his cherished library. But instead of reading or making notes, he was turning slowly in the center of the room, his face an alien mask of bewilderment. “Where is the Symposium?” he said.
From their years together, she understood what he meant. “Plato is there, Papa, with all your Greek books.” She pointed to a rank of shelves.
His dark eyes had flickered, lit. “Elinor. Are you back so soon, my dear?” he responded.
Elinor, Charlotte’s mother, had been dead for ten years, and Charlotte did not at all resemble her portraits. “Father?” she’d replied in a shaken voice.
For a terrifying instant, he had gazed at her with an absolute lack of recognition. It was as if she faced a stranger in her beloved father’s image. Then he’d recovered, laughed, insisted it was the sort of momentary lapse that might happen to anyone. But it wasn’t. And it wasn’t the first. Charlotte had felt the rock of her existence turning to sand. She’d been in shock when he insisted she marry, she thought, and his insistence had so reminded her of the man who had held and guided her whole life. She’d had to see him as right. Tears clogged her throat. He hadn’t been right. He’d been dying.
Something thumped downstairs. Charlotte swallowed, frowned, and dismissed it as the settling of an empty house. She was almost used to being startled by how different it sounded uninhabited. The noise came again—not a creak—much more substantial. Probably nothing, she told herself, and didn’t believe it. Heart pounding, she slipped from her bed, picked up a candlestick, and opened the door a crack. She heard rustling, a distinct footstep. Someone was downstairs. Lucy?
She tiptoed across the hall and opened Lucy’s door. She had moved her maid downstairs for company. Lucy curled peacefully in sleep, but the wash of candlelight woke her. “Wha…?”
“Shhh. There’s someone below,” Charlotte whispered.
Lucy threw back her covers, and they stood together at the head of the stairs, straining their ears. Another soft bump; if Charlotte had been asleep, it would likely have gone unnoticed. Bug-eyed, Lucy wrapped her arms around herself.
The candlestick wavered; hot wax dripped onto the lace at Charlotte’s cuff. She was just as frightened as Lucy looked, but something within her refused to be intimidated any longer. She drew in a deep breath and spoke as loud as she could. “Jonathan, I believe there is someone downstairs. Go and see.”
Lucy goggled at her.
Charlotte swallowed and spoke again, pitching her voice as low and gruff as she could. “Yes, ma’am. Right away.” She stomped heavily on the hall floor, trying to sound large and dangerous.
There was a crash downstairs and a flurry of footsteps. Then all was silent. Charlotte went still, listening with every fiber of her being.
“Miss…?”
“Shh.” All senses on high alert, pulse still hammering, she let the minutes tick by. “I think they’ve gone,” she concluded at last.
“Oh, miss! When you spoke…” Lucy sagged against the wall. “Jonathan?” Her laugh had a ragged edge. “Was it the footman from home you were thinking of?”
Home would always be Hampshire. Charlotte nodded.
“I wish he was here! What are we going to…?”
“Right now, we are going into my bedchamber and locking the door. In the morning we will consult Mr. Wycliffe.” Charlotte tried to keep her voice steady, but it shook.
Lucy heard the tremor and automatically tried to think of some comfort as she followed her mistress into the room and watched her turn the key. Lucy had known Charlotte Rutherford since she was seven years old—a sweet child, the sort the whole household had cosseted when her mother died. It had been so hard to see her sad. It was not long after that tragedy that Lucy had become her personal maid. At just five years older, she had often felt like a big sister, and had many times consoled and advised like one. At this moment, however, she found no comforting words to speak. The creeping sounds below had thoroughly unnerved her.
Miss Charlotte put the candle on the nightstand and climbed back into bed. At her gesture, Lucy joined her in the big four-poster. “Can we leave the candle burning?” she ventured.
“Absolutely.”
Lucy appreciated her crisp tone and her resolute look. She’d been brave as a lion tonight, speaking right up and scaring off the burglar. More like her old self, the mistress of the Hampshire house, a grown woman, not a forlorn little girl. As they settled on the wide feather mattress and her pulse slowed, Lucy hoped