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Anne had been delighted when Letty had surprised her with the hot water in the dressing room. Wouldn’t she be pleased for Letty to take the initiative for the public rooms, if she revealed them to be as thoughtfully designed as the dressing room? Anne’s bedchamber would be finished soon enough. She could easily divide her time between the first and second floors in the meantime.
She said yes.
It was a long carriage drive to the warehouse by the docks, and Letty let herself be entertained by the duke’s observations and witticisms. He had the talent of flattering without being effusive and his manner was engaging without being too familiar. She knew Anne would be furious if she ever told her, but she couldn’t help but feel charmed by the duke.
Letty stopped short once she entered the storage facility at the docks. It was an enormous warehouse, and the duke had been right—everywhere she looked wastreasure. Marble statuary. Filigreed furniture. Antique chairs, priceless silverwork, painstakingly embroidered tapestries. Onyx and emerald and opals, ebony and maple and rosewood. Clocks and candlesticks cluttered the tables, and everything from the smallest of snuffboxes to the largest of ornamental jars were stuffed on the shelves.
This is what she wanted for her own, one day. She had dreamt of collecting beautiful things, waiting for the right moment to part with them and place them in the homes she yearned to arrange for other people.
Hawthorne led her through several large rooms, each more astonishing than the last, and then they set to work marking what they wanted to cart back to the estate for display.
“These are beautiful,” Letty said, looking closer at a shelf full of Greek vases. Vase collecting had become quite popular over the past fifty years, and she had seen many examples in the museums.
But the vases in the museums were nothing quite like this.
“Ah yes. This is what I love most to collect but have never found the right place for them.” He picked one up, a large black vase with stark red outlines of two naked men embracing. “If I am not mistaken, Miss Barrow, this is part of our shared heritage, is it not? Does it not deserve to be displayed? Love should never be something to be ashamed of.”
She couldn’t find it in herself to disagree. Not when it was so important to her to live as openly as she could. She gazed at the dozens of vases and plates before her, all of them depicting illustrations of men in various stages of undress, all in the company of other men.
“I have been collecting for years,” Hawthorne told her. “I had many wonders in my Parisian estate. Perhaps you would have enjoyed a visit. I have marbles from Claude Ramey, bronzes by Donatello, paintings by Caravaggio. I have been shipping items here during the past decade and am still deciding what to bring from my Paris home as I have no plans to return there anytime soon. Looking at all that I have amassed now in one space, it seems…well, rather a waste.”
Letty nodded. “I understand what you mean. There is too much here for any man to display in his lifetime, even if he had dozens of homes instead of the six estates that your duchess tells me you own.”
“Exactly so. They deserve to have eyes on them, instead of languishing here in the dark.” He brushed a finger over a small bonecarving of an owl with jade eyes. “They would fetch a pretty penny at auction. Perhaps I should contact Christie’s.”
She wanted to snatch it to her chest and forbid him to sell. But perhaps it was the right choice. He couldn’t display everything.
“Would it be unforgivably rude of me to wonder how an army captain’s daughter came to be so knowledgeable about fine art?”
“Rude to wonder? Perhaps. The answer is quite rude as well, or rather indelicate might be the better word. However, I shall answer.”
“Do go on,” he said with a raised brow.
“I left my village pregnant and alone save for the promise of my ruiner to provide for me. While I dreamt of wedding bells, he quietly set me up in a house with a stipend and paid me quarterly visits when he came to London. I was so green, I wasn’t even aware that I was his mistress.”
“That is the action of no gentleman.”
“I was desperate to fit in with his family, and because I wasn’t of the same station, I found myself in need of education. I began to take an interest in the newspapers and joined a lending library. The British Museum wasn’t a far walk, so I frequented it every day. I made friends first with the guides, then the curators, and then friends of the curators. Before I knew it, I had surrounded myself with art collectors and furniture makers and silversmiths and painters, and I never stopped learning.”
“I presume you ended things with the cad?”
“Yes. I realized that John was never going to marry me, and by that time, I loved my life in London. I promised myself I wouldn’t let myself live in shame as his secret mistress, so I stopped agreeing to see him. He was a faithless liar, yet generous in his way. The townhouse was lovely, and I had a nursemaid to help with Robert, as well as tutors as he grew. I began to organize and design rooms for my friends as they married and moved into larger houses, and I helped the local eating houses when they chose new chairs for their diners or art for their walls, and that’s how I began to grow my reputation for design.”
“How very enterprising.”
By the end of the afternoon, Letty had compiled several pages of notes detailing what they would bring back. Her mind was whirring with ideas, which she was eager to sketch up into plans for each room. She couldn’t wait to arrange for her crew to visit the warehouse and start retrieving the goods and placing them where they belonged.
She returned to the estate with hope in her heart and energy in her step.
And then she saw Anne, arms crossed, a scowl on her face.
* * *
When Anne saw Letty laughing with Hawthorne as they walked up the grand staircase together, she felt for a moment like the air had been removed from the estate as well as most of the furniture. What was Letty thinking, to be seen with him? Her hand was on his arm, and they made a pretty picture together, Letty’s mischievous smile paired with Hawthorne’s sardonic smirk.
She hadn’t even realized that they had left the estate together. Anne had been on her way to the room that Letty was working on to entice her away for a moment or two, and now she stood in the hallway at the top of the stairs with no thought of where to turn.
“Anne!” Letty cried. “Hawthorne was kind enough to bring me to the warehouse where your art is kept.”
