Once Upon a Time

by Marylyle Rogers

  "The tests are complete but I've still a substantial number of reports to write." Garnet's answer was prompt and concise but hardly forthcoming.

  "So you really have found more instances of serious tampering with our country's foodstuffs and our health?" As Lord Farley spoke for the first time, keen interest burned in his eyes.

  Amy, too, was intrigued by the issue although men, her brother and father included, tended to believe such matters outside a woman's interest and far beyond her ability to understand. But then it was the discounting of feminine presence that months before had allowed Amy to intently listen while her father told his son how, three decades earlier, he'd read Dr. Accun's treatise, Adulterations of Food and Culinary Poisons, and been appalled. No doubt that report was responsible for the older man's fascination with Garnet's current role (by social necessity behind the scenes) in further exposing these scandalous wrongs.

  "Oh, yes, indeed." Garnet was plainly gratified that his own enthusiasm for the task roused the interest of at least one parent. "In many instances such falsifications act like a slow poison while in a few others they bring the threat of quick death."

  Amy smiled. Garnet's fondness for her and longstanding interest in the sciences had prompted him to lead his youngest sister down its path of exciting discoveries. She was as tantalized by the promise of new discoveries as he and as anxious to learn more. However, as a woman—a wellborn woman— she was unlikely to have any such opportunity… a fact increasing her pleasure in Garnet's unswerving pursuit of scientific knowledge.

  While Garnet had been pleased and a little flattered by his former tutor's request for assistance in a massive task, Amy had been thrilled for him. Under the direction of two medical doctors appointed by Thomas Wakely, editor of the medical journal, Lancet, her brother and other scientists had begun testing all manner of foodstuffs from around the country. She knew their results were consistently published in that erudite journal read by only the learned few—and certainly no copy had ever appeared in a Wyfirth home. But then recently the magazine Punch had taken up the cause, and with its biting wit exposed such wrongs to the masses—even to overprotected Society ladies.

  "Milk is routinely whitened with chalk to hide how heavily it's been diluted with water." Galled by these deceptions, Garnet's gray eyes glowed. "We found alum used for whiteness in every loaf of bread we tested from bakeries all over London. And often boiled potatoes were added to increase their weight."

  During a pause thick with Garnet's disgust for these actions, Lord Farley met his son's serious gaze in silent accord. Lips firmly pressed together, he nodded encouragement for the younger man to continue.

  "All too many sweets are brightly colored by salts of copper and lead—deadly poisons." With the fervor of a revivalist minister, Garnet listed additional wrongs. "Chocolate is enriched with brick dust. And often grocers sell teas containing only a small amount of real tea mixed with roasted leaves of sloe, ash or elder and a dash of verdigris for the right color. Much the same happens with what they call British Coffee which is merely ground beans, peas, grains of sand and—"

  "That is quite enough!" Again Lady Cornelia's sharp voice cut across an animated table conversation. Here in Garnet's words lay the second peril endangering her efforts to elevate their family into Britain's highest social level.

  "Coarse work for wages is never a proper subject for people of our class." She paused long enough to be certain her penetrating glare had truly pinned Garnet. "But far less acceptable are the unpleasant details in which you seem to revel. It is improper of you to subject three ladies to this talk of the fraud wickedly perpetrated against all good folk. But it's most unsavory to have this subject discussed while we breakfast!"

  "I'm sorry, Mother," Garnet dutifully apologized.

  The remorseful words left Amy struggling to restrain a wicked imp urging her to ask for which meal their mother would find the subject more acceptable.

  An uncomfortable silence returned, and several unnaturally long minutes passed while the only sounds to be heard were the ting of silver utensils lightly brushing china and crystal.

  Lady Cornelia knew she was the cause of renewed strain but refused to repent. Money had tempted Garnet into selling his time and conducting tests. That fact reinforced her firm belief that money was too sordid to bear thinking about let alone lowering oneself to seek. No, it was property which made people who they were and placed them in a privileged position. Clearly it was her husband's lands and her own heritage that placed their family on a higher plane than the common rabble. And that was the all-important fact their son and heir must not be allowed to forget.

  "Aye, well, at least you had some good news to report, as well, heh?" Lord Farley made a futile attempt to smooth over the awkward lapse in conversation. "Orville tells us you've given his farms a clean report."

  Garnet nodded but his already solemn face went cold.

  Lovey joined her father-in-law's crusade by leaning nearer to her handsome husband and enthusing, "And your work will see us into our very own home."

  "Soon." Smiling into his wife's pretty face, Garnet's tension eased. "Very soon we'll begin looking for a worthy house." Although flighty and an unrepentant coquette, Lovey was the ray of sunshine lighting the long, dull gray parade of his days. And to give her the home she wanted, Garnet would willingly do almost anything.

  "I still cannot understand why you, as Wyfirth heir, are so intent on living anywhere but in the Wyfirth town house." It was an objection Lady Cornelia had made often before and yet never hesitated to restate.

  Having given their reasons nearly as many times, Garnet and Louvisa merely exchanged a glance of loving amusement.

  Amy understood Lovey's wish to escape her in-laws' control and move into a house decorated to her tastes, managed by her own rules. And though Amy loved her parents, despite their foibles, she wished the same could be an option for her without having to pay the price of accepting Orville as mate.

  No one risked saying more than a few mundane words through the blessedly short remainder of the meal. At its close, Lord Farley left for the House of Lords while Garnet mumbled something about returning to his lab and tackling unfinished reports. The three women retreated to the back parlor to answer invitations and write the many letters expected of wellborn females.

  Chapter 4

  "But surely she's more likely to be pleased with ribbons she selects herself?" Beattie hustled to keep pace with her lambie, striving again to convince the girl that this unwelcome task should rightly be left to her sister-in-law.

  "Lovey will need them tonight but can't go out for them today." The plume on Amy's bonnet fluttered as she led the way past shops lining London's most fashionable shopping district. "She promised her afternoon to aid in Lady Ophelia's charity work."

  "They why, pray tell, didn't you take her place in toiling for charity—freeing Lovey to collect her own ribbons?" Beattie was less than pleased by the morning's duty. "After all, Lovey thrives on traipsing through shops, pawing through mounds of choices to find just exactly what she wants… the very thing you least enjoy."

  "Ah…" Amy sent her maid a grin. "But then I'm not striving to impress Lady Ophelia. Lovey is."

  "Tch, tch." Disapproval compressed Beattie's lips.

  Before Amy could respond the subdued atmosphere of the refined shopping area was shattered by a desperate, piercing scream.

  The well-dressed crowd froze and above the vee formed by the meeting of two ladies' crinoline-widened skirts, Amy had a clear view of the terrified lad who'd tumbled into the roadway just in front of two horses drawing an elegant carriage.

  In the next impossibly brief instant a bright haze flashed across the scene, and a golden, devastatingly handsome man lowered the boy safely to his grateful mother's side.

  "Comlan—" The name barely squeaked from Amy's throat but drew his immediate attention and earned a brilliant smile no less potent for its wry twist.

  "Who?" A frowning Beattie do
urly asked.

  While the boy's savior climbed immediately through an open door into the still-moving carriage, Amy's gaze remained fixed on him.

  "Who was that?" Beattie demanded, shifting her attention from passing carriage to the mistress whose rapt expression showed her too stunned by the incident to answer a simple question.

  "That…" Amy finally spoke as the carriage rounded a corner and disappeared, "was Lord Comlan of Doncaully—the man I told you about."

  "In the carriage?" Beattie had already recognized the name of Amy's Irish lord and the lingering admiration on the girl's face intensified her uneasiness.

  "Yes." Amy nodded and gave her lifelong friend a reassuring smile. "Both in the carriage and rescuing the boy."

  "Tch, tch." Beattie's disgruntled frown deepened. She wanted to condemn Amy's foolish claim that the man had been in both places but… Much as she'd like to deny it, if forced, she'd have had to admit that the face of the man who'd saved the boy appeared to be the same one she'd glimpsed inside a rapidly departing carriage.

  While Amy was both amazed and warmly impressed that her fantasy hero had used his remarkable powers to save a human child, Comlan sat in the coach more than a little annoyed with the whole scene. He didn't regret rescuing the boy but he deeply resented the mess that action had made of his plans.

  From farther down Ealsingham Court, unnoticed but with a clear view of Wyfirth House, inside the carriage whose reins Dooley held he'd waited and watched to see the dark colleen depart. She had and he'd followed, intending to arrange an "accidental" meeting where he could open the subject he'd come to see settled. And hopefully with haste enough for him to soon return to his own realm. Yes, escape the human world with sufficient speed to elude the dark beauty's likely unintentional enticements. He'd failed… this time.

  "So, there you are… at long last."

  Squinting against bright sunlight, Garnet glanced up to find an irritable Orville impatiently waiting within the shadows beside the door of a small structure housing laboratory facilities leased to the Lancet. It was the fact that this was an unfashionable yet respectable area of the City which provided Garnet with hope of keeping his socially unacceptable association with the journal a secret.

  Having already settled with the hansom cab which had delivered him here, Garnet took time to wave it off down the cobbled street while gathering his thoughts and pondering his next step. He then leisurely moved to unlock the door and motion his visitor into a room lined with shelves, some crowded with thick leather-bound volumes, others lined with rows of glass jars and bottles. A table in the center of the room held even more bottles along with a complicated arrangement of glass tubing. On either side of the desk against one wall was a variety of notebooks while in the middle was a neat stack of papers covered with tight handwritten lines.

  Garnet waited for his uninvited guest to enter and turned to face him before issuing a chill response to the man's initial comment. "Do consider your wait simply a minor part of the price owed."

  Expecting Orville's irritation to be greatly aggravated by this statement, Garnet was more than a little disturbed by the wide grin with which the man greeted this reminder of a continuing debt.

  "Your price is already too high." The lack of heat in Orville's words made it clear that they offered no more than a perfunctory rebuttal. As recent events provided so much reason to expect future success for his scheme to recoup all losses, Orville was able to hand the other man a flat, tightly packed envelope without the slightest visible twinge of resentment.

  "Not as high as it is now." Disgust for the overbearing man deepening each time he saw his face, Garnet took pleasure in announcing this assuredly unwelcome increase.

  "What are you saying?" Smile struck from Orville's face by fear of discovery, he glowered at the dark-haired man. "Have we been exposed?"

  "Not yet." Garnet's gray eyes hardened to granite while his hands slowly curled into fists. "But you soon may be."

  Several tense moments of silence passed while Orville steadily returned the gray glare.

  At length, although clenched hands tightened, Garnet reluctantly yielded to the demand in this wordless pause by flatly stating, "You can avoid that peril by abandoning the pursuit of my sister."

  "Oh, come now, old boy." Orville's lips took on an unsavory upward curl, more sneer than smile. "Betray me and I'll see to it that you've betrayed yourself. And to what purpose?"

  Garnet stiffened, glaring at his disagreeable, muttonchopped cohort.

  Pleased with the dark man's response, Orville's heavy features resettled into a feigned expression of injured sensibilities while in a too mild voice he added, "So long as—one way or the other—you receive the income you seek, you've no justifiable reason to object."

  "But I do most heartily object!" Garnet heatedly responded, taking a threatening step forward be-fore reason prevailed and forced him to an abrupt halt.

  Orville nonchalantly shrugged. He had no intention of ending his courtship of Amethyst. Indeed, he'd only just taken the first steps to see a possible threat neutralized. Unholy glee deepened the contempt in his smile as he turned to depart.

  Chapter 5

  Amy followed her mother's example in accepting their footman's aid in stepping down from the family carriage while Lovey slid to the edge of her seat, preparing to repeat the action. Making room for her sister-in-law's descent by moving aside, Amy peeked up from beneath her primrose bonnet's brim, stylishly short but not shockingly so. The afternoon of Lady's Delwyn's garden party had been blessed with a blue sky marred by only a very few fleecy clouds.

  "Amethyst," Lady Cornelia softly remonstrated her daughter in a cold tone at variance with the feigned warmth of her smile. "Use your parasol, if you please."

  Amy could see no good use in yet another barrier between her face and the sun, but that fact was not sufficient excuse nor was this the place to defy her mother's dread of a sun-darkened complexion. Obediently unfurling her dainty, lace embellished parasol, she trailed her mother down a laid-brick path marked every few feet with an extravagant satin bow. It led to the back of their hosts' imposing home where they paused at the gathering's outer edge.

  Amy scanned gardens amazingly spacious for the grounds of a town house. There were bright beds of daffodils and tulips surrounded by low-growing vegetation. And lined against the deep green wall of the small but famous Delwyn maze's outermost hedge were tubs of summer roses forced into early bloom brought from the conservatory for the afternoon. A large number of guests were already chatting in small groups, selecting refreshments from an abundant array, or relaxing on the few pieces of wicker furniture scattered across immaculately manicured lawns.

  Eyes caught by the glow of sunlight reflected by a golden head, Amy silently gasped as its possessor turned toward her.

  The shy smile instantly appearing on the dark damsel's winsome, heart-shaped face held such spontaneous warmth that it knocked the self-assured Comlan off stride as little had in a very long time.

  "Amy!" Again Lady Cornelia sharply and more firmly demanded her daughter's attention. Her patience was sorely strained by the girl abruptly gone still as if, like Lot's wife, transformed to an inanimate pillar by some unfortunate vision. Her gaze followed the direction of Amethyst's to meet an even more distressing sight: the Irish lord casting his sinfully charming smile at her susceptible daughter. It seemed to confirm Cornelia's many fears and left her determined to caution Amy as soon as possible against the dangers handsome rakes posed to a woman's all-important maidenly virtue.

  "Lady Cornelia…" A woman of imposing dimensions sailed toward the new arrivals with amazing grace for one of her size. "How kind of you to come and bring your lovely daughters as well."

  Amy was both relieved and disappointed when their hostess's welcome smoothly broke her exciting visual bond with the man who for several days she'd hoped to see but hadn't. The Season had begun less than a week past but already Lord Comlan had become its most sought-after bachelor.
Thus for any given time he must have a wide variety of events from which to choose, and she'd begun to despair for her plan to talk with him privately.

  "Thank you for the invitation, Lady Delwyn." Amy added her greeting to those given by her two companions, careful to show the reticence proper in a debutante—even one entering her fourth Season and near to being labeled "on the shelf." In the next instant, sight of the rapidly approaching Orville intensified her preference for spinster-hood. Yes, she'd rather remain unmarried than wed him despite having been taught, as were all well-bred females, to regard that condition as a heavy cross of humiliating failure to be humbly borne for the rest of one's joyless life.

  While her mother and Lovey accompanied Lady Delwyn to the refreshment table with its huge punch bowl and wide variety of delicacies, Orville blocked the parasol-clutching Amy's path.

  "I am so glad to see you here, Amethyst." Orville claimed her free white-gloved fingers with both of his hands. "I was disappointed not to find you at the Wareham's rout last evening."

  "Garnet particularly requested that we join him and Lou visa at the Selwyndes' dinner party," Amy politely murmured, careful not to betray either how warmly she'd welcomed the excuse to avoid him or her regret for the lost opportunity to warn Comlan of Orville's threat. A well-trained conscience reproved Amy for the indelicate familiarity in even thinking of the Irish lord by his given name. Hoping Orville wouldn't notice the hint of color caused by her lapse, she continued.

  "My father was anxious to hear Sir David's thoughts on the Don Pacifico Affair—a subject to be raised in the House of Lords this week. I believe he is unhappy that the fleet is being recalled from its blockade of the harbor at Perancus." She gave her unappreciated companion a bland smile. "And that's why we were with the Selwyndes while you were at the rout."