Page 54 of A Lady of Conscience

“Without question. Your writing is succinct and non-judgmental, with a good helping of sentiment.”

Hannah winced. “Was I too sentimental?”

“Not at all. Sentiment is a good thing for the cause. Often, the best way to reach a person’s mind is through their heart.” Mattie took a fortifying sip of her tea. “No. It’s not anything you’ve done, but something I have done, quite unintentionally.”

“You had better just have out with it,” Hannah said. “It cannot be that bad.”

Mattie lowered her cup back to its saucer, her brow furrowed in a deep line. “I was, perhaps, overambitious when I said that the Animal Advocate would be a monthly publication. I have been beside myself this past week assembling all the elements together for the printer. I might have predicted that something would go wrong.”

Hannah waited.

“The crux of it is…” Mattie moistened her lips. “I forgot to use only your initial on the attribution for your article. It has gone to print with your full name, Hannah Heywood.”

“Oh.” Hannah blinked. “That isn’t too⁠—”

“It’s bad,” Mattie said.

“Surely not. My contributions have already been published once with my name.”

“The horse article was published with your initial. The H might have stood for Henry, or Harry, or Hal. Now, however, everyone will know that the article was penned by a Hannah.”

Hannah felt a stirring of pride at the prospect. “I am glad for them to know,” she said. “The sentiments I expressed in that article are nothing I’m ashamed of.”

“I agree. You’ve done nothing wrong, not by any logical measure. But the dictates of a lady’s season are far from logical. It is one thing to be called a bluestocking, but to be spouting support for cats, and in such an unashamedly brazen fashion⁠—”

“Brazen!”

One of the wolfhounds raised his head at Hannah’s tone of sharp astonishment. He dropped it just as quickly, lapsing back into a snoring doze.

“In print, it is brazen, yes,” Mattie said. “It’s asserting your opinions as though they were on par with a man’s. And like it or not, cats are associated with spinsters. The satirical magazines are forever pairing them together with comic drawings. If it becomes widely known that you have joined the ranks of cat-loving maidens, and in print, no less, people will remark on it. They live for such sport.”

Hannah scoffed. “It is too much ridiculousness.”

“It is the world we live in.”

“Yes, but rational people⁠—”

“Forget rational! You are on the marriage mart. Everything you say and do is weighed in the balance. A better friend would have taken that into consideration before printing your article. Indeed, I more than anyone should have known the danger. I know the high price of eccentricity.”

Hannah listened to Mattie in growing disquiet. Was it true? Could people really be so smallminded? So judgmental? All because Hannah had dared to sign her full name to a printed article espousing basic kindness to animals?

“I am sorry,” Mattie said. “I would undo it if I could.”

“Can you not?”

“The journal has already been printed.” Mattie set aside her teacup. She took a deep breath. “I am left with only two options. I can either send the journal to my subscribers as it is, or…”

“Or?”

“I can have the printer destroy the copies he’s made. It would mean that there would be no issue this month.”

“You could not simply have him make the correction?”

“He would have to reprint it,” Mattie said. “And I can’t afford the cost. My budget only stretches to one printing. Even that much is barely within my reach, and only because of the subscriptions people have taken.”

Hannah frowned. She understood the repercussions. Still, she wasn’t dissuaded by them. “You must send it out as is.”

A horrified gasp escaped Ernsby from her place by the window.