Page 10 of The Heir (A Young Queen Victoria Mystery #1)

“J ane? Is that you?”

Jane had hoped that once she reached home, she’d be able to run straight upstairs to the rooms she shared with her sister. Unfortunately, the door to the blue parlor was open, so Mother heard her entrance.

“Jane?”

“Yes, Mother!” Jane called back.

“What are you doing home?” called Mother. “Where’s your father? Oh, do come in here. I’m too exhausted to be shouting.”

Betty’s smile was triumphant, and her pointed glance at Jane’s muddy hems and soiled boots was positively pitying.

Betty whisked away Jane’s coat, bonnet, gloves, and bag with smug efficiency, leaving Jane to bat feebly at her skirts. Her hair was surely a ruin, as well.

She told herself not to worry. Mother disliked any sort of bother, and the list of things that bothered her frequently included her younger daughter. She would make a few dismayed remarks and then let Jane go upstairs.

“Jane?”

Jane slunk into the parlor.

Somehow, Mother always managed to look like a painting.

Just now, she lay back on the sofa, as prostrate as her corset permitted.

A froth of ocean-blue skirts spread out all around her.

Despite her seeming swoon, her hair remained fetchingly arranged, with her curls draped perfectly across one white shoulder.

Mother lifted her head just a little and opened her limpid eyes.

“Good heavens, Jane! Your face! You’re swollen! And the color! Was it a beesting? Did you fall?”

“No, Mother,” mumbled Jane. She was suddenly enormously tired. She was shivering again. Both her tongue and her mind felt feeble and slow.

“Well, you can’t be seen like this.” Mother waved one long white hand to shoo her away. “Oh! I’m too tired to deal with you. I had my card luncheon today, and you know how that always fatigues me. Get yourself upstairs. I’ll send Meg to you.”

Jane hesitated. “Why Meg? Where’s Susan?”

Mother gave a wordless groan of frustration. “Susan has been dismissed.”

“What! Why?” Jane had been counting on Susan’s help, and her silence.

“She upset my best tea tray,” said Mama, more to the ceiling than to Jane. “And broke every piece of china.”

“Oh.”

What do I do now? Jane needed help, but she could not trust Betty or Meg. And Liza . . . Liza might be willing to keep a secret, but only if it amused her.

Thankfully, Mother completely misunderstood Jane’s discomfort.

“Yes. It is a tremendous nuisance. Now we shall have to find another maid. But where one is to find any sort of trustworthy girl these days is beyond me. Still, what else could I have done?” Mother threw up her hands, but only for a moment, before allowing her arms to collapse delicately back against the pillows.

“How I do wish we could get through one day without some sort of trouble!” Her eyes drifted closed.

“Go and hide yourself, Jane. Meg will know what to do for you.”

Dismissed as easily as Susan had been, Jane took herself upstairs.

It was futile to hope that the rooms set aside for her and her sister might be empty when she arrived. The sitting room was, but the door to the dressing room had been left open, so Jane could see Liza at her mirror, tying up her curls in a yellow ribbon.

Liza took after Mama. All pale pink and gold, she was the picture of the delicate English female. When they were out in company, the men’s eyes, and not a few of the women’s, always followed Liza.

“What are you—” began Liza. Then she, too, saw Jane’s face. “Good grief, Jane! You’re a mess. What did you do?”

“Nothing.” Jane sank onto the sofa. Her jaw throbbed. Her head felt muzzy, and her stomach ached. She could not tell if she was hungry or simply sick. “I wanted to walk home across the green.”

“Did you fall out there? Your face is a disaster! Look at yourself!” Liza, with far more than the necessary energy, ran over and thrust a hand mirror in front of Jane.

It was the first time Jane had seen herself since the blow.

She could understand why her mother had asked about a beesting.

Her cheek was badly swollen. Rain and cold had left her pale and pinched.

Dirt smeared her cheek and mingled with the deepening blue gray of the bruise.

Dark circles under her eyes added a finishing touch.

She was, in fact, just as Liza described. A disaster.

Jane handed the mirror back. She did not want it.

“And you’ve managed to end up with your hems and good boots an inch deep in mud,” Liza went on in angry disbelief. “Well done, Jane. That was an excellent thought, taking a walk on such a day.”

Jane ignored this. What, after all, was there to say?

If she tried to blame Father, she would only be asked what she’d done to make him angry.

She let her gaze drift to her own dressing table, which stood beside Liza’s.

Her reticule lay there, ready for her, should she need to retrieve something from inside.

Such as a pair of broken spectacles trailing a muddy ribbon. Jane hoped her melting relief did not show in her expression.

Liza sighed sharply. “Well, we’d better get you out of those things before Father sees you looking like that.”

Father has already seen me. “Don’t bother. Mother said she’d send Meg up.”

“Yes, and we all know how well Mother attends to details. I am not going to spend the night with you snoring because your nose has swelled up with cold. Come along.” She gestured for Jane to stand up.

While Mother truly was indolent, Liza merely played at it.

Liza would complain when asked to undertake any form of exertion, but she could be remarkably brisk when it suited her.

The two sisters acted as each other’s dressers most days, so Liza had plenty of practice wrestling Jane out of a walking costume, even one that was unusually muddy and damp.

“What happened to Susan? Mother said she’s been dismissed.” Jane was curious to hear Liza’s version of events. It was not that Mother would lie, exactly. But she might choose to simplify events to avoid the strain of answering questions.

“Lord, I don’t know. I was out leaving a card with Mrs. Ashford, and then I went to call on Greta Schumann.

By the time I got back, Mother had already sent Susan packing.

She said the tea tray was upset and there was a dreadful commotion, and that was that.

Susan always was clumsy and sulky. Perhaps that’s why you two got on so.

” The insult was casual, a normal part of Liza’s conversation when she was talking with Jane.

“But personally, I don’t think it had anything to do with the tray. ”

“Then what . . . ?”

“I think Mother wanted Susan out of the house before Father noticed that Ned had already paid her too much attention.” Liza drew out the last word significantly.

“Do you mean she was increasing?”

“Well, if she wasn’t, she would be soon.”

Jane’s words dried up.

It was a thing that happened. Everyone knew it. Jane herself had been pinched and handled by men at the palace. Like all the other women, she learned who to avoid and where not to walk alone.

But to find out their brother had been so careless with another person’s life . . . Anger stirred. Helplessness made it stronger.

But, of course, there was nothing to be said, because there was nothing to be done.

By the time Meg arrived with the second-best tea tray, Liza had Jane out of her sodden dress.

They had changed her muslin petticoat for one of flannel and, blessedly, loosened her corset stays so Jane could breathe more easily while Liza wrestled her into her plain blue house dress with the straight sleeves and white cuffs and collar.

“Leave the tea, Meg, and take these.” Liza dumped Jane’s discarded things into Meg’s arms. “Also, I think we will need a warm compress. As you can see, Miss Jane has somehow managed to damage herself.” Liza went into the sitting room and cast herself upon the chaise lounge in a fair imitation of Mother’s customary fainting pose.

“We’ll do something with your hair in a minute.

Pour the tea, Jane, would you? And tell me how things are at the palace. ”

Jane sat down and did as she was told. “Things are as usual. Another scene between the princess and her mother.” She says she saw a dead man on the green. She fell from her horse and might now be dying of cold and shock.

“Well, at least all you had to do was sit and watch.” Liza held out her hand, and Jane put the teacup in it. “I swear, it almost makes me want to change places with you.”

Anytime you like. Jane drank her own tea. The fresh warmth was a shock to her empty stomach. “And what was so strenuous about your day?”

“If you think running Mother’s errands and paying Mother’s calls and writing Mother’s letters—not to mention giving the orders to Cook and Mrs. Pullet because she simply cannot be bothered—is a grand way to spend your time, you’re welcome to try it.

No. Wait. Forget I said that.” She waved her own words away as Jane opened her mouth. “You’d only make a mess of it.”

Jane reached for the bread and butter, and then she froze. The sound of boots on the stairs reached them.

The door opened.

Father had arrived.

“Hullo, Father!” Liza jumped to her feet, all sunshine and smiles. She ran to him and stretched up on her tiptoes to kiss his cheek.

“Hullo, Liza.” He beamed at her proudly. “That is a very pretty ribbon.” He touched her curls, but he was already looking at Jane. Jane felt pinned in place—drab, small, gray.

“Your mother wants you,” Father told Liza.

This was probably not true, but Liza didn’t question it. None of them would. Liza kissed him again and skipped away like a much younger girl.

Father closed the door.

“Come here, Jane.”

Jane stood and walked over to stand in front of him. Father cupped her chin in his calloused hand and turned her cheek toward the light. He pressed his thumb against the swelling. Her loose teeth shifted. Jane winced. She couldn’t help it.