“You don’t mind spending my money — and I know it doesn’t all go on food,” Sedgwick accused, pushing his face close to hers. “You think people don’t tell me things, too?”
“Believe what you want, John,” she told him dully. “It doesn’t matter to me.”
He settled back on the bed, his body tense. That was the truth of it, he thought: it really didn’t matter to her. And maybe it didn’t to him either. Slowly the anger began to seep away, and he left her behind as he drifted into sleep.
There was nothing more to do in the brief hours before daylight. Nottingham needed sleep and to change out of his sodden clothes.
The rain had gone, but water from the deluge still lay everywhere. He skirted huge puddles, kept his senses alert for people throwing night soil from their windows, and soon crossed Timble Bridge. His house was dark, and he could hear the even sound of breathing as he made his way through the rooms. In the kitchen he stropped a razor and ran it over his cheeks and chin before sluicing his face with cold water.
He tried not to wake Mary as he crept into the bedroom, but as he draped his hose over the chair to dry, she stirred.
“Richard?”
“It’s me.”
She sat up, peering in the half-light to find him.
“You look like you’ve had a bad night,” she said anxiously.
“Two more murders, and I’m soaked to the skin,” he began to explain. “Which means Carver’s not guilty, and — ”
“It’s Emily…” she interrupted, and he stopped.
“What about her?” he straightened up, suddenly alarmed. “Is she all right?”
“She’s fine now,” Mary assured him. “I looked in on her before I came to bed. But she went out, wouldn’t tell me where, and she didn’t come back until late.”
Nottingham ran a hand over his hair. At this rate, if the job didn’t kill him, that girl would.
“Tell me what happened.” He sat on the end of the bed. There wasn’t a chance of sleep now, he knew.
“After we’d eaten, Emily announced she was going out.” Mary bunched the sheet in her small fingers. “I asked her where she was going, but she wouldn’t tell me. She just ran out into the rain and over the bridge.”
Damn the lass, he thought furiously, breathing hard and trying to contain his temper.
“How long was she gone?” he asked, his face set hard.
“A couple of hours.”
“And when she got back? Did she seem hurt or upset?”
“No.” Mary gave a small smile that was almost wistful. “In fact, she looked quite happy, even if she was all wet and bedraggled.”
“She still wouldn’t say where she’d been?”
Mary shook her head.
“You’re going to have to do something about her,” she told him.
“I know,” he agreed, although, apart from beating some sense into the girl, he had no idea what. “As soon as I can.”
“Not soon, Richard.” There was a deep, hurting ache in her voice. “She won’t listen to me.”
“Do you think she’ll take notice of me?” he asked in a fast whisper.
“You have to make her.” Mary’s eyes flashed. “You’re the Constable of this city, you can’t have your daughter running around like a wild girl. Make her.” It was part demand, part plea.
He sighed. She was right. He needed to take Emily in hand, by reason or force. He just wasn’t sure he had the energy or the will to handle her at the moment.
“Please, Richard,” Mary said, reaching out and digging her fingers into his forearm, “wake her up. Find out where she was. We need to know.”
He couldn’t refuse her. He nodded his exhausted consent.
“Do you know what she told me yesterday?” Mary continued in slight amazement.
“What?”
“That if she could, she’d like to be a writer.” She didn’t sound amused or aggrieved; instead she seemed fascinated at the thought.
“A writer? Why?” Nottingham had no time to read. It was pleasant, he supposed, but a frivolous way of spending an evening when there were more important things to be done.
“Like Mrs Haywood, she said.”
“Who’s Mrs Haywood?” He didn’t know the name.
“She writes novels,” Mary explained. “And essays, too. Emily prefers those. She’s married to a Reverend.”
“And he makes no objection to his wife doing this?” the Constable wondered, shaking his head in surprise.
“No, he doesn’t.”
“Maybe you’re encouraging her to read too much,” he suggested sourly. “It’s putting ideas in her head.”
After dressing in dry clothes, he crossed into the room the girls shared. There was just one bed; Rose had always slept by the window, and Emily, the restless one, by the door. He watched them for a minute, marvelling that they’d come from him, that he’d helped make such perfect forms. Rose was curled on her side, hair neatly tucked under a cap. Emily lay on her back, hair all over the pillow, arms sprawled at her side. It summed up the difference between the sisters perfectly, he thought with a small smile.
He sat beside Emily, rubbing her shoulder gently until she began to stir. As she opened her eyes he put his finger to his lips and whispered, “Come on downstairs.”
Nottingham had been sitting before the dead hearth for five full minutes before he heard her soft footfalls on the stair. In the half-light he watched her come down, tousled and sleepy. She was ripening all too quickly into a woman, in the unconscious sway of her walk and the shape of her body. She gathered herself quietly on the settle, pulling bare feet under her, and looked at him.
“What time is it?” she asked, blinking slowly.
“Early. Or late, I don’t know,” he admitted.
“Why do you need to talk to me, Papa?” There was an undertone of defiance in her voice and she pushed her hair back in that gesture which reminded him terrifyingly of himself.
“You know the answer to that. Your mother told me you were out long after you should have been at home, and you wouldn’t tell her where you’d been,” he told her firmly.
“Mama thinks I should be just like Rose.”
He was astonished as the withering contempt the girl summoned into such a short sentence, and considered his words before speaking.
“Rose is Rose, and you’re you. We wouldn’t have it any other way. But we do expect you to behave.”
Emily turned her eyes to him.
“I’ve behaved with perfect propriety, father. No man’s touched me yet.” She paused to gauge his reaction, but Nottingham kept his silence, willing his face to remain calm. “Maybe some prudish people might consider some of the situations I’ve been in rather scandalous,” she continued, “but I haven’t been compromised.”
“Fancy words for a young girl,” he said after a while, angered by her attitude but not giving her the satisfaction of showing it.
“It’s simply the truth,” she shrugged sullenly.
“Shall I tell you what I’ve discovered over the years?” he asked, and continued without letting her reply. “Much as we’d like to think there’s one truth, there isn’t really. There’s your truth, my truth, someone else’s, and we each believe our own to be right. There are facts which are indisputable, but all too often they’re not the same as truth.”
He glanced at Emily. She was watching him intently.
“Go on,” she said. “At least you’re talking to me like an adult.”
“When have I ever talked down to you?” Nottingham wondered, and she shook her head in answer.
“Never, Papa.”
“And I never will,” he told her seriously. “Your mother doesn’t talk down to you either.” He held up his hand
