N o coach would dare take Sylvia, Dowager Duchess of Westleigh, into the heart of the East End, to the place where she had grown up and the streets where she had walked. If one could truly call them streets. No, they’d been a pulsing mass of muddy, broken ways, lined with dilapidated buildings that creaked and groaned under the weight of the misery that filled that section of the city.
She couldn’t ask any coachman to risk his life and limb. No hired hackney would go into those back warrens of murder, trickery, and life on the edge.
It was too dangerous to go to such a place. Sometimes outsiders went in and simply never came out.
One might argue that the devil ruled there. That it was hell’s other land. There was almost no law. It had been left almost entirely to the people who dwelt there. A condemnation of sorts. For those born to that life, there was very little getting out of it.
But she had and so had her sister, Estella. Though her sister had never chosen to marry.
Now, a part of her she’d thought long gone demanded she delve deep into those winding streets, but Sylvia was not about to chance it. So, Sylvia did the only thing that someone like her could actually do.
She sat in her luxurious vehicle, racing through the West London streets in the dark, knowing that no one would attack a ducal coach in this part of town. Not now. Perhaps thirty years ago, she might’ve had to fear a highwayman stopping her with pistols and rapier, coming in from the outskirts of the city. Once, the parks had been rife with those dangers.
But those days were long gone.
There was actual law in West London now.
And as her coach rolled through the newest and wealthiest part of London towards Covent Garden, she felt an ache so deep inside her that she couldn’t explain it. She’d always been, well, happy was not the correct word. No. She’d been grateful and determined to do more than just survive. She’d thrived, but she still carried the past with her.
And as the coach turned off the main road and stopped before the theater that had made herself and her sister so very famous, she drew in a steadying breath.
Peggy Cutmore had jolted her this night. She’d been yanked back to a time when she had been small, a time when she had watched her own mother struggle to feed her children. Her mother had sacrificed herself in so many ways to keep her and Estella as safe as a girl could be, given the life they were born to.
Now, she’d seen herself in Peggy. And, when thinking of Liza Cutmore, she could not ignore the life that could have been hers if she had not met her beloved duke.
The thought had taken root, and she’d instinctively known she had to act. And following her instincts had always served Sylvia well.
With the assistance of her footman in his elegantly embroidered livery, she slipped down into the dark street, sparsely lit with lanterns. Keeping her skirts out of the muck, she hurried towards the back entrance of the theater. Her leather shoes padded delicately over the cobbles, and, for an instant, she was transported back to when she was but eighteen years old, with holes in her shoes and a prayer that she would be chosen to be the new ingenue for this theater.
She swallowed. She’d been bold as brass then.
So had Estella. She needed to speak with her. To remember. And to ease the feeling growing inside her.
Her sister would, no doubt, have come back to the theater after an excursion. Estella loved the theater. Sometimes she even slept there, as if she preferred the building to the rest of the world. In many ways, Sylvia could not blame her.
The rest of the world was very questionable. Far better to fling oneself into the imaginary lands of plays and the magic of the theater, where anything was possible. It was a world where wood could become a golden throne or scepter, and paper could become a crown.
She slipped in through the back door and gave a nod to Adam, who was the doorkeeper. Adam, a big, gruff man, who loved to sew the most delicate of lace onto costumes, kept out any undesirables, and London was full of undesirables. He was also quite good at ushering out drunk lords who did not know how to take no from an actress. Adam was a treasure.
She wound her way through the dark halls, past rooms that held costume after costume and set piece after set piece, then headed to her sister’s dressing room. Her sister, even after all these years, was the star. There were younger actresses coming up, trying to seize her place, but Estella still managed to shine. She also didn’t shove the young ones down as so many other stars did. Something Sylvia admired greatly.
She knocked upon the dressing room door and slipped inside the shadowy chamber, lit only with a soft lamp on the table, which bore Estella’s most prized makeup and dressing items.
Estella, as she was sure she would be, was reclining on a chaise lounge reading a new play. The plays being written today simply were not as good as they were in the past. She knew it was because there was a certain sort of sentimentality that had overtaken the works being produced.
People were disinclined to be honest. They instead wished to present pat fantasies. No, there was no mirror being held up to society now. Just convenient fairy tales that made everyone feel good. Sometimes there was a drama, but those were always written to keep ladies in line or people in their place. They were not like the great works which ripped off the masks that people wore before all society.
People had forgotten the true fairy tales. Tales in which the darkness was there to intensify the light.
Estella turned to her. “Whatever are you doing here? I thought your days out on the town were long gone.”
“They are,” Sylvia said with a sigh, closing the door behind her. Her skirts swished against the elaborate furnishings Estella preferred as she crossed to her sister. Estella loved grand things. She had no time for understated elegance. She lived unapologetically from lover to lover, grand house to grand house, wearing beautifully cut emeralds to even larger diamonds.
Sylvia loved that about her.
They embraced quickly. Even after all these years, they were close. They had clung to each other when their family had fallen on the worst of times, when things had been hard. And somehow, they had climbed their way out of the mire they had been born into. Hand in hand, though in different ways.
“Something happened this evening,” Sylvia said.
Estella sat up straight. “One of your children? One of your grandchildren?”
Estella loved her nieces and nephews with a fierce loyalty, and that extended to the next generation as well. There was no fiercer defender than she!
“No, nothing like that,” Sylvia assured quickly, sitting opposite her. “Well…not exactly. Maximus made a rather remarkable discovery.”
“Did he?” she exclaimed. Putting the play aside, her lips pursed as if she could not quite forgive the pages for being so disappointing. “How is the darling boy doing? I know that he’s been struggling ever since coming home.”
Sylvia’s heart ached for him. “Yes, I have worried about him. He was always the one with the largest heart, and he hasn’t done well, has he? He’s tried to make us all think he’s perfectly well. But tonight! Tonight was the first hint I saw that he might actually recover.”
“Good,” Estella said, beaming. “But why has that brought you here?”
Sylvia cleared her throat. “The girl.”
“The girl?” Estella said, her gaze dancing with anticipation. “How wonderful. He’s getting married then.”
“It is impossible to say, though I hope so. She’s most intriguing.” Sylvia paused, then declared, “She’s one of us.”
Estella cocked her head to the side. “What do you mean ‘she’s one of us’?”
“Her grandmother is Liza Cutmore.”
Estella gasped. “Liza Cutmore? I haven’t heard that name in years, decades even.”
“Exactly. And it bothers me,” Sylvia said softly.
“Why does it bother you?” Estella asked.
“It’s like a ghost has come to find me, haunt me, recriminate me.”
“How could it possibly recriminate you?” Estella demanded, pulling her feet off the chaise lounge and letting them fall to the floor. She readjusted her skirts and shoved the play farther away, lest it sully her gown.
“Drivel, is it?” Sylvia couldn’t help but ask.
Estella rolled her eyes. “The young female lead is sheep-brained, wringing her hands, waiting to be rescued. And the older woman is an old crone of a witch. I’m sure it will be a tremendous success but…” She gave a shudder. “I shan’t be in it.”
Sylvia shook her head. “They will insist on writing women as saints or sinners.”
“We both know there are very few who fall into such categories,” Estella said firmly. “Now, what of Liza?”
“Liza is living in a hovel in the East End. I am sure of it.”
Estella frowned. “Why are you so certain?”
Sylivia drew in a breath. “Because her granddaughter was found stealing in my house today.”
“Stealing?” Estella echoed, her hand flying to her bosom. “That’s a bold move.”
“Yes, it is quite bold.” Sylvia smiled slowly, thinking of the girls who worked the theater crowds when she’d been on stage long ago. She’d always admired their light fingers and the way they could cut a purse without being detected. “You’d like her. She would be remarkable on stage. But whatever happened to her grandmother and her mother has driven her away from the theater and made her think your way of life is terrible.”
“But the theater can be terrible,” Estella said honestly. “It’s not all magical. Sometimes it’s quite cruel.”
Sylvia nodded.
“It doesn’t all end in fairy tales like it did for you and for me,” Estella said ruefully. “And one might even argue that my life is not really a fairy tale.” Estella arched a brow before she stood and crossed to the table bearing refreshments. She poured them each a small glass of wine. “Though I like my ending far better than most fairy tales.”
Sylvia leaned forward, took the offered glass of wine, and stared into the blood-red liquid. “You and I have been remarkably lucky.”
“We were born lucky,” Estella said, “though some might insist we were not. And we were driven. We never let any of the darkness get in our way. We just simply kept going, lighting our own way, even when others tried to put out our spark.”
Sylvia took a drink of wine, troubled as she had not been in some time. She did not know why this feeling had come to her so late in life. It was almost as if she had been running from her past. She’d been so certain she’d accepted it all. But now? Thinking of Liza?
“But all the women,” Sylvia said, “that we worked with. Where are they now?”
Estella bit her lower lip, turning her cut crystal glass in her bejeweled fingers, a glass that was worth enough to have fed their family for a year when they were children. “I try not to let myself think of it. Honestly, it’s too terrible if I do. They must all have fallen to the wayside like flower petals rotting in the dirt, or stars that shoot across the sky and are never seen again. This business is cold and you know it, Sylvia. You took yourself out of it. It was akin to a miracle. I’ve always been grateful you found such power and wealth, and being raised here made you special in the ton, but you have been away from it for so long—”
“Yes,” Sylvia breathed. “I have. I have been wrapped up in how wonderful my life is. Raising my children, making society better, making the ton better. Now, my grandchildren are out in the world, and I do my best for them. But…I think I have forgotten.”
“Forgotten what?” Estella asked.
“Forgotten how brutal life can sometimes be. I have protected myself in these last years, only touching the surface of suffering. I place plasters on wounds rather than heal them.”
Estella shook her ahead. “You cannot recriminate yourself for the way the world is.”
“I could have saved more people along the way,” Sylvia gritted.
“Sylvia,” Estella said firmly, “I will not allow you to do this. You are a wonderful woman, and you are allowed to have doubts. So doubt away, but do not beat yourself because Liza made the choices that she did. She picked the wrong man. Everyone knew it. He was a terrible fellow.”
“And her daughter?” she said.
Estella bit her lip. “Yes, there was an ugly rumor about that man too.”
“Did you know the daughter?” she asked, wondering what had happened to Peggy’s mother.
Estella was quiet for a moment, then nodded. “Yes. She was very promising. She was even an actress in this theater for a time, but whatever happened with her protector was not good. She disappeared from the theater, and I know little about what became of her.”
It was as she feared. Somehow, she and Estella had found luck and opportunity. As had her children and grandchildren. But the Cutmores? They had found pain and darkness instead. Good heavens! Peggy was a thief, and no matter how charming she had pretended to be, the fate of a woman in a London jail was so appalling she could not think about it without wishing to cast up her accounts.
She had become soft.
She squared her shoulders. “We are going to help them.”
Estella hesitated. “Are you certain? Sometimes people don’t wish to be helped.”
“Sometimes people need to be helped, even if they don’t want it,” Sylvia bit out. “We cannot let this happen to women like us. You and I got out, and we didn’t look back. But now I have to look back,” Sylvia said.
“Why?” Estella demanded.
“Because I am in the last stage of my life. I have far less of it than I have lived now, and I cannot go out with good conscience if I don’t do something. I’ve never cared what people thought. Now, I must go further. I must help the women who tried, just as you and I did, but were not blessed with luck. I must do something about them.”
Much to her shock, tears stung her eyes, and her whole body vibrated with emotion as she realized that what she felt was rage. Rage for a world that cast out women when they were of no value anymore. “I want to do something for the Lizas of this world. Will you help me?”
Estella swallowed. “I’m afraid to look back as you wish me to, if I’m honest.”
“I’ve never heard you say that you’re afraid before,” Sylvia replied softly.
“Well, I am,” Estella admitted. “We have all been one step away from falling.”
Sylvia lifted her glass in salute, determined now. “So let us put out a net.”