Page 73 of The Last Heir to Blackwood Library

The book lay forgotten in Mrs. Hewitt’s hand as she stared out the window at the gathering rain clouds. She quickly whisked a tear from her eye and stared down into her lap, her thin fingers wound around each other. The silence grew long, but something told Ivy to stay her tongue, that Mrs. Hewitt was building to something. “Ralph is our son,” she said finally.

Ivy’s cup hovered beneath her mouth as Mrs. Hewitt’s revelation settled around her. Had she known that, or was it a secret? There was a certain similarity between the firm set of their jaws, the serious gray eyes, but she wouldn’t have noticed unless she was looking for a resemblance. “Ralph never told me,” she murmured. “Or, if he did, I don’t remember.”

Mrs. Hewitt looked up sharply. “He doesn’t know.”

Was he the product of an affair? Were the housekeeper and butler not truly married, and had had a child in a clandestine relationship? How could three people—a family—work together their whole lives, and one not know that they were related to the others?

As if reading her thoughts, Mrs. Hewitt gave a ghost of smile. “It’s nothing like it sounds. It was the war, his memory was...” She made a futile gesture as she searched for words. “Ralph came home different. Broken. He used to be such a good-natured lad, still is, I suppose, but without that spark in his eyes. He was such a spirited boy, always getting into trouble around the abbey. Bringing toads into the kitchen and giving the cook the fright of her life. I remember one time he put on a play for the whole staff, acting out each part himself,” Mrs. Hewitt said with a misty-eyed smile. “But all that was gone after the war. I suppose some of it was just growing up, but I can’t help but feel the war stole the rest of his youth.”

Ivy slouched back in her seat, closing her eyes. Ralph was missing pieces of his life too. And not just memories, but the knowledge that he had a family that loved him.

“We were so careful,” Mrs. Hewitt was continuing. “Even with our family history, we made sure that he was never about the library too much, or even in the house too long for that matter. But then the war came, and he insisted on fighting. It broke my heart as a mother, but I couldn’t stop him. You know Ralph. And then he came back...” She dabbed a handkerchief at her eyes. “My sweet boy came back so...soangry.He didn’t remember what happened to him, and there were these big black spots where he couldn’t remember entire chapters of his life. He knew that he used to work at the abbey, and he remembered the library and its secrets, but he didn’t recognize us as his parents anymore. He’d go into rages at the smallest things, and the longer it went on, the less we felt we could tell him the truth. It wasn’t until you came that he began to calm down, though he still carries that anger, still doesn’t have a name for it.”

Ivy quickly cut her watering gaze away. Watching the usually stoic housekeeper fight the tremble in her lips gave Ivy no pleasure, but she had seen how Ralph hungered for companionship despite his hardened demeanor. “Don’t you think he would have wanted to know, even if it was painful?”

“We thought it was better this way,” Mrs. Hewitt said. “Mr. Hewitt and I are bound to the abbey, the library. We didn’t want that for Ralph. We didn’t want to burden him.”

“Burden me with what?”

Both women snapped their attention to the door where Ralph was standing, an army-issued canvas sack hefted over one shoulder.

Mrs. Hewitt shot to her feet. “Ralph.”

Slinging his bag to the floor, he moved further into the library. “Burden me with what,” he repeated without inflection.

Mrs. Hewitt looked about the room as if she might find an escape route, as Ralph’s energy heated and seeped into the library.

“Maybe I should leave,” Ivy said, rising from her chair.

She could just make out their voices as she waited outside the library doors. Ralph did not seem to be taking the news well. There was shouting, then a teary rejoinder from Mrs. Hewitt. Ivy was just considering going back in to act as peacekeeper, when the doors flew open and Ralph stormed out, Mrs. Hewitt’s voice calling out behind him.

Ivy chased after him out to the cold March evening. Raindrops were starting to fall, a thousand silent witnesses to Ivy’s desperation. “Ralph, wait.” Her hand caught the edge of his coat, only to have it slide through her fingers.

“Will you talk to me?”

“What good is talking?” he growled without turning around. “Words don’t seem to mean much around here.”

Still, she followed him out through the back gardens and to the edge of the moors, ignoring the sharp raindrops falling in her hair.

“Where are you going?” He still had his bag over his shoulder, and she had a terrible feeling that she already knew.

“I’m leaving.”

She stayed her step, nearly losing her footing in the uneven heather. “What?”

“That was always the plan. I’m not needed here—the work on the abbey is almost done.”

“What are you talking about? Of course you’re needed here. I don’t want anyone else. Ralph?” She scurried in front of him, planting her hands on her hips. “Tell me what’s really wrong. I demand it. And don’t tell me it’s what Mrs. Hewitt said—I know it must have been a shock to learn the truth about your origins, but you had your bag with you before that.”

He hitched the bag higher on his shoulder, gazing out into the dark rain. “You wouldn’t understand,” he muttered.

“Hogwash.”

His voice was low, made even harder to hear by the wind and rain. She moved closer to catch his words. “I—I swore to protect you. And then I failed you, when you needed it the most.”

“I don’t understand.”

Color touched his ears. “Lord Mabry,” he said. “You were forced to shoot him, because I was too... I was...” His words trailed off into miserable silence.

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