Page 16 of The English Wife

Janie’s mother drew herself up straighter, visibly pulling herself together, drawing her face back into its accustomed lines.

As if nothing had happened, Janie’s mother said, “Gregson, Miss Janie is feeling unwell. You will prepare a tisane.” Turning to her daughter, she added, “Your face is flushed, Janie. I suggest you lie down.”

It was her mother who was flushed, not Janie, but Janie wasn’t going to argue, not now. Janie rose from her seat, smoothing down her rumpled skirt. “Yes, Mother.”

Her mother stood by the cloth-shrouded window, her profile to Janie. She seemed diminished, her spine less erect, the skin of her jaw less firm. Her color was still high, making her face look like a wax model of itself, out of drawing, not quite right.

Janie hesitated. She should go to her, console her. But Gregson stood sentinel by the door, ready to repel any liberties.

“Good night, Mother,” Janie said instead and received only a nod in return, as though the act of speaking was too much for her mother to bear.

Feeling all her own inadequacy, Janie found her way to her own room, the room into which she had moved when she graduated from the depleted nursery into a bedroom on the third floor. It had seemed a momentous thing, a step into the adult world to come. She couldn’t have been aware, then, that her steps would be stopped at the threshold of this room, that she and her mother would be yoked together for all eternity, each an irritant to the other.

Her mother’s silent grief reproached her.

Her mother had worn black for her father, but it had been for form’s sake. This was something different, something that cut to the bone. There were two things Janie knew her mother to truly love: the family’s good name and Bay. Both gone in a night.

Maybe—for all that he had been the one to speak it—maybe Mr. Burke was right. Maybe there was consolation in truth. Janie sat down on the slipper chair by the window, staring sightlessly at the cretonne shade. Outside, the crowd still clamored. Nothing would bring her brother back, but couldn’t she rescue the memory of him?

Janie pressed two fingers against the bridge of her nose. Fine words, but she might as well cry for the moon. This wasn’t a story by Mr. Arthur Conan Doyle. There was no keen-eyed detective to put together a tiny shred of fabric here and a particular blend of tobacco there and, like that, produce a villain from the air.

George.

The name of the assailant? Or merely her own imagination, grafting meaning onto meaningless sounds?

Even if she were willing to go against her mother’s expressed wishes, she hadn’t the first idea of how to hire a Pinkerton agent. A call on the family lawyer, the nearest male figure of authority, would only generate a corresponding call to her mother, who would make concerned noises about sick headaches and order Gregson to prepare another tisane.

It was galling to consider that James Burke had better access to news about her brother’s death than she. It was even more galling to think how selectively such information might be used. For all his fine words about truth, the business of a paper was selling papers. The most sensational stories were the ones most likely to be printed.

The minions of The World had been over every inch of that ground, ignoring notices to keep out. It was common knowledge that the press had far better resources than the police when it came to the investigation of a crime. The New York Journal’s infamous Murder Squad was one of the sights of the city, a phalanx of reporters on bicycles, wheeling through the city like a flock of crows following the scent of carrion. Macabre, yes, but effective.

She didn’t know how to hire a detective, but she did know where to find Mr. Burke. The World Building, with its bold golden dome, loomed over Park Row. She had passed it hundreds of times, on her way to the Girls’ Club on Frankfort Street, where she performed those charitable offices that her mother tolerated so audibly.

Her mother had never stinted her allowance. She had more than enough money to—her mind winced away from the word bribe. To persuade Mr. Burke that it might be more noble to share his information before publishing it.

It was a mad idea.

And yet …

Her door opened. Gregson set the tisane on a tray on Janie’s nightstand. “Madame says you’re to drink this.”

The cup smelled of herbs and, beneath it, the familiar sleepy scent of laudanum.

“Thank you,” said Janie, but she didn’t drink. Now was not the time to court oblivion.

As the door closed behind Gregson, Janie lifted her hands to her cheeks. Her mother was right: her face was flushed. But not with fever.

London, 1894

February

“Are you all right?”

Georgie didn’t see any obvious signs of abuse, no purple bruises beneath the grease paint, no fingerprints on Kitty’s wrists, but something was wrong. Kitty had been distracted all evening, missing her cues and blundering over her lines.

“Why shouldn’t I be?” Kitty yanked on her gloves, knocking over a vial of scent in the process. The lid shattered against the floor, releasing a strong odor of violets. “Now look what you’ve made me do!”

Georgie knelt to help gather the shards, the tight breeches she wore as Viola straining dangerously. “Sorry, Kit,” she said. “It’s just, after your night with Sir Hugo—”