Free Angel of Hever Castle, The by Kim Wright

said faintly.
    Melly lifted her chin. “He says he loves me.”
    “Yes,” said Emma, raking the scraps and peels into the bowl.  Slop for a pig somewhere, she hoped, and not the basis for the dinner for Melly and the other servants. For you could never tell.  Some of the most respectable looking houses could also be the cruelest to those helpless souls in their employ. “Yes, I’m sure he says he does.”

Chapter Seven
     
    “Emma has a theory,” Trevor said, putting the telegram in his vest pocket.
    “I’m not surprised,” Rayley said.  “The one thing our little troupe has never lacked for is theories.”
    “Brace yourself, for this isn’t a bad one.  A girl calling herself Rose Spencer was recently at a home for unwed mothers.  A rather upper class sort of place, I gather, at least as these things go, and it hides behind the façade of a boarding school for young ladies.  Then apparently she had her child and disappeared, just as they all do.”
    “And Emma thinks Rose is Dorinda’s sister?” Rayley frowned.  “That is a bit of a stretch.  Spencer is hardly an uncommon last name.”
    “Actually, Emma theorized that Rose and Dorinda might be the same person, but your idea has merit as well.”
    “She’s suggesting that Dorinda bore LaRusse’s child and gave it up, but then returned to Hever?” Rayley asked, skepticism evident in his tone.  “Why would a young woman do such a thing?  Continue to chase a man after he has abandoned her so cruelly?  And, even if she might imagine she would still be his paramour, why would he allow her into the walls of Hever when he has already taken up with Anne Arborton?  No, the woman I met is far too composed to have been through such an ordeal and even the half-mad LaRusse would not…” He shook his head.  “It stretches belief, Welles.”
    “I suppose you are right.”
    The two were walking in the fields, burrowed into their scarves and hats against the afternoon wind.  It had gotten colder each day since they had come to Hever Castle, and Trevor’s gaze fell on the bush outside the gatehouse.  A singular bloom remained, one final and especially hearty Christmas rose.
    “A most unusual plant,” he said, gesturing toward it.  “Beautiful, but dangerous.  I should take a cutting back to Geraldine for her garden.”
    “I thought Emma tended the flower garden.”
    “So she does.”
    “Then you should bring Emma the rose.  What are you waiting for, Welles?  Even the most patient girl must in time begin to wonder – “
    But just then the door to the g atehouse opened and Anne stumbled out.  It was obvious she had been weeping and her clothing was disarranged, as if she had dressed in the darkness or in haste.  Her hair was likewise tousled and she fixed on them a wild and desperate stare that Trevor thought he had seem somewhere before.   Then he remembered:  This was the exact same expression Anne’s mother Tess had borne when she came to Geraldine’s just days ago, begging them for help.
    “Are you looking for LaRusse?” the girl said , her voice hoarse from weeping.  “May I assume that you have come like all the others - to ask him for a favor, to make some suggestion for the betterment of the colony, to fawn at his feet?” Without waiting for a response, she rushed on.  “Well, you needn’t have bothered.  He is gone.”
    “Gone?” said Trevor , genuinely startled, for this was the last thing he would have predicted.  “Gone where?”
    “Do you think I know?” said the girl and she weaved on her feet, so unsteady that Rayley reached for her arm. 
    “We all should go,” he said gently.  “Let us leave this treacherous place and return to the safety of London.  Christmastime is approaching.  It is only right to be home with one’s family, is it not?”
    There was a beat of silence, just enough that both men hoped the girl would nod and say yes, that she was prepared to leave at once.  But then Anne drew