Chapter 18

18

T he four walls of Grace’s sitting room were closing in on her. Nevermind that the stones of Castle Alnwick were strong enough to resist even the fiercest of attackers, Grace was certain they were shifting closer together. It was the only explanation she could find for why her throat grew tight when she sat, safe from all harm, in her private quarters.

Deep inside, she was aware of just how absurd her thoughts were. She did not dare speak them out loud, not even to herself. Everyone in the castle was hard at work, starting from dawn and not ending until late in the night. Roland commanded their every movement from his study.

Everyone except Grace, that was.

For perhaps the first time in her adult life, Grace was completely useless. Roland had assured her time and again that she had the most important task of all—carrying their child. But when she sat in the utter quiet of her sitting room, with naught to entertain her but her half-hearted efforts at embroidery, she felt as though she served no purpose at all.

She glared at the snarled thread marring the pristine surface of the white handkerchief stretched across the wooden frame in her lap. Yet another task she could not get right. She had offered to venture into town to help Miss Whitby with the school. Roland had countered that it was not safe, nor wise given the icy ground, for her to venture out. Mr Harding gave her a similar shake of the head when she asked if she could help with the business side of the estate while Roland was speaking with the tradesmen.

“As much as I’d welcome the help, my lady, it would take me more time to explain everything than it would to do it myself. My lady is not familiar enough with the area or the tenants to know which complaints are urgent.”

“I am certain I could do something, Mr Harding,” Grace had replied, undaunted. “A broken chimney is more timely than a broken door latch, etcetera, etcetera.”

“Perhaps so, my lady,” Harding said, shifting uncomfortably in his chair. “But the requests themselves are only part of the story. Mrs Smitherton, for example, always says her chimney is clogged, when in truth all it needs is for her husband to sweep it out. If I put her at the bottom of the list, Mr Smitherton will eventually get round to it. Do you see what I mean, my lady?”

Indeed, Grace did. She had left the good man to his work and ventured belowstairs. Mrs Yardley gave a look of such horror at her setting foot in her domain, Grace had hurried back up the stairs, claiming she had got turned around and never meant to be there in the first place.

No matter what Grace wanted to do, Lady Percy, esteemed countess and future duchess, was very much in the way.

Resigned to her confinement, Grace tugged on the knot of thread. It stretched taut and then snapped, leaving the mess of the knot behind and a useless bit of string dangling from her needle. She jabbed it into the cotton cloth, penting her frustration, and ended up stabbing the finger she had failed to move out of the way. Blood stained the back of the cloth, rendering it fit only for the fireplace.

“Drat, bother, and blast,” she growled, savouring the way the words felt in her mouth. She loosed the screw holding the wooden frame together and pulled the cloth free. With great satisfaction, she balled it into her fist and launched it into the red-gold flames. For the first time in days, she experienced the satisfaction of accomplishing at least one thing to which she had put her mind.

Her childhood self longed to toss another item in, perhaps a scrap of foolscap or a spool of thread. Those items, however, would be hard to come by in the depths of winter. The action had at least given her some idea for putting her time to better use. She had energy to spare. So, too, did the Sprouts.

Much relieved to have something new to focus upon, Grace marched out of her sitting room and up the stairs to the nursery. As usual, she heard the children’s voices before she saw them. This time, at least, when she opened the door she found they were getting along.

“A sea monster!” Willa screamed in mock horror. She dove behind the doll house and shouted for Wes to light his cannons.

“Hold yer fire!” Miss Fenton called, wading into the mix with a white flag in her hand. “Sorry, my lady. The children have been pretending tae be pirates on the high seas ever since Sir Nathaniel told them the story of Calico Jack.”

Grace drew up short, her mind going blank on the name.

“He was fearless,” Wes said. “Sailing the high seas, flying the Jolly Roger, he used his wits to lay claim to all the plunder.”

“I see,” Grace said, giving every impression of being impressed. “And was he a Robin Hood type, robbing the rich to feed the poor?”

Wes shook his head. “No, ma’am, he was not. That’s why the government tossed him in jail, sentenced him to death, and then hung his corpse on display to serve as a message to the other criminals.”

Willa bobbed her head in agreement, the old doll still tucked close to her side.

Grace could not imagine why Thorne would find such a story an appropriate story for two rambunctious children. Determined to change the conversation, Grace asked Willa about her dolly. “Have you given her a name?”

“Anne,” Willa said, beaming with pride.

“A nice, solid name,” Grace said, but she didn’t get further than that.

“Like Anne Bonny! She left her husband to sail off with Calico Jack. She didn’t die with him though. No one knows what happened to her. I’ve decided she’s still out sailing. That’s why we started playing pirates. He’s Calico Jack and I’m Anne Bonny.”

Grace gave a moment of consideration to suggesting more appropriate role models for the children, but decided to leave well enough alone. They were healthy, happy, and far enough away from open water to eliminate the risk they might sail off into the night. She waved for them to go back to their playing and went over to have a word with their nanny.

“Hello Miss Fenton, I hope the Sprouts have not made you walk the plank.”

“Only a time or two,” she replied. “They soon found that those they sent into the sea had a tendency tae return as multi-tentacled monsters. Monsters, I should add, who reminded them tae practise their letters and sums.”

The women paused as the children’s voices rose again, making chat impossible. If there was one positive thing about Alnwick Castle, it was the distance between the nursery and the family rooms, and the extra thick walls. Though their voices echoed off the hard surfaces, Grace did not worry they might disturb either Roland or the Breaker.

Grace cast a glance at Miss Fenton. The woman was eyeing the children with a fond smile, none the worse for her time spent corralling them.

“I would never have predicted it, but Willa loves that doll something fierce. I’ve had tae repair the stitching on the body twice. At the rate she’s going, she’ll need a replacement by Christmas morning.”

“Bless you for putting the doll to rights—and for taking such great care of the Sprouts. If you will ring for tea, I will see if they will settle down long enough to listen to a story.”

The Sprouts were not keen to call an end to their game, but the arrival of a plate of iced biscuits brought them around. Grace and Miss Fenton laid claim to a settee near the window, while the children sat at their feet. After several sips of restorative tea, Grace felt up to the task of entertaining.

“Would you two be interested in a new story? Perhaps something that might inspire a different game?” she asked.

“I dunno, my lady,” Wes replied, his nose wrinkled. “We’ve got soldiers fighting battles, pirates sailing along the coasts. I don’t want some yarn about a princess. That’s boring.”

“Not if the princess is dead,” Willa countered. “And a ghost! Maybe the ghost haunting this castle is a princess or even a queen. Did a queen ever live here?”

“Not that I am aware of….” Grace halted there.

“But there is a ghost, right?” Wes asked, his eyes gone wide. “Willa and I’ve heard plenty of scraping and shuffling noises. It ain’t mice, no matter what Miss Fenton says.”

“It’s nae a ghost either,” the woman countered.

Wes dropped his biscuit onto his plate and leapt to his feet to defend his statement. While he carried on about hearing a door open and close, unexplained footsteps, and strange apparitions, Grace wondered why the duke would wander so far from his room. Was he in search of someone? Or something? Perhaps he sought the sister he had lost so long ago.

Grace pulled her mind back to the matter at hand and noticed Willa had gone awfully quiet. “What do you think?” Grace asked her when Wes paused to catch his breath.

Willa glanced over at her doll and studied it, as though engaging in an imaginary conversation. After a moment, she turned back to Grace. “Anne says ghosts aren’t real.”

“What about you, Willa? Do you agree with your doll?”

Willa nodded her head once, but then shook it. She scrunched her mouth up and shrugged her shoulders. “I want Anne to be right, but Wes isn’t lying about the noises.”

Somehow, Grace knew that telling the children it was likely the old duke stalking the corridors would not put a stop to their concerns, or their interest. He was worse than any imaginary monster. They had seen him shout and raise his fist in anger more than once since their arrival in Northumberland.

Yet, it would be equally unfair to dismiss their concerns out of hand. It was not important for them to know who it was so much as to understand that the noises were entirely human.

“I promise there is no ghost. How about I tell you a story from when I was a child? Would you be interested in that? I know it is not a fairytale, but you might enjoy it nonetheless.” She offered them another biscuit from the plate and waited for them to get settled again. “Do you two remember my brother Felix?”

“He came to the wedding,” Willa replied. “Mrs Archer told us he’ll be an earl one day, like Lord Percy is now.”

“He will, indeed, but not for a very long time, I hope. Though his title sounds very fancy, I assure you he was just as rambunctious a child as the two of you are now. I was his younger sister and he took no end of delight from causing me trouble.”

“I know what that’s like,” Willa mumbled. Her brother responded with a blistering glare that made Grace bite back a laugh. Both Wes and Willa were equally likely to get up to no good.

“As I was saying, when I was a much younger child, younger than the two of you now, I had a problem with disappearing ink pots. My governess chastised me time and again for losing track of mine, no matter how many times I said I was not to blame. My brother told me I was slowly losing my mind, and would soon have to be locked away for everyone else’s safety.” Grace checked to make sure the children were paying attention.

“Something about his tone made me question whether he was telling the truth. I was certain there had to be a perfectly logical explanation. All I had to do was look for the clues to find it. The ink pots always disappeared on the days I had my piano lessons. I cried off sick at the start of one, and then hurried to my room. My ink pot was still there. I slid under my bed and kept watch to see what would happen. Not twenty minutes later, Felix crept in. He had been taking the pots and hiding them in an unused cupboard. I caught him red handed and made him confess to our governess. He ended up being the one locked up—for a week, that was—writing lines promising not to do it again. So you see, children, you should not let your imagination get away from you. Do you understand the point of my story?”

“We got it, my lady, but I won’t lie. It was boring, miss, no offence intended. Couldn’t you have included at least a highwayman?” Wes asked. He got to his feet and went over to the bookshelf, and then returned with an old leather-bound book in hand. “Miss Fenton’s been reading us these. Maybe you can find a better idea here.”

Grace did not take his criticism to heart, for her story had been designed to educate more than anything else. She opened the book at the page marked. The bookmark was made of a narrow strip of cloth, with a key attached to it with a swirl of red wax. It was a curious marker, to say the least. Grace used her finger to make the place and then went back to look at the first pages. A single name was written inside the front, the letters printed by a childish hand.

“Hannah Percy,” she whispered. She flipped back to the key, studying it more closely.

“It looks like Mrs Yardley’s keys,” Wes said. “When we asked her, she said she didn’t know what it was meant to open.”

Had anyone else made the comment, Grace might not have made the connection. But she recalled, quite vividly, Wes complaining about the trunk he could not unlock.

Grace pulled the key free from the wax and closed it in her hand. She passed the book over to Miss Fenton. “I am sorry. I have just remembered something I need to do. Would you mind taking over?”