Isabel scurried, then darted sideways behind a looming structure, running with all her might, turning right, then left. When she knew she was not being chased, she stopped, leaning against the side of a building. She gulped, and when her breathing righted she reflected.
She would become the best songstress in all London. She knew it. Mr Thomas Wren knew it. The future was hers. Now she just had to find it. She was lost beyond hope in the biggest city of the world.
Isabel tried to scrape the street refuse from her shoe without it being noticed what she was doing. She didn’t know how she was going to get the muck off her dress. A stranger who wore a drooping cravat was eyeing her bosom quite openly. Only the fact that she was certain she could outrun him, even in her soiled slippers, kept her from screaming.
He tipped his hat to her and ambled into a doorway across the street.
Her dress, the only one with the entire bodice made from silk, would have to be altered now. The rip in the skirt—thank you, dog who didn’t appreciate my trespassing in his gardens—was not something she could mend. She didn’t think it could be fixed. The skirt would have to be ripped from the bodice and replaced. That would not be simple.
How? How had she got herself into this? Oh, well, she decided, she would buy all new clothing when Mr Thomas Wren gave her the funds he’d promised.
Yet, she didn’t quite know where to begin in her search for him and she’d have to find him before nightfall. She would certainly ask someone as soon as she left this disreputable part of London. The dead fish head at her feet didn’t give her the encouragement she needed.
But then she looked up. Straight into a ray of sunshine illuminating a placard hanging from a building. A bird on it. She didn’t have to search. Providence had put out its golden torch and led her right to the very place she was searching for. This sign—well, the sign was a sign of her future. This was Mr Thomas Wren’s establishment. The man with the ill-mannered eyes had gone inside but still, one did sometimes have to sing for unpleasant people and one could only hope they gleaned some lesson from the song. She had quite the repertoire of songs with lessons hidden in the words and knew when to use them.
She opened the satchel, pulled out the plume, and examined it. She straightened the unfortunate new crimp in it as best she could and put the splash of blue into the little slot she’d added to her bonnet. She picked up her satchel, realising she had got a bit of the street muck on it—and began again her new life.
Begin her new life, she repeated to herself, unmoving. She looked at the paint peeling from the exterior and watched as another man came from the doorway, waistcoat buttoned at an angle. Gripping the satchel with both hands, she locked her eyes on the wayward man.
Her stomach began a song of its own and very off-key. She couldn’t turn back. She had no funds to hire a carriage. She knew no one in London but Mr Wren. And he had been so complimentary and kind to everyone at Madame Dubois’s School for Young Ladies. Not just her. She could manage. She would have to. His compliments had not been idle, surely.
She held her head the way she planned to look over the audience when she first walked on stage and put one foot in front of the other, ignoring everything but the entrance in front of her.
As she walked through the doorway, head high, the first thing Isabel noticed was the stage. A woman was singing. Isabel concealed her shudder and hoped her ears would forgive her. She supposed she would be replacing the woman. The songstress’s bosom was obviously well padded because it would be hard for nature to be so overzealous, but perhaps it had been to make up for the error of her voice.
A man with silver hair and a gold-tipped cane sat gaping at the stage. The woman put her arms tighter to the side of her body and bent forward to emphasise her words.
Isabel turned her head. She could not believe it. She would have to have a word with Mr Wren about this, although—
Then her eyes skipped from person to person to person. It would take more than a word. Men sat around a table playing Five Card Loo, but it seemed only pence were on the table.
The men at the game could not decide whether to watch the stage or their hand. Two women obviously championed their favourites, alternately cheering and gasping at the cards. Then the game ended. Whoops erupted. A man stood, bowed to the table, and waited. The other players reached into their purses, took out coins and handed them to the women. The winner put his arm around the women’s waists and led them through a curtained hallway.
She let out a breath and all her dreams fluttered away with it.
* * *
William strode under the faded placard and stepped into Wren House, giving himself a moment to let his eyes adjust from the bright August sun to the dim light of a world only illuminated because men needed to see the cards in their hand. He’d have to go to a stable to get the scent of Wren’s out of his nostrils.
If his father knew this was where Cousin Sylvester spent every Wednesday night, things might have been different. But now Sylvester had Marvel and Ivory, the two best horses in England and the only ones whose eyes flickered regard when William neared them. The beasts would always stick out their necks for a treat when William appeared. ‘Spoiled,’ the stable master muttered each time.
William always replied, ‘And worth it.’
William surveyed the table, and spotted his cousin immediately. Sylvester mumbled a greeting and two others looked over, recognising William and giving him a grunt of their own before they returned to the cards. William jerked his head sideways, motioning for Sylvester to join him. The answer, a quick shake of Sylvester’s head, and a brief upturn of the lips, didn’t surprise William. He took a seat near the corner where he could watch the room. He didn’t want anyone at his back. A woman on stage finished singing, thankfully.
He ordered an ale and when the barmaid brought the drink, her brows lifted in question and she looked to the curtain at the back. He shook his head, smiling to soften the refusal. His fingers clasped the mug, but as he lifted it, he paused. Sticky residue lay under his touch. Jam? He gazed into the liquid, half-expecting to see something floating, but nothing looked alive in it. Then he sat the mug back on the table.
A perfect ending to a perfect day, but Marvel and Ivory were worth it.
And having a roof over one’s head did have some merit.
William’s father had visited early in the morning and had pontificated well into the day. The Viscount had picked a fine time to regain an interest in life and an excellent plan to disinherit his only son. The Viscount knew the entailment laws as well as anyone. He had to leave his property to William. But he could, however, lease his nephew the estate for the next fifty years. Upon the Viscount’s death, William would receive the proceeds of the lease. A bargain to Sylvester at one pound per year.
If his father had mentioned that once, he’d mentioned it one hundred times. And he’d had no smell of brandy on his breath.
The inheritance could be dealt with later. Marvel and Ivory were already gone from the stables.
Sylvester smirked at the cards, but William knew the smugness was directed his way. No hand could be that good.
William glanced around and, even though his eyes didn’t stop until they returned to his mug, he noted the woman sitting on a bench at the other side of the room. She sat close to the wall, her body slanted away from the group of men. The shadowed interior hid more of her than it revealed. He was certain she had a face, but she’d pulled the bonnet off-centre and it perched askew so he couldn’t see her features unless she turned his way. If not for the plume, he wouldn’t have noticed her.
In one movement to relax his frame, he twisted his chair just a bit in her direction so he could stare forward, but see her from the corner of his eye.
The barmaid sauntered by him. He waved a coin her way