The Shadow in the Glass by JJA Harwood (any book recommendations txt) 📕

Bessie raised her eyebrows. ‘Can’t give you a nice place out in the country? Dunno about that.’

Eleanor slapped the arm of her chair, slopping tea everywhere. ‘You don’t understand. They never told me I was coming here! I’ll have him up before the magistrate on a charge of kidnap! He can’t do this!’

‘Kidnap, miss? It ain’t kidnap. You’ve a nice little home, with a hard-working and well-appointed servant, if I do say so myself. No point going to a magistrate. He’ll only laugh.’

Eleanor sat back in her chair, still woozy, still seething. Bessie patted her knee.

‘Cheer up, miss. It’ll all seem better in a day or so.’

Eleanor screamed in frustration, and Bessie ignored her.

It took Eleanor a long time to read Charles’s letter. At first all the words bled together, twisting around each other like black ivy. It was only when she started shivering and sweating that she recognized the last vestiges of the morphine. Bessie left her to sleep it off, layering her with blankets.

When Eleanor woke, it was with a pounding headache and a dull fury throbbing in her veins. Mr Pembroke had drugged her to avoid a scene when she left. Granborough House was falling apart and half the maids had been interfered with, but still, she was the centre of the scandal. She had to be discreetly sent away, while Mr Pembroke drank away his son’s prospects and assaulted any maid who got close. Worst of all, he’d kept Aoife with him – oh God, what would Aoife think when she found that Eleanor had gone without her? Fear gripped Eleanor in its talons. What would Mr Pembroke do, now that Eleanor had let him know that she cared about Aoife?

Eleanor wanted to go back. But her arms shook when she tried to sit upright and the bones in her legs might have been replaced with string, they felt so weak. How could she make it to Mayfair and back?

Eleanor wiped her eyes. Slowly, she drew out the letter. The paper fluttered as she unfolded it.

Dearest Eleanor,

I write these few lines in the little time I have, and I know they shall never be enough. My love, I have grave news. I have persuaded Father to arrange a comfortable living for you, but in exchange, he demands that I never see you again. How could I ever choose anything but your comfort and security?

Had I known that Father arranged your departure for tonight I would have rained flowers in your lap and covered you in jewels. But the memory of our time together, however brief, was brighter than any diamond.

The knowledge that you shall be safe and well cared for is the best balm a man could ask for. My darling girl, I shall think of you always, but I beg you, do not think of me. I would not have you shed a tear for this lovesick fool.

Your ever loving,

Charles

Confined to her bed, Eleanor seethed.

Bessie fed her on an invalid’s diet: gruel, chicken broth and beef tea – the food Eleanor had once tried to make for her mother, while she lay coughing in her bed. The smell sent Eleanor back to the age of nine, when she’d stood on a chair to reach the stove-top and wasn’t strong enough to lift the pan off the heat. Eleanor still wanted to throw it at the wall.

The worst part was that she needed it.

The morphine was all at Granborough House. Without it, she realized how weak she’d become. Even as January melted into February, goosebumps still prickled along her arms and her pulse fluttered like a caged bird. She begged Bessie for magazines, newspapers, penny bloods, forcing herself to focus on the exploits of Spring-heeled Jack and Dick Turpin while she turned the pages with shaking, sweating fingers. No matter how cheap and flimsy it was, she needed her shield.

If she didn’t have that, she’d only read Charles’s letter again.

Tears had only been the beginning. When she’d reread it, she’d been so furious that she’d nearly torn it to pieces. Mr Pembroke had lied to his son. He’d allowed Charles to believe that Eleanor’s house had been his own idea, and made Charles promise his happiness away in exchange. It was bad enough that she’d bartered her own.

Eleanor tried to calm herself down. She was not above breaking a promise. A couple of months to make Mr Pembroke think it had all been forgotten, and then she’d find Charles again. Until then, she’d make herself a lady.

It was harder than she thought. Eleanor’s eyes sprang open at five o’clock every morning, and she felt strangely guilty for sitting in a chair. But now that her food was not being snatched out of her hands, and she was no longer fetching and carrying, all the graces Mrs Pembroke had taught her came flooding back. She had the manners of a lady already; all she needed now was the money.

Mr Pembroke’s three hundred pounds would cover rent and basic necessities, but it would not last. The workmen had refused his credit to fix the roof of Granborough House; if knowledge of his debts had spread to tradesmen, they must be substantial. The next month’s allowance might never arrive, and Eleanor could not help Aoife leave Granborough House without money. She had to find another source of income.

For that, she turned to Mrs Pembroke’s address book.

She wrote to every name that sounded familiar. Eleanor did not directly ask for money – that would’ve seemed cheap – but she hoped that she might have the pleasure of renewing their acquaintance a dozen times over, and in her best handwriting. They were crawling, spineless letters, and she hated herself for writing them. But Eleanor would need to match Aoife’s wages to buy her way out of Granborough House, and there was no respectable way Eleanor could earn that much. Only a wealthy patron could provide the funds, and Eleanor would only meet such people if she grovelled in pen and ink,