deteriorated, had doomed her to a few months of illness and then death. The Marquis had never recovered from the blow, and along with it he suffered from a leg wound received at Waterloo which had forever ended his riding days, causing him to use a cane and walk with a decided limp.
On that first morning he had sat at the desk in his study like the grim martinet he was. His hair was gray and thinning and he had the kind of strong, lined face with a prominent nose which somehow made the nervous Fanny think of an eagle.
The heavy gray eyebrows met in a frown and the Marquis commented, “You speak very well, girl. Not at all like one of the lower classes. Where did you get your education?”
“I was most fortunate, sir,” she said. “My mother took care of a scholar and I lived in the house. As part of her wages he gave me lessons in any number of things.”
“Consider yourself a lucky girl,” the Marquis said in his odd, hoarse voice, a result of chronic bronchial trouble. “Do not lose your fine way of speaking. It may serve you well in life.”
“Yes, sir,” she said quietly, looking down.
“And you are an orphan you say,” the Marquis went on. “May I ask what happened to your late father?”
Fanny looked directly at him now, her large green eyes wide. “My father was a strolling player, sir, a man of great talent. Many years ago he left my mother to search for employment in the theatre at Bristol. He never did come back. The letters my mother sent to him were returned so we presumed he had died.”
The Marquis scowled and moved his cane a little. “I should say the fellow deserted her! That you and your mother were abandoned by this scoundrel of an actor!”
She protested hotly, “We have never thought of it that way. My mother always said he was a kind man with fine manners and speech. That is why I have wished to learn to speak well. I would like to be an actress one day!”
There was a shocked silence in the study as the Marquis glared at her in astonishment. Then her stout cousin Lily had bobbed forth to curtsy to her employer and say, “You must forgive the girl, sir. She is from the country and does not know what the life of an actress means. Her ambitions are moral even if her goal isn’t! And she shouldn’t be blamed for loving the memory of her father, sir. That surely isn’t a bad quality!”
“Filial devotion!” the Marquis said. “I find no fault in that, Lily. But the pitfalls of a life in the theatre should be explained to the girl.”
“I shall do it, sir, never fear!” Lily promised. “If you will be so kind as to take her on as a scullery maid I’ll give her a proper training!”
“Very well, Lily,” the Marquis said. “Fanny shall be our new scullery maid.” And turning to her he had added severely, “Mind you pay attention to all your cousin tells you and forget that stage business! It could lead to your ruin!”
“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir,” she’d bobbed her gratitude.
“We shall do our best to offer you a good home here, Fanny,” the Marquis said. “Do the duties assigned you and you will have no problems.” With that he waved them out.
So it had been settled. But as they made their way back to the kitchen Fanny had defiantly told the elderly Lily, “I shall work hard but I won’t give up my dream of becoming an actress!”
Lily’s round, fat face showed impatience. “Drat it, child, let me train you to be a proper servant first before you worry about anything else!”
And Lily had been an excellent tutor. Marsden, who had served at Waterloo as orderly to the Marquis and who was now his butler, also had shown a keen interest in her. The tall, long-faced man with frayed, gray side-whiskers and thin gray hair had shown her particular attention, perhaps because he and Lily were warm friends. At any rate, within a few months Fanny had been promoted to upstairs maid.
It was as upstairs maid she had first seen the three sons of the Marquis. There was Viscount George Palmer, first in line to his father’s title, a young law graduate of Oxford, who had inherited his mother’s good looks and fair complexion and also her indifferent health. He had recently returned from a long voyage to Australia and New Zealand to strengthen his lungs.
Then there was his twenty-three-year-old brother, Kenneth. He was darker in complexion and had his father’s stern features. He was now the Reverend Kenneth Palmer, curate of the neighboring Brenmoor Cathedral. And the youngest, the twenty-two-year-old, Charles, who had recently taken his commission in the Fifteenth Cavalry Regiment, his father’s old regiment. Captain Charles was quite as handsome as his oldest brother and also fair like him. He had a jolly disposition and was fond of practical jokes.
It was inevitable that Viscount George and Captain Charles be the favorites with the servants, while the Reverend Kenneth was regarded with some wariness as being whey-faced and unduly stern in his moral judgements of others. Unlike his two brothers, he had little friendliness about him and went back and forth to the Cathedral, spending scant time at home. Fanny had found him cold and a little frightening.
It was Viscount George who had first shown an interest in her. As a girl she had often attended the travelling shows which came to her village. One entertainer in particular had caught her fancy, a singer and dancer called Little Nell. Fanny attended her performances often enough to memorize all the entertainer’s songs and dances.
She soon began giving her mother and the old scholar a sample of what she’d learned. They had been most enthusiastic in their reception of her talents. So it was not strange that after she’d been long enough at the Brenmoor mansion she began to entertain the other servants with her musical act, often at their insistence.
One night in March after the dinner had been served and everything cleared away Peg Grant, one of the other maids, a tiny, straw-haired girl urged her, “Do some songs and dances for us, Fanny!”
Fanny had been standing by the blazing fireplace and now she turned a questioning face to her cousin Lily. The stout Lily, in turn, had hesitated and then given Marsden a look. Marsden, regal at the end of the kitchen table with an accounts book in his hands, had nodded his assent. There was a burst of cheers and laughter from the younger servants, hushed at once by Lily.
“Very well, now,” the stout woman had said sternly. “Let us have no row! If Fanny is to entertain us let us listen quietly like ladies and gentlemen!”
“Hear! Hear!” Marsden said, closing his accounts book.
Fanny took a stand at the end of the big kitchen and began her first song. It recorded the adventures of a dairy maid who caught the eye of the Squire and married him. She carried it off with spirit and ended it with a little dance.
She’d been so absorbed in her performance that she’d paid no attention to her audience. Now as she finished she was astonished to find that standing on the sidelines was the good-looking Viscount George. He was smiling with admiration and with the other servants hushed into silence by his presence, he came to her and congratulated her.
“You did that like a professional,” he said. “I’m amazed.”
“It’s only a poor imitation, sir,” she apologized, pink with confusion.
“Not at all,” the handsome young George told her. “I’ve seen much worse in the Halls. Isn’t that so, everyone?” He turned to the others.
“Fanny is a proper riot!” Peg piped up and clapped her small hands enthusiastically. The other servants followed her example leaving a smiling, blushing Fanny.
The young Viscount said, “There! You see?”
“They’re much too kind!”
“Never,” George Palmer said. “You are good enough to be a professional entertainer right now!”
“I’m quite happy here,” she assured him, seeing that her cousin Lily was watching with bated breath.
“Fine!” George said, smiling. “But if you ever wish to change your work I’m sure someone would be willing to hire you as an entertainer.”
It was her moment of glory. From then on the others kept requesting her to sing their favorite songs. She didn’t mind since she enjoyed doing it and her secret ambition still was to become an actress, despite what she had heard about their ranks being filled with loose women not in any way highly regarded. Her ambition and her respect for her father’s profession continued. And she continued to give her impromptu concerts.
Little did she guess then that her friendship with the charming George was to be the cause of her leaving the great mansion. There was not even a small cloud on Fanny’s horizon at the moment as the harsh weather ended and spring came. But she had been impressed by the pleasant, young man and often thought about him.
• • •
From the thick, yellow fog behind her came the distant sound of carriage wheels and horses’ hooves on the cobblestones. She had chosen a street of modest mansions with fine steps leading up to each and a door to the servants’ entrance situated at one side beneath the steps with access by its own stone set of steps downward.
Hearing the carriage approach she pressed close to the wall of one of the houses and waited uneasily for the vehicle to pass. She had visions of wayward gentlemen riding in it and dragging her off the sidewalk and into the carriage. Everything terrified her at this late hour on this lonely street. She knew what a fool she had been to run off from her snug quarters at Brenmoor House to brave the threats of the London night. If she had been determined to leave she ought at least to have waited until morning!
Her heart pounded as the hackney cab went past and then, to her alarm, came to a halt a short distance beyond her. She pressed rigidly to the building, expecting someone to jump out and come running to pounce on her. But this did not happen. Instead she heard the sound of slightly drunken but happy male voices and a stout young man in brown coat and top hat stumbled out onto the street and bade goodnight to companions still in the cab. The cab moved on and he waved after it and then, staggering just a trifle, started up the steps to his door, fumbling for his key in his pocket at the same time.
Fanny was watching this small drama when to her horror she saw two sinister figures appear from hiding under the steps, a tall, ugly man in nondescript, ragged clothes and battered cap, and his singular companion, a bow-legged dwarf. The dwarf was wearing a battered stove-pipe hat and a coat too long for him, open and dragging on the ground.
The stout gentleman was still fumbling for his keys when the footpads came up behind him. The tall one quickly seized him by the throat and cut off any chance of his crying out by holding an arm tightly around his victim’s windpipe. At the same time he urged, “Get at it, Snipe!”
Snipe, the dwarf, was dancing with excitement as he quickly went through the stout man’s pockets and thrust all he found in the oversized pockets of his own greatcoat.
“Finished!” the dwarf chortled. It all happened in a matter of a few seconds.
“Better make sure he doesn’t recognize us!” the tall one said hoarsely and to Fanny’s horror took a knife from an inside pocket and plunged it into the stout man’s chest. The stout man went suddenly limp and with a look of ecstasy on his ugly face the tall man let him fall onto the steps.
“Come on!” The dwarf, a macabre figure in the fog-shrouded street, was dancing again, with an expression of fear on his large ape-like face. He had short black whiskers which, along with rows of large white teeth made the simian resemblance all the more strong.
“Right!” the tall man said in a low voice, bending over his victim. “He’s a goner!”
“This way!” Snipe, the dwarf, said tensely. And to Fanny’s horror they started down the street towards where she was standing.
Sick and trembling from what she’d witnessed, she prayed that the fog would hide her sufficiently so that the evil twosome would pass on without seeing her. But it was too much to expect.
The dwarf came running awkwardly towards her on his short bow legs and then suddenly halted with a look of sheer hatred on his big simian face under the battered hat. He turned and in a shrill voice shouted, “Here, Martin! Someone here!”
The tall criminal was just coming down the steps and when he heard his companion’s cry he came sprinting to join the dwarf. Fanny knew she would be dead in a moment if she remained there. She had no choice but to try and make a run for it. Catching up her skirt in one hand and clutching her valise in the other she turned and ran wildly back along the street with no idea where she might be heading.
“Crikey!” the dwarf shouted angrily after her.
“Got to get her!” Martin the murderer cried and dashed after her on the double with the dwarf coming along a poor third.
Fanny knew she could not outrun the tall, rangy Martin. Her only hope was to escape by confusing them. She turned at the first corner and then after racing down a short street turned again. They were not far behind. Then she was conscious of a church ahead and next to it what seemed to be an open field surrounded by an iron railing in which was a gate. She flung open the gate and raced into what she now recognized as a cemetery. She picked her way between the tombstones and finally saw a hedge which seemed to offer a hiding place. She flung herself onto the wet grass and crawled under the hedge to hide between it and the church wall.
She was sobbing now and her breath was coming in painful gasps from her unusual exertion. She’d barely hauled her valise in with her when she heard the footsteps of the murderers as they came running into the cemetery. She fought to silence her agonized breathing, fearful that they would hear her.
Martin, the tall one, gazed around with a menacing look on his coarse face. “I’d have sworn she came in here!” he said.
The dwarf, Snipe, was waddling among the headstones looking for her. He spoke up in his high-pitched voice; “I don’t agree, Martin. A female isn’t likely to come into this place of the dead!”
“No?” Martin eyed him with annoyance.
“She’s not here,” the dwarf said. “She tricked us by leaving the gate open, giving her time to run on.”
“Maybe,” the other one said.
“She’ll be blocks away by now,” the dwarf complained, still searching, and now close by the hedge where she was hiding, close enough so that he could have reached out and touched her. She held her breath and pressed rigidly against the stones of the church wall.
“I got a good look at her,” Martin said. “I’ll know her if I see her again!”
“So did I,” the dwarf said, halting by the big man. “And if we do see her again we’d better manage more smoothly than this time. She saw it all! She can put our necks in the hangman’s noose!”
“If we come upon her I’ll not give her time for that,” Martin said grimly. “We’d better get along and divide the swag.”
The dwarf looked intently at the hedge and then seemed to change his mind. He moved away, allowing her to breathe again. Joining the tall man he said, “No use staying here! She won’t come back! And there’s at least a hundred pounds in that purse!”
“Good night’s work!” Martin said approvingly as the evil couple made their way slowly out of the small cemetery.
Fanny didn’t move until long after their voices and figures had faded away in the fog. At last she crawled out from her hiding place, wet, miserable and afraid. She gazed at the various headstones, crypts and monuments all about her and shivered. She did not much relish the idea of spending the night among the dead!
But her common sense told her that she had less to fear from them than she did from the living outside the fence. She stood there, still thoroughly fear-stricken, as the clock in the church tower sonorously struck the hour of one. She gazed at one of the flat-topped grave markers and debated stretching out on it to spend the night on this hard bed with the cold, yellow fog penetrating her body. It was a long way from her former warm room at Brenmoor. But there was no use feeling sorry for herself. She had brought herself to this unhappy state!
As she stood there she heard a slight creaking sound, like the movement of rusty hinges. It made her heart almost stop. Then she wheeled around in the direction of the sound and to her utter horror she saw the doors of the largest crypt moving. As they opened a fearsome apparition emerged, a thin man with a deathly white face in which were two sunken eyes, burning fiercely as they stared at her from the shadows of his gaunt face. The man wore a black top hat from under which flowed wild strands of iron-gray hair reaching to the shoulders of his black, worn frock coat and shabby trousers. She could only think of the creature as one risen from the dead!
“Girl!” The apparition was addressing her.
She drew back, terrified. “Who are you? What are you?” she quavered.
The ghostly one chuckled, showing gray uneven teeth in an equally gray, gaunt face. “The last question is of more moment than the first, I vow! What am I? A creature of the night! A wastrel of the streets, seeking comfort with my friends in this resting place of the dead.”
“Your friends?”
“I have several,” the apparition assured her. “From our vantage point in the tomb we saw you run in here followed by those two evil fellows.”
“I saw them commit a murder,” she said tensely, realizing that this was no spirit, but a human being like herself. “They wish to kill me!”
“No doubt,” the ghostly figure said in his courtly way. “But they have gone now. So you are safe. I have emerged from the tomb to invite you to join my friends and me in a hot cup of tea and a warming fire!”
“Don’t make fun of me!” she wailed, more conscious of the cold than ever.
“I assure you I’m not,” the apparition intoned. He waved a claw-like hand gracefully. “Come a step further and observe for yourself.”
Hesitantly she moved a little closer so that she was able to see down into the tomb and sure enough, there was a small blaze in the middle of the floor with sticks set up to hold a pot over it to boil. Gathered by the fire were three other figures, two very elderly women dressed in ragged clothes and a young girl of about her own age and in not so ragged a condition. The girl had jet black hair and a rather pretty face.
“There is a very good draught at the top which allows the smoke to go out and the fire to burn nicely,” the apparition said.
She stared down into the eerie depths and in a low voice said, “I must be dreaming!”
“On the contrary,” the gaunt-faced man said, “you are being rescued from your nightmare. Come along with me to a place of warmth and safety.”
“What will they say?”
He assured her, “We have already discussed it among ourselves and decided that you should be given sanctuary. The church would normally be the proper place, but unhappily in the Anglican tradition the verger has locked it. So we have to make do with the hospitality of those who have gone before us.”
As he went over this preamble Fanny carefully picked her way down the moss-covered steps and entered the tomb. The wave of warmth gave her a new feeling of hope. She deliberately ignored the shelves on either side with their dusty coffins and the cobwebs which streaked up from them to the level of the roof.
The two old women were huddled by the fire with their eyes closed. But the girl smiled up at her and said, “We’re not spirits, though we may seem to be so.”
“Thank you for allowing me to join you,” she said. “My name is Fanny Hastings!”
The dark-haired girl laughed and said, “More likely it would have been mud if those two blokes had caught up with you. Mine is Moll! The last name don’t count!”
The man with the skull-like face and long gray hair smiled as he settled down by the fire after having carefully closed the doors to the tomb. He said, “Her reason for not giving you her last name is because she does not know it.”
Moll was pouring out a cup of tea and she stuck her tongue out at the gaunt man in black. “That for you, Mr. Hodder!” And she handed the tea to Fanny.
“Thank you,” Fanny said gratefully. She sipped the tea and felt she’d never tasted anything so good.
“My name is Silas Hodder,” the man with the burning eyes said. “I am a beggar by profession. And so is Moll. The two old ladies are somewhat beyond even this lowly profession and so live largely on our bounty.”
“Share and share alike,” Moll said piously. “Charity is a grand thing!”
“Amen!” Silas Hodder said, nodding.
Fanny stared at them in amazement. “But doesn’t it hurt your pride to beg?”
“Not at all,” the man said. “I consider myself tops in my profession.”
“Oh, he’s very good, he is, I promise you that,” Moll agreed, her hands clasped around her knees and a smile on her pert face.
Fanny said, “Can’t you get regular work?”
“None that would pay as well and be respectable,” Moll told her.
“London is a cruel city,” Silas Hodder warned her as the two old ladies continued to sleep by the fire. Fanny now noticed the gin bottle on the ground between them, empty as she might have suspected. The two old ones had downed it without doubt and were now blissfully at rest.
Moll followed her glance and laughed. “No tea for them! Gin is their mother’s milk and nothing else will do.”
Silas Hodder said, “I was once a businessman of some wealth and great respectability. I was swindled out of my fortune by scoundrels and I made a vow to even the score with the world by extracting a good living from it. And I have!”
Moll gave him an admiring look. “He’s really brainy, Mr. Hodder is. He put me on my game as well.”
“I’ll explain my own tactics first,” Silas Hodder told the dark girl. And then to Fanny, he continued, “I sleep rather late in the day. Then I make the rounds of the best taverns. I am, as you can see, shabby and peculiar-looking; I also smell rather high. When I enter these respected places I conduct myself most quietly and gentlemanly so there can be no excuse to evict me. I seat myself amid the most prosperous looking group and look as doleful as possible. Naturally I make them very uncomfortable.”
“And then?” Fanny asked.
“One of them will query me about my business there. I tell them I have come merely to sit in my haunts of yesteryear. To be a shadow at the feast and think of more prosperous days. I note that I once had a suite of offices in the City and then I bring out a box of matches (without offering them for sale). Most of the fat-bellies have a fit of conscience and thrust coins in my hand as I leave. All I do is sit there dull-eyed. When I’ve made all I can in one tavern I move on to another.”
Fanny said, “Don’t they become familiar with your routine?”
“Makes it all the better,” the skull-faced man said. “I become a sort of charge to them. If I don’t appear they worry that my health has broken completely or I have taken my life as I’ve frequently threatened, and my demise will be upon their conscience. I make the same rounds in the evening until about ten. Then I return here.”
She listened in amazement. “And this makes you a good living?”
“More than that, it allows me to bank a little each week,” Silas Hodder said with satisfaction. “Soon I shall be able to retire and take up my status as a true gentleman!”
“Ah, you never will!” Moll told him. “Not you! The greed has got you! You won’t ever give it up.”
“What about you?” Fanny wanted to know of the girl.
Moll said, “I don’t know. Mr. Hodder made me what I am. He showed me how to turn over a few pounds a week. He reads the death notices and he picks out names of married gentlemen in good circumstances. Then I makes a call on the dead man’s widow. I tell her what a dear gent he was and how he made love to me on the quiet and promised to marry me. I sniffle a lot at losing him but tell her there’s a good side. I will have the child he gave me. And it’s then they bring out their purses and give me a little something to keep quiet and go on my way.”
Fanny was shocked. “But that is so cruel! You make those poor widows unhappy by thinking their husbands were unfaithful. And you do harm to the reputations of the dead husbands!”
Moll chuckled. “There’s more to it than that. Some of those widows didn’t have much use for their husbands in any event. And they’re properly surprised many a time that the poor old gent was able to get me with child, since he hadn’t been able to do it for them. The way I see it, I give those dead chaps a gamy reputation that should make them happy!”
“No one is really hurt,” Silas Hodder said. “I carefully select the cases. No grieving young widows are ever included.”
“And all four of you sleep here every night?” Fanny said.
“We do,” Moll replied. “The old girls spend most of the day under an arch on the embankment not too far from here. But come nightfall we all head for our tomb.”
“A touch of the vampire, you might say,” the weird old man said with amusement. “Naturally the church people are not aware of our making such good use of the facilities or they would evict us. As yet, our dead comrades have made no complaint of any sort.”
She glanced warily at the dusty coffins with their cobwebs and said, “I can tell that. Is it healthy down here?”
“As healthy as most places in London,” Silas Hodder said. “My physician assures me no disease lives on in such places. The coffins are well-sealed and the tomb makes a comfortable place for us on nights such as this.”
Moll said, “We have just room for one more. You can join us if you like. You’ve got to keep out of the way of those two blokes!”
Fanny gave a deep sigh, thinking of all that had taken place since she ran away from Brenmoor on this eventful evening. She said, “The tall one will kill me to silence me if he ever finds me again.”
“I wouldn’t trust the dwarf either,” Silas Hodder advised. “He has a wicked look.”
Fanny’s pretty face was shadowed with the evil memory of what had happened. She said, “I saw those two murder a man only a few blocks from here.”
“Many such murders occur here in London every night,” the man in shabby black warned.
Moll stared at her with interest. “How do you come to be in London on your own?”
“It’s a complicated story,” Fanny said, staring wistfully into the fire.
“You’re nursing a broken heart! I’ll vow to that!” Moll declared.
Fanny gave her a surprised look. “How sharp you are to realize that!”
“Part of my trade,” Moll said proudly.
“Have either of you heard of the Marquis of Brenmoor?” Fanny asked.
Silas Hodder replied at once, “He has a large estate just outside London. I think he has three sons and a fine stable of race horses.”
She told the odd, old man, “You’re right on all points.” And then she went on to explain about her mother dying, her cousin Lily being the cook at Brenmoor and how she came to be there. She also told them of her stage ambitions and of meeting young George Palmer.
In a moment she had lost herself in the pleasant reverie of her second meeting with Viscount George Palmer. It had happened on a night in mid-April. The Marquis, who held many shares in the British East India Company, was having an entertainment to honor a certain Prince Aran, the Oxford-educated son of a Maharajah in the northwest of that vast and mysterious country.
Cousin Lily was in a state about the food, since the Marquis had commissioned a special menu for the Prince who was a Hindu and would not eat any beef dishes. Fanny herself was busily involved with the preparing of extra rooms for overnight guests. The great ballroom was festooned with colorful garlands and other decorations. There was to be a dinner, dancing and a musical entertainment.
The only one in the house who was not excited was the Reverend Kenneth Palmer, who disapproved of the Marquis catering to a man he felt was a heathen. Fanny had overheard him in conversation with his father in the lower hallway.
The young curate had informed the old man, “I shall be absent from the party, father. I trust you will understand.”
The Marquis had leaned on his cane and said tartly, “I expect you to attend. My guest of honor, the Prince, may be offended if you are not present.”
“I do not share your enthusiasm for heathen royalty,” the young man snapped back. “The Bishop is putting me up for a few days. I shall return here when this pagan orgy is over.”
“I call that most inconsiderate of you, Kenneth,” the Marquis had rebuked him.
But, as Fanny had expected, the rebuke had done no good. The bigoted young man was not influenced by his father’s words. On the other hand, Captain Charles and the Vicount George entered into the preparations with enthusiasm, as did Dora Carson, a daughter of a distant poor relation of the Marquis whom the old man had adopted as his daughter.
Several times Fanny had been assigned to act as personal maid to the pleasant young woman. And on the evening of the party for the prince Fanny found herself acting in this capacity for Dora once again.
Dora was slender, twenty-two, quietly attractive. Her large brown eyes and olive skin were her best features and she wore white as often as possible to emphasize her coloring. On the exciting night Fanny stood behind her fastening her gown as Dora studied herself in the mirror.
Dora, surveying herself with a smile as Fanny worked at the buttons, said, “They say the Prince is charming and a ladies’ man.”
“You should soon know, miss,” Fanny said.
“I have seen likenesses of him. I would not call him handsome by our standards but he has a noble look and a regal bearing, I’m told.”
“Is he returning to India soon?”
“Yes,” Dora said. “His father is ill. He may soon to be the Maharajah and his friendship is important to the British East India Company. Otherwise you can be sure the Marquis would not go to all this fuss.”
Fanny finished and stood back. “There! You look ever so nice, miss!”
“Thank you, Fanny,” Dora said, smiling at her. “You must look in on the party tonight.”
“I shall be serving,” she said. “And then later some of the other maids and I will watch from the balcony where we won’t be seen.”
Dora stood up. “Believe me, you’re lovely enough to be a guest. And you speak so nicely. You really shouldn’t be a servant.”
Fanny said, “You mustn’t be deceived by my speech, miss. I have very ordinary origins. I’m in my proper station in life.”
Dora placed an arm around her. “My dear Fanny, my origins were no more notable than your own until the Marquis adopted me!”
“But you do have his blood.”
“So little of it he would like to see me marry one of his sons,” Dora said with a wry look.
Fanny was surprised. “Truly?”
“Yes. You mustn’t whisper a word of it to anyone else. But the Marquis thinks I’d make a fine wife for a minister. And I can’t abide that awful Kenneth! He’s such a prig!”
“I agree!”
Dora’s eyes gleamed mischievously. “I wouldn’t mind being his daughter-in-law if he encouraged a match between George and me.”
“The Viscount!”
“Yes,” Dora said. “He’s the pick of the three. I’m very fond of him.”
“What about Captain Charles?” Fanny ventured.
Dora shrugged. “He’s not like Kenneth. He has a good nature. But he lacks George’s brilliance and charm.”
Fanny smiled a little sadly. “I quite agree with you, miss.”
“So you have been taken with him too!” Dora exclaimed with delight.
Fanny smiled ruefully. “He’s the hero to every maid and scullery girl in the house. No denying the Viscount is the favorite.”
“I’m sure of that,” Dora said. And then confidentially, “Of course, the Marquis is playing politics again, even with the lives of those dear to him. He’s deeply anxious for George to marry Virginia Andrews, the daughter of Sir Matthew Andrews.”
Fanny found herself feeling shocked, as she had not heard of this before. She said. “Is she apt to make him a good wife?”
“She’s pretty enough,” Dora said. “But that’s about all. She is flighty and shallow! The sort who flirts with every man at a party but cares for none of them. She only cares for herself.”
“It doesn’t sound promising,” Fanny suggested.
“It’s a shame,” Dora sighed. “And the worst part of it is that Virginia just might entice George into marrying her!”
“I hope not,” Fanny said, surprised at how strongly she felt on the subject.
“So do I,” Dora said as she prepared to go down to the party.
• • •
The ballroom of the great mansion was filled. Fanny was doubling as a serving girl. She went to the kitchen where she hastily donned an apron and different cap and then, equipped with a tray of dainties, went up to the ballroom to serve the guests.
At one end of the room an orchestra was playing. The notables, including the Marquis, the Indian Prince Aran and Dora and Viscount George stood at the other end of the great room receiving the guests as they came. There were red and blue uniforms resplendent with gold braid and bands, in contrast to the more soberly hued formal coats of civilians and the ladies in flowing gowns of every shade of the rainbow.
Conversation was loud and animated. The Prince, in native costume of pale salmon-colored silk and a turban in the same shade, was the center of attention. He was a young man with a short black beard. His eyes were black and sharp in his narrow brown face and his nose rather pointed. He was not truly handsome by Western standards, yet he had a certain quality about him.
Fanny did not take her tray to him as the group were still receiving. But she found herself blushing as his glance fixed on her and his eyes seemed to follow her about the room. Her tray was empty and she was about to go downstairs when a hand caught her by the arm. She turned to see that it was Viscount George.
The young man guided her to an alcove off the ballroom and whispered intensely, “I must have a word with you!”