She rubbed her forehead. “Are the girls all right?”
“I believe so. Their mother seems to be the most affected.”
“Such is often the way.”
“How did you know?”
She shrugged. “I often sequestered myself as a child.”
“No,” Gavin said, “I mean, how did you know where to find them?” Although, now he very much wished to know where and why she’d sequestered herself as a child.
“I heard noises in the walls.”
“Which you immediately assumed to be a five-year-old girl?”
“I immediately assumed rats.”
“There are no rats in Blackberry Manor.”
“Perhaps not literal ones.”
He chose to ignore the barb. “How did you discover the swinging painting? Another lucky guess?”
“Another accident. It was my escape path when I found myself in the walls earlier this morning.”
“When you—” Gavin broke off and stared at her, remembering his earlier bafflement at her odd, disheveled appearance. “How does one accidentally find oneself in the walls?”
She arched a slender eyebrow. “By tumbling through one’s false bookcase.”
“Did you lure the girls in after you?”
Her eyes flashed. “Of course not. I was with you belowstairs, was I not?”
“But you knew precisely where I would find Rebecca. How is that possible unless you were with them when they got lost?”
“Did they say I was with them?”
“No.”
“Then blame your own cleverness. If you didn’t have an abundance of cunning façades disguising access panels to secret passageways, none of your guests would have found themselves caught between the walls. Had something horrible happened to one of those little girls, you would have only yourself to blame.”
Without waiting for a rejoinder from him, she turned and stalked down the corridor and out of sight. Not that there was any escape from danger.
Even his house was capable of evil.
Chapter 19
Before Evangeline progressed even half the distance to her bedchamber, Susan Stanton strode forth from a connecting corridor, linked her arm with Evangeline’s, and tugged her off in a new direction.
“May I ask,” Evangeline ventured, “where we are going in such a hurry?”
“You may ask,” Susan returned, “but do not blame me if you succumb to a fit of vapors upon learning.”
“Has something happened?”
“Of course something’s happened. You were there when the something that happened was busy happening, while I was stuck scouring the scullery with my mother, who has now decided my sensitive female constitution must be in such a state of excitement over the loss and subsequent discovery of the girls that only one activity remains which might calm my tender nerves.” She took a deep, shuddering breath.“Sewing samplers.”
“But you know I—”
