Page 22 of The Finest Print

21

23 May 1848

Papa,

Secure in the knowledge I will see you in a matter of days, I will keep this letter brief, so you can anticipate hearing more upon your return.

Helena has been aflutter with activity; as to be expected, Aunt Cora has been an indefatigable ally to her social calendar. I’ve been busy in my own way—writing my stories and trying very hard not to get ahead of myself.

I miss you. I hope you and Mama are faring well, and your weather has been agreeable. You’ll find you are returning to London on the cusp of summer.

It’s very hard to believe June is a week away.

Love from your daughter

—B.

The Fordham House breakfast room was quiet Tuesday morning. Belle sat alone with a heaping tea tray, though she was more focused on her story than her stomach. Two different sets of notes were spread before her; she’d just started a revision of her latest draft, much improved by Clementina’s foiling of a swell-headed detective inspector.

What she had not improved was the state of her journals. She frowned at the mess, shaking out her wrist. Ethan was right—she had too many stories going at once. The breakneck pace of the serial was catching up to her, but she couldn’t slow down.

Next week marked the beginning of June, and soon, Ethan would have to determine once and for all if he was going to decline the New York offer. Things looked promising, though still very tenuous. If only she could race ahead to the finish and report back, reassuring him all was well, he could keep the shop, they could be together…

Unfortunately, her assistance was limited to finishing this blasted draft by day’s end.

“Oh, Belle, there you are.” Aunt Cora’s voice drew her attention. “I didn’t realize anyone else was awake.”

“Well it is half past nine.” Belle forced a smile as her aunt came into the room. “Not so very early.”

“Not for some of us.” Aunt Cora shook her head in amusement. “Already at work, darling? I hope I’m not disturbing you. You seem rather…caught up.”

Belle looked at her piles of papers, feeling the exact opposite of caught up . “I was just finishing something.”

“Hmm.” Aunt Cora sat beside her, pouring them both tea. “Did you sleep well?”

“Very.”

Belle had lingered with Ethan last evening, arguing over the proof for number eight until they’d resolved their differing opinions to their mutual satisfaction. She hadn’t arrived at Fordham House until after Aunt Cora and the girls departed for their dinner party.

“Mrs. Bowers wasn’t expecting you?” Aunt Cora said lightly.

“No.” Belle sipped her tea. “I told her I would be here.”

“Ah.” Aunt Cora smiled. “I must have been mixed up with Sunday.”

“I was at home on Sunday,” Belle said, thinking of the standoff with Duncan and the lonely night in her own bed.

“Of course,” Aunt Cora allowed. “My mistake. It’s so very hard to keep track of your comings and goings. Especially when there have been so many…goings.”

Belle stilled, forcing herself to meet her aunt’s hazel-blue gaze.

“Your new endeavor is keeping you very busy,” Aunt Cora finally said.

Belle managed a nod.

“I imagine a new project involves new people.” Aunt Cora paused. “Perhaps a new…friend.”

Recognizing this confrontation for exactly what it was, Belle stiffened. “Is it such a marvel I would have a friend?” she asked quietly.

“You tell me, darling.” Aunt Cora studied her carefully. “Does it feel like a marvel?”

Belle’s feelings were on her face, and she knew her aunt could read them. The two of them had always been close, doubly so in recent years. Aunt Cora understood all too well what Belle had narrowly avoided with Duncan, for she herself hadn’t been so lucky. Her first marriage had been arranged, horrendously unhappy, and resulted in near-catastrophic consequences for her small family.

Now Belle recalled the evening after she broke her engagement, how her aunt had arrived at the Sinclair residence with a bottle of amber liquor in hand. Belle curled on her bed while Aunt Cora sat at her dressing table to pour them each a healthy measure. When Belle morosely asked what they were toasting, her aunt had gently replied that in her experience, the first thing a woman does when she sheds an onerous man is raise a glass to her future.

“Yes,” Belle said softly. The truth spread through her like sunshine, immediately improving her strained mood. “It does feel rather marvelous. To have a friend.”

For a long moment, Aunt Cora was quiet, studying the floral pattern on her teacup.

“Belle, perhaps you might permit me a bit of retrospection this morning?”

“Yes. Of course.”

Aunt Cora busied herself fixing a plate of eggs. She set it in front of Belle.

“When I was married to my first husband, there was a great deal of unhappiness in my home. Even after he died, loneliness was inescapable.” She watched Belle closely. “It was a very bad turn, darling.”

Belle nodded.

“When your Uncle Nate came around, it was an explosion of light. Every corner of my home was filled with him. It was intoxicating—to be loved so freely after all the horrible restraint. It was bigger than me, bigger than my worries, bigger than my good sense. I was very fortunate he took good care with my heart, with my future.”

She reached for Belle’s hand.

“You know, Belle, sometimes…after a bad turn, anything that’s not bad seems good. That’s a thing to be careful about, darling. The temptation to settle for less can be very real—especially when the lesser part was all that was offered.”

Belle knew what her aunt was trying to warn her against, just as she knew there was no need for it. Ethan was her very own explosion of light.

“What happens the other times?” Belle asked. “When something that seems good is good? When something turns out to be so much more than the lesser part?”

“You count yourself very fortunate.” Aunt Cora finally smiled, wide and lovely. “And you hold on to it with both hands.”

At that moment, voices sounded in the corridor, followed by Cecily, Lena, and Uncle Nate, apparently in the midst of dissecting the soiree the ladies attended last night.

“Good morning,” Belle called, smiling at her sister’s and cousin’s wan countenances. “Late night?”

“They’re all late nights.” Lena yawned, kissing Belle on the cheek. “You look bright today, dearest.”

Belle blushed, looking at her dress. She was wearing the pale yellow Ethan seemed to favor.

“Now, what happened after that final hand of hearts with Henry St. James?” Lena asked Cecily as she accepted a cup of tea. “You weren’t really going to go through with a kissing forfeit, were you?”

“That isn’t something my daughter would do.” Uncle Nate turned to Cecily, his handsome face sharp with inquiry. “Would she?”

“Hmm?” Cecily busied herself by selecting a pastry for her father. “Jam, Papa?”

“Don’t distract me with biscuits.” He raised one eyebrow. “I invented that trick.”

“I wasn’t going to lose.” Cecily waved aside his concern. “And I certainly wasn’t going to kiss him. Now if Henry Sullivan had been playing?—”

“Wait.” Uncle Nate looked between Lena and Cecily. “I thought you were playing with Henry Sullivan.”

“No, I was playing Henry St. James ,” Cecily corrected.

“Which one is?—”

“Henry St. James is a clodpoll, and Henry Sullivan is a cad,” Lena explained.

“Ah.” Uncle Nate picked up his paper. “So glad we sorted that out.”

“Good morning, ladies.” A smooth, deep voice sounded from the threshold. “Father, I see you remain a thorn amongst roses.”

Belle looked up to see her cousin Oliver amble into the breakfast room. Lord Travers was still wearing evening clothes but appeared as irrepressibly handsome as always—tall and broad, with dimples he wielded like weapons. He was the picture of his father, and unfortunately, he knew it.

“Good morning, Ollie.” Lena grinned. “Or should I say goodnight?”

Oliver winked and shrugged out of his coat.

“I sincerely hope it’s not goodnight.” Aunt Cora pointed a finger at twenty-seven-year-old Oliver, who towered over her. “You’re meant to escort me to Mrs. Everett’s garden party, and I expect you to at least pretend you want to be there.”

“Fear not.” Oliver kissed his mother’s hand and widened his smile. “Nobody will be looking at me so long as you are on my arm.”

Aunt Cora beamed.

“I invented that too,” Uncle Nate said dryly.

“Invented it? You secured the patent,” Aunt Cora teased, and Uncle Nate turned a smile on her that put Ollie’s dimples to shame.

Cecily grimaced. “Not today, I beg you.”

Oliver slung his coat over the chair next to Belle. She scooted her knee away from the fine wool; it reeked of smoke and liquor.

“How was your evening, Cecily?” he asked. “Sullivan asked after you.”

Belle hardly heard Cecily’s animated exclamation. She was too distracted by Oliver’s rumpled coat.

He’d left it folded, the lining visible, and from the interior pocket peeked the top right corner of a publication.

Belle stared.

She knew that top right corner.

She knew every word in the top right corner…and in the other three corners too.

Those words shouldn’t be here , in front of her, at breakfast.

How …

She tilted her head, trying to get a better view, as though if she looked hard enough, the type would rearrange itself into the Times or Standard .

But no. There was no question.

Oliver was carrying Secrets of the Old Bailey, No. 6.

Her belly flipped several times in rapid, unpleasant succession, and each rotation seemed to funnel more heat to her cheeks.

“Oh, Belle.” Oliver noticed her staring and plopped next to her. “I nearly forgot. I saw this at my club, and it reminded me of something you might like.”

He pulled the serial from his coat and tossed it to the table.

‘The False Chaperone’ stared at the ceiling. Belle looked up, too, as if a hole would appear and suck her right up from the breakfast table.

How on earth had Ollie found it? They didn’t distribute the serial in Mayfair. They didn’t distribute anywhere near Mayfair…

Oliver was looking at her expectantly.

“Thank you, Ollie,” she managed. “This is…”

“It’s not erudite, that’s for damn sure.” Oliver grinned. “I thought you might have fun with it. I know you like horror, though this is more horrifically dramatic.”

A strange but certain discomfort crept over her, seeming to steal her words and breath in one swoop. No matter how long she looked, she couldn’t make this situation make sense. It was entirely incongruous—an etching of Clementina Bloom holding a skull…beside Aunt Cora’s third-best breakfast china.

“Belle can like what she likes,” Uncle Nate cut in. “I’ll put my vote of confidence behind any paper that has you actually reading.”

His tone held a faint warning; he thought Oliver was making fun of her reading selection.

No, Uncle , she thought dully. Just my writing .

“ I…” She faltered under a crushing weight of awkwardness. How to explain? She wasn’t prepared to reveal her secret today. “This…was at your club?”

“It was mixed in with the other papers.” Ollie took the scone Cecily had tried to ply her father with. “I thought the woman looked a bit familiar, so I picked it up.”

Belle was torn by brief vindication that the illustration was, in fact, doing exactly as it ought and outright horror that Victor Marks had put her face on Clementina’s.

She quickly pulled the paper into her lap.

“A penny blood?” Aunt Cora blanched, glancing at the folded publication. “She doesn’t want to read that, Oliver. Aren’t they rather…scurrilous?”

“What do you know of penny bloods, love?” Uncle Nate tilted his head toward his wife. “I didn’t know you were in the habit of perusing street literature.”

“Mama, I would do something drastic to see you read that.” Cecily leaned forward. “I’d give you my new lace gloves.”

“She would only make it to the second page,” Oliver predicted. “There’s a garroting. It ends quite badly.”

“Garrotings…don’t usually end well,” Belle said haltingly.

Her throat was very dry. In her mind, her stories had seemed wonderfully sensational, but that was before her family analyzed them over breakfast. It was undeniably jarring to have her two worlds collide in such an unexpected way.

“Belle, perhaps you should give it back to Ollie.” Aunt Cora looked worried. “Your father won’t want you reading this?—”

Lena curiously craned her neck, and Belle folded the serial. If Lena saw the name Clementina Bloom, she would instantly know Belle had written it.

“Papa won’t mind,” she found herself saying as she scooted back her chair. “I’m at the courthouse half the day anyway. I can’t imagine anything in here would upset me.”

“Besides, from what I’ve heard, her novel is highly shocking.” Lena grinned.

“She won’t let anyone read it,” Cecily added. “Believe me, I’ve tried.”

“My manuscript,” Belle corrected, “is not yet published.”

“That’s right. Belle is a novelist ,” Aunt Cora said decisively. She looked at Belle, her expression warm and proud. “Stop feeding her drivel, Oliver.”

Belle’s smile froze in place as her aunt came around the table to wrap her in a fierce embrace.

“I’m not…a novelist,” she mumbled into the gathered pleats of Aunt Cora’s shoulder. “Far from it.”

“Oh, darling.” Her aunt touched her cheek. “Don’t discount yourself so easily.”

“I’m not.” Belle fumbled over an explanation she wasn’t prepared for. “That is…I’m not a novelist. But I’m not discounting myself. I…”

Everyone was looking at her.

Tell them , a brave corner of her mind spoke up. Tell them you wrote this. Tell them thousands of copies of this are spread all over the city. Tell them you are in love and halfway down a wildly unconventional path with a wildly unconventional man, and you plan to keep walking it.

Tell them .

Belle’s face heated. There was nothing for it. She was facing the prospect of what she feared and reviled most in all the world—scrutiny.

So she did what she always did.

“If you’ll excuse me…” She cleared her throat. “I need to ready myself for the day.”

“Belle?” Lena looked concerned. “Oh no, stay. We didn’t mean to upset you. You don’t need to read it, really.”

Belle folded the serial in half and stuffed it in her basket, wishing she could just as easily set aside her family’s reaction to it.

Instead, she carefully schooled her features.

“I’m not upset.” She forced a smile. “I’m perfectly fine.”

But by late afternoon, it was clear that Belle was not, in fact, perfectly fine.

She was uncharacteristically irritable, unable to concentrate in the noise of the printshop, unable to write more than a few sentences at a time, unable to find what she needed in these bloody piles of jumbled notes?—

“So then I was talking to Paulie about my story—you know, with the heiress who poisoned me—and he had a great idea.”

Sam had been pacing in front of her desk for the last quarter hour, and while Belle usually enjoyed entertaining Sam’s creative notions, she couldn’t match his enthusiasm today.

“Where is my research journal?” she muttered, sifting through a stack of old revisions. She hissed in impatience and tossed the papers aside.

As soon as she had time, she very much needed to reorder her notebooks. These last few weeks, she’d been writing so much, so fast, that instead of keeping her court notes in one journal and her stories in another, she’d fallen into grabbing whichever notebook was nearest and making do.

It was becoming a rather untenable operation. Her handwriting had taken on a slightly manic slant, and her journals were bursting at the seams with shorthand notes and half drafts. Last week at the Old Bailey, she’d been so inspired by the proceedings of a trial for a silver theft, she penned half her story right there alongside the court transcription.

Come to think of it, she still needed to revise that fair copy for Newburn. She’d added the untimely end of the greedy banker but had yet to alter the trial details.

Blast , there was too much to do.

“You know how Varney the Vampire keeps being resurrected? Well, what if we bring me back from the dead too? I could haunt someone.”

“Sam.” Belle pressed her temples.

“My first thought is the heiress, because it would only be logical, but I can leave it to you, Miss Sinclair, and I told Paulie?—”

“You told Paulie what?” she snapped, sitting up in alarm. “You told him I’m Irascible Nell?”

“No.” Sam looked flummoxed. “I told him I’d talk to Irascible Nell about it.”

“More like Irascible Belle,” Victor Marks observed. “You’ve been tetchy since you arrived, lovely.”

“I just don’t think we need to include supernatural elements, that’s all. I don’t suppose we could stand to take ourselves a bit seriously? My aim was to write about trials, you know, but of course, why not add vampires and ghosts and hauntings, and be just like every other penny blood on the corner stand. We haven’t baked anyone into a pie yet, why not try that next?”

She flung her pen into the workroom, watching it sail through the door, instantly regretting it but too mortified to retrieve it.

Marks made a small sound of interest, his charcoal moving quickly as he studied Belle.

“And stop drawing me, if you please.” She snatched the artist’s latest sketch. “I don’t want my face all over the city.”

“What the devil is going on in here?”

At the sound of Ethan’s deep voice breaking over her shoulder, Marks and Sam exchanged a look of patent relief, as though they were boys being saved from an angry school-mistress by the arrival of the headmaster.

Belle’s neck heated. She was already feeling combustible; she did not need to add a stern Ethan Fletcher to the mix.

“You dropped this.”

Her pen appeared before her, dangling idly from Ethan’s fingers.

She pressed the heel of her hand to her eyelids. Heavens , she was acting beastly, wasn’t she?

“I’m sorry.” She looked worriedly between Sam and Marks. “I must apologize for my outburst. It seems I’m having some difficulty today.”

Ethan jerked his head toward the door. “Give us a moment, gentlemen.”

The pair evaporated to the workroom.

“Well?” Ethan looked at her expectantly. “What’s got into you today? I haven’t heard you snap at anyone except me in the last two months.”

“I do feel a bit like a pot boiling over,” she admitted, pushing her hair off her forehead. “My papers are disordered, my stories are vulgar, my parents are set to return day after next, and I’m expected to spend the rest of the week at home with them, which means I won’t see you, and I’ll miss you, and I can’t help you?—”

“Who says the serial is vulgar?” Ethan shook his head. “And missing you aside, I’m not concerned about the work. We’re on schedule—your draft of number nine is nearly finished. We’ll print it this week to distribute next Saturday, and you’ll be back in time to revise number ten.”

She bit her lip, still uneasy.

“Look.” Ethan raked back his dark hair and glanced at the clock. “We’re almost done for today. I think you ought to go home and clear your head.”

She followed his gaze to the clock and cursed. “Damn. I’m meant to help Lena ready for the opera.”

“Go. Help your sister. I can’t afford for you to break any more writing instruments,” he pointed out wryly.

She sighed in frustration, accepting he was right. Her agitation had stifled her productivity today. She couldn’t stop revisiting breakfast at Fordham House, hating the way she’d frozen, besieged by an uneasy swell of doubt. What if she was ruining her future—or worse, his future? Ethan was pinning all his hopes on her.

If Secrets couldn’t pull through for him…

If she couldn’t pull through for him…

She swallowed a small, painful lump.

“Belle.” Ethan’s tone was firm and kind, breaking through her rising nerves. “Leave me your fair copy, sweetheart. I’ll handle the rest.”

Grateful for a task she could complete, she gave him her journal.

He easily hefted the notebook in his palm, as if it belonged there.

And then he pressed her fingers to his mouth, as if they belonged there too.