She did not want to eat anymore, and she pushed her plate away and sighed. Her father looked at her angrily.
“This is your sister’s fault. If you weren’t so obsessed with finding her, then perhaps you’d have grown up like other young ladies do. You should’ve been looking for a husband, not for a sister who doesn’t want to be found.” He banged his fist down hard on the table.
Eloise stared at him. It was not like her father to mention Alice without prompting, and now she wondered as to his words. What did he mean by saying she did not want to be found?
“But, what do you mean, Father? How do you know she doesn’t want to be found? What do you know of it?” she asked, staring at him in disbelief.
He looked uncomfortable, as though he had not meant to say the things he did.
“If she wanted to be found, she would have allowed herself to be. I’ve told you before, don’t go searching for those things you might not want to find,” he replied, pushing aside his own plate as Eloise shook her head.
“I’m not mad, Father. I don’t know what you mean by telling me she doesn’t want to be found, but I don’t believe you. You know far more than you let on. I think you know where Alice is, and I think you’ve prevented me from finding her. It’s not me that’s mad, Father. You’re the one with delusions. I’ll find her. Somehow, somewhere, I’ll find her.”
Eloise ran from the room, as tears rolled down her cheeks. Her father called angrily after her, but she had already fled upstairs and was now sobbing into her pillow. How she longed for her sister. Alice had not deserted her. She refused to believe it. She wanted to be found, and it was this hope Eloise now clung to, even as the darkness seemed to engulf her, and the day of her tragedy approached.
CHAPTER25
“Burrows? Oh, yes, I know the Burrows. There are not many around these parts that don’t,” the man said, and Jackson breathed a sigh of relief.
“Where might I find them? James Burrows, that’s whom I’m looking for,” he clarified.
His carriage had pulled up in the center of a small village around ten miles from Wingate Towers. Jackson had accosted the first person he had seen – a stout man, dressed in tweeds, emerging from the village inn.
“James Burrows? Yes, he farms up on the hill yonder. Follow this track out of the village and through the woods. You’ll come to the farm gates,” the man said.
“And… do you know his wife?” Jackson asked, hardly daring to believe how close he had come to finding Alice.
“Charlotte? Yes, she’s a delightful sort. Ever so kind and thoughtful,” the man replied.
Jackson thanked him and climbed back into the carriage, where an anxious-looking Delphine was waiting for news.
“It’s this way. There’s a farm. That’s where we’ll find Alice,” Jackson relayed, as the carriage jolted off through the village and up the hill.
“Oh, I wish Her Ladyship could see us now. She’d not believe it. All those years of writing letters, searching at dead ends, and now we’re the ones to find her sister. It seems… unfair, somehow,” Delphine murmured.
Jackson nodded. He, too, felt the same. It seemed a cruel twist of fate for Eloise to be excluded from that which she had worked so hard to find. But Jackson was determined to reunite the sisters, and he could only hope they would find Alice amenable to their request. This was the final hurdle. They had followed the trail, searched high and low, and now they were to discover the prize. But would Alice want to see them? Would she even acknowledge her past and ask for news of Eloise? It could be a disaster, and Jackson knew he must prepare himself for rejection, as well as jubilation.
“I wish she was here, too, Delphine. But think about what we’ve achieved together. We’ve accomplished the seemingly impossible. I can’t wait to see Eloise’s face when we tell her.”
Delphine shook her head sadly.
“If we ever see her, my Lord. I wonder… well, the marriage to Lord Crawford, it’s going ahead, isn’t it? Will we even be able to see her? She’s his prisoner, or as good as one. Oh, it’s too awful,” she exclaimed, and a tear rolled down her cheek.
It was a fear Jackson shared. He knew the wedding was imminent and that Eloise was being held against her will. She was to be forced into marrying Lord Crawford, and if Jackson did not do something to save her, then her life would be lived in misery from that moment onwards.
“Don’t think like that, Delphine. It’s not as bad as it seems. If we can convince Alice to come home and tell her story, then perhaps…” Jackson trailed off.
So much depended on a woman he had never met. A woman who may so easily turn out to be far from what they wished her to be. If Alice wanted nothing to do with her sister, then there would be nothing Jackson or anyone else could do to persuade her.
“Perhaps we can stop this wickedness in its track. If the ton discovers Viscount Snowden had an illegitimate daughter… well, Lord Crawford would never wish to marry Her Ladyship. He’d be tainted with the same colors,” Delphine said, and Jackson nodded.
“That’s what I’m hoping for. He’ll call the marriage off and then there’ll be nothing standing in the way of Eloise and I marrying. And you’ll get your job back Delphine. I’ll see to that, I promise.”
The carriage was trundling uphill through pleasant woodland, the leaves on the trees marked by the burnished golden twinge of early autumn. In the distance, Jackson could see a farm, its whitewashed buildings standing out against the cornfields, and he thought again of what this first encounter with Eloise’s sister would be like. Would he recognize something of Eloise in her mannerisms? He had thought often of what she would be like, and now, as they came to the sign pointing to the farm, he took a deep breath and steadied his nerves.
“We can only do our best for Her Ladyship, Your Grace,” Delphine affirmed as the carriage pulled into the farmyard.
Hens were squawking and pigs grunting as Jackson opened the door of the carriage compartment and climbed down. To his surprise, an inquisitive-looking child appeared at the door of the farmhouse, and Delphine gasped as she climbed down from the carriage.