With This Curse: A Novel of Victorian Romantic Suspense Read Online Free Page A

opinions about a stranger’s ensemble.”
    “Oh, but you’re not a stranger,” said my friend Martha, whose eyes had gone as round as an owl’s. “You’re Sybil Ingram! I saw you in The Prodigal’s Return. You were wonderful!”
    Miss Ingram beamed at her, gratified at being recognized. “You’re too kind,” she said, in a tone of voice that indicated that it was her due. Though scarcely twenty, she was already firmly established as one of the most popular actresses in London. “I must admit I was fond of that particular role. But my gowns were sadly out of tune with the character. You, girl”—this was to me—“what would you say to coming to supper with me and giving me your thoughts on my gowns for the new tour? You seem to have a good head on your shoulders, a tumbled one though it be.”
    My hand went self-consciously to my curly hair, which I still had not learned to subdue. Later, when I had left the factory to work solely for Miss Ingram, she would show me how to tame it. “I’d be delighted, ma’am,” I said. And thus our association began.
    Becoming Sybil Ingram’s modiste was the best thing to happen to me since my ignominious departure from Gravesend. It was exciting to be intimately involved in the life of the theater, to move among actors, who were, many of them, as entertaining off the stage as they were on it—but they could also, as I saw very quickly, put an unattached female in a compromising position. Partly for that reason, Sybil Ingram helped me construct the persona of Widow Graves, advising me on posture and vocal inflections to most effectively present a dampening effect on masculine ardor. “And I quite agree that you need some such armor,” she said cheerfully.
    “It isn’t as if I were a young woman still,” I had said.
    “You look younger than you are, though. That tiny waist takes years off your age.” She could say this without rancor, as her own waist was every bit as slender. Hers was the product of self-denial and tight lacing, mine of a life that had not permitted ample meals.
    Now her voice brought me back to the present. “You’re being quite mysterious about your gentleman visitor,” she said as she settled the wig in place over her hair. “Did he wish to whisk you out of this sordid world of play-acting and into the rarefied sphere of his titled existence?”
    This quip was so disconcertingly close to the truth that my clothes brush halted for a moment. What spirit possessed her to be so roguish today? Now that I took a closer look, I saw that her color was high—even apart from the rouge—and her eyes unusually bright. “Is something the matter, Miss Ingram?”
    She gave a laugh that confirmed my suspicion. Some secret was energizing her, and now she sprang to her feet and darted over to grasp my hands, regardless of the clothes brush. “Graves,” she exclaimed, “I’m to be married.”
    I stared at her. Never in the ten years that I had known her had Sybil Ingram breathed any intention of giving up the life of the theater for marriage. “Married?” I stammered. “To whom?” If only it were another actor, or someone well established in the theater world, perhaps she would not be abandoning us. But her next words shattered that possibility.
    “To Alcott Lammle. You remember, from when we played last year in New York?”
    Remember I most certainly did. Mr. Lammle, a prominent American hotelier, was among the most prosperous of the suitors Miss Ingram had collected during the tour, hosting lavish dinners in her honor and showering her with expensive gifts. “Will you be settling here in London?” I asked faintly. Perhaps her new husband would be expanding his business interests into England, and Sybil Ingram’s vassals would not be disbanded after all.
    This faint hope, however, was soon obliterated. “No, Graves, you don’t understand,” she cried, pulling me to my feet to lead me into an improvised waltz. “I’m leaving the theater. No