Chapter 6

OVER THE FOLLOWING two weeks, Mr Alabaster called at the house no less than six times in an attempt to persuade Mab’s father to rethink his decision. Fortunately for Mab, her father’s icy glares and unusually prolonged silent treatment meant that she spent most of her time either in her room or walking the grounds, and she luckily never encountered Mr Alabaster on any of his visits.

Only for the briefest of moments did she stop her seething long enough to consider her father’s words.

You will be pleased to know that I sent a letter to Mr Alabaster yesterday – yes, yesterday, before your shenanigans – telling him that I had been too hasty in accepting his proposal and would need some time to properly consider it.

Her father had withdrawn from the proposal. Had she known that, would she have gone ahead with her plan?

Yes , a little voice in the depths of her mind said. Her father had only withdrawn to give himself long enough to properly consider it. And given this new and aggressive stance her father had taken regarding Mab’s marital status, she didn’t trust him to back down. Even if he did see sense that Robert Alabaster was a despicably poor choice for Mab, what about the next man who asked for Mab’s hand?

Her father’s threat about Aunt áine had actually brightened Mab’s mood somewhat, and she’d occasionally found herself giggling at the ridiculousness of it all. Aunt áine was a story told to little girls to get them to behave. Fortunately, Mab’s parents (current threat notwithstanding) had never used the folktale of Aunt áine to keep her in line, but she’d grown up knowing the tale from her petrified peers. According to her peers’ parents, little naughty girls grew up into bold women who were so bad that no good, honourable man would want them as a wife. So, the only way for them to find a husband was for Aunt áine to come and steal them away in the dead of night to marry horrible old men that needed wives.

Her father might as well have told Mab that St Nicholas would leave her coal if she misbehaved again.

Between her good moods, when she recalled the foolishness of her father using a child’s ghost story to try to get her to behave, she had many melancholic moments as well. On the first night, she’d had to physically stop herself from accidentally cracking a joke at dinner, resulting in the first ever time she and her father had eaten a meal in utter silence. The following days had become a battle of wills to see who would be the first to break the silence, which neither of them had yet.

When Mr Ross presented her father with the mail in the mornings and afternoons, her father tossed all the invitations to balls and parties back onto the silver platter unopened, muttering “Mab won’t be here to attend this one”, or the like, under his breath. At first, Mab snorted and rolled her eyes at her father keeping up his boogey-woman ruse. But by the end of the second week, it had started to get under her skin. Mab supposed it was his way of telling her that he was now too ashamed of being seen out in public with his sullied daughter.

It also hadn’t helped that none of the servants would meet her gaze. While Mab trusted that none of the servants would breathe a word to anyone outside the household of her indiscretions, they still talked among themselves. It was the first time in her life that Mab had felt lonely, and she hated it.

She hated it to the point that the notion that she perhaps had been too haughty with her plan had started to solidify. But then again, when she looked out the window to see the new stable master glancing over his shoulders to make sure no one was watching while he sneaked the horses slices of apples, she knew she’d done the right thing, even if it was only the poor horses that had thus far benefited from it.

The sound of wheels on gravel tore Mab’s attention from the stable, and she quickly darted back to her bed, curled into a woodlouse-like ball and prayed that the caller was not for her.

Her prayers went unanswered. For a few moments later, her lady’s maid was rapping on her door. Mab couldn’t bring herself to answer and hoped feigning sleep would be enough for Edna to give up and to politely tell whoever was waiting to see her that she was indisposed.

Mab groaned as Edna barged through the door.

“Apologies, Miss Mab,” Edna said breathlessly. “Your father has said that you must get dressed immediately. He’s just received word that your aunt has taken ill and needs some company while she recuperates—”

“Lady Banbridge?” Mab shouted, throwing the blankets off her and scrambling out of bed.

“No, an aunt on your father’s side,” said Edna, who was depositing large piles of clothes into a trunk.

Mab racked her brain. Her father had plenty of Liverpudlian cousins, and Mab, in turn, had countless second and third cousins ... but the last aunt that she was aware of had died almost a decade ago. Nonetheless, Mab didn’t have time to dwell on who it could be from her father’s extensive family that she would be looking after, only that the clothes Edna was packing were not remotely suitable to stay with the docker side of her family.

She was just about to explain as such to Edna when the lady’s maid said, “Your father said to pack your nicest dresses and jewels, and you have” – she glanced at the small clock on the mantel – “Oh! Good heavens! You only have fifteen minutes!”

MAB HAD PROMISED EDNA that she would be down directly; she just had a few personal items that she needed to collect.

That was only partially true.

Mab crossed the room to her bedside table and picked up the miniature painting of her mother. The portrait looked eerily similar to Mab, with high cheekbones and cupid bow lips. Her mother had the same slight slant to her eyes. The artist had painted her mother’s eyes azure when, in fact, they were the same forest green as Mab’s. While Mab’s locks were ember-red, her mother’s were a dark auburn. Mab gently placed the miniature on a scarf that she’d laid out on the bed. She carefully wrapped the material around the painting and slipped it into her small travel bag.

Mab pulled out the drawer of her bedside table and, looking over her shoulder to make sure no maids had slipped in unawares, lifted the false bottom. She pulled the mother-of-pearl inlaid pistol out, along with the small box of accompanying paraphernalia, and quickly shoved it into her bag. The pistol had been a gift from one of her more nefarious cousins the last time she’d stayed with them in Liverpool. Not that she’d had occasion to use it, but she had felt safer with it on her person when her cousins had taken her to some of their meetings. Mab had no idea, of course, what had gone on in the meetings, only that she’d been required to remain casually in the tearoom below with their wives and to look as inconspicuous as possible. It had been ever so exciting, even if Mab really had no idea what exactly was happening .

She felt safer knowing that the gun would be on her person – well, in her travel bag – ready to be drawn at a moment’s notice should the need arise.

Mab heard a grunt from below her window and crossed the room to look out. Her eyebrows knitted in confusion as she took in the hearse-like carriage below, the two footmen heaving her trunks onto the back. The carriage was painted black, with the odd flash of gold throughout. It was unusually extravagant for her father’s side of the family, and Mab had a sinking feeling that she couldn’t quite put a finger on.

“Mab!” her father’s voice called from below.

A little smile twinged at the corner of her lips.

Ha! He spoke first!

Though Mab couldn’t quite muster the enthusiasm to bask in her glorious triumph. She would, reluctantly, miss her father.

Sighing, Mab crossed her room, making her fingers walk on the footboard of her bed. She trudged across the landing and down the stairs, where she was met by the stares of curious servants, two unfamiliar footmen and the oddly pleased smile of her father.

“That will be all,” her father announced to the room. The servants moved in a fluster, issuing Mab a nod as they passed before breaking off into the various rooms of the house. Her father offered Mab his arm, and she warily took it.

Together, they followed the footmen out of the front door and towards the carriage.

It was only as they came to a halt that Mab realised something very peculiar – the carriage had no windows.

One of the footmen opened the door, and Mab strained her eyes to see inside the coffin that she was to travel in. No matter, it would only be a day’s travel to Liverpool. The interior was covered in plush dark material – too dark for Mab to discern exactly what colour it was. A number of glass sconces lit the interior, and Mab could make out a small table on the side and a glass decanter of water fastened securely with a metal loop affixed to the wall.

Mab stared into the carriage for a long time, struggling to find the words to say goodbye to her father.

The footman shuffled uncomfortably as he held the door open, his dark eyes flitting between Mab and her father, waiting for someone to break the silence.

Eventually, her father said, “They’re here to take you to Aunt áine’s.”

Mab barked out a laugh. She finally realised what was happening. No wonder she couldn’t recall a single living aunt – she didn’t have any! This was all part of her father’s terrible, childish ruse to punish her. She could scarcely believe he was still trying to scare her with such a childish story. She wagered he thought she would crumble and beg him not to send her off to the silly imaginary place.

Ha!

As if a fairy tale could scare Mab! And if he thought for one moment that she’d beg to remain with him and promise she’d be a good little daughter and marry whomever he chose for her, well then, he was sorely mistaken.

“Goodbye, Father,” Mab said. Without further acknowledgement, Mab climbed into the windowless carriage and stared blankly at the fabric walls, refusing to meet her father’s gaze.

“This is for your own good, Mab,” her father said quietly.

Mab gritted her teeth. Her father really was drawing the ruse out painfully long. “I am sure it is,” she finally said.

Mab sighed deeply, and from the corner of her eye, she saw her father nod to the footman. The footman closed the door, and despite the wall sconces, Mab was plunged into darkness. It took her eyes a painful moment to adjust.

Mab jolted in surprise as the carriage took off. Her father really was committed to the ruse.

She supposed that he would have the footman drive her to town and back. But after an hour in the carriage, Mab’s resolve began to waver .

Her heart sank when, after a full day of travel, she realised that perhaps the threat was more real than she’d initially thought.