Chapter 25

25

Love sought is good, but given unsought is better.

Twelfth Night, Act 3, Scene 1

August

His new German apprentice, Bastian, hovered at the door, tapping his leg with the letter in his left hand. He insisted on wearing the strangest little hat, Bastian, even indoors, but he was so willing and so obedient Bridger just let him do it. The boy had been sent out to acquire pastries for tea and returned with a basket of treats in one hand, the letter in the other.

"I'm sure the seedcakes will do, Bastian. Neeve will be here any moment and I'd rather your backside not be the thing that greets him." Bridger scarcely looked up from the papers stacked on his desk, his patience wearing thin.

"Another letter returned, sir, is all," said the boy. Bastian picked his way across the cramped office, dodging the furniture and bookcases that made the space feel even tinier. Said letter was tossed onto his desk, then the apprentice made a curt little bow and left with the basket of seedcakes.

"Tell Maria lemon and milk with the tea, please," he called after him. The unopened letter on the desk pulsed like red eyes in the darkness. He had to look, even if he didn't want to. And as expected, and feared, it was his latest letter to Miss Arden, sent to her aunt's home in Mayfair and rejected. A man had to hold himself to things, and he had promised himself that if this one came back, too, then it was really over.

And there it was. Proof of her indifference. Proof that it was time for hope to die.

Bridger scooped up the message and pulled a ring of keys out of the top drawer of his desk. He unlocked the bottom right drawer, nudged it open with the toe of his boot, and dropped the letter inside. It nestled down beside other cherished treasures—a pair of ruined, stained lady's gloves, a few folded notes, and a stack of unread letters, brothers to the one that had just landed. Under it all, the thick stack of pages comprising Miss Arden's The Killbride, sent to him many months earlier and never fully read. Well, not until recently. And then, repeatedly.

There was a chime somewhere in the building. Bastian ran hastily through his office, scooting like a panicked lapdog from one door to the other, huffing and puffing.

Bridger slid out from behind his desk and pulled down his waistcoat. Heartbroken or otherwise, he had a job to do. And anyway, it was good to have work. Passionate employment could sustain a man for years; he had seen it be so with John Dockarty. He decided not to consider that John died quite alone, leaving everything to Bridger. Oh God, am I doomed to pass this all to Bastian and his ridiculous hat? Indeed, Bastian reappeared a moment later, hat in hand, bouncing up and down like a song sparrow. He had the oddest expression on his milky little face. It was like he had encountered a ghost.

"What is the matter with you?" Bridger demanded.

"G. R. Neeve is h-here, sir, at least, it should be them."

"Should be?"

"It's a lady ."

Before Bridger could fully receive that, Bastian swung around and pulled open the door the rest of the way. And there, sure enough, stood a lady. And not just any lady, but Miss Regina Applethwaite, her hair a silvery halo above her blue silk ensemble. A coy smile tugged at her rosebud lips because she obviously could not contain herself. There was a woman fully submersed in the heady liquor of a successful coup.

Despite the shock, Bridger's mind worked very fast.

"G. R. Neeve," he muttered, dismissing poor, befuddled Bastian with a wave. "Revenge."

Regina drifted forward, bringing with her the scent of watery flowers. There was a chair before his desk, and Bridger moved aside, allowing her to have it. She descended like a queen about to hold court, though the smile had vanished. "You worked that out rather quickly."

"I didn't work it out at all," he said. But of course, he couldn't go a single day, a single bloody hour, without Margaret Arden crashing into his thoughts. "Miss Arden pointed out the coincidence this summer, when we were all at Pressmore for the Richmond wedding."

That pleased Regina immensely. She sat up straighter and beamed. "She is uncommonly clever. Even more so for having abandoned your acquaintance."

Bridger strode to his side of the desk, took the worn chair, and refused to look at her, propping both hands under his chin. "Ah yes, which means the two of you must be the best of friends now."

She made a soft, unoffended sound. "Not at all, actually. She has gone out of her way to snub me."

At that, his head snapped around toward her. "Really?"

"Oh, yes. I tried to stop Miss Arden at the opera just last week. She was there with the Burtons, but I couldn't squeeze more than three words out of her."

Bridger grinned. "Then your triumph is not complete."

"Complete enough." She tossed her head. "You will publish Sable Falls to all the acclaim it deserves, and you and I will forever know that I am G. R. Neeve and the source of your publishing success. I have looked over your suggestions for the frontispiece and woodcut, and heartily approve, Mr. Darrow. You really were meant to do this work. I see great things ahead for Dockarty and Company."

He had never heard a compliment presented thus, like a poisoned blade wrapped in velvet.

Putting his hands down, he shifted in his chair. Regina cast her gaze about the room, rearranging her shawl and reticule several times. The office was not the lavish surroundings she had become accustomed to.

"You are taking this better than I hoped," she said finally. "It's deflating."

"A man who has lost everything is difficult to rob."

Regina's eyes widened. "Whatever do you mean by that, Mr. Darrow?"

"It is of no consequence, Miss Applethwaite," he said. His toe nudged the drawer with all of Margaret's things, and he swallowed hard. He hadn't locked it back up, and, ajar, he saw the note from Regina peeking out from inside. "I hurt you terribly, didn't I?"

Regina sat back, studying him. Her hand fluttered to her heart. "I beg your pardon?"

"I never took full responsibility for it, the depths of what I put you through." Bridger laughed mirthlessly, then fell silent as Maria entered, bringing tea. It was laid out on his desk among the drifting dunes of contracts and marked-up pages. Neither of them touched the seedcakes, though Regina took a saucer of tea and politely held it. "I think we should publish Sable Falls under your real name, Miss Applethwaite. You should take full credit for the work; it is an astonishing achievement. You could have given up after how much I discouraged you, but you persevered. I'm sorry for what I said to you all those years ago. My father demanded it, but I should have had the courage to end things cleanly. I shouldn't have listened to him, and I should have treated you better."

Her mouth hung open briefly. Regina, always polished, always together, collected herself with a tiny sniff. "Thank you, Mr. Darrow."

"Then, you will agree to put your name on the book?"

Regina sipped her tea twice, put the saucer on the desk, and stood. "Indeed. I think I would like that very much. After all, I am rich, beautiful, and strong enough to endure society's scrutiny." She sounded dazed. Stunned. Slowly, she glided like an apparition to the door. Bridger went forward to hold it open for her, a strange buzzing in his chest. She was almost gone, leaving nothing but the imprint of her elderflower perfume, before she cursed under her breath and spun. For a while, she simply regarded him, her expression changing rapidly, traveling from bemused to determined with several stops along the way.

"You have done me a good turn, Mr. Darrow, and so I will match the favor," she said, then smirked. "Even if you are very naughty for ruining my clever joke on you."

"A cleverer person than I realized the trick."

Regina nodded, touching her lip thoughtfully. "This summer I was, well, politely minding my own thoughts when I happened to pass by the Sapphire Library and hear Miss Arden's aunts unleashing upon her. Which—have you tried, sir, to make amends with the lady?"

"I have written her repeatedly, even gone to the Mayfair address for the Burtons, but I am rebuffed."

She pressed her lips together tightly. "She has been forbidden from seeing you, speaking of you, and writing her books. It was a painful sentence levied, Mrs. Burton vowing to turn her family out of their cottage if Margaret disobeyed. I fear she ignores you not out of any malice, but for the love of her mother and sisters."

Bridger stepped back as if struck.

"I…That…" He shook his head, heat burning across his chest and up his throat. Oh God. "Margaret."

At his lowest, he had thought the most uncharitable things about her. Now he saw that she had been forced to drop him or betray her entire family.

"I wish there was more I could say or do," said Regina, kindly. "I hope you know I only ever advised her against you because of our past. We are both women pursuing passions outside what society deems appropriate, and I felt protective of her."

"You have done what you could. Now I will do the rest."

Regina arched a brow. "If you mean to assist her in some daring, devious literary capacity, I simply must be involved. An olive branch to you both, for all the ways we have misunderstood each other."

For the first time in a long time, Bridger felt hope.

There was so much to do, he couldn't command his limbs to cooperate harmoniously. He bid Regina goodbye and returned to the warm, leathery depths of his office, retrieving the manuscript from the bottom right drawer of his desk. Breaths and ideas were coming fast now. They were already in the midst of publishing Regina's novel, and that would have to be completed before moving on to The Killbride . But that was all right; that would give him time to hammer out the details of the contract with Regina, source a woodcut, meet with libraries, purchase the materials, set the type, edit for spelling, and so on.

It felt good to have a distraction. For the first time in months, he felt purposeful, focused. And better still, he felt close to Margaret.