Sea-bathing. She would concentrate on sea-bathing. She had been curious about it since she’d read about the practice gaining popularity in Brighton. It had been an idle sort of interest, though, because why allow oneself to want something one can’t have? That was another maxim Julianna lived by:You can’t miss what you don’t let yourself want.
Therefore, she hadn’t wanted to sea-bathe.
But now she could try it. And she wouldseethe sea, too. Walk along it and stare at its vastness.
She dug in her reticule and produced the wedding band she often wore when she was out and about alone. Julianna would never be a wife, but being a “widow” afforded a lady a certain amount of freedom, and she had found that the existence of a dear departed husband, even a fictional one, often aided in her work. She suspected the same would prove true on holiday. For instance, a spinster, even a spinster of eight-and-thirty with a great deal of experience of the world, might not be allowed to sea-bathe without her mother, or a maid.
Back in the coach, she closed her eyes and attempted to visualize a flame. Julianna had read about the technique in a book written by a professor at East India College who’d been an acquaintance of Father. It was meant to be practiced every morning, and with time and diligence, reportedly led to “enlightenment.” Julianna had yet to achieve that exalted state, but the exercise reliably focused her mind when she was distracted.
Today, as per usual, enlightenment was not achieved, but alas, neither was focus. The attempt yielded only slumber. It wasn’t until the ostler shouted, “Brighton! End of the line!” that Julianna awakened. Well, if one could have neither enlightenment nor focus, a nap was a not-unwelcome substitute.
She smelled the sea the moment she alit. The air was heavy and tangy and salty andwonderful. The sun was shining, and the sky was a brilliant blue.
“Which way to the sea?” she asked a boy leading the horses off, and she went in the direction he pointed, reasoning that if she walked long enough, she would eventually reach it.
She took in fine town houses and green parks on the downward-sloping streets. When she finally glimpsed the sea peeking between buildings, she realized she’dbeenseeing it for some time. She thought she’d been looking at the sky.
She passed an inn called the Old Ship as she traversed the final stretch toward the water, making a note to return and inquire about a room. It looked like a fine hotel. Perhaps Effie and her traveling companions would be lodging there.
A few more steps, and she arrived at her destination at the end of the earth, buildings and other assorted man-made detritus behind her. She stepped onto a pebbled beach and marveled.
There were two shades of blue ahead, two wide stripes, one of sea and one of sky, meeting up in the middle in what looked like a poorly sewn seam between two patches on a quilt.
Even in London where she could hardly see it, Julianna understood that the sky was vast. She had not been prepared for the sea, too, to be so boundless. There was more water than she could fathom, steely and beautiful and blue. That water touched America and the Far East. It was home to shipwrecks and fanciful animals. It was the cure for any number of maladies if one believed Dr. Awsiter’s claims about the sea right here in Brighton. She had thought such claims a grift, but now she wondered. It seemed possible that this much water could do anything. Perhaps it could even remake a person.
There were people all about, strolling and talking and laughing, but she was alone in the ways that mattered. No one need witness her body being turned inside out, her ribs cracking and vulnerable in the salt breeze. She was a pillowslip being turned in on itself by a wash maid, beaten with a stick and hung to dry in the curative sun.
She was in a new world.Shewas new. She had not misspent her funds after all.
Chapter 3
From the Mouths of Birds
“Shall we drive through Brighton before we turn for Hove?” Archie asked as they made a quick stop a few miles out of town to stretch their legs.
“Oh, yes, let’s,” Effie said. “We can take the measure of the place. Although perhaps weoughtto have brought disguises. What if the kingisthere? What if someone recognizes us?”
“No one is going to recognize us,” Archie said.
“Of course you are right,” Effie said archly. He tapped the side of Archie’s coach as he climbed back inside. “This grand vehicle emblazoned with the livery of the Earl of Harcourt won’t give us away in the slightest.”
“We merely need get to the house,” Simon said with an air of tried patience, as if he were a harried mother and Archie and Effie quarreling children. “Hove has the advantage of being home to a mere three hundred souls, and the house itself is on the outskirts. We shall be quite anonymous once tucked up there. Then we may come and go between Brighton and Hove on horseback.”
“It is almost akin to being a character in a novel of intrigue,” Effie said. If one had inexplicably ceased to enjoy balls and parties, intrigue might be the next best thing.
“The last thing I want to do on my holiday is feel like I’m a character in a novel of intrigue,” Archie said.
“To each his own.” Effie sniffed jestingly.
After some discussion, the gentlemen agreed to make a brief stop at the foot of Brighton, where it met the sea, to take in the prospect.
“With the caveat,” Simon said, “that we take a circuitous route down to the sea so as to avoid glimpsing the Pavilion.”
“Is the Pavilion not the point of this trip?” Archie asked.
“It is, which means I want to take it in properly, all at once and not in passing en route somewhere else. I prefer to be overwhelmed all at once by its symmetry and majesty rather than assailed by bits and bobs of it as we drive by.”
“How poetic of you,” Effie teased. “But I understand perfectly.”
