Mrs. Pariseau had come down the stairs to join them in time to hear this startling bit of news.
They all pondered it.
“It stands to reason no one here is to say a word about this to anyone outside of this building and not present at the moment,” Captain Hardy said. “Understood?”
Every head present bobbed up and down.
“I told Hawkes that if it was safe to return the way he departed we’d tie a ribbon to the lamp hook outside. Just to warn all of you, and the maids, that he may reappear in the hallways within a few days. And he won’t be a ghost, Dot.”
They stood together a moment, everyone quietly reeling yet exhilarated to have gotten away with something.
“Breakfast?” Lord Bolt suggested evenly.
“Cor, I love living here!” Delacorte said passionately, under his breath a moment later, as they all filed to the table.
Chapter Twenty-One
The door at the back of Starling Cottage was indeed loose on its hinges. Just as the sun had dipped low enough to tint the house amber, Aurelie seized the knob and pulled, and the entire door nearly toppled off onto her.
She heaved it up, then propped it back where it was. She sidled into what appeared to be a little kitchen.
She was grateful that Mr. Bellingham apparently wasn’t hyperbolic, and that the cottage was indeed rather snugly secluded, if not remote. It was situated on a little rise, and as the hack had rounded the bend, she could see the town of Baggleston nestled in a valley—the smoke rising from chimneys, a church spire, a man on horseback, pleasant houses clustered in the town and scattered about the hills. It looked peaceful. She wondered how much secret turmoil was contained behind the walls of the houses.
It had been nearly half a day’s easy journey to Sussex with a hack driver grateful to get out of London for a change, and she’d paid him well. The cottage was just as Mr. Bellingham described—tiny and thatched, tucked back neatly into the bend of a road lined with hawthorns, just past where a gurgling creek widened.
Inside, it was enchanting.
If she stretched her arms, she could very nearly touch the walls. It was the sort of place an elf wouldbe happy to call home. Considerably smaller than any place she’d ever lived, but she instantly saw the appeal of burrows to little animals.
All the cooking would be done on the little hearth, she saw. Heavy curtains of wool hung in the front windows, which closed with shutters, and tammy cloth hung in the windows in the kitchen. To allow in light, she flung them open.
She would need to close them and shutter them soon enough to keep out the cold.
Two little rooms, one with a bed covered in a well-patched quilt, and a fireplace, and all of it, just like Mr. Bellingham had said, looked as though it had benefited from a recent tidying.
A further search revealed two oil lanterns and two candles pressed into holders.
And then she saw three skinny logs stacked next to the hearth.
She stared at them.
Onlythree.
How had she not considered this?
The house felt snug enough now, but nights would be a different story. And she would be here for at least two nights before the mail coach came through town.
Because that was now her plan: take the mail coach to Falmouth, and from there buy passage on a packet. Tomorrow she would walk into Baggleston, the nearby town, to attempt to sell her necklace at the notions shop Mr. Bellingham had mentioned, and perhaps find the baker and buy more food and inquire about obtaining firewood. If she couldn’t find a buyer for the necklace in Baggleston, perhaps she could sell it in Falmouth.
She could not think beyond either of these possibilities. Falmouth was where the road, and her money, would run out.
Suddenly the setting sun was her enemy.
In the main room was a round wood table and a set of four chairs. If she could find an ax she might be able to chop them to bits, but she’d never swung an ax before, and it seemed more probable that she would chop herself to bits, and poor Mr. Bellingham didn’t deserve his inherited furniture reduced to kindling.
She maneuvered the logs into the fireplace and found a flint and steel on top of the mantel. She crouched and struck and struck until one of the logs finally caught and she felt like she’d conquered an enemy. It would be quite some time before any actual warmth filled the room. Thank God the chimney and hearth were clean.
She’d asked the hack driver to leave her and her trunk in front of the house. She unpacked it the same way she and Dot had packed it, by emptying it and carrying things in a little at a time. Then she alternately pushed and dragged the emptied trunk into the house. This exercise certainly went a ways toward warming her up.
