Amanda Scott (22 page)

“I don’t know what he means to do, and I shan’t know until I go into the library,” she told him, “but neither he nor Melanie would thank me for bringing you into this business. That much I can tell you.”

“You didn’t bring me. I brought you.”

“Yes, and I am grateful that you were able to find me, but now you are keeping me standing here in the hall. Do go for a walk, Giles, and tell no one else about what is transpiring between your cousin and Melanie.”

“But I don’t know what’s happening. I know only what Melanie said, that Cousin Jack is as mad as fire and means to punish her for something she has done. She wouldn’t even tell me what it was, and I wish to know. I am her brother, after all—her elder brother, too, so I ought to know what’s wrong, and I ought to be able to do something to help her.”

Emily laid a hand upon the boy’s shoulder and smiled down at him. “Your concern for Melanie does you proud, Giles, but your good sense ought to tell you that you have done all you can by fetching me. Now, the sooner I get inside the library, the sooner I can help her. I don’t mean to allow Meriden to punish her if I can stop him from doing so. Melanie can tell you all you wish to know later.”

Reluctantly the boy stepped away from her, and Emily rewarded him with another smile as she turned toward the library doors. The hall was empty of servants for once, so she opened the doors without ceremony and walked in. To her surprise, there were not two people in the room but three.

Meriden stood in front of the library table. He was dressed in his riding breeches and coat, and held his whip and gloves in his right hand as though he had just come into the house. Beside him stood the maid Molly, wringing her hands in her white cambric apron, her mobcap sitting askew atop her brown curls. Facing them, her back to the door, was Melanie. Beneath her white muslin frock her spine was ramrod straight, and every line of her body shouted indignation. She turned belatedly, as though she had just become aware of Emily’s entrance.

Emily shut the door and moved toward the child, only to be stopped in her tracks by Meriden’s crisp voice.

“You intrude, Miss Wingrave. This matter is a private one.”

With difficulty Emily held her temper in check. She even managed a haughty lift of her right eyebrow as she replied, “So private, in fact, that you include a servant, sir?”

In answer, Meriden set his whip and gloves on the table and held up her missing amethyst earbobs and her gold bracelet. “You should thank Molly for the return of these baubles. I regret that your pearls were not with the rest of the things she found, but no doubt we will soon discover their location, so if you will be good enough—”

“Don’t be absurd, Jack. Are you daring to tell me that you suspect Melanie, Melanie, of taking Miss Lavinia’s jewels and mine as well? You must be all about in your head, sir.” With that, she strode decisively forward and placed a protective arm about the little girl’s shoulders.

Melanie stiffened.

“You see,” Jack said sardonically, “she does not welcome your championship. Her guilt no doubt makes it difficult for her to thank you for such undeserved compassion.”

“I didn’t take Aunt Emily’s jewels,” Melanie said in a lifeless voice.

“Of course she did not,” Emily said heatedly. “Molly, did you dare to accuse Miss Melanie of such a thing?”

“Now, look here, Em—”

“No, miss,” said Molly at the same moment, “I did no such of a thing. His lordship said we was to tell him if anything that was lost was found, so I come here to tell him that I found them things in Miss Melanie’s bedchamber because I doesn’t want nobody thinking I knowed where they was and didn’t say, as anyone would think who was to find them later on. I’m a right good cleaner, I am, and none as knows me would believe them things was in Miss Melanie’s room without me knowing. But as for saying that young lassie took anything, well, I never, and that’s the truth.”

Meriden looked as he might have looked had an oak tree talked back to him, but he recovered rapidly. Fixing the maidservant with a basilisk stare, he said in cold tones, “That will do, Molly. I know how many days make a week, and the facts speak for themselves.”

“Well, sir, if tha’ll not take offense at me saying so, they don’t.” Molly returned his look, clearly knowing she was stepping beyond her place but just as clearly determined to say her piece. “Miss Melanie don’t hide her treasures under her wardrobe, and that’s a fact.” She smiled at Melanie. “Aught she wants to keep hid out of sight, she puts in a wee recess back o’ the headboard of her bed, and no one don’t touch such.”

Emily glanced at Melanie, but the little girl’s face was devoid of expression. She stared straight ahead of her, making no attempt to respond to the maidservant’s words.

Meriden also looked at the child. Then he turned back to the maid and said in measured tones, “You may go now, Molly.”

Molly held her ground. “Tha’ don’t still be thinking—”

“I said, you may leave. And be so good as to take Miss Wingrave with you. I wish to be private now with Miss Melanie.”

The maid opened her mouth; then, with an appealing look at Emily, she closed it again and walked quickly out the door, shutting it firmly behind her without having so much as looked to see if Emily were following her.

Emily stood where she was, waiting only for the sound of the door’s snapping to before demanding to know if Meriden had lost his mind. “Melanie is no thief, sir, as you ought to know by looking at her. Someone put my things where Molly found them.”

“Yes, someone did,” he replied caustically. “Melanie did.”

“Didn’t,” muttered Melanie.

“Then,” Jack said, turning to face her, “perhaps you will explain how and why they came to be found in your room.”

Melanie said nothing.

“Meriden,” Emily said, “you are handling this matter all wrong. You would do much better—”

“Now, see here,” he said grimly, “I told you once to leave, and I insist now that you do so. This matter is strictly between Melanie and me. We have no need of your assistance, and I have no desire to hear any more of your opinions. There is a good deal more to this than you know—is there not, Melanie?—so if you will just for once do as you are told—”

“I am staying right here, and nothing you say will make me do otherwise,” Emily told him defiantly, “so you might as well get on with whatever you have to say to Melanie.”

Exasperated, Jack said, “Dashed if I don’t understand perfectly now why young Campion refused to come up to scratch. In my opinion, the man showed a great deal of sense in not taking such an ill-tempered shrew for his wife.” He glared at Emily, but for once his words had no power to hurt her and she simply glared back. Goaded, he snapped, “If you must know, madam, I intend to do more than just talk to Melanie this time, and if you are wise, you won’t tempt me to deal you similar treatment. Indeed, if you don’t wish to be picked up and thrust bodily out of this room, you will go quietly and at once.”

“I won’t,” Emily said flatly, adding hastily when he took a step toward her, “and if you touch me I will scream the house down. I won’t leave you alone to inflict your brutality upon poor Melanie. You are making much more of this great discovery of Molly’s than it deserves, you know. You heard her yourself. Melanie wouldn’t put something she meant to hide from everyone else under her wardrobe. Nobody would do so who meant to keep her plunder hidden. For goodness’ sake, Jack, even in a less-well-regulated house than this one is, the servants sweep under the furniture from time to time.”

“Does it occur to you,” he asked sarcastically, “that a nine-year-old child might fail to comprehend the ramifications of that fact?”

“No, it does not,” she retorted. “Children think such things through, particularly when they wish to protect themselves, and they are more observant than adults, who tend to forget that their servants exist. We talk together in their presence just as we do in privacy, and never consider what they think about us. Children don’t do that. When I was a child, I would never have been caught out in such a way by a servant, that I can tell you. One might have caught me, but only because some of them knew me better than my parents did. I would never have been found out through having my ill-gained bounty discovered.”

“No doubt that much is true,” he said grimly. “I would believe you capable of anything, but Molly does know where Melanie hides her treasures, so your argument won’t hold in this case. Perhaps there simply wasn’t room for anything more in the headboard recess and she was forced to look elsewhere, perhaps even to hide the things quickly, in a panic.”

“Didn’t hide them,” Melanie said. “Didn’t take them.”

“Enough of that,” Jack said sharply. “You certainly didn’t appear surprised to have been summoned to the library.”

Melanie’s face grew wooden and her eyelids drooped, hooding the expression in her eyes.

“Jack, stop tormenting her,” Emily said, moving close to the child again. “You must know she wouldn’t steal—”

“I know nothing of the sort,” he snapped. “Do I, Melanie?”

Melanie did not respond. If anything, Emily thought she relaxed a little.

“Answer me, Melanie,” Jack said in a stern voice. “Were you surprised to receive my summons?”

“No.” The single word was barely audible.

“Did you think, perhaps, that I wished to discuss another matter with you?”

There was silence.

“Open your eyes and look at me, Melanie.”

The little girl obeyed the first part of his command, opening her eyes, but her gaze was unfocused, expressionless.

Emily stared at Jack. “What is this, sir? Why do you carp at her so? Surely, even suspecting what you do, you are being too harsh. A little gentleness, a modicum of under—”

“She has convinced the village apothecary to credit more of her so-called loans to the Priory account,” he said brusquely without taking his eyes off Melanie. “I had just returned from a talk with my bailiff, who informed me that he had paid her reckoning, and I was about to send for Melanie to discuss the matter when Molly came to me with her news. Whether Melanie has stolen the jewels remains to be seen,” he added, flicking Emily with a whiplike glance, “but I can tell you here and now that she has disobeyed me for the last time.”

U
NDERSTANDING NOW WHY JACK
was so angry, Emily made no attempt to answer him at once, looking instead, with sympathy, at Melanie. To her surprise, the little girl showed no fear. Her attitude was still unresponsive, but she was watching Jack with a look of resignation on her face. It was, Emily thought, as though she believed her fate to be both preordained and inevitable, as though she just wanted to have the matter over and done as soon as possible.

Realizing that Emily was not going to say anything, Jack gave a nod of grim satisfaction, then turned back to Melanie. When he saw the child’s expression, his own tightened and he took a step toward her, then stopped, visibly taking his temper in hand as he said, “I told you what would happen if you took money again, did I not? Surely you know me well enough by now to know that when I say a thing I mean it, so you cannot have expected such defiance to go unpunished.”

Melanie stared at a point beyond his shoulder, her trembling lips the only sign that she had heard him.

Emily said quickly, “She didn’t exactly—”

“She did,” he retorted, watching the child for a moment longer before he cast Emily a brief glance. “If you insist upon remaining, you will oblige me by keeping silent and by not interfering any further. I know you disapprove of what I intend to do, but that cannot be helped. Now,” he added, turning back to speak directly to Melanie, “will you please have the goodness to tell me why you still find it necessary to obtain money from the village shopkeepers?”

Melanie swallowed hard but did not speak.

“Well? I am waiting.”

Her eyes shifted, but she did not look at him or at Emily.

Emily thought she detected fear in the little girl’s expression, but so fleeting was the look that she could not be certain. Nor, she thought, could she blame Melanie if she was afraid. Jack was at his most formidable, and Emily could only be glad that his anger was not, for once, directed at herself.

He took another step toward Melanie. “Believe me when I say that, one way or another, you are going to tell me what is going on, and if you did take your aunt’s jewels, you are also going to tell me where her pearls are. It will be a good deal easier for both of us if you simply tell the truth at once, for although you will still be punished, your punishment will be much less severe than if you continue to refuse to speak. It is clear that you have fancied yourself in need of money and have done whatever you could think of to obtain it, but why you would steal from a lady who has been only kind to you quite passes my understanding.”

“I didn’t.”

“But you did lie to get money from the apothecary.”

When Melanie’s only response to this gambit was to bite her lower lip, Jack gave a growl of anger and turned toward the library table. At first Emily hoped that he would give up his attempt to force the issue and merely send Melanie up to her bedchamber to contemplate her sins, but that hope evaporated in a gasp of outrage when he turned back again, holding the whip in his hand.

“Jack, no!”

“Come here to me, Melanie,” he said, ignoring Emily’s cry.

Melanie did not move.

“You have misbehaved badly, and you will take your punishment,” he said grimly. “Only if you decide at once to tell me why you took that money will punishment be delayed, but it will only be delayed, not forgotten.”

“Please, Jack,” Emily begged, “you cannot—”

“I told you to hold your tongue.”

“I know you did, but I cannot remain silent when you are going to do such a dreadful thing.”

“There is nothing dreadful about a thrashing,” he snapped. “Children are thrashed all the time, and it is held by most people to be good for them. I daresay your father might have utilized such punishment to excellent effect.”

“He did,” she retorted, “but he never used a riding whip.”

“Well then, he ought to have done so. If ever—”