The Secret of Pembrooke Park (38 page)

Abigail shook her head. “How you must have detested our coming and moving in to your home. . . .”

“Not at all! You mistake me, Abigail. It has saddened me to see my family home sitting empty and slowly decaying all these years, despite Papa’s efforts to keep the roof sound and vandals away. I am glad you are here. And I am glad you’ve lifted the lid on this long stewing pot. It was only a matter of time before it all boiled over, or scorched and burned. . . .”

She shook her head as though to dispel the notion. “I have been content with my lot, Abigail. Truly. There are times I wish I might lighten Mamma’s load or see the Chapmans living here in Pembrooke Park in style and ease, compared to that crowded old cottage. But they would never want to live here. And I’m not
certain I would either, even if it were mine free and clear and safe. Don’t feel sorry for me, I beg of you. I don’t.” She smiled bravely, charming dimples framing her gentle mouth. “Well, not often, at any rate.”

“But surely some people knew, or guessed, who you really were?”

“Of course. After all, Mac and Kate Chapman had announced the birth of their firstborn son four years before. But when I returned from school after a year away, they told anyone who asked that I was an orphan of relatives in the north that they were raising as their own. William grew up believing that story, more or less. I don’t think he was ever lied to directly—though many lies of omission, yes. Papa felt no remorse about lying to outsiders, though. He would have done anything to protect me. Some of our neighbors knew or recognized me as a Pembrooke. But with the man we all believed guilty of killing my father living right here in Pembrooke Park—all were willing to keep our secret, apparently.

“How Mac worried over the years, coddling this neighbor or that with loose lips or a tendency to drink too much, or growing old and forgetful. . . . But, thankfully, his worst fears have never come to pass. At least . . . so far.”

Abigail thought of Mrs. Hayes. Did this explain Mac’s visits and gifts?

Leah glanced at the hidden door behind them. “Papa won’t be happy when he hears you know about me. But William and I agree we must tell him. He has every right to know.”

Abigail nodded, a tremor of dread pinching her gut at the thought of Mac’s anger.

“William has ridden to Hunts Hall to tell him, if he can find him around the estate. I think I shall wait to look through the rest of these things until he’s with me. Or at least, until he knows that I’m in here with you.” Leah expelled a breath of amazement at the thought.

“I understand.” Abigail led the way back into the bedchamber, carefully closing the hidden door behind them. She looked around
the room with new eyes. “How strange to think this is your room . . .”

“
Was
my room. Twenty years ago.”

“That’s why you cried—when you watched Kitty play with the dolls’ house. It’s yours.”

“I don’t know why I cried, exactly.”

Abigail shook her head in bemusement and said gently, “You have many valid reasons to choose from.”

“Perhaps. But I choose not to dwell on them. Now, would you mind terribly if I returned later, after I have talked to Papa?”

“Not at all. You are welcome any time. More than welcome. This is your home. Your room.”

“Shh . . . Enough of that.”

“Very well. For now.” Abigail went to the bedside table and opened the drawer. “But in the meantime, you might wish to read these.” She handed Leah the ribbon-tied bundle of letters and journal pages she’d received from Harriet Pembrooke.

Leah glanced at them, saw Abigail’s own name written on the letters, and lifted questioning eyes to her face.

“Your friend ‘Jane’ has been writing to me these many weeks. And I think she’d want you to see them.”

Early the next morning, Duncan knocked on her door and announced that Miss Chapman had come to call. Opening the door a crack, Abigail asked the manservant to send up her guest, as she was not yet fully dressed.

A few minutes later, she opened the door for Leah and shut it softly behind her. “I thought Mac would be coming with you.”

“He is. He’ll be here any moment, I imagine. He let himself in through the servants’ entrance but insisted I go to the front door as a proper lady. He’s probably helping himself to one of Mrs. Walsh’s sausages as we speak.”

“I thought you might return last night.”

“We considered it. But he thought it would be more difficult to explain to your family.”

“Ah.”

“I hope we’re not too early.”

“No. Just give me one minute . . .”

Abigail sat at the dressing table and began gathering her long hair. She had shooed Polly away earlier, saying she would take care of her own hair that morning. In case the Chapmans made an early morning call, she wanted to be alone as soon as possible. Now she hurriedly twisted the hair into a coil atop her head. Holding it in place with one hand, she reached for the pins with the other.

Leah came and stood behind her. “Let me help you.”

Leah picked up the pins and made quick work of securing Abigail’s hair.

A soft scratching at the door alerted them, and Leah walked over and opened it, gesturing for Mac to enter. She returned to the dressing table and pushed in the last pin.

His voice low and regretful, Mac said, “You were meant to be a lady, my dear, not a lady’s maid.”

“Papa . . . I offered to help. And how many times have I told you I don’t mind a little work.”

Abigail rose, ran a self-conscious hand over her hair, and forced herself to meet Mac’s gaze. She was relieved not to see anger there, only caution and concern.

“How many of Mrs. Walsh’s sausages did you eat?” Leah asked him wryly.

“Only two.”

“Ah. Cutting back, I see.”

“I told her Miss Foster mentioned having trouble with her door and I’d said I’d take a look at it. I ran into Duncan on the way up and told him the same.”

Abigail nodded. “Good thinking.”

She hoped Duncan wouldn’t become suspicious with all these visitors to her room, as Miles had.

This time, Abigail locked her bedchamber door and then gestured
for the two of them to enter the secret room whenever they were ready. They left the door partway open for her, but she hung back, not wanting to intrude on their private moment, yet undeniably curious.

For several moments a heavy silence hung in the air of the secret room. Then she heard Mac’s voice, throaty and rough, “You look so much like her. Much more so now than when I hung this here. Turns out I was right to do so.”

Abigail stood just to the side of the door, watching the scene through the opening, knowing she probably shouldn’t but unable to look away.

Leah asked, “You took it down from Father’s room and hung it here?”

Mac nodded. “I feared the resemblance would eventually give you away.”

“It’s good to see her again.”

He glanced at Leah. “I’m sorry the painting’s been kept from you. Sorry so many things rightfully yours have been kept from you. I hope you know everything I did, I did to protect you.”

“I do know, Papa.” She pressed his hand.

Reassured, Mac looked again at the painting. “I didn’t know if Clive had been acquainted with Elizabeth Pembrooke. The brothers had been estranged for years, but I feared if he’d met her, he would remember, being as beautiful as she was. It was the main reason we sent you to school for that year. To give time for his memory to fade. His and our neighbors’ as well.”

The words were out of Abigail’s mouth before she could stop them. “It was a courageous thing to do—to hide Robert Pembrooke’s daughter right under his brother’s nose.”

Mac opened the door wider. “Courageous? To hide?” He shook his head, lip curled. “I don’t think so. And I can’t take credit for the idea. I never would have presumed to remove her from the house, to send her away, and then to raise her as my own in our wee cottage, had Robert Pembrooke not asked it of me.”

Abigail felt her brow furrow and joined them inside. “What do you mean?”

Mac turned to one of the shelves. “I left it hidden here. The note he sent with his valet. God rest their souls. . . .”

He picked up a cigar tin from the lowest shelf, blew the dust off the cover, and carried it to the window ledge. There he opened the lid and from the bottom of a stack of invoices and receipts pulled forth a small notebook entitled
Household Accounts.
“I folded it within this, knowing it would not appeal to a man like Clive Pembrooke, even if he ever found this room.”

From within the account book, he extracted a piece of paper, unfolded it, and handed it to Leah. “Written by your father, right before he died.”

Hands trembling, Leah read the letter, her eyes filling with tears as she did so. Then she handed it to Abigail to read.

Abigail hesitated. “Are you certain?”

Leah nodded, and pulled a handkerchief from her sleeve.

Abigail read the note written in a hurried, erratic hand. And guessed the dark brown stain on one corner might be Robert Pembrooke’s own blood.

Mac,

Protect Eleanor or he will kill her.

Let him have the house, anything he wants,

but hide my treasure.

—R. Pembrooke

Ellie,

I love you more than life. Never forget.

—Papa

“How I wished that Mr. Pembrooke had identified his attacker,” Mac said. “Given me something I could take to the magistrates to use against Clive. Solid evidence. But considering he was near death, it’s a miracle he was able to write this much. And a testament of
his love for you, my dear, that you were foremost in his mind. His last, most precious, thought.”

Mac looked at Abigail. “Leah told you about that night . . . ?”

Abigail nodded solemnly.

Leah explained, “Only up until the part where Uncle Pembrooke left and you took me to Grandmamma’s cottage.”

He nodded thoughtfully and filled in some of the details. “Eventually, we heard the front door slam closed, and for a time, all was quiet. Assuming Clive had fled the scene of the crime, I tiptoed back through Ellie’s room and went down to check on poor Walter, but as I feared, he was dead. I took advantage of the empty house, gathered a few things for Ellie, and then left the manor, taking her to my mother-in-law’s cottage. Thinking she would be safer there than in my own, in case Clive came looking.

“Then I waited and watched the manor from a distance, just in case. Soon a gig approached with Mr. Brown at the reins and Clive Pembrooke riding that big black of his alongside. I admit I was surprised.

“A few minutes later, I entered the house, claiming to have heard a carriage and that I was coming to check on the place. I found Mr. Brown and Clive Pembrooke standing over Walter Kelly’s body. Clive Pembrooke was all cool civility, all concern and grief over Walter’s fate, theorizing the young man had fallen down the stairs in his hurry to answer the door. Of course there was nothing Mr. Brown could do for him. He was already dead—had died honorably, protecting his young mistress.

“The surgeon left to summon the undertaker. While Clive and I waited for him to come and remove the poor man’s body, Clive told me he had come to Pembrooke Park with the news he’d heard in London, that Robert Pembrooke was dead—killed by thieves who broke into the London house.”

Here, Mac looked at Abigail and interjected, “Lies, all of it.”

Then he continued, “Clive said he’d seen the valet’s horse out front, lathered and exhausted, and assumed he’d come on the same mission. He asked me why the man would ride so far in such a hurry. Whom had he meant to tell if the house was empty?

“I told him, ‘The housekeeper and me, I suppose. He wouldn’t know that she had gone to sit at her sister’s sickbed. And of course the rector and all the parish would want to know the news—the most significant news to grieve our parish since the death of Mrs. Pembrooke.’”

“Clive said, ‘His wife and daughter died, I believe I heard.’”

“‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Taken in the typhus epidemic that claimed so many.’”

“Then Clive said, all casual-like, ‘The poor man muttered something before I went for the surgeon. Perhaps it will make more sense to you than it did to me. He said his master had sent him home to hide his treasure.’”

Mac gave Abigail another sidelong glance. “That part of his story was true. Clive looked at me then with his snakelike eyes. Genial and venomous all at once. He asked me, ‘What did he mean by that? Had my brother some treasure I don’t know about?’”

“I shrugged and answered as casually as I could, ‘I suppose there must be some family jewels or something of that sort, though I don’t know the particulars. But I hardly think this is the time to worry about such things. Not when two men are dead.’

“I suppose it was a risk, speaking to him like that. But it was how I would have spoken to him under other circumstances. And I feared he would guess that I knew what he’d done if I acted servile or timid.”

“It seemed to convince him, for he continued on with his act of innocence in full confidence that the only witness against him—or so he thought—was dead.”

Mac turned to Leah. “Had it not been for you, my dear, or your father’s plea that I act quickly to hide and protect you, I shudder to think what I might have done, likely confronting him then and there—accusing him of killing both men, and likely ending up a third victim.” He shook his head. “Even so, how guilty I’ve felt. Perhaps I should have confronted him, called in the law, and tried to avenge Robert Pembrooke, to obtain justice, weak evidence or not.”