“Sauly New,” Sabine repeated. He was known in London as Saul Newington, the Duke of Wrest. “That’s original.”
“This fromElaine Toble,” Stoker scoffed.
“I am not a duke, impersonating... whomever Wrest was pretending to be,” Sabine retorted.
She knew he’d been displeased with the role she’d affected to dupe Phineas Legg. She hated to play the flirt, but it had been the fastest and most effective way to extract the information she wanted.
She tried again. “Who was Wrest pretending to be when he was Sauly New?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“I think it matters a great deal.”
“It should not matter to you.”
“I alone decide what matters to me. We’ve discussed this.”
“Sabine,”he warned.
“Say it, Stoker,” she sighed, taking two steps to his one. “Tell me!”
They came to another dead end, but a third corridor turned to the right, and he made the corner.
“I don’t want to bring my terrible memories down on your head. These are things you should not have to know.” He sounded angry, desperate; he was begging her without saying the wordplease.
Sabine was not too proud to beg. “Please tell me.” She stopped walking. “Please.”
He made an agonized sound of frustration and spun back. “You ask too much.”
“I’ve only begun to ask, Stoker,” she sighed, “and I am agonizingly persistent.”
He swore and pivoted and walked five paces. “Fine,” he said, not looking at her. “You wish to know?”
“I wish to know,” she said softly. The outer wall of the corridor was lined with windows that overlooked a dark garden. Cushioned benches were positioned at intervals against the glass. Sabine trudged to a bench. “Will you sit?” she asked.
He shook his head. He began to pace back and forth, a jerky, angry march.
“My mother’s life was not what I would call pleasant,” he began. He stared at the floor. “Neither of our lives werepleasant.” He stopped walking and looked at her. “I cannot do this.”
“You will do this,” she said.
He glared at her then resumed his pacing.“In our unpleasant lives,”he said, “she traded hunger and cold for her service to men. An unending line of terrible men. Sometimes there was considerable money, but in exchange, my mother suffered black eyes and broken bones. Sometimes there was money but also the constant, lurking presence of some man and his friends, lumbering through her rooms at every hour. Sometimes we had money but my mother was sick from the very nature of her work.”
Sabine blinked slowly once, twice.Oh, my poor Stoker,she thought.
“Always, always she was unhappy. Bitter, cynical, maudlin—a woman who knew her life had been spent in service to hateful men.”
“But she had you,” Sabine said softly.
He shook his head. “My presence was not a reason to live. I was a burden.”
Sabine scoffed. “You cannot mean—”
“Sabine,” he said sharply, stopping again. “I’ve told you that I have no wish to bring down my terrible past on another person, least of all you, and that is the honest truth. If Imust say it, there is no benefit to pretending it was different. Please. I exaggerate nothing, I misrepresent nothing. I was there, and I have no confusion about what our lives were like and no reason to overblow it. It was wretched, but it was not her fault. She did the best she could.”
“I’m sorry,” she said quickly. “It is your story.” She wanted to leave the bench and hold on to him. She wanted him to drop onto the bench beside her and lay his head in her lap. She wanted—
“But sometimes,” he went on, “maybe once or twice a year, a different sort of man would turn up.” He gestured behind him. “Sauly New was, I suppose you could say, such a man. He was not a drunk and he was not cruel. He dressed in finer clothes than ever I had seen. My mother actually appeared... well, lighthearted when he came around.”
