Daniel had escaped into the darkness after a struggle, leaving his baggage behind.
“Was the coachman alive when you left?” Emily asked.
“Yes.”
“Then we must send someone.”
“Higgins has already offered.”
The butler nodded.
“I know the bridge, miss.”
Emily looked toward the back door where rain battered the stone threshold.
“Take the lantern and ask Thomas to come with you.”
Higgins hesitated.
“His lordship dismissed Thomas this afternoon.”
Emily closed her eyes briefly.
Thomas had worked at Oak Haven for sixteen years.
He had a wife and two children, and the Harringtons owed him three months of wages.
“Then ask Mrs. Pike’s son at the village smithy.”
“I shall go at once.”
After he left, Daniel rested his hands on the table.
“You give orders rather well for someone who has been told she must not speak.”
“I only give them when there is no one else willing to do what is necessary.”
“That is often how leadership begins.”
Emily wrung the bloody linen into the basin.
“Please do not make me into something grander than I am.”
“I was merely observing what happened.”
She set a dry cloth beside him.
“You may stay in the old storeroom tonight.”
“The lock is broken, but the roof does not leak.”
“Does the rest of the house leak?”
“Only when it rains.”
He laughed softly, and she found herself laughing too.
The sound frightened her because it felt unfamiliar.
Then footsteps struck the passage.
Arthur entered with Lady Harrington and Clara behind him.
He had brought the family ledger, a thick book whose cracked leather binding had once been handsome.
“So here you are, entertaining your intended.”
Emily stood.
“Father, he needs rest.”
“And I need money.”
Arthur slapped the ledger onto the kitchen table.
“Your gallant visitor says he can pay for a horse.”
“Let us see whether he can pay for a bride.”
Daniel placed his spoon carefully beside the bowl.
“Is this another joke, Lord Harrington?”
Arthur’s eyes narrowed.
“I offer you a respectable young woman with a name older than half the county.”
“She has no dowry, of course, but a fellow in your position cannot afford to be particular.”
Clara laughed.
“Emily would be grateful for a broom closet and a wedding ring made of string.”
Emily felt her face burn.
Daniel looked at Clara, then at her parents.
“You speak of your daughter as though she were absent.”
“She may as well be,” Lady Harrington replied.
“She has never understood how a family of our standing must survive.”
