Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
Evie shifted from one side to the other, to ease the pressure of the hard floor against her body.
Her entire left side felt sore; her arm had fallen asleep, and she had a cramp in her thigh, but now that she rolled to the other side, her right side began to hurt.
There was nothing she could do to make herself feel more comfortable in this tiny, cramped room.
She sat up and leaned with a sigh against the wall under the window.
The laundry room was a narrow closet lined with shelves to the right and left from the floor to the ceiling, filled with linen, bedsheets and tablecloths.
It smelled of starch, lavender, and that peculiar scent of iron that freshly pressed laundry emitted.
It was not an unpleasant smell, but pungent and singular.
The floor provided barely enough space for one person. For two, it worked only if both were lying on their sides, stacked tightly next to each other.
How had she, Lady Evangeline Stafford-Hill, come to share her bed with a mere laundry maid? On the bare ground, too.
Evie regarded the girl next to her with a sigh.
Mitzi had graciously offered to share her humble sleeping quarters after she had given up the bedroom she’d so painstakingly acquired earlier to the woman with her children.
She had placed a thin straw mattress on the floor, with a thin woollen blanket, and shyly said that Evie was welcome to sleep here, for surely that was better than sleeping in the common room with the men.
If Mitzi had not offered that, she would not have known what else to do but commit the unthinkable and sleep in a room filled with strangers, most of them travellers and soldiers.
If word ever got out that the sister of the Duke of Aldingbourne had been sharing her sleeping quarters with these men…
if her brother were ever to discover that… Evie shuddered. Best not think of that.
A sliver of anxiety trickled down her back, and she shifted to ease the cramp in her leg. Mitzi mumbled in her sleep and flopped over, now taking up all the remaining space on the little mattress.
Her reputation was hanging on a silken thread, ready to snap at any time.
Evie sighed. No, no. It was better to be confined here, with that maid, safely stowed away from the others.
Except then, two drunken men had attempted to come into the room, searching for the privy, no doubt, but Mitzi had pushed them out firmly and bolted the door.
“If anyone wants to get in now, they’ll have to break down the door,” Mitzi had said with confidence, but Evie had eyed the thin wooden door dubiously, thinking that doing so, in all likelihood, wasn’t all that difficult to accomplish.
Now sleep was gone and here she sat, pondering on the events of the day.
Part of her was thrilled that she was finally, finally experiencing a real adventure. All on her own, too, without her brother towering over her. Yet she wasn’t quite enjoying it as much as she ought. She pursed her lips and puckered her forehead as she thought of him.
Hartenberg.
Her bridegroom.
So entirely different from the man she’d always believed him to be. Not at all old and doddering, but very virile; almost annoyingly so, and with a confidence about him that she found most irritating.
He most definitely irritated her.
No, that was not the right word.
He’d irked and provoked her, from the moment she’d stepped off the carriage and he’d uttered those despicable words. He’d cast a single glance at her and judged her in the worst possible light. Merely thinking about it raised her hackles.
How Julius had ended up befriending a man like him remained a mystery to her. She could not possibly marry this man. She was determined to call off the engagement.
But only after she’d led him a little way up the garden path, as punishment for having called her a china doll.
And Clara? Poor Clara.
The girl was lying in bed, delirious with fever. Evie was upset that she could not be in the same room to nurse her. If only she could have had the measles when she was a child!
Earlier, Evie had thrown caution to the wind and tried to visit her room again, and found the door slightly ajar. She’d peeked inside to see whether the maid was there, and found herself lingering by the door when she saw the back of another woman standing by Clara’s bedside.
At first, she’d thought she was the maid. But she wasn’t.
She was clearly a gentlewoman; slender, tall, garbed in widow’s weeds.
Black from head to toe in deepest bombazine, a twilled fabric commonly worn by women who were in mourning.
Evie would have said something to make her presence known, but there had been something odd about the woman.
It was not only her appearance that was arresting, but the way she did not move at all, remaining there, staring down at Clara, until every hair on Evie’s body stood on end.
Evie held her breath, arrested, her eyes fixed on the woman. Who was she? What did she want? And why was she staring at Clara in that manner, as though she wanted something from her?
Just when Evie opened her lips to make herself known, the woman moved her head slightly and against the flickering candlelight, she saw that her profile was shrouded in a black veil that was attached to her dark hair.
“Lady Evangeline,” a voice said by her side, and Evie nearly jumped out of her skin.
It was her maid Nellie, holding up a lamp.
Evie’s hand fluttered to her throat. “Goodness, Nellie. What a fright you gave me.” Her voice was breathless.
“Why are you waiting out here, m’lady?” Nellie pursed her lips in disapproval. “You know you are not supposed to come close to Miss Clara, on account of you never having had the measles.”
“Yes, yes.” Evie’s gaze flew back to the room. No doubt the woman inside must have heard them. But the place where she’d been standing only a second ago was empty. “That can’t be.” Evie pushed the door open and looked around, bemused.
“M’lady?”
Evie took her lamp and held it higher, and she would have stepped inside the room, if Nellie hadn’t held her back.
“Go, and check where the woman has gone.”
“What woman?”
“Just now, there was a woman standing next to Miss Clara’s bed.”
Nellie went inside, checked every corner, and returned, reporting, “There is no one here.”
“That is impossible. That cannot be. She was here only a moment ago.”
“Who is it you were looking for?”
Evie told her about the woman she’d seen, but Nellie shook her head. “There is no one.”
“I don’t understand it.” Evie rubbed the space between her eyebrows. “She can’t have just disappeared like that.”
Nellie’s eyes grew round. “Do you suppose…do you suppose…”
“Yes?”
“That she was a ghost?” Nellie grew pale. “They do say this inn is haunted.”
Evie forced a laugh. “Nonsense.” She was certain that that woman had been of flesh and blood as much as she herself was. But if so, where had she gone?
Nellie had looked miserable at the prospect of having to spend the entire night alone with Miss Clara in a haunted room, but after Evie had given her her lamp as well, she’d bravely swallowed. “I shan’t sleep the entire night,” she’d said.
“You’ll be all right. And remember, Miss Clara is to be me, now, and I am Miss Clara. No one is to know.”
The maid nodded. “Very well, my lady. I mean, Miss Clara.”
Evie had returned to the laundry room and found herself unable to sleep.
With a sigh, she lowered herself on the ground again to attempt to slumber, propping herself on her elbow to blow out the candle next to her, when her eyes caught something sticking out behind the laundry stack on the lowest shelf. She reached inside the shelf and tugged.
A piece of paper.
It was a list. Written with impeccable, bold black ink. Her eyes flew over the names.
Kasper Draskovic
Graf von Witt
Karl Ludwig von Schulmeister
Franz von Leykam
Chevalier Valmont
Evie’s gaze wandered further down. There were approximately twenty names on it.
Then she gasped.
For at the bottom of the list was a name she had not expected to see.
Julius Stafford-Hill, Duke of Aldingbourne.
She stared at the name, her mind in a whirl.
What did it mean? Why was her brother’s name on the list? Who were these men? And what relationship did Julius have with them?
And, most importantly, why was it hidden here, in this tiny little laundry room?
She reached inside again and felt around, but there was nothing else. She moved the stack of laundry aside, but nothing.
There was only this paper.
She did not know what it meant. Something about it boded ill.
It might be dangerous.
She flew over the list again, once, twice, three times.
Then, with a resolute motion, she held it towards the candle flame and watched the paper light up in an orange blaze and gradually burn to a crisp.
Evie blew at the cinders so they scattered in the air.
Mitzi groaned and turned aside.
Evie quenched the flame of the candle and settled in the narrow space next to her.
She had done the right thing, she told herself.
Whatever it meant, it was better that it was gone.
Especially if Julius’s name was on it.
At one point, Evie must have fallen asleep, because when she opened her eyes, the weak morning light was drifting through the window. The storm had stopped, thankfully.
Evie picked herself up, patted down her skirt, and opened the door.
She nearly fell over the figure prostrated in front of her door.
It was that man, Schneider.
And next to him, on the floor leaning against the opposite wall, arms crossed over his chest, chin sunk to his breast, sleeping deeply, was Hartenberg.
Evie stared for one moment. Then slowly, carefully, she crouched down so she was on the same level as him and peered into his face.
A strand of dark hair fell over his forehead.
Thus, asleep, he looked half as frightful as when he was awake. But she supposed that was true for anyone.
Just what sort of a man was he, exactly?
Certainly, he was domineering and annoying and tended to command everyone around.
But did he have a sense of humour? So far, she’d not detected a single drop.
He also seemed practical, and concerned for his betrothed’s welfare.
That was, of course, herself. Or rather Clara.
Evie scratched the back of her head. It was all getting somewhat confusing.
Why was he sleeping here, with Schneider? As if they were keeping guard.
Well, if they were, that was a useless endeavour, for she was quite capable of keeping guard herself.
She looked up and her gaze stopped at a vase filled with purple asters by the windowsill, which, no doubt, the innkeeper’s wife must have placed there.
Evie rose carefully and pulled one out of the vase.
Then, repressing a giggle, she carefully, carefully tucked it behind the Field Marshal’s ear. For good measure, she adorned him with a few more until she was satisfied with her handiwork.
He slept serenely on.
Then, Evie stepped lithely over his outstretched body and sought out the kitchen.
Her stomach was grumbling and she craved some breakfast.
With some good, strong British tea, preferably.