House of Bliss Read online

  House of Bliss

  T. T. Thomas

  Copyright © 2019 by T. T. Thomas

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Cover Design: Patty G. Henderson

  Cover Designer Website: https://blvdphotografica.wixsite.com/boulevard

  Created with Vellum

  In memory of Mary Colette Todd,

  13 November 1948-17 April 2018

  Our sister ‘Marybells’ was our beloved family drama queen, and, true to form, she left us wanting more, so much more.

  And for Karyn, always, with my love

  Contents

  Part I

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Part II

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Part III

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Part IV

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  About the Author

  Also by T. T. Thomas

  Acknowledgments

  Part I

  Chapter 1

  London, 31 December 1905

  “Few women in this part of London would be out alone so late at night, and fewer still would dress in a man’s cashmere greatcoat, Black Watch tartan trousers, high Wellington boots and the slouchy, wide-brimmed hat of a highwayman. And yet, there I was, trudging through the eerie, empty, midnight street, my cheeks rosy with Irish whiskey, my mouth a slash of a smile at the memory of the lovely Miss Adelaide VonHansen’s feeble attempts to ignore me.”

  Excerpt from Sabrina Blissdon’s journal Exhibit 1, Evidence File No. 3.

  Sleet came down fast at an angle, cold, sharp and stinging, and it pricked what little of her frozen cheeks remained exposed. From the bridge of her nose below the brim of her hat to the area above the muffler wrapped around her mouth, she felt the devil’s own darts pinging her skin.

  The diffused yellow glow from the few streetlamps gave but scant light as a thick, playful fog darted about the lamps’ glass covers but drifted no lower. Her dulled reflection in a few of the darkened shop windows looked like an amorphous ghost on a preternatural mission as she trudged through uneven mounds of snow swept by man or drafted by nature into the middle of narrow Morrowgate Street. She sidestepped drifts and walked over miniature mountains because the paths on either side of the center were already icy and perilous.

  Putting one booted foot in front of the other, she half-heartedly chastised herself for not accepting the VonHansen family’s invitation to stay the night after the holiday celebration ended. They’d offered her a lovely room, but the familiar comfort of her more intimate abode beckoned.

  Miss VonHansen, the family’s eldest daughter, appeared disappointed. These things happened to Sabrina Blissdon increasingly, of late. To the casual observer, it might seem Adelaide could not care less whether Sabrina remained or departed, but Sabrina knew in her heart that the ever-lovely Miss V. was besotted with her. With a deep sigh of resignation unfettered by either humility or irony, Sabrina trudged onward.

  She had only two more streetlights to go before turning left down the dark path called Phantom Way, little more than a short, dead-end alleyway leading to her modest estate. One could walk thirty paces or so on Phantom before realizing that gates hindered further progress into the only parcel of private property on the alley. Most people were unaware of the respectable three-story residence and green lawns hidden behind all the trees and hedges. A long driveway ran alongside the house and disappeared behind it.

  Across the alley from Sabrina’s home and property, a small public park ran down to a treed bluff above the banks of the Thames, but few people frequented the park save for nearby shop girls during spring or summer lunch breaks. By late afternoon, the diminutive reserve was hers alone to wander should she desire.

  The cool grounds came in handy on hot, listless, late summer afternoons when corset fittings became problematic at House of Bliss, Lingerie Pour Les Femmes, her fledgling but wildly successful business. Undergarments for Women. It captured the delicacy of the product and the clients without being indelicate. Lingerie, another French word that went on to achieve universal usage and understanding.

  As Sabrina reached the end of the alley, large cottony snowflakes began to fall. She pulled a gate key from a deep coat pocket, stepped inside the gate and heard a noise. She squinted into the darkness, willing her vision to isolate the source. She peered into the snow banks opposite but saw nothing. She lowered her gaze, as the sound was most like a whimper one might hear from a small animal. She half expected to see a kitten or a puppy trembling in the snow.

  Seeing nothing, she expelled a foggy breath of relief that her houseman, Walters, had remembered to put on the front step lights. As she reached to turn the lock on the gate, her gaze swept over the snow banks one more time. A smattering of light from her front porch revealed the source of the noise. A woman. Alone. She had stepped out of the shadows on the other side of the alley, trembling and shaking, arms held across her chest as if to hold in what meager warmth her body had. She wore a lightweight coat not quite reaching her ankles, and a solitary shoe. Not a boot, a mere shoe. Sabrina stepped outside her gate again and slowly approached the mysterious specter.

  The woman stood silently, as quiet as the ice on the cold, iron gate, but in the faint glow of the last streetlamp on Morrowgate Terrace, Sabrina saw in the woman’s sagging shoulders an expression of fading hope. She had feverishly bright eyes, raw red lips and crimson cheeks that painted her face in a scarlet sheen of immodesty most associated with…but no, those women do not venture into this neighborhood. It was merely the harsh weather falling on her unprotected skin.

  “Can I help you, Miss?” Sabrina called out.

  Although the thought of her cozy rooms, her reviving brandy and the crackling comfort of a blazing fire beckoned, in good conscience she could not walk away. Between the faint streetlamp and the weak glow from a seven-day old New Moon in an overcast sky, Sabrina saw the weather-ravaged pain around the woman’s eyes. Her gaze locked onto Sabrina’s eyes even as her entire body trembled—and though staring fixedly, her expressionless scrutiny did not beg, yet her entire face pleaded. It was mesmerizing.

  “Please, sir—oh! I beg your pardon, Miss.”

&
nbsp; Hers was a common mistake, and normally it served Sabrina’s privacy and security concerns admirably. When she realized Sabrina was not a man, she fainted forward into Sabrina’s arms. Although she caught her, Sabrina couldn’t hope to carry her through the gate to her house. Lowering her to the ground, she shrugged out of her coat and covered the limp body. She tried to wrap the excess material around the smaller woman, but it was a paltry effort that wouldn’t hold heat long. She placed the empty sleeves across her chest.

  Sabrina ran back to her gate and rang the bell continuously. Once she saw Walters at the door, she hollered for help. Carter Walters was half of the full-time household staff, but everyone, including his wife Cath, called him Walters. He disappeared inside, and then came barreling down the steps in his nightgown, his wife’s cardigan and some hastily pulled on Wellies.

  Sabrina helped lift the young woman off the freezing ground, and Walters carried her into the library. The stranger kept her arms crossed as they placed her on the sofa. Her single shoe made an almost noiseless drop onto the floor. Cath added blankets and massaged the woman’s feet and legs. Her shapely feet, although raw from the cold, were narrow with a high arch. Walters left to heat a bag of pebbles in the kitchen fire so her feet would stay warm once thawed.

  The woman stirred, and Sabrina noticed she had something in her arms. A tightly wrapped bundle positioned snugly in a makeshift sling. Suddenly, the bundle cried.

  Cath looked up, a wild, familiar concern in her eyes, and she lurched forward to pick up the swaddled baby. They wrapped another thick blanket around the infant, and Cath held the child while rocking on the commodious stone hearth of the fireplace. He, or she, stopped crying but continued to whimper.

  “The bairn’s hungry,” she decided aloud. After a few minutes, Cath handed the baby to Sabrina and hurried into the kitchen.

  Glimpsing herself in the large leaning mirror on the opposite side of the room, Sabrina found it odd to see herself holding a baby. She walked around the room and gave the sleeping baby a tour of the premises.

  “Yes, well, we call it the library, but in reality, it’s our study, our morning room and our favorite room, really. We have the fireplace, so it’s cozy of a chilly day or night, but we also have grand windows that let in a wonderful filtered sunlight during the day should there be any. You’ll come to find that sunlight and London have a complicated relationship.”

  Cath returned with a cup of warmed milk and a piece of white cotton fabric. Her eyes crossed when she walked in on Sabrina talking to the baby, but she took the bundle from her mistress and headed toward the fireplace. She dipped the soft cloth into the milk and fed it to the baby who appeared to find it satisfactory.

  Walters returned carrying a salver with a small sterling milk pot, a couple scones wrapped in a linen napkin and placed in a filigree basket Sabrina had never seen, situated next to a Royal Copenhagen Flora Danica butter pat plate of Seville marmalade. And a bone-handled butter knife.

  “In case she wakes up,” he said. And then, “The mother, I mean.”

  “Indeed,” Sabrina raised an eyebrow.

  She was about to say something else when Cath’s response righted the boat tacking wildly close to rough water. “Lovely, Walters, just lovely.”

  Sabrina changed her silent What the hell? to an audible “Excellent.”

  They all stared at the sleeping woman and child, and nodded wordlessly in wariness and wonderment. They then took turns throughout the night sitting up with their guests. They determined they couldn’t allow the child to roll off the mother, and similarly, they didn’t wish the beleaguered woman to turn and roll atop her baby. Beyond that, they hadn’t any clear notion what to do with either of them.

  Sabrina took the first shift, and as she watched the two of them breathe evenly in a peaceful sleep, she decided to have Dr. Wintermere come ‘round first thing in the morning. Then, they’d have them both moved to the largest guest room. They’d have to find something to put the child in—maybe one of those large gift boxes she’d picked up in Piccadilly? But all that could await the morrow.

  The mother had beautiful skin though chafed by the elements. The bone structure of her face was patrician, and she had a classic, straight nose. But her chapped ruby lips and threadbare clothing suggested poverty. The child, though, was tight as a bug in an old but durable woolen blanket.

  She watched as the woman stirred, ready to reach for the baby should the mother turn on her side. But she didn’t. Her long eyelashes rested in perfect stillness upon her skin as if to close off further inquiry. Sabrina reached for her brandy and raised the fat crystal goblet to her lips. She was intrigued and on her way to intoxicated at the sight of the slumbering portrait in repose.

  Walters relieved her a couple hours later and shared the plan to have Cath there when their guests awoke.

  The next morning, although lacking her normal amount of sleep, Sabrina arose early but with uncharacteristic consternation remembering the evening’s events. It had been the lateness of the hour, she reminded herself—otherwise, certainly, she wouldn’t have brought the woman and baby into her home. One didn’t normally do that sort of thing. Any sentient being though—at such an hour in those weather conditions? It was the least she could do.

  Sabrina dressed as she would when seeing clients: a smart, medium brown with powder blue pinstripes Savile Row suit once owned by her father but re-tailored to bring the waistline of the jacket in, let the waistline of the trousers out a smidgen and narrow the lapels in the style of the day. She wore a lightly starched, persimmon linen blouse of her own creation. She chose the circular blue-toned mother-of-pearl cufflinks.

  As she passed the guest room, she peered in and saw that Walters, or someone, had redecorated. A small crib stood alongside the bed with diapers and more small blankets draped over it. She couldn’t imagine that the sturdy piece had been found in her attic or basement, but it looked vaguely familiar. It might have been hers once. She smiled, then frowned. Who on God’s earth had she brought into her home?

  She stopped short when she recognized one of her old dresses hung on the wardrobe opposite the bed in the guest room. It was a pretty piece, a sentimental-level of pretty, and that’s why she didn’t like it. When forced, through both custom and annoying convention, to wear a dress or gown, she preferred a solid color, a simple design, and a subtle, suitable fabric, almost serious but not funereal or morose. Expensive and beautifully made, but devoid of the fleurettes, doilies and odd botanical ephemera they put on ladieswear. It astonished Sabrina what passed for women’s fashion these days. Was she the only one who felt as though she had walked into a life-sized terrarium set piece at the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew every time she saw the latest floral print entering a room on the body of an otherwise svelte and sophisticated woman? How many pansies, petunias and peonies could one woman wear!

  Even couture hadn’t let go of the past but hadn’t embraced the future either. In truth, women shouldn’t be wearing the type of corsetry fashion forced her to design and make, either. She’d tried to wean her clients off the breath-defying designs of disciplined discomfort. And she abhorred the prevailing trend and utter folly of cinching one’s waist from the age of three or four to train the waist. Mostly, the clients ignored her exhortations: The young mothers were doing it to themselves and their young children because their mothers did it to them. She could not radically change her corsets, and corset-based designs of the bustiere, torsolette and cincher until the dress designers changed outerwear fashion. So frustrating. One couldn’t say as much aloud, but still…

  She wandered down the long hallway, her hand in her trouser pocket. The suit jacket was perfect to ward off the morning chill although her face felt hot. She was about to step off the top landing when she heard an unfamiliar voice asking Cath if she would mind bringing another pot of tea to the library. And then Cath, humming her way to the kitchen, walked past the bottom of the stairs carrying a gurgling baby on her hip. Sabrina heard Walters som
ewhere whistling a bouncy ditty.

  The glare through windows meant the sun was out. The snow and ice would be melting. Excellent. They’d get this woman and her child sorted out to the nearest women’s society or relief house should she prove to have no family. And how could she have? So, by day’s end today—or latest tomorrow—all would be back to normal.

  As she stepped off the stairs and rounded the handrail to enter the library, she saw her houseguest at the library table poring over several books. The woman looked up. Sabrina thought she’d explain why she was looking at Mr. Blissdon’s case law books, but the woman’s left shoulder rose then dipped in a small shrug, and she smiled.

  “Oh hello,” she said. “Thank you for last night. I mean, for taking me in. I, right. Well, I—I wanted to look up some legal information.” She fluttered her right hand over the books. “Should have known it was far too dense to make sense of,” she added, staring down at a page.

  Right. And who doesn’t look up case law in a stranger’s library before breakfast? Motionless, Sabrina stared at her from the doorway. She wanted to move inside the room but couldn’t. She was taken aback by her guest’s stunning good looks, more evident now, after a night’s sleep and some food.