Page 52 of Infamous

‘My deadline is in a few weeks. If anybody should need me, I suppose I shall be .?.?. in the boathouse. Hiding.’

*

The atmosphere at the house changed as suddenly as the weather; where it had felt like a sleepy, cavernous shell, with only a handful of occupants drifting from room to room and bumping into one another in the library quite by accident, suddenly it was a hive of activity, more servants appearing as if from nowhere to do Nash’s bidding. At one point, sitting in the drawing room writing, Eddie watched through the doorway as Henry and a gaggle of other fine, strapping young men somehow transported a large Grecian sculpture from the garden into the entrance hall. The sounds of grunting, soft swearing and various limbs bouncing off furniture carried on long after they had left Eddie’s field of vision.

She had asked Nash if his editor might make an appearance – a question which had been met with near-hysterical laughter and a fond pat on the shoulder, which she had taken to meanno– but had otherwise tried to steer clear of any party-planning activities.

Valentine wandered into rooms sporadically to offer opinions and instruction. Dayo disappeared completely, having apparently made good on his threat to hide. Kitty refused to acknowledge that servants were rearranging the furniture around her; she simply painted in the South Parlour as she had always done, her focus absolute, undeterred by the chaos. Eddie found herself moving from place to place, clutching her manuscript as if it were a life raft, her fingers and other random, odd corners of her being perpetually smudged with ink. Her interactions with Nash were entirely normal by their usual standards, save for the quickening of Eddie’s pulse when he drew near, as if the brief moment of madness on the clifftop hadn’t happened at all; her interactions with Rose were decidedly not. They were strange and awkward around each other, Rose unfailingly polite but noticeably distant, Eddie always hyper-aware of where Rose was in any room and determined to avoid any dangerous physical collisions. At night this descended into farcical territory, as they undressed on opposite sides of the room and then climbed very carefully into bed, each of them attempting to keep a safe barrier approximately the size of the Thames between them.

It wasn’t that Eddie didn’t want to touch Rose. Increasingly, she was realising that shedid, which was far more troubling than lovely, mindless ignorance had been.

The key to dealing with it was to think about it as little as possible.

She had been closely observing Rose and Albert instead, and had noticed that while they were very comfortable with each other, there seemed not to be an ounce of romantic feeling between them. They never contrived little excuses to touch each other; there were no blushes, no signs at all that either of them was awaiting their wedding day with great anticipation. It soothed her, somewhat, although it remained puzzling.

She discovered their hiding place the day before the party quite by accident, walking into the long gallery and finding them sitting on very uncomfortable-looking wooden chairs, reading by the fire. Juno was slumped on the floor between them.

‘They have not yet started in here,’ Albert said, without looking up. ‘It’s the last bastion of refuge.’

Rose didn’t say anything. She was wearing a dress of sky-blue muslin and a lacy cream pelerine over her shoulders. The only sign that she had given in to the debauchery of the house was that her hair was only half-pinned, and she hadn’t bothered trying to curl it into submission. Eddie found herself staring at the place where her hair touched the hollow of her clavicle, remembering how it had felt to fit her fingers there, and then did the mental equivalent of smacking herself on the nose like one would a bad dog and resolved not to think about it again under any circumstances.

‘Room for another on the floor?’ Eddie said, watching Rose’s gaze flick up and then quickly return to her book.

‘Be our guest,’ said Albert. ‘Although I would appreciate it ifyoudidn’t chew on my slippers.’

Eddie laughed, surprised. ‘I’ll give you fair warning if I get a hankering.’

She set herself down with her back to the wall, using a book propped against her knees as a makeshift writing desk, watching the dog’s ears twitch whenever her mind drifted from the task in front of her. It was cold despite the fire, draughts seeking her out and chilling her exposed fingers. It took her a while to fall back into the rhythm of writing, but once she did, a tornado could have blown through the gallery and she would only have tightened her grip on her parchment to prevent it from flying away; she was crossing out jokes, adding footnotes, waxing lyrical about the weather and the stars in a way that she hoped would please Nash and his editor. She started when she felt something soft touch her shoulder, and looked up at Rose with utmost confusion, taking a moment to realise that she had just dropped her shawl unceremoniously onto Eddie’s back.

‘Your teeth are rattling like game dice,’ Rose said quietly. ‘It’s very annoying.’

‘Apologies,’ said Eddie. ‘I will endeavour to freeze to death with more discretion, if my passing is going to interrupt your reading.’

‘Please do.’

Rose hadn’t looked at her properly, but to joke together felt like progress, and Eddie got back to work in higher spirits, feeling rather productive until the door to the long gallery slammed open and Nash walked in with Mrs Hall and some servants in tow.

‘Oh, look – an infestation of unhelpful pests,’ he said, as Juno sprang to her feet and lolloped towards him. ‘Not you, Juno, you beautiful beast of leisure. All right, Mrs Hall, what do you think – could we fashion a sort of maze in here? An obstacle course?’

‘No,’ Mrs Hall said immediately.

Nash sighed. ‘You do so love to say that. Unfortunately, I either cannot or will not hear you. Henry? Where’s Henry?’

‘He is helping Mr Morris and some of the men shore up the repairs on the second floor. As I have told you, Mr Nicholson, our priority—’

‘Fetch him down here, will you? What the man lacks in artistic vision he makes up for in can-do spirit. And, Mrs Hall, if you see my wife, will you please inform her that she must stop hiding those magnificent Tudor goblets from me? I always find them in the end.’ He clapped his hands together, making Rose jump. ‘Right. Edie, drag yourself away from your work of genius. I need you. Have you ever planned a seance before? Well, no matter, there’s no time like the present .?.?.’

Chapter Nineteen

‘Ifeel,’ said Dayo, ‘as if we are standing upon the battlements of a crumbling castle, on the eve of battle.’

‘I don’t know if I’d call it a castle,’ Valentine said, leaning over and handing him a bottle of wine. ‘But it’s certainly crumbling.’

They were sitting on the dock, which had tonight deigned to hold the weight of all six of them: Rose and Albert sitting closest to the shore on the sturdiest wood, Dayo next to them with his shirtsleeves rolled up, Kitty with her head on Valentine’s shoulder, and Valentine so close to Eddie that when she adjusted her skirts, their knees brushed.

‘Strumpet,’ Valentine said. ‘Keep your legs to yourself.’

‘Valentine,’ said Eddie sternly. ‘That dress is so low-cut, I can almost see to your midriff.’