The Ashford Affair by Lauren Willig Page A

it out on Addie, who didn’t understand most of it but liked the cadence of Fernie’s voice and the way she tilted her head as she read. She was only twenty-two, Fernie, and very pretty, with long red hair that she wore piled on top of her head in loops and puffs that she promised she would teach Addie to make just as soon as Addie was old enough. Her dresses all had pretty flounces on the bottom, and lace trim, and she always smelled of rosewater. Addie wanted to be just like her when she grew up.
    “I’d rather that, too,” said Fernie gently. The flounce on her dress swished gently against the wood floor as she moved from dresser to bed, tucking Addie’s brush and comb, the ones with her initials on them, into the corner of the bag. “But where would I keep you?”
    “We can stay here! I’ll be a laundress like Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle.”
    “Oh, sweetheart.” Fernie squeezed her in a quick, rose-scented hug. Her lips brushed Addie’s hair. “You haven’t much luck keeping your own pinafores clean. I wouldn’t trust you with anyone else’s.”
    Addie bit her lip, bunching together the front of her pinny to hide the telltale smudges on the fabric. “I’ll try harder?”
    But Fernie had been obdurate. Usually, she could be wheedled and cajoled, but not on this. Addie’s aunt and uncle were coming for her and she was to go with them and be a good girl and always remember I love you, Fernie had said, and that your mother and father loved you, too.
    If they loved her, why had they gone away?
    It had been an omnibus, they said, coming around a sharp corner. The night had been dark and wet. Addie’s parents, heads lowered, one umbrella shared, had been picking their way back from a concert across the rain-slick streets. They had decided to walk, rather than take a cab; it was like them, everyone agreed. Like them, too, to be too absorbed in their discussion to know where they were going or see the vehicle before it was upon them.
    Father had died instantly; Mother had lived long enough to be taken to hospital, but not long enough for Addie to see her. By the time Addie had been told, it was over; they were both gone. Everyone agreed that she wasn’t to come to the funeral, that it was too much for a child her age. Instead, she had sat at home, watching the endless rain weep outside the window as Cook sobbed into her pots and Mary, the one maid, clattered up and down, setting out tea and cakes for Mother’s and Father’s friends who had come to say their final good-byes.
    That had been yesterday, and the house was empty again, cold and empty. Mother’s papers were still where she had left them, on her writing table in the parlor; Father’s pipe was in its saucer. But, already, they had an air of abandonment about them, as though they knew their owners weren’t to come back.
    It was cold in the closet, cold and damp, surrounded by musty coats that no one would ever wear again.
    “ Is there anyone in this ridiculous house?” There were people in the front hall, a woman and a man. The woman’s voice dropped. “I have a bad feeling about this, Charles, a very bad feeling.”
    “What else is to be done? We are her family.” It was a man’s voice, clipped, aristocratic, unutterably weary.
    “There are places.…” It was the woman’s voice again.
    “Would you have it said that a Gillecote of Ashford was sent to the poorhouse?”
    “Don’t be pompous, Charles,” said the woman irritably. “You make me sound like something out of Dickens! Hideous, underbred man. I wasn’t suggesting we send her to the poorhouse. But, surely, there are options other than taking her ourselves. What about her mother’s people? She must have come from somewhere. ”
    “Vera—”
    “Or the cousins in Canada. They have so many, they’d scarcely notice another. Good hearty, colonial air. Just the thing, surely.”
    “I’m not putting a little girl alone on a boat,” said the man. Uncle Charles. Addie didn’t know