The Countess Conspiracy (Brothers Sinister #3)(14)

A lady never acknowledges an insult. That was the public rule, the one that was eventually printed in The Ladies’ Guide to Proper Deportment. But the Shadow Guide—as she and Lily had called the private rules their mother had given them—was more explicit.

A lady never acknowledges an insult, but she never forgets one either. She pays it back, no matter how long it takes.

A lady never lies, the Guide cheerily proclaimed. Her good word is her most precious possession.

A lady never gets caught lying, the Shadow Guide grimly countered, but there are six things every lady always lies about.

A lady shares her good fortune, taught the Guide. But the Shadow Guide explained: A lady protects what is hers, and she doesn’t let anyone else have a piece.

Over the year of their mourning, their mother had drummed every rule into the two sisters. Nobody had ever known the lies they told, because they never got caught.

And when they’d come out in society, it was their mother’s newly-published book of rules, the Ladies’ Guide to Deportment, that had dominated the conversation. Not the question of whether their father was a suicide. A clever woman, their mother. She’d made everyone watch her daughters for the wrong clues, and taught her girls to hide the things nobody was allowed to see.

They’d been perfect, utterly perfect liars, lying with their smiles and their best behaviors.

Lily might think that was awful, but Violet could see that training for what it had been: necessary. Lily had never forgiven their mother; Violet held the woman in awe.

As a child, she’d never thought of her mother’s private grief. She’d never thought how much it would hurt her mother to smile through the worst innuendo. She recognized it now: Their mother had raised her head and soldiered on, refusing to let her sorrow and her husband’s likely accident harm her daughters’ futures.

“It’s completely unnecessary,” Lily was saying. “Every time Amanda visits, Mama starts drilling her on the rules. On all of the rules. She’s teaching my daughter the things that every lady must lie about.” Violet’s sister threw her hands in the air. “It’s never acceptable to lie! She tells me that one never knows when a scandal might break, and that it’s best to be prepared. Have you ever heard anything so unreasonable? What sort of scandal does she expect?”

Violet tried to look suitably blank, to shake her head in what she hoped came across as friendly confusion. But her mind had already leaped ahead of her sister. She had written dozens of papers discussing inheritance—and therefore sexual intercourse—in frank, clear terms. She thought about the paper she’d published explaining the reproductive habits of the peppered moth, the relative incidence of various moth colorings since the onset of the Industrial Revolution, and what that all had to do with Darwin’s evolutionary notions. She thought about the people who visited Sebastian’s lectures—waving placards and shouting epithets—and imagined them following her around instead.

Filthy, that woman behind her had whispered. Filthy reprobate.

In theory, Mama didn’t know any of that. In practice, Violet was never stupid enough to wager against her mother. Clearly, she needed to have a talk with the woman.

Lily was shaking her head, oblivious to Violet’s thoughts. “That’s what I thought. There’s no scandal at all. Not unless you’re hiding something juicy.”

There are six things every lady must lie about.

Violet smiled at her sister, as warmly as she was able. “Goodness,” she heard herself say, her words starched and pressed to unbending crispness. “When have I ever been able to hide anything from you?”

“Well,” Lily said slyly. “There is Mr. Malheur.”

Violet blinked at her sister, afraid to say anything.

“His reputation?” Lily said, nudging her playfully with an elbow. “With women? You are aware of that? Never say you’ve finally succumbed.”

“Oh.” Violet inhaled. “That. Lily, you know we’re only old friends from childhood.”

We’re not even that anymore.

Lily smiled and set her hand on Violet’s wrist. “I’m teasing you, dear. Of course I know you’d never involve yourself with him in that way.” She winked at Violet. “He’s so awful—with those dreadful lectures he gives? If you ever were so selfish as to surrender to his wicked wiles, I’d have to give you the cut direct.” She laughed.

Violet looked at her sister—listened to a laugh that was not quite merry enough, just a little ugly at the edges—and understood that Lily wasn’t joking. That had been a warning, not a tease. She swallowed hard.

This was why Lily never understood Mama. Mama knew what it was like to carry a scandal in her heart, to know that the truth would cause you to be cast out forever. Lily had never understood that.

“You’ll talk to Mama, then,” Lily was saying. “Convince her to stop filling Amanda’s head with such nonsense. She never listens to me, but you…”

“That’s because I understand her,” Violet remarked.

“Yes,” Lily said offhandedly, “you’re difficult like she is. Prickly, hard to understand.” She tossed this off as if it were a simple fact, one that everyone agreed on. “And could you talk to Amanda? She has something on her mind, something ridiculous. She listens to you.”