The painted plaster walls were inelegant, but they were clean. Floorboards creaked and groaned, yet she felt no fear of falling through. There were lamps enough to light her way, and she had no trouble finding the female servants’ dormitory.
She paused at a door that stood slightly ajar. Since all the maids were working, this was surely Morla’s room. Cassandra knocked before entering.
“Ma’am…” The girl did her best to sit up, but lacked the strength. Morla lay in a narrow metal bed with the covers tucked beneath her chin. She looked tiny and frail, and far too young to live on her own in the world.
“Please don’t move for my sake,” Cassandra said, stepping into the slanting, low-ceilinged chamber.
There were two identical beds separated by a table and lamp. Across the room stood a chest of drawers, washbasin, and tarnished oval mirror. A maid’s frock, apron, stockings, and mob cap hung on pegs nailed into the wall. No carpet covered the floor, and a sliver of pale evening light stretched across the boards.
After the trek upstairs, Cassandra did not have the strength to stand. She wavered on her feet, asking, “May I sit?”
Morla nodded.
She perched on the sagging mattress. “With whom do you share your room?”
“Why, it be Wenna, ma’am.”
Cassandra smiled. The two maids seemed constantly at loggerheads. They quarreled in a way that only two girls living in close confines could—she ought to know, for she had two sisters.
“I suppose Mrs. Cardy has told you that you’ll be going home.”
Morla nodded. “And I may keep my wages.”
“Yes, that, too. I shan’t bother you for long. I only wanted to see for myself that you were well, and that you are happy with the arrangement. Your recuperation is important to His Grace and me. We want you to get better and come back to us…if you wish.”
“I do wish it, ma’am! The duke be generous, payin’ for a doctor who’d set my leg rather than saw it. My family’ll be that glad to have me healin’ at oome.”
“Good,” Cassandra said, hoping she’d translated that right. “All His Grace and I ask in return is that you never allow your opinions of our relationship to affect your work. I don’t care that you find my presence in the house offensive. I am your mistress. If you intend to live at Pender Abbey, you must—at least outwardly—respect me.”
Morla looked slightly sheepish. She ducked her chin beneath the eiderdown, saying, “It be wrong to live in sin.”
“I was always taught the same,” Cassandra said, “then I fell in love.”
“If ‘ee love the duke, why can’t ‘ee wed?”
“Perhaps, someday, we might, though I’d be doing His Grace a disservice. I pray you never have to make such a difficult decision. I hope a broken leg is the worst thing that ever happens in your very long, very happy life.” She smiled, sadly. “Either way, I ask you to look kindly upon us poor sinners. We are all imperfect, are we not?”
Morla cast an angry glare toward the empty bedstead beside her. “Some more than others.”
Cassandra laughed. “I know your family will be pleased to see you, but we shall miss your righteous presence here at Pender Abbey. Godspeed on your recovery, Morla.”
“Thank ‘ee, ma’am. ‘Ee be that kind.” The maid studied her from beneath the covers. “But are‘eewell? Beggin’ pardon for sayin’ so, but ‘ee look a mite allish.”
She felt pale and flushed, and no amount of whiskey could dull the cramps that had been steadily building all day. “It’s nothing—woman’s troubles, you know?”
Morla nodded. “The monthly curse.”
Cassandra’s curse was stronger than most. Tonight, she’d prepare for the arrival of her menses, which had first come when she’d been about Morla’s age.
This household was filled with girls on the cusp of womanhood, who might look to their new mistress for guidance. It was a humbling, somewhat frightening thought.
She dragged to her feet, pausing to bid her one-time adversary ‘goodnight’. They weren’t friends, though Cassandra imagined she had laid a few stones on the foundation of mutual respect. Eight weeks was a long time in a young woman’s life. Anything could happen—to either of them—between now and then.
***
Wade rapped his knuckles upon the gilded wooden panel that separated his apartments from hers. He stood at the threshold, awaiting Cassandra’s now-familiar call to enter.
The door creaked open, but it was not his lover’s face that appeared in the sliver of lamplight. A wild, unkempt nest of hair greeted him from beneath a maid’s mob cap.
