The instant the giant appeared from the stairwell, Wilma produced a butcher knife and held it at the girl’s throat. “Send Mrs. Morgan down and no one gets hurt.”
Shocked, Fletch had to rethink his beliefs about motherhood and witless oxen. He had no compunction about striking a male lunatic, but no notion of how to take down a crazed female.
As he’d planned, she couldn’t see him in the dark stalls. He could stab her through the liver before she knew he was there. It would save the court the trouble of a trial.
Kate would hate him.
He’d hate himself for releasing the lurking monster.
Oh well. Here went the other shoulder. He dropped, rolled, and hitting the back of Wilma’s knees, slashed his knife upward, slicing the arm holding the little girl.
Wilma screamed, her grip loosened, and Fletch rolled the little girl out of her clutches. Wilma came after him with her stolen butcher knife.
Impolitely, Arnaud plowed his massive fist into the mad woman’s jaw. She dropped like the proverbial rock.
Instead of bleeding to death, Fletch found himself in possession of a weeping, hysterical child.
Forty-one
Rafe
Most of the manor folk and half the village crammed into the normally spacious study in the manor’s new wing. Rafe edged his wide self toward the desk and away from the door, creating an opening for Meera Walker to enter.
“Wilma’s arm will heal,” she announced, after Hunt pounded his fist on the desk to halt the nattering. “Mr. Morgan’s wounds have been treated poorly for a week and the infection is serious.”
Morgan could rot in hell for all Rafe cared. But if anyone else showed up, they’d have to move this meeting into the billiard room. He briefly entertained the thought of holding court while knocking balls about. He was no doubt giddy with relief that the culprit was caught. “Little Betsy?” he asked.
“I had to sedate her. She’s terrified and hysterical,” the physician said. “She told me her mother promised they would go home, and she could have her pets again, if she let her out of the wine cellar.”
“The child is not as stupid as she seems if she figured out how to find the keys,” Hunt suggested.
“My fault,” Lady Elsa admitted. “One of the maids found the child at the service entrance, crying. I told them to let her talk to her mother, to calm her down. Apparently, Wilma knew where the keys hang. A knife isn’t hard to find in a kitchen. A lost child wandering into the kitchen. . . we just directed her back to the cellar.”
“I have a notion they’ve been educated in thievery,” Rafe added. But if the boy had been given any instructions, he hadn’t followed them. He’d stayed in the schoolroom. Again, smarter than he seemed.
“How much can we believe their stories?” Hunt sat on the edge of his mahogany desk, leaving his chair to his steward, Meera’s husband, who took notes of the proceedings for the assize judges.
“What the children have told us mostly agrees with statements from Miss Vivien and Morgan.” Rafe set his scribbled interview notes on the desk for Walker, but they were meager. “Morgan’s a petty thief. He’s somehow got it in his thick head that Kate’s farm belongs to him. Damien has explained, but he refuses to believe. If the old goat had funds, he’d probably drag Kate into court. He’s that dense. Or the fever has infected his upper story. Otherwise, he’s not a complete lunatic. He’s been living out by the farm and Hall, waiting for Wilma to come through on her promise to force Kate to move in with her sister.”
“He’s not completely innocent! He had to have carried Lavender in and out of the cart,” Kate argued, more indignant about that than her farm.
“Morgan is muddled with fever and most likely not in his right head when he did that,” Rafe warned. “He thought—and I use that word loosely—she was you. Lavender had that bonnet pulled over her head. She was passed out on the floor. She was wearing a dress and thus, female. His goal was Kate. Wilma told him she’d arrange everything, he only needed to haul Kate out.”
“So Morgan thought he was carting me to the Hall, where he thinks I belong—with my sister?” Kate winced. “And then they were all going to move into my house?”
“Stop thinking it’s your fault,” Rafe ordered. “If it’s anyone’s fault, it’s Wilma’s. She’s madder than Morgan. I’ll make a wild surmise that she believed you’d be the only one in the shop, and that he’d just tie you up, bundle you to the Hall, and you’d stay there, terrified.”
“Why the Hall?” Brydie intelligently asked. “Everyone knows we’re living in the village now.”
Rafe shook his head. “In her cracked mind, Wilma thought she’d neatly take care of Kate and the actors at the same time. If you and your sister occupied the Hall, the actors had to leave. She’s wily enough to know they’d testify to her thievery if they saw her, and she had plans to stay in Gravesyde.”
Hunt’s brow lowered dangerously.
His wife spoke over the outbreak of questions. “I have seen something similar when dealing with a deranged officer while I was in Egypt. He believed all he had to do was order what he wanted, and his men would make it happen. Fortunately, he was sent home before he caused any harm. The physician called him delusional.”
Meera nodded. “It’s not an uncommon infliction. I am inclined to believe some of our politicians are under the same impression.”
Rafe snickered. Hunt snorted.
