He tried to remember when she had last had her monthlies, and could not recall. “Are you-?” he asked under his breath.
“I don’t know.”
He could not tell what she felt. He could not even tell what he felt. It would be a great difficulty, if Penelope really meant to be gone. And then, she might stay for the sake of the child, and the thought made him furious. But despite all these rational considerations, there was something very much like joy being born in his heart: a hopeful, infant joy.
He turned his head so that Penelope would not see him smiling, and spied Sir Jasper going out the door. He ignored his irrational flash of unease. “Here, sit down. I’ll get you a cup of tea.”
Penelope sat, a look of shock still on her face. Nev crossed to the tea service and was just adding the obscene amounts of honey he knew Penelope liked when Mr. Snively raced in, sweaty and gasping for breath.
For once in his life, the vicar didn’t bother with polite greetings. “Where is Sir Jasper? He must come directly!”
“He just stepped out,” Nev said. “What is the trouble?”
“He’s needed to read the Riot Act. The folk are forming up here and at Loweston, and they mean to free the prisoners!”
Eighteen
Sir Jasper rode down the drive, the shade of the Montagu oaks heavy on his face like a corpse’s shadow in the hot Paris summer. In the fields, his men’s faces twisted with hatred as he passed. Fear grew within him, hot and thick.
It was all slipping away, everything he had worked so hard for. He had spent his life keeping the wretches in his district from revolting. He had spent countless hours on the bench and spent a fortune to discourage poaching and sedition, he had enclosed the commons, he had spent years painstakingly guiding the late Lord Bedlow in everything, he had built up contacts and relationships, he had spent his life. Other people were happy, but not he. He had worked so hard, always, to make sure that everyone was safe. To make sure his sons never had to hide in the attic and watch an old man hanged on their doorstep.
He laughed, a strangled, high sound he didn’t recognize. What sons? His wife had been barren and was dead, and Louisa was gone, eloped with the steward because of Bedlow’s mismanagement and that bitch Lady Bedlow, who had somehow tricked him into thinking it was her the steward had his eye on, and not beautiful Louisa, the pride of the neighborhood.
And now the Cit countess was breeding. Breeding! She would have a son, and all that money would be assured, and together that wretched family would lead the district straight to Hell. Loweston would be ruined and Greygloss with it, and then the whole country would go, slipping and sliding into bloody revolt like at St. Peter’s Field.
As sudden and fierce and unstoppable as a revolution, something inside Sir Jasper rose up and said No more. It was all that bitch Lady Bedlow’s fault. Bedlow would have seen things Sir Jasper’s way easy enough if she hadn’t always been there with her idiotic town notions. The district was up in arms, and she’d made Bedlow think he could stop it with a few hocks of ham.
Without her degenerate influence, Louisa would never have dreamed of running away.
Sir Jasper was going to stop this. He had tried to do it kindly, to see that no one was hurt. They had been too willful. It was too late for that now.
Amy felt herself waking up and fought against it. It was no use, but she didn’t open her eyes. As long as she kept her eyes closed, she might still be in her charming, sumptuous bedroom in London and not a wretched, dirty hovel. Of course, even with her eyes closed, she could tell she was lying on a hard cot, not her huge featherbed. She had worked so hard not to live like this. She could not wait to be better and go back to London, away from sweet, handsome Nev and his likable wife who made her green with envy.
It took her a moment or two to realize she was hearing voices, and that they had woken her up. Agnes and-Sir Jasper, she realized. She tried to be pleased. The baronet had been visiting her regularly ever since she was well enough; she rather thought that was one reason the Baileys had wanted to get rid of her. She had quickly learned that Sir Jasper was not popular among the local people.
She didn’t like him either, though she could not put her finger on why. He simply made her hackles rise. Stop being fanciful, she told herself. Open your eyes and charm him. The thought exhausted her. In a moment, she promised, and snuggled deeper into her blankets.
Sir Jasper broke off. “Is she awake?” Amy heard him coming closer and stooping down to look at her. “Amy,” he said softly, his breath hot on her face.
She did not know what in his tone made her do it, but she shifted and sighed, as if still asleep, throwing an arm over her face. Feigning sleep was one of Amy’s many professional skills.
Sir Jasper stood and walked back to Agnes, speaking to her in a low voice. Amy strained to hear. She caught “my house,” “Lady Bedlow,” something she thought was “get her alone” and “woods” but might not have been, and her own name. Everything else was a murmur whose sense she could not fully grasp but which somehow made her intensely uneasy. “Wait for me there,” he finished.
“But sir-” Agnes said, audible and agitated.
Amy heard his next words very clearly. “Oh, come now, it’s not as if you have any affection for the woman.”
“No, sir, but-”
“If you care for your daughter at all, you will do it. I can see her saved, or I can send her to the Assizes.”
There was a pause. “Yes, sir. I’ll go at once.”
Sir Jasper strode out.
Amy heard a rustling thud that might have been Agnes kneeling. “Kit,” she said softly. “Mama has to go out now. Stay here, sweetie.”
“Mama go where?”
“Mama is going to help Josie.” Agnes’s voice shook. “Stay here and watch the pretty lady. Don’t go outside. There are angry people outside.”
“Angry?”
“Because people like Sir Jasper think they own us,” Agnes told him, sounding stronger for a moment. “But they don’t, do they, Kit?”
“No,” Kit said doubtfully.
“They don’t own you on the inside, Kit. Always remember that.” Agnes went out and shut the door behind her.
Something was very wrong. Amy did not know what; she only knew, deep in her bones, that something was wrong, and that Sir Jasper wanted to hurt Nev’s wife.
Amy opened her eyes and considered, staring at the ancient thatch. Yesterday she had managed to walk from her bed to the door and back again without stumbling. Of course, she had leaned on the door frame for a minute or two in between. She did not know if she could make it to the Grange to warn the Bedlows. She did not even know where the Grange was. And Agnes had said there were angry people outside. Whatever that meant, it couldn’t be good.
She could lie here and pretend she had heard nothing. Even if Penelope were hurt, what did it harm Amy? Nev might even take her back if his wife was out of the way.
Amy sighed and threw back the blankets. She sat up, slowly, and her head spun. Standing, she balanced herself with a hand laid flat against the wall.
“Kit? We need to go for a walk.” The child would slow her down, but Amy could hardly leave him behind.
“No outside. Mama said.”
“Mama told you to stay with me. And I’m going for a walk. Do you know where the big house is?”
“Grange,” Kit said. “Sloship gave me sixpence.”
That took her a moment. “His lordship gave you sixpence?”
Kit nodded.
“If we go there now, he’ll give you a shilling,” Amy promised. “Do you know how to get there from here?”
“Another riot?” Lady Bedlow was white and trembling, but Nev had no attention to spare.
“Is this true?” he asked. “How many are involved?”
“It’s true,” Mr. Snively said. “I saw them with my own eyes. Thirty at least and half of them drunk. They want an audience with Sir Jasper. They’re on their way here now.” There were gasps from a number of the guests. Nev distinctly heard his mother’s sharp intake of breath; when he glanced down at Penelope, however, she looked merely intent, her brown eyes fixed on the vicar’s face.