Me too, Tory, thought. But Jack had enough worries over his trip to London without her piling on the extra burden of how keenly she would miss him, so she didn't say it. "You will have more than enough to keep you busy, without me underfoot," she said.
Jack sighed, gazing down at the folded shirt he was about to stow into the old carpetbag someone had unearthed from the property room. "Aye, perhaps it's better if you're not there to see it," he muttered.
Tory put down the impeccable white silk stock borrowed from Kit that she was rolling into a tight cylinder, crossed the two steps to where Jack was standing, plucked the shirt out of his hands, and took both of his hands in hers. "You are going to be splendid, hombre," she told him. "You've been rehearsing for this your whole life."
His dark eyes searched hers, uncertain if he should let himself believe her.
"No one will be disappointed," she went on, squeezing his hands in hers. "Least of all me."
"And if I fail?"
"Well, it would be a great relief to me, of course, not having to share you with the world," Tory admitted. "Although I doubt I shall be so lucky."
A hint of Jack's crooked grin teased a corner of his mouth as his fingers maneuvered around hers, and he drew her hands up to his lips and kissed them. "Hellfire, I wish you were coming with me, Rusty," he said again, this time with a deal more sauce. "How can I leave you for a week? It will be an eternity."
"Write to me."
"Every day," Jack promised, kissing her fingertips one last time before he let her go.
A scrap of paper would be a poor substitute for Jack in the flesh, Tory knew, with a deep internal sigh, but there was more at stake here than her temporary sacrifice
"It's only a week," she reasoned. "You'll come back with a pile of money, and then you and Alphonse will find us a new playhouse for the winter."
Jack nodded and returned to his folded shirt, sliding it into the carpetbag on top of his charcoal-grey jacket and trousers. It would not do to wear his only good suit of clothing on top of the coach all the way to London. Tory knew he had to keep it clean and dust-free, to have something presentable to wear when he arrived at Drury Lane, and whatever fate awaited him there. For the journey, he was dressed in his old country coat and trousers, bravely cleaned; the oxblood-colored redingote she'd bought him in London hung ready on a peg by the door in the little attic room they shared at Kelsingham's modest lodging house.
Tory finished rolling up the stock and handed it to Jack. He glanced at her again.
"I just wish I didn't have to leave you alone —"
"We've a dozen people in our company; I'll be surrounded every hour of the day!" She laughed. Glancing at her logbook, sitting on the lower shelf of the night table, its latter pages stuffed with scraps of paper containing scrawled notes, she added, "Besides, I'm so busy writing you out of our plays, I'll scarcely have time to come up for air before you're back."
Jack settled the last of his few things in the faded old bag, its once vibrant swirling rose pattern bleached to a tepid blush, and straightened up. "And you've spoken to Jenny?"
"Yes, yes, she's agreed to stay here and play nursemaid to me while you're gone," Tory assured him. "Anyway, the ladies are all a bit crowded at the pastry cook's. Kit and Tom will walk us back here on play nights; they will guard her like mastiffs, I promise you."
"It's not only Jenny I worry about," Jack said, peering at her.
"No one is after me," Tory pointed out. "Don't worry, Jack, we'll all be fine."
He had obviously reached the end of his litany of objections. Yet, Tory too wished she could keep him here talking a little longer, postponing the inevitable moment when she must let him go. They had never been apart from each other for so long, not by choice, anyway, and for all her brave talk, Tory was not looking forward to it now. But she knew she mustn't communicate her feelings to Jack, who already had so much to contend with.
When they heard Alphonse's distinctive tapping at the door, Tory swiftly moved to Jack for a quick farewell embrace. But his arms wrapped fiercely around her for another heartbeat before he called for Alphonse to come in, and let go of her again.
"The carter from Bristol is due at the Somerset Arms in a quarter of an hour," Alphonse told them.
He had arranged for the fellow to take Jack along on his route into Bath, where Jack could catch the mail coach to London that evening. The carter had agreed to a ha'penny a mile, or tuppence altogether, half of what a stage coach would cost, and a quarter of the mail coach fare.
"He ought to be in Bath by four in the afternoon," Alphonse went on. "Plenty of time for you to catch the Bath Mail at six."
"I'm ready," said Jack. He shut up his little bag and latched it, peering all round the room one last time, with all the dash, Tory thought, of a man marching off to the gallows.
"Oh, and this arrived this morning," said Alphonse, producing a folded paper from his inside coat pocket. He handed it to Jack. "It is the name of Mr. Jepson's agent at his London office in the Strand. Jepson keeps permanent lodgings nearby, which are not in use at the moment. This gentleman will provide you with directions and the key."
"But — I have no right — " Jack began.
"Mr. Jepson is very pleased with the funds we raised for his organization at out last benefit of Prospero and Ariel. He would like to be allowed to do this one small favor in return," said Alphonse. "The rooms are standing empty at present. Someone might as well use them."
Jack took the paper from Alphonse and stuck it into the inner breast pocket of his own coat. When it didn't look like he could think of any other reason to delay, Alphonse added quietly, "We ought to go."
Jack had asked the others not to see him off at the coaching inn, as if the lack of ceremony at his departure might somehow render his mission to London less daunting. Tory supposed they'd all be peeking from behind the curtains at their various lodgings, watching him go, anyway, but she was determined to honor her promise and not follow him to the inn like a stray puppy, whimpering at his heels. Indeed, she dared not even touch him one more time in farewell, now, in their room, for fear she'd never be able to give him up. So when he turned to face her again, she merely smiled and waved one hand.
"Enjoy it," she told him. "Every minute of it!"
Jack nodded, his expression dubious. She could see him marshaling his resolve.
I love you, hombre, she thought, and Jack finally smiled at her.
"Let's go," he said to Alphonse.
As coaching inns went, the Somerset Arms was hardly the most prepossessing of buildings. A simple rectangle, it sat flush to the street, a public house below and perhaps half a dozen rooms above, Jack guessed, and no open galleried inn yard within. Its stable could only accommodate two or three post horses for private hire; with only seven miles or so between Bath and the end of the mail line in Bristol, no one bothered to stop in Kelsingham to change the horses.
But it sat on the coaching road and served as a mail drop-off, and so qualified by the breadth of a hair for the designation of coaching inn. Jack might have waited another hour or two to catch the mail coach out of Bristol right here, but it was not obliged to stop in Kelsingham, as it was in Bath, and Jack didn't want to chance wracking his nerves any further by missing his coach.
As it was, he was giving himself one extra day to fret between his arrival in London tomorrow morning at eight o'clock, and the hour when he must present himself for his reckoning at Drury Lane, the following evening; he dared not cut the time any closer, lest something happened to the coach along the way. Still, it preyed on his mind, being away for so long.
"You will look after . . . everyone," he said again to Alphonse as they trudged down High Street for the inn.
"The bens are scheduled, the bills are seen to, our creditors shall not hound us out of town for at least a fortnight —"
"You know what I mean."
Alphonse gazed up at Jack, his expression implacable. "Do you think I would ever let anything happen to her?"
Jack drew a breath, thought better of making a reply, and simply shook his head.
"Or Jenny," Alphonse went on. "They shall never be alone, we'll all see to that. They could not be any more safe if they were locked up in the playhouse at night."
"Believe me, it has crossed my mind," Jack muttered.
They were only a few doors shy of the inn, and as the carter had not yet arrived, Alphonse stopped and turned to face Jack.
"It is my business to manage things while you are away," said Alphonse. "When have I ever failed you?"
"Never," Jack admitted.
"I shall not begin now. Do not worry, Jack," Alphonse went on, a bit more gently. "Your business is to manage things in London. Send us news when you can, for Tory's sake."
"She made me promise to write every day."
"And so you shall," agreed Alphonse. "Or you shall answer to me."
It took some care to navigate his way across the front courtyard to the alcove under the statue of the proud stag, what with all the carriages drawing up or departing, the travelers flitting about on their way in or out of town, the patrons heading out for or just returning from the Pump Room across the street, and the porters and footmen dashing about to accommodate all the others.
Inside, the lobby was scarcely any less bustling with people parading in and out of the tap room or the dining room. Dimly aware that he was not dressed to be seen by the fashion of Bath, Jack kept to the edge of the scene, yet, perversely, found himself standing taller inside his redingote, if not for the sake of the worn garment itself, then for the sake of the one who had given it to him. He hoped the overcoat might infuse in him some of the confidence, misplaced though it might be, that Tory had always had in him, while he prepared himself for his upcoming ordeal.
"Enjoy it," Tory's voice scolded him in his head. Hah. Easy enough for her to say; she hadn't been there . . . what was it? Eleven years ago, now, when he'd destroyed his fledgling career before it began with his first ill-fated attempt on the London stage. Hard to believe now that he'd ever been as young and unworldly as he was that summer on the Gloucester circuit when a great lady of the London stage had come on tour with them. She had plucked him out of the company to play Malcolm in the production built around her Lady Macbeth — and favored him in other ways, as well. He was not so innocent on that score, he supposed, although looking back it must have been the novelty of a besotted young puppy of nineteen more than anything else about him that appealed to her. At any rate, when she returned to London in the fall, to give a series of farewell performances in her signature role of Juliet, she'd brought him along as her Romeo.
A raw young bullock full of clumsy ardor who didn't have the experience to upstage her, that was how he'd described the scene to Tory, that fateful day on the island of Tortola, when she'd coaxed his deep, dark secret out of him. How Tory had laughed! Oh, she'd tried to stifle her amusement, pretend to sympathize with his mortally wounded pride. But in the end the hilarity burst out of her, that the grand tragedy for which he could never return to his homeland was that he'd given a bad performance.
And it was hilarious, and he'd begun to laugh too, laugh at the pompous young fool he had been. And years of disgrace and mortification had been washed away in that cleansing flood of laughter — just as the memory of the untrained boy he had once been, John Young, had been washed away from the annals of the London stage. This would be his London debut, for the man, the player, he now was.
Enjoy it, Tory had advised him, the moment he'd been working toward his entire life. The past is prologue, as Shakespeare said. This was now. This was his future, and he would not meet it like a cowed, sniveling boy, defeated before he even began. This was his opportunity to seize, and by God, he would seize it, for all their sakes, all their futures. Whatever Fortune, that wily strumpet, had in store for him, this time he would not go down without a fight.
And Jack forgot the plainness of his dress and the worn condition of his luggage and marched into the busy taproom. He was heading for a seat near the window with a view of the courtyard, when his shoulder inadvertently brushed another fellow's coming in the other direction.
"Oh, I beg your pardon, sir," Jack apologized.
"Not at all. No harm . . . why, hello!"
Jack glanced back and found himself looking into the surprised countenance of Henry Harding. Who surprised Jack even more by smiling broadly at him.
"Dance!"
"Harding.” Jack nodded.
Harding too was dressed for travel, in a bottle-green topcoat and yellow waistcoat over black and white checked trousers, although he carried no bag. "Whatever brings you to Bath?" he prompted Jack.
"I've an engagement in the north." Jack thought better than to mention Drury Lane.
"Why, there's a coincidence! I'm off to a new engagement myself!" Harding beamed at him. Jack was unsure how to respond, and in the instant that he hesitated, Harding drew slightly nearer, his voice lowered, his expression more earnest. "See here, Dance, I know we did not part on the most cordial of terms. But I should be sorry was there any ill will between us. On the contrary, my fortunes have improved dramatically since leaving the company — for which I have you to thank."
This surprised a smile out of Jack. "Then, congratulations are in order, Mr. Harding."
Harding grinned again. "Have a drink with me, Dance. For the sake of bygones and all that." He leaned slightly closer again. "It's fearful bad luck to begin a new venture tangled up in old animosities, eh?"
Jack supposed it would be churlish to refuse, and anyway, he had an hour to pass before the mail coach arrived, and he doubted anything could go awry in such a public place. "Well said," he agreed.
"I see you have your eye on those seats by the window," Harding went on. "You take possession, and I'll go fetch us a glass of something from the bar. No, no, my treat, I insist!"
Jack snagged a couple of straight-backed chairs and drew them up near the window, sat on one and placed his carpet bag on the other, thinking that perhaps he wasn't the only one who needed to make peace with his past in order to move on. He should never have taken Harding for the introspective sort of fellow, but people did change over time. Jack himself would be glad of one less enemy as he headed for his rendezvous with Fortune.
After a few more minutes, Harding emerged from the crowd around the bar holding two pints, one of which he handed to Jack, before he sat down opposite him.
"To Fortune," said Jack, raising his glass.
"To the theatre!" Harding smiled.
Top: Vintage coaching inn poster
The White Hart Inn, Bath, by John Charles Mags, 1869
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