Karen Doornebos - Definitely Not Mr Darcy

Her head throbbed with the onslaught of car engines, a train, honking horns, voices, and car radios. Raindrops fell, and umbrellas of all different sizes and colors popped up all around her.

None of the men bowed to her. The women didn’t curtsy. Nobody even looked at her, or if they did, they quickly looked away out of politeness. She was the raving lunatic homeless woman on the street.

Pelting rain dripped down her face and neck and probably by now had smudged her eyebrow liner made from candle ashes. Even in the rain, though, the aroma of scones spilled out of a bakery. She stood in front of a tearoom and coffeehouse under a dripping awning, looking at a reflection in the window of her sodden self. The antibride with a child hidden in her attic.

She pressed her hand to the window. She needed a plane ticket home, but first—coffee. It didn’t even have to be a double espresso latte, but she didn’t have any money. For the first time in a long time, she ached for a credit card, and couldn’t believe she cut up all her credit cards in a fit of rage all those years ago.

A young man sat inside the tearoom, holding a bouquet of flowers wrapped in white paper. For the first time in forever, a man with flowers didn’t make her moon over Winthrop. She smiled. They were better off, the two of them, without each other. She had left him for good reason, and now she finally felt the strength to fight him in the upcoming custody trial. She could do it—and win.

The young man in the tearoom gave Chloe a hostile glance; no doubt she looked crazy. She stepped back and the rain from the awning dripped heavily on her. He was waiting for someone, because he had a life, a real life, with real people in it. All these people had a life. She had nothing. Except for Abigail, who counted on her for everything. And as far as that went, she had blown it. She’d be coming home without the prize money. What she would be coming home with, though, was a resolve to leave the past behind—all of it—even the nineteenth century, and that was worth a lot more than a hundred grand.

She darted under a covered bus stop where an old woman sat in her green trench coat with a cloth market basket full of lettuce, tomatoes, and cucumbers. Lettuce! Green lettuce helped digestion. She craved lettuce. She’d trade the gown off her back for a chopped salad.

She sat on the bench next to the woman, wiped her glasses with her wet gloves, put them back on, and looked up the street, where, high atop a hill in the distance, Dartworth Hall stood. It would’ve made a great postcard. Hell, it probably was one and probably was sold in the shops along this street.

“I can’t believe—” she said out loud, like a homeless woman.

The old woman looked at her, then quickly looked at her watch.

“I threw it all away.”

The woman pushed back her plastic rain scarf. “Threw what away?” She eyed Chloe up and down; she was curious.

“Dartworth Hall. The prize money. Everything.”

The woman gave Chloe a tissue from her trench pocket, which only reminded Chloe of Henry and his handkerchiefs. Chloe wiped her dripping nose.

“Are you part of that film going on up there?”

Chloe nodded. “They wanted me to marry him. But I couldn’t. Even though it was just for TV. I couldn’t.”

The old woman had kind green eyes. “Marry who?”

“Why, Sebastian, of course. Sebastian Wrightman.”

The old woman looked confused. She stood up. “Who? Ah. Here’s my bus. But Dartworth Hall doesn’t belong to anyone named Sebastian.” The bus lumbered up. “Henry Wrightman is the master of Dartworth Hall.”

“What?” Chloe clenched her pelisse around her chest; her lips quivered.

The bus doors opened and the woman stepped up the first step in her black flats. “I would say it’s a good thing you didn’t marry that Sebastian—”

“Door’s closing!” the annoyed driver yelled, and the doors snapped closed.

Chloe stepped out from under the Plexiglas bus stop, into the rain, to watch the woman take her seat and wave.

She collapsed back down on the bench under the covered bus stop and buried her head in her hands. Maybe that old woman didn’t know what she was talking about. Maybe she had Alzheimer’s or dementia or some sort of addled-brain disease that Chloe was convinced she would get someday, too, if she didn’t have it already. She better start doing crossword puzzles or something—and soon. Wait a minute. Crossword. Acrostic—she opened her wedding reticule and pulled out the well-worn folded-up poem from Sebastian. The acrostic jumped out at her now:

A s the sun shines high in the sky

L ove blooms in my heart, I cannot lie.

L et our love grow

I s what is want, I know.

S till I cannot be convinced

N ay, I need more evidence

O f your intentions, are they true?

T o convince me here is what you need to do:

A s the clock strikes two you must find

S omething in a garden where light and shadow are intertwined

I nspect the face in the garden bright

T hen follow the line of light

S traight to a house without walls

E nter the door and go where the water falls

E xtrapolate from this poem the puzzle within

M ake a note of the six-word answer, write it, and you will win

S end your missive through the secret door and the answers you seek will

be in store!

The first letter of every line was to be read down, and it spelled out ALL IS NOT AS IT SEEMS . She squeezed her eyes shut and heard something familiar in the din of gushing rain and cars. The sound of hooves clomping on the cobblestone.

It was Henry on a white horse. On Sebastian’s white horse. Rain dripped from his wide-brimmed hat and nineteenth-century greatcoat as he rode right smack down the middle of the road and ignored the chaos he was causing. Two hunting hounds nuzzled up to Chloe and slipped their soaked heads under her hands. Never in her life had she been so happy to see a dog, not to mention two sopping wet hounds. She rubbed their bony heads. But Henry? If he was really the master of Dartworth Hall, he had lied to her. And who the hell was Sebastian, then?

Henry slowed his horse right in front of the bus stop, tipped his hat, and held out his hand to her. “Miss Parker, your conveyance has arrived.”

She folded her arms and the dogs wagged their tails against her wet gown. The lady was not amused.

His lips curled into a smile as he eyed her up and down. “I must say that your dramatic exit from the church was better than any production crew could dream of. Even now they’re salivating over the prospect of skyrocketing ratings. Well done.”

Traffic wove around the horse. Chloe looked up the street, and half expected to see the camera crew. A small crowd under umbrellas gathered around them.

“And where are the cameras now? I’m sure they’d love to get me on film looking like this.”

“No cameras. I lost them in the deer park. And as for your looks, well, I’ve never been happier to see you.”

“I wish I could say the same.” If what that woman said was true, then he’d been lying to her for weeks! Chloe took off her glasses and tucked them into her soaked white reticule. She looked away from Henry and toward Dartworth Hall, where a patch of blue sky had broken through the clouds.