Chapter Twenty-Three
Clara opened the letter. She knew what it would say. She knew Adam had sent it.
Come to me it read.
Similar letters arrived three times a day. They had continued for a week. Only the first one, written upon his return to London, had been more expansive. You fell in love with me, you said. As I have with you. To discard love when we find it is a great sin. Come to me.
Each letter made her want to cry. Each one also lit a tiny flame of uncertainty.
Could she do it? Would love let them separate themselves from the past? Even if that past included his belief that her father had wronged his so severely?
It would mean believing in him more than common sense warranted. More than she had any person, really. Would love let her see deeper than normal or make her blind?
Mrs. Finley announced that Althea was arriving. Clara tucked the letter into her writing desk with the others and removed a stack of banknotes and a bag of coins.
“Do you have it all?” Althea asked as soon as she entered.
“I visited every shop the last two days. Here it is. Three copies remain at Ackermann’s, but he expects them to sell and told me to increase the order to twenty next time.”
Althea opened a sheet of paper at the table, then moved the inkwell over. “Let us proceed, then, so our ladies see the fruits of their labor.”
Althea’s paper listed all the women who had contributed to the last issue of Parnassus, from Lady Farnsworth down to the women who carried the copies to the shops. She read out the amount each should receive, and Clara counted it out.
“Mrs. Galbreath, ten shillings,” Althea read as the last name.
Clara took a five pound note and placed it beside the others. Althea glanced at it, then at Clara. “That is not ten shillings.”
“Indeed it is not. I think it is the correct amount, however. Your list was in error.”
“We agreed to ten shillings almost two years ago.”
“We agreed before it was known if we would sell a single copy. You do more than half the work, Althea. I could not do this without you, let alone contemplate a regular schedule of publication. In fact, I think you should be a partner in the law, not only one in responsibility.”
Althea’s big smile made her glow. “I think so too. Where do we sign?”
Clara laughed until she cried. She wiped her eyes. “Oh, that felt so good. I was beginning to think I would never laugh again.” She took a deep breath. “I will have my solicitor draw up an agreement and we will sign as soon as it is prepared. Now, take that banknote before I decide it would pay for a nice ball gown.”
Althea grabbed the note and stuffed it in her reticule. “If you deliver the money to those who live near here, I will do so with those who live near Mayfair.”
“You will have to be more discreet than I will.”
In Althea’s always organized way, she placed pieces of paper naming each stack, then tied coins into little sacks with the papers inside. She grouped the Mayfair stacks on one side and the east London stacks on the other.
“Now,” she said, “I want to celebrate and do something decadent with my earnings. I think you should come with me to Berkeley Square and indulge in an ice.”
“Mr. Brady can take us, then bring you home before we return here.” Clara went to the reception hall to call Mrs. Finley and tell her to send word down to Mr. Brady.
She and Althea tied on their bonnets. “I am so glad you are joining me on this little debauch,” Althea said. “While we indulge ourselves at Gunter’s, you can explain why you feared you would never laugh again.”
* * *
Clara dipped her spoon into her ice, then savored its cold, rich sweetness. It helped soothe the sadness that came on her when she explained her break with Stratton to Althea.
From their tiny table, she could see the other wares that made Gunter’s famous. Cakes and bisquits and other desserts lined the counter of the confectionary shop. Marzipan could be had too, crafted into artistic tiny sculptures of animals and flowers. A decadent sweet smell permeated the premises.
“Of course if you could not trust his motivations, there was nothing else to do,” Althea said.
“That is what I told myself.”
“It would be horrible for it to go on, only to learn he had deceived you all along.”
“Terrible. Only—he is not one for deception, it seems to me. To say so is unfair.”
“So you do not think you would have discovered that?”
She thought about it. “There was the chance I would, I suppose. I rather think not.”
Althea set down her spoon. “If you believe he would not deceive you, why do you doubt his motivations in pursuing you? You are contradicting yourself, darling.”
She shoveled a large spoonful of ice into her mouth. Too much. It hurt.
“How can I marry a man who carries such hatred for the father who loved and protected me? And he must hate him, if he learned my father encouraged the accusations against his own. For an instant, when he looked at me that day, I think he hated me too, or at least hated the ghost he saw standing behind me.”
Althea raised her hand holding the spoon. “Stop, please. Let us go back to your first sentence. Did you say marry?”
“Did I?”
“I am sure you did. Have you been considering it?”
“I suppose so, a little.”
“Did he propose, even a little?”
“Oh, he proposed the second time we talked to each other. It was a sly form of revenge. He has all but admitted as much.”
“Did he ever propose again?”
She poked her spoon repeatedly into the remaining ice. “I suppose so.”
Althea reached over and patted her arm. “You suppose a lot of so. Is heartbreak making you a little dim-witted?”
“I suppose so,” she muttered.
“Clara, your mention of marriage makes me change my opinion of him and makes me better understand your current sorrow. If you considered marriage at all, you must care deeply for him. I believe you should learn if there is a possibility for happiness with him. You should be very sure before throwing away a chance for that.”
“He said much the same thing,” she said when they finished. “Or rather, he wrote it.”
“Then perhaps you should see him one more time and speak honestly with each other.”
That night, after much debate, Clara picked up her pen. I will call on Wednesday afternoon. You must tell me everything. There will be no kissing.
* * *
It was not cowardice that made her delay that meeting with Adam, she told herself. She did not dread what might be the final, unalterable break with him. Not at all. She did not spend most nights fighting against impossible hope that wanted to take hold in her heart. She could not see him right away because she had things to do, that was all.
The next day she set out early to pay her contributors. She called on Mrs. Dalton first. Mrs. Dalton presided over a household near the river. Her husband and she let the modest home only for the Season, after which they would return to their property in Kent.
Mr. Dalton did not know his wife was Boudica’s Daughter, so Clara arrived at one o’clock, ostensibly to pay a call. While she and Mrs. Dalton chatted about society gossip, the little sack moved from Clara’s reticule to Mrs. Dalton’s ample bodice.
No such sleight of hand proved necessary with Mrs. Clark. She greeted Clara at her shop and took her to a tiny office, where they transacted business.
“If you have the payment for the others, I will see they get it as before,” Mrs. Clark said.
“I would like to bring it myself, if you would supply their directions.”
“That is good of you, but it may be better if I do it. Their streets are not fitting for a lady like you.”
“I have a coachman with me. I think I will be safe enough. If you brave those streets, I can too.”
Mrs. Clark did not like it. All the same, she wrote down the directions. “You watch yourself now, Lady Clara. There’s pickpockets and worse about. Don’t let your man leave the carriage, whatever he does, and tell him to have his whip at the ready.”
“I promise to be alert and cautious, Mrs. Clark.” Before she left she admired some of the bonnets in the shop. When she embarked on an orgy of sartorial excess, she would have to order some here.
Mrs. Clark’s warnings proved less charming and more sensible when Clara’s carriage rolled into the neighborhood where one of her delivery women lived. Mr. Brady did not want her to step out of the carriage when they found the sad house of Mrs. Watkins. Clara insisted, however, and knocked on the door.
It went without saying that no servant answered, but instead Mrs. Watkins herself. A young girl accompanied her, grasping her skirt.
“Milady. What brings you here? Did that shop man claim I did not take him the books? If so, he is lying so as to rob you. I did, most certainly, and—”
“There has been no complaint, Mrs. Watkins. I came to bring you this.” She handed over the sack of coins.
The girl heard the sound and her eyes widened. Mrs. Watkins flushed. “My apologies. I was just surprised to see you here on my doorstep.” She looked behind her. “Won’t you come in?”
Clara could see the chamber and the makings of a dinner being prepared. A cot hugged one wall. Mrs. Watkins and her family appeared to occupy only this one room and not the entire house.
“I do not want to intrude, and I have more errands to attend to,” she said, to spare the woman the difficulty of trying to host a visitor. “I just wanted to bring that to you and tell you how much I appreciate your help.”
Mrs. Watkins beamed. “My pleasure, milady. I’m glad to do it anytime.”
Clara returned to the carriage. Mr. Brady could not get her in it fast enough.
“Bedford Square?” he asked through the window.
“I am afraid not. We next go to St. Giles.”
“Lady Clara, I don’t think—”
“St. Giles, Mr. Brady.”
She gazed out at Mrs. Watkins’s home while they rolled away. Parnassus might be a lady’s avocation for her, and others like Lady Farnsworth and Lady Grace, but for Mrs. Clark and Mrs. Watkins, and even Mrs. Dalton and Althea, the small earnings they gleaned from the journal mattered. In some cases quite a lot.