The Last Word Page 18
Lucinda looked up to see David standing in front of them with his cockiest of smiles. Lucinda could not help but grin.
“Lucinda was telling me her name means light,” Mrs. Randall said.
“Very appropriate,” David agreed. “Mother, do you mind if I steal Miss Leavitt for the waltz?”
“Not at all.”
Mrs. Randall released her hold on Lucinda’s arm, and Lucinda placed her hand into David’s outstretched one. He brought his other hand to her waist and pulled her closer to him as they danced.
“Where have you been?” Lucinda asked.
“Were you looking for me?”
“No, no,” Lucinda said quickly, shaking her head.
“Are you sure?” David asked.
“I might have noticed you were not present,” Lucinda allowed.
“Do you wish to know where I was?”
Lucinda shrugged nonchalantly, and she heard David laugh. She looked up into his smiling face, and her heart began to beat faster. He leaned his head closer to hers and whispered, “I’ve found her at last.”
“Who?”
“Eurydice Emerson.”
* * *
Lucinda and David sat on one side of the carriage and her father sat on the other.
“Now, where are we going again, Lucinda?” her father asked.
“To meet Mr. Topliffe, the rector of St. Ivy’s parish,” Lucinda explained. “He is the brother of a recently deceased author who died before completing her story. He is in possession of her final papers, and I am hoping to find some clue to how she would have ended it.”
“All this effort is for a story?”
“It is not about the story,” David said before Lucinda could. “It’s about unfinished business.”
When they arrived at the small rectory next to St. Ivy’s Church, David alighted from the carriage, helped Lucinda out, and held the door for her father. They had not yet reached the front step of the rectory when Mr. Topliffe opened the door to his house and invited them in. He led them to a comfortable sitting room with chairs that had seen many years of service. His wife served them tea, and he took out a small box, opening the lid.
“This is everything Mrs. Burntwood sent,” he said solemnly.
Lucinda touched the top paper, but was unable to pick it up. Her hands could not perform such small tasks yet. David did not wait to be asked, but was instantly at her side. He picked up the paper and turned it over. The first dozen or so pages were letters from Mr. Topliffe to his sister. David continued to turn the papers over. There were several letters from the editor, Mr. Gibbs. David was nearly to the bottom of the pile, and Lucinda began to despair.
He picked up the second-to-last paper and turned it over, revealing the last page. This paper was written by a different hand. It was a neat scrawl, but very tiny. Lucinda had to peer closer to read the words.
It pained her, but Eurydice Emerson knew she was right. She could not marry where she did not love.
“Mr. Thisbe, I am honored by your offer of marriage,” she said. “I think you are a most estimable man. But it is impossible for me to accept it. I can only wish you happiness and God’s greatest blessings in your future life.”
“I hope you are not deluded by your other suitor,” he said. “Lord Dunstan’s life has not been what your future husband’s should have been.”
Eurydice flushed with anger.
“Please, sir. Let us speak of this no more. It will not be pleasing to either party.”
“Very well, Miss Emerson. I bid you adieu.”
Eurydice could not speak. She turned from her spurned suitor and fled farther into the garden. Her tears fell like rain from her eyes. She stumbled to her knees and rested her head on a stone bench. What great crime had Lord Dunstan committed to cause Mr. Thisbe to feel such scorn?
“Miss Emerson.”
Behind her stood none other than Lord Dunstan. He looked handsomer than ever. He stepped toward her.
“My dear girl, what is amiss?”
Eurydice dabbed her handkerchief at her eyes and managed to get to her feet. She could not quite look Lord Dunstan in the eye.
“Mr. Thisbe said the most unpleasant things about you, sir.”
“What did he say?”
Eurydice could only shake her head.
“I should have told you before, Miss Emerson—Eurydice,” Lord Dunstan said. “In my youth, I committed many follies. The most grievous one is that I was a free trader for several years. You would call it smuggling. Indeed, that is how I earned my fortune and saved the family estate. I promise I am no longer engaged in the illegal trade and that in future, I will be upright before the law and the Lord.”
Lord Dunstan placed his hand on her shoulder, and Eurydice turned back to look at him.
“My lord, I cannot say that I approve of such behavior,” she began, “but I believe a person can change, and I believe you when you say that you have changed.”
Lord Dunstan took each of Eurydice’s hands and kissed them. “My dearest Eurydice, say you will be my wife.”
“I cannot,” she said. “I am sorry. Although I hold a great regard for you, I do not love you.”
“Perhaps, with time, you could learn to love me?” he suggested.
“Love is not a subject that can be taught,” Eurydice said, and gently pulled her hands from his. “Love can only be felt by your heart and echoed in the darkest corners of your soul.”
Lord Dunstan nodded, stepping back from her.
“I appreciate your honesty, Miss Emerson,” he said with a bow. “Should you ever need my assistance, please know that I would gladly offer it to you.”
“Thank you,” she said. “Goodbye, dear friend.”
Eurydice left the garden and returned to the house. But her home no longer fit her—it was like a favorite dress she’d outgrown.
She went into her childhood bedchamber and began placing her clothes in a trunk. There was a great wide world out there, and it was time for her to go and discover it. Eurydice …
Clearly Bertha Topliffe had intended to write more. But she never did. She left her greatest work unfinished. Lucinda looked up and saw the eyes of three men upon her, waiting expectedly.
“Eurydice Emerson knew she was right.”
“And?” her father asked.
“And?” Mr. Topliffe questioned.
“And?” David prompted.
“She refused them both and decided to leave home for the wider world.”
“I knew it!” David said and punched the air. “I told you that from the start. She wasn’t in love with either of them.”
“David Randall knew he was right,” Lucinda quipped.
And they all laughed.
Epilogue
A YEAR LATER, LUCINDA BREATHED in the smell of freshly cut lumber and recently painted orange trim. The newly rebuilt countinghouse on Tooley Street now boasted three private offices: Mr. Leavitt, Owner; Mr. David Randall, Owner; and Miss Lucinda Leavitt, Chief Financial Officer. Lucinda’s office had three windows that were covered in morning frost. She walked to the windows and looked out at the new buildings among the remnants of the destructive fire that had nearly cost her life. The River Thames flowed past with a steadiness that reassured her.
She sat at her desk and looked at her mother’s portrait hanging prominently on the wall of her office. Lucinda felt warm and loved every time she looked at her mother’s brown eyes and beautiful face. Her mother had understood how it felt to be a part of two societies without belonging to either of them. Lucinda was not sure where she fit in society anymore, but it no longer mattered to her. She had a friend who cared for her. A father who adored her. And a fiancé who loved her.
Lucinda no longer felt unfinished.
She felt complete.
Whole.
Lucinda took off her gloves. She wiggled her stiff, scarred fingers to loosen them. She carefully turned the cover of the first ledger and picked up her pen. Her hand clenched, but she held the
pen determinedly. She was strong. She could hold this pen in her hand. She could accomplish any task.
Lucinda completed the first page.
The second.
The third.
She dipped her pen into the ink and painstakingly turned the ledger to the fourth page when she heard a knock at the door. She set the pen down on the desk.
“Come in.”
David opened the door and closed it behind him. He gave her his familiar cocky grin and lifted his eyebrows.
“Yes, David?”
“Do you like your new office?”
“I adore my new office,” she said, crossing the room to the man she loved. “And do you like yours?”
David took her hands in his and kissed each one. “Yes, but what I like best is that it is right next to yours.”
“Very conveniently placed,” Lucinda said, trying hard not to giggle.
“Very,” David agreed.
Lucinda wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him long and lingeringly on the lips. And just like Miss Eurydice Emerson, Lucinda knew she was right where she wanted to be.
Author’s Note
WHEN I READ ELIZABETH GASKELL’S Wives and Daughters for the first time, I did not know Mrs. Gaskell had died before completing the novel. I eagerly turned the massive Victorian tome’s pages and was concerned as I got closer to the end that there was too much to wrap up and not enough pages to do it. Then I turned the last page, and I saw the editor’s concluding remarks stating Mrs. Gaskell had died and these were her intentions for the conclusion. I felt cheated. Upset. And I wondered what it would have been like to be reading it serially.
Wives and Daughters was published in chapters, or serially, in Cornhill Magazine from August 1864 to January 1866. Part of the first paragraph of the fictional editor’s remarks in She Knew She Was Right is taken from the real editor’s note about Mrs. Gaskell in Wives and Daughters. Unlike the editor in my story, Gaskell’s editor assures the reader the two main characters did indeed marry and live happily ever after.
Many Victorian authors’ novels were published serially, including Charles Dickens, who died leaving The Mystery of Edwin Drood unfinished. But it’s his book, A Tale of Two Cities, that became the inspiration for Mrs. Smith’s first novel, A Tale of Two Towns. Anthony Trollope was another prolific Victorian writer, and I used the title of his novel He Knew He Was Right to create Mrs. Smith’s She Knew She Was Right. My favorite novel by the author Elizabeth Gaskell is North and South, and so I gave a nod to it with the title of Mrs. Smith’s fictional novel, East and West.
King Henry I announced the building of Reading Abbey in 1121. In 1855, the Reading Corporation purchased the land for the Forbury Gardens. Jane Austen and her sister Cassandra attended school in the Abbey Gateway in 1785. In 1861, the Abbey Gateway collapsed in a gale and Sir George Gilbert Scott, a Victorian architect known for his Gothic Revival work, was hired to restore it.
On June 22, 1861, a fire broke out in Scovell’s warehouse. This event is known as the Tooley Street Fire of 1861. More than eleven acres in London were burned, and some parts of the fire took nearly three weeks to be put out completely. The River Thames was truly on fire because of all the oil and tallow that poured into the river from the warehouses, which were also on fire. Fireman Tozer and Superintendent James Braidwood were real people. Braidwood died in the explosion described in the story, and he was accorded a hero’s funeral.
The steel framework of the crinoline cage (picture a large birdcage from your waist to your ankle) made it impossible to wrap a rug around a woman’s dress to extinguish the flames. The oxygen from underneath the skirt kept the fire burning. Clothing was very flammable, and people of all ages died by being burned to death, including the wife of American author Henry David Longfellow in 1861. Fanny Appleton Longfellow accidently started her clothing on fire with melted sealing wax. Longfellow burned his hands and face trying to save his wife, but she died the next morning from her injuries.
Amelia Jenks Bloomer was a women’s rights activist. She founded a feminist magazine in 1849 called The Lily, where she advocated women’s dress reform among other women’s rights issues, including suffrage, better education, wider employment, and fair pay. She thought that women’s clothing was impractical and uncomfortable. Inspired by a colleague’s traveling costume (Elizabeth Smith Miller), Amelia Jenks Bloomer made her own pantaloons with a shortened skirt and promoted them in her magazine. Thousands of women wrote to the magazine asking for patterns and instructions on how to make the pantaloons. Dress reform outraged conservatives, and they nicknamed her pantaloons “bloomers.” Although not widely accepted, Victorian dress reform was an important step for feminism.
Acknowledgments
DEAR READER, THANK YOU FOR picking up my book and taking the time to read my last words. The writing and publishing process is a long and hard one, and there are so many people I need to thank for helping me along the way.
I would like to give an impossibly big thank-you to the Swoon Reads team: Jean Feiwel, Lauren Scobell, Holly West, and Kat Brzozowski. To my editor, Emily Settle, I am so grateful for your amazing insight into my characters and your great eye for detail. My book is better because of you. Thank you, Katie Klimowicz, for the unforgettable cover you created. I really appreciate all the incredible work from my copyeditor, Kayley Hoffman, my production editor, Ilana Worrell, and my publicist, Madison Furr. There are not enough words, even last ones, to tell you what your work has meant to me.
Cheers to the Novel Nineteens debut group for swapping stories and wisdom. And a special shout-out to my Swoon Sisters (other Swoon Reads authors). I’m so grateful to have your support and sassiness on my publishing journey. You are all so talented and I’m humbled to be among you.
I would tip my hat (if I wore one) to my amazing beta readers: Maren, Katie, Dannielle, Erin, Angie, Mylee, and Eva.
I am so blessed to have a supportive family. To my sisters, Michelle and Stacy, I don’t know what I would do without you. You have always been my best friends and my greatest fans. Thank you for loving me and everything that I write. To my brothers, Keith and Steve, thank you for teaching me that humor is possible (and essential) in every situation. To my mom and dad, thank you for believing that I could do anything and supporting me when I tried. To my kids, I am so grateful that I get to call you mine. You challenge me and surprise me daily. Being your mom is my greatest adventure so far.
And finally to my husband, Jon, who believed in my dreams even when I doubted them. Thank you for encouraging me to keep writing when I got discouraged. You are the Darcy to my Elizabeth, the Rochester to my Jane, the Howl to my Sophie. I love you so much, and I am so lucky to have a happily ever after with you.
About the Author
Samantha Hastings has degrees from Brigham Young University, the University of Reading (Berkshire, England), and the University of North Texas. She met her husband in a turkey-sandwich line. They live in Salt Lake City, Utah, where she spends most of her time reading, eating popcorn, and chasing her kids. The Last Word is her debut novel.
Visit her online at samanthahastings.com, or sign up for email updates here.
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Contents
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
Epigraph
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Epilogue
Author’s Note
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Copyright
Copyright © 2019 by Samantha Hastings
A Feiwel and Friends Book
An imprint of Macmillan Publishing Group, LLC
120 Broadway, New York, NY 10271
swoonreads.com
All rights reserved.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.
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First hardcover edition 2019
eBook edition July 2019
eISBN 9781250301871