Powder of Sin Read Free Page B

as
lemonade. Cook just made a poppy seed cake.”
    “I couldn’t sit still, and I’m not hungry for
something so silly as cake. No, no, I don’t want that. Oh.
Something more. Something new.” She shivered again. And her hands
strayed to her throat to stroke the skin there, then slowly, slowly
traveled over her breasts.
    Miss Renshaw’s eyes were closed, and she seemed not
to care that a horrified Rosalie watched her.
    Beels returned with the lemonade.
    He put down the tray and glanced at the door.
Rosalie jumped to her feet in case Miss Renshaw tried to go after
him again. Watching her companion, she said, “Thank you, Beels.
That will be all for now.”
    He didn’t run from the room, but he moved more
quickly than his usual stately progress.
    Miss Renshaw picked up a glass and pressed it to her
forehead. “Cold. Perfect.” She pulled a chip of ice from the drink
and sucked on it. Water dribbled down her wrists and chin. She
sucked harder.
    Rosalie stared. Miss Renshaw usually had exquisite
manners. The lady nibbled her food and barely touched a roll with
her fingers at meals. Now she gulped down the lemonade as if she
were dying of thirst.
    “Delicious,” she said brightly. “I’m quite
refreshed, and now I think I shall go for a stroll.”
    “No.” Rosalie’s panic surfaced. “You can’t leave
when you’re under the influence of this peculiar substance. I think
it best you go to your bedroom and sleep.”
    “Sleep? La, Rosalie, it is madness to sleep when I
feel this—It was this substance, you say? I’m alive for the first
time since I was a girl.” She laughed. “Sleep? No, thank you.”
    “Please. Miss Renshaw. You are not yourself tonight,
and I think you’ll regret going out.” She hoped she’d put enough
iron in her voice to make it clear it was a threat.
    “No.” Miss Renshaw still smiled brightly.
    Rosalie tried again. “If you leave this house in
this state, I will have to find a new companion. I will dismiss
you.”
    “Really?” Miss Renshaw raised her thin brows. “I
must be behaving very badly, then.” She didn’t sound at all
concerned.
    “It isn’t your fault.” Rosalie decided to tell the
whole truth. “You see, the dust that you touched awakens certain
animal appetites in people.”
    “Aha. That explains a great deal!” Miss Renshaw
laughed. “How amusing to think we are animals after all. How long
will this effect last?”
    “I don’t know, Miss Renshaw. I wish I did.” She had
the appalling thought that the effect would never go away, but then
she recalled Mr. Dorsey, who’d obviously opened the box and
overcome its influence. For a horrifying moment, she imagined him
in an aroused state similar to this, but pushed the image out of
her mind.
    Miss Renshaw still pirouetted toward the door, and
Rosalie had to speak loudly to make herself heard over the waltz
her companion hummed. “But I hope you understand it is for your own
good that I will, um, put a guard outside your door.”
    The companion’s brightness dimmed. “My own good,”
she said. “All my life, everything that has been for my own good
has not been at all amusing or interesting. Did you know that?”
    “Miss Renshaw. Emily. I am sorry. I understand what
you are saying. But do you truly wish to become disgraced? Lose
your good name and possibly even your virtue?” Good God, she
sounded like her father when he had lectured her about her meetings
with Cousin Johnny, but Rosalie pressed on. “What might happen
should you give in to baser impulses?”
    “Yes, yes, I am a grown woman on the shady side of
thirty-five.” Miss Renshaw was waspish now. “I’ve seen enough of
life to understand disgrace. If I indulged in sins of the flesh.”
She stopped to take a deep breath and gave another visible shudder.
“If I tarry alone with a man, he might put himself inside me.
Pshaw. It’s such a shame.”
    Rosalie nodded, though she wasn’t sure what she was
agreeing with. “I apologize for not