Page 16 of The Recluse and the Runaway

Still, she had to try. “Hush, Fairy!” she pleaded, and kept on going.

“Miss Nell, wait!” That was Joe Jenkins’s voice. She liked Joe, but he was Rupert’s man and would obey him. The question was, what had he told Joe to do? She kept on running, out of the kitchen, through the garden, dithering from path to path in the dark.

Fairy nudged her, took the silk gown in her mouth, and pulled. “Don’t! You’ll ruin the gown,” she whispered, which was utterly stupid, for what did a gown matter? She followed the dog nonetheless, and suddenly saw her salvation.

The scaffolding! “Thank you!” she whispered. She knotted the shawl around her neck, hurriedly bunched her skirts, and began to climb. Halfway up, one foot lost purchase and a slipper fell off. One side of her skirt came loose. Dangling by one hand, she stuffed the hem between her teeth and kept going.

She climbed in the broken window just as Joe Jenkins came into the garden, calling her name. Then Mrs. O emerged. “Nell, where are you? Please come back.”

“Sir Rupert told us to find you,” Joey said. “He told us to keep you safe.”

Safe—or safely held, to be handed over to the law?

Sir Rupert was an honorable man. He had promised to protect her. She longed to believe him. Drat, she did believe him, but now he might have changed his mind. If only she’d had the courage to tell him the whole truth!

For the moment, she was trapped. She had promised to stay until Christmas Day, which she would do. In the morning, she would learn for sure whether he had kept his promise, too.

In the meantime, she sank to the floor and wept.

Chapter Five

Three hours later it was long past midnight, and despite all the men of the village taking part in the search, they still hadn’t found Nell. Rupert stormed to the drawing room, where the three so-called ladies were drinking tea and waiting for Sir Nathaniel to convey them home.

“No luck?” Mrs. Walmsley asked sweetly. “What did you expect, Sir Rupert? She’s a thief!”

Pauletta batted her eyelashes at Rupert. “Forget about Nell. Be thankful she’s gone, for now that you have seen her true colors, you can find yourself a real lady to wed.”

“It’s Nell or no one,” Rupert growled.

“Pauletta, will you never learn tact?” Clorinda rolled her eyes. “Stupid question. Even if he were inclined to wed one of us—which he’s not—he needs a little time to adjust to the fact that Nell is gone.”

“Quite right,” Mrs. Walmsley said. “Poor Sir Rupert; think of his chagrin at being cozened and betrayed by a slip of a girl.”

Rupert clenched and unclenched his fists. He would never hit a female, even a vile woman like this one, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t mete out punishment.

Pauletta pouted. “Where is Sir Nathaniel? I’m frightfully tired and want to go home.”

“He’s still searching. You’re not going home tonight,” Sir Rupert said.

Mrs. Walmsley assumed the smug expression of a cat at the cream pot.

“We’re in no fit shape for overnight guests,” Rupert said, “but my housekeeper has done what she can to prepare a bedchamber. Come with me.”

“Are you sure, Sir Rupert?” Mrs. O whispered, hastening alongside him ahead of the Walmsley ladies.

Pauletta whined that he was walking too fast, Mrs. Walmsley muttered that scolding and complaining were for after winning a husband, not before, and Clorinda snorted rudely.

“I haven’t had a chance to dust,” Mrs. O said, “and the chimney’s not been swept, and as for the bed—"

“Oh, yes,” Rupert said. “I’m completely sure.” He took the stairs two at a time, grabbed a lantern from the landing, and led them down a dusty hall that was rarely used. At the very end, he opened a door. “In you go. There’s no fire, but there may be a candle someplace, so you won’t be completely in the dark.”

“But—but—this is ghastly!” Mrs. Walmsley moaned, taking in the tattered bed curtains. Rupert found a candelabra with a couple of stubs and lit them from the lantern, sending ghostly shadows across the room. They would soon burn out, and the women would be left in the cold and dark for what remained of the night.

“Oh, dear,” Mrs. O murmured. “Not that I don’t agree with you in principle, sir, but the dreadful condition of this room reflects badly on me.”

“Nonsense. It was closed off because of my uncle’s neglect, nothing to do with you.”

“There are cobwebs!” Pauletta shrieked suddenly. “That means spiders. They’ll bite!”