Her tearful pleas played well, for they had a small curricle ready to go within ten minutes. Her unsuspecting lady’s maid barely had time to pull on a walking coat in the ensuing fuss. She looked askance at Rosalind’s black layers, and her mourning hat with its newly added, obscuring veil. She must seem ridiculous to them, a lovesick ninny. She knew this was madness, but she also knew this was her only chance at the life she wanted, her only chance to be with Marlow rather than Boring Brittingham. She was so nervous she nearly forgot her reticule, packed with more items she’d need for the trip.
Anxiety made her tremble all the way to the docks. Her maid believed she was only upset to see Marlow sail away. Over her past few weeks of “mourning,” the whole house had become aware of her heartbreak. Her maid had been patient if quietly disapproving.
She would send the maid and grooms home once they delivered the trunk shipside. She would assure them she was fine, that she would join her family for the farewells. If they were not wont to leave, she would need to send them on some errand. It was important that they returned to Townsend House separately from her family, that neither faction discovered her missing until dinner at least.
So much risk. So much to go wrong. Please, she prayed, gripping her black reticule in her lap. Please let things work out as I wish. She had never been rebellious before, never asked for anything beyond a young girl’s sedate life and her parents’ wishes, but this was important. Oh goodness, they had arrived. She steeled herself to tell more lies.
But after all her worries, the staff did not argue with her directions. One of the grooms lugged the trunk over to the Providence’s porters, not realizing the card he handed him had the direction of Widow Lintel’s berth, not Lord Marlow’s. Her lady’s maid did not insist upon staying with her and the family to see Marlow off, since in the rush to leave, she had grabbed her shabbiest walking coat with one button missing.
In the bustle of other ships and passengers, Rosalind walked toward her family and friends with her veil drawn down until she heard the curricle start away. Then she stopped and watched her loved ones from afar. Marlow was there, looking smart for travel. His mother, Lady Warren, bent her head near his, looking sad as any parent might as their son sailed away. The others—her parents, the Barrymores, the Arlingtons, as well as her eldest brother and his friends—stood about, ready to wave to the ship and wish him a bon voyage. Marlow’s cousin Lord Augustine looked very put out he was leaving. Of course, no one wanted him to leave.
It was her fault, all of this. If she had not kissed him, not insisted he propose…
She pursed her lips and turned from the huddle of well-wishers. She must board the vessel before Marlow and hide in her quarters, lest he recognize her before they left. She tugged the veil closer about her face and approached the steward, giving her name, carefully rehearsed, in a quiet voice. “I’m Mrs. Rosa Lintel. I have booked a berth in first class.”
Her heart pounded so hard and fast she was sure the man must have heard it, but he only checked the manifest and put a tick beside her name. “Have you a maid or anyone else traveling with you?” he asked.
“No, just myself.” She tried to sound brisk and sad at once. “When I arrive in India—”
She began a rehearsed tale about the maid that awaited her service in her family’s household, but the man only stepped aside and gestured her forward. “That boy there’ll show you to your room, ma’am. If you need a maid for the journey, there be some young women in steerage might be willing to help you. Just ask the first mate.”
“I will, thank you.”
He was already looking past her, arranging his features into servile respect. Marlow must be coming behind her. She had to move, to board this craft before he reached her, but her feet could barely function as the enormity of her actions crashed upon her. Some part of her had expected to be caught, to be stopped at some point in her deception, but now she was walking along this gently rocking gangplank to a future where Rosalind Lionel was no longer the perfect, mild lady. She was a runaway, a rulebreaker. A scandal.
There was no going back now. She followed the deckhand down a narrow set of stairs and through a well-appointed hallway to her room. “That’s the cap’n’s quarters there, and the first mate’s,” he told her, pointing to a pair of doors across from hers. “If you need anything just give a knock.”
“Thank you, young man,” she said, trying to sound widowly.
“Do you need me to help move your trunk somewheres?” he asked, indicating the sole piece of luggage deposited just inside her berth.
“Oh, oh no.” Goodness, Marlow was approaching too quickly behind her. “I shall be fine,” she said, practically shutting the door in the young man’s face. She heard the door to the quarters beside hers creak open moments later.
“Will this do, my lord?”
It was a deep, formal voice, perhaps the first mate’s or even the captain’s. She heard Marlow’s murmured response. A series of trunks were delivered, wood sliding against wood. His room must have been larger than hers, she thought, staring around at her accommodations. Of course, space was at a premium on a ship. There was a bed and a table so small it could hardly count as a table, and over the table a small porthole set into the wall to allow her some light and a narrow view. She realized her dim, cramped room was probably meant as a servant’s quarters to Marlow’s larger chamber, since there was a narrow door set into the wall separating the space.
She flew to the door, relieved to see the sliding lock was engaged. He was so close. She hadn’t expected him to be so near her own cabin. He could not know she was here, not yet. She couldn’t leave these walls, nor could she bring herself to look through the small porthole to see the Thames’ rippling water leading out to sea. The boat swayed gently, up and down. It reminded her of rowboats in the summers, crossing country lakes in Oxfordshire, but this was hardly the same thing.
She sat on her narrow bed and hugged herself, the heat of fear and worry numbing her limbs. She wished to rise and splash some water on her flushed cheeks to calm and refresh herself, but she found she couldn’t move. Even now, she was frightened of being discovered. A knock at the door, her father’s glowering visage. Oh, her father would be so livid. Her mother would be beside herself at her daughter’s shocking behavior.
She could still abandon this caper and return home. That was the biggest terror of all, that she could run from the room, run back the way she’d been led, down the corridor, up the stairs, across the gangplank, and just go home. She might even be able to manage it without being discovered. She could hire a hack with some of the coins left in her purse and have it deliver her a short distance from her home, without clattering into the courtyard and alerting everyone that she’d been gone.
She hugged herself harder, forcing herself to stay still as stone. That was all she needed to do, stay still until the ship exited the harbor. She must focus on Marlow in the room next door. They loved one another. They belonged together. What she was doing was not really bad, merely necessary. That was what she told herself, over and over, until the deckhands overhead began to shout orders and the boat’s gentle rocking transformed to palpable motion.
Then, finally, she was able to move and let out a breath. They were leaving, headed on their journey.
Too late to change her mind now.
*
Marlow looked around his first-class quarters. The small room contained a surprisingly large bed and a heavy mahogany chest of drawers bolted to the walls and floor. A compact but sturdy mahogany chair was likewise bolted to the floor beside a matching side table. It was all exceptionally appointed, as he’d been assured it would be. It was a long way to Suez, where he would change to a larger ship bound for India. He would be comfortable, if miserable.
He removed his cravat and flung it across the room. There would be no trusty Pierre to fetch it later, to press and starch it. There was an adjoining room for a servant, but he’d released it to be let to some other passenger. He could not have dragged his valet across the miles to India, so he’d left him behind like everyone else.
Curse it. He turned and stared at the door, and wondered if it was too late to abandon his plans. He was a coward, a fool, to run away from England. To run away from her.
He reached for the knob, putting together the words to reverse everything. Here, boy, he’d say to the chipper young deckhand. Take my things topside again. I’ve decided to delay my journey. He’d go to his parents’ home straight away, embrace his mother so she needn’t gaze at him with that worry in her eyes.