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Once they reached the lower level, the man drew out a heavy ring of keys and unlocked a thick door that had a window cut from the middle, covered in bars. He ushered them into the hallway, lined on either side with iron bars. Scrawny hands reached through the bars, and men dressed in rags pressed against the bars on the opposite sides.
“Down here,” the man said, guiding them down the hall. “Try not to get too close to the cells.” Edwina drew back when a man reached for her skirt, only to nearly bump into another reaching hand. She closed her lips tightly against a whimper of fear. Another man spat at her, the thick spittle landing on her hem.
“Eh, princess, wanna lift your skirts, huh?” a man called out, leering at her with a toothless smile. Shaking, she hurried past them, catching up with the jailer, who had stopped at a cell toward the end of the hall.
“Oi, Lord Haverton, you’ve a visitor already,” the man said. Edwina faced the cell. Unlike the others, crammed full of four or six men, her father sat in a cell by himself, his back against the cold stone wall.
“Papa,” she whispered, falling to her knees on the dirty stone floor. The cold of the floor quickly chilled her, and she could not imagine how her father managed to sit on the floor for so long. She grasped the iron bars, reaching inside the cell. “Papa, what happened? Why were you arrested?”
Father reached for her, his eyes full of tears. “Oh, Edwina. It is the biggest mistake. I went walking out in the countryside and saw the most beautiful flowers. I cut a few, but a man in a mask caught me and accused me of stealing. I think he was a Duke, but I did not get his name. He wants me tried as a thief!”
“A thief?” Edwina cried, clutching his hand. “A thief, over a few flowers? What kind of monster is this man?”
“He was so terrible,” he breathed. “I thought he would strike me down where I stood; he was so angry. He was huge, a tall and broad man, so I have no doubt he could have strangled me with his own hands if he thought he would get away with it. He had a mask covering part of his face, too, as though he was hiding something.”
“The Duke of Hillow,” the jailer noted. Edwina looked up to him. “Terribly frightening fellow.”
“Release my father at once,” Edwina demanded, struggling to bite back tears. “You cannot keep him over cutting a few flowers. What would that cost in a market, a few pence?”
“I even offered to pay for them,” Father insisted, taking hold of Edwina’s hand. “He refused, outright. Would not hear of it. He was unreasonable!”
“I cannot release him,” the jailer told her. “The Duke will not drop the charges, and I cannot release him. He’ll have to go before the judge and be tried.”
“How long would that take?” Edwina asked frantically. She looked up to Lizbeth and Bertie for help, feeling desperate and hopeless.
The jailer shrugged. “It might be a while.”
Tears fell down Edwina’s eyes. “And he’ll stay here until then? Can I pay for better lodging, perhaps? Something?”
“I’m sure you could,” the jailer said.
Edwina tried to wipe the tears from her face and looked back at her father. She removed one of her hands from his and stroked his face. “I shall get you out of here at once. I will get this Duke to drop the charges and have you released.”
“No!” Father cried. “Do not go anywhere near that man! He is dangerous.”
“I will,” Edwina affirmed, standing. She set her chin and sniffled. “I will go to him at once.”
“You should listen to your father,” the jailer said. “The Duke of Hillow is not a man to be trifled with.”
“Well,” Edwina told him calmly, “I am not a woman to be trifled with.”
Turning back to her father, she reached back through the bars and lightly kissed her father’s cheek as best she could, her cheeks brushing against the cold iron. She closed her eyes for a moment, feeling as though she could risk never seeing her father again if she let him go.
“Edwina, please, I beg you,” father said, his voice pleading and trembling.
“Do not worry about me,” she told him. “You are the one behind bars, and I am not. I shall get you out of here as soon as I can.”
She nodded to the jailer, and he led them back down the hall. “Let us go at once to Hillow House. It cannot be far.”
“It is early in the morning,” Bertie protested. “Surely, His Grace would not yet be awake.”
“I do not care,” Edwina told him determinedly. “He has unjustly imprisoned my father, and he can deal with the consequences. I will knock on his door until someone lets me in, and I will drag him from his bed if I have to!”
