TWELVE
“What isthis?” a voice thunders, and I leap up, all four limbs flailing. One knocks the book off the bed, and before I can blink myself awake, Mrs. Wallace is scooping it up. The housekeeper stares at the book and then opens it and stares some more.
I’m about to ask what emergency brought her here in the middle of the night. Then I see dawn’s light seeping through the curtains. That doesn’t necessarily mean it isn’t the middle of the night, as I’ve already realized. We’re in the north and we predate daylight savings time, meaning “dawn” comes around fourA.M. at this time of year.
I rub my eyes and give my head a sharp shake. I’m still dressed from the day before, having fallen asleep reading.
I squint behind Mrs. Wallace.
“No,” she snaps. “Alice did not come to wake you, because I had a more important task for her. I realized you were still abed and came to get you myself and found you’ve been eating pilfered biscuits. That was bad enough. But this?” She waves the book. “You stole from the master’slibrary?”
From her tone, you’d think I’d stolen from the family safe. “No, I didn’t—”
“It is bad enough you pilfered from the good silver,” she says. “Bad enough I caught you with one of the mistress’s bracelets. They will not notice that.Thisthey will notice.”
She waves the book again.
“I didn’t—”
“I covered for you, missy. I let you cry and promise you wouldn’t do it again. I knew better. I could hear the lie in your voice, see the crocodile in your tears, but for Miss Isla’s sake, I allowed you one final chance. This is the last straw. This time I will speak to the master.”
“Speak to the master about what?” a voice says from the hallway.
Mrs. Wallace turns in horror. Then she sprints—astonishingly fast given her long skirts—and blocks the doorway, as if shielding me from Gray’s view.
“What ever are you doing in this part of the house, sir?” she says.
“This being my house, I believe I am entitled to be in any part of it,” he says dryly. “Excepting, of course, the bedchambers, which is why I stopped in the hallway to voice my question. As for why I am in this part of the house at all, I ventured out in search of coffee and heard raised voices.”
Mrs. Wallace glares at me. “The master should notneedto venture out in search of his morning beverage.”
“Perhaps,” Gray muses. “But the master is quite capable of not only venturing out but even brewing his own.”
She shoots him a meaningful glance.
He clears his throat and says, “It was a very small fire.”
I catch the barest quirk of Mrs. Wallace’s lips, but when she turns to me, her face is stone again. Seeing that softening, I’m reminded that I’ve never heard the housekeeper do more than mock-sternly admonish Alice. In other words, she’s not usually the gorgon I’ve seen. I get that side of her because Catriona has deserved it. Yet another person I’ve shoved into a box—the dour and strict housekeeper, overly proud of her position and lording it over her staff.
“The master should not need to venture out in search of his morning beverage,” she repeats.
I scramble from the bed. “Yes, ma’am. Apologies, ma’am. I seem to be having difficulty rising without a… without Alice. I stayed up too late reading.”
“Reading?” She lifts the book. “Is that really how you wish to do this? All right then.” She turns on Gray and dips her chin. “I regret to say, sir, that—”
“He lent it to me.”
She wheels on me, face suffusing with red. “Do not dare pull Dr. Gray into this. If you expect him to lie for you—”
“I do not, and I apologize for interrupting, ma’am, but I did not get a chance to explain earlier, and I didn’t wish Dr. Gray to think I was causing trouble to embarrass you.”
I smooth my rumpled dress and turn to Gray. “Mrs. Wallace found your book here, and she mistakenly believed I had stolen it because of my felonious past, as you called it. Also, she has caught me stealing before, and she kindly gave me a second chance. I did not yet have the opportunity to explain that you lent me the book or show her the note that accompanied it.”
I find the note and pass it to Mrs. Wallace. “I professed an interest in the book yesterday, when I was helping Dr. Gray, and he kindly lent it to me, and then I stayed up too late reading.”
“And the biscuits?” she says, her gaze only skimming the note.
“I did take the biscuits,” I say. “And I am sorry.”