Good.
In the middle of the bright confusion, Anna slipped from the room unseen. Once she was gone, Nathaniel allowed himself a breath of relief. But disappearing was not the same as being safe.
Somewhere inside Mrs. Pembroke’s crowded, candlelit battlefield, Anna could be carrying a secret dangerous enough to get her killed.
Eight
The next morning, Pembroke House looked as though the war had been fought entirely with glasses of punch.
Glasses stood abandoned on mantels, tables, and windowsills. Several chairs had been dragged into the wrong room, and candle wax dripped onto the edge of Mrs. Pembroke’s good sideboard. When Mrs. Fenwick saw it, a sound so low and dangerous escaped her, that Elias backed out of the dining room and hurried down the hall. Crumbs lay under almost every chair, and someone had overturned a vase in the parlor. Flowers were strewn all over the carpet, which made Mrs. Fenwick growl like a wild beast.
Anna survived the affair, but only just. Her feet ached, so did her shoulders, and her head was stuffed with music, whispers, and fragments of conversation. She’d repeated them so many times during the night that she feared the words would become stitched into her thoughts.
The shore after midnight. Brewster’s lower field. Bell still silent. Everyone talks eventually.
And beneath it all, she carried the message in the locket until Mrs. Pembroke took it from her in the narrow hall by the pantry.
The locket was gone now, thank goodness. She didn’t know where Mrs. Pembroke sent it or whose hands carried it from the house. She only knew that sometime after the country dance, Mrs. Pembroke had appeared beside her.
“Pantry,” she’d said. “Now.”
Anna obeyed without question. Once inside, behind shelves of crockery and jars of preserves, Mrs. Pembroke held out her hand. Anna unpinned the pouch from beneath her petticoat and handed her the locket. Mrs. Pembroke took it, tucked it into the hollow beneath a folded tablecloth, and handed the cloth to Elias not a minute later with instructions to carry it to the laundry basket near the back door.
A maid from the neighboring house took the basket before supper ended. At least, Anna thought she’d been a maid. She’d worn a cap, at any rate, and never looked directly at anyone. By dawn, the woman was gone, along with the locket and the message inside.
Anna spent the remaining hours of the ball with one hand moving toward the seam of her petticoat where the locket no longer resided. Not carrying it was almost as frightening as carrying it had been.
She looked around with a sigh. Now the house was bright with morning sunshine. There were no officers in the parlor, no music in the hall, and no ladies fluttering fans to get their attention.
There was only one big mess.
“Mercy,” Mrs. Fenwick snapped from beneath the dining room table. “Why is there a sugared almond in this candlestick?”
Mercy, who was gathering napkins from chairs, peered over at her. “Perhaps someone wished to save it for later?”
Mrs. Fenwick glared at her. “In a candlestick?”
Mercy shrugged. “People do peculiar things at balls.” She rolled her eyes. “Therewasa lot of wine served last night.”
Mrs. Fenwick emerged with a spoon in one hand and the almond in the other. “If I ever host a ball, child, you have permission to strike me with a rolling pin until reason returns.”
Mercy glanced at Anna. “Would that be before or after the musicians arrive?”
“Before,” Anna suggested.
“Definitely before,” Mrs. Fenwick added.
Anna bent to collect two empty glasses from beneath a chair. “At least nothing was broken.”
A crash sounded from the hall, causing the three to still.
Mercy closed her eyes. “I would like everyone to know that I was inthis roomwhen that happened.”
Mrs. Fenwick pointed at Anna. “See what it is before Mrs. Pembroke hears and blames the entire kitchen.”
Anna set the glasses on the table and hurried toward the hall.
Elias stood near the sideboard, staring at the remains of a blue-edged plate on the floor, his face pale. “I barely touched it.”
