Chapter Two #2
By the time I’ve finished, there are small piles of discarded garments on the floor and a few bits of fabric poking out from the seam of my trunk.
I leave it there and slip out of my room, glancing back at the bedroom of my childhood for a mere second before I make my way along the hallway and shuffle down the stairs as quietly as I can manage.
What am I doing? What am I doing? Before I can muster an answer, I am sitting at my father’s desk, prying open the locked drawer where I know he keeps his banknotes. It opens with a crack and I freeze, gaze darting to the shadow of the door. I wait with bated breath, but nothing happens.
I can’t even allow myself a sigh of relief.
Exhaling quietly through my nostrils, I snatch up a bag of coin and as many notes as I can take without making an obvious dent.
Just before I close the drawer, my name catches my attention: Christopher-Henry, written across an envelope in an unfamiliar, looping hand.
I reach for it, taking in the frayed folds and water-stained corners.
I haven’t the time to read it now, but I tuck it into the pocket of my jacket with the bag and notes.
Then I push the drawer shut and rise from my father’s chair.
The coins are heavy in my pocket, but not quite as heavy as that envelope.
As I make to step around his desk, the glint of gold catches my eye, and I freeze.
Tucked beside my father’s flint box and sealing wax is the signet ring with our family crest on it—two lions on either side of a chevron shield.
I have no obvious need of it, but something tells me to snatch the ring anyway, so I do.
I drop it into the purse before I can change my mind, and hurry from the room.
There are no servants in the hall, so I make my way back up to my bedroom. I open the trunk once more and shove my stolen booty deep into the folds of fabric, before tucking everything neatly inside. I drop the lid, lock it, and pocket the key, then stand back to admire my handiwork.
What a bloody disaster.
How am I to get this monstrosity down the stairs and out into the street without being heard or seen?
It seems impossible, but my pulse is rushing through my ears and leaving no room for rational thought.
I take the trunk by the handle and drag it as quietly as I can across the floor.
I can move it barely an inch at a time, but the slow progress works in my favor to prevent any loud scraping sounds it might otherwise have made.
I’m quite certain hours pass before I get the trunk to the top of the stairs, and just as I feel I might burst into tears and give up, I hear a soft gasp behind me. I spin about and nearly pitch down the staircase, saved only by my firm grasp on the leaden trunk’s handle.
It is far later than I thought, for the lad who delivers our milk and eggs for breakfast is staring up at me with wide eyes, a scone in one hand.
He isn’t supposed to be in the foyer, and he certainly isn’t supposed to be eating our food.
(I suspect one of the kitchen maids must fancy him.) I hardly mind his egregious overstep, however—I can use it to my benefit.
I grin at him and release the trunk, hurrying down the stairs before he can escape.
“You, lad,” I whisper. “A shilling to take my trunk out to the front of the house.”
He eyes me suspiciously as I pull a shiny coin out of my pocket. Fair enough.
I withdraw two more coins and hold them out as well. “And two more for your discretion.”
“Yes, Your Lordship,” he says through a mouthful of scone as he takes the coins from my hand.
I don’t correct his misuse of my title. I merely smile and clap him on the back, then glance up the stairs once more.
Somehow, no one has woken up yet. I suppose the sheer number of empty wine bottles at dinner is to blame for that small mercy.
He climbs the stairs with more grace than one might expect from a farmhand, shoves the scone into his pocket—revolting—and lifts my trunk with an ease that sends my bollocks straight back into my body out of pure shame. “We ought go round the back instead,” he suggests.
Thoroughly emasculated but too terrified at the prospect of being caught to concern myself with it, I follow him through the kitchens, snatching a pastry from the counter on my way out.
It’s only as he is loading my trunk onto his wagon that I realize I am to give him further instruction and indicate my imminent destination.
I panic as I scramble up beside him and hoist my collar to my chin, as if it will somehow protect me from the thing I have just done.
I can’t think of anywhere in England I might go where my father cannot find me. Helplessly, I turn to look at the lad beside me, and his brows rise. “To the docks, Your Lordship?” he asks.
“Yes,” I say, as if that were the plan all along. The wagon lurches forward, leaving my stomach behind.
Soon Kitty will be waking to bathe in rose-scented water so she might smell sweet for our nuptials.
Soon she will be carefully laced into the no-doubt-extravagant gown she has chosen for this special day.
Soon she will make her way into the foyer with a delighted smile on her face, and her heart will shatter into pieces when she finds out her betrothed has jilted her like a coward. Like a thief in the night.
But I cannot bring myself to feel bad for her. She doesn’t know it yet, but I have saved her from certain unhappiness. My selfishness has spared us both from a loveless marriage. One day, I am sure, she will thank me—but that day is not today.