Lady Anne and the Menacing Mystic

by Victoria Hamilton

  She pondered it a moment, turning her thoughts inward. “I was surprised at first, but I am not shocked. My father taught me to keep my eyes and my heart and my mind open.”

  “Thank you for discovering his killer,” Bertie whispered, tears clogging his throat. He took her free hand and brought it to his lips. “Thank you. I’m only sorry I sheltered her for so long, held her to my bosom, called her my beloved cousin. You never knew Bella, but she was the sweetest friend I had in my youth, the one who made me feel I was not lost. This woman . . . she felt like a hollow sham the whole time, but I needed to believe her. My dear Bella was the real thing. She knew what I am, and she didn’t care.”

  “Neither do I, my friend, neither do I.” They returned, arm in arm, to the sitting room.

  • • •

  Finally, it was all drawing to a close. Anne looked around at her friends. Quin, wrapped warmly in a blanket, sat by the fire with Susanna on a low stool at his side, her cheek laid on his knee. Alethea and Bertie stood nearby, arms twined about each other, looking as loving as any couple could. It was good that they had each other.

  Darkefell stood by Anne’s chair. He cleared his throat. “I would like to say, to you all . . . thank you for looking after Anne.” He raised his glass and bowed, saluting them all. “And to Mr. Quin Birkenhead I offer my most sincere congratulations; you are indeed, as Anne said, the hero of the hour.”

  “And to my wonderful Dr. Fothergill,” Quin said softly, loath as always to take credit to himself. “It was he who ensured that Betty Macree did not escape justice.”

  Chapter Thirty

  Much later she and Darkefell sat in the Everingham townhome with Lady Harecross, Lady Everingham (who was napping, truth be told) and Osei. Anne’s mother knew only the vaguest hint of what her daughter had suffered that day. She was beaming and gloriously happy. Darkefell and Anne had agreed to an engagement supper in three weeks, followed by a wedding in Bath at St. Swithin, rather than in London, in two months or so, close to Christmas.

  Anne had insisted that her father be invited, and Darkefell said he would invite his mother but wasn’t sure she would travel so far, especially since Anne and Tony would be going north almost immediately after the wedding. The butler entered with a note on a silver tray. Though Lady Harecross held out her hand, the butler crossed to Lord Darkefell instead and bowed.

  Tony took the note up, read it swiftly, and started up in surprise.

  “What is it?” Anne asked. “What’s going on?”

  “It is Lydia; she is about to give birth.”

  “Oh! I must go to her, poor girl.”

  “Are you sure?” Darkefell said with an ironic lift of his brow. “Even in the best of times Lydia has a tendency to dramatize herself. Can you imagine what she will be like having a child?”

  “Don’t be rude, Tony. Of course I must go to her. The poor girl has suffered intolerably—”

  “Through her own stupidity,” he said.

  Anne stiffened and glared at him. “Don’t be cruel; Lydia is frightened. If you cannot be sympathetic about something you will never suffer, then you should keep your criticisms to yourself.” Anne stood, noting her mother’s look of horror at her manner of speaking to her fiancé. “Do you not agree, Mother, that with no fear of ever suffering the life-threatening condition of pregnancy, perhaps men should take the old adage to heart, that silence is wisdom . . . at least in this instance?”

  Lady Harecross hesitated, but with a lift of her chin she said, “My lord, as seldom as it happens, I think I must agree with my daughter. Having gone through the condition many times, though only twice successfully, my sympathies lie with Lady John.”

  The marquess, outnumbered and out-reasoned, bowed. “Ladies, I will bow to your superior knowledge and agree; in this case I will never know the truth of it. I retreat in the face of your inexorable reason.”

  “Thank you, Tony.”

  “Don’t thank me for admitting I am wrong.”

  “Why not?”

  “Would you expect thanks from me if you were ever to admit being wrong?”

  She smiled as he took her hand. Looking up at him and winking, she said, “Since it is unlikely to happen, I may never know what I would—or would not—expect. Nonetheless . . . I thank you for doing what so few men are capable of.”

  Osei politely declined going with them; he had work to do at the marquess’s rented townhome, now filled with staff arranging for their master’s comfort. Anne took Mary with her, and they repaired to the Bestwick home on Milsom. It was late. Lydia had been suffering through contractions, laboring with the friendly coaching of the midwife. But at long last, late in the night, the birth had been accomplished. Mary and the midwife, along with a young maid of the house, helped Lydia with the necessary labors after birth to expel the afterbirth and clean herself and the baby.

  Anne, exhausted and feeling faint after viewing the birth, was considerably buoyed by how Lydia, who most considered silly and fragile, was stoic through the process, putting all of her effort into the delivery and immediate aftermath. It was miraculous, in a way, how Lydia seemed to mature through the process, and how the midwife, an experienced woman of advanced years and sturdy health, patiently coached the young woman, supporting her and giving her courage with homely good sense and composure.

  John, who had been frantically pacing outside the birth chamber for hours, poking his head in the door many times, only to be expelled time and again, was finally invited in to view his new baby. He broke down in tears when given his little daughter to hold, and Lydia, wearily beaming, chuckled at the sight.

  Anne left them alone and crept out to find Darkefell. He was in John’s library, restlessly pacing.

  “Is Lydia all right?” he asked, his face much more drawn with anxiety than she would have expected.

  “She’s wonderful. Oh, Tony, it was remarkable, and frightening and . . . overwhelming.”

  He took her in his arms and held her against his chest. She felt the steady reassuring rhythm against her cheek. “After such a day and such a night I’m so tired,” she sighed. “I don’t know how she did it, how she stayed so strong. I have a new respect for Lydia.”

  “Despite her getting bamboozled by that mistaken mystic?”

  “Fear will turn anyone foolish. I won’t judge her for it, Tony. The poor girl has been through enough. We’ve always known she was superstitious, but she’s not alone in that. My own mother will never allow a white tablecloth to stay on the table overnight.”

  “What will happen if she does?”

  She looked up at him and grinned. “We would, apparently, need a shroud soon after. It defies examination, I know, to explain how one thing follows the other, but she always says better safe when reproached.” Anne examined his face in the dim light of one branch of candles. “Do you wish to see the baby?”

  “I’d much rather stay right here with you in my arms.” He tightened his grasp on her, squeezing until she was breathless and murmured a complaint. He loosened his hold a fraction. “I feel like I will never get enough of this. I’m more than a little frustrated, my lady, if you must know.” His hands traced the curve of her waist and roamed up to touch her neck and thread into her hair. “The thought of having to wait, now, until we are wed, to be alone with you . . .” He sighed.

  Anne smiled in the dark. “Then let’s not wait long,” she said, shuddering in delight at his caresses. “Get a special license and let us marry within the week.” She felt him tremble against her.

  He held her away from him and stared into her eyes. “Are you being serious, Anne? Don’t you wish all the fuss leading up to it? Don’t you want your mother’s engagement party, and the congratulations of friends, and the—”

  “All I want is you, Tony, truly.”

  He sighed. “Just hearing you say that . . . I can wait. Let us do this right, for the sake of your family, especially. I would bear a hundred engagement parties, knowing you will be mine at the end of it. Two mon
ths, Anne . . . let us wait the two months. I will stay in Bath, Lydia will recover her strength, your mother can glory in having a daughter well wed, and your father can complicate the marriage settlements to his heart’s content to protect you. Julius and mother can attend, if they wish, and your friends can give us party after party. I want every single bit of it.”

  She sighed and he folded her back into his sturdy embrace. “Two months, then, Tony; two months and we’ll be married here, in Bath.”

  “I love you, my lady. Now . . . shall I go and make faces at a new baby?”

  “Let’s stay here a moment longer,” she replied. “I’ve missed you so, Tony. Let’s not be apart ever again.”

  About the Book

  A writer must research many odd things while writing. When I was looking for a poison to use in Lady Anne and the Menacing Mystic I considered many and discarded many for various reasons. I finally settled on the yew; I already knew it was poisonous, discovered how lethal while researching, and coincidentally discovered a reference to St. Swithin’s churchyard having a hedge of yews. Perfect. I let Osei, the most learned person in the novel, have his say when he speaks of a historical reference to poisoning from the “juice of the yew,” but Anne does chime in, as she remembers from her own education how Socrates died from an infusion of hemlock.

  Lady Anne and the Menacing Mystic takes place in 1786, a year in the late middle of the Georgian era in England. Sometimes I wonder, do readers know how lewd and slyly suggestive books and songs were in this era? I think we too often believe that folks of the past had a more restrictive outlook on sex, but nothing could be further from the truth, as anyone who understands Shakespeare will acknowledge.

  For example . . . “My Thing Is My Own,” a song mentioned, is a real English folk song with an extremely naughty meaning; the “Thing” of the title (remember, the song is sung by a lady!) is a lady’s most intimate parts and she states quite tartly that the “thing” is her own and she will not let anyone have it, no matter how cunning or handsome or witty they are, without marriage. The song first appeared in print in a large six-volume collection of songs published by Thomas d’Urfey (Wit and Mirth – or – Pills to Purge Melancholy) between 1698 and 1720.

  Read below the entire lyrics, and imagine the meanings, which are all frankly bawdy and sexual. To hear a delightful rendition, look on YouTube and find the incomparable Wilson sisters—yes, those Wilson sisters, of the rock group Heart fame—singing their version.

  Lolly singing it may seem out of character, but she has lived a long life, and though she is a lady, she knows a thing or two about life, men and sex. Her past is mysterious; she doesn’t speak of it much. I like to imagine a slightly scandalous and perhaps tragic love story for her. As sentimental and silly as she sometimes seems, there are depths to the woman that make her a favorite relation of Anne’s. In short, her singing the song is a suitable saucy moment for her character!

  And speaking of sex (we were, weren’t we?) research often leads one down fascinating paths. When Lady Anne needs to rope in the marquess’s estimable secretary to help her investigate the rumors of homosexuality (not a word in use until a century later, by the way) and the Sacred Theban Club, she must first find out what he understands about same-sex attraction. I’ll say it again; surprises are in store for the naïve researcher who may think of “olden days” as more strict and constrained when it comes to sex and sexual expression. Though it is true that same-sex activity was criminalized in the UK and some other countries, that does not tell the whole story.

  I discovered that shame of, and criminalization of, same-sex attraction and conduct is a relatively modern reaction to an ancient and widely accepted behavior. Mr. Osei Boatin’s invocation of the phrase boy wife from his language comes from my research into homosexuality among the African nations. There are, in many of the continent’s cultures (and many many ancient cultures!) a frank acknowledgment of same-sex attraction dating back to artistic depictions on cave walls from millennia ago. In fact, the Sacred Band of Thebes referenced in Lady Anne and the Menacing Mystic was, as far as can be ascertained, true, an army regiment made up of older men and their younger male lovers.

  In England in the late eighteenth century, though homosexual activity was a criminal offense—the language of which lingers in our vernacular (words such as bugger, etc.)—it was common enough, according to reports of the time. In some cases reports of its occurrence in society were weaponized to whip up a religious fervor for moral reformation. Reforming preachers made it their mission to convict homosexuals, even if they had to entrap and trick them, or invent accusations.

  There did not seem to be the same fervor to accuse and convict women who loved other women, a sociological phenomenon that I find bewildering but fascinating. Historical research is an absorbing rabbit hole for the historical fiction author to disappear down.

  I’ll leave you with this thought: understanding the past can lead to a calmer present. There have always been times of great suffering. Moral panics, crime waves, pandemics, heartbreaking wars, all are tragic. We are in this together, my friends and beloved readers, this world, this life. But through it all and beyond, the human spirit of love endures.

  Wishing you love and light,

  Victoria Hamilton

  *Read below the delightful “My Thing Is My Own”!

  My Thing Is My Own

  English Folk Song

  I a tender young Maid have been courted by many,

  Of all sorts and Trades as ever was any:

  A spruce Haberdasher first spake me fair,

  But I would have nothing to do with Small ware.

  My thing is my own, and I’ll keep it so still,

  Yet other young Lasses may do what they will.

  A sweet scented Courtier did give me a Kiss,

  And promis’d me Mountains if I would be his,

  But I’ll not believe him, for it is too true,

  Some Courtiers do promise much more than they do.

  (Chorus Repeated) My thing is my own . . .

  A Master of Musick came with an intent,

  To give me a Lesson on my Instrument,

  I thank’d him for nothing, but bid him be gone,

  For my little Fiddle should not be plaid on.

  (Chorus Repeated) My thing is my own . . .

  An Usurer came with abundance of Cash,

  But I had no mind to come under his Lash,

  He profer’d me Jewels, and a great store of Gold,

  But I would not Mortgage my little Free-hold.

  (Chorus Repeated) My thing is my own . . .

  A blunt Lieutenant surpriz’d my Placket1

  And fiercely began to rifle and sack it,

  I mustered my Spirits up and became bold,

  And forc’d my Lieutenant to quit his strong hold.

  (Chorus Repeated) My thing is my own . . .

  A fine dapper Taylor, with a Yard2 in his Hand,

  Did profer his Service to be at Command,

  He talk’d of a slit3 I had above Knee,

  But I’ll have no Taylors to stitch it for me.

  (Chorus Repeated) My thing is my own . . .

  Now here I could reckon a hundred and more,

  Besides all the Gamesters recited before,

  That made their addresses in hopes of a snap

  But as young as I was I understood Trap,

  My thing is my own, and I’ll keep it so still,

  Until I be Marryed, say Men what they will.

  Notes:

  1. A placket is an opening or slit in fabric; I think you can guess what it implies.

  2. Yard, in this instance, refers to a yardstick; again, I think you can guess the euphemism!

  3. Again with the naughtiness!

  Books by Victoria Hamilton

  Lady Anne Addison Mysteries

  Lady Anne and the Howl in the Dark

  Revenge of the Barbary Ghost

  Curse of the Gypsy

  Lady Anne a
nd the Menacing Mystic

  Vintage Kitchen Mysteries

  A Deadly Grind

  Bowled Over

  Freezer I’ll Shoot

  No Mallets Intended

  White Colander Crime

  Leave It to Cleaver

  No Grater Danger

  Breaking the Mould

  Cast Iron Alibi

  Merry Muffin Mysteries

  Bran New Death

  Muffin But Murder

  Death of an English Muffin

  Much Ado About Muffin

  Muffin to Fear

  About the Author

  Victoria Hamilton is the pseudonym of nationally bestselling romance author Donna Lea Simpson. Victoria is the bestselling author of three mystery series, the Lady Anne Addison Mysteries, the Vintage Kitchen Mysteries, and the Merry Muffin Mysteries. Her latest adventure in writing is a Regency-set historical mystery series, starting with A Gentlewoman’s Guide to Murder.

  Victoria loves to read, especially mystery novels, and enjoys good tea and cheap wine, the company of friends, and has a newfound appreciation for opera. She enjoys crocheting and beading, but a good book can tempt her away from almost anything . . . except writing!

  Visit Victoria at: www.victoriahamiltonmysteries.com.