Page 75 of Darkest at Dusk
“Go on,” Rhys said.
“She wouldn’t say it if she didn’t believe it. But…she says she was pushed. Felt two hands on her back and a hard shove.”
Isabella gasped.
The housekeeper’s mouth compressed. “Peg’s not one to tell tales.”
“Did she see who it was?” Rhys asked, his voice tense.
“She did not,” Mrs. Abernathy said. “She only swears she smelled roses and ash. Says she heard a woman’s laugh before she fell.” The housekeeper paused. Beneath the sheet, Rhys lightly squeezed Isabella’s hand. “But I was in the kitchen with Cook and Marry and Emma, and there are no other women in this house, except Miss Barrett.”
“Are you suggesting that it was Miss Barrett who pushed her?” Rhys asked, his voice silky and dangerous.
The housekeeper looked appalled. “Absolutely not. I was only saying that every woman in this house was accounted for when Peg fell.”
Mrs. Abernathy’s hands smoothed the apron at her waist and Isabella sensed the woman had more to say.
“There is something else you wish to share,” Rhys said.
“There is,” Mrs. Abernathy said. She hesitated, then reached into her pocket and drew out a small parcel wrapped in muslin, tied with a bit of yarn. “A house grows sour if you leave doors barred too long. Yesterday, I sent Peg to the second floor of the east wing, airing, dusting, polishing.”
Isabella felt Rhys tense at her side.
“The east wing,” he said, his tone flat.
Mrs. Abernathy turned the packet in her hands. “Peg says the top drawer of the tall boy in the blue room”—Isabella felt Rhys tense beside her— “would not close all the way. She took the drawer out and found this tucked in behind. She pressed it into my hands after her fall. Pale as death she was.”
The housekeeper pulled the yarn, and the muslin fell away to reveal a small calfskin diary, its corners rubbed pale with use, the brass clasp broken so the strap hung loose. “I read only a page. Enough to know it wasn’t accounts or linen lists. A housekeeper has no business prying into a young lady’s private pages.”
She offered the book and Rhys accepted it, his frame humming with tension.
“I would have you send for Dr. Linton in Marlow. Let him look Peg over and be certain she has no hidden hurt. Bruises mend, but a blow on the stair can turn itself cruel in the bones,” Rhys said, his tone brooking no argument. It warmed Isabella to see his concern for those in his care. “Make sure she rests.”
With a nod, Mrs. Abernathy took her leave.
Once the door was closed behind her, Isabella asked, “What is it? What has distressed you so.”
He only offered her the diary, silent.
Accepting it, she hesitated. She did not need his confirmation that the blue room had been Catrin’s, that this diary had belonged to her. She felt it in the tense hum that wove between them.
She opened the cover. The flyleaf bore several attempts at the same hand, ink faded with age.
Catrin Caradoc
C. Caradoc
Catrin C?—
Beneath the names, in small letters, was written the motto: I must be what is wanted. The words crawled across Isabella’s skin.
She turned the page and read aloud the entry. It was mundane, a recitation of the courses at dinner. A mention of a new hat. The triviality scraped her. Had she not written the same in her own youthful journals? A mention of a ribbon Papa brought her. A description of a new frock. The familiarity unsettled her.
She fanned the pages and let the diary fall open where it would.
They see only what they wish to see. Dead sparrows in the garden, a rabbit curled stiff beneath the lilac bush. Father says it must be a fox, Mother a cat. The fire in the greenhouse? They call it an accident. They never look deeper. They never look at me.
A chill uncurled beneath Isabella’s skin. It was not only the dead sparrows or the burned greenhouse that made her stomach knot, but the truth pulsing between the lines. The words bled cruelty, but beneath them lay hunger, for recognition, for consequence. Catrin had wanted them to see, to recognize the darkness she carried.
