Page 77 of The Ladies Least Likely
Slightly more than pounds. Two hundred guineas—that ought to be enough to support the Hunsdon household until the next quarter’s income came through. Two hundred guineas could buy a fine horse. It was nearly enough to buy a carriage, something well beyond the reach of a simple tradeswoman.
“I think I will take the two hundred now, if you have it,” Amaranthe managed to say.
“Very well. How fortunate for us that you have this family member who so carefully preserves these rare manuscripts.” Karim regarded her with fresh surprise. “You are very fine today, if it is not rude in me to remark upon it.”
“Borrowed finery.” She produced a thin smile.
Why had it not occurred to her that they could sell some of the duchess’s abandoned gowns for ready coin?
Such a wardrobe would fetch a fair price, though Sybil might quarrel at her possessions being parted from her.
Too late now. Mr. Karim darted into the back room, and Amaranthe was left to say a quiet goodbye to her manuscript.
She peeked one last time at her signature in the border of the concluding page.
A cluster of long, gaudy purplish blooms of the amaranth plant called love-lies-bleeding.
The flowers of amaranths kept their color long after they dried, for which the Greeks had named them ‘unfading.’ Most species of amaranth were considered pigweeds, true, but the oil was nourishing to the skin, and the seeds were delicious if properly cooked.
A hardy and useful plant. Just like me , Amaranthe thought.
Karim returned with a small pouch of coins, but he hesitated before he handed them to her. His eyes fell again on the tidy stack of folio pages.
“May I tell this patron of mine that he is buying a unique copy of the Sirr al-Asrar ?” he asked.
“You may.”
It was, in some respects, not a lie. She had learned to give all her copies slight variations.
Sometimes she changed the decorations of initial capitals or the border decorations to more pleasing designs.
And it went against the grain to preserve the scribal errors she so often found in medieval copies, when monks or clerics predictably skipped or confused lines after staring too long at marching grids of tiny script.
It wasn’t in her to duplicate an error when she could correct it.
All her works, equally, bore her signature of the amaranth flowers. They would mark the sign above her door when she was finally able to open her bookshop. All her manuscripts were, in this respect, unique.
The weight of the enormous sum in her palm felt heavy on her heart.
How far these guineas might go toward her dream of opening her own bookshop.
How much further she might be along the path to that dream if she had never lost her Book of Hours.
The study she could have made from it, the copies, the sales?—
Amaranthe forced her mind away. Eyde’s safety, and Derwa’s, and her own, were more important than a book. The welfare of the Hunsdon children was more important than a book, too.
Karim checked that the folio pages were in their correct order, using the small Roman numeral she’d marked at the top of each page, verso and recto.
“Just think if we came across another surviving copy of the tenth-century Arabic text of the Sirr al-Asrar ,” he said, a new gleam in his eye. “What a find that would be!”
“A find indeed.” Amaranthe stowed the money in her inside pocket and wondered how much Mr. Karim suspected of her antics.
Copies of French, German, Latin, and Flemish manuscripts were all well and good, but mundane fare for antiquarians.
Ancient Arabic manuscripts, now—there would be quite a rage for those, were any to be discovered in secret caches and corners of old crumbling homes, where rare treasures might sometimes be found.
Karim had begun teaching her Arabic, after she expressed interest, but she wondered now if he were suggesting she apply these skills for their mutual benefit?
“And I have told you already of a different work also known as the Book of Secrets, the Kitab al-Asrar by Muhammad al-Razi,” Karim continued.
“This one is on the practice al-kimiya, what I believe you English call alchemy. But the book is much rarer and harder to find. I was told once that the Duke of Hunsdon had something like it in his library. Your brother is tutor to the young duke, I understand.”
Amaranthe nodded, holding his gaze. Joseph had come across such a book, in passing, and mentioned it to her. If Karim knew about it as well, then the manuscript must indeed be a legend among antiquarians. The one to find it would possess a treasure indeed.
Was the bookseller dropping a broad hint? Or had Amaranthe become so sly that she detected subtle meanings now in everything?
There was no slyness in Malden Grey. He was an open book, as such things went.
“I shall keep a lookout for such a volume,” Amaranthe said. “I imagine you’d be delighted to negotiate the sale of it, should the young duke be willing.”
Depending on how much damage the duchess and her steward had done to the Hunsdon estates, the young duke might well be reduced to selling off his library to feed himself and his siblings. Amaranthe only had so many manuscripts locked in her cedar chest.
Again that needle pierced her chest. If she had found the Hunsdon book last night, she might be making a very different negotiation today.
An honest, aboveboard negotiation. But Grey needed money, and she had arranged for two dozen servants to descend on the house tomorrow, servants who must be paid wages, fed, and supplied with uniforms. She pressed her hand to her pocket.
Would she return the two hundred guineas to have her Book of Secrets back?
No, because she had a second copy, the first and highly inferior one she’d made as practice, attempting such a large work untutored and all on her own.
She could use that in her shop display. Joseph had contributed to the terrible state of things at Hunsdon House, and she felt obliged to exonerate him.
Sacrificing her Secretorum was not too high a price, just as she had been willing to sacrifice her Physiologus to keep a roof over their heads.
Sacrificing her Book of Hours had been a steeper price, but necessary to extract herself from Reuben’s clutches. She hoped nightmares dogged his sleep and followed him into everlasting torment.
She was not stealing, Amaranthe told herself as she patted her purse.
Oxford was an institution designed for education.
And if she made a second copy of books she was commissioned to restore or reproduce, they were intended for her private use, as displays for her eventual bookshop and demonstrations of her skill.
If she had now and again been obliged to sell those copies to support her household—well, she could justify the necessity, at least to herself.
The chime above the door jangled, and Mr. Karim stepped away, ending their conversation. Amaranthe turned to see Malden Grey enter the shop. Tall, stern, handsome as a devil, he filled the room.
Her heart fluttered with pleasure. He was an imposing man, not to be overlooked.
He was also a dangerous man, though his strength lay leashed and civilized under a gentleman’s coat.
He looked displeased about something, his jaw set in that way she’d noted when he burst into her house, and the little thrill shifted to alarm.
“Buying books, Miss Illingworth?” he inquired.
Malden Grey, man of the law, would have a very firm opinion of the activities she engaged in with her commissions and her copies. Like her father, he would see black and white, wrong and more wrong.
“In truth, I am buying from her,” Mr. Karim answered in a pleasant tone.
“Miss Illingworth had the good fortune to come across a Latin version of the Secretum Secretorum , what we call in Arabic the Kitāb Sirr-al-asrar , the Book of the Secret of Secrets . She has done me the very great honor of transferring it to my hands. Look you, sir, do you not find the workmanship astonishing?”
“Aristotle’s advice to young Alexander the Great? And Miss Illingworth in possession of a copy? I am astonished indeed,” Mal said.
Amaranthe’s belly splashed into her heeled slippers. He knew .
They exchanged a long look, and the hair on her arms lifted in warning.
He was about to expose her. But he mustn’t do it here, in front of the bookseller who provided the larger portion of her income.
She stepped forward to urge him toward the door when the chimes rang again and another man entered.
Mal’s posture grew taut and alert.
“Grey.” The new entrant regarded Mal with surprise. “Didn’t expect to see you here.”
“Oliver.” Mal inclined his head, acknowledging a superior. “My first visit.”
The newcomer looked at Mr. Karim. “I’ve come for my set of lectures, if you have them bound.”
“Of course. Only a moment.” The bookseller whisked into the backroom.
Amaranthe straightened her elaborate skirts, wondering if she could edge out the door while the newcomer distracted Mal.
Except that the two men blocked her exit, the shop made narrow by the closely set shelves of books and book-binding supplies.
In the awkward silence the noises from the street outside penetrated: the clop of hooves as a wagon rolled past, the calls and conversations of passersby, and, startling in their clarity, the sonorous bells of St. Paul’s as they rang the hour.
“Never seen you with a woman, Grey,” the newcomer said, regarding Amaranthe with interest.
She lifted her chin. She’d never been looked at so much in her life as she had this day. Next time Eyde and Mrs. Blackthorn tried to coax her into the duchess’s clothes, she’d put a flea in their ear.