As I left the library, my phone showed it was just after nine o’clock. James would be landing any minute. And though I was discouraged by the fruitless search, I breathed in the warm London air and steeled myself as I made my way toward the Underground and Ludgate Hill, ready to face head-on what I could no longer choose to ignore.

As distraught as I’d been in the last few days, I felt more alive in London—enveloped in an old mystery, an old story—than I could remember feeling in years. I resolved to continue digging. To push through the dark and look inside of it all.

15

Eliza

February 8, 1791

After Lady Clarence rushed out of Nella’s shop, the air in the small room felt humid and hot, like it often did in the kitchen. The hair on my arms stood on end; I’d never heard anyone speak in the tones Nella and Lady Clarence had exchanged a moment ago.

Nella’s face twisted into a look of misery and fatigue. I could see how the weight of her work—and the demands of women like Lady Clarence—had carved lines into her forehead and sunk pockets into her cheeks. Faint wisps of smoke still curled in the air as she slumped to one side in her chair, concern splashed all over her face like spilled vinegar.

“Kill the mistress of a lord,” she mumbled, “or swing from the gallows?” She rolled her head to look into the fire, as though searching for what remained of her beetles. “Each choice is more hideous than the other.”

“You must remake the powder.” She did not ask for my opinion, but the words came out of me before I knew what I was saying. “It is the only option.”

She turned on me, her eyes crazed. “Easier than killing a woman? All my life, I have sought to help women. Indeed, it is the only part of my mother’s legacy that I have maintained with any measure of success.”

But Nella had shown me her register, and I knew the entries consisted of names and dates and remedies. Worse than this, I knew that Mr. Amwell’s name, and my own, were listed within. Which meant that if Nella did not remake the powder and Lady Clarence sought revenge, I would be exposed.

All of us in the book, exposed.

I pointed my finger at her book. “You may find a way to avoid writing Miss Berkwell’s name in there, but what about me? What about the others written in those pages?”

Nella looked down at the book and frowned, like she had not even considered this idea. Like she did not really believe that Lady Clarence would make good on her threat. She slowly read the last few rows.