Chapter 6 #3
Patricia was sitting at the long wooden table with a cup of tea in front of her and a large pile of carrots waiting to be chopped. She looked up when Thelma entered and gestured toward the empty chair across from her.
“Sit,” she said. “You look like you need it more than I do.”
Thelma sat down gratefully. Patricia pushed a fresh cup of tea toward her. Thelma wrapped both hands around the warm cup and let the heat seep slowly into her cold fingers.
“Her Grace came to the nursery this afternoon,” Thelma said after a moment.
“I heard.” Patricia picked up a carrot and began chopping with quick, practiced strokes. “Mrs. Ames said she looked strange when she came back downstairs. Pale. Shaken. She went straight to her rooms and did not come out for nearly an hour.”
“She asked me about my sister.”
Patricia’s knife paused mid-chop. “Your sister?”
“I told her I had a younger sister. That I helped care for her when she was small.”
“Was that true?”
“Yes.” Thelma paused. “Mostly.”
Patricia was quiet for a moment, her knife working steadily through a pile of carrots. The kitchen settled around them. Outside the small window, the garden had gone completely dark.
"She frightened you," Patricia said. It was not a question.
"Perhaps she frightens everyone, I think."
"She does." Patricia set the knife down.
"She has had a great deal to be frightened about herself, these past two years. The old duke died eight months ago. Slow and painful. By the end, he was not really himself anymore. Her Grace managed everything during that time. The household, the accounts, the staff. Everything.”
“The staff?” Thelma asked.
“The household used to have fourteen servants. Now there are only seven. No one really talks about why.” Patricia set the knife down and looked at Thelma directly.
“The late duke was a very private man. He kept to himself. He had connections everywhere, but he rarely spoke about them. He kept careful records of things he wanted no one else to see.”
“What kind of things?”
Patricia shrugged. “No one knows. That was the whole point.”
Thelma thought about the shawl again. The old wool. The family emblem. The way Her Grace’s hands had trembled slightly when she first saw it.
“How long has the Langley family lived here?”
“A very long time. Centuries, probably.” Patricia carried the chopped carrots over to a large pot on the stove. “Why do you ask?”
“I was just wondering,” Thelma said carefully. “Whether the late duke had any connections in Somerset.”
Patricia gave her a long, knowing look. “Everyone has connections in Somerset. It is a big county.”
“I know. I was only asking.”
“You were asking about something very specific,” Patricia said. “I can tell.”
She wiped her hands on her apron and sat back down.
“The late duke had connections everywhere, but he kept most of them to himself. He was not the kind of man who shared. He kept records, though. Very careful records. My mother used to work in the estate office before she retired, and she said he had files on everything. Every letter, every conversation, every payment. He wrote it all down and locked it away.”
“Where?”
“No one knows. That was the point.” Patricia leaned forward slightly.
“People started leaving when the house stopped feeling like it had a future. That is what happened here. The old duke got sick, the staff began to drift away, and no one knew whether the estate would pass to someone who cared or someone who did not. Then His Grace came home, and everyone waited to see what he would do.”
“And?”
“And he is still here. He is asking questions. He is looking at the accounts. He is trying.” Patricia gave a small nod. “That is more than his father did toward the end.”
Thelma stayed quiet. She thought about her father sending Liliana to a duke he had never once mentioned.
What is the connection? she wondered. What are you not telling me?
The kitchen door opened, and Mrs. Ames stepped inside. The housekeeper looked at Thelma, then at Patricia, then back at Thelma again.
“Miss Hartley,” she said. “His Grace has asked to see you in his study after breakfast tomorrow.”
Thelma’s stomach dropped. “Did he say why?”
“He did not. He simply asked that you attend to him at nine o’clock.” Mrs. Ames gave a short nod and left.
Thelma sat at the kitchen table with her now-cold tea and her pounding heart. She tried not to imagine all the terrible reasons the duke might want to speak with her.
He knows, she thought. He must know. Why else would he summon me?
Patricia reached across the table and gave her hand a gentle squeeze. “It is probably nothing. He summons people all the time. He summoned me just to ask about the milk.”
“The milk?”
“Yes, remember I told you he is very concerned about the milk lately.” Patricia stood up. “Go to bed. Get some proper sleep. You look like you are about to fall over.”
Thelma went back upstairs to her room. Her bag was still by the door, still packed, still waiting. She stared at it for a long moment. Then she picked it up and slid it under the bed.
She would not be leaving that night.
Nor the next day either.
She was staying. At least for a time.