Page 3 of The Secret Daughter
Marie dropped her gaze in shame. “It’s nothing, mademoiselle.”
“It’s not nothing at all. Tell me who did this to you.”
Marie lifted a hopeless shoulder and shook her head. “Shall I help you undress, mademoiselle?”
Zoë eyed the cut on her cheekbone. Made by a signet ring, she thought, a signet ring she’d seen very recently on a pudgy aristocratic finger. “Monsieur Etienne.” It wasn’t a question.
Marie nodded.
Zoë muttered something under her breath. “You resisted him?”
Marie nodded again, and a choked sob broke her tenuous composure. “I am dismissed, mademoiselle. As soon as I have finished with you here tonight, I must leave.”
Zoë frowned. “Tonight? But it’s dark. Where will you go? Do you have family nearby?”
Marie shook her head. “No family, mademoiselle. I am an orphan.”
“So what will you do?”
Marie’s eyes filled with tears again. She gave a hopeless shrug.
“Well, let’s see to that nasty cut, first. I have some very good ointment that my sister made.” Zoë fetched the little case filled with Clarissa’s products and pulled out a small jar. “This will help.” She soaked a clean cloth with thewarm water Marie had brought and gently cleaned the girl’s face, then smoothed the ointment carefully over the cut and the bruise.
“Oh, that feels nice,” the girl said.
“My sister is very clever.”
“Thank you, mademoiselle. You are very kind. Now, I must leave or the housekeeper will be angry.”
“Nonsense! You can’t go out into the night with nowhere to go! It’s, it’s inhumane. Anything could happen to you,” Zoë said.
“But I must, mademoiselle. I was told to be gone as soon as I had completed my duties.”
“But what would you do?”
Marie said in a hopeless voice, “Walk to the village, I suppose, and try to find another position.”
Walk to the village?
Without a character reference, Marie would have no hope, Zoë thought. And walking that distance at night? It was not to be thought of.
“You’re not going anywhere,” Zoë told her. “Certainly not out into the night with nowhere to go! Would you work for me?”
“For you, mademoiselle, of course.” Marie brightened. “You mean it?”
Zoë nodded. The maid’s plan to walk to the village had given her an idea. She eyed the maid thoughtfully. “We’re about the same size, aren’t we?”
Marie looked puzzled. “Oui, mademoiselle,” she said cautiously.
“Good. Take off your dress.”
“My dress?” Marie didn’t move.
Zoë laughed at her expression. “It’s all right, we’re going to swap clothes, that’s all.”
“Swap clothes? Mine for…yours?” Marie said incredulously.
“Yes. Here.” Zoë tossed her the plainest of her dresses,still much finer than anything Marie would own, and one of her fine lawn chemises.
