I hope you do not become horribly bored and fall asleep in the middle of it. And surely there will be enough to get me back to Bath in a little more comfort than the stagecoach is said to provide. Perhaps there will be enough to enable me to take some modest rooms outside the orphanage and thus acquire more independence. How lovely that would be!
But oh dear, I do feel bruised and battered. For I have found my parents and they are dead, and I have found a family that is mine—I do believe most of the people there in that room, if not all, must be related to me in some way—but they hate me with a passion. The elder sister—my half sister—in particular yelled the most horrible things at me. The boy—my half brother—could only seem to laugh and look dazed and talk about it all being a lark, poor thing. Oh, poor thing, Joel, and he is my BROTHER! The younger sister looked dazed and bewildered. And the dispossessed wife wrapped herself in dignity and looked like a stone monument about to crumble. I fear she will indeed crumble when the reality of it all hits full force.
My fingers are sore, my wrist is aching, and my arm is about to fall off. Mr. Brumford sent me back here even though I wanted to return to Bath without further delay. He convinced me to stay until he has had a chance to come and talk business with me. I expect him any moment.
I will come home soon, though. Oh, how I long for my schoolroom and my children, even the naughty ones. How I long for you and Miss Ford and Roger and—oh, and my little room in which I would not be able to swing a cat even if I had one—another of Miss Rutledge’s sayings. Maybe I will come tomorrow. Almost certainly I will come no later than the day after.
Meanwhile, you have my permission to share the contents of this letter if you wish—everyone will be longing to know why I was summoned here and will be vastly entertained by my story. You will be the most popular man in Bath.
Thank you for reading so patiently, my dearest friend—I trust you have read this far! What would I do without you?
Your ever grateful and affectionate
Anna Snow (for that is who I am!)
Anna blotted the final sheet of the letter, folded it neatly—it was indeed fat—and sank back in her chair, exhausted. She had had luncheon with Miss Knox soon after her return from that mansion, though she could not remember either what had been served or how much she had eaten. All she wanted to do now was crawl into the large bed in the bedchamber that was hers, pull the bedcovers over her head, curl up into a ball, and sleep for a week.
But there was a knock upon the door, and she sighed and got to her feet while Miss Knox strode past her to open it.
*
When Avery entered the drawing room, he found it much as he had expected. It was full of variously distraught Westcotts—with the apparent exception of the Countess of Riverdale, who was no longer the countess and actually never had been, and Camille and Abigail, who were sitting in a row on the sofa, silent and motionless.
The dowager countess was seated on an adjacent love seat, her eldest daughter beside her.
“Do not fuss, Matilda,” she was saying in obvious exasperation. “I am not about to swoon.”
“But, Mama,” Lady Matilda protested with an inelegant hiccup of a sob. “You have had a severe shock. We all have. And you know what the physician said about your heart.”
“The man is a quack,” her mother said. “I do not have heart palpitations; I have a heartbeat, which I have always thought a good thing, though today I am not so sure of it.”
“Swallow this down, Mother-in-Law,” Molenor said as he approached from the sideboard with a glass of brandy.
Mildred, Lady Molenor, looked as though she needed it more. She was seated beside her sister, the duchess, her head thrown back, her handkerchief spread over her face and held there with both hands, while she informed anyone who cared to listen that the late Humphrey had been every nasty beast and insect the world has ever produced, and that was actually an insult to the bestial and insect kingdoms. The duchess was patting her knee but showing no inclination to contradict her. She was looking like thunder.
Mrs. Westcott—Cousin Althea—was hovering behind the sofa, gazing down in obvious concern at the backs of the heads of the three seated there and assuring them that all would be well, that everything always turned out for the best in the end. For a sensible woman—and Avery had always considered her sensible—she was talking a pile of rubbish. But what else was there to say?
Alexander Westcott—the new Earl of Riverdale—was standing with his back to the fireplace, his hands clasped behind him, looking elegant and commanding, though his face was a bit waxy. His sister, standing a few feet away from him, was telling him that it was impossible, he could not refuse the title, and even if he could, it would not revert to Harry.
Of Harry himself there was no sign.