Sea of Secrets: A Novel of Victorian Romantic Suspense

by DeWees, Amanda

  The conversation was taking a stranger turn than I had expected, but I was eager to hear more. “Yes,” I said, marveling; “I suspected there must have been some breach between you, since Father never even admitted to the existence of this side of the family; and Father is not one to keep silent about connections to the peerage.”

  She gave a sad little nod. “Yes, he always was slavishly devoted to rank. It was something that worried my father; he was not wholly certain that Hugo wanted your mother for herself, and not just her family. She had no rank, of course; but by that time I was married to the duke, and I could give her entrée into the highest circles… along with her husband.”

  My mother was part of this. I realized with amazement that I had not thought to question the duchess before about her, when one of the reasons I had been so overjoyed to be taken under her wing was the hope that from her I might at last learn more of the mother I had not known. How could I have forgotten about my quest so completely in so short a time?

  But the answer was not difficult to find. Herron had seized my heart and mind so strongly and suddenly that there was no room for anyone else; he had become all in all to me before I was aware of it, and had supplanted all other loves. How much I had changed in so short a time, and how poorly the change reflected upon me, to be so easily distracted from what had been so important to me. At once all my wistful eagerness for knowledge of my mother came thronging back to me, so swiftly that words rushed to my lips and threatened to stifle me.

  “Is it something to do with my mother? Will you tell me more of her? Did your parents disapprove of her marriage, and was that why they denied the connection?”

  “Nothing that simple, I am afraid.” She still held my hands in hers, and I waited in bewilderment for what she was having such difficulty in bringing herself to say. “I know you have little love for your father, child, and less reason to love him, but what I am going to tell you cannot be easy for any daughter to hear. You know that your mother drowned, here at Ellsmere, less than a year after your birth.”

  “Yes,” I whispered, a terrible vague dread creeping over me.

  “You were just a tiny baby, of course; you could not remember what your mother was like. I am certain she married your father in the full confidence that he returned her love. For she did love him, foolish girl, for all his arrogant vanity and ambition.” Her voice had died to a thread, and her eyes were squeezed shut, but she gave herself a little shake and seemed to collect herself. When she spoke again there was steel in her voice. “None of us knows for certain. That is the dreadful thing, and it is one of the reasons I did not turn him out of doors this morning. In the end we had no proof.”

  Again, no proof, I thought fleetingly.

  “Nor were there any witnesses. But I knew my stepsister.” She flung up her head now, and her jaw was set, her eyes hard as flint through her tears. “Before her marriage she was a happy girl. She would never have drowned herself. But something happened after the marriage to change her. I would never have thought she could abandon the baby girl she loved so much. I would have thought her capable of enduring anything for the sake of you and Lionel.”

  “What did my father do to her?”

  “Oh, child, if only we knew. I know he was unkind to her. She would not tell me what passed between them; she was too loyal. Loyal to him! But she changed so after the marriage, became so melancholy and nervous. And he—it was plain he was not satisfied with her income. He was always so profligate, always in need of more money.” I thought suddenly of the endless supply of fine cigars and brandy in my father’s house, of his elegant suits and collection of fine cravat pins. He still had expensive tastes.

  “How did it happen?” I asked, and was surprised that my voice was so steady.

  “That afternoon we were having tea outside, on the terrace. Hugo and your mother had taken you for a walk; you were just beginning to be able to toddle around on your own, and she was so proud of you. She always regretted that Papa had not lived to see you and Lionel; but he died not long after your mother married. I always wondered if he might have known something was wrong, and if he was too grieved to find the heart to rally when he fell ill…. Your nurse went after the three of you, but in less than a quarter of an hour she came hurrying back in great distress: when she came in sight of you and your father at the edge of the cliffs, your mother had vanished. Pembroke told the girl that she had suddenly let go your hand and run to fling herself off the cliff before he could reach her. We sent for the fishermen from the village for assistance. All that night there were lights moving back and forth on the water, as the men in their boats searched for her body.”

  “But they did not find her.” That much I knew.

  “No. That is what led some to claim that Hugo had invented the story and that she had run away from him.” Her voice had regained some of its strength and resolve. “But I knew your mother, and how well she loved you and Lionel. She would never have abandoned you. That is what convinces me that only some terrible torment could have driven her to take her life and leave the two of you in Hugo’s care.”

  “You mean my father deliberately drove her to her death.”

  She rose abruptly from the divan as if she could sit still no longer. “We were never certain of it, but that is what I think all of us felt in our hearts. Ambrose—my husband—was sure enough to ban your father from the house. He told Hugo that we would not recognize him and did not wish to see him again. It sounds harsh”—she turned to gaze at me with a kind of defiance, even though her husband was well out of reach of my disapproval—“but Ambrose would never have acted so had he not excellent reason. In the family it was accepted as the most likely explanation that your father was responsible for her death.”

  My silence seemed to prick her conscience. “Should I not have told you?” she asked anxiously, drawing closer and reaching out to me. “It is a dreadful story, I know, and one that I do not relish having to tell—”

  “You did right.” I stood, gently putting her hands away from me, and made my way slowly to the door. I could feel her eyes following me, and I knew I should reassure her, but at that moment I could not spare any words for her; my mind was too wholly taken up with recovering from the series of shocks it had been dealt, and trying to rebuild what I knew to be true of my past.

  For all of my remembered life he had cast her death up to me. And now to find that not only was I without blame, but that he himself, thinking perhaps of the legacy he expected, had probably provoked her suicide.

  If it was true. It might not be. The duchess, for all her reliance on her late husband’s judgment, still had no proof but her own instinct for her theory. But from what I knew of his character I could believe him quite capable of driving my mother to take her life, baiting her in so hateful and punishing a manner that it drove her at last from him, to run to the oblivion of the waves.

  At least I knew now that she had loved me, I tried to tell myself. But the knowledge almost caused more pain than consolation: now I knew the true magnitude of my loss.

  “Are you all right?” came a voice, and I found that I had wandered unseeing out to the front terrace. I realized that I was cold, and that Charles was standing before me. He had not been at breakfast, I recalled dimly. He was regarding me with concern. I must have looked peculiar, to say the least.

  I shook my head, more to clear it than to reply. “I’ve just learned something disturbing.” Then I realized, with a jolt, that he must know the whole story; the entire family must know. “The duchess has been telling me about the family’s opinion of my mother’s death,” I said.

  “I see.” The deep voice was very quiet.

  I was glad that he did not rush to fill the awkward moment with meaningless condolences or explanations. “Will you walk a bit?” I asked. “It’s cold, and I don’t want to go in.” He offered me his arm, and we walked for a time in silence. “What I most regret is that I still have no knowledge of her,” I said at last. “It may see
m strange to you, but for me the real tragedy has not changed. My father had already robbed me of my mother, whether or not he killed her in fact.”

  There was another long silence, and I did not know whether Charles had even been paying attention. Then he said, “She was one of the loveliest women I’ve ever seen.”

  “What?”

  He was gazing into the distance, his bright eyes pensive. “Your mother. I was madly in love with her. Even though I was only six years old at the time, I still remember how I worshipped her.”

  “You knew her!” Of course he would have; I chided myself for not having realized. But how could I have known that he would remember? When I found the breath to speak, I begged, “What was she like?”

  His eyes dwelt consideringly on my face. “Very like you, in fact, although I think she was taller—but I was still so young everyone towered over me. I used to pretend she was a dryad,” he admitted, half abashed. “She looked like the spirit of a willow tree, slender, with long white hands and big, sad eyes; I realize now she can’t have been very strong. I remember her in shadow, mostly, lying on a sofa with the shades drawn because the light hurt her eyes.”

  I did not dare to speak, for fear he would stop.

  “She used to sing to you and Lionel, and I envied you that; she had a beautiful voice, very low and sweet, and she would sing you to sleep with old ballads. I’d hide outside the door to listen. When she realized I was spying she didn’t scold me, but let me sit on the hearth rug and listen.”

  We stopped walking. He gave me his handkerchief, and I held it to my eyes for a few minutes. “Thank you,” I said at last. “You’ve given me something I never had before.”

  “You truly knew nothing of her?”

  “Only that she had chosen my name.” I managed a quavery laugh. “And that was such a strange legacy. Lionel used to hector me by saying I was named after the window.”

  His laugh was a comfortable sound, something reassuringly normal after all the strangeness of the morning. “Don’t tell me you believed him? I thought you a better scholar.” When I stared at him, he shook his head at me, gently teasing. “Remember your Latin, Oriel? Your mother had a pet name for you, although you wouldn’t remember it. That is why she chose the name she did. She used to call you her golden one.”

  “Of course,” I said softly, and found myself smiling back at him. “From aureolus.” I felt like a simpleton for having failed to recognize it before, but that did not matter now. Now, after all these years of wondering, I knew something of her, something I could claim and hold to. And I knew that I had been loved.

  Suddenly a shout broke upon us. From across the lawn, in the direction where the stables lay, Herron was approaching us. He moved haltingly, and he cradled one arm as if it was injured. His face was white with what seemed equal parts pain and anger. It was he who had hailed us.

  Charles gave an exclamation. “Whatever have you done to yourself, Herron?” he said, and we hurried down the terrace steps toward him.

  “The beast threw me,” Herron said shortly. “That blasted Caesar. Tell your father he’s a miserable judge of horseflesh, Charles; that animal should be destroyed.”

  Charles was too busy testing Herron’s injury to heed him. “It looks like no more than a sprain. It should be fine once you have it bound up. Destroyed? Aren’t you overreacting, Herron? We all take a toss now and then, but there’s no reason to feel it so personally.”

  “I’ll send a servant for the doctor,” I volunteered, picking up my skirts to start for the house, but Herron stopped me.

  “No, don’t trouble; I’ll have my man bandage it for me. And then I’ll send him to shoot that horse.”

  Pushing past us, he strode up the steps into the house, and we stood looking after him in silence. We could hear him shouting for his valet.

  “Will he be all right?” I asked.

  “Oh, without a doubt,” said Charles encouragingly. “His wrist should heal completely in a few days.”

  But that was not what I had meant.

  Chapter Fourteen

  “There you are at last, child! Come in, do; there’s so much to be done. Jane, help her off with her things.”

  It was the evening of the ball, and at her request I had come to the duchess’s room to dress. The scene that greeted me halted me on the threshold. Clad only in her underclothes, the duchess commanded a flurry of activity, issuing orders as briskly as a general in battle even as Mary laced her up. Jane immediately bustled over to urge me inside the room and unfasten my dress. One of the tweenies was touching up the ruffles on the duchess’s ball gown with a hot iron, and another was sorting through a gossamer tangle of stockings.

  All the women wore the same expression of concentration mixed with excitement. While Mary and Jane tried to affect a more worldly air, as befitted their station and experience, the tweenies giggled and whispered openly over their work, and the atmosphere was festive. The air was scented with perfume, fresh flowers, and the warm smell of the iron and curling tongs.

  I surrendered myself to the ministrations of the handmaidens, for once not unwilling to let others fuss over me. After the strain of the last few days, the excitement was a welcome diversion. Herron’s coolness, my disappointment in Lord Claude, the horrifying revelation of my father’s probable involvement in my mother’s death, even the misery of being under his scrutiny once again—all were swept away now on a rising tide of anticipation, and I gladly succumbed to it.

  “It’s a shame Felicity won’t be able to join us this evening,” I said, as Jane spirited my day dress away. “She’s talked of nothing else for the past fortnight.”

  “And well I know it! Poor child, it is hard for her.”

  “Could she not come to the ball, even just for an hour? Surely it would not do any harm.” As my own spirits revived, I wanted everyone else to be happy too.

  The duchess sighed, but without disturbing her contented expression. “I could have indulged her, true, but she’s so young to be out in society, and she’ll be marrying all too soon, I fear. I can’t bear the thought of it just yet; I’d like to keep my new daughter by me a little longer.”

  I had wondered before why the duchess had not, with her cavalier disregard for inconvenient proprieties, allowed Felicity to anticipate her debut into society. I could sympathize, though, with the duchess’s wish to keep Felicity out of the marriage market as long as she could. It was all too likely that once out she would be quick to find a husband, and she did seem very young to marry. It was difficult to remember that the duchess had been no older than Felicity when she herself had first married.

  “I told her she could come and see us in all our finery, though,” she continued. “And if I know her, she will find a hiding place behind a curtain and observe the dancing as long as she can stay awake. But what of you? Are you not excited to be attending your first ball?”

  I assured her truthfully that I was, and watched with fascinated eyes as she was helped into her ball gown. It took Jane and Mary both to lift the dress over the duchess’s head and fluff the abundant skirts out over the supporting crinoline. Her gown was the delicate pink flush of the inside of a seashell, and the skirts were fashioned in layers like the petals of a flower, with frothy frilled edges at her bosom and arms, so that, with the fairness of her hair and complexion, she looked like nothing so much as a great pink rose. Indeed, her gown would have been more befitting to a girl at her first ball than for a matron of more than twenty years. But it suited her fair coloring and softly rounded figure, while I would have felt ridiculous in so girlish a dress.

  I was to wear the sea-green gown I had coveted so when I had first seen it, and I sighed with pure pleasure as the maids produced it. It was, perhaps, too mature for one my age, with its spare, simple lines, unrelieved by flounces or lace, and its bold and unusual color, but the duchess dismissed these considerations with her usual unconcern. She kept interrupting her own toilette to look after my preparations.

  �
�Is she laced properly, Jane? Remember that gown has only an eighteen-inch waist. Here, Becky”—to one of the tweenies—“these ferns are for her hair; can you pin them? Yes, that’s perfect. Now, you need jewels. Mary, have you seen my emerald parure? And my diamond combs? Here, my dear, you’ll need just the merest touch of powder…”

  The preparations were a long and painstaking process, but even the process of being laced by Mary could not dampen my spirits. True, the deep décolletage of my gown showed a great deal of my shoulders and bosom, and I was alarmed at first when I observed this, trying to pull the gown higher on my shoulders. When the duchess noticed my unease she laughed.

  “You have nothing to fret about,” she said comfortably. “You look perfectly lovely, child; did I not tell you that the dress becomes you?”

  “Are you sure—it is not too much—”

  For answer she placed her hands on my shoulders and propelled me firmly to the mirror. “None of that, now. Have a look at yourself. I declare, Herron will not be able to resist you! I will not be at all surprised if he proposes tonight.” The reflection framed us side by side like mother and daughter, as if her prediction had called up a vision of a future in which she had become my mother-in-law.

  I did present a striking contrast to the dainty, pearly-hued duchess, as I’d feared. But it was not a displeasing contrast. The duchess was right: the gown was suited to me. The blue-green satin was luminous, its color shifting like the sea under a storm-laden sky, and the tint was reflected in my eyes, which shone in a way they never had before. The huge skirts billowed out gracefully, rendering my waist almost nonexistent, and I enjoyed the sensation of the hoops as my dress bobbed and swayed around me like a great bell; I felt as though I moved in the center of an orbit of shimmering color, like a soap bubble.

  Even the low neckline was becoming. Aided by my stays, my bosom rounded out above the corsage in an undeniably feminine way; and fortunately the bruise on my shoulder had faded until it could be completely hidden by the judicious application of powder. Jane had worked her magic on my stubborn hair, coaxing it into an elaborate arrangement set about with ferns and long, springy curls that brushed my bare shoulders. From my ears dripped emeralds that quivered at the slightest motion of my head.