What Remains Of Heaven Part 29

"Arabia. India. Who knows?"

"Good G.o.d," said Jarvis. "What put this idea in your head?"

She looked over at him, her face set in oddly stiff lines. "You know I've always wanted to see the world. I think I've finally reached the age that I can do so without exciting too much comment."

"But . . ." Her mother groped for her winegla.s.s. "Whatever will I do without you?"

"End your days in Bedlam, where you belong, no doubt," suggested Jarvis maliciously.

"Papa," said Hero in a low, tense voice. "You shouldn't say that, even in jest."

Jarvis raised one eyebrow. "What makes you think I'm jesting? Do you seriously expect me to put up with her nonsense without you here to coax and wheedle her into a semblance of normality?"

Jarvis considered himself a master at reading both men and women, but what he saw in his daughter's drawn, troubled face confused him. She reminded him of a hunted fox backed into a corner.

"Hero?" said Annabelle in a weak, pleading voice.

Hero reached out to grip her mother's hand, tightly, in her own. "It's all right, Mama." She forced her lips into an unconvincing smile that didn't reach her eyes. "It was just a thought. Don't worry. I won't go."

"If you're that bored," snapped Jarvis, "what you need to do is to find a husband and start having babies."

Hero glanced over at him. He expected her to make one of her usual provocative remarks on the inequities of modern English marriage laws. Instead, she gave a strange, soft laugh and said, "Perhaps I shall."

Author's Note.

While the church of St. Margaret's and the village of Tanfield Hill are fictional, the crypt of St. Margaret's was inspired in both its design and the details of its rediscovery by the very real crypt of St. Wystan's in Repton, England.

For nineteenth-century burial customs and the condition of burials in crypts, see the fascinating material published both in print and on the Internet on the archaeological excavations of Christ Church, Spitalfields, London; of St. Pancras Church, Euston Road; and the recently rediscovered crypt of the former Dominican church in Vac, Hungary.

As surprising as it may seem, the incredibly long delay in the funeral of Bishop Prescott was quite common at the time, with the average being ten to twelve days; English gentlewomen did not attend funerals until Victorian times.

The fire that forms the climax of this tale is inspired by a real event: A fire in the crypt of St. Clements in London burned for days at the end of the nineteenth century, fueled solely by its jam-packed coffins and their contents.

The person of Bishop Francis Prescott is based, loosely, on the very real Bishop Beilby Porteus, who was for many years Bishop of London. An ardent reformer and abolitionist, Porteus was one of the leading supporters of the Slave Trade Act that pa.s.sed Parliament in 1807. While a vocal opponent of both the French Revolution and the republican doctrines of Thomas Paine, he also penned the antiwar, antiempire poem quoted, in part, by Lord Jarvis. He died (peacefully) at the Bishop of London's summer residence of Fulham Palace in 1809. John Moore was the Archbishop of Canterbury from 1783 to 1805, when he was succeeded by the rather colorless Charles Manners-Sutton. My thanks to Ms. Janet Laws, personal secretary and a.s.sistant to the current Bishop of London, for answering some of my research queries on the bishops' former London residence.

Numerous sites and buildings referred to in this series, such as the first church of St. Pancras and the Temple, have been renovated or rebuilt in the past two hundred years and therefore appear differently now than they would have in 1812. I have described them as Sebastian would have seen them.

The life of William Franklin, son of Benjamin Franklin, was much as I have portrayed it, although he actually sailed from New York in September of 1782, rather than at the beginning of June, as I have it here. Most of the comments my characters make about the American Revolution and the young United States are taken from actual letters, journals, and speeches made at the time. While they might strike some as having a modern, slightly satirical ring, they are actually very true to the period, with most gentlemen of the Regency era viewing the new American state and its radical new form of government as a serious threat to civilization.

THE SEBASTIAN ST. CYR MYSTERY SERIES.

What Angels Fear.

When G.o.ds Die.

Why Mermaids Sing.

Where Serpents Sleep.