Chapter Five

The afternoon sun’s dull rays offered little in the way of warmth, but Charlotte hardly noticed. Seeing Finlay the night before had left her in what she feared was a permanently flushed state. The heat of attraction still burned in her limbs.

After all this time, after all the careful decisions she’d made since the morning she fled from Lord Belling’s townhome, she hadn’t really escaped Finlay or severed the connection she had with him.

Securing the teaching position at Little Windmill House had been a lucky boon. The advertisement appeared in the paper the morning she slipped from the earl’s home, and she’d been the first to respond. Her lack of a formal education proved not to be the stumbling block she expected, largely because her practical experience was vast and varied. And she spoke French like a native speaker.

In the months she’d been employed at the foundling home, she’d formed relationships with her peers, her students, and even the patrons. She feared each connection was foolhardy even as she couldn’t help herself. Since her parents had died from influenza when she was a child, the number of people she could count on was small. Most spurned her family and close neighbors, believing the sickness was a punishment for their sins. When Eliza’s parents finally found her, they did their best to care for her. But they had their own brood to feed and clothe, and Charlotte learned quickly the only person she could truly depend upon was herself.

And then she’d met Roderick and fallen in love. For two years, life was idyllic. They explored. They laughed. They loved. And then he taught her, once again, that trusting others was a painful and foolish exercise.

Charlotte flinched from the memories. The amount of time she’d spent as a widow now equaled the time she’d spent as a married woman, but the pain hadn’t lessened. Perhaps because grief had warped into anger. Into bitterness at being abandoned. Again.

She stopped abruptly in the middle of the walk and clasped her knapsack tightly to her chest. Pulling deep, painful breaths through her nose, she willed her heart to cease its racing. But thoughts of the awful days after Roderick died threatened to send her into a panic.

Looking wildly about her, she spied a small bench tucked under a scrawny tree in the clearing down the street. She hurried to it, the sight of it a lighthouse in a treacherous gale of emotion. She came upon it almost gasping for air and sank onto its unyielding seat. Charlotte longed to drop her head into her hands as she greedily sucked air into her lungs, but she feared drawing attention to herself.

Instead, she tipped her head back as if she were merely inspecting the last umber-colored leaves that clung to the tree’s branches. Those last few leaves, tenaciously clutching onto boughs that no longer wanted them, reminded Charlotte so much of the life she was expunged from, she had to choke back a sob.

She’d been doing well.

Teaching was enjoyable. She respected and liked her colleagues. She’d finally reached a point where she could start setting aside money for the future. She attended shul regularly. What had happened to upset the placid routine she’d clenched with both hands?

Finlay.

With just a glimpse of his merry green eyes and wicked mouth, he’d turned her inside out.

Finally, Charlotte gave in to temptation and dropped her head into her hands as she realized he resurrected all the happy feelings she’d felt with Roderick. Finlay made her want to laugh. To smile. The last time she’d done those things, she’d lost so much. She didn’t know if she could do it again, especially because a man like Finlay—Viscount Firthwell, as she knew she should address him—could never be a fixture in her life unless she agreed to a scandalous arrangement between them.

And what if he proposed such an arrangement? What if he threatened her or her position at the home unless she agreed? She brought a fist up to her mouth and bit her knuckle. She didn’t think him capable of such things, but she didn’t know him. Not really. If he chose to be difficult, he would have all the power.

She would have none.

The acrid bite of bile touched her throat.

A quarter of an hour passed in which she merely expelled deep breaths and discreetly wiped her brow with a handkerchief. Finally, she climbed to her feet and headed home. She had meant to visit the market to purchase more candles for Shabbat dinner, but she no longer had the energy for such a trip.

Her small flat was on the top floor of a narrow building, which she assumed had been constructed of red brick, although the color had dulled with age and coal soot to a grimy brown. It was crammed between a bakery and a seamstress shop, and the decadent scent of baked treats flavored the air, masking the otherwise harsh odors of the city.

Charlotte pulled open the front door, her hands almost shaking for a cup of strong tea. Her foot was on the bottom stair when the door to her left opened, revealing her landlady’s graying head. When the woman’s gaze locked on Charlotte, she knew her tea would have to wait.

“Mrs. Taylor, I’ve been waiting for you,” the older woman said without preface.

Suppressing a sigh, Charlotte responded with a strained smile. “Mrs. Gladington, I hope your wait was not a long one.”

“An hour or so at least. ” The woman’s gray curls shook with agitation. “But I know you’ve only just finished teaching.”

“Indeed.” Charlotte took another step up the staircase, hoping her action indicated she did not have time to chat.

Mrs. Gladington looked toward the front door for a long moment, cocking her head to the side as if listening, before she gestured with her chin to the inside of her flat. “Perhaps it would be best if we talked in private.”

Something in the woman’s cautious behavior raised hairs on the back of Charlotte’s neck. She nodded. “If you insist.”

The older woman’s living space was cramped with furniture, stacks of yellowing newspapers, and the comforting scent of baked bread.

Shooing Charlotte to sit on a patched armchair, the old woman bustled about the tiny kitchen preparing tea. Charlotte knotted her hands tightly in her lap. She’d enjoyed a cup of tea with Mrs. Gladington on more than one occasion and knew the woman was not to be rushed. But the older woman kept stopping to look out the front windows as if she was expecting another guest.

Nervous. She was acting nervous, and it made Charlotte so as well. Her mind was already overloaded with stress; she hoped whatever her landlady had to share wouldn’t tip the precarious hold she had on her self-control.

After what felt like an eternity, Mrs. Gladington returned with a tea tray, which she sat on the crooked table between their chairs. She quickly prepared Charlotte’s cup, offering it to her along with a biscuit.

She took a bite to be polite, but it was tasteless.

“I had visitors today,” Mrs. Gladington said, slowly stirring her tea. “Two gentlemen asking for a Mrs. Charlotte Townsend. Wife of the late Mr. Roderick Townsend.”

Terror clogged Charlotte’s throat, and she raised her teacup to shield the fact she was gasping. Was Roderick’s family trying to find her? But why? Surely they had ceased blaming her for their son’s acceptance of the post in India. “How curious.” She was relieved her voice sounded normal. “Why did they think such a person would be here?”

“I asked them the same question.” Mrs. Gladington locked watery eyes on her. “They said they’d had reports of a young woman matching her description being seen in the area.”

She feigned a frown. “What did they say she looked like?”

The older woman selected a biscuit from the tray and took a bite, crumbs falling unheeded onto her lap. “Brown hair. Grayish blue eyes. A beauty mark near her brow.” Mrs. Gladington’s gaze slid to the mark on her face. “She sounded a good deal like you, my dear.”

“It certainly sounds like it,” Charlotte managed, battling the urge to dash out the door and up the stairs to her flat, bolting the lock behind her. “Did they say why they were looking for her?”

Mrs. Gladington placed another biscuit on Charlotte’s plate, although she hadn’t finished the first one. “They accused her of theft.”

“Theft?” Her voice would best be described as a squeak.

“They said she took a valuable family heirloom her husband gave her and kept it, rather than return it to his family upon his death.” Mrs. Gladington’s pinched lips left little doubt of what she thought of such a claim.

“If Mrs. Townsend’s husband gave this heirloom to her, wouldn’t that make it hers to do with as she’d like?” The injustice of the assertion loosened Charlotte’s otherwise cautious tongue.

“I said the very same thing, my dear, but they dismissed me as ignorant.” The older woman put her cup down with a loud clank. “I don’t think one needs to be a toff to understand the rules of gift-giving and ownership.”

“Indeed not,” she said, a reluctant smile tugging on the corners of her mouth.

“I sent them on their way. Told them I knew no Charlotte Townsend.” She paused, the moment charged with tension. “And I didn’t lie. I know a Charlotte Taylor, and that Charlotte is kind, quiet, and a paragon of virtue.”

Charlotte swallowed, the sensation like forcing down hot pokers. “Thank you, Mrs. Gladington.”

“Of course.” She reached out and patted her on the hand. “I’ll let you know if they return, or if I see them about the neighborhood.”

“Please do,” she said, rising on unsteady legs to her feet.

She thanked her landlady for her hospitality, and as she reached to shut the woman’s door behind her, Mrs. Gladington stopped her.

“Be watchful, Mrs. Taylor.” She grabbed Charlotte’s hand and gripped it tightly. “These men were not gentlemen. I’m afraid of what they’d do once they catch this Mrs. Townsend they’re searching for.”

Charlotte nodded her thanks, fear coalescing into a ball of ice in her stomach.

In the privacy of her flat, she stowed her bag and books and put a kettle on to heat. She crossed to her narrow bed, sinking onto its welcoming mattress. With shaking hands, she pulled the pins from her hair, collecting them in a small tin on her side table. When her sable tresses hung loose about her shoulders, Charlotte reached for her brush and pulled it slowly through one section and then another. The methodical, rhythmic movements helped ease her nerves, and eventually her hands stopped shaking.

When every knot was worked free, and the strands shone in the faint light coming through the window, Charlotte plaited it. She wandered to her bureau near the bed, where she returned the brush. She considered her face in the small mirror on the wall, noting how her suppressed tears had made her eyes red. She rubbed the heels of her palms into her eyes, enjoying the sensation. As she dropped her hands, her gaze fell to her left hand, painfully devoid of jewelry.

In the two years since Roderick’s death, she’d grown accustomed to not feeling the weight of her wedding band on her finger. But now, with the news of Mrs. Gladington’s visitors, her left hand suddenly felt like lead.

Before Charlotte could indulge in the tears that threatened to finally spill over the dam of her hard-won composure, the teakettle sounded. With a deep gulp of bracing air, Charlotte turned to prepare her night’s meal. There would always be a reason for tears, she told herself with a shake, and she refused for this to be one of them.