Page 26 of The Curse of Penryth Hall
She made a sound of amusement. “You’re an odd one, Miss…”
“Vaughn. Ruby Vaughn.” I jutted out my hand in offering.
She examined it, then looked up to meet my gaze. Shewiped her own hands on her apron before taking mine and giving it a shake. “Nellie Smythe. But I’m guessing you know that.”
“I heard.”
“I suspect you heard a lot if you’ve come from town.” She turned back to her weeds.
I lifted a shoulder. “I heard enough. Mrs. Penrose said you used to work up at the house for Sir Edward before—”
“Before I lifted my skirts, eh? Is that what she said? She’s always shown me a bit of kindness, but they all say it. At least when they think I can’t hear.”
“Not precisely, no. But I take it that’s the gist of the story.”
“It is, isn’t it? Great men and their great cocks.” A sentiment I shared. It was the plight of our sex, to bear the consequences of a man’s lust. Nellie turned to her boy. “Go on into the house, Sam. Let us have a bit of peace.”
The boy gave an uncertain nod, bounding off into the cramped little cottage.
I shifted the basket in my hands, setting it down by the stone fence.
“I’m sorry for my language, but it’s not fair, is it? Men can do as they please, whatever they want. And we? What happens to us then?” She drove the knife hard into the ground. I flinched slightly, staring at her hands. She seemed more sad than angry. Tormented even. But pain didn’t make one a killer. If it did, I’d have wiped out all of Britain in my grief ages ago.
“Were you here the night before last with your boy?”
Her eyes narrowed. “You don’t believe me.”
“Frankly, I don’t know what I believe. But for whatever it’s worth I do agree with you. It would have been difficult for a girl in your position to say no to an unwanted advance from the master of the house—a baronet at that. Unfortunately, I understand how these things work, far more keenly than I care to.”
She looked at me thoughtfully, as if she saw the truth behind my words. “Isn’t that the way?”
My fingers reached for my pocket where the flask usually rested and found only penny sweets. I popped one in my mouth instead, a sorry substitute.
She leaned back down, continuing to tug at the weeds in the rows of vegetables. Nellie didn’t speak for a while before finally looking up. “I was up at the Hind and Hare that night.” She tilted her chin toward the main road leading back to Lothlel Green.
“All night?” I sucked on the hard candy. Clacking it between my teeth.
She shook her head and cast her eyes down. “Until I left.”
“And went where…?” A few raindrops began to sputter from the sky.
She gave me a wry smile. “Where do women go when they need to pay the butcher and have nothing but parsnips to pay?”
A wave of understanding crossed me. “I see.” No wonder the woman wished him to the devil in town. “Miss Smythe, I have to ask… I heard that you’d been engaged before…”
She sucked in her breath and nodded. “Aye, George Martin. God rest him. He was a good man.”
I frowned. “Did Sir Edward have anything to do with your falling-out?”
She let out a bitter laugh and wiped the sweat from her brow. “No, Miss Vaughn. That fault lies squarely at Lord Kitchener’s feet.”
“The war?”
She looked wistfully up at the clouds stretching across the brilliant blue sky. “George wasn’t quite right when he came home. But war does that to some folks, you know? Sir Edward? He was the same selfish bastard he’d always been, but George… I think it broke him, Miss Vaughn. And it wasn’t me that could put him together again.”
Wasn’t me?That was a curious thing to say, but I let it go. There was no sense prying into her past. Not when she’d already been through enough. I took a step nearer to the garden patch. “Can I help you with anything?”
“Happen to have two tickets to America in that basket of yours?” she asked with a laugh then shook her head. “No, I don’t want charity, miss… that’s not why I told you what I did. I just wanted you to know I didn’t kill Edward. Go down to town and ask, anyone there will know how I spent the evening, I’m not ashamed of it. They know well enough how I pay the bills.” Her gaze drifted momentarily to the pigpen. “But all the same, I would rather be able to feed my son and be left in peace.”
