Chapter Three
Exmore’s head pounded with a dull throb, his mouth was dry, and his stomach clenched at the thought of eating the toast and butter that the servants at Brooks’s had placed before him. The last twelve hours were snatches of images in his mind: a lovely actress at curtain call, the firelight on his glass of brandy, the dice rolling down a table, a paste diamond ring glinting on the actress’s finger, and the rain trickling down the filthy gutter as he held his stomach.
The owner of the ring had whispered into his ear, “Let me comfort you. Let me help you forget.”
But nothing could help him. She had kissed him against the door to her flat and fondled his privates, but he hadn’t reacted. She wasn’t her, and he was too drunk to pretend. He weaved home, his vision blurry, his steps unsteady, to where her portrait rose high in the entrance hall. The one he’d commissioned on their honeymoon. She stared shyly over her creamy shoulder at visitors. The artist had painted the lovely sunlight upon her pink gown and dark hair, capturing that radiance about her. The light had seemingly followed her, keeping her bathed in its glow. No woman could be more beautiful to him than she was.
He had drunk some more spirits, despite his butler’s warning. Then he had fallen into bed, letting his valet pull his clothes off him. Then he had drifted in and out of nightmares.
This morning, he had awakened reeking of the actress’s perfume. His face was bloated, his chin rough with stubble, but in the hall, she remained radiant in her silken gown, gazing upon him, her sweet expression unchanged.
Damn her.
He couldn’t stay in his home. It was the least emotionally comforting place he knew. So, he’d scooped up his correspondences and taken them to the club. He’d found a table in the back corner. He wanted to be left alone, but he didn’t want to be alone. He guzzled black tea and rested his clammy head on his hand as he read over missives concerning a vote that would take place in Parliament that afternoon.
“You look dreadful,” a familiar voice said.
He glanced up to find Wallis Hume standing before him in a somber gray coat with a matching cravat. His eyes had that watery quality that came with age, and the hand that held his cane shook.
“I had a trying night.”
“Every night is trying for you, I hear.” Wallis sat and then eyed Exmore in that assessing manner of a physician. “You need to leave London, my good man. Take in the fresh air instead of the brandy. Find a gentle wife and leave the actresses alone.”
“I’m needed here.” Exmore tapped his letters concerning the vote.
The man waved his trembling hand. “Britain will roll along quite well without you for a few months. Why not go to your estate in the lake country?”
She was there too. He couldn’t escape her.
Wallis leaned in. “You know, I was married before Beatrice. A lovely lady. Died of a chill after our first year of marriage. I took her to Spain, but nothing could help her poor lungs. I tried to save her, but the Lord wanted her more.” He turned silent and peered off with those filmy eyes. His gnarled gripped tightened on his cane.
“I’m sorry,” Exmore said after a long pause.
“Listen to me. You will find another wife. You will feel affection for her. You will care for her differently than the first. But she will bring you consolation.”
“Thank you,” Exmore muttered and then took a sip of tea to keep back the words, You know nothing. And it was clear that the man had never got over the death of his first wife, who was clearly loved more than his next one. Exmore changed the subject to direct it away from himself and any more unwanted counsel. “How is Patrick?”
“Ah. Glad you should ask. I have a little healthy pursuit for you should you be inclined.” Wallis held up his hand. “Now don’t protest until you hear me out. My son is coming home, and he needs to be set up properly. I thought perhaps that you knew a place befitting a wealthy, distinguished gentleman to let. It is time he established himself and started his own family. Patrick has always looked up to you. You could advise him. Reacquaint him to London Society and find him a proper wife, so that we may avoid the last unfortunate episode. Whatever became of that wild girl?”
“I’m sure she saddled herself to some unassuming country gentleman by now and has more children than she can handle…” Exmore trailed off. A trim young man possessing arresting pale silvery blue eyes entered the room. The rest of his him was dark: his hair that spiked at the edges and his sun-tanned skin. He wore a fashionable blue coat and carried a rolled newspaper under his arm. His eyes hardened with animosity when he spotted Exmore. He started to turn away when Wallis hailed him.
“Good morning to you, Colonel Lewiston.”
A polite smile stretched on Lewiston’s tight lips. He made a small bow. “Lord Exmore. Mr. Hume. I hope you are well.”
Exmore’s fingers tightened on his teacup. Luckily, Wallis answered the man’s greetings, saving Exmore the trouble.
“Well?” Wallis made a humphing sound and continued talking, oblivious to the tension between the other two men. “My son—my only son—is coming home.”
“Ah, I have heard much of the fine young man. I hope you will acquaint us when he returns.” Lewiston was always congenial and polished, and that aggravated Exmore’s hatred of the gentleman.
“Very kind of you, sir. Very kind. Aye, he has been gone for so long, I fear his old set have all scattered. Won’t you join us?”
The younger men’s gazes met. Lewiston glanced away first. “I beg you would forgive me,” he mumbled. “I have previously arranged to meet a friend.”
He bowed again. Exmore watched Lewiston stride toward the front tables.
Lewiston’s presence in the same room set Exmore on edge. Exmore had come here to get some peace, and now what little he had garnered was destroyed. He couldn’t concentrate on Wallis’s recitation of humdrum daily news when he could hear Lewiston greet other members or his affable chuckle rise above the rumble of conversation.
“Pardon me.” Exmore abruptly cut off Wallis’s listing of whom he had seen at Tattersalls. “I remembered that I have an appointment with my man of business.”
Wallis’s mouth dropped at Exmore’s rudeness. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to keep you, forcing you to listen to the droning of an old man.”
“Not at all. I’m afraid I had almost forgotten the appointment. Do send Patrick directly to me when he arrives. I shall introduce him in Society.” A contented look of accomplishment passed over Wallis’s features. Wallis had got what he wanted, for he surely didn’t seek out Exmore unless he wanted something. That was really the only reason people reached out to Exmore—for what he could give them.
Exmore hurried away. He could feel Lewiston watching him. Exmore shoved on his gloves and hat as he exited the club. Wind whistled down the street, blowing up loose papers and the rotting scents from the gutter. He hadn’t any appointment, of course. He had lied to Wallis, and he didn’t feel a tinge of guilt about it. Living as he did now required many lies. Lies to conceal, omit, deceive, and to mercifully spare the feelings of others. The first lies were the hardest to tell. Now, they flowed easily from his tongue.
He glanced up and down the street. He didn’t want to go home. Parliament didn’t start for several hours. He thought about a drink. No, he wouldn’t. Even he was beginning to worry about his deteriorating health. But that left him with nothing to numb his mind for the next few empty hours of the day.
He wandered down the street with no destination in mind. He greeted passing people he knew, pretending to be like everyone else with destinations, appointments, and reasons to be out in the world. He continued in this fashion until he came to a print shop. He stopped and took in the illustrations in frames that were propped by the window. They were botany images of flowers and insects he couldn’t name, but they alleviated his mind for a few minutes, so he entered the shop.
The bell tinkling on the door announced his presence, and a clerk shifting through prints at a table glanced up. Exmore waved him off and ambled to a bin of images behind a marble vase on a pedestal. He and the clerk were the only souls in the shop. He flipped through prints of political caricatures, turning his head to read the small text. He didn’t chuckle at any of the grossly drawn images, except the one of him in Parliament, throwing dice with one hand and holding playing cards in the other.
The caption read, Lord Exmore wagers on the fate of the country.
The bell rang again. He looked up as a young woman entered, her body silhouetted against the bright light flooding from the glass door.
* * *
Annalise survived the glove maker, milliner, hosier, and the first draper perfectly well. She joined in with her cousins’ and aunt’s squeals of delight over kid gloves or a darling straw bonnet. But after the next shop and the next, she found her smile waning, her nails digging into her palms, and her head aching. At every stop, three women were simultaneously asking for her opinion of a slipper or shade of green against her skin or a lace design. She remembered she once could shop all day, delighting in loading boxes into the carriage. She had never worried about the money. All items had been put on an invisible bill that was sent home to her father. Now, the money was hers, and whenever she demurred on an item, her aunt would flick her wrist and say, “My love, you can’t go about in those old unfashionable threads.”
It was to be a shopping expedition to replenish Annalise’s wardrobe, but her aunt bought far more for herself. For everything she picked for Annalise, she had to have one for herself or her daughters. By mid-morning, they had sent the loaded carriage home with boxes and were walking to the Burlington Arcade, where the carriage would return to retrieve them.
Annalise stopped on the walk, arrested by the images in the print-shop window. A dozen prints by Dutch naturalist Christiaan Visser, whom her father had esteemed, were neatly set about in carved frames. She had seen tiny, etched reproductions in Visser’s books that she had read to her father in their garden, but here were the same images in detailed precision and vivid color.
“Please,” Annalise implored. “May I visit this shop?”
“Why ever would you want to do that?” Phoebe asked. “It’s pictures of bugs and such.”
“No, it’s just that, my father… his work…” She stumbled over her words in the face of their confused stares. She couldn’t make them understand that these images stirred cherished memories. “He was a naturalist too. It would mean a great deal to me.”
“My poor darling.” Her aunt embraced her. “We shall be at the draper’s two doors down selecting fabric for you. Come, girls.”
Annalise watched them leave, releasing a long breath. She opened the door and stepped inside the gloriously quiet shop. It was empty except for a clerk and a gentleman in the back. More of Mr. Visser’s work was exhibited on tables or hanging on walls. She gazed around herself, feeling as if days and days of tension were draining away.
The clerk approached. “May I help you, miss?”
She smiled. “I want to stand here and quietly study the glorious illustrations of Mr. Visser.”
* * *
It couldn’t be, Exmore thought.
The serene woman clad in the soft lavender of half mourning resembled Annalise Van Der Keer in all aspects of outward appearance. Same large eyes, heart-shaped face, and turned-up nose. Yet, it couldn’t be her. There was something very different about this woman. Something he couldn’t articulate.
He edged behind a statue of Athena so that he might safely study the mysterious woman. There was nothing particularly fashionable about her gown. It had none of the numerous bows and lace that had characterized Annalise’s country-aping-city dress. The sunlight that fell at an angle from the window gave her a Madonna-like quality as it rested on her cheekbones and strands of hair falling from her bonnet. She gazed at the illustrations with a gentle smile that curved her lips and lit in her eyes.
But this serene vision couldn’t be Annalise Van Der Keer, the love-sickened, hysterical girl who’d arrived at his home during a rainstorm to blame him for destroying her life. The wild, frenetic energy of that girl wasn’t present. It seemed as if someone had taken the shell of Annalise Van Der Keer and poured another woman into it. He continued to watch her, unable to take his eyes from her. Her radiance infused the space around her.
The young clerk was not immune to her power either. He nervously rubbed his hands as he approached her.
“You—you admire the work of Mr. Visser?” he stammered.
She spun around as if surprised. She must have been wholly mesmerized by the images. Her smile widened as her dreamy eyes focused on the clerk. His mouth dropped open, and his ears reddened.
“Yes, I do.” Her voice was silken and light. “So does my father. I mean, so did my father. He was a naturalist.” There was an inflection in her last words, as if she wanted the man to ask about her father.
“I think they are quite nice prints,” the man said instead. “But sadly, none are selling.”
Exmore watched her face fall a fraction. No, you ignorant, young clerk. She wants to talk about her father. You make her feel insignificant when you say no one wants what she and her father found valuable.
“I suppose they aren’t very exciting to someone who doesn’t study botany or zoology,” she conceded. Exmore could hear the tinge of hurt in her voice. “But to me, there are so many tiny miracles in these prints. For instance, have you noticed something particular about this print you have among the Australian floral illustrations? The Phyllopteryx taeniolatus? It’s not a plant at all, but a sea horse. Or sea dragon, to be more precise.” Excitement sped her words and brightened her face.
My God, it could really be her.
She turned and walked in Exmore’s direction, but her gaze was fixed on the wall above him. He slipped farther behind his statue, concealing his face.
“And don’t let this sweet-looking flower fool you,” she continued. “It’s a sinister Australian pitcher plant, or Cephalotus follicularis. These dainty petal-looking things actually trap flies and digest them.”
She stood at least fifteen feet away—too far to pick up her scent or reach out to touch her. Yet, some odd energy shot through his veins, speeding the beat of his heart and bathing him in heat.
And he knew it was truly Annalise Van Der Keer. He remembered the same wild energy that emitted from her body into his that night she embraced him. The sensation had scared him and sent him rushing to his wife.
What had happened to Annalise that so radically changed her?
He remembered the morning his wife died. In a matter of hours, he had gone from knowing who he was and what he wanted, to being a stranger in his own home. The servants had been the same, all the furnishings had remained in place, he had met the same people along the walk by his home, yet he had had the disorienting sensation of being lost. Of not knowing what he had thought he knew. His world had completely turned upside down, yet everyone else had carried on in the normal cycles of their everyday lives. But maybe Annalise’s world had changed too.
“Would you like a print?” the clerk asked Annalise. He was painfully smitten now.
“Why, yes, all of them.”
“Shall I—”
She tossed back her head with a musical chuckle. “I’m sorry. I was jesting. I’m supposed to be buying fabrics and bonnets and such annoying little things.” She sighed with a drop of her shoulders. “But this duck-billed platypus wants to live on my wall and so does this koala bear. Oh, I can’t decide. There’s nothing for me but to go to Australia and collect them all.”
The clerk’s mouth dropped open again. She gave that laugh that seemed to resonate in Exmore’s chest. “I’m still jesting. I guess I shall take the platypus—my father adored it. My other monies I shall waste on silly ball slippers and such.”
Exmore suppressed an appreciative smile. The poor young clerk’s hands were positively shaking when he lifted the desired illustration from the table and began to wrap it in paper. Meanwhile, Annalise returned to studying the pictures. She turned toward Exmore again, and her gaze was about to take him in. He couldn’t hide. Instead, he rose taller, bracing for the impact of eye contact. His heart hammered as if it were located behind his eardrums. What would she say? Would she still hate him? Did she love someone else? Did she know his wife had died? Did she know how low he had sunk?
Then the door flew open, the bell ringing violently. Annalise spun around as Sally Sommerville rushed in. Two young ladies were in her wake, one he had seen dangling about the woman at balls. He made himself as invisible as possible behind the statue and lowered his head. He could not see the ladies, but he listened to their conversation.
“Annalise, it was all for naught. The shipment from India is late,” one of the girls said.
“How thoughtless of the Indian and Atlantic oceans to delay us,” Annalise quipped. Again, his lips curled into a smile.
“Thank you, miss,” the clerk said.
“Did you buy an illustration?” Mrs. Sommerville asked.
“Oh yes.” Annalise’s voice was breathy with joy. Paper crinkled as she must have opened the package for the others to see.
“What is that?” one of the girls asked.
“It’s a duck-billed platypus.” Annalise enunciated each syllable. “Isn’t it delightful?”
“It’s rather homely.”
“I’m sure to other platypuses it’s quite ravishing,” Annalise declared. Exmore smirked.
“I’m thinking of dressing as one for the masquerade,” Annalise continued. “Then, should I see another duck-billed platypus, I shall know that we are destined to be together. Perhaps you should like to be a sea dragon, Phoebe? Imagine the costume.”
“I should love to be anything other than a boring shepherdess.”
“But then you may use your crook to herd your dance partner,” Annalise pointed out.
They must be referring to the Boxhaven masquerade tomorrow night.
“Oh, I’m vexed that the shipment hasn’t arrived,” Mrs. Sommerville complained, putting an end to the banter Exmore had enjoyed. “Now we must try that other shop in the arcade. Hardly my favorite. Come along, girls.”
The bell jingled as the door closed. He raised his head, assuming the ladies had left. But Annalise had remained behind, her hand resting on the door handle. She took one last sad glance around. Exmore could see her eyes fill with tears. He heard his uneven exhale and stepped forward… to do what? Comfort her? But she blinked away the tears, turned, and left. Never realizing he was there.
He continued to stare at the empty space she had occupied. Although the light continued to shine through the window, the room felt darker, as if someone had extinguished a glowing lamp.
“Did you find an illustration, sir?”
Exmore looked at the inquiring clerk, not seeing him for a moment.
“Yes,” Exmore said, making a reckless decision to try to chase away the oncoming despondency. “I would like that one.” He pointed to the illustration of Australian bears that Annalise had rejected for the platypus.
Minutes later, he held the paper-wrapped print under his arm as he navigated the crowded streets. A cynical thought bubbled up. How convenient that Annalise should return at the same time that Patrick was returning to England. As if planned. Had the two corresponded all these years? Patrick had made no mention of her in his letters to Exmore. In fact, after six months in India, Patrick had written of his appreciation to Exmore for helping extract him from Annalise’s influence. Away from London, Patrick had come to realize the folly of his affections and now could see the numerous faults of Miss Van Der Keer that everyone else had realized but him.
Patrick had described her as an ambitious, witless, unmanageable piece of fluff and had promised that he would choose more wisely in the future, citing Exmore’s late wife as a model of how a gentle, graceful wife should behave. Had he lied to Exmore? Exmore wouldn’t be surprised. He harbored little faith in humanity these days.
Once he was away from her arresting image, his senses returned. How could he assume from one chance meeting that she had changed? Maybe her wild character waited below the surface.
He left the print, still wrapped, on his desk and chided himself for the foolish purchase. Being at home did little to raise his spirits, so he headed out again, finding a welcoming tavern where a fire roared and actresses mingled about.
He never made it to Parliament that night, but stumbled home in the early hours, his world rocking like a boat on a sea—a sea of brandy. He studied himself in the mirror, as his valet undressed him, and loathed what he saw. What had he become? His eyes were reddened from drink, dark crescents carved beneath, an unhealthy pallor to his skin. His valet tried to extinguish his lamp, but Exmore waved him off. He resented that when he overindulged in spirits, his staff treated him like a child who might burn down the house. Left alone, Exmore unwrapped the illustration of the Australian bear and studied it. He had been thinking about Annalise since that encounter. She had called the bear a koala.
He stroked the edge of the image like it was that mythical jar that contained a genie. Maybe some mythical version of Annalise would emerge and calm his pain with the peace that had enveloped her in the gallery when the beautiful light fell on her smiling face.