Sinful in Satin (6 page)

Celia examined the expensive raw silks at the windows, and the classical style of the furniture. A careful composition of blues and creams, each item had been chosen to reflect good taste so the gentlemen who visited would feel at home. There were important illusions to be maintained.

Nothing had changed in this chamber since she abandoned this house, and her mother, five years ago. She and Alessandra had met on occasion during their estrangement, but never here. Celia had not entered this house again until she came during her mother’s final days.

“Is this property already in the hands of an estate agent, Mr. Mappleton?”

“I thought to take care of that after informing you of the particulars. I will come tomorrow and do an inventory, and see that full value is attained in the disposal of the property.”

She paused her stroll near a mahogany table with a Chinese vase on it. She stood now in the very spot she had been when Anthony told her, gently but firmly, that she had misunderstood his intentions.

She had thought he meant marriage when he spoke of being together forever. She had thought he would save her. She had been a fool.

No, not a fool. Young and in love, but not a fool. Too innocent still, despite all her mother’s lessons; that was all. One cannot teach experience about human nature, or the hard ways that the world forces compromises.

She closed her eyes and waited to experience again the desolation of that day. It did not come back, except as a small echo. She had long ago healed. Five years living in Daphne’s house near Cumberworth had provided time for her to grow up.

She did not even blame Anthony anymore, and had not for years. Of course a man of good family and fortune did not marry the daughter of Alessandra Northrope. There were rules about such things. Celia not only knew them now, but she also accepted their power.

“Since the house is not yet for sale, I want to go through my mother’s personal belongings more carefully than when we were here yesterday, Mr. Mappleton. I will not remove anything of value. However, if there are private papers and such, letters for example, I will take them with me. Is that permitted?”

“If you give your word that you will not strip the premises, that should be acceptable.” He managed only a crooked smile at his own attempt at humor. “I have still found no account book among the business papers waiting for me in the library. If you come upon it, please leave it out and visible so we can ascertain just what is what.”

She agreed to keep her eyes open for any accounts. “Will it be necessary for you to stay with me? I would like to say good-bye to her alone. The burial was a strange and foreign experience. This was where she lived her life, and breathed her last, and it is here that her spirit lingers.”

Mr. Mappleton gazed at her so soberly that she worried he would weep. “I expect that I need not interfere with that good-bye. May I say, Miss Pennifold, that your mother was a wonderful, brilliant woman. If I did not attend the funeral to say my own good-bye, I hope that you understand that in no way reflects the esteem I had for her.”

“I understood your absence, Mr. Mappleton. I saw no insult in it. Nor would she have done so. I thank you for your kind words.”

He took his leave. As soon as she heard the door close, she went up to her mother’s bedchamber.

She fought back the nostalgia provoked by the familiar scents and space. Most of the lessons had taken place here, in the privacy of this apartment. Mama would recline on that golden silk chaise longue and explain the world’s ways, and so much more. It had seemed natural when the talk had moved from how to dress and how to entertain to how to touch and other intimate secrets.

More recent memories forced the old ones into a cloud, however. This bedchamber had also been where Mama had lain ill. There had not been much talking the last weeks, but even so Mama had managed a few more lessons, and voiced her belief that her daughter should take her place. She had regaled Celia with stories of glory, of triumphs and fame. She had extracted a promise that Celia would at least think hard about what she rejected before turning her back forever on the place waiting for her.

Celia checked the drawer in the small writing table. The contents were not notable in themselves, but their arrangement had made her pause yesterday, when she and Mr. Mappleton had done a quick search for those accounts.

Alessandra was not one to stack letters and papers like this. The spaces and trunks not cared for by her lady’s maid were usually a tossed miscellany.

She stuffed the letters in her reticule, then went to the dressing room and opened the wardrobes. Alessandra’s magnificent garments, all from the best modistes, shone like so many large flowers in the afternoon light. They, like everything else of value, would be sold now.

The dressing table also displayed uncharacteristic neatness, but then, Mama had not used it in several weeks. Its few drawers were neat as well, which was less expected. Celia examined the jewels within, and wondered if any of them had been gifts from her unknown father. None of their boxes gave her a clue.

The apartment offered no help with learning his identity that she could see. She ventured up to the attic, and found the storage rooms there. To her disappointment, they contained very little besides old furniture. One trunk held nothing but garments at least twenty years out of style. She had hoped, even assumed, that her mother’s history would be evidenced in this house, documented by papers or objects.

She descended to the library and sat down at the elegant, inlaid secretaire.

She opened drawers to find little of interest besides a collection of old fashion plates, but again she noted the neat organization.

Had her mother done this, to get her affairs in order? Perhaps she did not want her solicitor to see disarray when he came to do his inventory after her death. It was one explanation, and the most likely one. It would have had to have been before Celia came home, and implied her mother knew the end was near.

However, Celia still could not shake the sense that someone besides Mr. Mappleton and herself had been in this house since her mother’s death, and also examined the contents of her mother’s private property.

Maybe it had been her father. If he did not want his identity known, he may have come, or sent someone else, to make sure no evidence of him would be found in this house. It saddened her that he might have gone to such efforts to thwart her attempts to learn the truth. He probably thought she would demand money or use his name badly if she knew him. The truth was she desired only to fill a void that she had carried in her soul all her life.

She continued searching the secretaire’s drawers and nooks. When she poked deeply into one of the cubbyholes, her fingertips touched something. She extracted a folded paper with her name on it.

Curious, she opened it.

She gazed at the letter. While she traced the elegant penmanship with her fingers, the grief that had eluded her for days finally shattered her heart. Her eyes burned with tears.

She
had
come home, briefly, finally. How terrible it would have been to read this letter if she had not.

She bent low over her palms and the letter itself, and cried out her good-bye.

 

 

“
Y
ou must admit that my plan is agood one, Daphne.

It will permit the business to grow with less burden to you,” Celia said two days later.

Daphne pondered the offer that had just been made. Distraction claimed her gray eyes, but her delicate, flawless face remained serene below her simply dressed pale hair.

“The sense of your plan does not elude me. I had never thought to have a partner in The Rarest Blooms; that is all. I also thought I was bringing you here to stay for several days only, while you decided what to do with this property. However, now it sounds as if you intend to take permanent residence.”

They stood in a back chamber of Alessandra’s house on Wells Street. Sunlight poured in its southern exposure, emphasizing the translucence of Daphne’s pale skin. Even on overcast days, this sitting room would be bright. And, as Daphne had noted that first day and Celia had clearly seen for herself, the windows and exposure made this chamber perfect for plants.

In the last year Daphne’s trade, The Rarest Blooms, had prospered. Now some of the best houses in Mayfair contracted with Daphne to provide plants and flowers from her gardens and greenhouses near Cumberworth on a regular basis.

Transporting all that vegetation had become a hard chore, however. If there were an outpost of the business here in London, where the wagons could deposit blooms and greenery, the orders could be dispersed with less trouble.

“This chamber would be warm enough to hold plants for a few days, even in winter. Cut flowers could reside in the cool larder and basement in summer,” Celia said.

“I agree that this property will meet our needs. If I hesitate, it is because I do not want you to assume the risk of a partnership,” Daphne said. “We could do the same thing without that.”

“I would prefer if you accepted the money I saved from my allowance while my mother was alive, and made me a partner. Even if I only have a small percentage, it will give me an income, which is what I need if I am going to live here. You will have the use of this house and I will see to the actual delivery of the plants.”

Daphne lowered herself into one of the cane chairs. Normally she remained a carefully composed and beautiful portrait, but now her brow puckered and her eyes clouded.

“It is not your proposal that I resist, Celia. My mind knows it is a good one. My heart, however—” She gazed up sadly. “You are determined to leave us for good, then?”

Celia stepped around the chair, bent, and embraced Daphne’s shoulders from behind. She laid her cheek against her dear friend’s cool face. “I have been dependent on you too long. One year turned to three, and three to five. I will forever be grateful for the home that you provided, but it is time for me to make my own way.”

“You are really doing this because of the gossip. I do not care what anyone says and I will not allow you to—”

“You cannot change the world, Daphne. Your business will continue being harmed as long as I am known to live and work with you. Our partnership will be a quiet one, and preserve both your trade and the reputation of your household, while it provides me with a living.”

Daphne did not answer, and Celia knew her friend still fretted. Daphne did not like accommodating injustice.

“I am three and twenty, Daphne. I have this house now, and should return to the world anyway. I would have done this even if my name had never been linked to Alessandra’s in the death notices. We will remain close in every other way, however.”

“If The Rarest Blooms should fail, you might lose this house.”

“We will not fail. We will flourish.”

Daphne rested her hand upon Celia’s embracing arm. Celia could not see her friend’s face regain its composure, but she felt it within her embrace.

“It would be much easier to have one place to bring all the plants for dispersal,” Daphne said.

Celia skipped around the chair, took Daphne’s hands, and pulled her up. “You will not regret this. Neither of us will. You can take my investment and build another hot-house and we can sell fruit we grow in it out of season for ridiculous prices. We can bring in the wagon when there are extra blooms and sell to the girls at Covent Garden. We can—”

Daphne patted Celia’s cheek. “First Audrianna left, then Verity, now you. I fear being all alone, Celia, and it was that which argued against your fine plan.”

“We will see each other so often it will be as if I never left, and you still have Katherine and Mrs. Hill there.”

“I suppose you are correct.” Daphne picked up her reticule. “I should go home to them now. I will write to my solicitor about this partnership and have it done as quickly as the settlement of your mother’s estate permits.”

Celia walked with her to the front door of the house. Daphne paused there. “I accept your reasons for living here, but I do not like your being alone, Celia. I wish I had brought my pistol and could leave it with you.”

“I will not be alone for long, and I will be safe for the short while that I am.” She felt a little guilty not telling Daphne about Mr. Albrighton. The revelation would lead only to more questions than could be answered, however.

Daphne departed with a kiss. Celia watched her step up into the gig.

Celia suspected that soon it would probably not be only Katherine and Mrs. Hill at the country property where The Rarest Blooms was housed. Daphne had a habit of finding and taking in stray women of ambiguous respectability and histories.

No doubt she would find more of them, although Celia sometimes thought it would be better if Daphne did not. At seven and twenty, it might be time for Daphne to step out of that sanctuary herself.