“I’ll eat it, I will; it doesn’t matter, does it?” Felicia said, turning her eyes to Adelia, pleading like a small child trying to avoid a beating. Her voice was rising.
“You cannot possibly eat it now,” The Countess snapped, looking up from her plate briefly. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
The spoiled food was whisked away by a maid, and the steward followed her from the room, muttering under his breath. Felicia sat awkwardly with nothing in front of her, her head bowed. She was not being treated as if she were the mistress of the house.
Adelia’s mouth had gone dry. She pushed a few morsels around her plate before giving up. Her clothing was too tight, and the air in the room was growing more stale by the minute. “Will there be ices?” she asked, knowing that it was rude to second-guess a hostess but no longer caring. She pointedly addressed the question to Felicia.
“Ices?” Felicia said, still looking down at the table, her hands knotted in her lap. “Oh, no. No. There are never any ices.”
“But your ice house...”
“There is no ice in the ice house. We never go down there. It’s all shut up.”
Lady Agnes jumped into the conversation before Felicia had finished speaking, with another flash of uncharacteristic chattiness, clearly forced. “So, Lady Calaway, do tell me about your role in the last investigation. I heard about a mad chase to Lancaster, is that right...? Did you really...?”
Felicia looked miserable and The Countess’s eyes were flashing with danger. Theodore seemed confused.
Adelia smiled thinly and answered as politely as she could. She could not wait for this strange meal to end.
Two
The gathering had been too small and intimate to allow Adelia any chance to speak privately with Felicia the previous evening. Nothing remarkable happened for the remainder of the meal but still Adelia slept badly that night. When she pressed Theodore about the meal, he told her that he had seen nothing out of the ordinary in anyone’s conduct and Adelia gave up in frustration. Something was off kilter here in the castle, and she was determined to find out what it was. Felicia had been writing to her for some time, alluding to problems within the household. Why could she not speak out openly? Was she scared? If so, of whom?
Adelia’s suspicions could not help but settle upon The Countess with her snobbish nastiness and, by extension, her companion and daughter Lady Agnes, who Adelia thought ought to step in to defend Felicia against her mother’s barbs. In spite of that, a part of Adelia liked the spinster Lady Agnes. Her flashes of wit, her uncomplaining service to her elderly mother, her evident intelligence – all were things that endeared her to Adelia. Lady Agnes was well-read, curious about the world, and perfectly able to hold a conversation about anything from trade deals to politics to the importance of not wearing exotic feathers in one’s hat. In fact, she was at her most alive when talking of serious subjects. In essence, Lady Agnes was not one for frivolous chatter. And Adelia liked her for it.
But she could not shake how Lady Agnes had treated Felicia the previous night, and her warm feelings dissipated. Lady Agnes’s silence made her complicit in The Countess’s treatment of Felicia, and Adelia could see it as nothing but bullying, plain and simple. Before breakfast, she headed out of the suite of rooms and went in search of her daughter.
As expected for the early hour, Felicia was in her own bedroom. But, in a more unexpected discovery, she was kneeling on the floor at the far end, frantically pushing thin strips of fabric between the bottom of the long window and its wooden frame.
“Felicia, what on earth are you doing?” Adelia cried, rushing over to her side and pulling at her daughter’s shoulders. Felicia was wearing a comfortable cotton day-dress, the floral blue fabric perfectly complementing her dark hair and pale skin. But her nose was red, as if it had been running or itching. And her eyes were wild.
“Help me, mama; I need to stop it getting in.”
“What is getting in? Stop this, Felicia, get up!” Adelia tugged at her shoulders but Felicia shook her off.
“The swamp air, it’s getting in everywhere. Can’t you smell it?”
“In truth, I can, but that bit of cloth won’t stop it.”
Felicia rocked back on her heels and looked up at her mother with big, scared eyes. “Then what will? What can I do? Will papa know what to do? Let’s ask him!” She jumped up, but stopped suddenly, catching her breath with her hand pressed to her side.
Adelia steered her to the bed and they sat down together. “Are you all right?”
“I stood up too quickly.”
“I mean, in general. I am worried about you. Are you sick?”
“Yes!” Felicia’s voice rose. “Yes, of course I am sick! The swamps are suffocating me, mama, I cannot breathe here!”
There was a tap at the door which was already ajar and the worried face of the housekeeper peered in. Hester Rush was a strong, capable woman with a generous jaw and deep-set orange-brown eyes. She cast a glance over the scene and did not seem at all surprised. “My lady, shall I bring you a draught? The usual, to settle you?”
“No, no, no!” Felicia said, twisting away, flapping her hands uselessly. “Just stop the swamps from coming in.”
Mrs Rush made eye contact with Adelia, who nodded her silent assent. Mrs Rush nodded back slightly and slipped into the room, coming up to the other side of Felicia though she did not, of course, sit down. She spoke in a soothing voice and her patter was long-practised. “My lady, remember that Jack went around and sealed all the gaps for
