“Please…tell me.”
“I should thinkyoucould tellme.Did I leave no impression on you at all?” He forced her down behind several dirty kegs. “Lie still, and do not move. On the chance someone should pay me a visit, I do not wish for a screaming chit to be discovered in my cellar room. Understood?”
“What…what are you going to do with me?”
“Kill you.” He draped an old, rancid-smelling blanket over top of her. The darkness stifled her but didn’t stifle his words. “A pleasure I was denied fourteen years ago, but shall not be denied again.”
“Have you been to see your mother this morning?”
Felton tossed two letters upon Papa’s desk. “No, I have not.” He grabbed another stack. “Are these all unanswered?”
Papa stepped into the study, brushing toast crumbs from his marmalade-stained cravat. “Yes, yes, quite unanswered.”
“Why?”
“Got away from me, I suppose. Time, that is. So much on my mind these days.” He walked behind his desk and tapped the ledger. “I have been keeping up with this, though. I am not entirely inept.” His father chuckled, as if it were some amusing joke that correspondences were not being attended to and marmalade was on his cravat and the entire household had been falling apart for fourteen years.
“I say, Son, why so glum? Did you not sleep well last night?”
“No.” Felton turned away from him, walked to the window, and jerked back the calico curtain. Morning sun glowed bright and yellow against the pale pink sky. “No, I did not sleep at all.”
“I hardly did myself what with your mother’s coughing. Poor dear.”
“How is she today?”
“The same, I suppose. In a trifle better temperament though, if you care to go up and see her.”
“I will.” He let the curtain drop. “Just as soon as I take breakfast.”
“Miss Gillingham has not.”
He frowned at her name. “Not what?”
“Taken breakfast. You might go and see if she should like to join you. I fear she doesn’t especially care to take breakfast with me.”
“Has she been so obvious?”
“What do you mean?”
“Never mind.” Felton started toward the door, but halted when Dodie filled the threshold.
The girl’s face seemed ashen. “Mr. Northwood. Master Northwood.” Even her voice was an octave or two higher. Nearly a shriek. “I be sorry to bother you, but what with the milk she ne’er came for and the chamber empty like it be and Merrylad—”
“What are you saying, Dodie?” Felton pulled her into the study.
“Just this, Master Northwood. I think she be gone.”
“Gone where?”
“I don’t know.” The girl fluttered both hands at once and tears sprung. “I says to Miss Gillingham, I says last night, ‘I be gettin’ milk for the dog.’ And she says to me something, but I can’t ’ardly remember what, and I waited and waited but she ne’er did come. I guess I falled asleep in the kitchen whilst I was waitin’ because Cook woke me up sometime this mornin’ and I just forgot about e’erything until her chamber be empty like it was.” She puckered a trembling lip. “Oh, Master Northwood, e’erything be my fault! I just know something be wrong.”
“You are not to blame.” Anxiety clamored in his brain, searching for a possibility, demanding an explanation. Had she run back to the forest? To Lord Gillingham? Had he so frightened her last night that she should flee his home alone while they slept?
Papa cleared his throat. “Er, I better go see to your mother.” Quickly—too quickly—he squeezed past Dodie and left the room.
But Felton hadn’t time to think on that now. “Dodie, go and check her chamber again and see if she took anything with her. Mayhap she left a note.”
“Yes, Master Northwood.”
