Page 49 of Fortune Favors the Frivolous
With a great sigh, she contemplated the worst that could happen. As a child, it had been a night locked in a dark, musty cupboard for a rude or sullen response.
Now it was marriage to Windermere.
There was only one way to find out what he and her aunt knew.
Venetia rose slowly, forcing courage into her veins. Her aunt was sleeping, having gone straight to bed after the ball. It was perhaps the best time to begin her search.
Caroline had risked her life to prevent Venetia from the very fate which Venetia was now sleepwalking towards… unless Venetia forced steel into her backbone.
Picking up the candlestick from the dresser, she did not even stop to change her clothes. For that might give her time to change her mind.
If she could not do this to save herself, then she needed to do it to prove her gratitude to Caroline for all her dear friend had done.
The corridor outside her bedchamber was silent and dark. Venetia held her breath as she eased her door closed, wincing at the slight creak of the hinges. Her candle cast eerie shadows on the wall as she made her way towards her aunt’s study—hopefully the more likely place to begin her search than her aunt’s bedchamber.
Her slippers made no sound on the carpet as she approached the study door. It was locked, of course, but Venetia had been prepared for this. From her pocket, she withdrew a hairpin bent into the crude shape of a lock pick, a skill learned long ago from an unlikely quarter: one of her school friends from the Ladies Seminary.
Those had been among the happiest years of her life, she reflected, thinking back to her first season when she and the Misses P had attended the London round of balls and recitals in search of a husband. After her parents’ early deaths, she’d experienced only a few months of her aunt’s coldness before being sent off to school.
What a fool she’d been to imagine her aunt would be any kinder when she was an adult.
After several tense minutes, during which Venetia was certain the thundering of her heart would wake the entire household, the lock finally yielded with a soft click. She slipped inside, closing the door quietly behind her.
The study was illuminated only by faint moonlight filtering through the curtains and the weak glow of her candle. Aunt Pike’s massive mahogany desk dominated the room, its polished surface gleaming in the dim light. Venetia approached it with trepidation, setting her candle down carefully.
The drawers were locked as well, but Venetia was determined now. One by one, she worked through them with her improvised lock pick until she reached the bottom right drawer—the only one that resisted her efforts. This had to be where the most sensitive documents were kept.
It took longer than the others, but finally, the lock surrendered. Inside was a small wooden box, ornately carved with a pattern of intertwined roses. Venetia’s hands trembled as she lifted it out and placed it on the desk.
The box itself was locked with a tiny brass padlock and she worked at it feverishly. Her aunt was asleep, but with Aunt Pike, one could never be too careful.
At last, the padlock sprang open, and Venetia raised the lid with bated breath.
Letters.
Well, at least she’d found correspondence. It was a start, but it did not mean she’d find what her aunt had taunted her with: letters from her father.
Carefully, she withdrew a stack of letters and began to rifle through them. Correspondence with female friends, accounts of visits to the country. The dates began more than thirty years previously when her aunt had been a young woman. Nothing mentioned a man. Nothing from a man.
Until—
Venetia gasped, and her heart rate increased.
Nothing from any man other than her father, for she certainly recognized his handwriting with its distinctive slanted style. The last letter he’d ever written to Venetia when he knew he was dying was something she treasured and gazed upon often.
Now, here was his handwriting—in fact, a bundle of letters in his handwriting—amidst a pile of faded letters tied with pink ribbon.
With trembling fingers, she untied the bow and began to read the first letter.
“My dearest Eliza,” it began. Venetia’s breath caught—Eliza was her aunt’s Christian name. “Not a day passes when I do not think of you and the moments we have shared…”
With a great sob, Venetia dropped the pile of letters onto the desk, swinging round to cover her eyes, and inadvertently sweeping a paperweight to the floor.
The noise reverberated through the house, but Venetia could not leave what she had begun. She had to read that letter.
“My Dearest Eliza—” she read once again, tears welling in her eyes as she continued.
It didn’t get any better. The letter continued in the same vein, full of passionate declarations and plans for the future. Dull misery churned in her breast. This was exactly what both Windermere and her aunt had claimed—proof that her father had loved Aunt Pike first. She hastily moved to the next letter, and the next, each one confirming the love affair that had preceded her parents’ marriage.
