Page 12 of Speculations in Sin

His tone froze me to the bone, and I strove to retain my dignity.

“I do apologize,” I said. “You are right. I have no business here, except that I was terribly worried about you and trying to decide where you had gone.”

Mr. Davis stepped into the passageway, motioning me out as he would an unwanted guest from the house.

“Where I have been is my own affair. I took a day out, is all, and had difficulty returning before now. Had I meant to stay away longer, I would have sent word.”

I scuttled past him but turned back in the passageway, his high dudgeon beginning to vex me.

“If you had told Mrs. Redfern you would be away for all this time, we wouldn’t have imagined you’d been run down by a coach or a train. None of us knew what to think.”

“I told the master.Hehad no need to question me or to search my chamber. I was visiting a friend who was ill, if you must know. Good day, Mrs. Holloway. I will see you in the kitchen.”

My ire now moved to Mr. Bywater. He might have mentioned Mr. Davis’s planned absence and saved us some grief. I could be charitable and assume Mr. Bywater thought Mr. Davis would tell us himself, but I was embarrassed and unnerved and did not feel at all charitable at this moment.

“Next time, at least tellme,” I stated. “I would have kept your business private from the others had you asked me. You had no call to plunge us into such worry, Mr. Davis. I thought we were friends.”

For a moment, surprise flickered in his eyes, then the frost descended once more.

“I never inquire whereyougo haring off to on your days out, especially with Daniel McAdam, of all people. I do not approve of him, but I do not stop you, nor do I search your bedchamber for indication of what you get up to. I would think afriendabove such things.”

I lifted my chin. “Friends do look out for one another. I apologize for disturbing you. It will not happen again.”

I marched off, my back straight, and slammed the door of the partition behind me. Once on the women’s side, I leaned against the wall, breathing in gulps of cold air.

Mr. Davis had the right of it—I had no business snooping into his personal life, and none at all to go through the pile of letters he’d clearly hidden from everyone in the house.

But I had the right of it as well, I insisted to myself. He oughtn’t to have simply disappeared, leaving Mrs. Redfern andme to manage his duties. Mr. Bywater ought to have told Mrs. Redfern, or at least his wife or Cynthia. That neither Mr. Bywater nor Mr. Davis had bothered made me grind my teeth.

“Men,” I muttered.

Heaving a sigh, I pushed myself from the wall and began the journey downstairs to inform the rest of the staff that Mr. Davis had returned.

* * *

Another man I was annoyed with also returned that afternoon. Daniel McAdam made his noisy way down the outside stairs and slung sacks of flour I had not ordered onto the clean kitchen floor.

“There you are, missus,” he said to me.

He flashed me his warmest grin, just as he had the day he’d entered my kitchen at Mrs. Pauling’s, four years ago now, winking at me like the impudent man he was. I’d struggled to be stern with him, telling him he’d better have wiped his feet, but I’d been quivering inside. Daniel’s smile could melt one.

I kept up the pretense that his presence did not affect me in any way. “I do hope this is from the finest miller,” I said coolly. “One who does not add chalk to fill out the bag.”

“Best in London,” Daniel assured me. He flashed another smile at Tess and Elsie—Elsie leaned on the doorframe to stare dreamily at him.

“Back to work,” I commanded both young women. “You cannot cease your labors whenever a handsome man walks in the door. Where would you be then?”

“She says I am handsome,” Daniel informed the room. “Mrs. Holloway, you are too kind to me.”

“Oh, get on with you.” I resumed chopping onions at the table, forcing my knife to be steady.

Daniel lifted a bag onto his shoulders once more and hauled it down the hall to the larder. He was allowed to do things like that in this house, and I appreciated the help.

I could not hope to speak to him alone, because the staff came out of the woodwork whenever Daniel arrived. He cheerily greeted the footmen who suddenly had things to do below stairs and waved at the maids, who’d likewise appeared to gaze at him.

Only Mr. Davis, who’d emerged from his butler’s pantry at the noise, sent Daniel a disparaging look.

“I’ve got more provisions in the cart,” Daniel said when he returned from depositing the first bag. I watched his muscles work as he hefted the second bag, the onion pieces under my knife growing smaller and smaller. “Perhaps you want a look at them? I’m earning an extra bob or two on the side selling to kitchens on my route.”

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