Mother was delicate the way badgers were delicate.

Since this was likely to be my last moment to myself until later in the evening when we reached Lord Jasper’s estate in Hampshire, I rushed out, accidentally bumping into a countess with a tiered bustle that took up the space of three people. I didn’t even stop to apologize properly.

Because if I had to be shut up in that box for another minute, I’d run mad.

Mother would say it was frightfully ungrateful of me, but it was true nonetheless. She’d been hours without her glass of medicinal sherry and that alone was enough to make her cross, never mind the fine ladies looking down their noses at us.

We were situated in the first-class car, which was far and above the most luxurious place I’d ever seen. It was set with chandeliers hanging from the decorated ceiling, carved mahogany tables, and blue silk cushions and was better appointed than the parlor in our house. The movement might have rattled my teeth alarmingly, but I didn’t care. I did, however, feel rather bad for Colin and Marjorie stuck in the last car, with no walls to shield them from the elements or the dust and no seats to speak of. At least it wasn’t raining.

I’d never been on a train before, with the great roar of sound, the billows of steam like a dragon’s breath, and the rapid blur of London tenement houses followed by fields of sheep and oak groves. I rather liked it; it made me feel as if I were leaving my old life behind me.

If only that were true.

I attached myself to a tired-looking woman and her five daughters, all dressed in browns, like plump, happy sparrows. I trailed behind them as if I were a member of the family, a sixth daughter in a black-and-white striped dress. It wasn’t a traveling dress exactly since I’d never had occasion to travel, but it was dashing and hid the dirt well enough. My adopted family afforded me enough protection to see me to the ladies’ necessity and then to a lounge set aside for ladies to procure tea and soup. I didn’t have money for tea but I didn’t care. I didn’t even know what station we were at. I only knew it wasn’t our narrow house near Wimpole Street and that was good enough for me.

Our house was far and above beyond anything of our previous residences, but it felt tainted. We’d only been able to afford it after Miss Hartington died last year. She’d outlived Mrs. Gordon, which was a surprise to us all. We’d been visiting once a month for years, facilitating conversations with her dead husband and daughter. She finally joined them, but Miss Hartington, though older and more cross, stubbornly lived on. More surprising still, when she finally succumbed to a lung fever, her solicitor contacted us with a tidy and surprising sum of three hundred and fifty pounds, which she had willed to me, having no other children or close living relations of her own. Mother took every farthing and rented us a house within walking distance of a very fine neighborhood.

Now we had the veneer of respectability, heaven help us, and doors opened to Mother all over London. When she wasn’t drunk on sherry, she was drunk on fame.

But this was our trickiest demonstration yet. Lord Jasper wasn’t just an earl; he was clever and kind and well versed in Spiritualist matters. Not to mention that we were traveling to him, instead of working in the comfort of our specially rigged parlor. There were so many pitfalls it hardly bore thinking about.

The crowd had thinned on the platform, with most passengers still in the lounges, lingering over their supper. The air was thick with steam and burning coal, the wind pushing the iron hinges of the wooden signs into constant creaking. I skirted a pile of trunks, taller than I was and teetering dangerously, and ran straight into three boys about my age.

They looked to be from the second-class compartments by the state of their suits and smart waistcoats. And they were smiling that certain kind of smile that sent an alarm through me, lifting the hairs on the back of my neck.

I should have preferred being crushed by the luggage.

“Well, what have we here, lads?”

I looked away, refusing to meet their eyes. Colin told me once that if I came upon an angry dog, I shouldn’t meet his eyes as it would be interpreted as a challenge. I adjusted my grip on my parasol. It was plain, with no ruffles or silk roses, but pointy all the same.

“Traveling all alone, are you?” one of them asked with what could be described only as a leer worthy of any penny dreadful.

Blast.

“Let me pass,” I demanded. Where the devil was everyone?

“There’s a toll, love,” he insisted. “Didn’t you know?”

We were well hidden by the luggage and a shroud of steam, thick as London fog. The third boy looked uncomfortable, as if he wanted to stop his companions but didn’t know how. Fat lot of good his squirming would do me.

“Give us a kiss, then.”

When the ringleader reached for me, I jabbed my parasol at him. I was rather proud of my aim. It should have hit him painfully between the ribs. If I hadn’t been wearing a corset and had a proper range of motion, that is. I wasn’t used to wearing corsets, nor the way they restricted my movements and altered my ability to breathe properly.

The young man just grabbed the end of my parasol and held on, smirking. I tugged. He tugged back harder, and I lost my footing slightly. The edge of the tracks loomed close. The bone stays of my corset poked me in the ribs. His friends laughed.

“Now that’s not nice, is it?” he asked. I gave up the struggle and decided to follow with his last yank of the parasol. My sudden weight took him by surprise, nearly toppling him. One of them grabbed my elbow.