Page 48 of Unforeseen Affairs (The Sedleys #6)

“No, no,” Mrs. Collier tutted as she swept forward, her elegant gown spun with an open black lace that more than hinted at spiderwebs. “Our prophetess does not wish for the doors to be shut. Ajar is best, I’m told.”

The footman blinked. He looked questioningly at Charlotte, then back again at Mrs. Collier.

Mrs. Cressida Collier might have shed her lofty title when she married far beneath her station to a humble, middle-class doctor, but nothing could take away her grace and elegance.

Or her hauteur.

“Goodness, what is it with you spiritualists and doors?” she said with a laugh, placing a soft hand upon Charlotte’s arm. “I believe I’ve spent more time considering portals in the past week than I ever had in my entire life.”

Charlotte did not take offense. “Not open,” she said to the footman. “Ajar.”

“Right, ma’am,” he said with a nod.

He nodded to Mrs. Collier as well, then turned and went about positioning each of the four sets of doors, one on each wall, just slightly open.

“Now, Mrs. Gearing, you’ll have to indulge my—”

“It’s for the spirits,” Charlotte said, not caring to talk about whatever tidbit of gossip Mrs. Collier was angling after. “That they might leave if they feel it necessary.”

“Beg pardon?” Mrs. Collier asked, a skeptical look upon her very pretty, still rather youthful face. Charlotte supposed Mrs. Collier must be nearly twice her age, but she still looked very much the lovely and charming society hostess Charlotte knew she used to be.

“If they are spirits,” Mrs. Collier said with a half-grin, “can they not simply… flit away through the walls?”

Charlotte looked back over her shoulder, searching for Mrs. Stone.

She spotted her in one corner of the room, flanked by Colin and his mother.

Her father-in-law, Commodore Gearing, had cried off the affair, despite the allure of an invitation from Mrs. Collier.

Charlotte imagined the man had endured enough Sedleys to last him several years, after he’d sat through both the wedding service and breakfast with a look of stoic resignation.

Not to mention that soon afterward he’d practically erupted when Colin informed him that he’d not be returning to sea.

Charlotte had accompanied him to that meeting, doing all she could to silently bolster her husband.

In the end, though, he hadn’t needed it; his mettle had proven more than enough.

“No,” Charlotte murmured, watching as the diminutive medium sat serenely with her eyes shut, draped in her dark veils. “Mrs. Stone doesn’t wish them to feel confined. She says they prefer to come and go in the same manner they would have in life.”

This was to be Mrs. Stone’s third private sitting since she’d started up once again.

The papers had been particularly punishing in their excoriation of Mr. Bass, for whom all invitations had disappeared.

The rumor in the spiritualist community was that Bass, with his tail between his legs, had absconded to America and adopted a new persona in the hope that he could start anew.

As Charlotte had correctly predicted, Bass’s humiliation and subsequent departure had infused her mentor with a newfound energy, a reinvigorated zeal and purpose.

“Confined, indeed,” Mrs. Collier echoed, with a nod toward Mrs. Stone. “Does she ever open her eyes, I wonder?”

“She will. Right now she is conserving her energy and focus.” Charlotte forced herself to sound enthusiastic. “I daresay your guests will be mesmerized.”

“That is what I have been told,” Mrs. Collier said with a hint of skepticism, before excusing herself to attend to another of her duties as hostess.

Charlotte found herself drawn to Colin from across the room. She gave little thought to the other gentlemen and ladies milling about, for the majority were the same sorry lot of Sedleys she’d been thrown in with nearly a decade ago.

Cousin Harmonia held court in one corner, resplendent as usual in a red and gold dress.

She was speaking animatedly with a pair that Charlotte placed as the wealthy businessman Joseph Palgrave and his eccentric artist wife, a tall lady named Rose, with red hair bright enough to rival even Colin’s.

Harmonia’s husband, the stone-faced Thomas Rickard, stood nearby with Charlotte’s father and Dr. Collier.

There was more gray than brown in Ajax Sedley’s hair these days, but he still cut a charming, dashing figure.

After all these years Charlotte found she could no longer fault him for it, for Colin was also charming and dashing, albeit in a different, far less irritating way.

Whatever the three men were talking about, Charlotte knew it was something that would no doubt bore her to tears.

She cut a wide berth around them accordingly.

Her stepmother, Susanna, hadn’t wished to go out, and was instead happy to remain home with Thalia, Lucius, and the new baby—a bubbly girl with a full, dark head of hair they’d named Helen.

Susanna had never been entirely comfortable with the idea of a séance, and Charlotte had never felt the need to convince her otherwise.

Finally, standing before the large, round table set in the center of the room, was Cousin Bess, dressed head-to-toe in black and upon the arm of her son, Marcus.

Marcus’s wife Evelyn stood alongside them, her black shawl adding even more severity to her appearance than usual.

Unfortunately, there would be no avoiding Cousin Bess if she wished to reach Colin and Mrs. Stone, so Charlotte approached the trio begrudgingly.

Cousin Bess was sniffling, her black-gloved fingers digging into Marcus’s sleeve.

“The salmis of pheasant with truffles was such perfection,” Bess bemoaned. “Walter would have adored it.”

“He did enjoy game, that’s true,” Evelyn said calmly. She glanced up when she noticed Charlotte approaching. “Ah, Cousin Charlotte. How does your… spiritualist friend fare?” She looked back to Mrs. Stone, who remained deathly still upon the couch, eyes still shut.

“Very well, thank you,” Charlotte bluffed. In truth she hadn’t yet spoken with Mrs. Stone that day, and could not be sure of her state one way or the other. But it seemed simpler—and friendlier—to report that she was fine.

“Are you sure?” Marcus winced. “She appears… overcome. It seems rather premature, for someone in her trade.”

“It is not a trade,” Charlotte said sternly. “Mrs. Stone does not charge for private sittings.”

Evelyn blanched.

“And the desserts! Oh, Mrs. Collier keeps such a lovely table. Walter was ever so fond of meringues and compotes!” Cousin Bess was now precariously close to wailing.

“How old was Walter, exactly?” Charlotte asked. His passing that winter should not have come as a shock, but it had sometimes seemed as though the little lapdog would outlive all of them.

“Sixteen,” Cousin Bess sighed as she accepted a handkerchief from Marcus. Charlotte would have believed it if she had said twice that much.

“A hound is a fine companion,” Evelyn said, although she faltered slightly on the word “hound.” Charlotte had certainly never thought of the spaniel as such, and was pleased to see that Evelyn didn’t either.

“Cheer up, Mama,” Marcus said blithely. “Perhaps Mrs. Stone will call on Walter to return. Who knows, he may be slobbering upon our outstretched hands within the hour.”

Cousin Bess did wail at that, then began quietly sobbing. Evelyn shot Marcus a look, at which Marcus only grinned.

Charlotte excused herself, unconcerned with the spiritual well-being of Walter. The dog had lived quite well—better, even, than most humans. However his spirit found itself now, Charlotte was at peace with it.

Mrs. Collier was now making her rounds, supervising a pair of footmen in their dimming of the lamps.

The descending light lent an air of mystery to the room, and as Charlotte finally drifted over to Colin, his mother, and Mrs. Stone, she felt almost as though she were stepping into an ethereal painting.

Colin caught her eye as she approached, exuding a kind, gentle strength.

“Darling,” he said as he stood up, imbuing the word with all the familiarity and awe of a lover’s caress. “Please, sit.”

He took her arm with outsized chivalry and helped to lower her to the seat. Charlotte narrowed her eyes at the obvious gesture. She did not wish for anyone to puzzle out the secret that only the two of them shared for now.

A child. Her child. And his. Quickening in her womb.

She resisted the urge to place a protective hand over her middle. To do something like that would give everything away.

Colin smiled sheepishly.

“Charlotte, dearest, Mrs. Stone was just about to tell us something you might be interested in,” Mrs. Gearing said brightly, completely unfazed by the medium’s eccentricities.

“Yes,” Colin interjected. “Of what she saw—or thought she saw—at that first spirit circle.”

“What I did see,” Mrs. Stone corrected, her high-pitched voice rather indignant.

“At Mrs. Gearing’s house?” Charlotte said.

“Yes, the one that Mr. Bass conducted,” Colin’s mother confirmed.

“Please do not speak that name,” said Mrs. Stone, recoiling visibly at the mention of it.

Charlotte glanced at Colin, recalling the old newspaper they’d chanced upon in the back of The Black Candle. The one that had suggested a far closer association between the two mediums than they had previously guessed.

“At any rate,” Mrs. Stone said, “what Mr. Bass had said was true.”

Charlotte and Colin looked at each other, then back to Mrs. Stone again.

“He is a humbug of the highest order,” Mrs. Stone declared with a sniff, “but yes. The information he conveyed during that circle… was correct.”

Colin furrowed his brow in that charmingly frazzled way that always set Charlotte’s stomach aflutter. “What do you mean?”

“About your friend,” Mrs. Stone replied. “He did, in fact, father a child in Italy, outside the bounds of marriage.”

Charlotte watched as Colin winced, his expression a mix of confusion and pain. She felt a stab of betrayal in her own heart.

Mrs. Gearing looked triumphant. “I knew it! Something about that claim always rang true to me.” She looked sheepishly at Mrs. Stone, no doubt feeling some degree of guilt at having turned that fateful circle over to Mr. Bass.

“Er, despite the falseness of the messenger. Anyway, thank goodness that… business was all sorted.” She shook her head. “All’s well that ends well, I say.”

The sound of rustling skirts, shuffling feet, and chairs scraping against the floor indicated that it was nearly time for Mrs. Stone to take her place at the table.

Mrs. Gearing, now buzzing with the kind of excitement that can only come from hearing the most tantalizing gossip, gave a nod and turned away to find her own seat.

“Mrs. Stone,” Charlotte prodded, “how could that be?”

The medium pursed her lips, thinking.

Charlotte glanced back at Colin, concerned. He looked pale, and his jaw was sharp as he clenched it shut.

“It is not unheard of,” Mrs. Stone said slowly, “for one to sometimes… project their own thoughts and feelings onto another. To one who…” She stood up and smoothed her skirts.

“To one with whom a connection is shared. I am sure that Mr. Bass, unscrupulous as he is, plucked the image of the poor woman in Italy from my mind and passed it off as his own.”

Then, rather abruptly, she left them and went to sit at the table without another word.

Charlotte felt her heart thumping in her chest. She reached for Colin’s hand. He took it.

“I am not surprised,” she said quietly.

He scoffed. “Of course you aren’t,” he said as he rubbed a hand over his face. “What a fool I was, though, believing Beaky.”

“Did he ever actually deny it, when you asked?”

Colin frowned, thinking.

The sound of Cousin Bess blowing her nose cut through the murmur of chatter about the table behind them.

“Come to think of it… no, I don’t believe he did. Not directly. The cagey devil.”

Charlotte stood, and he followed, lacing his arm through hers.

“Well. No matter. We ought to be thankful to Beaky, after all.” She smiled at him mischievously.

“Oh?” he said, looking at her in a way that made her want to leave the circle immediately and push him up against the nearest wall. “How is that?”

“His dishonesty and false friendship may have sent you on a fool’s errand… but a fool’s errand right into my arms,” Charlotte said. She felt silly, like a heroine in one of the cheap yellowbacks her father wrote. But she didn’t care.

Colin leaned over, his lips brushing against her ear. “And between your legs,” he whispered.

“Later,” Charlotte admonished with a raised brow.

“Now we must sing,” Mrs. Stone said to the table, stretching her thin voice to its limit.

“May I at least sit alongside you?” Colin purred, pulling out her chair.

“Very well.”

He sat down and took her hand. In a moment she felt his leg pressed against hers, sending a ripple of pleasure through her body.

Charlotte bit back a smile.

She knew that the happiness they had found, while wholly unexpected, would sustain them forever. And they would continue to find more of it, together, wherever their journey through life took them.

As a family.