44
THE PINNACLE
LIZZY
“A new day,”I croaked. The words made the cracks in my lips sting. “I feel much better.”
Darcy was seated on the floor behind me, steadying me. I had tried to steal away in the night, but he found me.
He wiped sweat-soaked curls from my temples and felt my forehead, then got to his feet and returned with a dampened towel and a cup of water. I wiped my face and neck, then chanced a few sips.
He said, “When I was a boy, I helped my mother care for her patients. You do not need to hide.”
“I am preserving my dignity.” I dabbed the soaked neckline of my robe. “What time is it? I should like to visit breakfast, at least. To see Mary and Georgiana.” My fever had roared back after the performance. I had only blurry memories of being guided through the crowd, then thrashing in bed.
“Lucy looked in already. I will ring for her.”
Lucy returned, and I banished Darcy to go find his valet. Lucy made me presentable, chattering only one notch too cheerfully and never breathing a word about my health, for which I was stupendously grateful. After fastening my dress, she became quiet, then said, “One thing more,” and gently dabbed rouge on my lips. I had worn it perhaps twice in my life. Despite her effort, theface in the looking glass looked like death absent the courtesy of even a tepid warming.
There was no routine yet with our guests, but the household breakfast was private. Darcy and I walked down together and found Mary with a dozen books spread over a third of the table. She had her nose inches from the page, which meant she had been at this for hours, but she leaped up when we approached, looking doctorly and concerned.
I ended that by pulling her into a long embrace, then I held her at arm’s length to show my smile. “I feel very foolish about misunderstanding you in that London park. I am all joy to know I have a sister in love, and to someone so admirable. You were clever about it, too. Will you have a royal commission?” Mary frowned, so to head off a lecture on the evils of monarchy, I said, “I do have a question about the opera. Why was Belinda a sprite as well?”
Mary smiled then. “When I was four, I wished to be a sprite. So why not?”
I nodded to her array of books. “Is this what you wanted to speak about?”
“We should wait for Georgiana and Emma. I have both questions and answers.”
The staff began placing breakfast, and Mary and Darcy greeted them while pouring coffee. I took one look at the silver coffee pot, every gleam a scintillating needle that stabbed my waking headache, then I turned my back to it to sip hot water with a thin splash of tea.
That left me sunk in morbid thought, and it took a minute to notice Darcy had stepped into the hallway. I followed and found him with Mr. Digweed and Mrs. Reynolds, who were so rushed that they were speaking over top of each other. Finally, Mr. Digweed deferred to our housekeeper, and Mrs. Reynolds began.
“Master and madam, I am afraid that Miss Woodhouse, Miss Smith, and Mr. Knightley have not been seen since the Box Hall entertainment.”
“Harriet went to the school,” I said. For some reason, the courtiers had thought that the hottest of gossip. “Perhaps they all went.”
“I thought so too, madam, and the staff assignments were topsy-turvy all evening, so I thought they only missed dinner. But the maids have been in this morning. Their beds were untouched.”
“Mr. Knightley was preparing to leave,” Darcy said. “Miss Woodhouse may have chosen to depart at the same time.”
“Without a goodbye?” I said. “Darcy, that is impossible.”
Rigidly, he said, “Miss Woodhouse had cause to leave. I behavedpoorly.”
There was an awkward pause. Darcy considered it poor behavior if he was not the first to rise when a lady stood, but clearly his conversation on the terrace had been difficult.
Mrs. Reynolds spoke into the silence. “Mr. Knightley’s trunks were not yet packed. And nothing was taken from the ladies’ room. Not a comb. Not a shoe.”
Darcy’s comment had left me more curious than concerned, but Mrs. Reynolds’s news filled me with alarm—a strangely dispassionate alarm for a discussion of missing friends.
“I must add my news,” Mr. Digweed said. “The patrols we set up for Lord Wellington caught a pair of suspicious men in the hills. We are holding them in the east village, and they are angry about it. One is a laborer from Lambton. I do not know the other man, but his accent is Sussex. He is protesting loudly that they are hired to scout for a birding party and lost their way.”
My sense of urgency had soared, but Darcy’s answer was hesitant. “I am no soldier. What does the captain recommend?” That was the military officer Lord Wellington had left to manage the royal guards.
“He is unsure. Call a constable, perhaps. But they have broken no law.” Everyone pursed their lips as if this were cause for consideration.
Why were they so thickheaded? “They are spies,” I said. “It is a classic pairing. A local guide, who is bribed, ignorant, and untrusted, and a master, who will survive and report. Did the Lambton man have too much money?”
