Page 52 of Duke of Moonstone
“Would you like one? I had Cook make them especially for you. I always think introductions go better with something sweet, don’t you?”
Emily selected a sugarplum and put it in her mouth. Frances could see the bridge that Margaret had built with Emily through her letters, and this now felt more like a reunion than an introduction.
“Is it good?” Margaret asked.
She nodded.
“Excellent. Take another. I insist. Mrs. Wells will tell you I am not to have more than two myself, so someone must eat them, or they shall go to waste, and that would be a terrible shame.”
Emily took another while Margaret patted the edge of the bed. “Come, sit beside me. I want to hear everything about your trip to Whitestone Hall and how you have found it thus far.”
Emily told her everything while Frances watched from her chair beside the bed. Margaret sighed after Emily’s tale and glanced at Frances.
“A wonderful age she has.” She turned back to Emily. “I remember being eight. I had a ginger cat named Biscuit who used to sleep on my pillow and steal my breakfast. Do you like cats?”
Emily’s eyes widened. “I do not know, Your Grace. I have never had one.”
“Never had a cat? Well, that is something we must remedy. Every child should have a cat. Or a dog. Or both, if the house is large enough, and this house is certainly large enough.”
“Truly?”
“Of course, my dear.” Margaret adjusted the shawl that was draped about her shoulder. “Now, tell me, what do you like to read?”
“Stories. About knights. And...” Emily stopped. Her gaze dropped to her lap.
“And?” Margaret prompted.
“Dragons,” Emily said, very quietly, as though the admission might be judged.
“Dragons!” Margaret pressed a hand to her chest. “My absolute favorite. When Alexander was a boy, he used to make me read him the same story about a dragon every single night. Every night, without fail, for three months. I knew every word by heart. I could recite it in my sleep.”
Emily looked up, and Frances leaned forward. “The Duke liked dragons?” they asked in unison.
“He was utterly mad for them. He built one out of the table linens once. It took up the entire nursery. The housekeeper at the time—not Mrs. Wells, the one before her—nearly fainted when she saw it.”
Frances’s chest ached. What must have happened to change Alexander like this?
“Now then.” Margaret reached for the sugarplum dish and set it on the bed between them with an air of conspiracy. “Have another. And tell me—what is your very favorite story?”
Emily took a third sugarplum. She chewed it slowly. “There is one about a princess. She rescues herself.”
Margaret’s gaze moved to Frances. The look that passed between them needed no words.
“That,” Margaret said, turning back to Emily, “sounds like the very best kind of story.”
The minutes passed. Frances watched. She asked about Emily’s lessons. She asked about her favorite foods. She asked whether she had ever been to the seaside, and when Emily said she had not, Margaret declared this a travesty of the highest order and said they had to arrange it at once.
At one point, Margaret asked her if she could keep a secret.
Emily nodded.
“When I was a girl,” Margaret said, leaning in, “I climbed out of my bedroom window and onto the roof because I wanted to see the stars without the glass in the way. My mother did not discover it for three weeks, and when she did, she was so horrified she could not speak for a full minute. A full minute of silence from my mother. It was glorious.”
Emily’s eyes went wide. “You climbed on the roof?”
“I did. It was not terribly high. And the stars were magnificent.”
“Were you frightened?”
