The Ringmaster's Wife (4 page)

“Admit it,” Dulcey said. “You only get your box out when you dream. I couldn't begin to guess how many catalog clippings of Steinway pianos are buried in there.”

“Shhh!” Armilda leaned forward. “Papa's probably already up and Momma's heating water for coffee, but I'd like a few moments of peace before we have to head for the shoe factory.”

“Uh-uh. Not until you admit the truth.” Dulcey crossed her arms over her chest.

“Fine.” Armilda kicked out, connecting a light tap to her sister's shin. “But we're all allowed our secret dreams. I was merely visiting mine again. You shouldn't tease me for it.”

“But we have to work today. How can you focus on your job if your mind is always flitting about in that cigar box? You're so distracted, it's a wonder you don't make shoes for a person who has two left feet.”

“Oh, Dulce. I don't want to spend the rest of my life thinking about shoes—not when there's so much more out there.”

“Maybe. Here there's nothing but sleepy cows and dew-covered fields as far as the eye can see.” Dulcey gestured to the span of misty fields. “And when the factory moves to Chicago next year, you won't even have shoes to think about! Which is why you need to see this.”

Dulcey leaned forward with a loud creak of her rocker and extended a folded newspaper clipping to her sister. “It's from the
Chicago Daily Tribune
.”

Armilda opened it and glanced at the headline:
WORLD
'
S FAIR COLUMBIAN EXPOSITION: GROUNDBREAKING CEREMONY TO TAKE PLACE OCTOBER
21.

“So?”

“Just read it,” Dulcey said.

Armilda scanned the article. Though the fair wouldn't open for another seven months after that, plans for the grand spectacle were well under way. The city of Chicago would show that it could rise from the ashes of the great fire that had felled it in 1871. And the 400th anniversary of Columbus's first landing on the continent would be celebrated the world over, with a grand showcase of technology, science, industry, and culture from forty-six different nations.

In short, it sounded amazing.

Amazing, but miles away from Moons. And a lifetime away from where she'd ever be.

“Did you read about the electricity exhibit? And there's actually a moving walkway. A
travellator
, it says. It will carry a person down to the pier without lifting a foot.” Dulcey laughed. “How do you like that? With moving walkways, shoes might become a thing of the past.”

“We've read exciting news stories before. Why is this one any different?”

“Think about it. It's the
World's Fair
, Mim. As close as it's ever
going to be to us. It's coming to Chicago along with millions of people from all over the globe. You've always wanted to see the world. Well, it looks like the world is coming to see you.”

Fashion. Art. Music. All the things she loved.

“How about that
zoopraxiscope
thing—a giant picture on the wall that moves like a photograph's come to life! Wouldn't you love to see that? And Sissieretta Jones is going to sing! Can you imagine?”

“Sounds wonderful,” Armilda said, handing the clipping back. “Maybe you should go.”

“Be serious.” Dulcey shook her head at the folded clipping. “
You
should go, Armilda. I'm not joking. Go to Chicago. The shoe factory is moving there and you're guaranteed a job in it. And then who knows? Maybe you can go on to New York after that. Or some-place even more exciting. What else do you have in that box of yours? Maybe you could find a way onto a ship sailing for Europe.”

Armilda smiled, thinking of the articles she had collected from all over, catalog drawings and fashion photos she'd clipped and saved—not even knowing why.

Venice,
she thought, her heart leaping in her chest just a little bit.
Venice is in there, along with Paris. London. New York . . .

Everywhere is waiting for me.

Dulcey wasn't finished. “You've read every book our teacher has that mentions anything about art or travel in it. And your eyes are always fixed on a point past the fields. You're special, Mim.”

“But I couldn't leave, could I?” Armilda whispered, chewing on her bottom lip as the idea began to sink in deeper. “What would that do to Momma and Papa? And where would that leave all of you?”

“Where will we be?” Dulcey stood. “Right here, dear sister. Waiting for letters to hear about your grand adventures, I expect.” She shrugged. “I like my life here. I know I'll be happy. But you?” She rested a hand on Armilda's shoulder. “The world is calling you,
Mim. And you should meet it head-on. You can be anyone you want to be.”

Armilda took her sister's hand in her own and pecked a kiss to her palm. Dulcey was right. If she was ever going to turn her cigar-box dream into reality, reinvent Armilda Burton the farm girl from Moons, Ohio, this was her opportunity.

She leaned back in the rocker once more, the old chair showing its age with loud creaking again.
Anyone you want to be . . .

She thought of a name she'd once read in C. M. Yonge's
The Heir of Redclyffe
—a novel in which an Irish character had the name that meant “lovable” and “dear.” It was a name with star power, in her mind. With so much more unbridled strength than the provincial “Armilda” could possess. A name that should be owned by one who played Steinway pianos. And visited tearooms. Who wasn't afraid to be brave. Because that's what she'd need—the courage to walk away from everything she'd always known and step out with hopes for a reimagined life.

“I'll be Mable Burton,” she whispered, the words floating out on the breeze.

Birds chirped in the loft of trees overhead, mingling with her voice. Echoing their song with her words. Her dreams. The possibilities that extended far beyond the farmhouse, beyond the sunrise over the fields.

She closed her eyes and rocked back, cradling the cigar box in her lap.

“Mable—the girl who will never be afraid to really
live
.”

1926

N
ORTH
Y
ORKSHIRE
, E
NGLAND

It was one heck of a first impression.

Colin had to admit that.

To arrive three hours late for a business meeting would have been insulting enough to the English. But judging by the butler's scowl, Colin suspected it was slightly worse to arrive at a manor in a state of disrepair, bearing no dinner invitation, on the night of a grand house party. It seemed quite enough to have been deemed utterly disastrous by the standards of the English aristocracy.

Fortunately the butler's sense of propriety also meant he couldn't leave anyone on the front step in the rain, no matter their breach of decorum. So he and Ward had been shown into the grand entry hall—for the moment at least—to await a proper announcement to the lord and lady of the manor. And with the gale building outside, it seemed a real possibility they might have to stay through the entirety of a white-tie, full five-course dinner.

Colin pictured the butler's abject horror with a suppressed smile.

The stone and wood-paneled entry of Easling Park glowed in subtle lamplight from iron-scroll wall sconces illuminating a towering wood and stylized stucco ceiling. The varying orange-yellow
light of a fire danced out from a marble-faced hearth on the back wall. A gust of autumn wind drove the rain against the leaded glass panes of floor-to-ceiling windows.

Colin glanced up at the tinkling crystal chandelier above their heads, altogether relieved to be out of the storm. Putting on airs with the English upper crust he could manage. Spending a night in Linton with nothing to show for the cost and time involved he could not.

He ran his hands down the sleeves of his coal-black suit coat, shedding it of stubborn raindrops that had collected on the wool. Ward did the same with his, and when the butler left them made a feeble attempt at slicking his hair back without the aid of a comb.

“This isn't at all how it's done.” He bent at an awkward angle, trying to find his reflection in a polished gold vase perched on a mahogany table nearby.

“Isn't how what's done, exactly?” Colin inquired.

“Being presented at a wealthy heiress's home, that's what.” He blew out a frustrated breath. “Classic. The wind decided to wreak havoc with every effort I made.”

Colin watched in amusement as Ward continued the frenzied dance.

“Something tells me it wouldn't have mattered anyway. I'm not sure working-class Americans—and circus hands at that—are high on their list of honored guests.”

“Say what you want, but I heard talk from the village boys that this guy's got a daughter. An unmarried one.” Ward surveyed the room, whistling low. “On top of this massive pile of bricks and estate grounds. Can you imagine the luck?”

“Bricks we've seen before,” Colin reminded him, and slid his hands in his pockets with a light shrug.

“The Ringlings may live high on the hog, but not like this,” Ward countered. “And certainly not with the offer of a package deal.”

“Who said they're offering anything to you?”

“It's the fact that they
could
offer something, if we make a good impression. She's free to fall in love with anyone she likes, isn't she?”

Maybe Colin should have told Ward the truth, that to arrive at this very manor was the reason they'd come this far north in the first place. And she—the girl who'd called herself Rose—was the reason why.

The instant he recognized the earl's daughter in the water, Colin should have been out with it. She was dressed differently than she'd been at the Linton trick-riding competition, but there was no mistaking what he'd seen. Those green eyes had been burned in his memory. And the mare she'd ridden? Only Lord Denton boasted horseflesh like that.

There wasn't another estate in all of the North Country that could lay claim to either beauty. And falling in love with “anyone she liked” wasn't in the cards for her, of that much he was certain. The man would have to boast something far more impressive than the whole of Easling Park's estate. A cot in the corner of a circus work tent wasn't likely to be attractive to these people.

Ward was busy straightening his collar. Checking his teeth in the vase. No doubt plotting the very real possibility of a future in Yorkshire, all the while unaware that he'd already met the very lady he was hoping to impress.

He smoothed his waistcoat and added one last impassioned tug at his collar. “Well? How do I look?”

Colin cocked an eyebrow.

“I know.” Ward shrugged. “But your shirt is too big on me. How's everything else?”

“Listen, Ward. About the girl—”

“Shh, shh. He's coming back.”

The butler reappeared, his disapproval barely hidden below the
surface. It managed to leak out, however, in his pin-straight stance and the stern glare he sent in their direction.

“Lord and Lady Denton will receive you now,” he announced, extending an arm toward a long hall lined with a red filigree runner on the floor and an abundance of oil paintings bedecking the walls. “This way.”

Ward nearly tripped jumping into line behind the butler, a bit too eager in his haste to get to his future. Colin, however, hung back. He squared his shoulders and, with one final indrawn breath, set his jaw for the battle he knew was coming.

Lead weighted Rosamund's shoes with each step to the drawing room door.

By the time she arrived back from Linton and ducked through the servants' entrance, an exquisite jade-and-gold beaded gown had already been laid out in her chamber. It boasted a silk-banded drop waist fashioned by Poiret, a noted Parisian designer whom her mother had commissioned just weeks before. The gown was paired with Rosamund's finest beaded heels, a geometric-shaped trinket on a long black and gleaming gold chain, and evening gloves that added a soft pearl shimmer up the length of her arms. The final touch was a diamond-encrusted headband that grazed the chignon of finger waves her maid gathered at her nape.

The lavish ensemble foretold what awaited her—either a crowd of the most eligible bachelors her mother could summon at a single dinner party, or one carefully selected gentleman whose attentions she should properly win.

Either way Rosamund had been primped for a purpose.

The butler presented Lady Rosamund Easling and she stepped in, quite prepared to offer a cordial greeting her mother would approve of. At least that was her plan, until two gentlemen—whom she never expected to see again—appeared among the sea of faces.

Any words Rosamund might have rehearsed in her mind died on her tongue.

The two men who'd rescued her that day now stood by the hearth, observing her presentation from the back of the room. Mr. Butler owned a completely bemused look, obviously having had no clue she was the earl's daughter. Mr. Keary, however, boasted an air of reserved nonchalance. If he was surprised to see her, he covered it well.

Rosamund reminded herself to keep calm. To cross the room and not stumble. To keep her face serene, and certainly not let shock rise to the surface in a flustered blush.

Breathe in. Breathe out . . .

“Ah. And here she is. Our daughter, Lady Rosamund,” the countess, Lady Denton, exclaimed in a sugar-coated welcome. She rose from her seat on the edge of the room's central settee.

Reaching Rosamund's side, she latched onto her gloved hand in a vise grip that suggested they'd be having more than a light after-dinner conversation about her whereabouts that day. And if the fear of an impending reprimand weren't punishment enough, Rosamund would now have to navigate the evening with the two Americans in the same room, and under her mother's already speculative eye.