Page 33 of The Cherry Trees of Rosings
“Well, I am not this time!” Elizabeth said. “Perhaps we should talk in the morning. It has been a tiring day.”
She started to walk away. And she was nearly at the foot of the staircase—when Charlotte spoke again.
“Would you tell me, then, why you sent a letter to Matlock House last week?”
Elizabeth stilled. And then she bit her lip, hard.
Of course nothing ever stayed a secret in country villages!
She turned around. Charlotte had that stubborn cast to her face. Elizabeth knew it mirrored her own.
“Why?” she asked.
Her heart was thumping loudly in her chest. The now-familiar ache, spreading through her bones.She did not wish to speak of this.
“Why would you believe such a thing?”
There was a pressure building behind her eyes.
Charlotte’s face softened. She closed the distance between them.
“Because I know you, Eliza, and you are not one for such fanciful notions.”
“Neither are you.”
A small smile appeared on Charlotte’s face.
“Yes, but I have caught you speaking to thin air a couple of times when you did not know,” she said. “And, to tell the truth, I was rather relieved when Colonel Fitzwilliam mentioned what he did to me.”
Her smile dimmed.
“I believed it was something entirely different. I was beginning to worry.”
Elizabeth stared at her. “He threatened to have me sent to Bedlam.”
A stricken look appeared on Charlotte’s face.
“Who?”
“Colonel Fitzwilliam.”
“Oh Eliza!”
Charlotte instantly drew Elizabeth into a hug.
Elizabeth stiffened. But then she leaned into Charlotte, placing her arms around her friend. The strain she had not realized she was feeling inside unravelled.
“I still do not understand why you believe such a thing,” Elizabeth whispered. “Nobody would.”
Twin tears rolled down her cheeks.
Charlotte tightened her hold around Elizabeth.
“I never told anyone this,” Charlotte said, her voice almost in Elizabeth’s hair. “But when I was twelve and Grandmother Lucas had just passed away, I saw her ghost twice at the top of the landing. Outside the room that used to be hers.”
“What?”
Elizabeth pulled back, clutching at Charlotte’s arms in disbelief. “Truly?”
