by Sue Lyndon
Papa collected the letter from the tray on which it rested, opened it and quickly read the contents. His brows knitted with worry as he read, and Cammie wondered what it might be about. To her credit, however, she kept her tongue and did not ask. Papa would share with her what she needed to know, nothing more, nothing less.
Papa folded the letter and put it back on the tray before speaking to Cammie. “My apologies, my dear, I am going to have to cancel our outing today. There is an issue which requires my immediate attention, and I will be spending the better part of the day with my solicitor.”
“Oh no, Papa. I hope that nothing is wrong,” Cammie said, her mind spinning with this change in plans.
“Nothing for you to be concerned about. My only regret is that we will not be able to spend the day together. However, I expect to be home by dinner time and I will look forward to seeing you then. I apologize that we will not be able to go to back to Mrs. Stilton’s shop today, but I promise that when we go tomorrow, I will buy you an extra special present to make up for it. How would that be?”
A whole day to herself to get to the milliner’s shop and pass her message to Priscilla. Cammie worked hard not to show her excitement. Even with the promise of a special present, Papa would be hurt if she did not appear disappointed at missing out on a day with him. All she really cared about was getting to the millinery today. Nonetheless, she gave Papa a sad smile and said, “Of course, Papa. I will miss you.”
As Papa left the room, he looked at her. “Now, Cammie, you are not to leave this house without my permission. And since I will not be here to give permission, that means you are not to leave this house at all. There is plenty for you to do to keep you occupied and out of trouble. You have toys, games and books in your bedroom. It would not hurt for you to practice on the piano, either. I am sure you do not need me to remind you how disappointed I will be if you do not follow my directions.”
Cammie’s bottom clenched up in response to the implications of Papa’s words. “Oh, I do not need a reminder, Papa. I am well aware. You have a good day and I hope everything goes well with the solicitor. I will see you at dinner time.”
Papa leaned down and placed a kiss upon her forehead before leaving the room.
Cammie pushed the food around on her breakfast plate until she was certain Papa’s carriage had left. Then she hurried from the breakfast room up to her bedroom where she collected a few things for her journey and also made a hasty stop in Papa’s library where she found paper and a quill and wrote a note for Robert in case she was not able to speak to him directly.
While seated at Papa’s desk, she had remembered the money he kept in one of the drawers. She had a beautiful home and servants and her dear brother had to work as a delivery man. Surely it would not be too wrong to try to assist him, would it?
And now she stood upon the sidewalk in the morning sun nervously waiting for the delivery wagon operated by her brother, Robert.
She tapped her foot and tried not to notice the passersby who glanced curiously at her standing alone in front of Mrs. Stilton’s millinery. Peeking through the shop window, she noticed Priscilla and gave a slight wave. The shopgirl hurried out the front door.
“Lady Cavendish,” she said, “will you not come into the store? You ought not to be out here alone, especially not in the heat of the day.”
Cammie smiled at the young lady. “Has Robert the delivery man arrived yet?” she asked.
Priscilla pulled back and gaped at her. “I beg your pardon, Lady Cavendish, but why is he of interest to you? Are you expecting some particular wares?”
“N-no,” Cammie said, realizing she had spoken too soon and had made Priscilla suspicious. “I am simply curious about him.”
“Why would a lady like you be curious about a delivery man?” Priscilla put her hands on her hips, appraising Cammie skeptically. “I knew something did not seem proper about you. Is it not enough for you to be married to Lord Cavendish, you must also seek the attention of my beau?”
“No, it is not what you think.” Cammie reached into her bag and pulled out the letter addressed to Robert as well as a handful of banknotes which she waved at Priscilla. “Please, give these to him.”
Priscilla’s mouth hung open. “I will do no such thing. How dare you? Do you think because you are rich you can purchase anything...or anyone...you wish?”
“Please,” Cammie said. “I have explained it all in this letter.”
“Get away from me.” Priscilla turned to go back to her job. Desperate, Cammie grabbed her hand and pressed the bills and letter into it, but Priscilla kept her fingers clenched in a fist.
“You there,” a deep voice accosted her, followed by a firm hand on her upper arm. “What are you about?”
“Robert, she was asking after you. What is the meaning of this? Who is she to you?” Priscilla was practically in hysterics, angry tears glistened in the corners of her eyes.
“Priscilla,” he said, ignoring Cammie but not loosening his grip on her arm, “I have no idea what you are talking about.” He gave Cammie a cursory glance before turning back to Priscilla. “I have never seen this woman before in my life.”
“Priscilla! What on earth are you doing? And causing a scene in front of my shop no less. Oh my heavens. Lady Cavendish, is that you? Unhand her.” Mrs. Stilton exited her store and charged at Robert, wrapping both her hands around his so that Cammie now had two people and three hands tussling over her right arm.
“Please,” she said, “I can explain.”
* * *
Alexander peeked out the carriage window, relieved that Ashton Manor was finally in sight. He had spent the morning meeting with his solicitor and he was glad to be returning home earlier than expected. The matter had not been nearly as dire as his solicitor had made it out to be and Alexander had explained quite succinctly his displeasure at having his plans disrupted. However, he was pleased that the whole day had not been wasted. He had told Cammie not to expect him until shortly before dinner, and he couldn’t wait to see her face when he surprised her.
He glanced at the wrapped package in his hands, which contained some brand new sheet music for her to try on the piano. Once he’d learned Cammie knew how to play, he’d had his mother’s old piano tuned and brought into the drawing room. His little bride had put on several performances for him in the proceeding days, sometimes even singing along as she played.
He smiled to himself. Since her arrival, she’d filled Ashton Manor with an abundance of joy and light. His whole life had changed the moment she’d walked into it, and for the better. He couldn’t recall having ever felt so happy and complete. His breath caught. Cammie was the other half of his soul. God, he loved her. He told her so every day and took pleasure in the slight flush that always stained her cheeks when she demurely said she loved him in return.
The carriage pulled to a stop, and Alexander exited before his footman had a chance to open the door. He was too excited to see Cammie and give her the present. His footman stood awkwardly beside the carriage, giving him a strange look, as Alexander rushed up the steps of his home.
But Cammie was nowhere to be found. She wasn’t in the drawing room. Nor was she in her bedroom, or his bedroom. Alexander called out her name as he rushed around the house, only for his butler to approach him with a worried expression.
“I’m afraid I haven’t seen her since breakfast, my lord. None of the servants have. She appears to be…missing.”
Missing? No, she couldn’t be. Where would she have gone? He’d told her that she wasn’t to leave the premises of Ashton Manor by herself without permission. He searched the gardens one last time. Still no sign of her. Frowning, he stormed through the house, calling her name, as he approached his library. Since she had plenty of books in her room, she never tended to venture there unless he invited her, and he had forbidden her from touching his desk. But perhaps she had disobeyed and was now hiding there, not daring to come out because she didn’t want a spanking.
He burst into his library and scanned the spacious room.
“Cammie! If you keep hiding from me, I promise your punishment will be much worse than I’m already planning.” He approached his desk, noting the contents on the top were out of place. His quill and ink were shifted to the left, and a stack of correspondence had been toppled over. He didn’t have a direct view of the area behind his desk, and he surmised she must be hiding there.
“Cammie, I am quickly losing my patience. I’m going to count to three, little girl, and if you don’t come out from your hiding place, I will take a strap to you.”
He heard no movement, not even a catch of her breath. Very well. He would start counting. It angered him that the first time he’d left her alone, she’d misbehaved and not only entered his library, but had disturbed the contents on his desk and continued hiding from him. Another step forward, and he noticed one of the top drawers had been opened as well, fueling his anger even further. He was a man of order and conducted much of his business from his library. It wasn’t a playroom and Cammie had a lot of explaining to do.
“One…two…three.” He cleared his throat. “Very well, then. I will fetch you myself, and I doubt once I’m through with you that you’ll be sitting comfortably for quite some time.”
He strode for his large mahogany desk and rounded it, only to discover Cammie wasn’t hiding there as he’d suspected. A cold hand of worry clutched his heart. Several of the desk drawers were opened, including the one where he kept coins and banknotes. He gathered the scattered notes and thumbed through the stack. Some of the money was missing. Not a huge amount, but enough that he would have noticed, even if his desk would have been left in pristine condition.
His worry deepened. Cammie was missing, and someone had stolen from him.
Though he trusted his staff, many of whom had served his family since before his parents’ passing, he kept the drawer locked and the key hidden behind a small painting in his library. However, he’d retrieved the key in question once while Cammie had been in his company.
His heart ached from the evidence of his little wife’s betrayal. Had she stolen from him and run off? He replayed their last few interactions in his mind, for some indication that she’d been planning this, or any hints that she’d been unhappy in their marriage. She’d been rather quiet during breakfast, now that he thought about it. He also still had a nagging suspicion that she hadn’t been honest with him about what had happened at the millinery shop when she’d disobeyed him and knocked over the gloves. This additional thought troubled him further in this moment, though he still couldn’t gather why she’d jumped out of her seat and run across the shop without any warning, or what it had to do with her sudden disappearance and thievery.
“Oh, Cammie,” he whispered, his voice raspy with grief. “Oh, Cammie, what have you done?”
Alexander looked up from his desk and saw his butler standing in the doorway.
“Lord Cavendish, would you like the carriage readied?” The man pressed his lips together in a show of decorum. At least the servant had the tact not to say, “Would you like a carriage readied so you can hunt down your missing, thieving wife?”
“Yes. Right away.” Alexander found the key beneath his chair. Cammie must have left in a hurry. Had she returned to Talcott House? Or…had she decided to go shopping?
He thought of their recent trip to the millinery shop, and the punishment which had followed. Although she had accepted his discipline and the butt plug without too much fuss, and she had behaved perfectly ever since, he had indeed sensed she was holding something back from him. He had to believe that whatever secret she was keeping related to her disappearance as well as the missing money. But even with those clues he was flummoxed at trying to decipher her motive or plan. He doubted she’d taken the money to get herself a hat. She had many new hats in her sizeable closet, most of which she hadn’t even worn yet. Besides that, she had never shown a predisposition for material things. She always seemed overwhelmingly grateful for every little comfort or bobble he gave her. God, where had she gone?
Her disappearance gutted him.
He left the package that contained the music sheets on his messy desk and bounded outside for the carriage.
“To Talcott House,” he told the driver. “As fast as possible.”
“Of course, my lord,” the driver said, climbing up to his seat. Alexander entered the carriage, the footman closing the door behind him seconds before the wheels started rolling.
The hat shop was on the way to Talcott House. On the slim chance she’d gone shopping, perhaps he would spot her in the street. She had seemed to make a connection with the shopgirl there. Perhaps she had needed some companionship with a girl near her own age, though Alexander would prefer it to be the wife or daughter of one of his neighbors rather than a common shopgirl. He chided himself for being remiss in introducing her to ladies of her own station. He had been selfish in keeping her to himself.
Of course, her running off to Talcott House didn’t make sense either. They were man and wife. She belonged to him. Didn’t she realize he would track her to the very ends of the Earth? And if she truly meant to elude him, surely she must know that would be the first place he looked.
Anxiety knotted in his stomach. He gazed out the carriage windows, moving right and left between each of the two sides of the street, desperate to find her. He had dressed her in a yellow gown that morning. He looked for a flash of yellow and hoped she hadn’t changed before leaving Ashton Manor. Changing clothes by herself was also strictly against his rules, but given current events, he supposed he wouldn’t be surprised to find her wearing a different dress. But still, he had yet to spot a slight feminine figure that resembled his little Cammie, and as the minutes ticked by and the carriage barreled through the streets, his apprehension grew.
What if something bad had happened to her after she ran off? Dire possibilities swirled through his head. Please God, let me find her. Let me find her unharmed. She’d lived a sheltered life in Talcott House and had obviously left his estate on foot. What if she had ventured into a disreputable part of town? He couldn’t bear the thought of any harm coming to his sweet little girl, and when he finally found her he would…he would what?
Cold fear gripped him. Maybe she’d had a change of heart.
What if she’d run off because she didn’t want to be his little girl anymore?
No, he told himself. No, that couldn’t be the reason she was gone. There had to be another explanation. Yet he couldn’t come up with a reason for the missing money and her absence that made any more sense than her having had a change of heart.
“Stop!” he shouted, banging on the carriage roof.
There she was. Standing near the hat stop, in her yellow dress, her matching yellow parasol lying on the sidewalk while Mrs. Stilton and a young man he had never seen grappled with his wife’s arm and Mrs. Stilton’s shopgirl glared at Cammie.
* * *
Alexander tumbled from the carriage before it came to a stop. He hit the sidewalk at a dead run and sent both Mrs. Stilton and the heathen of a man who had dared touch his wife tumbling to the ground when he grabbed Cammie from their grasp.
Tucking Cammie behind him protectively, he squared his shoulders and put up his fists. From the corner of his eye he could see that a crowd of curious onlookers had gathered. This was hardly the behavior expected of a gentleman of his status, but where his wife’s safety was at issue, he cared not for public opinion and prepared to defend her, with his own life if necessary.
“Come on,” he goaded the other man as he stood up, “let’s see if you are as brave when attacking a man as you are about attacking a helpless woman.”
“Sir, I assure you I did not attack her, I was simply attempting to prevent her from harming Priscilla,” he said, nodding toward the shopgirl.
“Rubbish. What sort of coward blames a woman for his troubles? Get over here and defend yourself.” He waved his fists in the air like a crazed
pugilist, waiting for the other man to engage in the fight, never letting his guard down.
“My lord.” Cammie tugged at the tail of his coat.
“Not now, Cammie,” he said, giving her a quick glance. It was enough of a distraction however, for the other man to see an advantage and he took a swing, landing an impressive blow to Alexander’s jaw, sending him backward on top of Cammie who had been unable to get out of the way fast enough.
Alexander recovered quickly, though. By this time, the driver and footmen had joined the fracas, forming a perimeter around him while he rubbed his jaw and regained his footing, his fists were in the air again.
“Cammie,” he ordered, “get in the carriage and wait for me there.” Turning to his servants he said, “See to Lady Cavendish’s safety. I shall handle this matter myself.”
Tears were streaming down Cammie’s face and she clung to his arm. “Cammie,” he assured her, “I shall be fine. Please do as I tell you.”
“My lord,” she implored him, “he is my brother.”
* * *
It was an odd gathering around the tea table in Mrs. Stilton’s parlor. Cammie was overwhelmed with misery over all the trouble she had caused, and dreaded the punishment she knew awaited her upon her return to Ashton Manor. For right now, however, she did not care. Her heart sung at being seated next to her brother.
“Jane, I never would have recognized you,” he said. His use of her birth name gave her pause. “You have grown up into a beautiful young woman.”
“Thank you.” She blushed. His praise meant everything to her. “I am sorry for the confusion I created,” she said, looking around the table and making eye contact with each person, including Papa who sat on her other side. Sandwiched between her brother and her husband, Cammie felt whole and complete, utterly content.
“I am sorry for being suspicious of you,” Priscilla said. “I could not imagine any reason why Lady Cavendish would be curious about Robert.” Her loving gaze landed on Cammie’s brother.
