The Bride of the Unicorn

She had survived because the only alternative to survival was the unthinkable failure of death. Or, as Peaches had suggested, she could travel to London and join the ranks of the impure who hovered around Covent Garden hoping to make a passable living at “a fiver a flip”—at least until her teeth loosened from a bad diet, her body showed the ravages of one or more of the many venereal diseases rampant in the area, or her love of blue ruin, one of Peaches O’Hanlan’s many colorful names for gin, left her “workin’ the cribs for a penny a poke.”

Peaches hadn’t really wanted Caroline to become one of the soiled doves of Covent Garden. Caroline knew that now. She had simply intended to frighten her into realizing that a life spent as general dogsbody in an asylum full of raving maniacs was preferable to following in the footsteps of so many of the orphans who were pushed out of the foundling home to make their way as best they could.

“Will you have time for lessons this afternoon, Dulcinea?”

Caroline shook herself from her reverie and looked to the older woman, smiling as she saw the apprehension in her face. Miss Twittingdon hated to be alone and in charge of filling her own hours, for she often found them stuffed with unladylike thoughts concerning her brother, thoughts that frightened her. “And of course I do, Aunt Leticia, don’t you know,” she answered. “Don’t I do my best to make time for you every day?”

Miss Twittingdon frowned, shaking an accusatory finger in Caroline’s direction. “No, you don’t—or else I wouldn’t be hearing snippets of heathen Irishisms slipping back into your voice. We do not begin our sentences with ‘and’ and then tack a ‘don’t you know’ on the end of them. Both are appalling examples of Irish cant. To speak so is a sure sign of low breeding. You will remember that, won’t you? You must! Or how will you be able to show yourself to your best next Season when you make your come-out?”

Caroline rolled her eyes. She had been listening to this insane business of her come-out ever since first meeting Miss Twittingdon, who had immediately demanded that Caroline address her as “Aunt.” She hadn’t been very impressed with the notion at the beginning and complied with the daily lessons only because Miss Twittingdon seemed to have an endless supply of sugar comfits in a painted tin she hid under her bed.

But over time she had grown fond of the woman and enamored of the lessons and the books her “aunt” read to her as well. Not that improving her speech, memorizing simple history lessons, and learning the correct way to attack a turbot with knife and fork—and Caroline had never so much as seen a turbot—were of much use to her here at Woodwere.

But Leticia Twittingdon’s room was warm in the winter and there was always a fresh pitcher of water for Caroline to use to wash herself, and there was something vaguely comforting about having someone to call “Aunt,” so that it now seemed natural for Caroline to listen to Leticia’s grand plans for her “niece” without stopping to wonder at the futility of the thing.

Or even of the pain Leticia Twittingdon’s grand schemes for Caroline’s future caused, late at night, when Caroline lay on her thin cot in the attic, knowing in her heart of hearts that Caroline Monday, unlike Dick Whittington’s cat, would never look at a king.

“Caroline! Caroline! Come quickly! There are people here to see you. Downstairs, in old Woodwere’s office. Have you done something wrong? Did you filch another orange while you were in the village? Woodwere may keep Boxer and the other attendants away from you, but even he can’t pluck you from a jail cell.”

Caroline watched as Leticia uncrossed her legs and rose to her full height to stare across the carpeted floor at the doorway, where Frederick Haswit, a remarkably homely dwarf standing no more than three feet high, was jumping up and down on his stubby legs in a veritable frenzy of apprehension. “Is that any way to enter a lady’s chamber, sirrah?” she asked, arching one thin eyebrow. “Really, Ferdie, the disintegration of manners instigated in this modern age by hey-go-mad gentlemen such as you is appalling. Simply appalling! Furthermore, there is no Caroline here, but only Dulcinea and myself.”

Caroline smiled at Ferdie, another of her friends at Woodwere, who had been installed at the asylum six or seven years previously, when he was no more than thirteen. He had been placed there by his father once the boy’s doting mother had died, as the man did not appreciate having “a bloody freak” cluttering up either his impeccable lineage or his Mayfair town house.

Ferdie stamped one small, fat foot. “Not Dulcinea, you ridiculous twit! Caroline! Caroline! Oh, never mind. You’re too addlepated to know chalk from cheese.”

“At least I can see over the top of the dinner table to find the cheese, you abbreviated little snot,” Miss Twittingdon responded, looking down her long nose at the dwarf.

“Who is asking for me, Ferdie?” Caroline inquired quickly as the dwarf stuck his small hands in his pockets and struck a belligerent pose, obviously ready to go into battle with the woman, a move that would do Caroline no good at all. “Do I know these persons?”

“Of course you don’t, Dulcinea,” Mrs. Twittingdon pointed out in her usual reasonable tone, a tone that had played accompaniment to many an outrageously splendiferous notion. “You are not yet Out, and so you know nobody. I wouldn’t allow it. Why, as your guardian, I haven’t as yet even given you leave to put up your hair!”

“Of course,” Caroline echoed meekly, refusing to snap at the woman. Besides, she had enough to do wondering whom she might have offended lately with her sometimes sharp tongue, or what sleight of hand she had indulged in while visiting the village—picking pockets was one of the skills her first mentor, Peaches, had taught her—that might now have some back to haunt her. “You will forgive me, I hope.”

But Miss Twittingdon was speaking again, and Caroline tamped down any niggling fears in order to listen. “Did these persons leave their cards, Ferdie? You know we receive only on Tuesday mornings from ten until two. There is nothing else for it—they shall have to leave calling cards, as civilized people know they ought, with the corner bent down to show we did not receive them. As you should have known, Ferdie, if you were civilized, which we all are aware you are not. Then, if we so choose, we will condescend to receive them next week. Do toddle off downstairs now and pass on this information, if you please, and don’t hesitate to remind these people, whoever they may be, that certain basic rules of civilization must be maintained, even here in this benighted countryside.”

“Heavens yes, Ferdie,” Caroline seconded, caught between apprehension and a real enjoyment of Miss Twittingdon’s strict rules for receiving visitors in a madhouse. “Do tell them that Miss Caroline Dulcinea Monday regrets that she is not receiving today. She receives only on Tuesdays, and this, after all”—she began to giggle—“is already Wednesday. Can you do that for me, Ferdie—with so many days to remember?”

“Levity is not called for at this dark hour, Caroline, even if that loony red crow over there can’t see it,” Ferdie told her portentously, slowly shaking his too-large head. “Your visitors are an odd pair—an Irish drab and a great, large gentleman dressed in London clothes. Has eyes black as pokers and talks like he’s used to being listened to. Maybe you didn’t steal another orange. Maybe you’ve broken a big law this time. Maybe he’s come to take you away and brought a keeper with him to tie you up. Maybe—”

“Maybe I’ll hang, Ferdie,” Caroline snapped, her usual good humor evaporating under the uncomfortable heat of the dwarf’s melancholy suppositions. “Well, Aunt Leticia,” she proposed airily, turning to look at the older woman, “shall I trip off downstairs and do my best to stare down this well-dressed hangman, or will you stand firm beside me here while I…Ferdie! Did you say an Irishwoman?”

Frederick Haswit nodded with some vigor, then puffed up his barrel chest, folded both his hands over his heart, and recited importantly:

“A winsome damsel she is not,

with scrawny breast and lackluster hair,

her teeth numbering little more than a pair.

I saw her there, and must tell you true;

She peered at me, and laughed—hoo, hoo!

The man, he silenced her mirth with a look,

showing she’s naught but this black king’s rook.

It is in him I see the menace, the danger,

deep in the eyes of this intimidating stranger.

So come now, sweet child, we’ll hie away to

the sea,

the ridiculous Miss Twittingdon, Caroline—

and me.”

“Your meter worsens with each new, excruciatingly uneven couplet, Ferdie, and I for one wouldn’t cross the street with you, let alone run off to sea in your company,” Miss Twittingdon told him flatly, reaching into the sleeve of her scarlet gown to extract a lace-edged handkerchief and lift it to her lips. “Red crow, indeed! It’s no wonder you’ve been locked up. I would have had you put in chains and fetters myself. But enough of this nonsense. There is nothing else for it—show the gentleman upstairs.”

“And the Irishwoman as well, Ferdie,” Caroline instructed, sure that the dwarf had described Peaches. She hadn’t seen her in over a year, since the day the woman had left her, weeping uncontrollably, behind the locked gates of Woodwere.

Caroline frowned. What could Peaches be about? Certainly she hadn’t found a protector for her, some London swell who would, according to Peaches, set her up in a discreet apartment on the fringes of Mayfair, then use her for his convenience until he tired of her. Peaches had always thought such an arrangement to be the pinnacle of success—especially if the woman was smart enough to ask for diamonds at regular intervals and talented enough to lift coins from the man’s purse each night after he’d taken his pleasure on her and fallen to snoring into his pillow.

“Come sit here, Dulcinea,” Miss Twittingdon commanded, indicating the best chair in the room which, as there were only two chairs in the room, both of them as hard as the bread served in the servants’ hall, was not much of a recommendation. “And don’t cross your legs, even at the ankle. It is a deplorable habit. And pull this brush through your hair. You look as if you’ve been tugged backward through a hedge. And—”

“I thought no woman of breeding began her sentences with ‘and,’ Aunt Leticia,” Caroline interrupted, hating the fuss the woman was making over her. She had no time to think of her ankles, her hair, or even her grammar. She had to rack her brain for a way to rid herself of this London gentleman and not injure her friendship with Peaches, who the good Lord knew probably only meant well.

“A woman of breeding is also never impertinent, Dulcinea,” Miss Twittingdon intoned solemnly, arranging her own skirts neatly after depositing her lean frame in the other chair. “Now hold your chin high—ah, just so—and fold your hands in your lap. It wouldn’t do for anyone to see how you’ve gnawed your nails to the quick. And don’t say a word, my dear. I, as chaperon, will be in charge of this interview. Do you think our London gentleman likes red? I do hope so. I’m considering dyeing my hair to match my turban. His reaction, the opinion of a man of the world, a man who moves in the first circles, will be most helpful, don’t you think?”

“Ferdie says he’s a hangman,” Caroline pointed out, curling her hands together so that her bitten nails were hidden against her palms. “He probably would like you to dye your hair black.”

“Oh, pooh!” Miss Twittingdon said, shaking her head so that the scarlet satin turban slid forward, to hang suspended drunkenly over one eye.

Caroline bit her bottom lip, fearful that if she laughed, her giggles might easily turn to tears.

MORGAN WAS HAVING MORE than a little difficulty believing himself to be where he already knew he was—in the small, stuffy office of the owner of the Woodwere Asylum for Lunatics and Incorrigibles. He was having even more trouble reconciling himself to the fact that he was accompanied by a wizened, foul-mouthed Irishwoman named Peaches—for the love of Christ, Peaches!—who had eaten with her hands when they stopped for nuncheon at a nearby inn, and then strolled outside to the innyard, moved her skirts to one side, spread her feet wide apart, and relieved herself beside the closed coach, like some stray dog lifting its leg against a tree trunk.

“Coo! Not bad for a loony bin, is it, yer worship? Bet ye a bit of this would be like a torchlight procession goin’ down m’throat.”

Morgan, shaken from his reverie by this rude interruption, looked to where Peaches was standing beside a well-supplied drinks table, fondling a lead-crystal container filled with an amber liquid he supposed to be brandy. “You will oblige me by removing your grimy paws from that decanter at once, Miss O’Hanlan.”

Peaches pulled a face at him, but moved away from the drinks table. “No need to put yerself in a pucker, yer worship. And it was just a little nip I was after, don’t you know. That beefsteak at the inn was tough as the divil and left m’gullet dry as a bleached bone.”

Morgan sat very straight, his right calf propped on his left thigh. The woman had been trying his patience all day, but he refused to be baited. “I’m sure there is a pump out in the yard, if you’re in need of liquid refreshment. I believe I can handle things from here without your assistance.”

Peaches swaggered across the room to stand in front of him. “Oh, and is that so, yer high-and-mighty worship? Like I keep tellin’ ye, Caroline won’t give ye the time o’day without me here to vouch fer ye. Not that it’s much of that I’ll be doin’, still not knowin’ what ye’re about and all.” She marginally relaxed her threatening pose. “Is our Caroline really rich? Always thought there was somethin’ special about the wee darlin’. Raised her up m’self, I did—raised her up proper—and fed her outta me own bowl. Wouldna had a whisker of a chance without me, and don’t you know. Now, yer worship, if we could talk a little mite more about that reward?”