Chapter 2
It would have taken Charlotte no time at all to prepare for the dinner party on her own, but as usual Lucy snuck into her room with lace and petticoats in hand and demanded that they primp and preen together. This meant a long conversation about what would be worn, a search for ribbons that were just the right colour, and then an even longer wrestling match with the ladies’ maid over hairstyles.
In the end, Lucy looked a picture in a pale pink gown trimmed with ribbon rosettes; her curls up atop her head with the tight rag curls framing her face, her feet in white satin slippers, and a white ribbon looped around her hair. Charlotte chose simplicity, much to Lucy’s frustration; dressing in a deep blue gown with only a single ribbon of silver embroidery as trim. She put on the silver cross she always wore around her neck and pinned her red hair up off her neck in the simplest fashion possible.
“You ought to wear earrings,” Lucy said with a worried frown. “Mama will notice.”
And so silver earrings with a sapphire centre were added to the ensemble. Charlotte was about to pull on her gloves and tend to her mother’s needs when the sound of a muffled commotion came floating up the stairs to the two girls. There was firstly the crashing of a door, and then the sound of footsteps retreating quickly down the hall. Then, alarmingly, a muffled cry.
Charlotte leapt to her feet. “Something’s wrong.”
Lucy was putting the finishing touches on her hair and looked up with concern. “What was that?”
“I don’t know.” Charlotte started out the door. “Come with me, and we’ll see what we can find out.”
They stumbled over each other down the long marble staircase that poured into the foyer and then followed the sound of loud talking and arguing through the hall, past the dining room and parlour decked out for the coming dinner party, and into the private library. Charlotte opened the door, Lucy breathing down her neck, and stepped into the room quietly.
Their mother, the Lady of Pembleton, looked up from where she was sitting with her head in her hands on a settee. In a glance, Charlotte saw that her father was there as well, his hand on his wife’s shoulder, as well as a man dressed in plain clothing. The man was young, and Charlotte could tell from the respectful, slightly removed way that he stood with his hands folded that he was one of the many messengers who worked in the area.
“I don’t know more than what I’ve shared—” he paused suddenly when he saw the girls and looked at Lord and Lady Pembleton with a question in his eyes.
Sir Francis looked up at his daughters, hesitated for a moment, and then seemed to think better of protecting them and raised a hand to summon them into the room. Charlotte and Lucy walked in on slipper feet and sat beside their mother on the settee. It reminded Charlotte of a time when they were young and had heard of a death in the family—the awkward silence, the feeling of intrusion, the confusion.
“What happened, Mama?” She reached over and laid a hand on her mother’s arm.
Eleanor Livingston opened her mouth as though to speak, and then sank her head again into her hands and began softly crying. Francis cleared his throat uncomfortably and tried his best to fill in where his wife could not.
“Something’s become of Hester,” he said softly.
Hester Russell. The girls’ cousin on their mother’s side, and so dear to them both that, aside from parentage, they were essentially sisters. Hester was Charlotte’s age, a sweet, doe-eyed girl with brown hair and long limbs and a penchant for all living things. She had a heart of gold, and a way about her that put other people at ease. Charlotte felt her heart catch in her chest.
“Is she hurt?”
“We don’t know!” Eleanor wailed, the noise startling the uncomfortable messenger. “We don’t know anything.”
Francis reached out again and laid a hand on his wife’s arm. Turning to his daughters, he explained, “She’s run away from home. She left a note saying not to look for her, but there was no other information.”
Lucy gasped and held a delicate hand to her mouth. Charlotte wrinkled her forehead in confusion. It was so unlike Hester to do something so rash, so unexplained. A seed of doubt took root in her heart, and she wondered if perhaps there was more to this situation than met the eye.
“What did the note say exactly?” she asked, directing her question at the messenger.
The young man bowed his head nervously. “I didn’t read it, My Lady. I was just told to let you here at Pembleton know the truth of the matter—that the lady Hester Russell has gone missing, and that she left a note saying not to seek her out.”
“It will be a scandal.” Eleanor raised her head, showing a tear-streaked complexion and a well of emotion in her eyes. “This is unheard of! Why would a happy, well-adjusted girl run off and leave her parents in a place of confusion? Why would she not leave a way to contact her?”
Charlotte thought of Hester’s quiet nature and thought the action was doubly confusing. The thought had crossed her mind before, on days when her attempts at optimism failed and she wanted to be free of all that society put upon her shoulders, but she could not imagine Hester ever running off and leaving her family.
“What is being done?” she asked softly.
“The whole countryside has been mobilised to search for her,” Francis said quietly. “This messenger is one of many who were sent out to alert family in case she should contact us. Have you girls heard from her at all lately?”
Both Lucy and Charlotte shook their heads. Their mother gave a small sob into her hands and their father shook his head sadly. “The best we can hope for, then,” he said soberly, “is that she will be found before anything bad happens to her.”
“Anything bad?” Lucy asked, her voice quavering. “Like what?”
Charlotte, who knew a bit more of the world than her sister, exchanged a worried glance with her father and then laid a hand on her sister’s arm. “We don’t have to think about all the possibilities right now,” she said quickly. “We just need to focus on ways to help Hester.”
The door opened suddenly and the butler stepped into the room with an air of concern. “I’m sorry to interrupt, sir,” he said, “but General Wallace has arrived early for the dinner party and was wondering if he could steal a few moments with Lady Charlotte.”
“Now is not the time,” Charlotte said, raising her hand quickly in dismissal. “Ask the good general to wait in the parlour. I’ll be with him when this situation is handled.”
“Charlotte,” her father snapped quickly, an edge in his usually sedate tone. “That is no way to talk to or about your fiancé. Lionel has been a dear friend for many years, and as he will soon be the decision maker in your life, I think it quite acceptable that he should be here to offer advice and assistance if he can.”
Charlotte opened her mouth to object but could see that she was causing more harm than good. Why was it, after all, that she was so reluctant to have her fiancé hear the whole affair? That wasn’t the way it should be. She should feel desperately grateful for his presence and wisdom. Instead, she felt mildly annoyed and fearful of what he would think.
The general came in moments later. He was dressed perfectly in his fine uniform with the tasseled shoulders and the gold trim on a navy background. His hair, dark but mottled with grey, was swept back from his face and tied at the base of his neck. Long sideburns set off the distinguished affair, and Charlotte had to look closely to see any expression in his eyes. She wondered at that—usually eyes were the first thing she noticed about a person, but with the general they always came as an afterthought to her.
“Lord and Lady Pembleton.” He bowed austerely, directing his attention first at her parents as he always did. Then he took a few more steps into the room and bowed again in her direction. “Lady Charlotte.”
She lowered her head in brief acknowledgement. “General Wallace.”
A frown wrinkled his brow as he looked around the room at the sober faces. “I came early to take a few moments of conve
rsation with you, Lady Charlotte, but it appears I am trespassing on a private family moment.”
Charlotte didn’t open her mouth to contradict him, and so Sir Francis interjected with gusto. “Hardly. Something quite serious has befallen our family, old chap, but I assure you your advice and involvement could only be of help in solving this problem.”
The general nodded again and then sat on the same settee as Charlotte, as removed to the side as he could manage for the sake of propriety. “I’m sorry to hear as much. What has happened?”
“My cousin,” Charlotte said quickly. Something about the situation of her father and the general made her wish to speak of the events herself. She felt suddenly defensive of Hester. “She’s gone missing.”
The general looked genuinely surprised. “Miss Russell?”
“The very same.” Charlotte’s father cleared his throat. “Although ‘gone missing’ is a bit misleading. She left of her own accord it would seem, with only a brief note behind telling her family not to follow her.”
“This is most alarming indeed,” the general said. “What is being done to track her down?”
“The county has been mobilised to seek her out, but I’m not sure what else can be done under the circumstances,” Sir Francis responded.
“I will offer my assistance in any way possible,” the general interjected gallantly. “I have a network of friends across the country from my time in commission to the Crown, and I will of course spread the news at once so that they can keep their eyes out for any mention of her name. Perhaps the runaway attempt was somehow connected with a soldier. These things happen with the young and spirited.”
Charlotte felt a stab of annoyance that the general would jump to such an assumption.
“She could be in some kind of trouble,” she said slowly. “I cannot think of anything else that would have convinced Hester to do such a thing.”
“Can you not?” The general raised his dark eyebrows and levelled a stare on his soon-to-be wife. “My dear Lady Charlotte, your kindness does you credit, but you have that purposed blindness so often cultivated in the fairer sex. You are choosing to overlook warning signs that the rest of us have seen for years.”
She looked at him; blinked. “Pardon me, General, but I wasn’t aware you knew my cousin so very well. Do you run in the same circles?”
He shrugged and lowered his voice so that only she could hear. “I run in your circles, and she is dear to you. I’ve met her on occasion and was more than usually concerned with how flippant and relaxed she is about basic issues of propriety. I confess that I had been concerned about the influence she had over you, but of course now such things are behind us. We must focus on the task at hand.”
Charlotte felt a slew of retorts run through her mind. She wanted to tell him how shortsighted and bigoted he was—that Hester had never been the rebellious one in the family; on the contrary, she had always acted out of love and patience and gentleness.
Those were her main motivators. She would not have done anything just for the sake of flying in the face of propriety, and it seemed to Charlotte that the general was taking more than usual liberties in assuming he knew the situation well enough to speak.
All these thoughts simmered just below the surface, but Charlotte could not bring herself to say them. Her mother’s training, that a woman was to have few opinions and share none, was too ingrained in her psyche to be so easily thrown aside. She just looked at the general for a long moment in silence and then dropped her eyes into her lap where they could do no harm.
Chapter 3
Charlotte laid her head down on the desk for just a moment, letting her rest ever so lightly on yet another scrap of paper she was filling with notes. Her eyes slid closed for what seemed like only a minute, and then she felt a light hand on her shoulder shaking her awake. She sat up, eyes blurry, head wild, and saw her sister crouching beside the desk.
“Lottie, did you sleep here all night?”
Charlotte looked at the clock in alarm and saw that it was already eight in the morning. The sunlight from a half-drawn shade spilled over her bed but hadn’t yet reached her desk.
“Oh no,” she said, running a hand across her eyes. “I hadn’t meant to sleep so long.”
“You cannot mean that,” Lucy said with a frown, rising to her feet and going to the window to draw the shade the rest of the way open. “You’ve hardly slept at all over the last few months since we learned about Hester’s disappearance. You’re always up here scribbling letters, or out in the country talking to strangers Father tells you to avoid: it’s dangerous and reckless, and the one time I find you actually resting you’re sitting upright at your writing desk. Lottie, I’m worried.”
“It’s Charlotte,” Charlotte corrected her out of habit rather than spite. She stretched her neck to the side and felt the ripple of tension from her overnight rest shoot painfully down one shoulder. The letter she’d been working on was to a friend of the family in Dublin, an unlikely source of assistance, but some information was better than none.
“Have you had any leads at all?” Lucy asked quietly. “Anything that would make you think this strange quest of yours was justified?”
“Of course it’s justified, Lucy.” Charlotte stood up and walked stiffly across the room to the floor-length mirror in the corner. She was a sight to see, dressed in her nightgown with a walking coat over—she must have been cold last night and grabbed the nearest item of clothing—with her red hair loose and wild around her face and her eyes ringed with dark circles. “Anything to get Hester safely home again is justified.”
Lucy came and stood next to her, speaking to Charlotte in the mirror. “I know you love her, Charlotte. I do too. But if she hasn’t been found it’s because she doesn’t want to be found. It took the rest of us some time to come to terms with everything, too, but we accept it now. Hester ran away because she wanted to leave the family.” She ventured a smile in her sister’s direction. “You don’t need to look for her anymore. You could, say, take a bath? Comb your hair? Stop looking like a Scottish selkie for one day, at least?”
Charlotte turned serious eyes in her sister’s direction. “This isn’t a joke, Lucy. This isn’t about me, either. It’s about Hester, and I’m telling you Hester Russell wouldn’t have run away from her family if there wasn’t a reason.” She took a deep breath, knowing what her family thought of her most recent theory. “I still think she was kidnapped.”
“Charlotte—”
“No, hear me out.” Charlotte ran across the room and fumbled through some pages she’d found during the last few months of research. “Look at this—something similar happened just last year in Derbyshire—a girl disappeared and it was later discovered that she had been kidnapped. Then, only a few years before that, another young lady missing. It was all a ploy to get money out of the family; a ransom tactic.”
Lucy frowned. “If they wanted ransom, wouldn’t we have heard from her by now?”
“You’re parroting Father,” Charlotte said crisply, unable to keep the edge out of her voice. “In the two cases I mentioned the girl never made contact, and the kidnappers didn’t either. Their initial plan was thrown away when they decided to keep the lady for more nefarious means. What if Hester is a pawn in some game; if she is kept captive somewhere against her will? I would never be able to live with myself if I learned that was the case, and I can’t imagine how you all find yourself so comfortable with that situation.”
Tears came into Lucy’s eyes, and Charlotte felt an instant stab of remorse. She reached out and laid a hand on her sister’s arm. “I didn’t mean it like that,” she said softly. “I just mean that we should be taking this whole thing more seriously than we are.”
“Father says she doesn’t want to be found.”
Charlotte sighed and dropped the pages she’d picked up back onto the bedspread. She didn’t want to argue anymore. Every conversation since they’d first heard of Hester’s disappearance had gone the same in the
house. Everyone thought she’d run off to make some sort of rebellious point, and they thought she’d come back home when she’d had her fill of the hardship outside the walls of the Russell mansion. It hadn’t happened, though, and every day that passed filled Charlotte with more dread.
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