Why Mermaids Sing

Chapter 50

Kat was drinking tea on the terrace at the rear of her house, overlooking the tree-shaded garden, when her maid came hurrying across the pavement.

“I asked her to wait in the drawing room while I announced her,” said Elspeth, wringing her work-worn hands against her apron. “Truly I did, but she said—”

Kat cut her off. “Who, Elspeth?”

A woman’s voice reached her, low and stern. “Good morning, Niece.”

Kat stared across the sun-dappled terrace at the thin matron who stood in the open doorway. It had been more than ten years since Kat had stolen away from this woman’s home—a frightened, desperate child willing to face the uncertainties of life on the streets rather than continue to endure this woman’s grim whippings by day and the degrading violations that came in the terrifying darkness of the night.

Her name was Emma Stone, and she was a close associate of “Holy Hannah” More and William Wilberforce and the growing group of moral reformers known as the Evangelicals. Emma Stone had made the Evangelical’s Society for the Suppression of Vice and Immorality her own special project, perhaps as a public form of atonement for the shame of having a sister as scandalously immoral as Kat’s mother.

They had come to London together, Emma and Arabella Noland, two Irish sisters, pretty but poorly dowered. The elder, Emma, had married a barrister named Maurice Stone. Arabella, the younger and prettier, had chosen a different path, becoming the mistress of first one wealthy nobleman, then the next.

“You are not welcome in my house, Aunt,” said Kat, keeping her voice level with effort.

“Believe me, it is only my sense of duty to my dead mother and the laws of our dear Lord that have brought me here.”

Kat gave her aunt a cold, tight smile. “Your devotion to your Lord’s laws seems very selective.” She cast a deliberate eye over her aunt’s unrelieved mourning gown of black bombazine. “Is he dead then?”

“Mr. Stone has been gone from me these past three years.”

“And still you wear deep mourning for him? How”—Kat paused, searching for the right word—“hypocritical of you.”

Two bright spots of color appeared on the other woman’s cheeks. “I did not believe the lies you told ten years ago. I’m not about to believe them now.”

“No. Of course not.” Kat crossed her arms before her. “I assume you’re here for some reason. Please state what it is and go away.”

The color in Emma Stone’s cheeks deepened. “I should have expected such a reception. There aren’t many women in my position who would have taken you in when I did—the illegitimate offspring of a harlot and the man who had her in his keeping. And how did you repay me? By fleeing my protection without a word of warning or thanks.”

“I’m the oddest creature,” said Kat in a tight voice. “I decided if I was going to be forced to slake a man’s lust, then I might as well get paid for it.”

A tremble of raw fury shook Emma Stone’s thin frame. Kat expected her to launch into an impassioned defense of her dead husband, or simply go away. Instead, she clenched her jaw so tightly she was practically spitting out her words. “I am here because of the notice of your approaching nuptials in the Morning Post.”

“Really, Aunt? You shock me. I had no idea you interested yourself in the affairs of Society.”

“I do not. Which is why I remained unaware of your relationship with Lord Devlin until the betrothal was brought to my attention by my dear friend Mrs. Barnes. You recall Mrs. Barnes?”

Kat remained motionless. Eunice Barnes was both her aunt’s near neighbor and a fellow soldier in the Society for the Suppression of Vice.

“She is the only one of my acquaintances who realized that the brazen hussy calling herself Kat Boleyn and flaunting herself on the boards at Covent Garden was none other than the niece I had once sheltered.”

“And she kept such delicious gossip to herself? I am impressed.”

Mrs. Stone acknowledged the barb with a twitching of her upper lip. “Had I been aware of the nature of the relationship you had developed with Viscount Devlin, I would of course have overcome my repugnance and approached you sooner.”

“Your repugnance. Yes, I suppose it must be quite a soul-trying exercise for a saintly woman such as yourself to venture into this den of sin and debauchery. You’d best say what you came to say and run away quickly before you become contaminated.”

Mrs. Stone jerked open the strings of her reticule to draw forth two small miniatures painted on oval porcelain plaques and framed in gold filigree. “Your mother stayed with me for a short time before she fled London. Did you know?”

Kat kept her surprise to herself, although in truth she had not known. Had Emma Stone’s despicable husband made his vile advances on Kat’s mother, too? Kat wondered. Had he found a grown woman—even one heavy with child—better able to defend herself than a thirteen-year-old girl?

“The ungrateful wretch fled my house as you did, leaving only a curt note of thanks and these two miniatures, which she begged me to accept as payment.”

“And you didn’t sell them?” However much Emma Stone might prate on about the Kingdom of Heaven, Kat knew the woman still maintained a healthy interest in the material comforts of this world.

Mrs. Stone’s head reared back in exaggerated affront. “Do you think I would take payment for sheltering my own sister in her time of need? The Good Book says, ‘Jesus Our Lord hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him that hath called us to glory and virtue, and to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness charity.’”

Kat kept her gaze on her aunt’s lined face. The passage of time had not been kind to Emma Stone, crimping the skin around her mouth and etching her habitually disapproving expression deep. “I assume there is a point to all this, Aunt?”

Emma Stone held out the first miniature. “This one is of your mother. I assume you recognize her?”

Kat cradled the porcelain oval in her hands, the painting so exquisitely rendered that it caught her breath. It was a face Kat hadn’t seen in more than ten years, the wide green eyes slanted up slightly at the ends like a cat’s, the cheekbones high and flaring, the nose almost childlike above full, sensuous lips. Kat could trace some of those features in her own face, mingling with traits she’d come to think of as purely her own, although she knew they must come from the unknown lord who’d been her father.

She skimmed her fingertips across the smooth surface, as if by touching the painted likeness she might somehow touch the laughing, breathing mother who’d once loved her. A welling of emotion closed her throat. It was a moment before she could look up and say, “And the other miniature?”

Emma Stone pressed her lips together in grim censure. “The other miniature is the reason I have come. It is of the last man who had my sister in his keeping. Your father.”

With a hand that was not quite steady, Kat reached to take the small painting held out to her. Somehow, even before her hand closed over the miniature, she knew what she would see.

He was younger, of course, at least twenty-four years younger. The deftly rendered hair was still dark, the features solid but still firm. She had his chin, Kat realized; she supposed it was understandable that she had never noticed it before. But she should have recognized the eyes, she thought. How could she never have realized that the vivid blue eyes that stared back at her from her own reflection were those of Alistair St. Cyr, the Earl of Hendon?