“Well, dearie, let me have a quick look. Albert? Be a love.”
The Penrose butler placed his buttered toast down with a sigh and brought forth the sinister mirror from its velvet pouch on the sideboard.
Tamsyn bit her lip. She loved Jack and would be fervent in confessing it. Indeed, her arrival in London could hardly be construed as anything less, but a little encouragement for her boldness would be appreciated.
Being sensible, Lowdy had written down her declaration to Mr Miggens and recited it late last night in her bedchamber. Tamsyn had snivelled throughout, having had no idea Lowdy held herself in such low regard – not fit to be a gentlewoman and yet lacking the necessary skills to be anything else.
They’d hugged and vowed to be strong.
Later, Tamsyn had sat in bed with her own quill poised upon blank paper and yet the called-for words had refused to come, buried beneath doubts and convictions alike.
Mrs Mildern squinted into the black obsidian.
Sighed.
Moaned.
Brought a hand to her chest.
Lowered her eyelids.
“Is it… Is it bad?”
Faded green eyes, the colour of drying seaweed, snapped open. “Can’t see anything, dearie. Sorry.”
“Oh.” Tamsyn wafted a hand, shoulders drooping. “Never mind then, Mrs Mildern. I’ll see you in some weeks. Take care.”
“Right you are, Miss Penrose. God speed.”
And Tamsyn left none the wiser, her bright-blue skirts fluttering through the kitchen door.
“Why didn’t you tell her?” asked Albert, dipping toast to egg.
His gran’s lips curved widely. “Well, my young lad,” she said, despite himself having some two score years, “sometimes love must find its own path and there ain’t nothing you can say to steer its course…and they never listen to me anyway.”
“Will she find love?” Albert stared into the black mirror, but could see naught, the gift solely bestowed upon females of the Mildern family. “Miss Penrose deserves the best.”
Wise eyes reflected in the scrying glass alongside his.
And Gran smiled.
∞∞∞
“My lord, why don’t you…go out?”
Jack glared fiercely at the image of his housekeeper in the mirror.
Mrs Shepherd merely grinned.
Certainly, he had been staring into the hall looking glass for a goodly time, endeavouring to find Father’s likeness in his own face. Without doubt, the hair and nose were similar, but those black eyes refused to glower and his mouth declined to curve into a snarl when commanded.
“Mrs S, do you suppose me akin to my father?”
The dear woman had been a Winterbourne maid – heaven help her – before housekeeper and had patched his knees as a nipper, fed him supper as an adult and he distinctly remembered a mop to his arse as a youth when he’d rolled in at four in the morning and dirtied the top step.
“Only the nose, my lord.”
“Not the hair?”
