A Final Rest

by Blythe Baker

  “There is little to tell,” Miss Brown said softly, refusing to look Aunt Augusta in the eyes. “I did not steal anything. I would never take something that did not belong to me.”

  Aunt Augusta huffed, and Nicholas frowned at his grandmother, though his admonition did little to stifle her anger.

  “I stayed close to her like you asked me to, Lady Ashton, but I only opened her jewelry box to place her earrings in it as she already stated. Beyond that, I did not go near it.” She finished her statement with a small bow and stepped back into the shadows around the edges of the room.

  Lady Ashton smiled kindly at the woman, and then turned to Aunt Augusta. “I have no reason to suspect Miss Brown would steal from you, Aunt Augusta, so I have to believe her until I have reason to think otherwise. I am happy to assist you in searching for the necklace, but beyond that, there is nothing I can do.”

  “Start searching in her quarters,” Aunt Augusta shouted—as much as her weak lungs would allow, anyway. She pointed a crooked finger at the woman. “I’m sure we will find it straightaway.”

  Lady Ashton began to shake her head, but Miss Brown interrupted before she could say anything. “I shall gladly allow it if it will clear my name.”

  “Miss Brown,” Lady Ashton said, frowning. “I do not want to disrespect you in that way—”

  “Do it and be done with it,” Lord Ashton said. He had not even bothered to look up from his paper, but he waved a hand over the top and continued. “If we find the necklace, she will be dismissed at once. If we do not, then the matter will be put to rest, and we will not discuss it again.”

  The color drained from Miss Brown’s face at the suggestion of her dismissal, but she nodded. “That sounds fair to me.”

  Aunt Augusta’s top lip curled back. “Fine, but it must be done immediately. Before she has a chance to hide the necklace.”

  Lady Ashton looked longingly towards the breakfast table for a moment. She deserved a long rest more than anyone in the house. Every moment had been filled with entertaining guests and keeping Catherine from dissolving into a puddle of worry. Yet, another crisis called.

  Lady Ashton led Miss Brown towards the hallway where the servant’s quarters were located. Just before they left the room, she turned and gestured for me to follow, as well.

  “Would you mind assisting in the search, Rose? You have a keen eye for this kind of thing.”

  I wanted nothing more than to remain out of the matter altogether, but I would not refuse my aunt anything when she had so much to worry about. I followed Nicholas and his grandmother down the hall, and when I heard footsteps behind me, turned to see Alice in my wake. I wanted to tell her to go back to the dining room, but knew it would do no good.

  Miss Brown’s room was small and tidy. Her bed was made, the blankets tucked under the corners, and she had three identical dresses hanging in a small closet with an extra pair of thick-heeled shoes sitting neatly on the floor. There was no chest of drawers or trunks to search. Just a wooden table with a lamp and a Bible next to the bed and the closet. Everyone stood outside the room in the hallway while I stepped inside and spun in a circle twice.

  “Search,” Aunt Augusta urged. She turned to Lady Ashton. “What is she waiting for?”

  “There is nowhere to hide anything in here,” I said. “Unless you want to tear up the floorboards.”

  “Perhaps, it is on her person,” Aunt Augusta said, turning slowly to Miss Brown, milky eyes narrowed. She was leaning especially heavily on Nicholas now. It would not be long before she’d need to take a seat and rest. She’d just woken up, but already the day had been a busy one.

  “I will not have her searched like a criminal when there is no proof she did anything wrong,” Lady Ashton said. She stepped into the small room herself and then moved towards the closet. She slid each dress one at a time towards the right side of the closet.

  “There,” Aunt Augusta said, pointing to the closet. “That is my dress hanging in her closet.”

  Nicholas Whitlock moved forward at once, stepping into the room and offering to search in Lady Ashton’s place. He pulled a long, dark velvet gown identical to the one Augusta had on from the back of Miss Brown’s closet. “This gown?”

  “I was going to clean it for her,” Miss Brown said in her defense. “There was a mud stain on the hem from her walk yesterday, and I brought it down to brush it away. I was going to return it to her closet this afternoon.”

  “That is a reasonable explanation.” Nicholas laid the dress over his arm and turned to his grandmother. She scowled and instructed him to continue searching.

  Nicholas sighed, shrugged his shoulders at me in apology, and began to search. Or, search as much as possible in the small space. Lady Ashton returned to the closet, running her hands uselessly along the walls, and I flipped through the pages of Miss Brown’s Bible. Many passages were underlined, and she had written copious notes in the margins. Once I finished with the Bible, I circled a finger around the inside of the lampshade and then bent down to check on the underside of the table, as well. There was nothing.

  Nicholas was checking the bed, following his grandmother’s instructions as she asked him to remove Miss Brown’s pillow case, massage the pillow to see if she had sewn the necklace inside the stuffing, and look underneath the mattress.

  “Aunt Augusta,” Lady Ashton said when the old woman suggested we cut open the mattress. “I do not believe we are going to find anything here. The room is spotless. If it was here, we would have found it—”

  “Oh dear.”

  Lady Ashton went quiet, and everyone in the room and waiting in the hallway went silent, as well. We turned to watch as Nicholas Whitlock grabbed something from under the mattress and stood up. His hand uncurled slightly, and a gold chain fell out of his grip. And hanging from the chain was a golden oval-shaped locket.

  “That is mine,” Aunt Augusta said at once, her voice breaking the quiet.

  I could see Miss Brown standing behind her, face drained of color, eyes wide in shock. She said nothing, but shook her head.

  “No,” Lady Ashton said, in obvious dismay. “Surely not.”

  “It is.” Augusta stepped forward on shaky legs, gripping the door frame as she reached out and took the necklace from Nicholas. “This is my mother’s necklace.”

  She held it into the air, and I got a better look at it. The gold was tarnished, and there was a setting in the center of the locket where a gem was once set, but it was now empty. The necklace was worthless. The only value it held was sentimental, and yet, Miss Brown had taken it. Why?

  Lady Ashton asked the same question. “Why, Miss Brown?”

  There were tears in the young woman’s eyes now. Her timidity began to fade as desperation took over. She pushed through the crowd of onlookers, shoving aside Alice, who was watching the proceedings with hungry eyes. “I didn’t take it. I wouldn’t. I have no idea how it ended up there.”

  “Liar,” Aunt Augusta said, tucking the necklace into her pocket. “I will leave you to pack your things. Lady Ashton, you may want to check the rest of her belongings and make sure she is not leaving with any of your precious valuables.”

  Miss Brown let out a sob as Aunt Augusta and a sober looking Nicholas left the room together. Alice was still clinging to the doorframe, enthralled and horrified.

  “I swear I didn’t take it,” Miss Brown said, clutching at Lady Ashton’s hands. “You must believe me.”

  I could see in my aunt’s face that she was weary and wanted nothing more than to trust the woman who had done her utmost to make her life easier over the last few months. Miss Brown had assisted the family through some of their darkest days, and Lady Ashton had come to view Miss Brown as more than an employee. However, I could also see that she was torn.

  “Lady Ashton?” Miss Brown asked, her voice breaking.

  My aunt shook her head. “I…I’m not sure what I am supposed to do.”

  Miss Brown dropped her employer’s hands and step
ped away, something in her eyes hardening.

  “You must let her go.” Catherine was standing in the door now, her eyes downturned and sorrowful. “It is the deal father made with Aunt Augusta. She is in the dining room informing all of the other guests.”

  “But I do not know if she did it,” Lady Ashton said.

  “I didn’t,” Miss Brown insisted, fisting her hands at her sides.

  “It does not matter,” Catherine said. “If we do not let her go, the other guests will never rest easy. It will be a cloud over the entire wedding ceremony.”

  “Not everything is about your ceremony,” Alice argued from the doorway.

  Catherine snapped around to frown at her sister before moving forward to stand by her mother. “I know Miss Brown has been a friend to you, but she has put us in a bad position. We do not have many options.”

  “We can send Aunt Augusta away,” Alice whispered.

  Catherine turned on her sister. “That would mean Nicholas Whitlock would leave, as well.”

  Alice’s cheeks flushed, but the threat hit its mark. Alice pinched her lips together.

  “If Miss Brown stays, there will be no way to salvage the rest of the week,” Catherine said. “Even if Aunt Augusta becomes angry enough to leave, the rest of the guests will doubt our judgment and our help.”

  I saw the moment Lady Ashton accepted the truth. Her shoulders shrugged forward, and she looked up at Miss Brown from beneath lowered lashes. “I’m sorry, Miss Brown. You will have to pack your things. George can give you a ride into town.”

  Miss Brown staggered back as though she’d been slapped. Her expression changed from disbelief to sadness to anger in an instant. “But I did nothing wrong.”

  Lady Ashton’s mouth opened and closed several times before she finally spoke. “There is no other option.”

  “Yes, there is. Do not dismiss me on the word of a horrid old woman when I did nothing wrong.” Her voice was loud enough that everyone in the dining room could hear her, and Aunt Augusta could be heard gasping in offense.

  Lady Ashton frowned and lowered her head. “I’m sorry, Miss Brown. Please pack your things.”

  “I won’t.” Miss Brown stumbled backwards through the door and into the hallway, her face growing red. “I do not deserve this, and I will not allow my good name to be soiled because of a suspicious, vindictive old woman.”

  “Watch the way you speak about me,” Lady Augusta called from the dining room.

  “Be quiet,” Miss Brown hollered. “You’ve done more than enough already, but if I have anything to say about it, this will be the last time you treat anyone this way.”

  Aunt Augusta muttered something to Nicholas about stopping the woman from speaking so about her, but it did not matter. Before Lady Ashton could calm her or Nicholas could step forward to defend his grandmother’s name, Miss Brown ran down the hallway and exited through a servant’s door in the back of the house. When Alice ran after her a few moments later, there was no sign of her in the garden or the tree line. Miss Brown was gone.

  8

  Catherine and Lady Ashton did their best to keep the guests from discussing the situation between Miss Brown and Aunt Augusta in too much length, but it was hopeless. The excitement from breakfast lasted well into the evening. Even Nicholas Whitlock could not hold his tongue once he’d had a few after dinner drinks.

  “Imagine stealing from an old woman,” he’d said, shaking his head. “It is a horrible thing to do, though the crime itself leads me to believe this was her first offense.”

  “Why do you say so?” Lord Ashton asked.

  “Because she stole jewelry.” He took another drink and then wrinkled his nose. “You should never steal jewelry. It is too easy to identify. You want to steal money. No one marks their money. Once you take it from their coin purse, the victim cannot prove whether it is theirs or whether you’ve had it all along.”

  “Maybe she meant to sell the necklace,” Charles Barry suggested.

  “Perhaps,” Nicholas said.

  “According to Catherine, the necklace was not even very nice and wouldn’t have been worth much,” Charles Cresswell said. “And Catherine would know. She has very fine tastes.”

  Mr. Barry pulled back his top lip in distaste at the mention of Catherine.

  “Another proof that she is not a skilled thief,” Nicholas said.

  Catherine retired early to avoid the constant talk of the event that had officially overshadowed her wedding, whereas when I went to bed, I had to listen to Alice discuss the altercation until she became too exhausted to keep her eyes open.

  If Catherine hoped to awaken with the news from the day before forgotten, she was disappointed. Even with the back garden transformed into a lavish tea party complete with freshly-cut flowers filling the vases I’d purchased in London, trays of desserts and pastries on every table, and every guest dressed in their best, no one could help but whisper about the drama in small groups as Aunt Augusta moved slowly among the crowd, the worthless locket hanging from her neck like a prize.

  The drama the day before seemed to have left her exhausted. Her skin, which had been pale and papery, seemed to have taken on a gray and clammy sheen. As early morning turned to midday and the sun rose in the sky, she actually removed her jacket and bared her arms, which were crisscrossed with blue veins and purple bruises.

  Vivian Barry expressed her concern for the old woman by laying her hand on Nicholas Whitlock’s arm. “Your poor grandmother does not look well. I do not think the heat is agreeing with her.”

  “I’ve tried to send her inside several times already,” he said with a shrug, adjusting his top hat over his dark hair. “She refuses to take orders from anyone, including me. There is nothing to be done.”

  “You are a very adoring grandson,” Vivian said with a smile, eyelashes fluttering. When Nicholas turned away from her to watch his grandmother limp across the garden, she quickly rearranged her bright blonde hair beneath her lace headband, pulling a strand down across her forehead. “Not many men would be willing to care for an elderly woman the way you do.”

  “Then you do not know the right kind of men, sister,” Charles Barry said loudly, his gaze slipping over to where Catherine and Charles were entertaining Aunt Ruth and her three daughters. “I would be happy to care for an ailing family member if we had any.”

  Vivian frowned at her brother and pulled closer to Nicholas, which finally spurred Alice to step forward and engage the female Barry in conversation.

  “You and your brother are so close, Vivian,” she said, a bright, genuine smile spread across her face. “Many people have to be informed that you two are not husband and wife. Did you realize that, Nicholas?”

  Vivian’s cheeks flamed red, but her smile never faltered.

  “Realize what?” Nicholas asked, tearing his eyes from where Aunt Augusta was teetering on the edge of the fish pond, looking like she could tumble in from a stiff wind at any moment.

  “That Charles and Vivian are siblings and not a married couple,” Alice repeated just as cheerfully as the first time. “Many people make that mistake because they are so unusually close.”

  “We are closer that most,” Vivian said. “Though, I do not count it unusual. Perhaps, your perception is skewed because of your own relationship with your brother.”

  I watched as a violent glint appeared in Alice’s eyes, and decided it would be pointless to try and sway Alice to be civil, so instead I removed the source of the women’s struggle.

  “Nicholas, I have had my eye on the dessert table for awhile and can no longer resist. Would you care to sample a few things with me?”

  Nicholas offered me his elbow without hesitation, and we left Vivian and Alice behind, glaring at one another. As we walked, Nicholas did not talk to me, but rather kept his attention on his grandmother.

  “Are you worried for her?” I asked finally.

  Nicholas startled as though surprised by my presence and then laughed at himself. “Sorry.
I am being quite rude.”

  “No need to apologize.”

  He looked down at me, blue eyes bright and clear. “My grandmother doesn’t leave the house often, and I am nervous about how she is doing.”

  I nodded. “I understand. Though, if you want my opinion, she seemed in perfect health yesterday morning.”

  He ran a hand across his cheek and shook his head. “In the end, she was right about Miss Brown, but I still wish the whole mess had never happened. The poor woman lost her job because of a broken locket. It hardly seems fair.”

  “Yes,” I agreed. “But she did steal. That is not something that can be tolerated.”

  “No, but I would have liked to pull her aside privately and announce the news rather than embarrass her in front of a house of guests.”

  “Yes, that was unfortunate.” I had never seen Miss Brown be anything but kind and accommodating, but the image of her, red-faced and running from Ridgewick Hall would not leave me any time soon.

  We reached the dessert table, and I placed a sampling of small treats on my plate. Nicholas did the same, though he made no move to eat them.

  “I hope our coming to the wedding has not caused more trouble that it was worth,” he said, staring over as his grandmother walked from the pond back towards the party, her head lowered. “I’m sorry to admit she is not as friendly to the outside world as she is to me. Most people do not appreciate her the way I do.”

  I couldn’t imagine anyone appreciating Aunt Augusta’s company, but I did not admit that to Nicholas. “Perhaps, that is why she likes you, then. You appreciate her, therefore, she appreciates you.”

  “Perhaps.” He smiled.

  Just then, Aunt Augusta stumbled in the grass. I wouldn’t have noticed at all except that when she did, Lady Harwood let out a shriek, alerting the entire gathering to the matter.

  “Dr. Shaw,” she yelled. “Help Mrs. Whitlock. Hurry.”

  Aunt Ruth grabbed her three daughters and yanked them out of the way as though a car was rushing towards them as Dr. Shaw dropped his plate of dessert and hurried past them and a table where Catherine and Charles Cresswell were entertaining a group of local gentry. As soon as he reached Aunt Augusta, who had managed to right herself and shuffle forward to an empty table, he grabbed her elbow.