by Mary Balogh
“Matthew has admitted the truth?” Fleur said.
“To all intents and purposes,” his grace said. “I don’t believe you have anything more to fear from him, Fl … Miss Bradshaw.”
She put her hands up over her face and listened to Miriam’s bright laughter. She was aware of Daniel crossing the room to shake the duke by the hand.
“What a wonderful morning this is,” Miriam was saying. “I felt guilty about closing the school, but now I am very glad I did so.” Her voice seemed very far away.
“She needs to sit down,” another voice was saying, and strong hands were taking her by the arms and lowering her to a chair. And one of those hands cupped the back of her head and forced it down close to her knees. “It’s all over, Fleur. I told you you were safe.”
THE DUKE OF RIDGEWAY liked Miriam Booth. She appeared to be just the sort of friend Fleur needed. She was sensible, practical, cheerful, affectionate. Once Fleur had recovered from her partial fainting spell, Miriam took her off to her room for a while, despite her protests.
He was not so sure he liked Daniel Booth. The man was blond and handsome, quiet and gentle. Yes, all the qualities to make women fall in love with him. Combined with his clerical garb, they might well be irresistible to most women, his grace conceded.
And he cared about Fleur. As soon as the women had left the room, he asked detailed and perceptive questions until the whole story was told.
“Such a man ought not to be the social leader of a community,” he said. “He ought to be prosecuted. Unfortunately, to do so would be to cause Isabella further stress. One must accept the arrangement you have made as satisfactory, I suppose.”
“Those are my conclusions too,” his grace said. “Personally I would like to take the man apart limb from limb and bone from bone, but that, again, would not be in Miss Bradshaw’s best interests.”
The Reverend Booth looked at him with very direct eyes, which seemed to see through to his soul.
“Miss Bradshaw ought not to remain here,” the duke said, “though I am quite sure she is in no danger from her cousin. It would not be appropriate for a lady of her rank to return to my home as my daughter’s governess. I plan to find Brocklehurst and persuade him to release a sizable allowance to her until she gains control of all her fortune at the age of twenty-five. Failing that, I shall try to place her with an older lady as a companion.”
Again those eyes looked into his soul and saw everything.
“I believe you have done more than an employer is called upon to do for those dependent upon him,” the Reverend Booth said. “Isabella has been fortunate. But she is among friends again now. My sister and I have discussed plans for her future. Now that we know she will not be going to trial, we can present those plans to her for her approval.”
And one of those plans involved the curate’s marrying Fleur, his grace thought. And perhaps she would marry him, too, if she could somehow get past a certain event that had taken place in her life in London. And perhaps it would be the very best thing that could happen to her. She had been going to marry the man before the death of Brocklehurst’s valet had changed everything. She probably loved him, and he appeared to care for her.
The duke was not at all sure he liked Daniel Booth.
He should take his leave. There really was no further reason for staying, especially if her friends were willing to help her settle somewhere other than Heron House. He should wait until she reappeared, say a formal good-bye to her, and then begin his journey home.
He could be back at Willoughby less than a week after leaving. Back with Pamela. Back perhaps before Thomas left, in time to offer Sybil some sort of support in the agony she would suffer when he did so. Not that she would allow him near her, of course.
He should go back and try to begin the process of forgetting. It must be done soon. Why defer it?
And yet he accepted an invitation to luncheon and retold his story to an almost silent Fleur and a brightly curious Miss Booth. Fleur looked not nearly as relieved or excited as she should have looked. But of course, the stress of months had only just been lifted from her shoulders. It must be difficult to adjust her mind to the knowledge that it was over, that she was free.
And of course it was not over. The scars would remain for a long time. And one fact would remain with her for a lifetime. He met her eyes across the table as Miriam talked, and saw doubt there and pain. And he wanted to reach out a hand to her and ask her what it was, how he might help her.
But he could not help her. He returned his eyes to his plate. When all the events of the past months had been sorted through, it would be obvious to her that he was the only person who had done her permanent harm. Perhaps the thought had already struck her.
He should take his leave immediately after luncheon.
“So you will take the cottage that used to be Miss Galen’s, Isabella?” Miriam Booth was saying. “And help me at the school, as we originally planned? That will be splendid for a while, will it not? Until other arrangements can be made, that is. Perhaps under the circumstances Lord Brocklehurst can be persuaded to consent to …” She smiled. “Well, perhaps he will not act quite the tyrant he has always been.”
“I will have to think, Miriam,” Fleur said. “Yes, I think that would be a good idea. I always did love Miss Galen’s cottage. All those roses!”
“Can’t you see that Isabella’s mind is in a spin, Miriam?” the Reverend Booth asked quietly. “She needs time to think about her future. I have to return to the village. This is my afternoon for visiting the sick. Are you coming with me?”
Miriam pushed her chair back and got to her feet. “Yes,” she said. “Unless you would like me to stay with you, Isabella?”
Fleur shook her head and smiled.
The Reverend Booth too got to his feet and looked inquiringly at the duke.
“I will begin my journey home this afternoon, then,” his grace said. “Would you care for a stroll in the garden first, Miss Bradshaw?”
“Yes,” she said without looking at him.
The Reverend Booth looked full at him, and the duke knew that he did not like the man at all.
“IT WAS GOOD OF YOU to come,” Fleur said, “and to do what you have done. Thank you, your grace.”
They were strolling side by side in the formal gardens, not touching. They had seen the Reverend Booth and Miriam on their way back to the village.
“You are not happy,” he said. “What is it?”
“Of course I am happy,” she said. “How could I not be? For several months I have lived with the conviction that I would hang sooner or later. It is not a pleasant prospect. One finds oneself wondering about all the morbid details. And I returned here yesterday to find everyone looking at me as if I were a murderer and a thief. It will be something to have my name cleared.”
“Yes,” he said, and walked beside her in silence for a while. “What is it?”
She did not answer for a long while. “I came here to try to come to terms with what happened,” she said finally, “or perhaps to look for some evidence to prove my innocence. It seems that I do not need that evidence any longer. But there are so many unanswered questions. And I have come up against a brick wall here.”
“Explain,” he said.
“My maid has gone to other employment,” she said. “She is the one who discovered the jewels. I wanted to know where the jewels were. Were they carefully hidden, or were they on top? If I were the thief, I would have to be dreadfully stupid to lay them on top, wouldn’t I?”
“Was your trunk locked?” he asked.
“No, of course not,” she said. “I was going only as far as the rectory.”
“And it was left in an untended gig outside the house?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said. “Yes, of course. I would have had to be very foolish to leave costly jewels in just such a way. I would surely have smuggled them out some other way or hidden them on my person. But I don’t know what the pieces were or how large
they were. Anyway, Annie is gone and I cannot ask her any questions.”
“An annoyance,” he said. “I will have her found if it is important to you.”
“Mr. Houghton?” she said, smiling fleetingly. “No, that is not the main frustration. The worst thing is that I cannot find Hobson.”
“The valet?” he said. “He is not six feet beneath the churchyard?”
“He was taken to his own home for burial,” she said. “But no one seems to know where that is. The groom who took the coffin there has since gone to Yorkshire, and the coachman who drove Matthew there is still with him. It was Yardley, the man now in Yorkshire, who helped Matthew lay out the body and seal it in the coffin.”
“Was it, indeed?” he said.
“Somehow it is important to me to see his grave,” she said. “You see, I did not murder him, but I did kill him. Had I not been hysterical and pushed him, he would not have fallen and he would not have died. I killed him. I was the instrument of his death. Somehow I have to learn to live with that on my conscience. I have to come to terms with it. I have to see his grave.”
“You cannot shift the burden from your shoulders by telling yourself that the man brought his fate on himself and that your cousin was also responsible?” he said. “You cannot tell yourself that you were in no way to blame at all?”
“Yes,” she said. “With my head I can. But the knowledge that I pushed him and that he died will always be with me. I know it is foolish. I will not detain you, your grace. You must be eager to be on your way and have as much daylight as possible for your journey.”
“There must be someone who knows where the valet came from,” his grace said. “Did he have friends among the servants? In the village?”
“I don’t know,” she said.
“Then we must find out,” he said. “I must try to emulate my secretary and discover all there is to be discovered. I shall ask around in the village. Will you question the servants again?”
“I have spoken with most of them already,” she said. “They know nothing, and it has to be remembered that they are Matthew’s servants, not mine. Besides, this is none of your concern, your grace. You wish to be on your way.”
“Do I?” he said, stopping on the graveled path and taking both her hands in his. “I want to see you happy, Fleur, and completely free. I can’t leave you until I know that you are both.”
“But why?” she asked, looking wide-eyed into his eyes.
“You know very well why,” he said fiercely, squeezing her hands until they hurt before turning to stride in the direction of the stables.
She ran to catch up to him. “Because of what you did to me?” she said. “But I was standing outside the theater for that very purpose. If it had not been you, it would have been someone else. Perhaps not that night. But the night after.”
He stopped suddenly and took her hands once again. “Thank God it was me,” he said, his eyes burning into hers. “If it had to be anyone, then thank God it was me.” He released her hands. “I shall return early in the morning,” he said. “I hope I will be able to bring you some information.”
He strode away again, and this time she did not follow. She stood looking after him.
And there was one thought uppermost in her mind. There was to be a reprieve of one day. Tomorrow he would say good-bye and would be gone forever. But not today. Not quite yet.
Tomorrow.
WE ARE PLEASED TO SEE YOU BACK HOME, MISS, if you will pardon me for saying so.” The little maid who had been sent to take Annie’s place was hanging up in the wardrobe the muslin day dress Fleur had just removed. Her manner was suddenly confidential. “As Ted Jackson said, you could not be guilty of those things you are supposed to be guilty of if you have come back of your own accord. Not that most of us thought you were guilty anyway, miss.”
Fleur came out of a deep reverie. “Thank you, Mollie,” she said. “It is kind of you to say so.”
Mollie’s voice lowered and became even more confidential, though the door of Fleur’s dressing room was firmly closed and no other servant probably anywhere near it. “And if you was to ask me, miss,” she said, “I would say that Mr. Hobson got no more than he deserved. I never did like him. He always thought he was God’s gift to women.”
Hobson had been a handsome man in his own way. Mollie could not be described as a pretty girl, by any stretch of the imagination. Fleur guessed that the maid had been spurned by him at some time.
“He expected favors for nothing in return,” Mollie said, confirming her suspicions. “But I never would listen to his sweet talk, miss, though he tried it on me more than once.”
“Did he?” Fleur had spent another frustrating two hours since the Duke of Ridgeway had left, questioning the servants. She was tired, and she wished she had said nothing to him. By now he would be on his way back to Dorsetshire and she would be able to start thinking about the rest of her life. As it was, he was coming back the next morning, and she was unable even to feel the full elation that his story should have brought her. “Did he ever talk about himself, Mollie?”
“All the time,” the girl said. “It was his favorite subject, miss.”
The words were spoken with such spite that Fleur smiled despite herself.
“His father made good over at Wroxford,” Mollie said, “as a butcher, miss, and that was how Mr. Hobson was able to get such a grand position as gentleman’s man. But for all that, he had no cause to put on such airs.”
“So that is where he is from?” Fleur said. “Wroxford?”
“Oh!” Mollie’s hand came across her mouth with a loud slap. “Mr. Chapman will kill me. He said we was to remember who was paying our wages and say nothing.”
“To me?” Fleur said. “You were to say nothing to me?”
“On account of the fact that his lordship will be packing you off to jail as soon as he comes home, miss,” Mollie said. “Though I don’t think you deserve to go there. And nor do most of the others, miss. Mr. Chapman is going to kill me for sure.”
“The butler will hear nothing from my lips, Mollie,” Fleur said. “And I do thank you for telling me as much as you have. That is where Hobson is buried, then?”
“I suppose so, miss,” Mollie said. “I don’t rightly know or care. Wroxford is all of thirty miles away. I would not walk thirty yards to put flowers on his grave. I prefer Ted Jackson to him any day of the year, even if Ted is only an undergardener. Ted treats a girl as if she is special.”
Fleur got to her feet and brushed at the skirt of her silk evening dress. She did not really know why she had changed, since she would be dining alone. But it did feel good to be a lady again, to be surrounded by all her own familiar possessions.
“I must go down to dinner,” she said. “Thank you, Mollie. I will not need you later. You may have a free evening, unless someone else finds something for you to do belowstairs. Does Ted have a free evening too?” She smiled.
The girl grinned at her in conspiratorial manner. “That he does, miss,” she said. She crossed the room ahead of Fleur, but hesitated when her hand was on the doorknob. She looked about the room as if she expected to see the butler and perhaps a few other servants hiding behind the furniture. “I was a particular friend of Annie’s, miss. She looked after me, like, when I was new here.”
“Yes?” Fleur looked at the girl’s flushed cheeks.
“That night,” Mollie said, “you had left a pair of gloves in your dressing room, miss. Annie ran down to the gig with them and put them inside your trunk, on top.”
“Did she?” Fleur said.
“There was no jewels in there then,” the girl continued, “but when Annie opened the trunk later, the jewels was there, on top of the gloves. And just when she opened the trunk, his lordship and Mr. Chapman came into your room without knocking. She told them what I have just told you, miss. The next day she was sent away. She was frightened, and she told me, but she said I had better not say anything. They had given her a lot of money.”<
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“Had they?” Fleur said.
“Mr. Chapman will kill me if he finds out, miss,” Mollie said.
“Well, he won’t,” Fleur said. “I believe that before many days have passed, Mollie, Lord Brocklehurst himself will make clear to everyone that the matter of the jewels was an entire misunderstanding. But even so, I am glad to have had some proof of the matter myself. Thank you. You are the bravest of the servants in this house, and I will not forget it.”
Wroxford, she thought as she walked downstairs to dinner. Thirty miles away. And Mollie was right. Thirty yards would be too far to go to see Hobson’s grave. Except that she had killed him, and no man, however bad, she believed, deserved death at another’s hands. She must at least try to ease her conscience by kneeling at his grave.
Thirty miles. She would not be able to go there and back all within one day.
“BUT WROXFORD MUST BE thirty or thirty-five miles away,” the Reverend Booth said. “I cannot at all understand your wish to go there, Isabella. All you will see there is a grave, and perhaps a headstone. Why travel thirty miles for that?”
It was quite early the following morning. Fleur had found herself unable to wait at home for someone to call upon her. She wanted to be on her way. She would not be able to rest or know any final peace of mind until she had been to Wroxford.
“When I ran away,” she said, “it was as if I left behind an unfinished story. I have the feeling that nothing is ended despite what his grace said yesterday. And I think I will still have this feeling even after Matthew has made his statement. I was involved in a death and did not stay for the funeral. I think that is one reason for funerals, isn’t it—to help those left behind accept the reality of the death.”
“You are fortunate enough to have been granted a reprieve,” the Reverend Booth said. “Why not put it all behind you, Isabella? Why not start fresh today, forget everything that has gone before?”
