Powder of Sin (3 page)

Miss Renshaw’s eyes were closed, and she seemed not
to care that a horrified Rosalie watched her.

Beels returned with the lemonade.

He put down the tray and glanced at the door.
Rosalie jumped to her feet in case Miss Renshaw tried to go after
him again. Watching her companion, she said, “Thank you, Beels.
That will be all for now.”

He didn’t run from the room, but he moved more
quickly than his usual stately progress.

Miss Renshaw picked up a glass and pressed it to her
forehead. “Cold. Perfect.” She pulled a chip of ice from the drink
and sucked on it. Water dribbled down her wrists and chin. She
sucked harder.

Rosalie stared. Miss Renshaw usually had exquisite
manners. The lady nibbled her food and barely touched a roll with
her fingers at meals. Now she gulped down the lemonade as if she
were dying of thirst.

“Delicious,” she said brightly. “I’m quite
refreshed, and now I think I shall go for a stroll.”

“No.” Rosalie’s panic surfaced. “You can’t leave
when you’re under the influence of this peculiar substance. I think
it best you go to your bedroom and sleep.”

“Sleep? La, Rosalie, it is madness to sleep when I
feel this—It was this substance, you say? I’m alive for the first
time since I was a girl.” She laughed. “Sleep? No, thank you.”

“Please. Miss Renshaw. You are not yourself tonight,
and I think you’ll regret going out.” She hoped she’d put enough
iron in her voice to make it clear it was a threat.

“No.” Miss Renshaw still smiled brightly.

Rosalie tried again. “If you leave this house in
this state, I will have to find a new companion. I will dismiss
you.”

“Really?” Miss Renshaw raised her thin brows. “I
must be behaving very badly, then.” She didn’t sound at all
concerned.

“It isn’t your fault.” Rosalie decided to tell the
whole truth. “You see, the dust that you touched awakens certain
animal appetites in people.”

“Aha. That explains a great deal!” Miss Renshaw
laughed. “How amusing to think we are animals after all. How long
will this effect last?”

“I don’t know, Miss Renshaw. I wish I did.” She had
the appalling thought that the effect would never go away, but then
she recalled Mr. Dorsey, who’d obviously opened the box and
overcome its influence. For a horrifying moment, she imagined him
in an aroused state similar to this, but pushed the image out of
her mind.

Miss Renshaw still pirouetted toward the door, and
Rosalie had to speak loudly to make herself heard over the waltz
her companion hummed. “But I hope you understand it is for your own
good that I will, um, put a guard outside your door.”

The companion’s brightness dimmed. “My own good,”
she said. “All my life, everything that has been for my own good
has not been at all amusing or interesting. Did you know that?”

“Miss Renshaw. Emily. I am sorry. I understand what
you are saying. But do you truly wish to become disgraced? Lose
your good name and possibly even your virtue?” Good God, she
sounded like her father when he had lectured her about her meetings
with Cousin Johnny, but Rosalie pressed on. “What might happen
should you give in to baser impulses?”

“Yes, yes, I am a grown woman on the shady side of
thirty-five.” Miss Renshaw was waspish now. “I’ve seen enough of
life to understand disgrace. If I indulged in sins of the flesh.”
She stopped to take a deep breath and gave another visible shudder.
“If I tarry alone with a man, he might put himself inside me.
Pshaw. It’s such a shame.”

Rosalie nodded, though she wasn’t sure what she was
agreeing with. “I apologize for not telling you about the strange
box earlier. I suppose I didn’t believe it, but now I think I
must.” She sipped her glass of lemonade, still watching her beaming
companion, who’d shed her shoes and loosened her bodice. “I’m sorry
you touched the substance.”

“Heavens, I’m not sorry, Rosalie. I shall never
forget how I feel this evening. So entirely—alive.” Miss Renshaw
drifted to the French doors that led to the back garden. “I hope
you won’t mind if I go to the rear of the house? I shan’t go out in
public. I promise. I want to see the stars.”

Rosalie put down her glass on top of the letter from
her mother she’d just been reading. “I’ll join you.”

“No, please don’t worry. Now that I understand…I’ll
be back to my old self soon, I suppose,” Miss Renshaw said, almost
in her usual vague and apologetic manner. Perhaps the chemical or
whatever it could be was already wearing off. “I would like to be
alone, if you don’t mind.”

After Miss Renshaw slipped out to the walled back
garden, Rosalie donned gloves and went into the library. She held
her breath as she picked up the box and put it in the bottom desk
drawer that locked.

Would throwing away the gloves be excessive? She
recalled the ecstatic look on Miss Renshaw’s face and at once
wrapped the gloves in some newspaper before wedging them into the
bottom of the trash container next to the desk.

She wondered if she should start a fire and burn the
box. But what if the smoke carried the potent substance into the
air? Now that would be a sight. The entire city infected with the
powder. Rosalie again felt the strange hysteria, a mix of fear and
amusement.

After reflecting on various horrific scenarios the
powder might create, she climbed the stairs to Miss Renshaw’s room
to see if the lady required assistance. Her companion still hadn’t
returned.

A stab of guilt hit Rosalie. She should not have
left poor Miss Renshaw alone for so long. What if the drugged lady
forgot her promise not to leave the garden? She might wander out
the back gate. Rosalie went to the bedroom window and looked out
over the garden. It was too dark to see anything, but a light
glowed in the window of the mews, which lay not far beyond the
garden. Horses reading? No.

The mews. The stables had living quarters for—

Men.

Rosalie almost tripped on her skirts as she hurried
back down to the parlor. The French window stood open. Moonlight
silvered the stones of the path and the tops of the trees, but
threw much of the small garden into deeper shadow. She moved along
the path toward the back wall, and the wall seemed to move. Oh no.
That pale object that moved wasn’t the wall.

The dark bulk of the man was mostly clothed as he
covered the moaning female, and only part of his body showed—his
buttocks.

Rosalie knew who he was with even before she caught
sight of a rose-colored sleeve—Miss Renshaw’s gown. The pink arm
wrapped tight around the body of the man. For several moments,
Rosalie watched, fascinated and horrified.

That was the ultimate act—a man’s buttocks waggling
around? No, more like flexing rhythmically.

Her stomach flipped with anxiety. Should she scream
or sneak away? First she had to discover if this was something Miss
Renshaw wanted and not an attack.

“Harder,” the lady moaned. “Yes, yes.”

That question was answered.

Yet here, in the open? Such an activity in her own
garden? And poor Miss Renshaw would never do this in her right
mind. Again Rosalie wondered if she should cry out. But it was
obviously too late to save the woman’s virtue.

If the two participants had joined body parts, what
could she do? She tried to recall the process Johnny had described.
When did the possible baby production occur? Too late, she
imagined. Hard to think that seeds from the man hadn’t spilled by
now.

She backed away, not trying to hide her presence,
but the rhythm of the writhing bodies didn’t change.

When she reached the door, she went into the parlor
to await Miss Renshaw and possibly forestall any servant who would
go out that door and head down that path. Rosalie stretched out on
the sofa to wait.

When she woke, she discovered someone had covered
her with a blanket and it was daylight.

“Did you have trouble sleeping?” Miss Renshaw stood
nearby, her hand resting on a tray that lay on the table. Steam
rose from the coffeepot and fresh muffins.

Rosalie gaped up at her companion, who looked as she
always did: mousy brown and gray hair smoothed under the cap. A
puce-colored gown. Absolutely no sign of debauchery. No, perhaps
Miss Renshaw’s cheeks were pinker than usual. But it wasn’t a blush
of shame. Some sort of irritation perhaps.

“I’m sorry if you didn’t…sleep well,” Miss Renshaw
said. She wore her normal, vague smile. “I slept like a log.”

Rosalie sat up, and the covers slipped to the floor.
“Miss Renshaw, are you well?”

“It’s strange that you… I am coming down with
something. My limbs ache, and my skin…” She gave a slight cough,
the smallest of sounds that she made when something slightly
embarrassed her.

Rosalie swallowed to banish a wave of nausea. “You
don’t recall last night? You touched the box. Remember?”

“I felt odd. Not disagreeable, but odd. And my
dreams…pleasant, but…” Her voice died away, and now her face
definitely reddened. “Very naughty…” She wore the faintest
smile.

Rosalie hated to do it, but she had to. “What if?
Uh. Um. What if they weren’t dreams?”

Miss Renshaw’s smile faltered. “You had a disturbed
night, my dear. Sleeping here and… Perhaps you need more rest.”

“I wonder, should I tell you what happened?” she
whispered. Yes, she had to.

At that moment, Beels came into the room. He jerked
back, away from Rosalie’s companion when he noticed her. The ends
of his mouth quivered. “Flowers, miss,” he said, holding up a
rather bedraggled nosegay of roses. “Hawes wished to deliver them
to Miss Renshaw himself, but I deemed it best he not enter the
house.”

“Hawes?” Rosalie squeaked. “The coachman?”

It made sense, of course. The mews.

“Hawes?” Miss Renshaw whispered and went very pale.
“Hawes. Oh no. Hawes. And…and… Is his Christian name John?”

“I wouldn’t know, miss.” He didn’t sneer, but
Rosalie supposed that was only because he’d been too well
trained.

There was only one cup on the tray. “Beels, bring me
another cup for the coffee. At once,” she said sharply. After he
left, she helped her companion to the sofa. The poor lady’s eyes
were closed tight.

Rosalie pressed her hand. “The dream. Did it involve
intimacies? With Hawes?”

Miss Renshaw’s lips quivered. “Yes. With…”

It could have been worse, Rosalie supposed. He was
not a bad person, not like the coachman next door, who had a
tendency to drink too much, use the whip too often, and act in an
unpleasant manner with the maids. “He’s a good man. He won’t
gossip.”

The older lady kept her eyes closed, but she did not
fall into hysterics. “I saw him,” she said in a low voice. “He was
coming back from the, ah, privy. And I told him the air was too
wonderful to go indoors. He agreed. Particularly in his room, he
said. I gave him permission to come through the iron gate. The
garden. To look at the fountain. And we talked, and then I, ah, I
think…I told him I wanted him to kiss me. I hadn’t been kissed, you
see. I hadn’t. But if it wasn’t a dream…” Her voice grew thick with
unshed tears. “Good gracious, I’ve been kissed…”

She gave a choked sob. “It-it was… The whole thing
was so…” She shook her head. “I will never forgive myself.
Never.”

“It wasn’t your fault. Please, Emily, you were under
the influence of a powerful drug. No one could blame you.”

The lady pulled out a neat little handkerchief and
broke down completely. “Oh no. It’s terrible. Unforgivable.” She
took to her heels and flew from the room, slamming into Beels, who
must have been listening at the door.

Rosalie longed to pretend nothing had happened, but
someone had to make sure the man in question would stay quiet. She
considered sending a vaguely threatening note, but wasn’t sure
Hawes could read. Summoning him wouldn’t be a good plan. Miss
Renshaw might see him in the house, which would not be good for her
overwrought emotional state, not to mention the servants had enough
material for gossip.

Rosalie decided to go through the garden and cross
the cobblestone yard to find Hawes.

It was late enough in the morning that the mews and
stables were fairly quiet. Looking around to make sure no one
watched, she skirted the pile of hay and manure, climbed the
rickety wooden steps, and rapped on the door of the small
apartment.

“Come on in,” a muffled voice shouted.

Hawes sat at a bare wooden table, eating eggs from a
chipped plate. At the sight of Rosalie, he jumped to his feet and
yanked off his brown woolen cap, revealing a head of uncombed
graying hair that blended into his side whiskers and mustache. He
wore only a plain white shirt and trousers, held up with cheery
blue braces. Taller than Rosalie by only an inch or so, he must
have outweighed her by a good two stone, all of it muscle, she
guessed.

“Take a seat, miss?” he mumbled, clutching and
working the hat between both hands.

She shook her head and launched straight into speech
before she lost what was left of her nerve. Best to use her
reputation again as a blunt female. “Last night Miss Renshaw and
you had a…an interlude. It was due to some unfortunate drug she had
accidentally taken, Mr. Hawes.”

“Naw.” His voice was hoarse with shock. “I wouldn’t
guess she was under the influence. She didn’t sound slurred or
nothing. She was like herself, only…happier.”

“It was something other than alcohol. I think it
best you forget it happened and never speak of this matter to
anyone. I feel responsible for her accidental dosing, so I will
certainly help her should there be consequences.” She gulped at her
own words. Consequences meant a baby. Oh heavens, she wished she
knew what to do. No wonder her father fell back on anger so
often.