Page 84 of The Secret Life of the Elusive Governess
“I am sorry, Verona,” Caroline sighed as she laid her fork down, just before the servant whisked the plate away. “My mind is so preoccupied lately.”
“Would it be too bold to ask, preoccupied with what?” Verona said as she reheated the food.
“I cannot pinpoint it,” the governess mused, “But I know it is there.”
“Can it be something pertaining to His Grace?”
Just thinking of Moses made her chest hurt. She missed him so fiercely that sleep eluded her some nights. The days crawled by in peaceful quiet as Verona, a silent creature like Caroline, passed her days with needlepoint and reading, while Caroline drew and daydreamed. They had peaceful conversations but they were short-lived as both were not prone to speaking long.
Is this feeling about him? Is Moses in trouble?
Panic almost set inside her chest, but she breathed it away.Moses is powerful and able, he can protect himself…but what if it is not him? What if—?
“Here, Miss Robins,” Verona aid, “Please eat.”
Taking up her fork, Caroline dutifully ate the reheated victuals and cleaned her plate. “Where is Henry?”
“He went to the nearby town to buy some perishables, as even with your sparrow-bird appetite we are running low on food,” Verona teased lightly.
Standing up, Caroline felt another shift in her chest and knew something was not right. The feeling almost cramped her stomach and made her knees wobble, “I need to go back to Barley.”
“Miss Robins!”
Caroline nearly collapsed but hung onto the nearest surface, “I have to get home, now! Verona, I cannot tell you why but I need to get home!”
“Miss Robins, I am sorry,” the maid said with a deep grimace, “You cannot go back until we get a word. Your life in on the line here, please see sense. A feeling is not wisdom.”
“But…” Caroline’s head was swimming even as she was led to a chair. Bending over she mourned, “But…I have to. Something is wrong, I can feel it.”
* * *
A day and a half later
Six minutes—that was what it took to almost shatter the maid, Pauline Hart, who had just popped into the mansion to get a shawl for Lady Josephine Hayward as the evening was getting nippy.
Never had she imagined that she would go back to find the little girl gone. But she was, inexplicably, undeniably, gone, and in her place was a note secured under a smooth river rock. She snatched it up, took one look at the first words, and ran full tilt back into the house with her heart drumming in her ears.
“She's gone!” She screamed while darting inside. “She’s been taken!”
It did not take long for the lord of the manor, Moses Hayward, to rush out with alarm on his face, “Wha—?”
“Your Grace,” the woman trembled and gasped in terror, “Lady Josephine is gone!”The words she had just uttered rocked her and she nearly fell over at the horrible image of the sweet child being held in a dark, cold room, all alone and scared out of her mind. “And the only way you can get her back is to exchange her for Miss Robins.”
The Duke’s face paled just as the Duchess’ voice came from the stairwell.
“Moses, why did that ungodly scream disturb my rest? And what is this about Josephine? Tell me!” Her tone was almost hysterical. “What is happening?”
“Josephine has been kidnapped, Lavinia.” The Duke winced tightly, as her scream cut through the air, so shrill and laced with desolation that it tore his heart in two.The Duchess nearly fell from her precarious perch on the staircase. “How could that be?! How could someone just snatch her from the garden? We have eyes all over the place! How did no one see her?”
Moses grimaced.There has to be another agent here, but who?
The Duke took the crumpled note from the maid’s lax hand and read.
“We have the child...and you can only get her back if you hand over the governess to us in the next twenty-four hours.”
“But—Miss Robins?” the Duchess stuttered, “She’s gone. You sent our governess away, Moses. She is halfway across the county! How can you get her back in twenty-four hours? It took you three days to get her away! What will they do to my little girl if we can’t get her back?”
The Duke crumpled the noted with steely determination. “I’ll get her back, Lavinia. I swear on my life, I will get them both back. Tell Oliver to saddle my horse! Hinds, shut the whole estate down, send for constables, and search for the kidnapper’s accomplice. Do it now!”
