Free An Incomplete Revenge by Jacqueline Winspear Page A

Dr. Blanche.”
    “Dad—”
    Frankie raised a hand. “Hear me out, love. Hear me out.” He paused while Maisie fidgeted, cutting into her bacon, then leaving it on her plate as she settled back to listen. Frankie continued. “When you first started lessons with Dr. Blanche, all them years ago when you were in service, I’ve got to admit I wasn’t at all taken with it. I was grateful to ’im and Lady Rowan for giving you the opportunity, but I—”
    He paused. A man of few words, Maisie’s father was unused to expressing himself with such candor.
    “I was a bit put out, to tell you the truth. I wondered if that manwasn’t more of a father to you than me, what with all his education. But now I’ve come to know ’im, since I came down to work at Chelstone. And after my accident, when he made sure I was well looked after, I saw that what he had was respect for you, for what you’ve done, how far you’ve come. I don’t know what this argument is all about, but though I don’t have your learning under my belt, I’m not silly and I can work a thing or two out. All I can say is, if Dr. Blanche kept something from you, it wasn’t out of not trustin’ you. No, it was for reasons of protectin’ you, right or wrong.” He lifted up his knife and fork again. “And sometimes you’ve just got to say fain-ites —you’ve got to call a truce, with yourself as much as anyone else, and then get on with bein’ mates again.”
    Maisie sighed and poked at her breakfast. “I—” she began, but realized that she was about to justify her actions, or lack thereof, again, and simply added, “Nothing. Let’s eat our breakfast before it gets cold.”
    “Right you are. I just wanted to say my piece.”
    “And I’m glad you did.” She looked up at her father, changing the subject. “I think I’ll try to stay in Heronsdene tonight, if I can get lodgings at the inn. I want to spend a bit of time closer to my work for a couple of days, but I’ll be back again on Friday night.”
    Frankie nodded and stood up, taking his plate to the sink, where he set it in a bowl of water. He washed his hands, then came to Maisie and kissed the top of her head. “I’ll be off to the stables now.” He turned to take his jacket from a hook behind the door. “Mind how you drive, round these little lanes. Not like some of them new big roads you’ve got used to.”
    “Alright, Dad.”
    MAISIE DID NOT leave the table for some time. Finally, she sighed and set about tidying the kitchen before she gathered her belongingsready to set off. It was not yet seven o’clock, so she pulled on a pair of Wellington boots and stepped out the back door and into the garden. Long and narrow, the garden was almost entirely given over to vegetables, yet roses grew along the fence on all three sides. The cultivation of roses was an interest Frankie and Maurice Blanche shared, so the men had become friends of a kind across the fence that divided their respective homes, though the Dower House, situated on an incline close to the boundary of Chelstone Manor, was decidedly more grand than the humble Groom’s Cottage it looked down upon.
    Maisie went straight to the end of the garden, the heavy dew wet across her boots, and looked out at the fields and woodland beyond. She was eternally glad that her father had come to live at Chelstone in 1914 and would be allowed to remain in his cottage until the end of his days. She shuddered to think of such an event, for he was her only family, and he was past seventy.
    As she turned to leave, she stopped to look at the Dower House, where she could just about see the roofline and, to the fore, the glass-paned conservatory where Maurice would be taking breakfast, dipping freshly baked bread—his one indulgence—into the strong French coffee he favored. And as she stood there, remembering times past, when they would speak together of a case in hushed tones, she saw movement just beyond the windows of the conservatory.