Page 89 of Trouble

‘Oh, that you are secretly madly in love with Father, and that he obviously feels the same about you, and the two of you are enacting some sort of dramatic Shakespearean play where you are kept apart by class and station and other reasons that are sort of silly, in the end.’

‘Differences in class and station are not .?.?.silly,’ Emily said faintly. ‘This country is obsessed with them.’

‘Oh, well, yes, but it is also obsessed with manners, and teaching ladies nothing and gentlemen the worst parts of everything, and ensuring that everybody is in theproperclothes, and designating anything even the slightest bit different asevil.You cannot let what peoplethinkdictate how you live your life – nobody would ever do anything interesting. And when it comes to love .?.?. you know. The heart wants what it wants. And the heart is also terminally stupid. A dangerous combination.’

‘You’re wrong,’ Emily said. ‘About all of it. There’s no Shakespeare, there’s no .?.?.love.’

‘That’s just what the character in the play would say right about now,’ said Aster. ‘Although I imagine it’d be much less pithy. They do tend to drone on. Close the door on your way out, will you? I need to finish writing this letter soon or I will be in terrible trouble.’

‘Trouble with whom?’

Aster smiled a horrid, leonine grin. ‘One of mymanyadmirers.’

‘Ugh,’ said Emily, which was irritating, because it was just what Asterwantedher to say.

Once out in the hallway, she leaned against the wall and closed her eyes, listening to the sound of people saying their goodbyes down by the front door. She heard Mrs Spencer’s lilting, velvety voice above the hubbub, saying that the captainmustthank the cook for her. She could only imagine how red in the face Joe would get if Captain Edwards did march down to the kitchens to convey her effusive thanks. She wondered how the captain was feeling; relieved, perhaps, as he said farewell to his guests? Would he go to his study, loosen his stock and pour himself a drink? She thought of how he had looked before the party, tired and strained and completely without pretence, and felt a strange sort of protectivenessin his direction, which was ridiculous. He did not need protecting, andEmilywas not qualified to be his knight in second-hand armour even if he did.

Aster had got it all wrong. She was not inlovewith Captain Edwards, and the idea that he might feel anything beyond vaguely attracted to her as a person-shaped diversion was fanciful at best. Emotions had been running too high in this house, and things had become muddled.

Besides, wanting to kiss somebody was not the same as being in love with them. Even if you wanted to kiss them very, very badly .?.?. and worse still, wanted to ask them what was wrong, and actually cared about the answer. She could go to him now, in his study; knock on the door and feel sure that he would grant her entrance, even if it was technically very untoward; sit down in the chair opposite him, ask for a drink of her own, and then perhaps pick a small fight with him to get things going .?.?.

‘Are you napping?’ said Akia. Emily jumped a little, opening her eyes to find that Akia was offering her a letter. ‘I thought only large animals were able to sleep standing up. Horses. Elephants.’

‘Birds,’ said Emily, taking the letter.

‘Don’t be a fool, Emily, elephants aren’t birds,’ said Akia, looking pleased with herself. ‘I think they might actually be very large, hairless cats. That just came for you.’

The letter was not written in any hand Emily recognised; she thanked Akia absent-mindedly and opened it as she walked, unfolding it as she entered her bedroom.

Miss Emily Laurence,

I cannot help but notice that you failed to make our last appointment. It is my fault for not making myself clear: the consequences should you fail to attend again will be far more severe. I still have something of yours – or, not of yours – in my possession.

It is in both of our best interests for us to continue our friendship.

I will see you on Saturday. Don’t forget. I certainly will not.

Please send my regards to your sister.

Emily had not even closed the door. She did so as if in a trance, and then sat down heavily on the end of her bed.

She had completely misconstrued the situation, and her position in it. She had thought that Charles might write her off completely and move onto some more fruitful endeavour with a better chance of return; that he might have sold the box she had given him, and therefore have nothing left to hold over her.

She had underestimated his doggedness, and perhaps too the strength of his vendetta against the captain. He was not going to let this go. She was not free after all. Perhaps she never could be.

The letter crumpled in her fist as she tried to remember to breathe. She usually kept such a tight grip on herself that it was deeply alarming to find her thoughts spiralling out of control. Why had she ever thought herself clever enough to get away with any of this? What rank foolishness had led her here? She had always been able to find answers and solutions, and had thought that it proved that she wassturdyandcapablein ways her father never had been, but now it was becoming startlingly clear to her that she had only ever been an idiot, mere moments from disaster.

Amy. She had done it forAmy. But that felt foolish now, too: the plan of a child, to snatch and grab and run, rather than to be sensible and keep her head as her sister would have done.

She was being blackmailed by a known blackmailer. She wanted to kick herself almost as much as she wanted to kick him.

She scanned the letter again. The part about the box was clear enough. If she did not go to him with the evidence he had demanded to damn Captain Edwards, he would reveal her to be a thief. After how kind Meera and the others had been to her, the thought tore through her like the slip of a knife. They might have been lenient at Fairmont, but breaking the trust of everybody within and stealing something of immense value was not a small transgression that could be easily ignored. And if Charles told the captain how readily she had agreed to uncover and profit from his secrets .?.?.

It was more than enough reason for them to want to package her up in light restraints, deliver her personally to the constable and then wash their hands of her completely.

Without Emily, Amy and her mother would be in real danger, neither of them able to find the sort of work Emily could. There would be no more doctors, no more good food – no more food at all.

That could not be allowed to happen.