Page 19 of Unmasking the Silver Heiress
"Well, yes, ma'am, of course, but basics add up to quite a lot of items, and some heavy lots besides."
"Nathaniel wishes for the master bed to be left here," she said suddenly, the coolness of her tone giving the command a weight of authority. "It is heavy and made of precious materials that could easily be damaged en route. We will have no need of guest quarters for only a few short months, after all, and can make do with the furniture from the room I took the first night. Leave this one as it is."
"Oh," Sarah said, her bright blue eyes wide and alert. "Yes, of course. I will tell the men. We shan't be packing up anything cumbersome beyond what went last night. No rugs or tables or anything of that sort."
"Good," Nell replied. This time, she lifted a piece of toast and took her time coating it with a soft layer of butter and a dollop of marmalade. This petty act of defiance had somehow soothed her soul. "Only one wardrobe for us as well. It should be sufficient. Tell me, how many days is the journey, by your reckoning?"
"Well, I wouldn't rightly know, ma'am, but some of the more worldly staff have made estimations. They say that by horse, the way the master went, it is likely less than two days through. For us, in the coach, mayhap three, but that is all dependent on the roads and the weather."
"I see." Nell desperately wished to heave a great sigh, for the only thing that made the prospect of another long leg in a rumbling carriage less appealing than it already seemed was the absence of her new husband as a diversion. "I should like if you rode with me, Sarah," she decided, pleased with the way the girl's face lit up. "I do spend quite a lot of time reading during these trips, if you don't mind stints of silence."
"Oh, not at all," Sarah said breathlessly, clasping her hands in front of her in barely contained excitement. "I have some knitting to attend to and perhaps I will snag a book from the collection myself! I never make the time for such pleasures."
"Then it is settled," Nell said with a tilt of her head. "Let us make for Kent and Meridian House."
"Yes, ma'am," Sarah replied gleefully.
* * *
Nell foundthat she was rather adept at being the mistress of a domain. Never before in her life had she been the one to issue orders to others. Never before in her life had she lived anywhere but under another mistress's roof, be it her mother's, her aunt's, Mrs. Arlington's, or most recently the Viscountess Somers.
Without any practice whatsoever, she was able to speak with enough authority to be obeyed, and as such, her coach set off first, with two drivers and Sarah in tow. She explained to them the method Nathaniel had used to hasten the arrival time from Scotland to London, with refreshed horses at coaching inns and shifts between the two men up top. It was not an instruction that was received happily, but it was received, and that was all that really mattered in the end, wasn't it?
She wore her blue dress again, but reverted back to her sensible bun, her dark curls coiled and pinned into submission. She tucked herself into the corner of the carriage that she had become accustomed to and attempted to begin the journey by delving into the work of Alexander Pope, a man whose work was deemed inappropriate for the library at her finishing school.
Sarah sat opposite her, happily clacking her knitting needles together as lengths of woven textile emerged from the other end. After about an hour, Nell found the knitting process rather more fascinating than Mr. Pope's cynical views on life itself and the unavoidable futility of it all.
Perhaps it hit too close to home just now.
When they made their first stop, Nell was able to negotiate a refreshment period for their party, with a hot meal and a portion of time in one of the coaching inn boarding rooms, a dormitory of cots near the barn, where the gentlemen were able to nap if they so wished before setting out again. Nell herself felt too restless to sleep, and Sarah appeared happy to tuck herself near the fire at the inn and pelt the other travelers with curious questions.
They were no more than a day from London, but to the wide-eyed maid, they might as well have crossed the ocean and arrived on unknown shores.
Once back in the carriage, Sarah chattered wistfully about the things she'd been told of the town of Canterbury, and what it might be like to visit. "People take religious pilgrimages there," she said breathlessly. "It's quite famous!"
"It is," Nell had agreed with amusement. "I have not been either. It is likely in the history of Kent I took from the library in London, though. If you've a curiosity about the place, do have a look inside."
"Oh, yes, ma'am, that sounds splendid." Sarah sighed, standing immediately and bracing her hand against the top of the carriage so that she might dig through the bag with the books in them. "Do you want this other one, then? You don't seem to like the one you've got."
"Yes, might as well," Nell said with a sigh, holding out Mr. Pope's anthology in exchange for the impulsively borrowedTales from the East. "Perhaps this one will be a little more optimistic about the state of the world, hm?"
"Well, we are headed southeast, ma'am," Sarah said earnestly. "It seems appropriate."
Nell had chuckled to herself, settling back against the carriage window with her feet propped on the other side, and opened the cover of the book.
Tales from the East, it said.A collection of magic and myth from afar.
She didn't recognize the name of the translator, but did note that the book had been published by Oxford University. She wondered idly if her brother might know the man who'd done the translations. Perhaps the world was smaller than any of them realized.
It was a strange thought to have ahead of being catapulted into a world of fantasy quite alien to Nell. Here there were no knights in shining steel, nor lords and ladies at the forefront of all. Instead of English gardens and meandering dales, there was golden sand and tropical trees, filled with birdsong and the chatter of monkeys. Heroes were not the rich and powerful, but rather a fishmonger's wife who takes wishes from a magical catch, a concubine eager to run away with her lover, or a band of thieves after a treasure that certainly did not belong to them.
Each story was a little longer than the one that came before it, each trace of magic a little bolder and more fantastical. Nell thought that the man who'd translated this work had done a capital job of building one's immersion into the strange and foreign.
When she stumbled onto a story calledAli with the Large Member, she realized that this book too was likely not intended for young women. It was a strange story about the male anatomy and how those who possess a particular organ are prone to become obsessed with every aspect of it. Having only seen nude men in tasteful sculpture, Nell thought that the degree of concern over such a thing was well and truly overblown, even if the story itself had brought blood rushing into her cheeks.
The book was long and so dense that Nell often finished a story only to read it again twice over, simply to absorb everything woven inside. More than once she found herself reaching for a lantern so that she might continue to read through the dark hours of their journey.
She found herself at sea with djinn and mermaids, at a royal court studded with rubies as a sultan demanded the culprit of a murder in just three days from a man who would pay with his own life if he failed. She gave herself chills reading of a haunted mansion, full of trickster spirits, eager to sap the life from humans in exchange for pleasant dreams.
