Dear Future Husband

47. I Love You

25 April 1894

Dear future husband,

I scribble this missive to you under the dining table while my mother and Lord Oliver Dennings prattle inanely about the latest Season's gossip.

Your identity is no longer a mystery to me. I know you, Maximilian Walker, and I've been doing my utmost to deny any love for you that I might feel. But seeing you again... here... tonight... I love you. Truly. Passionately. Steadfastly.

I have prayed for you and worried for you and longed to see you every day of the past six years. You are the man who never sought to stifle me, but to protect me, to take wild ventures with me, and to appreciate me for who I am. I did not care about the difference between our statuses when I thought you were a stowaway on the RMS Etruria, and I do not care a whit now if you are a duke's son or not.

You are the boy I met who rescued my dog, Minerva, when we were on the Etruria. You are the boy whom my father adores. You are the boy who held my hand under a dining table, who danced with me in disguise at a ball neither of us had any right to be at, who hurt me to help me.

Though so much lies unspoken between us, I know I could forgive any fault of the past, any slight on your end, for the love that I hold for you.

Yours, if you will have me,

Rosalie Winthrop

A thunderous noise erupted from the kitchen. The three guests leaped from their chairs as the butler emerged, his eyebrows looking singed. Rosalie shoved the note deep into the pocket of her gown and looked on in horror.

'Whatever is the matter?" her mother demanded, as though this were her house instead of one in which she was a guest.

"Nothing to be worried about..." The butler stammered, but his sleeve was in flames. "A small kitchen fire."

"Your clothing is on fire," Lord Oliver Dennings noted, pushing past the women with a sigh of annoyance and beating out the conflagration with a dinner napkin. "By Jove, Walker, what is the matter?"

'N-no, Your Grace, I assure you... One of the cooks was attempting a flambe for dessert... I'm afraid that a new footman was there for some reason, and may have poured a bit too much liquor into the pan..." Walker chased his master into the kitchen as if to pull him away. "Truly, you mustn't worry..."

But Rosalie was worried, despite the servant's protestations.

Maximilian had excused himself fifteen minutes ago. Where was he?

She fingered the paper in the pocket of her skirt. He had to be here. What if, she thought absurdly, he had been in the kitchen? He could be injured!

"A fire in my own home and a footman I have not hired is reason enough for me to be worried," Lord Dennings was saying icily as he shoved open the kitchen door. "I will see to this immediately."

Just as he'd said the words, a footman ran out of the kitchen, narrowly avoiding the door that Lord Dennings had flung open. With blackened livery and greying hair, he had a face that looked faintly familiar to her, but she couldn't place where. "My sincerest apologies, Your Grace... I was only trying to help the cook..."

Lord Dennings looked like he wanted to shake the man by the shoulders. Violently. "Have you seen my son?"

"Your son?" The footman's salt and pepper eyebrows creased together. "Your Grace, I have not. Is he missing?"

Just then, the dining room doors burst open. "I thought this was going to be a peaceful supper," her mother muttered.

"Then perhaps you ought to make better friends," Rosalie said under her breath before taking a sip of wine. It was sour, burning as it slid down her throat, and it made her wonder how anyone could drink copiously for enjoyment.