Page 148 of The Ladies Least Likely
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
T hey could have made more a fuss about her leaving, Harriette thought glumly as she drove the cabriolet through the quiet, sleepy streets of London at dawn.
She’d lived in her aunt’s household for three years and these women were deeply a part of her life, their lot and hers intimately entwined.
They’d suffered her sketching and painting them again and again as she honed her skills.
They’d rallied her when she was rebuffed by prospect after prospect, painting school after school.
They’d celebrated with her when Angelica Kaufman took Harriette under her wing.
They’d coaxed her back into spirits when she was humiliated by the squire, when she parted with her soldier, when she found out the German margrave had been lying to her about marriage.
They’d stood beside her when the gossip paragraphs identified her as the maker of the salacious sketches of the Graf von Hardenburg, and they’d hung on every detail of her interactions with Ren and his sister.
Now they had seen her off as cheerily as if she were making a casual visit to the edge of town, rather than leaving for the deathbed of her mother, and beyond that, marriage to a man she’d never met.
Natalya, who wept easily, had pressed her into a soft, scented embrace and then let her go without a tear.
Melike had made her a beautiful icon to wear as a pendant, and Darci had sculpted her a tiny porcelain figure.
Sorcha had packed her a basket full of delicious smelling pastries, and Abassi had shown her, with enthusiasm, how to disable and flee a male attacker, were she threatened on the road.
Princess had not even bothered to make an appearance; no doubt she was still abed with her lover, or hadn’t yet made it to bed since it was still early hours.
Her aunt alone had shown a sign of being affected by their parting.
“Take this,” she’d instructed, handing Harriette a small decorative box inlaid with fine wood and painted paste that passed for jewels.
Harriette peeked inside to find a lump of velvet wrapped in a ribbon.
“They are trinkets that will prove who you are, if anyone has questions.”
Harriette nodded and slid the box into the valise she planned to carry with her, while her trunks would follow behind by a slower, less costly conveyance.
She had never considered that Franz Karl would demand proof she was of the Lowenburg ruling family, that her mother’s word would not be token enough.
She had imagined she might have some command over him, invested as she was as the heir to the title, if not the lands.
Suddenly she glimpsed a fraught, painful future where her husband doubted her birth and her worth, holding her captive to make good his claim to the duchy, but never according her the respect due her station.
Oh, why had she ever approached the rotted Graf von Hardenburg to ask him to find out about her family?
Harriette chastised herself as she turned into the narrow, twisted streets of the City of London, with Jock on the Yorkshire guiding their way.
Why couldn’t she have simply remained poor, plain Harriette Smythe, suspected of illegitimacy, relegated to the barest fringes of Polite Society?
At least she would still have her studio and her determination to make something of herself.
She didn’t even know if Franz Karl would allow her to paint.
Not that he could keep her from it, Harriette resolved as Jock won an argument with a sedan chair and the surly carriers moved aside to let them through. Her husband would not find her biddable or meek.
First she would resolve whatever was ailing her mother, which was no doubt another episode of spleen.
If announcing she was the Duchess of Lowenburg had not been enough to make her mother a marvel among the lesser beings of Shepton Mallet, then she would resort to a wasting illness, as had been her ploy for as long as Harriette could remember.
Doubtless news that her nephew was coming to fetch them both back to the land of her birth would cure whatever ailed the duchess right enough.
She’d spent Harriette’s entire childhood painting word pictures of the elegance and ease she’d left behind, making sure that Mrs. Demant knew how much the erstwhile Mrs. Smythe had lowered herself to live in a mere gentleman merchant’s home.
Ludgate Hill was thronged with traffic, coaches and people moving through the broad space where the medieval gate and its attached gaol had been torn down years before.
A crowd lounged outside the London Coffee House, studying a series of prints tacked to the windows. Her sketch of Renwick, of course.
Harriette tore her eyes away and appreciated instead the depth and dimension of the street, the narrow buildings with their medieval overhangs, the gothic spires of St. Martin’s Church, the neoclassical majesty of St. Paul’s dome and portico looming behind a veil of morning smoke.
How she would like to paint this scene, were she granted the time.
How much there was of London that she still hadn’t seen, would never see.
Jock steered the cabriolet through the archway fronting the Belle Sauvage to the broad cobbled yard beyond.
The inn in early days had also been a playhouse, and Harriette could imagine the audience crowding the balconies, riveted to the action below.
The stagecoach was being loaded, men strapping luggage onto the box behind, while the four horses stood in harness, blinkered and quiet.
The enclosed seats being more expensive, Harriette had a ticket for the perch atop.
She hoped the driver was a sober sort who would not risk their lives with unadvisable speed and would not be persuaded to turn the horses over to some young spark who wanted to show he was a dab hand at the ribbons.
Jock paused to watch a stable boy lead a pair of spirited blacks to a bright yellow post chaise trimmed with fresh black paint.
The near-side horse shied and stepped into a tall man standing nearby, his back to them, leaning on his cane as he conversed with the innkeeper.
Harriette caught herself admiring his long frame, the way his leather greatcoat fell from broad shoulders, the deep cuffs with golden buttons indicating a man of means, as did the polish on his black top boots.
His hair was hidden under a tricorn hat but his build suggested strength and command, and she was astonished to feel a flicker of attraction for a complete stranger.
She was supposed to be heartbroken over leaving Ren. Was she that fickle?
When the horse nudged him, the man turned, and the breath left her body at the sight of his profile. It was Ren.
His eyes found her immediately, as if he’d been waiting.
She moved through the air somehow—it must be Beater helping her descend from the coach—and a shadow chased across his face at the sight of the other man’s hand at her waist. Regret, annoyance, longing, shame; they were gone in an instant, but she understood what he felt watching her be assisted by someone else doing what he, with his negligible balance, could not do.
His expression was smooth when he reached her, or she reached him—everything in her pulled toward him like a tide—but his eyes were the blue of the sky in high summer.
“What—how—who—when?” She was the one stammering. She slid her gloved hands into his and only just refrained from kissing him.
“It happens I have business to see to in Shepton Mallet. Problems with the Manor House, and some trouble at my mills.” His eyes flickered to the coach, then the chaise. “I thought I might offer you a ride in my conveyance.”
“But I have already paid for the ticket.” Stupid, but she had to be frugal.
Her sudden title had not come with funds.
The guineas from Mrs. Darly’s prints lay wrapped at the bottom of her reticule and stashed at various points about her person, the girls having advised caution due to the high chance of encountering gentleman robbers on the highway.
The draft on Renwick’s bank for a staggering sum lay in the tiny pouch with what passed for her jewelry. She had not cashed it yet and knew in all practicality she must do so before leaving England.
His portrait canvas was carefully rolled, wrapped in layers of silk, and protected in the long leather tube waiting with her trunk in the bedroom she shared with Melike in the Countess of Calenberg’s house.
She wished she had it before her. She hadn’t accented enough the strong square of his jaw, but saw now just how to do it.
A smile rippled across his lips. At least she’d captured his mouth precisely, the hint of a bow in the upper lip, the curve of the lower, not overlarge, but exactly perfect proportions. She stared like a ninny.
“The innkeeper thinks he might sell your ticket yet. Or I shall reimburse you for the cost.”
“And ride with you.” Alone.
It would be at least two days to Shepton Mallet traveling at speed, possibly two nights if the roads proved rough, as roads in Britain were wont to do, even in summer.
Two men in Renwick livery lounged dicing in the shade of an overhang, and the postilion would accompany them as well.
Servants made the travel more comfortable, but not more respectable.
“I don’t suppose you brought a companion. Or a maid.”
Chaperonage was the kind of thing her aunt could not bring herself to care about, and Harriette, in making her travel arrangements, had not taken into account that she was now the daughter of a duchess and would be expected to turn out like one, in a style of dress and an entourage suiting her station.
She was wearing a plain German habit that would endure the dust and wear of the road, a set of stays she could fasten and unfasten herself, and had no more luggage than what she could carry.