An Unexpected Peril (Veronica Speedwell #6) -Deanna Raybourn Page 0,24
before her time. And somehow, I promised myself, I would find it.
Whilst I brooded, Stoker was busily engaged in wrestling with his walrus, an occupation that kept him occupied through the dinner hour. In the end, I ordered a tray from the kitchen, choosing to take my meal in solitude, opening the last post of the day as I ate in my little chapel. Cook had sent a fine breast of duck with a potato and apple galette, but the food gave scant satisfaction when I read my letters. There was one from Lady Wellingtonia Beauclerk, the earl’s elderly aunt and my unexpected friend. Born on the eve of Waterloo, she had served as the power behind the throne for decades, clearing up the untidy messes of the royal family and protecting them from their worst impulses to self-destruction. Given her loyalty to them, she might well have destroyed me for the danger I presented with my secret and semi-legitimate status.
Instead, she had befriended me as she had Stoker, offering wisdom and an unsentimental affection that meant more to me than most attachments I had ever known. Her usually robust health had taken a turn for the worse during the Ripper’s reign of terror, and after much reflection on her own mishandling of the affair, she had taken herself off to Scotland to her shooting box to recuperate. Given the inclement nature of Scottish weather, I rather suspected she had gone to sulk instead, and she had missed the yuletide, usually spent in the bosom of her rumbustious family. I surveyed the scrawled note as I picked at my duck. She had scribbled a few lines, indicating that she was recovering her health, albeit more slowly than either of us would have wished. I missed her dreadfully, and I was not entirely comfortable with that emotion. Between her departure and that of Tiberius, I felt abandoned by my friends, a state of affairs I would not have credited only a year before. I was accustomed to living my life as unfettered as one of my beloved butterflies, and these new bonds of attachment brought with them not only connection and warmth but a dreadful sensation of loss when my companions were not present.
I shoved her letter aside and picked up another, this written on heavy paper embellished with the heading of the Sudbury Hotel. It was short and equally unsatisfying.
My dear Miss Speedwell,
I hope this note finds you well. I am writing to inform you that His Excellency, Chancellor von Rechstein, declines to address the matter you brought to our attention. With kind regards, Baroness Margareta von Wallenberg.
I shook the envelope, but there was nothing more. Only a single line of dismissal to indicate that nothing would be done to investigate the murder of Alice Baker-Greene. My chance to persuade Stoker to undertake this new adventure was at an end and I was, quite plainly, bereft.
But why? I had not known the woman well, I reminded myself. And countless miscarriages of justice were done every day. Why did this particular lack of conclusion feel so brutal?
I put this letter aside, shoving away the plate of duck. It was congealing now, and I had no appetite for it. I was conscious only of a keen, sharp-edged sense of loss. I had, by any measure, all that I could wish for. I was healthy and not uncomely. I had work I loved, friends I treasured, and a man for whom I would walk through fire—and, in fact, had upon occasion and in the most literal sense. I could find no reason for the overwhelming sense of agitation I felt, but I rebelled against it.
I had experienced such emotions once or twice before. The remedy, I had found, was movement. To hurl one’s few possessions into a carpetbag and embark for a new adventure was the only solace. To leave behind one’s woes in a damp and fogbound land, awaking in brilliant sunshine, the air heavy with spices and the promise of fresh endeavors, this was true happiness. A train bound for anywhere, a ship unfurling its sails for some new shore. Steam whistle and snapping canvas, those were the lullabies that soothed a savage soul. And I had no recourse to them, I reflected bitterly. For now that I had joined myself in affection to Stoker, I could no longer run from myself as I had once so blithely done. I must, instead, sit and face my demons.