Everyone had had an opinion. Everyone had had a theory.
The one most likely to be true was that Anna’s benefactor, whoever he or she was, was ready to turn her loose upon the world and withdraw the monetary support she had relied upon for the past twenty-one years. He—or she—did not have to summon her all the way to London in order to inform her of that, though. But perhaps he had found her employment there. What could it be? Would she agree to take it and begin a new phase of her life, cut off from everyone she had ever known and the only home she could remember? Or would she refuse and return to Bath and try to subsist on her teacher’s wages? She would have a choice, she assumed. The letter had, after all, stated that her future needed to be discussed. A discussion was a two-way communication.
She wondered if there were enough coins in her purse for a ticket home by stagecoach. She had no idea what the fare was, but she had a little money of her own—a very little—and Miss Ford had pressed a whole sovereign into her palm last night despite her protests. What if it was still not enough? What if she found herself stranded in London for the rest of her life? The very thought was enough to make her feel bilious, and the state of the road over which they were traveling did nothing to settle her stomach.
A few times she tried determinedly not to think. She tried instead to marvel at the unfamiliar sensation of being in a carriage, of actually leaving Bath, climbing the hill away from it until it was no longer in sight behind her when she peered back. She tried to marvel at the passing countryside. She tried to think of this experience as the adventure of a lifetime, one she would remember for the rest of her life. She imagined how she would tell the children at the orphanage about it—about the tollbooths and the villages through which they passed; about village greens and taverns with quaint names painted upon their swinging signs and small churches with pointed steeples; about the posting inns at which they stopped, the food they ate there, the lumpiness of the bed in which she tried to sleep, the bustle of hostlers and grooms in the innyards; the deep ruts in the road that rattled the very teeth in one’s head and even occasionally made Miss Knox look less like a sphinx.
Soon enough, however, her mind would spin back to the great, frightening unknown that lay ahead of her. What if she was about to meet the person who had taken her to the orphanage all those years ago and paid to keep her there ever since? Would it be the man with the gruff voice? What if she really was a princess and a prince was waiting to marry her now that she was grown-up and out of danger from the wicked king—or witch!—from whom she had been carefully hidden all these years? The absurd thought made Anna smile despite herself and almost laugh aloud. That had been nine-year-old Olga Norton’s theory after she had listened to Anna’s letter the night before last. It had been eagerly espoused by several of the other little girls and soundly ridiculed by most of the boys.
All she could do, Anna thought with great good sense for surely the two hundredth time in the last few days, was wait and see. But that was more easily said than done. Why had the summons come through a solicitor? And why was she traveling in a private carriage when stagecoach tickets must cost far less? And why had she been provided with a chaperone? What was to happen when she arrived in London?
What did happen was that the carriage kept driving and driving. London was endlessly large and endlessly dreary, even squalid, for what seemed like miles and miles. So much for the story of Dick Whittington and the gold-paved streets of London town, though admittedly it might all look more inviting in full daylight instead of the dusk that was falling upon the outside world.
But the carriage did stop eventually outside a large, imposing stone building that turned out to be a hotel. They stepped inside a reception hall, and Miss Knox spoke with a man in uniform behind a high oak desk, was handed a large brass key, and led the way up two broad, carpeted flights of stairs and along a corridor before setting the key in the lock of a door and opening it wide. There was a spacious, square, high-ceilinged sitting room beyond it with doors on either side, each standing open to show a bedchamber within. There was a lamp alight in each of the three rooms, a great extravagance to Anna’s weary mind. It was a huge improvement over last night’s accommodations.
“I am to stay here?” she asked, moving sharply to one side when she realized that another man in uniform had come along behind them, her bag and Miss Knox’s in his hands. He set them down, looked expectantly at Miss Knox, who ignored him, and withdrew with a scowl.