“How very like you! To plead your case when you know I am as vulnerable as you,” I said bitterly. “You always did like to turn the tables. I suppose if I refuse, you will tell everyone the truth.”
“If you reveal my identity, then how we are acquainted with one another will, of necessity, be revealed,” he said evenly. “I will not deny it, and I will not lie.”
“Harry Spenlove, drawing the line at a lie—that is a new development!”
“You were always clever, Veronica, but you were never small. It is one of the things I admired most about you. There was never pettiness in you, and I do not believe you have acquired the habit of it. If you keep silent, then both of us will benefit, but most of all, a harmless old woman who cherishes her grandson will die happy. If you speak, you will bring pain to us both and perhaps hasten her death. I leave it to you to judge if that is a weight your conscience can bear.”
He moved to the door of the summerhouse and closed the lantern, plunging us into darkness. When he opened the door, moonlight flowed in, just bright enough to illuminate the path back to the Hall.
“Go first,” he urged. “I will wait and make certain you are not seen.”
I had to pass him to exit the summerhouse, and when I did, I felt rather than saw him move towards me. It was a brief gesture, just a quick touch of one finger along my arm, but it raised shivers.
“Whatever you decide,” he said softly, “I will not blame you.”
CHAPTER
12
After my conversation with Harry, I did not sleep easily. Too many memories had been resurrected. I sifted through them all, remembering the first time I had met him—with Jonathan, aboard a steamer leaving Sydney. We were all bound for Sumatra and they presented themselves as rivals for my affections, albeit good-naturedly. Before we passed through the Coral Sea, it became clear that something had quickened when Harry and I looked at one another. The air seemed to shimmer with possibility, and Jonathan took it with his usual grace. He and I formed a friendship of our own, founded upon our mutual love of lepidoptery. We exchanged stories of our best finds and our wish lists of specimens yet to be netted. We talked long into the night of birdwings and swallowtails, debating the merits and beauties of Papilioinidae versus Pieridae.
But at the end of our conversations, after we had said good night and gone our separate ways, Harry slipped into my cabin and we passed the rest of those nights in a very different manner. I had been enchanted with Harry’s easy manner; there was a lightness to him that indicated this would be a charming dalliance to offerrefreshment to my spirit and body and nothing more. To my astonishment, he proposed marriage. I did not know then what troubles had befallen my mother upon this score. A hasty and intemperate marriage had led to her destruction, but it would be some time before I came to learn of this. I knew only that marriage, as an institution, was a thing to rouse wariness in my breast. The bearing of brats and ironing of shirts held little charms, I explained to Harry. But he kissed away every objection I made, promising that our lives would never be little or dull, that we would travel the world, making our own adventures, forever ardent lovers instead of allowing ourselves to fall into complacency. In the end, he wore me down, enticed me with a pretty picture painted from his words. I said the vows and signed the papers and let him slip a slender cold band of gold upon my finger.
Within a month the ring was gone, pawned to pay a debt, and I realized what I had done. I had shackled myself to a man who could not be trusted, upon whom I could never truly depend. Too late, I understood the magnitude of a woman’s vulnerability in marriage, how every particle of her happiness depends upon her choosing well. And I had chosen unwisely.
Jonathan had understood. Harry would frequently vanish, taking with him some small trinket or other to buy his way into a game of cards. Jonathan, who might have gone with him, often stayed carefully behind. I never quite knew what he intended. Was he guardian? Friend? Did he nurture hopes to be more should circumstances arise? Or did he simply act out of guilt or pity for a neglected bride whose rosy, romantic dreams had been shredded?
He never behaved badly, never put a finger upon me nor murmured a word to cause unease. Only once, after we had spent a particularly lovely afternoon filling our jars with the most extraordinary specimens ofTroides vandepolli, did he, flushed with success andspurred by high spirits, permit his hand to linger too long upon my arm. I looked up at him and saw a jolt of surprise, awareness springing to life before a deliberate closing of the shutters.
Jonathan and I were never alone again after that day. He took great care always to invite others to join our expeditions, and even tried to leave once or twice himself. Harry always talked him round, but as our fledgling marriage crumbled even further, Harry seemed eager to escape. When Krakatoa began her fateful rumblings, it was Harry who arranged their jaunt to Java. It was meant to be a trip of less than a week, but a fortnight later I was still in Sumatra, twiddling my thumbs and waiting, growing more impatient with every passing hour. I was unaccustomed to ordering my life to suit another, and I had found I did not like it. I was preparing to make my own arrangements to leave when the volcano erupted in spectacular fashion. It is a time I seldom think on and never with fondness. Water and food were scarce and unpalatable, and hygienic arrangements were unspeakable. The most rudimentary civilities were obliterated in the volcano’s wake, everything drowned in soot and mud and boiling seawater that heaved upon the beaches, leaving dead and rotting things behind. I stood at the stern of the boat as we sailed away, gripping the railing to stare behind until the palm-fringed islands fell beyond the horizon.
I had never presented myself as a married woman; I had never called myself Spenlove, and Harry had taken my wedding ring. There were no photographs, no love letters, no tokens we had exchanged. There was nothing and no one to remind me of my foolish foray into matrimony. And so, I forgot it. At least, I tried. I worked hard, day and night, driving myself into exhausted and dreamless sleep, until at last, Harry began to fade, like a snippet of a song, long since heard and half-forgot.
Never again did I refer to Harry. From that point on, I looked only to please myself, keeping my heart firmly locked away. I dallied, Iflirted, I enjoyed myself immensely, but at all times, I made certain my activities were undertaken to suit my own inclinations and not those of another. If I took one excellent lesson away from my marriage, it was that wifehood was not my calling and was one I vowed I would never undertake again.
And for a number of years, my resolve was never threatened. I had met a number of charming men, some more distracting than others. Some I enjoyed for an afternoon, some for a fortnight. But never longer and never at home. I reserved my escapades for my travels, always knowing I could retreat to England should I feel myself in danger of falling prey once more to my softer feelings. And yet it was in England that I met the man who was more myself than I was. I had observed before that if the rest of the world’s folk were made of mud, Stoker and I were quicksilver, able to catch one another’s thoughts as easily as a swallowtail may be netted on the wing. We did not require one another, for neither of us was deficient. But we enhanced one another, we bettered one another.
I had always refused to entertain the possibility of marriage, and he had respected this, having had his own unwholesome encounter with that state. But I knew that in his heart of hearts, there was a most traditional and conventional part of him that would have married me if I were willing to have him. In spite of his pain and his scars, he would have taken me as his wife, and the knowledge that I could not, would not, do the same troubled me. Was my love the lesser because I would not risk myself to keep it? Was I selfish or pragmatic? Was I true to my own nature or was I everything nature abhorred, a woman who would not tie herself to a mate for the duration of her life?
And now Harry had returned, blithely stepping into my life as a reminder that every day I had spent with Stoker had been a lie, a stain upon my conscience because I had withheld from him the facts of my own past. Stoker had, in due course, laid himself bare, giving me everypart of himself, no matter how imperfect. And I had returned the favor by drawing a veil over that which I wished to conceal. I had not trusted him, and so I was repaid in betrayal, I reflected bitterly.
It was with considerable self-loathing that I at last tumbled into an uneasy sleep full of fitful rest and broken dreams. I woke to find another grim morning had begun, the sun nowhere in evidence, hid as it was behind a bank of gloomy grey cloud. I completed my ablutions and went down to breakfast, my footsteps slowed by dread. I did not anticipate telling Stoker the truth with anything like pleasure. In fact, I was not at all certain of what words I should employ. How does one evenbeginsuch a conversation?
And of course, there was the obvious temptation not to speak of it at all. For all his failures of character, Harry did have a certain soft charm, and whilst I did not doubt for a moment he had come to Hathaway Hall for his own mercenary purposes, I also knew he was entirely capable of following his capricious heart. That Lady Hathaway had roused his affections, I was certain. I had observed his little courtesies to her at dinner when he thought no one was looking. The dropped spoon he retrieved, silently exchanging it for his own so she did not have to wait to enjoy her pudding. The steadying hand when she rose to leave the table. The quick, assessing glances when her color rose or faded. He was adept at playing the attentive grandson, but even Harry Spenlove was not so gifted an actor as that. He did sincerely care for the old harridan, I was convinced. And unmasking his deceit would unquestionably devastate her, a distinctly unhappy possibility given her state of health.
And beside the matter of Lady Hathaway, I had excellent reasons of my own for not exposing Harry’s masquerade. When we had been married, the secret of my true parentage was one I had not yet penetrated. Now that he had returned, the revelation that I was the semi-legitimate daughter of the Prince of Wales was not information I caredto share, least of all with an opportunistic estranged husband. My father and I had never formally met and I had never been acknowledged, but I had upon more than one occasion been called into service for the family, lending such talents as I possessed. Ours was an uneasy partnership, and I did not even know if I wanted my father’s acknowledgment. But if there were ever to be a chance of a relationship with him, Harry could never know. Guarding my own secret seemed a good deal likelier if I gave Harry a wide berth, I reflected. Although I had made up my mind that I must somehow find the words to explain my situation to Stoker.
Breakfast provided no opportunity, for Stoker had already finished and begun his work in the Long Gallery, according to Charles Hathaway. “I was hoping you might go to the observatory, Miss Speedwell,” he continued. “My sister is still rather sullen about the notion of giving up our grandfather’s celestial instruments, and I thought she might be a little more amenable to giving them into your care. She admires you so,” he added with a little sop to my vanity.
I repressed a sigh. All my sympathies lay with Effie, and I had little inclination to be drawn into family quarrels. But before I could frame my refusal tactfully, Mary Hathaway appeared with a few of her offspring. “Children, say good morning to Miss Speedwell. You remember her, my darlings. The lady scientist.”
She managed to make the phrase “lady scientist” sound faintly obscene, but my greater objection was to the children themselves. Geoffrey was still carrying his cage, although I was relieved to see it contained nothing living, and the unlovely Ada was once more sucking at her finger. Her long, straight hair was tied back with a bow so enormous it looked like ears.
“Come, children, let us show Miss Speedwell where the observatory is,” she urged. “She is going to speak with your aunt Euphemia,” she told them firmly.
I had promised no such thing, but there seemed little chance of escaping Mary Hathaway’s domination as she herded us all up the stairs. Geoffrey walked next to me, one hand clutching my skirts as he waved the little cage at me. I realized then how much it looked like a gibbet and shuddered.
“So, no luck catching faeries then?” I asked meanly.
