Sophie Dash - Unmasking Of A Lady

“I have to leave tonight. I think Father might need me. Ellen had a sore throat before I left. I should go.”

“Then you can enquire after their health when your maidservant, Mary, gets here tomorrow. We need the extra staff to cope and she’s a good worker,” said the older woman, putting an end to the discussion, as though she had not heard her niece’s protests. “It will be a splendid evening, trust me. You could even try to enjoy yourself, for a change, if the whim took you.”

“But, I…” There was nothing else Harriet could say and no excuse to be offered that would make sense. “I am looking forward to it, Aunt Georgia.”

Another evening with Major Roberts. Their third, if she counted their gunpowder-drenched meeting, when he was only a shape in the darkness, commanding she not draw back from his death if indeed she meant to kill him. The scene replayed in her head over and over, only this time her memory filled in the blanks, gave the shadow a face, a smile.

“The major is handsome, is he not?”

“He is handsome,” Harriet agreed absently. “And he is just and courageous and far too good for the likes of me.”

Aunt Georgia had a look that suggested a plan in the works and Harriet was not ignorant; she knew what the woman intended.

“Nonsense, Harriet,” said Aunt Georgia. “If anything you’re his superior, for the Groves family line stretches back centuries. Our blood is almost royalty.”

“I did not mean station.”

“Then what did you mean, dear?”

Harriet pressed her tongue to the back of her teeth to stop forbidden confessions from escaping.

“It’s nothing. I am overtired; pay me no heed,” she eventually replied, as the night passed beyond the carriage windows and left the ball behind.

Dead in a week , Major Roberts had promised.

He seemed like a man of his word.

Chapter Three

Mary’s arrival at the Bath townhouse the next day was a mixed blessing. She was the sort of woman who was only happy when she was occupied and therefore got in everyone’s way constantly. Harriet had resolved not to worry the maidservant with all she had learned the night before, despite how isolated she found herself. If they were both caught for highway robbery, the sentence would be harsher on Mary for her lower standing in society. It was not fair, nor right, and therefore Harriet was determined to protect her from it. This was a burden she would bear alone, no matter the consequences.

“I am still not quite recovered from everything. Perhaps I had a little too much wine and it was ever so hot in there,” she told her Aunt Georgia when the woman tried to rouse her for a trip into the city’s centre. She could not stand the idle chatter and vacant wandering through various shops – not now, while her mind still lingered on everything that had taken place. Besides, they’d only attract further stares and unkind remarks. With a huff, Aunt Georgia left Harriet to entertain herself and that was how she preferred it.

Not a stone’s throw from the house was a public garden and though the roses were waning, showering petals upon the pathways, walking helped to clear her mind. It was as though all her thoughts were heavy furniture that she was trying to rearrange in her skull, but nothing fit as it should and there were too many sharp edges.

The dinner would take place tomorrow. She would see Major Roberts again. This time it would be different, she promised herself. This time she would control her impulses and there would be no further shocks. She was sharper in mind and quicker in wit than most men she met and this one was no different. There was no need for him to catch on to her other activities, no reason that she might give herself away, if only she could keep a cool head and a guarded heart.

***

Night came though she prayed it would not, for it brought tomorrow all the closer. Sleep was fitful. She dreamt that the major was in her room that was not a room, but a courthouse. The walls were a thick, dark wood with odd scratches from broken fingernails. And there, looming in a bright corner, he stood before her as an avenging angel, weighing in on her crimes with a flaming sword and a righteous manner. Nothing she said or did could persuade him that she was innocent – for she could not convince him if she could not first convince herself. Waking in a cold sweat, Harriet curled up by her room’s window, a blanket draped across her shoulders and tucked around her feet.

Would he understand all she had done?

If she told him… Would he… No .

Men like him saw right and wrong, good and evil, nowhere in between. Wherever she fell, it was far too close to sin.

On any other such evening she would have taken out her horse, breathed in the night air and cleared her head – along with a few purses – only now she could not risk it.

The lights and colours and activities in Bath’s centre held no interest for her when the sun finally emerged. She kept to herself, despite frequent attempts from her aunt to coax her into visiting various acquaintances. In her mind, it was as though the death sentence had already been passed and she was awaiting her journey to the scaffolds.

She didn’t want to be afraid; she didn’t want to be a coward. She couldn’t afford to be.

Only a brief trip to buy ribbon for her sister – traded with the little she’d pilfered during her last outing in the mask – pulled her from the townhouse, while the preparations for the upcoming dinner party stirred up the lower floors. Harriet toyed with the idea of leaving, returning to Atworth House, and forgetting her commitment to her aunt who so enjoyed her company. Feigning illness would not work as there was nothing that would frustrate her more than being shut upstairs in a house filled with people and being unable to converse with them. It was her duty to attend the dinner, but that did not mean she couldn’t stay as far away from a certain someone as was humanly possible.

***

As with all unwanted appointments, Thursday evening came with a startling speed and, with it, Major Roberts. Harriet wore the plainest dress she could find, soft grey in colour, determined to remain near invisible. It was a little worn, but it was her own – not from the lavish stash Aunt Georgia had purchased for her. It was wrong to continue to borrow from the woman, to already owe her so much when she could give so little. One day, soon, she could pay it all back.

The stairs creaked as Harriet descended to a small hall already filled with aging, familiar faces. These were a select few who knew her Aunt Georgia, all wealthy, the majority kind and harmless.

At first, fingers white on the bannister, she could not see him. Harriet’s heart skittered in her breast as she paused in her step, halfway between the upstairs and downstairs, when she spotted his dark-blond hair. There was a startling openness to his stance that invited one in. His voice was commanding though good-humoured. The lines on his youthful face betrayed the laughter he had shared with intimate companions.

He could never share it with her.

It was a ridiculous notion, one that shook her into activity, her mouth tilting into a polite smile that did not meet her eyes.

“Mr Polton,” she said, claiming one wrinkled man’s attention, desperate to distract herself. “Is your wife not with us this evening? You must pass our well wishes on to her.”

Idle chatter was a calming distraction, as she learnt of Mrs Kelly’s renovated garden and her son’s latest adventures, had a brief discussion on literature with Mr Bruntworth and had Aunt Georgia, subtly and under her breath, ask her why she was determined to dress like an old spinster at her young age.

“Didn’t you like anything I picked out for you?”