And though he would not admit it, he was sorry that it would be the last time they ever dined alone together. For a moment there, he had actually started to enjoy himself.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Curled up in the armchair, hurtling toward the end ofMoll Flandersat last, Amelia could not concentrate on the words. She must have read the same sentence at least five times, her mind wandering to the dining room. It had not been as bad as she had anticipated, not at first, but by the end, it had left a sour taste in her mouth.
Sighing, she closed her book and slipped down off the armchair to sit cross-legged in front of the warm fire.
Do his family not think our marriage is important either?Her thoughts were torn and tangled, for the staff had insisted that there was very little that could have kept the Dowager away from her grandson’s wedding. Yet, she had not been there. Nor had his sister, whom the staff described with the same affection they used for the Dowager.
“Will they avoid me too?” she murmured, praying it would not be true.
She drew her knees to her chest and stared into the flames, letting her mind empty. It would not serve her well to worry so much that she could not sleep, and she would find out soon enough what the Dowager and Lady Rebecca thought of her.
After a few minutes bathing in the heat from the fire, Amelia slowly got to her feet, intending to retire. On the mantelpiece, the carriage clock chimed out a single stroke, drawing her attention.
She smiled sadly, transported back to Lionel’s townhouse on the night she had done everything within her power to change her fate.I did, I suppose. I must not forget that.In truth, she had lost count of the amount of times she had told herself, “Things could be worse.” It had become something of a mantra, of late.
Just then, another sound pierced the night-thick silence.
She froze, a chill shivering down her spine. It sounded like someone shouting, but not in anger—in sorrow. A terrible cry of pain, howling down the hallways of the manor.
A wolf?She laughed awkwardly at herself. There were no wolves in Britain anymore. But perhaps it was a dog; she had seen the gamekeeper walking with two mastiffs, so maybe he was patrolling the grounds with his hounds, and they had spotted something.
Shaking off her unease, she padded toward the bed… and heard it again: the sound of a wounded animal, lowing in agony.
Turning around, she hurried to the window and squinted out into the partially moonlit night. Nothing stirred in the wintry gardens, the frost-tipped lawns beyond resembling a perfectly still ocean. She could not see any gamekeeper or any dogs, and when the sound came a third time, it was unmistakably human—a name, shouted in desperation.
Amelia could not be certain what the name was, but it was something similar to ‘Freddie’ or maybe the word ‘ready.’
Not known for her bravery, she surprised herself when her feet started leading her toward the door. She grabbed her housecoat on the way, slipping out into the hallway.
The contrast from the warmth of her bedchamber was a shock, her teeth chattering with the cold and her own fear as she hurried along, listening out for the sound. It came again in a mournful wail, then again in a crushing bellow of sorrow.
Is someone injured?She quickened her pace, racing across the landing and down the stairs, running toward the kitchens. The cook, Mrs. Bishop, would still be awake, baking bread for the morning; she would know where that sound was coming from.
“My Lady!” The cook clasped a hand to her chest, drawing in a sharp breath. “You startled me.”
Amelia slowed, ears still pricked for that noise. “Did you hear that?”
“What, My Lady?”
Amelia willed the sound to come again, but there was only the crackle of the stove and the hoot of an owl somewhere in the distance. “You did not hear that keening? I was worried someone might be injured.”
“I didn’t hear anything, My Lady.” The cook returned to what she had been doing, shaping rolls. “You should go back to bed and pay it no mind. It’ll be the dogs or some foxes causing mischief.”
Amelia shook her head. “It was human, Mrs. Bishop.”
“Those mastiffs can sound very human when they want to,” the cook replied, refusing to look at Amelia. “Why don’t I make you some warm milk, and you can take it back to bed with you?”
Furrowing her brow, worried that she had let her imagination get the better of her, Amelia nodded reluctantly. “That would be lovely, thank you.”
On the rare occasions that she had been permitted to drink wine before, it had always made her feel peculiar, giving her strange dreams. Perhaps, it was little more than that: an effect of the wine she had imbibed at dinner, transforming the sound into more than it was.
She did not hear the sound again throughout her brief time in the kitchen. Soon enough she was on her way back to herchambers with the warm milk in hand, convinced that she had made a mistake.
But as she put her foot on the bottom step of the staircase, it came again—a terrible howl that held her rigid. Her imagination might have been unreliable, but her ears were not; that noise was coming from inside the manor. And as far as she knew, the mastiffs were not allowed in the house.
She retreated from the staircase, moving out into the center of the entrance hall, waiting with her breath held. A softer cry drifted through to her keen ears, coming from somewhere down the hallway on the right.
