Chapter Six
Lewis closed the door firmly behind Lady Ambrose. He couldn’t make up his mind whether she was excessively kind or excessively inquisitive. He didn’t mind the former, but he was damned if he’d put up with the latter, which was good for no one and certainly not for him.
“Lady Ambrose has gone out?” old Kemp asked, as usual managing to convey his disapproval of everything. “It looks like there will be rain. Did you send for her outerwear?”
“She never asked for it, Mr. Kemp. She had a shawl with her, says she’s just taking the air. Shall I send for her maid to go after her?”
“No, no, it’s too late now. Mind your post, Lewis, and remember to be attentive.”
“Yes, Mr. Kemp.”
Silly old fossil. Lewis waited until the butler had made his stately way upstairs, then sank back onto his narrow bench in the porter’s box.
Life felt unbearably empty without Dinah.
Perhaps in time he’d come to appreciate the freedom from the torment of want and temptation, but right now, it was as if all the light had gone out the world.
All the servants knew she was dead, although it had never been officially announced. No doubt her body was already being transported to the aunt who wouldn’t want it, just so the rich Chadbons could avoid the cost and annoyance of her burial.
That was best. More than his job was at stake if the truth ever got out…
He would have to get the damned thing back. In fact, now would be an excellent opportunity. The maids were all busy clearing up after tea and setting the dining room table for the evening meal.
He rose and marched swiftly down the long hallway to the baize door. He almost collided with Andrew on the stairs, but the first footman, Lewis’s superior and pretender to Kemp’s throne if the old goat ever retired, merely grunted by way of acknowledgment and didn’t question him.
Without going into the servants’ hall or the kitchen, Lewis hurried past, along the corridor to the maids’ dormitory.
He knew, because Dinah had told him, that her bed was nearest to the door. He knew she’d liked that position because it was easier to escape at night and go wherever she wanted when the house and the grounds were quiet.
It had made Lewis jealous, for he suspected she’d met other men in that way. But at least she’d let Lewis kiss her…once. It was her subsequent coldness that had led him to show off. Well, that and his fear for her.
All the beds had a narrow hanging locker beside them, and a small bedside table with one drawer. Dinah’s drawer held a hairbrush, a comb, and several pins, plus three neat, self-sewn handkerchiefs, all cleaned, folded, and pressed.
He shut the drawer and felt under the pillow, then beneath the mattress. Damn her, where did she put it? Did she give it to someone else?
Straightening, he opened the locker and found a folded apron and cap on the shelf beside her plain bonnet. A black maid’s dress was hanging up next to a warm pelisse and the bright-blue dress that she wore on her half days. It matched the blue of her eyes.
“What are you doing in here?”
Starting, he spun around to face Mrs. Thornfield, whose normally kindly countenance was as sharp as she’d sounded.
He swallowed. “Sorry, Mrs. Thornfield. I just wanted something to remember her by. She was…she was special to me.”
“That doesn’t mean you can come in here, let alone rifle through her things and help yourself.”
The words were harsh, but at least her face had lost the angry suspicion.
“I know,” he said humbly. “But I thought Her Ladyship would send it all to the aunt who was nothing but mean to Dinah.”
“She probably will,” Mrs. Thornfield admitted.
After a moment, she came over to him and he made way. She opened the drawer and her frown came back.
“Did you take the necklace?” she snapped, holding out her hand.
Lewis caught his breath. He knew the necklace she meant, of course, a pretty silver thing depicting a dancer. It was very fine work and Dinah always wore it on her days off.
“Of course I didn’t,” he said indignantly. “She was probably wearing it when she…” He trailed off, biting his lip.
Mrs. Thornfield dropped her hand. “She probably was. I know she hid it inside her dress when she was working.” She picked up one of the handkerchiefs and thrust it at Lewis.
“Take this and don’t show it off. I’ll make sure her other friends have a keepsake too.
The aunt doesn’t need her handkerchiefs. ”
“No, Mrs. Thornfield. Thank you, ma’am.”
“Don’t make me regret it, Lewis. If I find you in here again, you’ll be dismissed.”
“I’d deserve it. Sorry, Mrs. Thornfield. Thank you.”
He stuffed the little piece of cloth in his pocket and fled, well aware of his luck, and the fact that he had, probably, used his whole year’s supply up in one moment. Which did not bode well…
*
The pleasant weather of the last couple of days vanished during the evening into cold gray skies and drizzling rain with intermittent torrents.
“You don’t want to go out in this, Miss Kate,” Grissy assured her, with more hope than expectation.
“I have to, though you don’t. If you just make sure I can get back in again…”
“Don’t be daft,” Grissy snapped. “As though I’d ever let you wander about strange countryside alone!”
“We won’t be wandering. It will be brisk and to the point. Or, at least, as brisk as muddy roads and puddles will allow us. Wear your old boots and dress.”
Grissy groaned again, but by midnight, when the house was quiet and even Chadbon and Newman had retired for the evening, allowing the last of the servants to go to bed too, she was ready in her traveling cloak and bonnet and had a lantern prepared by the side door.
She lit it from her own tinder box and flint, and they crept together out of the house.
Everything looked different in the dark, but at least the rain had let up to a harsh drizzle.
Kate easily found the lane by which she had been brought home this afternoon.
As they trudged along, they took turns holding the lantern, for they had to beware of branches sticking out to trip them or slash at their faces.
“So,” Grissy said at last, “why exactly are we going to the magistrate’s house?”
“To break in, of course.”
“We are not breaking into a magistrate’s house,” Grissy said firmly.
“Well, no, just into his prison cell, which has its own entrance. I know roughly where that is.”
“But it’ll be locked! Guarded, for all we know!”
“Actually, I’m hoping it is guarded,” Kate confided, “because then we can persuade the constable to let us in.”
She could imagine the fascinated, appalled look in the maid’s eyes as she turned her gaze to Kate’s profile.
“And how exactly do you plan to persuade him of that?” Grissy demanded. “In the middle of the night!”
“Maybe reason, maybe bribery,” Kate said vaguely. “I don’t know what kind of a man he will be.”
Grissy squeaked and grabbed Kate’s arm, causing the lantern to swing wildly.
“What?” Kate asked.
“Something moved! Didn’t you hear it?”
“Just some harmless animal in the hedgerows. Mind your feet, Grissy!”
“Yes, but why are we doing this? Are we springing the curate—who isn’t the curate—from prison?”
“He is the curate,” Kate said. “He’s just pretending not to be Lord Rupert, so we’re not to let on. As for springing him”—she regarded Grissy with some respect—“I never thought of it. I do need to talk to him. But maybe you’re right and we should just set him free. If we can get rid of the guard.”
“Who would surely know who you are and that you’re to blame. His Lordship wouldn’t like that, and as for Sir Gilbert—”
“Yes, well, Sir Gilbert isn’t here, but I suppose you are right. Freeing him would just cause different problems. In any case, I’m not sure he’d go. I don’t understand him anymore.”
The last sounded oddly plaintive to her own ears, which was foolish. She knew only too well how old friends grew apart as they grew up, because they changed somehow into different people. It saddened her, because she never felt she had changed.
After half an hour’s walking, the rain came on harder again, a massive deluge that seemed to dump entire oceans onto them.
Grissy’s silence took on a reproachful quality that Kate ignored.
Through the blinding torrent, she could just make out the magistrate’s house looming ahead, a deeper black against the misty dark sky. She could see no lights on.
Another quarter of an hour took them to the ancient gates, which, fortunately, no one had locked.
Once through, Kate pulled Grissy onto the grassy verge so that their feet didn’t crunch the gravel in the short drive.
At the end, she drew the maid on around the side of the house, shading the lantern with her wet cloak.
There, sure enough, toward the back of the house and down a couple of steps, was a small, narrow door, clearly designed to be insignificant. Kate halted, one hand warningly on Grissy’s arm. She peered into the darkness, listening hard, but could see no one and heard neither footsteps nor voices.
They crept closer and descended the steps, and Kate pressed her ear to the door to listen for the breathing of a guard on the other side.
If he was asleep, would he hear her knock and let her in?
Now that she was here, she couldn’t quite think how to persuade him that she should talk to his prisoner in the middle of the night, without the magistrate’s permission or presence.
In any case, she could hear nothing at all inside. Taking a deep breath, she raised her hand to the door.
Grissy caught her by the wrist.
“Miss,” she breathed, and lifted the lantern to show Kate what she’d seen. A large key on a ring, hanging from a hook beside the door.
Seriously? Could it be that easy?
Kate reached up and took the ring off the hook. Very carefully, she fitted it to the lock and turned it. Grissy stared at her, the whites of her eyes gleaming in the shaky lantern light. Kate eased open the door and crept inside.