Violets And Other Small Scandals

March 1835

Bloomsbury, London

The morning had long since abandoned any pretence of civility by the time Aimée emerged. March’s unrelenting light, sharp as a creditor’s knock, exposed every flaw it touched: the frayed edge of the curtain, the tray by the window with the one slice of toast gone leathery, a soft-boiled egg congealing in its cup, and a pot of tea that had surrendered its warmth at least an hour ago.

She sank into the chair, the wrapper she had thrown on over her nightdress gaping slightly as she eyed the breakfast tray with the enthusiasm of a debt collector surveying an empty purse. Her head throbbed, no doubt a reminder of last night’s indulgences, though whether it was the one glass too many or too few hours of sleep, she dared not say.

Around her, the room bore its compromises with quiet defiance: a silver teaspoon, orphaned from its set, glinted beside a lone violet in a vase far too fine for the chipped mantel it adorned. The curtains, drawn halfway, admitted just enough light to reveal that comfort and decay had struck an uneasy truce.

From the adjoining room came the familiar rustle of Nellie’s assault on the bedding, accompanied by a hum so resolutely off-key it might once have been fashionable. Aimée smiled, despite herself, but was compelled to press a helpless hand to her temple.

“Must you? My poor head protests.”

“I must, miss,” came the reply. “Else we’d forget what cheer sounds like, wouldn’t we?”

Aimée chose not to answer. She lifted the teacup, winced at the tepid dregs, and reached for the toast instead. It crumbled between her fingers, dry as the wit of yesterday’s suitors. She ate it anyway.

Once, she mused, there had been roses and champagne at breakfast, quail eggs and caviar, perhaps a note from a patron who knew better than to sign his name. Now, there were only unpaid bills, Mrs Peebles’s hints veiled as civility, and Nellie’s relentless bustle, a bulwark against the silence. Two rooms to her name, one loyal servant. For a woman of thirty-five, with a voice no longer what it was and a pension scarcely worth the name, it was a sort of comfort. Sort of. Or so she liked to tell herself.

The quiet of the morning shattered by a knock so peremptory it might have been a bailiff’s summons. Before Aimée could call out, Nellie was already in motion, apron untied, expression set for combat.

“That’d be Mrs. Peebles, heaven preserve us, Miss. What on God’s green earth does she want with us this time of day? Have mercy—”

From the passage came a flurry of voices and the rattle of impatient feet.

“You are not the gatekeeper of this establishment, Miss Simmons!” Mrs Peebles barked.

“I said she’s at breakfast!” Nellie shot back. “What kind of monster interrupts a woman mid-egg?”

“I do beg your pardon—” came a man’s voice, uneasy and clearly wishing to be anywhere else.

Aimée blinked at the racket, her teacup suspended mid-air. Was she being evicted mid-breakfast, or merely displayed?

Mrs Peebles charged in the moment later, breathless with self-importance and flanked by not one, but two gentlemen.

“Miss Millet! I took the liberty, seeing as how you said you’d be leaving at the quarter’s end, to show the rooms to a more suitable party,” she announced, triumphant. “Mr Latham and Mr Harcourt, I believe.”

Aimée set her cup down with deliberate care. She recalled, with sour precision, an offhand remark she’d made during their last quarrel: another complaint about the stairs, never intended as anything more than a fleeting gripe. But Mrs Peebles, ever the opportunist, had by all accounts pounced like a hawk upon a hare. Aimée knew there was no point in rising to the bait. The old tyrant would only relish the scene.

She met Mrs Peebles’s gaze with a lift of her chin, daring the woman to object.

“Of course, Mrs Peebles,” she said evenly. “I’m most obliged. Would you prefer me to stand or sit? Or dance, perhaps?”

Mrs Peebles decided not to hear. She ushered the gentlemen further inside with the flourish of someone parading prize cattle. The younger of the two—tall, fair, and visibly uncomfortable, stood awkwardly stiff in a navy frockcoat of such quiet perfection it could only have been conjured by the best Mayfair had to offer. His cravat, tied in an intricate knot that suggested the hand of an artist rather than a valet, seemed to constrict him, as if he might at any moment apologise for the very act of breathing.

His companion, by contrast, surveyed the room with frank disdain. Arrayed in a velvet tailcoat of such deep green it bordered on ostentatious, and a floral waistcoat clamouring for attention beneath, his stark white trousers and the jingle of spurs at his boots announced a man who considered himself above the subtleties of good taste. He tapped the wall near the window with a gloved finger, made a remark about the poor light, and bestowed upon Aimée a nod so perfunctory it might have been aimed at a hatstand.

“The rooms are small,” he said to Mrs Peebles, “and the situation unfashionable.”

Nellie, still hovering near the door, bristled.

“As are your manners, sir.”

“Enough, Nellie,” Aimée said, though not without satisfaction, and a smile she didn’t bother to conceal.

“Miss Millet!” Mrs Peebles began, voice tight with scandal. “I really—”

“Since I seem to be hosting a matinée,” Aimée interrupted, loud enough for the whole company to hear, “I regret to inform you the refreshments are limited to cold tea and embarrassment.”

That earned a stifled laugh from the fair young man. His companion shot him a look of weary patience.

“Well,” said he, brushing imaginary dust from his sleeve, “I think we’ve seen enough. The place won’t do. Harcourt?”

For one rare instant, Aimée and Mrs Peebles exchanged a look of perfect agreement: odious man.

The fair-haired gentleman—Harcourt, presumably—gave a small sigh.

“You’ve rejected six already this morning, Latham,” he muttered. “And at my expense.”

Mr Latham swept out, Mrs Peebles stumbling after him breathless with apologies. Aimée, at once painfully aware of her state of undress, lifted her chin just a fraction higher. The well-worn wrapper she had thrown on over her nightdress—thank heaven for that small mercy—presented her with all the grace of a discarded dishrag, and her hair, braided the night before, had long since surrendered to sleep and the morning’s chaos. With a subtle shift, she tucked her downtrodden slippers beneath the hem of her skirts. She allowed herself a half-smile, the sort that suggested she was above such trifles as dishevelment, even if the flush creeping into her cheeks may have betrayed her.

Undeterred, she met the young man’s stare as he lingered, his eyes—unguarded, open blue—resting on her with something like quiet amazement.

“Do I meet with your approval, sir?” she asked, arching a brow just enough to suggest amusement rather than reproach. “Or would you like me to stand upon the table for a better view?”

His own colour rose as he answered, his voice low with something like wonder.

“Please forgive me. But are you not—surely, you must be—the Miss Millet? The singer?”

Aimée stiffened. A faint nausea appeared out of nowhere, unless it was also to blame on yesterday’s wine, and the man’s utterly unguarded gaze made her throat tighten.

“I was,” she managed, dryly. “Once.”

The admission seemed only to heighten the gentleman’s delight.

“My God! I saw you in Orpheus and Eurydice—I must have been fifteen, sixteen at most. You sang Che farò senza Euridice? and I swear the whole house forgot to breathe.” He laughed, colouring even brighter. “I cut your portrait from my mother’s magazine and smuggled it to school. Monstrous offences, I confess.”

“Then I trust you were suitably punished,” she said, though a faint curve touched her lips.

“I was indeed; twice. But I got to play the hero at Farrer house for a week and regretted nothing.” He glanced at her, as if startled by his own honesty. “Oh, I still see it all—you had this... this magnificent presence. And that voice—” He paused, searching. “You made the world feel... lighter. As though something beyond it might be glimpsed, if only for a moment.”

Aimée shifted in her seat as if the chair, and not the sudden and rather unwelcome attention, were uncomfortable. The strange, young man clearly meant every word, and such honesty was more disarming than any polished flattery. She had long ago learned to parry admiration. The candour of youth was something else entirely.

“Well,” she said, lifting her teacup like a shield, “the young do have a talent for seeing magic wherever it pleases.”

That made him laugh, bright and artless.

“Perhaps. But some performances stay with one, long after the enchantment fades.”

His voice, more than his mild remark, made something shift inside. For the briefest moment, she imagined the ripple of applause, the footlights’ warmth, her name carried on a thousand voices. Then it was gone.

“Well,” she said more briskly, “I fear these rooms are quite unsuited to sacred memories.”

He seemed about to apologise, then thought better of it.

“Perhaps for my boor of a friend. Not, I think, for me.” The line was softened by a half-smile—hesitant, uncertain of its own courage—and yet it reached her more surely than any compliment.

She let her eyes survey the stranger—Mr. Harcourt, was it?—before her for a moment. Too young by far, that much she could tell even through her headache, and disarmingly sincere, with a mouth that knew laughter but not deceit. Handsome devil, no doubt, and that beautiful smile only made matters worse. For just a moment her pulse remembered what it was to answer warmth with warmth, before pride reminded it to behave.

As if on cue, Mr Latham—odious man!—called from the stairwell.

“Harcourt!”

Mr Harcourt straightened, his expression suddenly grave, as if only then recalling the impropriety of his very presence.

“Do forgive me, Miss Millet,” he said, with a bow so earnest it bordered on comedy. “I fear my enthusiasm has quite outstripped my manners. The pleasure was mine, though I cannot excuse the imposition.”

With that, he turned, and the door closed behind him before Aimée had a chance to respond. A stillness settled; not dreary, but rather oddly companionable. She kept her gaze on the doorway a beat too long, then looked away, shaking her head but not without the slightest of smiles.

Nellie reappeared, fangs bared.

“Well, upon my word! Marching in here as if you were part of the furniture! If I had my way—”

“If you had your way, Nellie,” Aimée said with a smile, “I suspect we’d both be arrested.”

She took a sip of her tea but put the cup down with a frow—stone-cold, of course. Unbidden, her mind drifted back to the sting of footlights, the scent of violets tossed from a pit box, a boy’s upturned face in a darkened crowd. Foolish, she told herself. And yet her pulse, traitorous thing, stirred.

With a shake of the head, she rose and crossed to the window. Outside, London pressed on—noisy, bright, full of people playing out their own assigned roles. She smiled faintly and pulled the curtains to the side. It had become a rare thing, indeed, to be regarded as though one might still be dangerous. She would not deny the reminder had left a sweet aftertaste—or that she was already half inclined to forgive the young man all his crimes.

Yes, she decided, he might consider himself quite absolved.