Page 44 of The English Wife

“Oh, it’s my eyes again, is it?”

Flustered, Janie looked away. She had lost control of the conversation again, somewhere between the Girls’ Club and Mr. Burke’s green eyes. “It occurred to me, if our Annabelle was Annabelle Lacey, then it wasn’t just her life between Mr. Lacey and his inheritance.”

Mr. Burke’s grin disappeared. “Her children.”

“I keep thinking … I keep thinking of the princes in the tower.” There’d been an engraving in one of her books as a child, the two young princes, curled up together, vulnerable in sleep as their murderers drew back the bed curtains. “They’re only four years old.”

“That’s why you bolted to the hinterlands.” Mr. Burke leaned forward on one elbow. “To take up your spear in their defense?”

She made an unlikely shield maiden. “You make me sound very foolish.”

“Not foolish,” said Mr. Burke unexpectedly. “Gallant.”

His praise made her more uncomfortable than his censure. “It’s really selfishness on my part, removing myself from the city.” Retreat, her mother had called it. Unfitting for a Van Duyvil. “Do you know that they take sightseers past our house on the omnibus? We can hear them shouting, ‘See the home of Ballard Van Devil!’ They can’t even get his name right.”

“That’s how legend works, isn’t it?” said Mr. Burke matter-of-factly. “Be grateful for it. A century from now, there’ll only be the gruesome tale of Ballard Devil, the demon lover of Putnam County, who killed eight wives and tossed them into the Hudson.”

Janie forced herself to relax her hands. “Was that meant to be reassuring?”

“In its way.” He looked at her without mockery, his green eyes thoughtful. “Myth is more durable than history and far more entertaining.”

“I thought you were in the business of selling truth.”

Mr. Burke’s lips twisted in a crooked smile. “When my editor allows it. Some truths sell better than others.”

Mr. Burke got to his feet, just as the conductor lurched past, calling out, “Cold Spring! Cold Spring, next stop!”

“Do you have a trunk?”

“The porter has it.” Janie watched with interest as Mr. Burke retrieved a battered leather satchel from beneath the seat. “Is that all you have?”

“What more does a man need?” He lifted a brow in deliberate provocation. “My people came over from the Old Country with less.”

“Mine appear to have emigrated from Holland with several sets of Delftware and a butter churn,” said Janie dryly, surprising a laugh out of Mr. Burke. “There’s Mr. Gerritt with the trap.”

Mr. Gerritt was sitting on the box of the governess cart that was used to transport guests the few miles from the station to the house. He was so wrapped in mufflers that only the bowl of his pipe could be seen, emerging from the wrappings. Her brother’s groundskeeper had always reminded Janie of a character from one of Mr. Washington Irving’s stories, with his long-stemmed pipe and taciturn air. At the sight of Janie, the pipe bowl lowered slightly in acknowledgment, which was, she knew, all the greeting she was going to get.

“Would you like a lift to Carmel?” Janie asked doubtfully. She wasn’t quite sure how Mr. Gerritt would take to being pressed into service as chauffeur.

“I’ve made my own arrangements.” Mr. Burke looked closely at her. “Is there a telephone at Illyria?”

“Yes, in the butler’s pantry.” It had been a compromise between Annabelle’s desire for privacy and the incursions of the modern world. “If the lines haven’t come down again.”

“I’ll be stopping for the night in Cold Spring. If anything makes you uncomfortable, you can find me at Hudson House.”

“Mr. Lacey is hardly Jack the Ripper.” At least, she hoped not. They had never found the Ripper. Janie decided not to pursue that line of thought. With more confidence than she felt, she said, “I can’t believe he would hurt me.”

“Can’t you?” Tipping his hat in farewell, Mr. Burke stepped back into the shadow of the depot. “Annabelle Lacey appears to have had a remarkably ill-fated history with bodies of water. If I were you, Miss Van Duyvil, I would stay away from the river.”

Paris, 1894

June

A woman in a white gown, her hair piled on top of her head, knelt by the river’s edge, like Narcissus seeking his own reflection. But there was no sign of a reflection in the water, only a few fallen leaves skimming the surface.

“Miroir de l’Eau by Emilie Clarkson,” read Bay, over Georgie’s shoulder. He stood back to take a better look at the photograph. “If it’s a mirror, shouldn’t there be a reflection?”

They were at the opening of the Photo-Club de Paris’s first exhibition, held in the Galeries Georges Petit. The exhibition was thronged by the fashionable, who had turned out to inspect each other rather than the compositions. Scattered among the gratin were critics, artists, and aesthetes, the latter identifiable by their brightly colored waistcoats and exceedingly floppy cravats. Broken bits of conversation floated about the room.