Chapter 43
The next day was a quiet one at Albery Hall.
Everyone in the house was tired, and disinclined for conversation.
Cecilia had her horribly tangled thoughts to occupy her, and she knew that Beatrice was struggling with her own dilemmas.
It seemed that they’d agreed without open discussion that they really couldn’t stand to talk about any of it any more. Not today.
They all walked out together on the sands when the tide was at its lowest; though nobody said so, they must all be aware that, unlike in the lanes with their high hedges, it was impossible for any person with malicious intent to approach them out there without being seen from far off.
But they had the beach to themselves today.
Even the Major didn’t appear to be out on this occasion, and Cecilia was annoyed with herself for obsessing over what precisely that might mean.
It did not have to signify that he was avoiding her, and even if he was, what did that prove?
She shook her head as if she could dislodge the unwelcome, churning thoughts.
It was the sort of day that led inevitably to an early night.
Nobody was in the mood for playing cards on this occasion.
Cecilia wondered if Alistair might come to visit her, waiting patiently out in the moonlight to see if she would join him, but she wasn’t sure what she’d say to him if he did, and still in the back of her mind was that lingering fear of Lord Pallant.
So she did not go outside, but went sedately to bed, in the rather vain hope that a good night’s sleep might bring her some much-needed wisdom.
She was tired, after last night’s lack of rest, the peaceful, even boring day had soothed her somewhat, and so she fell asleep quite quickly.
At first, she thought it was a dream – a nightmare, her anxious brain dredging up and repeating a previous disturbing experience.
Then as she fought her way up through the heavy layers of sleep, she realised that though everything was quiet now, she had heard the loud creak again, outside in the corridor.
Her heart was pounding and this time, unlike the last, she knew in her heart that there was someone in the house who did not belong there.
And she must have a shrewd idea who it was.
She was out of bed and wrapped in her dressing gown in an instant, though she had not the least idea what she was actually going to do.
But she could not lie in bed and leave her sisters and Miss Macintyre at the mercy of…
someone who must wish them all ill. Bianca, for one, wouldn’t wake if a band of desperate smugglers were in the room with her, arguing at the tops of their voices about which of them was going to shoot her first.
She crept to the door and stood listening, barely daring to breathe. But it was no good – she had to go and see. She eased the old door open with agonising slowness, fearful of giving herself away, equally fearful of what she’d find when it was fully open at last.