years ago. He began to feel cold despite the warmth of the June afternoon. “I still don’t understand what you think is happening.”
Edward stared at him out of bloodshot eyes. “I don’t know what is happening. I suspect that Mama has been selling her things to support her… style of living.” He rubbed his face with both hands. “I’ve wondered how she managed to dress as she does and keep a carriage. I didn’t really pay attention. Why should I?”
“Edward!” He got his cousin’s attention. He wanted to shake him. “What has this to do with Charlotte?”
“Don’t you see? She must have gone into Mama’s house when she… She must have seen the empty rooms. Mama would never forgive her for the humiliation.”
When she what, Alec wanted to ask? Should he take the time to choke out of Edward just what he had done? Not now. “All right, she will never forgive her. Why in God’s name would that lead her to come to the country?”
Edward gritted his teeth. “Will you listen to me? Nothing matters more to my mother than her place in society. It’s what she lives for. She’s… a bit… fanatical on the subject. And now I find that she’s sold everything she owns to maintain her position.” He put his head in his hands. “I’ve heard her telling people she had painters in, and then it was workmen moving a wall. Who listens to such things? But I realized as I traveled that she has been making excuses to keep people out of her house for a very long time. The idea that her shift was discovered, that it might be revealed to the ton, would make her frantic. I don’t know what she might do to protect… well, she has already gone far beyond the bounds… Oh, hell! I followed as soon as I could. From what I could discover on the road, I am a day or more behind them.”
The only part of this that he cared about hit Alec like a roundhouse blow. “You think she would harm Charlotte! Over such a triviality?”
“I have been trying to tell you that it is not a triviality to her! You have never understood Mama, never considered what she was made to endure…”
“Endure?” Alec’s brain filled with jumbled visions—his aunt in a fury, Charlotte threatened. “You think Aunt Bella has gone… has become like Grandmama?” Alec saw a screaming rictus of a face, shattering glass, paroxysms of hysteria.
His cousin blanched and looked away. “No! Of course not. There have been one or two occasions… but it is not the same… Martha knows what to do.”
“Martha? The same Martha who took care of…?”
“Yes! Why not? Mama has known her since she was a child. They… handled a great many crises together.” Edward scowled, then pounded on the roof of the chaise. “Devil take it, I have to get home!”
Alec opened the carriage door and stepped down. “I shall ride across the fields to your house. It’s the only way to get there quickly. Can I get it through your head that the countryside is practically in arms? The army is on the way to suppress what amounts to a popular uprising. The roads are dangerous.”
“I’ll take one of the post horses and come with you.”
“Without a saddle or bridle? Over the walls and hedges?”
Edward leaned out and grasped his arm. “Give me your horse then.”
“No.” Alec pulled free and walked away.
“It’s my mother!” Edward jumped down and pursued him.
“Who is threatening to harm Charlotte!” If anything had happened to her… Alec’s blood burned in his veins. Edward caught his arm again. They grappled in the road, heedless of interested eyes from the carriage and the dismantled barricade. Alec twisted, jerked free, and landed a solid blow to Edward’s midsection. His cousin folded, huffing for breath. Alec ripped his horse’s reins from the back of the chaise and mounted.
Edward gazed up at him, still gasping. “Alec. Please.”
Alec didn’t remember ever hearing that word from his cousin. Edward’s anguished expression reached him, though he had no intention of giving him what he wanted. “Up ahead, take the left fork. Go through Tarne. You have a better chance that way. But I warn you, men are out on the roads, in the villages, and they are angry. They are not stopping to listen to excuses.” He wheeled his horse and headed for a gate that led into the fields.
***
Sometime in the endless night, Charlotte had freed her wrists, gnawing like