Page 24 of Empire of Shadows
Constance slipped out the door of the shipping company office and hurried over to join her.
“You’re on,” she announced, slapping a piece of paper into Ellie’s hand. “Though it was a near thing. They’re sailing momentarily, and they were loath to deal with the paperwork for another passenger. I had to resort to an outright bribe in order to get you on board.”
“A bribe!” Ellie protested. “Connie!”
“It’s the sort of thing one does when one is on an adventure,” Constance neatly replied as she hooked a hand under Ellie’s elbow and dragged her away from the potato cart. “You shall be traveling as Mrs. Nitherscott-Watby, widow.”
“Nitherscott-Watby?” Ellie echoed in disbelief. “Did you make that up off the top of your head?”
“Of course I did,” Constance returned. “What a silly question.”
“Why must I be a widow when I am already a perfectly good spinster?” Ellie demanded.
Constance raised a wry eyebrow at her. “You are hardly some dried up old prune. You are an attractive woman of four-and-twenty. You have only passed as a spinster because you haven’t really tried to do anything scandalous yet beyond suffraging.”
“Suffrage is not a verb,” Ellie retorted.
“What else should I call it?” Constance continued without waiting for a reply. “As a widow, you will be subject to far less scrutiny than an unmarried woman. You will see the sense of it soon enough.”
“Should I invent a few imaginary siblings while I’m at it?” Ellie demanded crossly.
“A wealthy uncle might be handy,” Constance mused as she hauled Ellie toward the looming ships. “You can think about it on the boat. They’ve already sent your valise along.”
Ellie felt a bolt of panic. “What about my parents? I can’t just disappear to the other side of the world without so much as a note.”
“I’ll tell them you’ve gone off to Bournemouth on a holiday,” Constance breezily assured her. “Heaven only knows you were in desperate need of one.”
“Bournemouth?” Ellie’s headache threatened to return.
“Bournemouth is lovely, as you would know if you ever went anywhere besides the library. One more to board!” Constance hollered up at the men on the deck, who were in the process of drawing the chain across the gate for departure.
“Perhaps it’s too late,” Ellie suggested hopefully.
Constance caught Ellie’s shoulders, gripping them with a strength that belied her diminutive size.
“You are standing at the foot of the most important thing you have ever done in your life,” she declared. “Do you really want to turn around and walk away from that?”
Ellie blinked down at her friend. The answer spilled from her lips, as undeniable as it was terrifying.
“No.”
Constance narrowed her eyes with fiery determination. “Then get on the boat, Eleanora.”
Ellie yanked Constance into her arms, pressing a kiss to her cheek.
“Thank you,” she whispered, and then hurried up the gangplank.
She extended her pass to the porter when she reached the top.
“One more to board,” she announced.
“You’re cutting it fine,” the man retorted irritably before undoing the chain and waving Ellie impatiently onto the deck.
The crew raced to haul in lines as the ship gave off a warning whistle. Behind her, the gangplank clattered as a pair of men pulled it up and tucked it away.
Ellie grasped the rail tightly as she looked out over the docks. Constance had hopped up onto a barrel of salted fish and was waving at her enthusiastically. Behind her, a lean figure with night-dark hair broke the sea of busy, moving people on the pier.
It was Jacobs, gazing up at Ellie from beside the open door of a hackney carriage.