Unveiled (Turner #1)(81)
The change of the seasons had exerted some little effect on the scenery. Now, instead of being dark gray, foggy, drizzly and clouded over with coal dust, the city appeared to be light gray, foggy, drizzly and clouded over with coal dust. The flowers sold by the vendors had altered; fruit sellers walking the streets had a few baskets of late berries, instead of sacks of wizened apples.
But the biggest difference was not in the weather or the wares. It was something Margaret held deep inside her. London looked different when you came back looking for a fight. Over the past week, all of the best people had returned to town once again. Parliament prepared to sit once again. As a result, knockers had been hung on doors and invitations had begun to flourish, scattering on the wind like seeds from some great plant of etiquette.
This time, Margaret wasn’t going to retreat to the countryside to let her wounds fester.
Which was why for the fourth time in twelve days she stood on the threshold of the townhouse where Lady Elaine Warren lived. Margaret’s maid waited on the pavement behind her. When Margaret had first begun tilting at this particular windmill, her maid had been wary and uneasy. After over a week of battle, the woman had become inured to the prospect of rejection. Now she sported only a dour expression, shifting from foot to foot. From the slouch in her chaperone’s shoulders, Margaret could guess her thoughts: Can’t she hurry up and get tossed out on her ear again, so that we may finally return home?
Not, Margaret thought grimly, until they’d made their rounds. She’d visited twelve houses today. Twelve doors had remained closed to her; doors that would have sprung wide open for her a year ago.
Margaret’s dove-gray silk morning gown, trimmed with yards of fine-knit black lace, was a far cry from the sensible nurse’s frocks she’d worn back at Parford Manor. Her cloak was soft and warm. Her hair had been curled and arranged, and ringlets bounced about her shoulders in gentle sways as she lifted her hand and rapped the knocker. The sound echoed against the wood: firm, but polite. Margaret was always polite when she went out to do battle.
A jaunty little bonnet stood atop her head, tied in place. As she stood on the stoop, waiting for a response, she could feel the long, navy ribbons slithering down her shoulders. She shifted slightly, and the silk tickled her skin.
The door opened—one battle won. The dark-clad butler took one glance at Margaret and compressed his lips. He held a silver salver, which he normally would have extended at this point. Over the many years when Margaret had visited Lady Elaine, he’d often done so—if he hadn’t ushered her in immediately.
But everything had changed. This time, when the butler looked at her, he no longer saw a lady.
Margaret raised her chin. He would. He would.
It seemed as if she had been knocking at doors, and being turned away, for far more than two weeks. It seemed as if it had been years since she had last seen Ash, when in truth, scarcely two months had passed. The dreadful thick fog that blanketed London in the mornings had crawled over more than just the streets. It had swallowed up her memories of his features, dimmed them in cotton until he seemed an impossibility: a fairy-tale hero, too large for the life she had to live.
No, here in the clammy fog, there was only a dour-faced butler. He stood, wordlessly barring Margaret’s entry into her erstwhile friend’s home.
But there was one thing that Margaret carried with her from those enchanted weeks. They were words she held in her heart, words she repeated to herself every night, and again on waking. I matter. I am important. And I am not giving up.
Perhaps that was why, the fourth time she was faced with Lady Elaine’s butler, she reached forwards and placed a card on the salver the butler had not yet proffered.
“Newton,” Margaret said in her most commanding voice, “do tell Lady Elaine that Lady Anna Margaret Dalrymple has come to call.”
It was both a gamble and a brazen lie. She wasn’t Lady Anna Margaret any longer, even though her card proclaimed her as such in raised letters on thick, creamy stock.
From behind Newton, Margaret could hear scraps of conversation wafting to her. They came from inside the house—murmurs, and then a peal of feminine laughter. Margaret recognized that high-pitched nervous giggle, ending on a snort. Her friend’s laughs were legendary. Margaret could imagine everything about the conversation Lady Elaine must be engaged in now—everything from the length of the visit (always long) to the number of times she would poke her head out of the room and call for more biscuits (often).
The butler cleared his throat, forcibly reminding Margaret that she wasn’t in the front parlor, partaking of tea.
“Lady Elaine,” he stated inflexibly, “is not at home to visitors.”
From the sound of things, Lady Elaine was in fact at home. With visitors.
Margaret looked the man in the eye and shook her head in disappointment. He didn’t blush—a man as well-trained as he would never show so much emotion—but after a few seconds, his gaze cut away.
“Newton,” Margaret said quietly, “you will at least deliver my card, and allow Lady Elaine to refuse me entry personally.”
Newton didn’t blink. He didn’t sigh. And most important, he didn’t move from his post, blocking the door. But his shoulders shifted—a tiny amount, not so much as to hunch. For him, it was a clear declaration of regret.
“How many times have you escorted me to Lady Elaine’s parlor? How many years have you known me?”