Chapter Ten What the Father Buried
For three days after the discovery in the Thursday Room, Sebastian Rookwood behaved like a man trying to outrun the dead.
He did not call it that, of course. He called it inquiry, necessity, diligence, duty, urgency, and once, in a note written so sharply that Marianne could almost hear the pen striking the paper, the avoidance of further delay where delay has already done irreparable harm.
But Marianne had read enough ledgers, letters, household silences and human evasions to recognise the truth beneath a more respectable heading.
Sebastian was not searching only for the final page of Evangeline’s letter.
He was searching for the moment at which his life might have gone otherwise.
If Sebastian knew where Father sent me—
The burned fragment lay at Lantern House, locked in the japanned box with Evangeline’s other papers.
Its incompleteness had become more powerful than any finished accusation.
A full sentence might have allowed analysis.
This remnant invited torment. Every missing word multiplied.
If Sebastian knew where Father sent me, he would come.
If Sebastian knew where Father sent me, he would stop them.
If Sebastian knew where Father sent me, he would never forgive me.
If Sebastian knew where Father sent me, he would never forgive himself.
Sebastian chose the version that punished him most and then built his actions around it.
Letters went out from Halgrave House by every post. Riders were sent to Rookwood properties with instructions to search attics, muniment rooms, steward’s offices, dower houses, locked trunks, old travelling desks, and any box sealed after the year of Evangeline’s disgrace.
Former servants were traced through pension books.
Retired grooms, maids, housekeepers, land agents, valets and clerks were located, summoned, questioned or bribed into recollection.
The Halgrave solicitor received so many instructions in one morning that his reply, according to the messenger who delivered it to Lantern House by mistake, contained four underlined sentences and what looked very much like a plea for moderation.
Sebastian did not moderate.
He came to Lantern House late on the first day with a stack of copied inventories and a face drawn too tight around the bones.
He came early on the second with a list of estate keys and a memory of a hunting lodge mentioned in one of his father’s old calendars.
He sent three notes on the third before breakfast, each contradicting or refining the last. Marianne read them with increasing unease in Lady Theodosia’s study while Helena sat opposite her and said nothing, which was one of Helena’s more effective ways of permitting another person to arrive at an unpleasant conclusion unaided.
“He is acting too quickly,” Marianne said at last.
“Yes.”
“He knows it.”
“Likely.”
“He cannot stop.”
“No.”
Marianne set down the latest note. It named four servants who had been at Halgrave House during Evangeline’s last months in London.
Two were dead. One had emigrated. The fourth, Mrs Bell, formerly housekeeper, had been traced to a cottage on one of the smaller Rookwood estates in Hertfordshire. Sebastian intended to go there at once.
“At once,” Marianne repeated, with irritation that did not wholly disguise concern. “Everything is at once with him now.”
Helena looked up. “Guilt dislikes waiting.”
“Guilt also makes poor use of evidence.”
“Then you had better go with him.”
Marianne was still for half a breath.
“No.”
Helena’s brows rose. “No?”
“He has not asked.”
“That is true.”
“And until he remembers that asking is not a decorative addition to command, I do not see why I should place myself in his carriage again.”
“You are becoming proud.”
“I have been proud for years. People notice only when it inconveniences them.”
Helena’s mouth softened faintly, but she did not smile. “Marianne.”
Marianne looked away.
She knew she was not being entirely reasonable.
That was the difficulty. Complete unreason was easier to defend.
Sebastian had been careless in his urgency, yes.
He had sent instructions rather than requests.
His latest note had said, Miss Vale should be prepared to depart within the hour if Mrs Bell confirms she will speak only in person.
It had not said, Will Miss Vale consent?
It had not even said, Please. He had reverted, under the pressure of pain, to the old grammar of power.
Yet Marianne understood why.
That did not make it harmless.
Helena folded Sebastian’s note and placed it beside Evangeline’s fragment.
“Mrs Bell distrusts dukes, according to the reply from the estate steward. She says she will not speak to Halgrave men. She may speak to you because you are from Lantern House, if Mrs Pike’s name is mentioned.
She may refuse everyone. She is old, frightened, and likely has held silence longer than any of us have held suspicion. ”
“And you believe I should go because the truth matters more than how he asks for it.”
“I believe you already know that.”
Marianne looked down at her hands. There was still a faint mark on one finger where ink had settled beneath the nail. It pleased her to see it. Ink was more honest than feeling.
“I am not his remedy,” she said.
“No.”
“Nor Evangeline’s replacement.”
“No.”
“Nor Lady Theodosia’s instrument to be taken down whenever a difficult lock appears.”
Helena’s expression changed then, subtly, but enough that Marianne knew she had struck something true in them both.
“No,” Helena said again. “You are not. You may refuse.”
There was freedom in the sentence, and because of that, Marianne could no longer hide behind resentment.
She picked up Sebastian’s note once more. The writing was controlled, but not as controlled as usual. The final line slanted. He had been tired when he wrote it.
“If I go,” she said, “he must ask.”
“Then make him.”
Sebastian arrived twenty minutes later, wet from rain that had begun without courtesy, carrying his hat in one hand and impatience in every line of his body.
Mrs Finch admitted him with such visible reluctance that one might have supposed the Duke personally responsible for the weather.
He entered Lady Theodosia’s study after one knock, stopped upon seeing Marianne and Helena already waiting, and seemed for half a second to realise he had walked into judgement before he had remembered to arrange his defence.
“Mrs Bell will receive us if we arrive before dusk,” he said. “The road is passable. My carriage is ready.”
Marianne remained seated. “How useful.”
His eyes narrowed slightly. “Useful?”
“To have information. I assume there is some request to follow it.”
A silence opened.
Helena did not look up from the letter in her hand.
Sebastian’s expression changed in stages: first irritation, then comprehension, then the stiff discomfort of a man discovering his haste had carried him backward over ground already won.
“Miss Vale,” he said, formally, “will you accompany me to Mrs Bell’s cottage in Hertfordshire? She may speak more freely with a representative of Lantern House present. I ask because your skill is required, because your judgement has proved valuable, and because I cannot compel either.”
That was more than she had expected.
It was almost too much.
Marianne stood, because remaining seated would have turned principle into punishment. “I will accompany you as Lady Theodosia’s representative and Miss Vane’s assistant, not as your messenger, your conscience, or your answer to grief.”
His jaw tightened once, but he bowed. “Understood.”
“Is it?”
His gaze held hers. “I am attempting to make it so.”
Helena rose. “Then go before Mrs Finch overhears enough to add conditions.”
“I heard that, miss,” Mrs Finch called from the passage.
“Of course you did,” Helena said.
Mrs Finch entered immediately with a wrapped parcel. “Food. Dry stockings. A flask. Miss Vale, you will not refuse the stockings.”
“I had not yet opened my mouth.”
“It was preparing itself.”
Sebastian looked at the parcel in Marianne’s hands. “Does Mrs Finch believe I do not feed my passengers?”
Mrs Finch looked at him. “I believe men think danger and luncheon cannot occur in the same hour.”
Sebastian accepted this with the grave air of a man receiving doctrine. “I stand corrected.”
“Frequently, Your Grace.”
Helena coughed once. Marianne suspected it was laughter disguised by breeding.
The journey to Hertfordshire was quieter than their earlier expeditions.
Not silent. Silence between them had too much meaning now.
But the conversation stayed close to the work, as if both had agreed not to touch the more volatile subjects beneath it.
Sebastian gave the history of Mrs Bell. She had come to Halgrave House as an under-housemaid in his mother’s time, risen to housekeeper under his father, and left two years after Evangeline’s removal from London with a pension recorded as “generous,” which, as Marianne pointed out, was not always the same as freely given.
“She was loyal to my mother,” Sebastian said. “Less fond of my father.”
“Many sensible women appear to have disliked your father.”
“Mrs Bell rarely displayed dislike. She displayed disapproval by making rooms colder.”
“An impressive skill.”
“She could make a dining room feel like church punishment.”
Marianne almost smiled. “I should like her.”
“I suspect she may like you more than she likes me.”
“That is not a high threshold.”
“No.”
He said it without resentment, which disarmed her more than denial would have done.