Page 44 of The Lost Letter: A Victorian Romance

I remain your own,

Sylvia Stafford

Sebastian did not know how long he sat there, reading and re-reading Sylvia Stafford’s letter. At some point, he must have retrieved her lock of hair from his pocket, for when he began to return to his senses, it was clutched in his hand, his thumb stroking it in the old, familiar way.

I love you, she had written. And I hope when you return we might be married.

This then was what she believed had driven him away. A letter wherein she had exposed the innermost secrets of her heart. A letter full of endearments and affection. My love, she had called him. And my darling. A letter sealed with a thousand sweet kisses only for him.

He had been a humorless, stern-faced cavalry officer. A second son of little fortune and even less finer feeling. Yet she had loved him. And she believed he had read this letter and been unmoved. No, not unmoved. Repelled! That cursed Penelope Mainwaring had warned her of the very thing. You mustn’t declare yourself! He will run far and fast to escape you!

Sebastian swore low and foul. And then he summoned Milsom.

“Fetch my sister,” he said brusquely. “And then you may start packing.”

Milsom lifted his brows. “Will we be departing for London immediately, my lord?” he asked. “Or do you require additional time to write to Miss Stafford?”

Sebastian cast his valet an ominous glance. “You are impertinent, Milsom,” he said as he carefully placed Sylvia’s letter and lock of hair into his pocket. “But the answer is yes, damn you. We will leave for London as soon as Lady Harker can make herself ready. The time for letter writing is over.”

London, England

Spring, 1860

“And then what did you do, Miss Stafford?” Cora Dinwiddy asked in an awe-filled whisper.

Sylvia looked across the schoolroom at her two flaxen-haired charges. The girls had been relieved to have her back so soon. Their mother was a kind lady, but easily overwhelmed by the high spirits of her two exuberant offspring. By the end of the first day, she had retired to bed, leaving the girls in the care of the already harried housekeeper.

“Not a moment too soon, Miss Stafford!” Mrs. Poole had exclaimed upon Sylvia’s arrival at the door three days earlier. “‘A month!’ I says to the mistress. ‘You let the governess go a month without a by your leave? And what’s to become of the house while I’m chasing after those two little devils?’ But you know the mistress. She spends a half hour trying to herd those children together for a bit of sewing and then off she goes to her rooms with a megrim! And who do you think is left to tend things? It’s myself, isn’t it. But they don’t want sewing. Oh no. They must have stories. And I’m to read them just as Miss Stafford does. Have you ever heard of such a thing?”

Sylvia had found the girls in the schoolroom playing with their dolls amidst a great deal of disorder. The old piano was open, the music books scattered about. Crumpled drawing paper littered the floor. And someone—Cora, she suspected—had spilled their watercolors on the threadbare Kidderminster carpet, leaving an immense, bright purple stain that would have put the latest in aniline dyes to shame.

After a few stern words about their reported behavior and a polite request that they tidy the schoolroom in preparation for their morning lessons, Sylvia had left them and gone upstairs to her own small room to wash and change her clothes.

Had the house not been in utter chaos, someone might have asked why she had returned to London so soon or why she had arrived at the door in a hired hansom cab of all things. But no one had broached the subject until later that week. And the questions, when they came, were not from Mrs. Dinwiddy—though she had expressed regret that Sylvia’s short holiday had not been a success—but from Clara and Cora themselves.

“Yes, Miss Stafford,” Clara encouraged. “What did you do then?”

Sylvia used a piece of chalk to write a single word on the slate she held in her lap.

Earl.

She lifted it up for their perusal. “What do you suppose I did?” she countered. “Clara? Cora? How does one greet a gentleman of this rank?”

Cora frowned, staring at the word in consternation.

Clara, the elder, immediately brightened. “You curtsied!”

Sylvia affected to give this some consideration. “I certainly may have done if we had been in a ballroom and were about to dance,” she replied, “but we were in a parlor just like the one you have downstairs. Would you curtsy to an earl there, do you think?”

“I would shake his hand,” Cora said boldly. “I would say, ‘How do you do!’”

Sylvia smiled. “That would be quite acceptable, dear, if he were an acquaintance of equal or lesser rank. An earl, however, is a person of superior position. It is his privilege to extend his hand to us.”

Clara made a face. “I do not want to shake his hand.”

“Indeed,” Sylvia said. “He is not likely to offer it. Instead, he will bow to you and in return, you may incline your head, thusly, in a polite bow of your own. This will suffice for any person of superior rank, unless,” she added with a solemn tone, “you should one day meet the queen.”

Clara and Cora immediately went into rhapsodies. Sylvia, as always, endeavored to channel their high spirits into practical education. She lay down her slate and rose from her chair.