The Last Word Read online

  Then Lucinda heard the scuffling of footsteps, more than one pair of feet. The door opened, and the light of the gas lamp filled the room, stinging her eyes. Mrs. Patton carried the lamp into the room, followed by two male servants carrying a large parcel. They were followed by the housekeeper, Mrs. Wheeler, in her nightdress with a shawl around her shoulders. Lucinda held her breath as the servants untied the hemp string and unwrapped the portrait from the paper.

  “Where do you want it, Miss Leavitt?” Mrs. Wheeler asked.

  “By me,” Lucinda whispered. “I want my mother by me.”

  Mrs. Wheeler placed a chair next to Lucinda’s bed and bid the servants to place the portrait on it. She carefully straightened the portrait, angling it so Lucinda could see it from her bed. Lucinda opened her stinging eyes further, so she could see her mother’s brown eyes and her bright smile. Even through the blur, the face was shockingly like her own. As if she were looking through a mirror darkly.

  Eighteen

  DAVID CLOSED HIS EYES AND leaned his head back against the carriage seat, but the image of Lucinda, burned and bleeding, would not leave his mind. Forcing him to relive that horrible day over and over again.

  He pressed a handkerchief to his nose and mouth. The ringing in his ears was not from the explosions, but from church bells. It sounded like every church in London was playing the funeral peal in honor of Superintendent James Braidwood’s procession. David rode in his cousin’s carriage behind the Duke of Sutherland and the Earl of Caithness, as the chief mourners. He glanced out the carriage window. All the shops were closed on the street. Rows and rows of bodies flocked to watch the funeral procession. He saw the members of the crowd take off their hats and bonnets as the hearse passed by.

  David could almost feel the press of the crowd against him in the carriage. The way they had surrounded and touched him when he’d carried Lucinda the night of the fire. He swallowed.

  “Are you all right, David?” Alfred asked from the seat adjacent to him.

  David wiped his forehead with his handkerchief and replaced it in his pocket. “Only hot,” he said.

  “Nearly a week later and they say the fire is still burning,” Alfred said. “But at least it is contained.”

  “It may be a fortnight or more before I can see what is left of my countinghouse,” David said.

  “Have you lost a great deal of money?” his cousin asked.

  David shook his head. “It is impossible to say. The building itself was insured. But all the documents burned. Every contract will be in question. Every lease renegotiated. Our solicitors will probably be very busy for the next year, at least.”

  Alfred pulled a paper out of his pocket and handed it to David. It was a bank draft for one hundred thousand pounds from the Bank of England.

  “What is this?”

  “All of the amount owing with interest on Keynsham Hall’s mortgages,” Alfred explained. “Mr. Merritt thought you might need extra funds after the fire to rebuild your business. Maybe buy an estate of your own.”

  “How?” was all that David could manage to say.

  “It’s a part of the marriage settlements.”

  “Whose marriage settlements?”

  “Mine,” Alfred said with his catlike smile. “Miss Persephone Merritt has done me the honor of accepting my offer of marriage. But her father wants the estate free and clear of debt first.”

  “Are you sure?” David asked.

  Alfred pushed David’s fingers over the paper. “Yes, David. You no longer have to carry my burdens. I will soon have a wife for that.”

  “And how is Miss Merritt?”

  “Happy, I hope,” Alfred said. “We are to be married in less than two months.”

  “I hope you will be happy too,” David said.

  “I shall do my poor best.”

  “You’re not poor anymore.”

  Alfred gave him a crooked smile. “My rich best, then.”

  * * *

  David stood on the front step of the Leavitts’ house and knocked on the door. His mind could not help but cast back to the last time he had stood here, with Lucinda in his arms. The butler opened the door and quietly ushered him into the sitting room, only this time Lucinda was not in the room brightening up everything around her. He walked over to the table to set down his leather bag, when he saw the papers that he had forgotten to take with him after their disagreement.

  “Good heavens!” he exclaimed, picking up the three separate stacks of papers and riffling through them. Leases. Deeds. Ledgers. David’s most important documents had not burned in the fire after all—they had been safely here in the Leavitts’ sitting room.

  Relief and regret swept over him. Sweet relief that details of the Durham speculation were safe, each paper signifying thousands of pounds of his hard work. But he felt bitter regret that he had nearly risked his life for a few signatures that had not even been at his countinghouse to begin with. He carefully placed the papers inside his leather bag.

  “Mr. Randall,” Mrs. Patton said from the doorway. “To what do we owe the pleasure of this call?”

  David took off his hat and held it in both hands. “Mrs. Patton, I was hoping for news of Miss Leavitt. How is she doing? Is she any better?”

  Mrs. Patton came into the room and closed the door behind her. “I am delighted to tell you the doctor believes that Lucinda will live. Although she is scarred.”

  “May I see her?”

  Mrs. Patton shook her head. “I am afraid that would be most improper, Mr. Randall. Lucinda is confined to her bed, and as her chaperone, I could not allow an unrelated gentleman into her bedroom.”

  “But you would be there the entire time, Mrs. Patton,” David said. “Surely there can be no scandal in a short, chaperoned visit to an invalid confined to their bed?”

  “I suppose so, if it is a very short visit,” Mrs. Patton said doubtfully.

  “I promise you, I will not stay more than a few minutes,” David said. “I must see her.”

  Mrs. Patton gave a resigned sigh. “Follow me.”

  David did not have to be told twice. He grabbed his leather bag before trailing behind her. They walked up the stairs to a room at the end of the hall where Lucinda was asleep. Her dark hair swirled out in wild curls around her face on the white pillow. Her skin was deathly pale, and her lips were chapped. He could see bandages on her neck, hands, and arms. He walked closer to her and stood beside her bed.

  “Lucinda, you have a visitor,” Mrs. Patton said in her singsong voice from the bottom of the bed.

  Lucinda’s eyes flickered open and widened when she recognized him. David smiled down at her and their eyes met—his heart swelled with renewed hope. But then she closed her eyes and turned her head away from him without saying a word.

  “I-I brought you a new book,” he said, and pulled the slim leather volume out of his bag and placed it on her bedside table.

  Lucinda still didn’t look at him.

  “It’s called Silas Marner and it’s by George Eliot, but Mr. Gibbs assures me that it was actually written by a lady named Mary Ann Evans,” David explained. “I thought you might enjoy it.”

  But there was still no response from her. David could almost believe she had fallen back asleep; her eyes were closed and she didn’t move a muscle.

  “Mr. Randall,” Mrs. Patton said, as she briefly touched his arm. “I think you’d better go.”

  David nodded. “Goodbye, Lucinda.”

  With a sinking heart, he followed Mrs. Patton down the flight of stairs and to the front door.

  “Should I come back again tomorrow?” he asked.

  “She needs time to heal, Mr. Randall,” Mrs. Patton said in a sympathetic voice. “The best thing you can do for Lucinda is leave her alone.”

  David did not trust himself to reply. He simply nodded and left the house. His carriage was waiting for him, and he instructed his driver to take him to his warehouse.

  Randall and Leavitt’s warehouse was on the o
ther side of the fire, on the opposite bank of the River Thames. He had previously regretted that their warehouse was such a distance from the countinghouse, and now their separation was the only reason his business was still operating. He watched out the window of his carriage as it bumped over London Bridge.

  Smoke and sparks of fire were still actively burning around what once had been Tooley Street. Men, women, and children were wading neck-deep into the Thames, trying to salvage any of the goods that had been expelled there by the explosions. David coughed several times and then covered his mouth and nose. The usual smog of London blended with the smoke was a lethal combination.

  His carriage stopped in front of his warehouse. He thanked Evans and carried the documents inside the building. David had set up a temporary countinghouse in the west corner of the warehouse, where his clerks were working diligently to replace the lost information from the fire. He climbed up the stairs to a small landing that overlooked the entire warehouse, into what was formerly the foreman’s office, and was surprised to see Mr. Leavitt sitting at the desk. His gray hair was going in all directions, and he had a long, red scratch on the left side of his face above his beard. He flipped through the papers on his desk with a manic frenzy.

  “It’s not here. They’re not here,” he kept repeating over and over. “Not here. Nowhere.”

  “Sir,” David said. Mr. Leavitt looked up, his eyes red and unfocused. “Should you be here, sir?”

  “I must work. I must work. Work is the only thing I can do,” Leavitt said, and began again to riffle through the papers.

  “You should be with your daughter.”

  Leavitt shook his head, not looking up. “Just like her mother. I couldn’t protect her. Just like her mother.”

  David walked over to Mr. Leavitt and grabbed one of his shaking hands. “What are you looking for, sir? Perhaps I can assist you.”

  Mr. Leavitt yanked his hand out of David’s grasp. “The Durham pages. Must find the Durham pages. Gone up in flames. Everything I hold dear, gone up in flames.”

  “I have the pages.”

  “What?” Leavitt wiped his sweaty brow and seemed to regain some control over himself. “What a relief, Randall. But how?”

  “Your daughter has been helping me with my work for over a month now,” David said slowly. “And she is exceptionally talented with numbers. She is the reason these papers are not in cinders, and all she wishes is to be given a chance in this business. She would be the perfect choice, nay, the only choice, for our chief financial officer.”

  “She’s burned. Lucy is burned,” Mr. Leavitt said, running his hands through his wild hair.

  “Lucinda will be all right,” David said. “And you should be at home with her. Not here. Not working. Durham can wait.”

  Mr. Leavitt took a long, shaky breath, then nodded. “Durham can wait,” he echoed.

  David took his mentor by the arm and helped him to his feet, then handed him his hat and his cane. It was as if Mr. Leavitt had aged twenty years in the fire.

  David helped him out of the warehouse, hailed a hansom cab, and escorted him home to the care of the butler. Then, David climbed back into the hansom cab, and instead of instructing the driver to return him to his office, he called out, “Paddington Station.”

  “Very good, sir,” the driver said.

  When they arrived, David paid the driver, then purchased a ticket for the next train and got on it. He sat in a first-class compartment all by himself, grateful for the solitude. He opened the window and let the fresh air in, closing his eyes.

  It was impossible not to think of Lucinda. His last few train rides had been in her company. He longed to see her. To hold her close to him. To kiss her. To make her laugh and to see her smile of pure light. But could their relationship ever be the same again? Would she ever forgive him?

  He buried his face in his hands. If only he had heard her call for help sooner. If only he had agreed to talk to her father. Then she would not have gone to Tooley Street that night. She would be unharmed, but his mentor and partner would have burned to death. David understood choices and consequences from business. Everything had a cost. Nothing was free. And sometimes you did not realize how great the cost was until you had already paid it. Or the true value of something you possessed until you lost it.

  David got off the train at the next stop and began to walk. He just wanted to get away from people.

  He needed to think.

  To breathe clean air.

  To be alone.

  Once he was clear of the town, he took off his hat, his coat, and his waistcoat. He undid his cravat and unbuttoned the top two buttons of his shirt. The air felt good against his bare skin. He walked down the pike road for a mile or so, when he heard the sound of running water. He left the path and trudged through the dusty field until he found a small river winding its way through the trees.

  David took off his boots and waded knee-deep into the stream. For the first time since the fire, he didn’t feel hot. He put his hands into the water and splashed his face. He laughed. He stomped through the water as if he were a boy again. Free from responsibilities, from his father’s expectations. Free to enjoy himself. He eventually waded back to the shore and lay underneath a tree, balling up his coat for a pillow.

  It seemed that his work was taking over every minute of his life. He put his arm over his eyes, blocking all light. David enjoyed the business, and he relished the status he received for being a part owner in such a successful venture. He wanted to prove to himself, and to his dead father, that he was every bit as shrewd a businessman as his father had been. But when would it be enough? After the Durham deal? Another year? Another decade? An entire life spent trying to show a dead man that he was capable?

  David wanted to be more than his father, more than just a successful businessman. He wanted to be an acquaintance. A friend. To actually have time to visit his club, see his old cronies from Eton. Play a game of cricket. Join a fox hunt. Maybe purchase his own house in the country and stay for long weekends. Accompany Lucinda to find other lost authors. He could not imagine a future without her in it. Her laughter, her witty remarks, and her very kissable lips.

  Nineteen

  LUCINDA BROUGHT HER HAND TO her mouth and tried to chew on her thumbnail, only to taste cotton. She spat out the little bit she’d bitten off and exhaled loudly. Her nose began to itch, and no matter how she tried, she could not scratch it with her bandaged hands. She couldn’t do anything!

  She heard the scuffling of footsteps and closed her eyes tightly. She was in no mood for another conversation with Mrs. Patton. Lucinda heard the doorknob turn and two distinctly different footfalls.

  “Oh, dear, Miss Leavitt is sleeping,” Mrs. Patton said. “Shall I tell her you called?”

  “No,” Persephone said with her thick American accent. “I shall sit here until she wakes up.”

  “Very well,” Mrs. Patton said. “I shall go order you some tea, then. Shall I?”

  “Please.”

  Lucinda heard Mrs. Patton leave the room and close the door behind her with a click.

  “You can open your eyes, Lucinda,” Persephone said. “I can tell you are not asleep. Your breathing is not regular enough for sleep.”

  Lucinda opened her eyes and smiled at her friend. Persephone gave her a brilliant smile in return. “I am here to get you back on your feet.”

  “I haven’t walked yet,” Lucinda said, gesturing to her legs beneath the coverlet. “My arms were badly burned by the fire.”

  “Then your legs should work just fine,” Persephone replied, helping Lucinda sit up. “You need to get your strength back quickly so you can be one of my attendants at my wedding.”

  “What wedding?” Lucinda exclaimed. “You’re getting married?”

  “Yes, dear, that’s what wedding means.”

  “To Lord Adlington?”

  “No, to the Archbishop of Canterbury,” Persephone said with a laugh. “Of course I’m marrying Alfred.”<
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  Lucinda laughed for the first time since the fire. “I am so delighted for you both.”

  “Excellent. I’ll have my dressmaker come next week and take your measurements.”

  Lucinda covered her face with her bandaged hands. “I can’t be your attendant, Persephone. Not how I look now.”

  Persephone gently pulled each of Lucinda’s hands from her face and looked her squarely in the eye. “You are still one of the most beautiful women I have ever seen.”

  Lucinda shook her head. “I’m bruised and broken.”

  Persephone stamped her foot and put her hands on her narrow waist. “You are not a doll. You are a woman. And women don’t break that easily.”

  “I was ridiculed by society when I was lowborn and beautiful, and now I am lowborn and scarred,” Lucinda said. “There is no place in society for me now.”

  Persephone harrumphed and grabbed a hand mirror from the side table. She held it in front of Lucinda’s face. “Look. I see a pair of perfectly lovely blue eyes, a dainty nose Miss Clara Hardin would kill for, and rosy lips.”

  “I see a bruised face, hair that has been singed off, and pink spots of discoloration on my neck from where I was burned. I see hands that will probably never play the pianoforte again, and I may never even be able to hold a pen.”

  Persephone handed Lucinda the mirror. “Let’s start with the hair, then.”

  She walked around the room opening drawers until she found a brush and returned to the bed. Persephone gently took off Lucinda’s nightcap and slowly began to brush her hair, starting at the bottom and working her way to the roots. Persephone gave Lucinda’s hair one last comb-through before placing the brush on the bedside table.

  “Sit tight, Lucinda,” she said. “I shall be back in a jiffy.”

  What is a jiffy?

  A jiffy was not a long time. Persephone returned to Lucinda’s room with a pair of brass scissors. “Hold still while I cut off the burned bits.”

  Lucinda sat still, watching chunks of her hair fall onto her coverlet. She picked up her mirror and gasped. Her hair was short and uneven.