“Woe is me! Yes, that is the worst thing in the world.”
“Jessie!” Owen said sharply, following her through the staff corridors. When they drew level with his office, he flung open the door. “In. Now.” Jessie looked tempted to argue, but something in Owen’s harsh stare must have worked, for she sighed, relenting, and hurried inside. He closed the door behind them, being careful to check up and down the corridor to ensure no one saw them alone together first. “Tell me where you have been.”
“I went to see Parker’s family.” Jessie’s tart words took the anger out of Owen.
“Ah.” He struggled for words as he reached for the chair behind his desk. “Jessie, I would have given you the time off if you had asked. I am still a butler, and you are still a maid. We have to abide by the rules of our position.”
“Are you still a butler?” she asked with a small smile. “I would have thought you something new altogether now, what with you and the duchess –”
“I think that is enough.” Owen’s firm words made her shoulders sag before she turned and sat down in the chair opposite him.
“I had to go and see them.” With the words, her hands fidgeted relentlessly, picking at the skin around her fingernails. “It was odd.”
“Odd? How?” he asked.
“What they said, it just didn’t …” She faded off, looking down at her hands and offering no more words.
“Jessie, you’re not making any sense.”
“I do not know how to make sense of it, that is the problem.”
“Then at least start by telling me what happened.” His words seemed to break through her confusion, for though she still fidgeted, she looked up at him again.
“Parker was not the only one there the night of the fire. When I went to see his family, they said a few of his friends were there too, they all saw something that night.”
“Saw what?” Owen asked, leaning forward in his chair. He didn’t dare let his hope build.
“They think they saw the arsonist.”
“What?” Owen asked. “Did they not tell the constable? The fire has been written up in the papers as an accident, a candle being knocked over.”
“According to Parker’s family, they did say. Parker said so himself, but they were brushed off as imagining things.”
“What exactly did they see?”
“Parker’s family couldn’t tell me.” She shook her head. “I think we need to go and see these friends. Ask them exactly what they saw.”
Owen sat back in his chair and scratched the stubble along his chin. To him, they seemed to be going round in circles, talking to strangers and not making any progress at all. What good could come from talking to more people?
“Maybe no good can come of it,” he said with a sigh. Jessie’s eyes instantly narrowed.
“Are you abandoning our endeavour, Mr Arnold?”
“No, it is just wearing. Perhaps I am beginning to see what we hope for has little chance of succeeding.” He ruffled his hair with his hands. “What magistrate will convict a duke of anything?”
“A magistrate who is presented with evidence,” Jessie said firmly, standing to her feet. “We have to at least try, Mr Arnold. For Parker. For me. For … the duchess.”
Owen flinched at the words. He wanted to try, truly he did, it’s just there was little hope left in him.
For Diana, I have to try.
“Very well, we will go and talk to them. When do we leave?”
“I’ll talk to them. You can come, but I think it best I talk to them alone. They are not likely to trust a man that works for the Duke of Somerset.”
“Yet they trust you?”
“They know me,” she said with a shrug. “Though they do not know what I did.” She hung her head, evidently referring to her affair with the duke.
