Chapter 20 #2
He leaned down and kissed my mouth. “Which you did, thank God. The chapel door was bolted, but I decided to check just in case. The moment I opened the door to the chapel, Peony began struggling. I set her down and she dashed straight toward the wall below the alcove, bless her little nose. When I pushed down on the alcove’s base, she ran into the passage, but I went back for a lantern. ”
“The darkness was so thick that I couldn’t find the right brick to open the door.” I winced, remembering. “I felt so sad, knowing you would search for me.”
“I would have taken this abbey apart,” Godric said grimly.
I smiled at him. “I might have given up, but I couldn’t leave you.”
He started kissing me again, and it took a while before he picked the story back up.
“When I reached you, you were huddled against the kitchen wall, and Peony was curled up against your stomach, nuzzling your face. Luckily, the passage ended next to the bread oven. The warmth kept you alive.”
I wiggled my fingers. “I am glad to have all my fingers.”
Godric cleared his throat. “May I take you away from this cursed place, Evie?”
“I’m not sure we can call it cursed, since Hecuba saved me.”
“So you said.” His voice was wry but not disbelieving.
“I had been trying to find the entrance among the berries and vines. At the last minute, I saw a flutter, the edge of a fur-lined cloak, and followed her to the alcove.”
“Then I am deeply grateful to Hecuba,” Godric said, meaning it. “It’s still snowing hard, Evie, but the moment it stops, we are leaving. Fair warning: As long as we’re in the abbey, you must never be alone, not for a moment. Accident or no. Not until we’re in England.”
I wreathed my arms around his neck. “I’ll happily leave with you. But meanwhile, tomorrow is Christmas Eve, unless I lost track of time.”
“Tonight you shall eat in bed,” he ordered.
I nodded, still exhausted. “I’ll get up tomorrow.”
We discovered that Rousseau’s philosophy sent me straight to sleep. I awoke later when Ophelia and Colette came to visit.
“You frightened me!” Ophelia cried, throwing herself onto the bed and snuggling up against my side.
“I’m sorry,” I said, smoothing her hair.
Colette seated herself next to Ophelia. “We wanted to find the passage, but not at the cost of your life.”
“I’m so sorry I frightened both of you,” I said, reaching out to her.
Colette clung tightly to my hand. “Now that you are not dead, I have something to say. You and I are friends. I don’t have . . . Well, I have many friends, but none of them are like you. A true friend. When you live in England and I live in France, I shall write to you, and you shall write to me.”
I leaned over and kissed her cheek. “I would love to write to you.”
In the end, the three of us made a tearful agreement to carry on an epistolary conversation for the rest of our lives.
“Godric will write to you as well,” Ophelia said, her tone mischievous. “Won’t you, Godric?”
He had retreated to the window again and was reading. “Write to whom?”
“To Evie!”
His eyes met mine. “When we are not together, I shall write to her.”
The expression in his eyes stole away my breath. Ophelia didn’t notice, but Colette flipped open her fan and giggled.
I turned to Ophelia. “Your mother saved me. She showed me where the passage began.”
“My mother’s ghost?” Ophelia demanded, as skeptical as Godric. “Hecuba? Are you sure?”
Colette’s eyes rounded. “You actually saw a ghost? What did she look like? Was she in a shroud?”
“I saw just an edge of a white cloak, but Ophelia, it was trimmed with fox fur. I didn’t pay attention at first, because I thought I was hallucinating. I’m sure it was your mother.”
Her brow knit. “I’d say that was impossible, but do you remember I told you that I accidentally scared Alice from the library? Burnsby had ordered me to stay in the nursery, and it was a bitterly cold December.”
“How I despise the man,” Colette muttered.
“The very next day, Alice began screaming about a ghost all in white and never entered the library again. I decided she had seen me in the morning when I snuck in to retrieve my book—but she didn’t scream until the afternoon. Perhaps it was actually my mother who frightened her off.”
I tucked her more securely against my side. “I think Hecuba made sure that you could be warm and fed in the library.”
Ophelia gave me a wobbly smile. “After that, she made certain that I had you.”
“So this is a haunted abbey,” Colette said, shaking her head. “I’m disappointed that I haven’t met her. I’d coax Lance into taking me to the chapel, but I have a feeling we’d end up with pneumonia and no ghost.”
“Hecuba may appear only when she needs to protect her daughter,” I suggested.
“Or an innocent like yourself,” Colette said.
“If I were Hecuba, I’d be more communicative,” Ophelia said. “I would flutter around the abbey all night, rattling a chain so that everyone knew to come out for a chat.”
“She is not a common ghost, available for tricks,” Colette said. “Have you read Hamlet?”
“Yes, but I didn’t like it much.”
“No one does. My point is that parental ghosts show up for important events, not just to pass the time.”
“I guess so,” Ophelia said. “But the nursery was lonely after my nanny left. Even a chain-rattling phantom would have been welcome company.”
“Now you know that Hecuba was with you,” I said, squeezing her. “Even when she didn’t show herself. You can believe in her.”
“This has been a wretched day,” Ophelia said, head on my shoulder. “You got lost, and Mima wandered off when her footman was in the privy. She turned up safe and sound in the nursery, turning over the old games.”
“Would you read to me?” I asked, guessing she needed something to do.
I drowsed the evening away, listening as Ophelia read aloud Hamlet in honor of parental ghosts.
I spent most of Christmas Eve in bed as well.
I never get sick, but the chapel’s freezing air felt as if it had sunk into my bones.
It wasn’t until noon that I began feeling like myself; I insisted on sitting up to eat luncheon with Godric and Ophelia, albeit in a wrapper rather than proper clothing.
Tess shooed them away after the meal, remarking that my hair would take at least two hours to tame.
“I’ll be in my chamber,” Godric said, lingering at the adjoining door. “Do not walk through the door into the cloister without me, Evie.”
“Her wandering days are over,” Tess announced, waving her hairbrush.
I groaned. “It was an accident. I behaved rashly, but I don’t need a guard! I’m not Mima.”
“Either Lance or I will be with you at all times,” Godric said.
I opened my mouth to protest, but he shook his head. “Please. I need to know you are safe.”
I gave in because of the look in his eyes.
Remember the expression with which Lance regarded Colette?
I recognized it.
I recognized it!