Once Upon a Page

A Shadowing London Book

Coming September 2017

The most dangerous thing a lady can possess is a profession.

Ten years ago, Penelope Paiget promised she’d wait for Samuel Black. But ten years ago, she was only a genteel impoverished paid companion, forced into service after her father’s death revealed his insurmountable debts. Now she’s a successful novelist, posing as secretary to the Earl of Wickshire to hide her identity.

The most dangerous thing a gentleman can possess is a past.

Ten years ago, Samuel Black chose to go his own path instead of upholding his family’s legacy as spies. But now having fought for the formation of the Metropolitan Police Force, echoes of his past and his true origins remind him just how unworthy he is to call himself detective inspector. Let alone Penelope Paiget’s husband.

But when a dead body appears in the Earl of Wickshire’s drawing room, they have no choice but to trust each other with their secrets if they are to find the killer before it’s too late.

London

March 1833

Lady Emily Black liked presents.

It wasn’t that she always expected to receive presents nor did she expect everyone to bring her presents when calling on her.  It was just comforting to think about presents and what might be forthcoming.

Like the anticipation on a rainy day.  There were so many possibilities when one was confined to an indoor space.  One never knew what one might embark upon.  Given a rainy day, Emily would most likely be found in the sewing room, patterns splashed across the sofas, fabrics spilling to the floor, her nose near touching the fashion plates of the latest edition of La Belle Assemblee.  She could have an entire season’s wardrobe designed in the space of one drizzly afternoon.

As she contemplated the pencils in E.B. Worths on Marlborough, her eyes didn’t see plain, black stubs of charcoal.  She saw designs springing from their tips to radiate across the blank page of her sketchbook, a waterfall of fashion from a single nub.

Yes, Emily Black very much liked presents, and these pencils would do just nicely.

“Papa,” she said then, spinning about and holding the charcoals aloft.  “I think I should like these.”

Her father did not seem to have heard her as he stared out the front window of the shop.  The light fell across him in such a way as to accent his finely tailored coat of dark cloth and trousers cut just right along the thigh and knee.  There were things about her father Emily found lacking, especially his inability to keep his gray-smattered dark hair in neat fashion, but his choice of tailor was not something with which she could find fault.

“Papa,” she said, louder this time with quite a lot of girth as her mother would say.  “Papa, I said I would like these charcoals.”

Still nothing.

After presents, the second thing Emily Black liked most was attention.  She found the blood in her temples pounded a little harder when someone denied her the attention she wished.  Right now, her papa was guilty of such a thing, which was rather unusual.  She would expect such behavior from Jane, her older cousin, and certainly from her brothers, Ashley and Michael.  She had the pleasure of her younger sister’s complete and total attention when she was present, but Emily feared that was more out of some sort of worship phase the child was going through.

Emily softly patted the cascading folds of her skirt, the fabric just the right shade of pink to complement her untarnished skin, and a soft, knowing smile came to her lips.  Madeline had every reason to adore her.  The child had shown outstanding astuteness in the choosing of a proper role model for such a thing.  As the eldest daughter of the Duke of Lofton, Emily was worthy of such a position.

What she was not worthy of was her father’s current state of inattention, and Emily’s tolerance wore thin.

“Papa,” she said again, her teeth nearly scraping with her impatience.  “Papa, I—”

“Just a moment,” her father said, raising a single hand in her direction.

Her blood went from pounding to rampaging.

If Emily felt immense joy at the prospect of presents, she felt an equally intense but entirely opposite emotion about being ignored.  Anger flared inside her.  For but a moment, her nostrils flared, her mouth tightened, and her fingers curled into fists.  However, such gestures wreak havoc on fair and untouched skin, so with a breath, she purposefully released the tension in her body.

Shaking her head, she approached her father standing at the front window of the shop.  Mother was always saying how her father did not always understand the proper handling of womanly issues, and this was apparently one of those situations.  She assumed an expression of tender understanding, not unlike the one she used on simpletons, like servants and the sons of viscounts or gad, barons.

“Papa,” she said once more, her tone dripping with what others might term condescension but Emily liked to think of as helpful and necessary correction of one’s behavior.  “You seem not to understand the importance-“

“Worth,” her father said, his tone gruff and forthright, the way it sometimes sounded when Uncle Nathan would burst into their house at whatever hour of the night, ruthlessly rousing her from her needed rest.

Something was amiss, and it was not her father’s slip in appropriate behavior.

Her father strode past her to the back of the shop where the proprietor stood, the Mr. Worth from which the name of the store was derived.

“Worth, have you an errand boy?  Anyone who could deliver a note for me?”

Emily did not like this line of questioning whatsoever.  Her father had brought her here to shop, and it was to her his attention was due.  Why was he asking about errand boys?  She put fisted hands to her hips in the manner her mother had taught her.  One’s fragile skin must be sacrificed for the good of straightening men from their misdeeds, such as not paying adequate attention to Lady Emily Black.

“Papa, I demand to know what is going on.”

London

March 1833

Richard Black, the Duke of Lofton, died peacefully in his bed.  It was a Tuesday, as unremarkable as any other Tuesday, and he had gone to bed as he had any other Tuesday for the whole of his eighty-three years.  It was only as dawn broke through the curtains that his wife, Jane, found him gone when she woke beside his cold body.

His colleagues and friends had all remarked on such a virtuous end to a life lived in constant pursuit of death.  For in his work with the War Office, Richard Black had more than once traveled into the vicinity of death, caring not for the safety of his person but for the safety of an entire nation.  To have death finally come when one had lived a life as full as it was wide, having escaped attempt after attempt on his life by nefarious traitors and the like, it was a rather remarkable feat and oft mentioned at the clubs by those that survived him and admired him.

His funeral was quite the spectacle with everyone in attendance including the Earl Grey.  It was rumored even Peel would have appeared if he had been in the country at the time.  As it was, St. Paul’s ran over with the respectable and noble, the pews crammed with the latest in mourning fashions.  The people were all there to see the great Richard Black, the Duke of Lofton, celebrated spy for the War Office, and in his later years, tremendous supporter of the reform acts sweeping through the House of Lords, laid to rest.

It was an exultant affair for all that those types of things could be.  His life was carefully articulated by his sons, each milestone given its due.  His achievements were itemized in detail and revered with exuberance by Lord Crawley, a man simply referred to as exemplary in his work alongside Lofton at the War Office.

As Richard Black’s merits rang through the dome of St. Paul’s, the attendees all bowed their heads, absorbing the passage of time, reflecting on their own life’s achievements or lack thereof, and all pondered on the greatness of the man they had lost.

All except one, that is.

One slight head bent not in reflection but in fear.

Fear of the days ahead.  Fear of the unknown.

Fear of not being able to keep the last promise she made to her grandfather.

April 1826

London

“You are not at all concerned your wife will find out?”

Alec stood in the bedchamber of one of London’s most refined and most adventurous widows and casually replaced the stopper in the decanter of brandy.  He set it carefully down on the gold-plated tray that seemed rather ostentatious even to him.  Lady Hilary Hunisett had a reputation for ostentatiousness though, and he supposed the tray was simply indicative of the rumors circulating about the ton.

“My wife?” Alec said, turning to the woman now.

Lady Hunisett’s robe was tied loosely at the waist, its soft folds of silk accentuating the exposed expanse of her bosom.  She was in rather good condition for her age and hedonistic lifestyle.  Alec would have thought the woman’s drinking, poor eating habits, and reckless living would have taken their toll.  But her skin was still firm and flawless, a porcelain white against the red silk of her night rail peeking out from under her robe.

Hilary Hunisett had been a catch during her season twenty years ago, or at least that was what Jane had told him.  Alec wouldn’t have doubted it.  It seemed the woman was still accustomed to such attention.  Attention she now demanded from Alec.

“I think you need not worry about my wife,” Alec continued when no response from the woman came.  Handing one of the brandy glasses to Lady Hunisett, he was careful to stroke her fingertips with his own.  He could see the responding thrill illuminate Lady Hunisett’s eyes, and Alec smiled, allowing heat to enter his gaze.

Lady Hunisett smiled coyly, reaching up to toy with a strand of her auburn hair, twirling it around her finger before allowing the curl to fall and trickle invitingly down her bosom.

“Why is that, my lord?” Hunisett said.

Alec turned his smile into more of a smirk.  “My wife is a simpleton, my lady,” Alec said, bending forward as if his words were a secret meant to be shared only between lovers.  “Surely you’ve heard the story of where my father found her?”

Lady Hunisett looked up at him through long eyelashes, much darker than her auburn tresses.  “The story?” she said.

Alec laughed softly, picking up his hand to run a single finger along the line of her collarbone.  She trembled under his touch, and Alec captured her gaze in his.  “She’s a nobody, I’m afraid,” Alec said.  “My father took pity on some old woman’s charity case, and I’ve been strapped with the burden my entire life.  You cannot imagine what I’ve been forced to endure with such a lowly bred wife.  Just once I would like…”

His finger had trailed dangerously close to the valley between her breasts.  He looked up at Hunisett’s face, his mouth slightly agape, his eyes speaking of untold horrors, terrible afflictions he’d been forced to suffer during his awful marriage.  Hunisett blinked, her lids closing slowly over her amber eyes, her gaze drinking him in until he felt completely absorbed.

“You poor man,” she said.  “Someone as extraordinary as you should never have had to suffer the way you have.”  She stepped closer to him, the folds of her robe rubbing against the fabric of his breeches.  “Whatever can I do to make your life just a little more comfortable?”  Here she slipped a single leg between his, her thigh rubbing against him in a most intimate manner.

Alec smiled.  “Oh, I think I can come up with a couple of ideas of how you might help.”  He paused, took a sip of his brandy.  “But first, you must tell me where you acquired this lovely brandy.”

Hunisett’s eyes flashed, and her smile grew devilish.  “I have a source,” she said.  “A wonderful source who gets me the finest French brandy.”

Alec laughed softly.  “Of course, the finest brandy would be French, but this is rather exquisitely aged brandy.  Tell me, my darling, could it have been acquired during that terrible skirmish with that Napoleon chap a few years ago?”

Hunisett tipped back her head and laughed, the sound that of bells tinkling in a soft wind.  “Oh, you are lovely, Stryden,” she said.  “Of course, my source smuggled in brandy for me during the war.  Do you think I would have gone without?”  She reached up, ran a fingernail along the line of his jaw.  “My man not only gets me fine brandy, my lord, but he’s very capable of doing…other things…when I ask.”

Alec raised a single eyebrow.  “Is that so?” he asked.

Hunisett’s smile faded into something more beguiling.  “My man brings me the finest silks, the best tea, and the loveliest spices from India without having to go through the East India Company,” Hunisett batted her eyelashes at him.  “I haven’t paid a single tax or fee on anything in years.  I’m a rather spoiled woman, I’m afraid.”

Alec smiled, reaching out to pull Hunisett closer.  The movement brought her body against the length of his, and he cradled her in his arm.  “And I know you would share your source with me, wouldn’t you, my lady?  I mean in the interest of improving my rather burdened life?”

Hunisett smiled, reaching up that single finger to once more stroke the line of his jaw.  She seemed to push herself higher against him, and her lips came closer to his.  “His name is Lord Lucian Rye,” she whispered, closing her eyes as she waited for his kiss.

About To Be a Spy…

Samuel Black must make a decision: to be a spy like his father or follow his heart.

Either is likely to give his mother chest pains.

For Samuel is no longer a lad with the ambitious and noble wish of being a lamplighter to keep the seedy streets of London safe. About to embark on university, his mind stirs with the thoughts of creating a policing force in London to safeguard its citizens. Held back by his family’s legacy as spies, Samuel does not make his ideas known.

But when he stops a would-be purse-snatcher, his path unexpectedly veers into that of one Miss Penelope Paiget, and suddenly, Samuel must make a choice.

To Be a Spy picks up seven years after the conclusion of the Spy Series, a historical romantic suspense series following the adventures of a family of spies during the Napoleonic Wars.

By Jessie Clever

In Book Three of the Spy Series, A Countess Most Daring, we learned of the death of Richard Black, the Duke of Lofton, by foul means.  Or did we?

And when an assassin threatens England’s spy network, Lady Margaret Folton must find the killer before it’s too late.  But when Commodore John Lynwood is accidentally granted a title meant to be used as bait to lure the assassin into the War Office’s trap, Margaret must face the tragedy of her past and decide which is more important: the assignment or love?

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Happy reading!

Friday, 25 May 1900

If you spit on one side of the hill, it will end up in the Mississippi.  If you spit on the other, it will go north to the St. Lawrence.  So Uncle Perry told me twenty years ago when I first came down to Bear Lake from Buffalo.
I’ve spit on both sides of the hill and never made a ripple.  Maybe I just didn’t spit hard enough.
The hills watch the lake as the lake watches back.  A battalion of wetland trees stand guard around the perimeter, their exposed, rotting limbs prodding the sky.  They watch me.  I once tried to ask my wife, Meredith, if she felt it, too, felt the trees turn to see what it was you were doing there.  She told me not to be odd.
The water laps steadily against the shore, in no hurry to either arrive or depart.  Smaller rocks follow the drag back into the lake’s womb, disappearing from sight.
Some Canada geese have flown in to use the Utzes’ waterfront as a depository.  Joachim sometimes runs down the slope to yell at them in German.  I wonder if the geese understand him.  They fly away, so maybe they do.
The daffodils have already popped up along the road like a trail of breadcrumbs, but the trail only leads down to the swamp at the west end of the lake.
And the smell of sweet rolls from Mabel’s kitchen mixes with the odor of motor oil from Thomas’ new motorcar.  I can see him toying with it over by the carriage house with Joachim.  Whether they know what they’re doing with it or not, I have no idea.  But watching them is all I’m doing anyway.
Mabel is in the kitchen.  She does not want to make Joachim mad.
Memorial Day marks the beginning of the summer season.  There will be a parade on Wednesday in the towns around Bear Lake.  Brocton, Stockton, Cassadaga.  There are not enough people in Bear Lake for it to have its own parade even though there are more people here now than when Meredith and I first came down from Buffalo.  As I stand on the porch of the inn, I look at the scattering of cottages spread to the left and right of me that were not there the first time we came but have sprung up like the daffodils along the road.  But the cottages do not lead somewhere better than the swamp.  They just follow the quiet road.
The sound of clattering metal draws my gaze back to the carriage house and Thomas Bryant.  He has driven his motorcar across the state this year simply because he could.  He is what you might call a political manager in the City.  His grandfather’s name used to be O’Bryan.  His wife, Mercedes, will be following shortly.  She made a stop in Rochester to meet with Susan Anthony.  The other two rooms in the inn have been rented as well, but I did not recognize the names Mabel gave me.  Another family from the City and a young woman from Pittsburgh.  I wonder why she is traveling alone.
The road is empty, but the sound of voices carry along the water, deposits of nouns and adverbs, whispers and shouts.  At the cottage to the left and up the hill a ways from the Utzes’ inn, Mrs. Coachman’s bridge club is meeting on her porch again.  Mr. Coachman is conveniently missing again.  Up there, just along the bank, is the top of Mr. Dobbins’s hat.  His wife needs her flowerbeds mulched.  I am not sure what this process entails, but it has ignited a sudden urge in Mr. Dobbins to go find Mr. Coachman.  The young ladies of the girls’ camp across the lake are splashes of water mixed with bursts of giggles.  It sounds as if they are standing on the porch with me.  The water likes to carry their voices best.
“Get inside now and have a sweet roll, Mr. Abernathy.  Stop staring at everyone and everything.”
I turn to look at the dark shape that is Mabel in the screen door.  The one side of her hair has come undone from the bun and hangs like a drape, covering her forehead to her eyebrow.  There is a white spot of flour on the bump in her nose, and her yellowed teeth bite her lower lip as she stares at me with her sunken eyes.  Mabel was beautiful once.  I’ve seen the photograph.  It was taken before she met Joachim.
“I was not staring, Mabel,” I tell her, “I was watching.”
“Why don’t you come inside for a spill and watch something else then?”
“I believe you mean come inside for a spell.”
“Yes, that’s what I said.”  She frowns at me through the mesh of the door, the movement drawing her ears up.
“Yes, ma’am.”  I pull myself out of the chair, letting the linen of my trousers slide down, catching along my garters.  I take off my straw as I come in the door, letting the screen smack behind me.  The hallway is darker than the outside, and I have to let my eyes adjust.   A suitcase rests at the foot of the stairs with a pelisse draped across it.  It wasn’t there when I went out for a walk that morning.  The young lady must have arrived from Pittsburgh.
I stand for a moment listening to the tick of the clock in the front parlor.  I turn my head slightly in that direction, but the billowing curtains from the front windows pull my attention.  The wind is picking up.
I move to the windows on the east side of the house where wind isn’t blowing inside to see the trees again.  The leaves are still turned down, relaxing in layers around the trunk and branches.  The rain will be a while.
By the time I reach the kitchen, Mabel is already adding sugar to a bowl with some yeast to start it rising.  Two pans of finished sweet rolls rest on the table by the open window through which I see Thomas and Joachim still tinkering with the engine of the new motorcar.  Joachim is speaking in German.  I move toward the window, but Mabel snaps the curtains closed.
“You want ice tea?”
“Iced tea would be lovely. Thank you, Mabel.”
There is a leftover speck of sawdust floating on top of the tea.  I pick it out while Mabel measures flour for the dough.  A floorboard creaks overhead.  I wipe my hand on my trousers and look upward.
“It’s a real young ‘un, Mr. Abernathy.”
“Oh yes, of course, Mabel.”
“Fresh in from Pittsburgh.”  Mabel leans across the table at me.  “Wearing very odd pants.”
She says the last word as if it was a bullet and will only be effective if she puts some air behind it.
“Pants?”
Mabel looks at the door to the hallway and makes the sign of the cross.  She nods and picks up a pan of sweet rolls to put in the oven of the wood stove.  Snatching the hook off the wall, she picks up the plates on the stovetop checking the fire inside.  Sweat drips from the spot between her thinning gray eyebrows, and her flat, colorless hair dampens along her brow.  The Utzes cannot afford one of those summer kerosene cook stoves.  The woods behind the house provide free fuel, where as kerosene would have to be purchased.  Mabel cannot even get Joachim to build an outside kitchen.  He says summer doesn’t last long in Western New York anyway, and Mabel can tolerate the heat, store it up to last all winter long.
Overhead there is a small thud as something lands on the floor.