Page 56 of Razors & Ruin
Home.I never had one nor sought one out. I am a man who was never anywhere willingly; I was always held captive, beset by deceit and misunderstanding.
Never before did I have a person like my treacle who understands me yet doesn’t use my nature to break me apart. She loves me too deeply and with an agonizing honesty that humbles whatever is left of my soul.
How arrogant I was to try and save the broken pieces for Johanna when Nellie holds them to her, sharp edges and all, and lets them cut her.
The ghosts of Veronica and my infant daughter no longer loom in my mind; already, they are coming apart like smoke. I cannot picture Veronica’s face now as anything but a frozen mask of pain; her smile is lost to me.
Johanna, too, that child of mine that I now remember I never even held in my arms. I don’t rememberwhynot, but the imageis there of her mother clutching her tight, beseeching me to leave them be.
How could I have forgotten that? What else lurks, too deep for me to dredge it up?
So much for my squandered past. My future is right here before me, resplendent in her success, splendid in her horrible acumen.
I swore I’d make an honest woman of her, but in truth, I could not make her any more loyal. The moon herself is not as committed to the tides as my Nellie is to her Mr. T.
Despite the thorns in my head when I think of Johanna’s name, I’m flush with relief, drifting out to sea and ready to drown.
I shake my head and return to the room as a man tugs my sleeve.
“Dash it all, wake up!” he says. “We’d like some more potatoes if you can spare a moment.”
Nellie looks tired but happy as the last customers bid her goodbye.
I close the door and lock up gratefully, glad of some peace at last, and I smile as Nellie heaves the groaning cash box onto the counter.
“This isn’t even all of it,” she says. “There are six bags under here.Six. Mostly coins, of course, but would you bloody credit it?”
“The credit is allyours, girl.” I stack plates on my arm. “But you’re going to need to hire a brat or two for this serving malarky. My constitution isn’t suited to the job.”
“You don’t say?” she chides. “You’ve had a face like a slapped arse all night. It was hilarious. You didn’t enjoy any of it?”
I thrust my hands into my pockets and adopt a mock sheepishness. “I can’t promise that I didn’t spit on anything.”
She glares at me. “Now. That is the kind of fuckery thatwillget us in trouble. Can’t have someone whining to The Beadle and getting him to come poking around.”
“I didn’t hock up in anyone’s dinner, I promise. Doesn’t mean I didn’t want to.”
“Good.” She points at the counter. “Be a lamb and get the rest up on the side. Those bags weigh a ton, and I’ve done myself in carrying all those bastard trays.”
I do as she asks and lift the cash bags onto the worktop. Beneath them, I see the newspaper I pinched from the boy outside.
It’s only a pamphlet, really, a few pages at the most, but the headline is like a sucker punch.
LORD WETHERBY SUICIDE! LONDON SOCIETY ROCKED!
“Jesus cunting fuck!” I cry. Nellie jumps at my fury, knocking over crockery as she darts behind a chair.
“What?” she says. “Calm down, dammit!”
“Calm down?” I brandish the paper at her. “He’s dead. Wetherby. Killed himself.”
“You have to be fucking joking.” Nellie emerges gingerly and approaches me as I scan the page, staying safely on the other side of the counter. “What does it say?”
“Lord Francis Wetherby was found hanged in his greenhouse today following the gruesome murder of his wife Beatrix only last night at the Regent’s Ball,” I read.
“Acquaintances believe Wetherby, a prominent member of the gentry, was involved in an unsavory business that may have brought about the death of Lady Wetherby.
Beadle Higgins, an old family friend, vociferously refuted these rumors and said he was deeply saddened by the news. He has pledged guardianship of the Wetherby’s son, Julian. We are told Beadle Higgins will duly be granted trusteeship of the Wetherby fortune and estate, as dictated by Wetherby in a legal codicil he drew up before he took his life.”