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CHAPTER FIVE
ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ FISH OUT OF WATER!
"THE PERSONAL ADVERTISEMENT COLUMN?" Theodosia asked to themselves, though partly to Enola too. They were in the midst of publishing the cryptic message Enola had created in the aforementioned advertisement section of their first newspaper stop, in an attempt to contact Enola's estranged mother dearest, "Does she read the Pall Mall Gazette often?"
Enola nodded wholeheartedly, "Never missed a copy."
While they waited for the white-bearded man behind the counter to be done with it, Theodosia looked down at a paper, immediately seeing a drawn picture of Tewksbury scribbled in a surprising likeness, "This gentleman seems to be getting quite a lot of attention."
The man looked up, tickled with amusement, "Well, he's a bloomin' Marquess."
"Now, we must find out who my mother really was," Enola whispered to her blonde friend conspiratorially.
"Is, you mean?"
"Was. Is," Enola looked slightly embarrassed, before continuing, "My mother only corresponded with one address with regularity. It was wrong of me to look where it was addressed to——"
Theodosia's eyes widened, "You didn't."
"—and entirely wrong of me to have memorised it—"
"Oh my— you did."
"—but when growing up in the countryside, there is little excitement. So, one clings to whatever narratives one can get. Mother would often host meetings with many other women, and she would never let me in. I constantly saw the name, Ellie Houseman."
Theodosia mulled over her words, fully shocked Enola would even dare consider butting into her mother's private business.
They supposed Enola didn't have much to do like she did in the countryside. There were always meaningless social events to attend, stores to shop at... in the long run, they didn't actually hold much value— and when she wasn't dragged along to galas, Theodosia was preoccupied with their studies. Her father primarily taught them, teaching her French, English, Mathematics, Physics and anything else he pretty much felt like talking about that day.
But perhaps Enola didn't have that. They had already heard a lot about Enola's puzzling upbringing, an upbringing far from normal.
Then— the meetings. Enola was an intelligent girl, from what Theodosia knew—— why on earth would her mother exclude her daughter, who would probably be interested in whatever that meeting was discussing? What was Eudoria talking about? And— who was Ellie Houseman?
They had so many questions, but the ones that were answered only led to more.
The two amateur detectives visited two other newspaper establishments— two that Enola thought quite sure that her mother would be tickled by— and as they waited for the printing to be approved, Enola had whispered the address her mother regularly corresponded with.
