Darcy Branwyn

“I just don’t know what to do with you.” Harriet Taylor handed her daughter, Molly, the society section of the morning paper.

“Yes, I’ve already seen it.” Molly set it aside. She wiped her hands over the sprigged muslin of her gown. “I hadn’t meant to cause any trouble.”

“You cannot go around making up stories about people and then gossiping them all over the ton.”

“It wasn’t gossip. You can’t really believe Mrs. Sutherland walked into a wall. No one gets a black eye by accident. Someone has to hit them.”

Harriet leveled her brown eyes on Molly. “It is not our place to interfere in another person’s business. Thanks to you, everyone is talking about The Sutherlands.”

Molly had never been naughty as a child. She had never been unkind, unless she felt she had to tell the truth to adults, then they found her to be both naughty, and unkind. Her only real fault was in wanting to help people, but for some reason that was beyond her understanding, they didn’t want the truth about themselves, and they most certainly didn’t want her help.

“Perhaps the gossip is for the best,” Molly suggested. “Now people will be watching them. If Mr. Sutherland really does have fits of temper, then knowing it’s ruining his reputation might force him to do something about it.” 

“We haven’t come to London so that you can sit in your bedroom reading gothic romance novels and seeing treachery at every turn.” Harriet picked up Molly’s copy of The Monk, and slapped it down on the coffee table between them. “No more novels for you.”

“This has nothing to do with novels.”

Harriet sighed and rubbed her temples. “The books don’t help any. You’re getting worse. Perhaps it’s the busyness of London. I don’t know. But you have to control your imagination. Stay out of other people’s business. You have no right to say things about other people, and you have no right to try and change them.”

Molly’s stomach ached at the serious tone to her mother’s words, because she knew without a doubt, that Harriet Taylor meant every one of them.

“You will practice your music today until it is time for you to leave for your appointment with the modiste. If we were not here to find you a suitable match, I would ship you directly home. I expect you to act like a lady in the public eye.” Harriet reached over the table, taking Molly’s hand. “No man will want you for your overactive imagination.” 

“I just want to help people.” Molly pulled her hand away.

“Then help me, by finding yourself a good man.”

By good, Harriet meant wealthy. But if Molly could have her choice, she’d marry a poor man who loved her for all facets of her personality. Even—especially—the undesirable ones.

Even though she knew the truth behind Harriet’s words, Molly nodded, just to appease her mother.

“That’s my girl.”

Molly’s father had portioned aside a respectable dowry for her, as well as funds to purchase all kinds of beautiful gowns; anything needed to attend the best soirees. It was now her duty as a daughter, as Harriet had told her before they had left for London, to land the perfect match by the end of the year. 

Harriet frowned down at Molly. “Being a matron will give you prestige and security that you’ll enjoy.”

“But will my husband love me?”

Harriet laughed, making Molly wince at the rejection. “What does it matter if he loves you?”

“It matters to me.”

“Too many novels. Perhaps you should choose your reading materials more wisely from now on.” Harriet rearranged a golden brown curl over Molly’s forehead. “Once you marry, you will not have time for such things anyway.”

Her mother left the parlor, leaving behind the scent of gardenia blossoms.

Sighing, Molly picked up her copy of The Monk. As she flipped through its pages, a sick, hollow feeling came over her.

“Maybe she’s right,” Molly said to herself. “I need to stop trying to help people. They don’t seem to want my help anyway, so why should I even bother?”

She crossed the room to the hearth and tossed her book into the fire. No more make-believe. No more gothic novels. And positively no more helping people. Smoke curled around the edges of the leather bound volume as flames licked the paper.

Molly turned to the newspaper, still on the table where she’d left it. If she burned that as well, would it make her change of heart official?

She could move on with her life once it was done, becoming the perfect little idiot, so some rich man would want to marry her.

She took it up, cringing at the societal page, then placed it on top of her smoldering book. She turned back, looking at the rest of the paper, wondering if she should burn that too. Picking it up, she noticed the headline on the front page.

London’s Streets Safe Again

Below it were the words, our thanks go out to amateur detective, Liam Daltrey.

Sometimes she wished she had been born a man. Then she could help people and get her name plastered proudly on the front page too. Molly tossed the rest of the paper into the fire, then turned her back on all the things that couldn’t be.

She flipped through her sheet music, finding the blackest song she had in her collection, then sat down before her pianoforte to play.

Deduction Part Two