Chapter Text
If you have ever heard the saying, “You never get a second chance to make a first impression,” you may well have wished to bludgeon the speaker to death.
This is nothing to be ashamed of, naturally. We all of us on this planet have been tempted, from time to time, to express our displeasure with blunt instruments. As long as we simply restrain ourselves from actually reaching for the fireplace poker or frying pan, we need feel not even a twinge of guilt.
(Though there are those who hold, in such cases, that it is better to ask forgiveness than permission.)
Still, while spouting tired aphorisms is an excellent way to get messily murdered in a thousand imaginations, there is often truth to the wisdom of our most hated ancestors. And one would be hard-pressed to deny that first impressions can color an acquaintance for months or years to come.
Which was why, one March morning in 1903, one Charlotte Gordon rose early and chose her costume for the day with particular care. A neat suit of navy wool, modestly ornamented with cream braid in an almost nautical manner, emerged from her clothes-press to lie on the bed as she washed up at the sink in her little boarding-house room. Three times she attempted to fix her deep red curls into a satisfactory arrangement, pulling out pins in frustration only to shove them in again at different angles with increasing force. After holding up first this pair of earrings, and then that, she flung all four back into their boxes and fastened only a simple cameo at her throat. Equal care went into the choice of perfume, and whether or not to dust on powder- yes, she decided, a fine English lady would certainly expect it –and by the time she stood before the mirror in her full raiment, it was with the air of a general prepared for battle.
“She’s not English, though,” Charlotte said aloud to her reflection. “She was born here. I’ve probably met her and not even known it.”
This mantra had carried her through a week of mounting excitement and concern. And now the long-,awaited, dreaded day had arrived. At the very least, she thought as she descended the stairs and was helped into the motorcar waiting by the curb, she would not go unprepared.
Not until the door of the train car slid open barely a second after the engine chuffed to a halt and a figure in yellow dashed out at the top advisable speed for one wearing a long skirt and heeled boots, did she wonder if she’d overthought things a bit.
Indeed, her first impression of Lady Edith Sharpe was of a petite young woman clasping her escort's hands with a look of utter joy that lit up her face like a bonfire.
“Alan!” Lady Sharpe cried. “You’re here!”
That brought a chuckle, and the squeezing of those small, black-gloved hands in turn. “Where else would I be? I said I’d meet you at the station; am I not a man of my word?”
“Usually,” she said, drawing back and picking up the valise she’d dropped in her excitement, “but people have been known to change.”
“Edith.” For all his years and education, he sounded more like a schoolboy in that moment than a promising young doctor. He took Charlotte’s hand and guided her forward a few steps. When Lady Sharpe looked up from fussing with what appeared to be a broken clasp, the women’s eyes finally met.
Hers were warm, and brown, and quite kind. Something in Charlotte properly settled, for the first time in days.
“May I introduce you to Miss Charlotte Gordon,” Alan said, in a tone so proud Charlotte felt her heart swell. “My fiancée.”
There was a moment of silence. Then- the face beneath that fine veil of black net broke into a beaming smile.
“You- why didn’t you write? Why didn’t you say something?” Lady Sharpe breathed. A little laugh escaped her, sounding almost unconscious. She looked from Alan to Charlotte and back again, several times in succession. Finally, she clasped Charlotte’s hand firmly, her fingers warm in their kid-leather gloves.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Miss Gordon. Truly. I wish I could say I’d heard so much about you-” this with a rather sharp glance at Alan “-but still, better late than never.”
“The pleasure is all mine, Lady Sharpe,” Charlotte replied. Now it was her turn to level a Look in Alan’s direction. “I’m afraid he wanted to surprise you, and I’ve never been very good at saying no to him. Especially not when he mopes like a dog denied a bone.”
The target of their ire merely shrugged, without so much as a shadow of guilt in his grin. “I know how much you love surprises, Edith.” he said sweetly.
Charlotte dimly noticed two tall, dark figures alighting from the train where it stood belching out both steam and weary travelers. One- a man, by the trousers that became evident when he moved –strode off towards a knot of loitering porters. The other, clearly female, glanced around until she spotted the trio and began wandering in their direction. Vague descriptions of a husband and sister-in-law echoed in her mind, though Alan had seemed reluctant to discuss either.
The rather forbidding expression on the woman’s face as she approached made it somewhat apparent why.
“…whatever ancient stories he’s dug up,” Lady Sharpe was saying when she pulled herself back to earth. “And it’s Edith, if you please. My sister-in-law is also Lady Sharpe, and things get awfully muddled if we’re both standing on ceremony.”
Charlotte smiled. “Then I must insist on Charlotte. Turnabout is fair play, as they say.”
Edith nodded her assent just as the other stranger drew level with her elbow. Without looking back, she said, “Speak of the devil. Charlotte, this is Lady Lucille Sharpe, my husband’s sister. Lucille, Miss Charlotte Gordon, Alan’s fiancée.”
Lady Sharpe- Lady Lucille? –arranged her lips into something like a smile. It did not reach her large, slightly glassy green eyes. “Delighted, Miss Gordon. And my best wishes on the occasion of your engagement.”
“Lucille.” Alan’s voice sounded tight as a drum. Charlotte glanced at him, alarmed, and saw that his lips had pressed into a tight, narrow line.
“Alan,” came the utterly toneless response.
The cool air hung heavy with unspoken words. Someone, Charlotte decided, owed her an explanation when they were alone. For the moment, though, she simply fell back on, “Pleased to meet you, Lady Sharpe.”
(No invitation to use Christian names was forthcoming. As she took in the lady’s perfect posture and tight, old-fashioned black dress, she expected it less and less. Lucille Sharpe had a certain striking beauty in her slender build and chiseled features, but it was the beauty of an iceberg. Or a statue, or a diamond. Something to be admired, but seldom touched.)
Still, the look she turned on Edith had something the tiniest bit soft in it. Another question to be filed away for later.
“Thomas has gone to fetch the luggage,” she said. “He should be here in a moment.”
Edith opened her mouth to speak- and several things happened at once.
The man Charlotte had noticed earlier- tall, she now realized, with blue eyes and a sharp face that marked him as Lady Lucille’s brother –bustled over accompanied by a red-jacketed porter pushing a handcart. The three large trunks balanced on said handcart began to tip forward alarmingly, causing Sir Sharpe (was that the correct form of address?) to dive for them. A little boy in a blue sailor suit darted past and trod on Charlotte’s hem, making her stumble and struggle to stay upright.
And Alan, as he solicitously caught her arm and steadied her, squinted at Edith and asked, “What on earth has happened to your hair?”
With a groan, Edith pinched the bridge of her nose. “Oh, dash it all. I was hoping- darling, mind your foot! –hoping you wouldn’t notice until later.”
As the motley band collected their traps and made for the waiting auto, Charlotte tried to shake the feeling of being struck by an omnibus. If Alan’s best friend always brought this sort of chaos in her wake, his childhood stories suddenly made far more sense.
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“I had an accident with a candle.”
After ten minutes of puttering along and some polite conversation regarding the weather and everyone’s health, the non sequitur completely baffled Charlotte. Alan, too, seemed confused when she snuck a glance at him sidelong.
“Um. I beg your pardon?”
“I had an accident with a candle,” Edith repeated. She appeared, when Charlotte dared a peek into the rear seat, to be brushing some dust off her skirt. At Alan’s bemused expression, she raised her eyebrows.
“My hair? You asked, and that’s the answer.” Apparently satisfied, she sat back and peered at the buildings passing by.
Alan blinked several times in succession, and Charlotte couldn’t blame him. Clandestine examination of Edith as they left the station had explained his question, at least- her hat, a small black-and-gold confection, rested atop a soft halo of very short blonde waves. Not shocking, as such, but…certainly rather outré.
And difficult to put down to all but the most comically specific of household accidents.
“Was it an especially large candle, Edith?” he asked, sounding rather tired. Tales of cookies stolen from trays and abandoned houses that simply had to be explored drifted to the forefront of Charlotte’s thoughts.
The lady in question took a deep breath through her nose. “No, Alan,” she said with brittle patience. “It was an ordinary candle and an unusual circumstance, and I don’t care to discuss the incident further.”
“She set herself on fire.”
“Lucille!”
Charlotte fought the urge to twist entirely around in her seat. The mysterious and forbidding Lady Sharpe- already a title applied to Lucille alone in her mind –had spoken unprompted? The mere fact of it was almost more shocking than her words.
Edith huffed and glared at her sister-in-law. “I did not set myself on fire. Some of my hair got burned, that’s all.”
“A part of you was definitely on fire,” Lucille countered serenely. “It can’t be denied.”
As they reached a calm street adjoining a park, Alan dared a glance over his shoulder. “You have a very generous definition of ‘some.’ “
“I…might have tried to even things out-” Here her voice trailed away to muttering. Seeming to brace himself, Alan called back to her again.
“Pardon?”
“-with a letter opener.”
“Edith.”
She threw up her hands. “I was frustrated and not thinking clearly! And very shaken, I hardly need add!” After a moment, she seemed to compose herself and continued, “Lucille was able to tidy it up, but she had to- ah –take quite drastic measures. As you can see.”
Lucille’s dark, straight brows rose a fraction of an inch, though she said nothing. Alan nodded, seeming satisfied as he spun the wheel expertly and the auto turned down a broad, tree-lined street. Then, however, he frowned.
“Wait a moment,” he said slowly. “You wrote me that you’d singed your nightdress, so I could order you another from the seamstress here.”
“Yes.”
“Was that the same incident?”
“Yes. The collar was badly scorched. If it didn’t have such a wide frill, I might have been burned in earnest.”
“That was almost a year ago,” Alan said, sounding puzzled. “Why hasn’t your hair grown again?”
She blinked in Charlotte’s peripheral vision, looking for all the world as if he’d asked why the sky was blue. “I haven’t let it,” she said at last, with the air of one stating the blindingly obvious. “It’s much easier to manage this way- I must save at least a half-hour every morning, and you know that’s when I write the best.”
“And,” she added, coloring slightly, suddenly very interested in the dusty floor, “I’ve been told it’s rather becoming.”
Well. That was something Charlotte could readily understand. The way Sir Thomas, as Alan had wryly addressed him, looked at his wife was impossible to miss. As if she were the moon, the stars, and the sun in human form. She would have bet quite a lot on who exactly had complimented Edith’s hair, and whose opinion meant so much to her.
(And quite a bit less on that being her first priority. The younger Lady Sharpe did not seem the sort of woman to live her life by any man’s whim.)
“It is,” Alan said. More of his attention had returned to the road, now that curiosity Charlotte knew all too well was properly sated. He wasn’t wrong, she mused. The golden locks that hugged Edith’s neck and fell artistically over her temples had something romantic about them, lending her delicate features and enormous eyes a sylph-like air.
Still, Charlotte wouldn’t be in a hurry to forsake her own chignon any time soon. Especially not if accidents with fire were involved- though, from what she’d heard of Edith’s days as Miss Cushing, that part wasn’t especially surprising.
Sir Thomas, for a wonder, spoke next. “Edith, do tell Alan about your new publisher. Mackintosh, wasn’t it? Your first meeting was certainly eventful, as I recall.”
The bark of laughter that followed made even Lucille jump slightly. Edith giggled almost uncontrollably, gasping for air between bouts. Slipping a handkerchief from her sleeve, she dabbed at her watering eyes.
“That,” she finally managed, “I’m saving for tea with your mother. I think she’d really enjoy the story- don’t you, Thomas?”
But it was Lucille who replied, “Without a doubt.”
As if some celestial hand had timed things perfectly, the auto puttered through a tall porte-cochere at that precise moment, and slowed to a halt. Alan engaged the brake, and turned around in his seat. A little thrill ran through Charlotte at the half-smile on his face, an impish expression that always promised some sort of delightful trouble.
“You can tell her in a moment, then.” The wide front door with its ornate stained glass window swung open behind him, and right on schedule, a middle-aged lady in a long, fluttering tea gown stepped onto the wide marble veranda. “She was most insistent on coming out to meet you. Since she’d been-” his voice took on a sardonic tone, clearly quoting. “-so like a mother to you all these years.”
And Charlotte suddenly knew, as the laughter faded and was replaced by a poisonously sweet smile, that she was going to like Edith Sharpe very much indeed.