Kaleidoscope: A Regency Novella

by Hannah Meredith

  * * *

  This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual occurrences or persons, living or dead, is coincidental. Historical events and personages are fictionalized.

  Kaleidoscope

  Copyright © 2014 by Meredith Simmons

  All rights reserved. With the exception of brief quotes used in critical articles or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without written permission of the author.

  ISBN: 978-0-9895641-6-8

  ISBN: 978-0-9895641-7-5

  For the Men in my Life

  Bob, Rob, Michael, and Will

  May all your Patterns be Beautiful

  Advent of the Patterns 1803

  Calcutta, India

  Carolyn Howe shifted on the settee, scooting to the very edge so her dangling feet would touch the floor. Unlike her normal sari, her English clothes felt smothering and poked her in the oddest places. Assuming the role of the lady of the house and serving tea was worth any discomfort, however. This was the first time her father had asked her to fulfill these duties, and she wanted to make him proud.

  Male voices echoed in the wide hall, and then her father and his partner, Charles Rydell, came through the door. The men wore similar smiles. Mr. Rydell’s trip to England must have been successful.

  The household’s majordomo Param followed, carrying the heavy silver tea service. He placed it on the table in front of Carolyn with a bow she nearly missed, since her eyes were riveted on the box their guest held. Whenever he returned from a voyage, Mr. Rydell brought her a gift. The last had been a pin shaped like a bee. She always felt grown up when she wore it. But this box was much too large for jewelry.

  “Yes, Caro, this is for you.” Mr. Rydell grinned, making his graying side-whiskers puff out so he resembled a lion-tailed macaque. He offered the box with a flourish. She eagerly lifted the lid to reveal a shiny brass tube mounted on a stand. It looked like a navigational instrument from a ship. “Let me,” he said, lifting the device out and setting it next to the tea service on the table. “Look through here.” He pointed to one end of the tube.

  She dutifully placed an eye on the end piece and saw—exquisite beauty! A pattern of vivid colors glowed within. “I see a gorgeous mandala.” Her voice was a reverential whisper. She’d seen many of these Hindu symbols for the universe, but none of them had shimmered with light.

  “Here.” Mr. Rydell moved her hand to the far end of the cylinder. “Turn this slightly and watch what happens.”

  Carolyn did as instructed and the shape changed into something different, but still brilliantly colored and fascinating. A long “oh” sighed from her mouth, and she rotated the tube again. A new pattern, equally vivid and entrancing, filed her vision.

  Her eyes came up to meet Mr. Rydell’s amused ones. “What is this called?”

  “It’s a kaleidoscope. A Scottish inventor came up with it, and they’re all the rage in London. The name is from Greek and means something like ‘to see beautiful shapes.’”

  “How does it work?” she asked.

  “Caro…” Her father sounded a caution. Ladies weren’t supposed to be constantly curious, but she couldn’t help it. How could she learn anything if she didn’t ask? Mr. Rydell didn’t seem to think her questions were amiss. Instead, he carefully explained about reflecting mirrors and bits of colored glass and changing patterns. She didn’t fully understand what he described, but she appreciated his speaking to her as if she were an adult. Few people were willing to give a seven-year-old detailed answers.

  She looked back into the kaleidoscope and watched the forms shift into new creations, each as beautiful as the last. One that looked like a butterfly took her breath away. But her hand on the end of the tube moved slightly, and the butterfly disappeared.

  “Oh, it’s gone. How do I make it come back?”

  Mr. Rydell shook his head, his face taking on a mournful expression. “Alas, once it’s gone, the exact same shape won’t appear again. You might get something similar, but after a complex pattern has shifted, it won’t reform. Remember, you’re seeing tiny pieces of colored glass reflected in carefully aligned small mirrors. The slightest change in the position of just one of those glass pieces changes the whole.”

  Disappointment slumped her shoulders but didn’t quell her desire to see more. She leaned toward the device.

  “Caro, have your forgotten about our tea?” her father asked.

  Chagrin replaced disappointment. She had indeed forgotten her duty. She must put aside the magic for the mundane. But the kaleidoscope was hers, and she could watch the changing shapes for hours, days, even years to come. All the bright, little pieces would be waiting for her to rotate the cylinder and form breathtaking new patterns.

  Patterns for April 1825

  London

  There was no pain when the knife slipped between Luke’s ribs, just a sharp pressure. Only when his assailant moved away, extracting the blade, did the agony hit. Luke felt warm wetness on his right side, and his knees folded like a broken toy. The cobbles rushed up to meet his face. More pain, more blood, an errant thought that he’d broken his nose—a definite loss when he traded on his looks.

  Someone rolled him onto his back. Hands roamed his body, removed his pocket watch, handkerchief, the small hoard of coins inside his waistcoat. He opened his mouth to protest, but only a shallow groan emerged. His arms would not obey him. His fingers impotently rubbed the wet stone of the street.

  “Ah thought ya said ’e were a toff,” a voice said above him. “Scant pickins fer that.”

  “There’s a gold ’andled cane an’ a good ’at, that’s worth sumpin. Git the coat, if ya dinnit muck it up. Boots look fine.” A second voice, accompanied by a tugging on his carefully shined Hessians, seemed to echo from a distance.

  Luke was jerked to a sitting position. The pain intensified. His blurry vision faded to black, but he could still hear the heavy breathing as a man struggled to remove his tight fitting coat and waistcoat. When his shoulders were released, his head fell back and hit the street with a force that made lights dance before his darkened eyes.

  “Inta the river then,” the first voice said. Powerless to resist, Luke was hauled along the cobbles like a sack of refuse. There was a strange moment of suspension, and then cold water closed over his head.

  The shock roused him back to full consciousness, and he managed to move his legs enough to force his head above the lapping water. So this is death, he thought, and for so little—some well-worn clothing, a few coins, and a decent pair of boots. If the toughs had waited a few more weeks, they might have made a better haul. His one regret was that he had nothing but regrets. Dying was easier than living.

  Luke let the water take him.

  As Carolyn Rydell and her manager walked down the narrow aisles, the movement of their swinging lanterns caused shadows to careen over and around the bales and crates, making it difficult to focus, turning the mundane into something fantastic. Caro would have known where she was by smell alone, however. Only a warehouse filled with products from India would be so redolent with fragrances of frankincense, patchouli, and sandalwood.

  These were the scents of home, and she hated to leave them, even though the final entry in the bill of lading had been checked.

  “We’ve finished, Memsahib,” Sanjeet said softly, “and the hour is late.”

  “Yes, I know. I’m sorry.” Caro felt a stab of guilt that she’d kept her staff so long while she indulged herself in the scents and textures that brought her comfort. This echo of her former life temporarily kept loneliness at bay, but duty called her in t
he here and now. “Everything can go to the sales house tomorrow,” she said.

  Sanjeet’s teeth flashed brightly in his dark face. “And then the money will flow.”

  Caro smiled back at her manager. “Yes, and then all our bills can be paid.” That would be a relief. The East Indiaman Laughing Miss had been due last month, and the ship’s eventual arrival had lifted a burden from Caro’s shoulders. Building and equipping a new East Indiaman put financial stress on even the consistently lucrative Rydell Shipping. At this time, the loss of Laughing Miss, fully loaded with expensive cargo, would have been disastrous.

  Caro swept into the office to gather the rest of her retinue. Her maid Amala dozed in a chair, while the footmen, flushing with embarrassment, leaped up from a table on which sat dice and coins. The footmen provided protection; only a fool would come to the East London docks without muscle at her back.

  “We’re for home,” she said, setting everything in motion. “Peter, inform John Coachman that we’re on our way.” Her elderly coachman would also be embarrassed if he were discovered napping inside the carriage, which was undoubtedly the case.

  When she left the building, the breeze coming off the river felt almost cold, as if London was loath to throw off winter. In Calcutta, April would be hot and dusty. The heat was one aspect of her former home that Caro didn’t miss. She inhaled the cool air, not minding the smells of rot, tar, and damp, since they accompanied the beauty of the hazy moon’s reflection on the water.

  She stopped abruptly when she saw what appeared to be a body nudging against the water stairs. The white of a man’s shirt flickered in the moonlight. She pointed. “Sanjeet. There. Someone’s in the water.”

  Without further direction, the small man, trailed by two bulky footmen, hurried to the water stairs and gingerly made his way down the slippery steps.

  “Missy Caro, a body in the river should stay there,” Amala said, her eyes huge.

  “This is not the Ganges,” Caro replied. “This is not a burial, but more likely murder or misadventure.” She watched as her men dragged the body from the water onto the stair landing.

  Sanjeet, kneeling next to the drowned man, called up to her, “He’s still alive.”

  “Bring him,” Caro called back.

  “Forever you bring home injured pye-dogs,” Amala grumbled. “Have you not learned that they will bite?”

  “This is a man and not a feral dog,” Caro said. “I think my hands will be safe.

  Lord Lucien Harlington realized he was in hell. His arrival had long been predicted. Flames licked his body while demons, conversing in unknown tongues, poked and prodded at him, bringing breath-stealing pain.

  Curious as always, he tried to open his eyes to see the horror that his choices in life had wrought. His body would not follow his commands, however. Perhaps part of hell’s torments was that his questing mind would forever be without answers. He struggled against this constriction but was unsuccessful, until suddenly everything faded away again.

  The next time Luke became conscious, he felt much cooler and was pleased to discover that his eyes now worked. He could see a canopy above him. A canopy? What was a ruffled canopy doing in hell? Was this a reminder that hell was his punishment for gazing up at too many different ladies’ bed canopies in the past?

  Then a face appeared in his view—a beautiful face with sharp cheekbones and dark, vaguely tilted eyes. “Houri,” he said, reaching for her. He must have been whisked to the Muslim’s heaven. How odd. He was familiar with the basic tenets from his study at university, but he definitely wasn’t a believer. He didn’t understand his good fortune, but the reward that any religion offered was better than the alternative. He wanted to ask the breathtaking woman how this had happened, but darkness again descended.

  Caro watched the unknown man slide into unconsciousness, confident it wasn’t a precursor to death now that his fever had broken. The doctor had been right. Her inadvertent guest was now on the mend. His breathing was that of normal sleep.

  “Pye-dog,” Amala said at her shoulder. “I knew he would show himself to be a misbegotten cur. After saving him, he calls you a whore.”

  Caro smiled. Amala had been her defender since she was a child. “No, he said houri. I think he imagines that I’m something like an Islamic angel. Not a bad thing to be compared to.”

  But she suspected if there were an angel in the room, it was more probably the man on the bed. Even his battered face—the nose still swollen and the bruises now fading to a bilious yellow—could not detract from his underlying male beauty. And it was beauty more than standard handsomeness, despite his seeming to have dropped a half a stone in weight during his illness.

  The sleeping man could have been the model for a sculptor, his proportions were so balanced and pleasing. Corded muscle defined his chest and abdomen. Broad shoulders tapered to a narrow waist. His legs were long and straight, his thighs powerful. And what lay between his thighs.…Caro had been married for eight years but hadn’t seen her husband’s naked body until his last illness. Neither her husband Charles nor the Indian boys swimming in the river had prepared her for what she’d observed.

  After the blood had been washed out, the injured man’s hair was sandy blond, soft and silky. His eyebrows were a shade darker, as were the scattering of hairs across his chest and the surprisingly heavy beard that had formed in the past six days. His eyes, when open, were a deep blue. When closed, thick, tawny lashes lay on his bruised cheeks.

  Since she’d insisted on doing the bulk of the nursing duties, Caro knew the man intimately. She knew nothing about him, however.

  He carried no identification, but his shirt and trousers were of good quality. He had been beaten, stabbed, and doubtlessly robbed. No one had posted a notice for a missing person who resembled him. When notified, the constable had simply shrugged and said he was not his problem unless he died.

  And so, her patient remained an enigma. Perhaps this was the reason Caro found the man so fascinating. She spent more hours than necessary watching him sleep. Her excuse was the beef tea she was prepared to pour in his mouth every time he showed a glimmer of consciousness. A rather weak excuse, she though with a smile.

  “Missy Caro,” Amala broke her reverie, “Perkins says that Lord Kelton has called. He’s in the drawing room.”

  Caro stifled a groan. Meetings with her late husband’s nephew always irritated her. She wondered what his present complaint would be.

  Water trickled between his lips—delicious, sweet water. He sucked at the wondrous elixir and opened his eyes. A hand and face jerked back from him, spilling the liquid on his chest. He followed the movement and focused on a woman. Not the houri he remembered. This woman was darker, older.

  “Where? What?” he croaked.

  The older woman looked surprised. “I’ll get Missy Caro,” she said in a soft, lilting voice, and withdrew from the room.

  Left alone, Luke took stock of his situation. He was obviously not dead. He lay in a large bedchamber. Although the room had feminine touches, it lacked the personal accoutrements that he associated with a lady’s bedchamber. A guest room, perhaps? Sunlight streamed through the windows, so he had been unconscious for the past half day.

  He remembered walking toward the gambling hell where he was to meet Tremaine around one in the morning. He remembered being attacked. And then his memory became muddled.

  A bandage tightly wrapped his torso, but the pain in his side was slight compared to the pounding in his head. He felt weak and lethargic, but since he was aware, he must be getting better.

  The door opened, and the beautiful woman entered with the older one following closely behind. The younger woman smiled, making him feel that he was truly alive. “How do you feel?” she asked.

  “Like I might live.” His voice sounded rusty and worn. “Where am I? How did I get here?”

  The woman sat in a chair next to the bed and took his hand in hers. It felt familiar and comfortable, a memory or a dream. “We
found you in the water near the East India docks and brought you here, to my house. I’m Carolyn Rydell. And you are?”

  “Luke Harlington,” he said, purposely leaving off his courtesy title. He’d never seen this exquisite woman before. He would surely have remembered if he had, and he was, therefore, confident that she didn’t travel in the upper level of society.

  He’d heard the older woman call Carolyn Rydell “Missy Caro,” so she was evidently unmarried. For this reason, as well as her startling, slightly exotic looks, and the quality of the furnishings of the room in which he lay, Luke imagined that Carolyn Rydell was some lucky man’s expensive and much cherished mistress.

  There was no reason to make such a woman uncomfortable knowing that she had rescued the Marquess of Greyling’s youngest son. He also didn’t want her running to his estranged father with his whereabouts.

  As if she’d read his mind, she asked, “Is there anyone we should notify, Mr. Harlington? Someone who would be concerned about your disappearance?”

  “There’s no one who will have missed me, but since I’m here, it can’t be said that I’ve disappeared.” He tried to deflect her concern with humor, although it was weak humor, at best. He attempted a winning smile, but his face felt stiff and unresponsive. He raised a hand to his cheek, only to discover he’d grown a short beard. My God, how long had he been here?

  “When was I found?” he asked.

  “It will be a week tomorrow.”

  Heavens, so long! Tremaine would have assumed that Luke had changed his mind and wasn’t interested in looking for the stolen gems any longer. As much as the man traveled, Tremaine might have even left London.

  A knock at the door brought Carolyn’s head around, but the older woman answered it. After a brief, indistinct discussion, she came up to Carolyn and said, “Lord Kelton is very disturbed by your absence and requests that you return to the drawing room.”