His voice dropped a little. “But we’ll be poor. All I have won’t last us very long. People may not pay doctors much out there, and they may take a long time to get used to me and accept me. It will be hard work. There’ll be none of the luxuries we take for granted here. Certainly no servants, no pretty gowns, no hansom cabs to call, no sophisticated theater, music, or books. The climate will be harder. There may even be hostile Indians ….I don’t know. Are you still willing?”
Justine was torn between hope and terror of the unknown, the grim and dangerous, perhaps beautiful, but hideously unfamiliar. But it was all she had. She nodded slowly, but with absolute certainty.
“We still have to tell your mother something.”
He nodded also. “Of course. But not yet. Let us see what Mr. Pitt does about Uncle Padraig first, and what he has … decided.”
Charlotte moved away from the shadows at last. “It will be dawn soon. The maids will be up already.” She looked at Piers. “I think we should go back to our rooms and try to get ready for the day. We will need all our strength and whatever courage and intelligence we can bring to it.”
“Of course.” Piers went to the door and opened it for her. He turned and looked at Justine. Their eyes met in something almost like a smile.
“Thank you,” Justine said to both of them, then she spoke to Piers. “I know there is a very great way to go yet, even if I am not prosecuted. I shall have to prove to you that I am what I am trying to be. There is no point in saying I am sorry over and over again. I will show it by being there, every hour, every day, every week, until you know it.”
Charlotte and Piers went out, glanced at each other, then turned their separate ways.
When Charlotte reached her own room the small light was still on in the dressing room, but the bedroom door was ajar and it was dark inside. She was about to take off her robe and creep in when she was startled by a noise and whisked around to find Pitt standing just inside the room, his face drawn with exhaustion. “Where the hell have you been?” he demanded, his voice rough-edged with anxiety.
Guilt washed over her in a wave. She had not even thought of telling him where she was.
“I’m sorry,” she said, aghast at herself. “I stayed with Justine. She was so … so devastated. She told Piers. It took him all night, which in the circumstances is no time at all, but I think it will be all right.” She took a step towards him. “I’m sorry, Thomas. I didn’t think.”
“No,” he agreed. “She tried to kill Greville. You can’t protect her from that.”
“So what are you going to do?” she asked. “Arrest her for killing a corpse? I’m sure it is a crime, but does it matter? I mean …” She shook her head. “I know it matters, but will it really help anyone to prosecute her?”
He said nothing.
“Thomas … she won’t go unpunished. She can’t stay here, and she knows that. She wants to leave her old life, and she and Piers can go to America, to the west, where nobody will know her.”
“Charlotte …” He looked crumpled and worn out with sadness.
“You can’t stop him marrying her … if he wants to,” she said quickly. “And she did tell him ….”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. I went with her. I don’t know whether it will be all right or not, maybe no one will for years. But he’ll try. Can’t you just … turn a blind eye? Please?” It crossed her mind to say something about Eudora, and what it would mean to her, but she dismissed it as unworthy. This was between herself and Pitt, and Eudora Greville had nothing to do with it. “It will be hard enough for them,” she added. “They will leave everything they know behind them and take only their love, their courage, and their guilt.”
He leaned forward and kissed her long and very close, and then again, and then a third time. “Sometimes I haven’t the slightest idea what you are thinking,” he said at last, looking puzzled.
She smiled. “Well, that’s something, I suppose.”
Gracie woke up, and it was a moment before she remembered what had happened the day before, the strange, sweaty candle in Finn’s room, the look in his eyes when she had touched it … the guilt which had betrayed to her what it was, and then his anger when she had run away, then his arrest. It was hard to feel different about him quickly. There was too much memory of sweetness. One could not turn off emotion in a few hours, not when it had run so deep through you.
She got up and washed and dressed. She did not care how she looked. Clean and tidy was all that mattered, good enough for the job. Pretty wasn’t important anymore. Only the day before it had mattered so much.
She went downstairs and passed Doll looking busy but with a faraway smile on her face, and Gracie found it in herself for a moment to be glad for her.
In the servants’ hall she met Gwen, taking a quick cup of tea before going up with hot water for Emily to wash.
“I’m sorry,” Gwen said with a little shake of her head. “He seemed like a nice fellow. But far best you’re out of it now, and not later. One day you’ll maybe find someone decent, and you’ll forget all about this. At least you’ve still got your character, and no one thinks the worse of you.”
Gracie knew she meant well by it, but it was no comfort. The broken ache of loneliness inside her was just as deep—in fact, in ways deeper, because other people knew about it. Better they were sympathetic than not, probably. But it was surprising how kindness could hurt, make you want to sit down and cry.
“Yeah, I s’pose,” she said, not because she agreed, but she did not want to prolong the conversation. She poured herself a cup of tea. The hot liquid might warm her up inside, and it would give her something to do other than stand and talk. Maybe Gwen would go and carry the water up soon. Then she could draw her own and take it up to Charlotte.
“You’ll be all right,” Gwen went on. “You’re a sensible girl and you’ve got a good place.”
Sensible girls could hurt just as much as silly ones, Gracie thought, but she did not say so.
“Yeah,” she agreed absently, sipping at the tea. It was too hot. “Thank you,” she added, in case Gwen thought
