before replying, “Indeed. What motive? It is a piece of unfortunate business, especially when I nearly had Carstairs in my sights.” He looked over at Patience, who stood near the tea table, and dismissed her.
A brief curtsy and she reluctantly left the room, disappointed she would not hear more. She had to learn what he knew. Perhaps the earl, himself, had killed Carstairs and tried to misdirect his friend to her brother. On an impulse, she cracked the door, hoping to hear a gem of information. Surely, here in the shadows, no one could find her.
The earl’s friend began, “Yes, Carstairs was…”
Just then she heard steps and a woman’s voice above her on the staircase. She rushed across the hall into what she hoped was an empty parlor. Heart pounding, she swiped her sweaty palms on her apron, her hands clasped the cool doorknob.
Inside the quiet parlor, she listened at the door and heard more voices and footsteps. Precious minutes ticked by until suddenly everything resumed its normal tomblike silence.
Cautiously, she peeled open the door and peeked up and down the hall. No one. She scurried back across the hall to the study door, still slightly ajar. Leaning her ear close to the opening, Patience heard the earl’s voice.
“Meet me in my rooms tonight. I should be back after eleven.”
She did not hear the reply because the young footboy, Lem, beckoned her from the vestibule. “Miss,” he called insistently.
Patience hurried down the hall to meet the little boy. “What is it?” she asked him.
He pointed toward the kitchen. “It’s Mr. Gibbs. ’e’s been looking for you. ’e ’as more work for you.”
The minute he relayed his message, the lad shot out of the house like a cannon, probably in an effort to avoid work or the butler. She glanced once more at the study doors, sighed, and headed toward the kitchen. Already she was busy planning how to be in the earl’s bedchamber when he met with his friend tonight.
Chapter 3
The sun’s dying scarlet rays washed across the sky after Patience’s second day as Paddock Green’s newest still-room maid. She stretched her weary arms above her head, stiff from polishing the last looking glass with wine spirits, then added whiting for a final shine.
Finished earlier than expected, Patience had helped rub and sift sugar for cake, although the cook complained that Patience’s cake dough could be used as cannon fodder to shoot at the unsuspecting French enemy. Perhaps next time she could remember to add the yeast, the cook hinted scornfully.
But Patience’s mind was not on baking a better cake. Like Pandora with the key to her box, she wanted to unearth the earl’s secrets in his locked study; it had been secured, no doubt, to keep out prying still-room maids.
After she helped Lem cut the cotton tops off the candles and change the lamp oil, Mrs. Knockersmith sent her to bed with a warning to be up earlier than the sun. Patience wearily climbed the stairs, scratching her head through her large mobcap.
Lord Londringham, a subject never very far from her mind. What kind of a man was he? He was certainly guilty of espionage, but murder? She shivered as if ghostly hands had reached out to her from the grave. Biting her lip, she realized resignedly that she would have to get much closer to the earl if she wanted to discover the answers she sought.
Although the hour grew late, Patience decided to take a quick nap before attempting her first foray into spying. She had thought about it all afternoon and planned to eavesdrop on the earl and the captain when they met tonight in the earl’s rooms. With any luck, she could secure evidence to be used against the earl.
Once safely inside her maid’s room in the attic, Patience threw off her mobcap and spectacles, and in relief, unbuttoned the maid’s uniform before pulling on her thin blue lawn nightdress. She unpinned her hair, then combed the thick strands through her fingers, as she massaged away the slight pain from the cap and pins. She promptly curled into a ball and closed her eyes. Just for a few minutes, she promised herself.
An hour later Patience awakened, slowly, then jolted into a sitting position. It all came winging back to her on a cry.
Tonight. The earl’s room.
A glance at the clock showed almost half-past eleven. She grabbed a pale blue wrap and slipped quietly out the door, not giving herself pause for failure, and winked three times for luck before hastening toward the stairs.
Patience thought her frantic breathing would awaken the dead. Lips dry and hands trembling, her bare feet whispered across the moonbeam-lit wooden floor as she ran down the hallway. She prayed the shadows would hide her as she hugged the cool walls on her descent to the second floor, forcing her cowardly feet forward step-by-step.
When the longcase clock in the Grand Hall began to chime, she stopped to take quick, shallow breaths, keenly listening for any sleepless companions in the night.
What if she was too late? What if the earl had not returned yet? Too late for a change of heart. A spur of righteousness lit her heels and with frantic archangels beating in her heart, Patience began her secret advance toward the enemy. As she crept down the long corridor in the west wing, she noted the ornate pillars standing sentinel outside every other door down the hallway, which would provide a perfect refuge if needed.
Luckily, nothing disturbed the night. Wax candles nestled in their wall sconces flickered from the slight breeze through the open window at the end of the hallway. The dim light slightly illuminated the path to the earl’s door.
Stealthily she continued on, her palms dampened, as she moved closer, four doors, then three doors away. Not far from his suite of rooms, she could see a light under his door. Was success near at hand or was disappointment about to send her scurrying back to bed? On tiptoe, she crossed the hallway to his door to listen.
All quiet. At the point of deciding whether to wish for better luck tomorrow, someone made the choice for her. Heavy footsteps thudded on the stairs heading her way. The only escape available was a nearby door. She fervently hoped she had done something good lately to warrant an unoccupied room and a place to hide.
Patience sprang for the door, jerked it open, and then almost slammed it shut, her nightdress and robe flying about her ankles. She pressed her back to the door, holding her mouth with one hand to muffle her breathing. Thankfully, no indignant person leapt from the large tester bed. She leaned against the door and listened as the footsteps continued past her door and the earl’s rooms. Who could that have been? If it was the captain, why had he not stopped?
Putting a hand to her heart to calm herself, Patience peered into the room, her eyes adjusting to the moonlight laced faintly through the window. She slowly and cautiously circled a long chaise longue in the darkened room while holding out her left hand to guide herself to the wall, which she thought must adjoin the earl’s room.
She leaned an ear to the silk damask wall and with her senses tuned for sound, she strained to hear. A moment passed and then another. She held her breath and waited. Nothing. Were the walls too thick for the convenience of eavesdroppers or would-be spies?
If only she had not fallen asleep. She shook her head and sighed, regret as unfamiliar to her as poverty to a king.
Patience straightened up with an idea. Perhaps the captain had not yet arrived for their rendezvous?
A
