They all hurried back to the house.
“May I be of assistance?” the butler said when they entered.
“Have our horses saddled at once, please,” Anthony said. He didn’t know where they were going, but if Evie had been taken against her will, he had to find her.
“I’ll question the staff,” Toby said.
The rest of them ran up the stairs. Far smaller than his, the bed had been made and the room tidied.
“I found it there.” Prudence pointed to the pillows.
Anthony wasn’t sure what he thought he’d find, but he looked anyway. Dropping to a crouch, he searched beside and under the bed. He saw the chain as he rose. It was beside the nightstand.
“That’s Evie’s necklace,” Prudence said as Anthony held it out. “She never takes it off, even to sleep. It was our mother’s. She wouldn’t have left it behind.”
He would know that if they’d married, just as he would have learned all the sides to Miss Evangeline Spencer.
Anthony studied the necklace; the catch was broken. Someone had torn this off her. The thought of anyone touching her with anything but kindness or love made him burn with rage.
He’d pushed her away from fear of hurting her but ended up hurting her anyway. If he had remained in that conservatory with Evie, then whatever had befallen her would never have happened, he was sure of it.
“Find Calthorpe,” he said looking at Toby. His friend left at a run, and Anthony turned to face the Spencers. “Trust me to bring her back to you.”
“I want to help. E-Evie is everything to us.”
“I know that, Prudence, just as I know now, she would never have willingly left you—”
“You do?”
He nodded at her question. He’d been an idiot to believe otherwise.
“I need you both to stay here and keep up appearances. Tell anyone who asks as to her whereabouts that she has a headache and is resting in her room. Draw the curtains. I shall return as soon as I have her.”
“But what if you c-can’t find her?”
“I will, because I will not stop looking until I do.”
Prudence ran at Anthony, hugging him hard. “Please bring my sister home.”
“You have my word.” He hugged her back briefly, and then left the room in search of Jamie. He found him in the kitchens with the butler standing beside a young boy.
“What have you learned?” Anthony asked when he reached them.
“Tell him,” Jamie said to the boy, who looked terrified. “He won’t harm you. Just tell him what you told me.”
“I was hungry, and I came to the kitchens as Mrs. Broom always leaves me a slice of bread for if I need it. I saw a man coming in the door. He told me to mind my business and walked into the house. He took the servants’ stairs up. I got the bread and stayed here to eat it.
“What did he look like?”
“I didn’t see his face clearly because he was in the shadows, and the kitchen fire doesn’t throw out much light. He was shorter than you and wore a hat and coat.”
“How did he speak?” Anthony asked.
“Odd voice. Like a whisper but not. Hoarse,” the lad added. “Like Mr. Davis.”
“The stable master,” the butler added. “A horse kicked him in the neck, and he never spoke the same again.”
“Greville had a friend who talked like that,” Jamie said, clicking his fingers.
