Society's Secret

Chapter One

    England, 1815

     "Beatrice!" Abigail shouted out the window with desperation. She had been trying all morning to get the young girl to sit still but it was no use. Struggling with the washing, Abigail called out once more. "Beatrice!" 

     "Alright, dear Aunt.  There's no need to shout," Beatrice teased as she dropped her satchel into a chair and hung up her coat. 

     Abigail sighed as she viewed a couple of leaves and twigs sticking out of the twenty-one-year-old's golden mane of curls. "Child, do you see these wrinkles? This one is from that time I caught you swimming in the river. This one," she said, pointing to a line that creased her brow, "is from that dreadful Christmas I found you on the roof...and..." She paused, stopping to think.

     Beatrice bent down and kissed her beloved Aunt's forehead. "And this one, Aunt Abigail," she started in her sweetest voice "is from that time you realized you loved me so, and forgave me all my faults."

     Abigail looked up at her and smiled reluctantly. "If you're so wise, why don't you help me with the washing," she teased. Together, the two ladies gathered up the wet clothing and linens and brought them outside to dry. "All I'm saying," Abigail began as she bent down to fetch the next damp garment, "is that you scare me half to death when you disappear like that." 

     "I'm sorry," Beatrice said, genuinely. She popped her head over the clothesline and looked down at Abigail. She didn't quite remember the day that she began to tower over her small-statured Aunt, but Abigail told her she had grown up "faster than a weed in springtime." She looked at Abigail and tried to see if any of her aunt's features were reflected in her own. 

     Aside from their differences in height, Abigail had light brown hair and dazzling blue eyes, while Beatrice's unruly curls remained flaxen-colored and her eyes green. Perhaps she looked more like her father, though it would be a cold day in hell before Aunt Abigail admitted as much. 

     When she was a child, Abigail would tuck her in with stories of her late mother and the adventures they'd had as girls. Picnicking amongst the heather in the fields of Willoughby hall, making dresses for their dolls out of flower petals. Beatrice cherished these stories as if they were rubies, and could recite them all by heart. 

     One day, however, when she was seven, she'd mustered up the gall to ask Abigail about her father. "Don't I have a Papa, Auntie?" She'd asked. "The other girls in the village have Papas. Did mine have a large mustache like Betty Trumbill's?"

     Abigail's usually calm demeanor shifted, and she pulled her lips into a taut line. "Yes dear, you do indeed have a Papa. But just like your mother, he is gone from our lives and this world. And that is all you shall ever need to know." Beatrice knew better than to press her aunt. Despite being the most caring person she'd ever known, Beatrice was well aware that the sweet-tempered Abigail possessed a temper that would scare a feral tomcat. 

     "Beatrice, did you hear what I said?" Beatrice was snapped out of her stupor by her aunt's question. She shook her head bashfully. 

    "No, I'm sorry." Abigail put her hands on her hips.

     "Always in a fog, you are. I asked you where you go off to half the time?" Beatrice gulped. Despite her aunt's wishes to stay away from the Willoughby Manor house, she found herself so fascinated by the two elderly people that called it home. Perhaps it was because they were so wealthy, but Beatrice felt that wasn't fully the reason, somehow. She and her aunt lived in a humble cottage on the Willoughby's property, and they had always seemed comfortable. 

     Observing their ins and outs for so many years felt like discovering little pieces of a puzzle, all formulating some picture she couldn't see. Today, the manor house was all aflutter with some kind of excitement. She watched as the cook went out to inspect deliveries and the servants hung out all the bedclothes. Something was afoot, perhaps a grand party!