Romancing the Past

by Darcy Burke

  “Under the circumstances, that’s probably for the best,” said Julian.

  “Well.” Honoria cleared her throat. “I thought—and my stepmama thought—that we should host a small gathering afterward. Very quiet, respectful. Only it wouldn’t be the thing for either of us to be issuing invitations just now. But if you did it—”

  Then some of the scorn that would have fallen on Honoria would accrue to him instead. A fine way to announce his return to Derbyshire. “You’re asking me to host your wedding breakfast?”

  “We’ll take care of all the details,” Honoria assured him.

  Julian let that sink in. “The invitations have already been sent, haven’t they?”

  Honoria refused to meet his eyes.

  “That’s what I thought.” He pictured Honoria’s flower arrangement, with each bloom as a different species of bad decision: crass, thoughtless, awkward. She was working up quite an elaborate bouquet.

  “We’ve only asked a few close friends,” she said. “People who will understand.”

  “I’m not here to make you act in good taste, Honoria.”

  Her little rosebud mouth fell open.

  “Let me know if you need anything else,” Julian said wryly, and left Honoria to her flowers.

  He paused at the next room down, High Bend’s grand study. Huge wooden beams striped the ceiling overhead. A fireplace took up most of one wall, matched in size to the huge desk positioned opposite, with several clusters of chairs and sofas filling the space between. Clive had died in this room, but the servants had wiped away all traces of his passing. The floors had been swept and polished, the furniture set to rights.

  Everyone, it seemed, was ready to move on. Clive’s widow had already sought comfort in the arms of another man. His child couldn’t wait to marry a forbidden suitor.

  Sophie was the only person he’d met who seemed to actually miss Clive the Ninth.

  Good God, what if she’d been telling the truth? Everybody he’d met had a reason to want the man dead. Sophie had a motive, but was her lust for money stronger than the Dowager Duchess’s… lust? Or Lady Honoria’s love? What if Frogger had arranged it, hoping Sophie would drop right into his lap, weighted down with her new dowry? Or if Peter Roe had decided to clear away the obstacle in the way of a highly advantageous marriage?

  Julian squeezed his eyes shut. His throat tightened, his stomach knotted. Hope. How he hated it.

  Chapter 5

  At dawn the next morning, Sophie descended to Broadstone Cottage’s kitchen. Beyond a quick, “Good morning, Miss,” Cook paid no mind to the intrusion—she had breakfast to prepare. Sophie snatched up a roll and tore a pocket into its side, filled it with butter and treacle, and ate with relish as she made her way on foot to Padley.

  She dipped into the bowl-shaped vale just as the pale sun cleared the ragged peaks to the east, and found Iron & Wine’s door unlocked and Max Dawe already hard at work inside.

  “Mr. Dawe,” she said. “I need to speak with you and your sister. Will you join her?”

  She filled a purse with coins from the safe and joined the Dawe siblings in Charlotte’s cramped workshop. Sophie had furnished the room with three chairs, plain sturdy wood, but she stood in the doorway so she could observe both Charlotte and Max’s reactions to her announcement.

  “Ever since Charlotte started making nibs, I’ve been thinking about how to produce more of them,” Sophie began. “Even locally, in Padley, more people want to buy her pens than she has pens to sell.”

  Charlotte and Max nodded. This was a familiar problem, the sort they discussed without much urgency over tea. Charlotte had learned to make nibs, and enough people bought them that Sophie had set her up in a workshop, but Charlotte was only one person.

  “The solution is obvious, really. Charlotte would have to train other people to make nibs according to her specifications. I’ve wanted to try this for some time now, but the project has always been too ambitious for my means.” Sophie clasped her hands behind her back. “My circumstances have changed, as you know. So now I bring the question to you.”

  “I don’t understand, Miss Roe,” said Max. “You tell us what to do, and we do it.”

  “I’m sure I could train up a few craftsmen, if they had nimble fingers.” Charlotte ducked her head. “If they’d listen to a woman, anyhow.”

  “We’ll hire women,” Sophie said firmly. “Women who can sew. We’ll ask them to bring samples.”

  Max whistled low. Charlotte, her eyes huge and brimming with hope, peeked up.

  “That’s the secret, I think,” Sophie added. “Nimble fingers used to nimble work. And I know Charlotte would make a capable overseer. Especially if you remain with us, Mr. Dawe, in your administrative capacity.”

  Max tugged the lapels of his jacket.

  Charlotte firmed her shoulders. She hadn’t her brother’s confidence, but she ought to. She made the most exquisite nibs. The best Sophie had ever used, and she understood them as only an artist—or a forger—could. How a good stiff nib could shore up a lazy hand, and how the tines on a sweet writer would spread and narrow at the lightest pressure, making the pen as responsive as a painter’s brush. Those were the nibs Sophie favored; they made anything possible.

  Charlotte turned them out like biscuits.

  “This new enterprise would constitute, as you can imagine, a significant promotion for each of you,” Sophie added.

  “Now I hear it coming.” Max crossed his arms over his chest. “Where’s the trap?”

  “An expansion of this nature…” Sophie hesitated. “It’s a chance to take a fresh look at the business and where I want Iron & Wine to be in five years or ten. Padley is small and isolated. It would be easier to procure necessary supplies—and easier for our products to reach our customers—if we moved to a city. To Derby.”

  Max and Charlotte exchanged a long, considering look. Their family might not object if Max announced that he wanted to move to the city for work—but Charlotte? That wouldn’t sit with them so easily.

  “I’d like the pair of you to visit Derby to seek out an appropriate factory space. Something about the size of the smelting works on Littlemoor. Take the time to think about whether or not you can commit yourselves to such a move. I know neither of you would wish to leave home, and I don’t ask it of you lightly.”

  “You want us to pick out a factory?” Max asked. “For ladies to make nibs in?”

  “Precisely.” Sophie nodded. “You’ll have a good sense of appropriate costs and negotiation tactics, Mr. Dawe. And Miss Dawe should see the spaces, to decide whether or not they’ll suit. I fancy we’ll start with eight to ten women. Keep in mind that I’ll still need a workshop for my ink-making, and space to build a new hothouse.”

  Charlotte snatched up a fresh sheet of paper and a plain, steel-nibbed pen. She murmured, “The size of the smelting works on Littlemoor,” under her breath as she scribbled. “Workshop space.”

  Sophie added, “If you find a likely candidate, I will travel to Derby to make the final decision—perhaps next month? Earlier, if time is of the essence.”

  “Next month?” Max’s eyebrows climbed halfway up his forehead. “That’s right around the corner. When do you want us to leave?”

  “Today. As soon as possible.” Sophie handed Max the purse. “This should cover your expenses. You’ll be away from home for several nights, at least.”

  Max took the coin. “Thank you for trusting us.”

  “You’ve earned it, Mr. Dawe.” She smiled at Charlotte, who blushed. “Both of you have.”

  The Dawes cleared out and Sophie rolled up her sleeves to work. Empty, the cottage provided more peace and quiet than she could enjoy. She avoided her more contemplative tasks, focusing instead on keeping busy. She bottled an astonishing quantity of ink that day, and the next, and the day after, too.

  She saw Julian at church on Sunday, sitting with the Dowager Duchess and Lady Honoria in their family pew. After the service, the locals swa
rmed him. He looked like a hothouse lily among wildflowers, silver sunlight gleaming on his gilt hair, but he had a kind word for everyone.

  False, Sophie reminded herself, touching her scar. All false.

  She left without acknowledging the new duke, but found herself idling with her aunt and uncle in the churchyard while Peter stole away to take a turn with Lady Honoria. The pair of them ambled along at such a leisurely pace that Julian reached the church door, and spotted her, before they’d returned.

  He greeted her aunt and uncle warmly, which made both of them glow.

  “You’ll have to come see all the little changes we’ve made at Broadstone Cottage,” said Aunt Jenny. “Ten years is a long time!”

  “I’d be delighted.” Julian beamed at Jenny. “So long as you’ll grant me the privilege of walking Miss Roe home from Church.”

  “That wouldn’t be proper,” Sophie protested.

  “We’ll go with you,” volunteered Peter, still arm-in-arm with Lady Honoria. She wore deepest mourning, a bonnet of black lace framing the pale ringlets that bounced on her cheeks. “Lady Honoria and I. The ladies can chaperone one another.”

  Sophie began to frame an excuse of some kind—bunions?—but Honoria snatched up her hand and pleaded, “Whatever ails you, Miss Roe, a brisk walk and a bit of good company will surely cure it.”

  Sophie looked at Honoria’s red-rimmed eyes and sighed. “A walk it shall be.”

  “We should warn Cook,” said Jenny, shooing Malcolm into the carriage.

  “Not the road, I think,” said Peter, after they had filed out of the church gate. “My poor cousin must be sick of it, walking back and forth every day.”

  “I don’t mind—” Sophie tried to interrupt.

  “We could cut across Sparrowtop,” Peter finished.

  “It’s much longer that way,” Sophie said.

  Lady Honoria clapped her hands and rose up on tiptoe. “But I love the views on Sparrowtop!”

  “The weather might not hold,” Sophie cautioned.

  “Then we should stop dallying,” said Julian.

  Peter leaned close and dropped his voice. “It’s been a hard time for Lady Honoria. A little excursion will cheer her.”

  “You’re right, of course.” Sophie glanced at the younger girl. Her delicate shoulders had shaken with silent sobs for all to see when the vicar—tastelessly, in Sophie’s opinion—dwelt during his sermon on the terrors of hell. “Lead on.”

  They cut through the narrow side streets, unpaved dirt tracks barely wide enough for two donkeys to pass one another, toward the river. Julian fell into place at her side and, silently, they let Peter and Lady Honoria gain a few paces of distance, creating twin bubbles of privacy.

  “You must want something,” said Sophie.

  “Suspicion is a sign of guilt, you know.” He clasped his hands at his back, shaping the billowing furl of his cloak to the trim diameter of his hips.

  “Or mistrust,” Sophie replied placidly, trying to keep her attention on the road.

  “Or mistrust,” he agreed. “Do you still have your honey with you?”

  Sophie pulled the bottle from where she’d tucked it into her waistband, still dangling on its silver chain. The honey gleamed golden brown through the glass. “I always do.”

  They crossed the rope bridge over the river and tramped through a belt of marshland, mud sucking at their feet, before entering a flower-strewn meadow that sloped gently upward into the foothills. Walking kept Sophie warm despite the chill, and the sun shone blindingly bright in a sky swimming with clouds.

  When the path widened enough for two to walk side by side, Julian slowed until Sophie had caught up. Ahead of them, Peter wrapped his arm around Lady Honoria’s shoulders and she an arm around his waist. An awkward embrace on the uneven path, their bodies jouncing with every step, but they held on.

  The silence between Sophie and Julian grew heavier, less companionable.

  “I don’t remember that you shared a special bond with Clive the Ninth in the years before he inherited the dukedom,” Julian said finally.

  “I didn’t,” replied Sophie. “It could hardly have been otherwise. I was a child.”

  “You were eighteen when I left,” he corrected her. “Long past childhood.”

  “Compared to him, though…” Sophie shrugged. “I knew him a little, of course. He was a friend of my uncle’s, and a trustee of my parents’ estate. But Iron & Wine made us close. After you’d gone I couldn’t brew my ink in the High Bend distillery any longer. Once my uncle discovered I was selling the ink I made, he wouldn’t let me brew at Broadstone Cottage, either. I had a little bit of money left—not much, you know, just a very little—but none of the landlords in Padley would offer me a lease. They preferred anyone else, so long as the tenant was male.”

  “Clive turned out to be the exception?” Julian asked.

  Sophie nodded. “I had to speak to him about approving the funds to rent a shop anyhow, so he followed along with my travails. He knew every time my hopes were dashed, and when he became the Duke of Clive a few years later, one of the first things he did was offer me the cottage on Halftail Road.”

  “So I hold the lease now?”

  “For another two months.”

  “And then?”

  Sophie shrugged.

  Ahead of them, Peter and Lady Honoria’s heads bent together as though magnetized. Peter pressed a gentle kiss on Lady Honoria’s hair; she nuzzled his cheek.

  “Are you worried that I’ll oust your business from its home?” Julian snapped. “Why would I do that?”

  “You’ve accused me of murder.” Sophie folded her arms tightly beneath her breasts. “Why would I expect anything else?”

  “I made a logical deduction. A forged suicide note points to foul play. You must see that.”

  “Do you know what I saw, Julian?” Sophie stopped short, squeezing her arms even tighter. He slowed and turned, his cloak furling out behind. “I saw a man who was very dear to me die.”

  “A man resigned to death?” Julian asked.

  Sophie glared. “I don’t understand why you must pick apart his last moments. If there is any mystery in them, he didn’t wish us to unravel it.”

  “I want to believe you, Sophie.” He took a step closer. “I do. But I benefited from his death, and that gives me a choice. I can find out what really happened, or I can become an accomplice. The same goes for you. If you cared about Clive the Ninth, you’d help me.”

  Sophie closed her eyes and tried to hear the old duke’s voice again. I know what I am doing and I will not apologize. Julian was wrong. Clive wouldn’t have thanked him for prying.

  “No good will come of this,” she said simply.

  “Of doing the right thing?”

  Sophie hesitated. “How can it be right if it’s not what he wanted?”

  “Look west!” Peter cried, pointing.

  Julian tipped his hat away from his forehead and squinted. “The clouds have gone gray.”

  Sophie scanned the sky. Afternoon rains coming, right on time. “We should hurry.”

  They picked up their pace, arms swinging and breath coming faster, all the way to the summit. Harsh weather and high winds had scoured the hilltop raw, a bald patch fringed by sturdy grasses and sparse, stunted trees. Behind, cotton-fluff clouds swam in a raw blue sky. Ahead, a blanket of cloud drowned the sunlight and a blur along the horizon marked a curtain of advancing rain.

  Lady Honoria clapped a hand over her bonnet, her skirt belling out in front of her, and laughed wildly. “We’ll be soaked!”

  Peter edged closer to his fiancée. “Stay close to me.”

  Sophie resisted the urge to glance at Julian. Instead, she snatched her bonnet off her head, tugged the bow loose from under her chin, and wound her fingers round the ribbon.

  “Let’s race!” she cried, and bounded down the descending trail.

  She lifted her skirts clear of her ankles and skip-jogged along the path. She trusted her n
imble feet to find safe purchase and let gravity propel her onward, at a speed quickly grew frightening. The buffeting wind held her upright, like a helping hand.

  Until a strong arm wrapped around her waist, jerking her to a halt. Sophie thrashed against the steely wall of Julian’s chest until he let go.

  “Are you mad?” Julian shouted. “Taking off like that? You could break your neck!”

  Behind him, higher up the hill, Peter and Lady Honoria descended sedately, hand in hand. So. No race then. Sophie turned around and continued the descent, walking this time.

  “Sophie!” Julian grabbed her upper arm.

  She shook him off, violently. “Don’t you touch me, Julian,” she seethed. “Don’t you dare.”

  “Why?” He spread his arms wide, wind-whipped, braced as though he faced a firing squad. He the martyr bravely facing death, she the cold, black-eyed barrel of a gun. “What did I do to make you hate me?”

  Sophie gaped.

  “Don’t I deserve to know?”

  Deserve to know. Did he think he could make her forget? Rewrite her memories? He might, at that. He knew her weaknesses. Perhaps he’d done it before, slipping amongst the tatters of her recollections, cutting a corner here, snipping a thread there. He, who never forgot.

  Sophie shuddered.

  “After years of friendship—after you lay with me—”

  Enough.

  “Because of this.” Sophie touched her scar, before he could say any more. “You did this to me.”

  Julian laughed. Laughed. “You think I—” He laughed again. “I? Did that? To you?”

  “You are vile. Low and vile and—” She had no other words. She would have spat on him, if she were capable of it. Instead, she whirled and hurried onward, eager to be rid of him.

  He left her alone for a while, all the way down the hill until they started across the pastures dotted with sheep. He walked a little behind her, not beside, his gaze itching at her neck and nettling her until she wanted to scratch the skin right off.