Page 22 of The Marchioness Who Tempted Fate
“That, too,” Percival said, smiling. “But catching you is more of the end of the story, or perhaps the middle, rather than the beginning. Explain to me why a gently reared young woman would run away to live a life of crime.”
Tiffany stitched for a minute or two. “It is a curious thing. I think it begins with thinking about how some people believe they want something, but once they have it, they find it isn’t how they thought it would be.”
“An interesting thought,” Percival said. “You have experienced this?”
Tiffany nodded. “The Bentleys could not have children. They went to the orphanage together to pick out a child. I had not been there long, so I was still rosy, and healthy.”
“How do you know this? Do you remember being selected?”
Tiffany shook her head. “Father Bentley told me the story over and over. It was my favorite bedtime tale. I loved it even more than ordinary nursery stories.”
“But Mrs. Bentley?”
“One of her friends told her that nothing good would come of adopting an orphan from the poorhouse. I remember the friend very well, because every time she visited, she would look at me and say, “That child will only bring you ill. Mark my words, she will bring you to financial ruin.”
“Right in front of you?”
“Oh, yes. And I was obliged to sit with them and sip tea, behaving as if nothing at all had happened.”
“I’m sorry that happened to you,” Percival said. “But surely it was not enough to cause you to run away?”
“Not by itself. But the friend made the mistake of saying it in front of Father Bentley. After that, he always found something for me to do in the shop when Mrs. Bentley’s friends came to visit.”
“You say ‘Mrs. Bentley’ when you speak of her, yet Father Bentley when you speak of Mr. Bentley.”
“He encouraged me to call him Father, and he was a father to me. No one could have been better. I adored him.”
“But then . . .?”
“He was not a young man when he adopted me. His health became uncertain in his last year or two, and he relied more and more on me to take care of simple things in the shop. Mrs. Bentley wouldn’t work there. She said that her place was to take care of the house.”
“Did she? Take care of the house, I mean.”
“For a while. Truly, I do not think her health was all that good, either. After Father Bentley fell ill, a great deal of the upkeep fell to me.”
“How old were you when Mr. Bentley passed on?” Percival was truly curious now.
“I had just had my official twelfth birthday. Mr. Bentley thought it likely that I was around two years of age when they adopted me. We always celebrated my adoption day anniversary as my birthday.”
“A practical approach. So what happened after Mr. Bentley became ill?”
“I took care of the shop. Mrs. Bentley had her hands full nursing Father Bentley. He simply wasted away, then one morning just didn’t wake up.” Tiffany blinked back tears. “Not long before he died, he asked me to take care of Mrs. Bentley. And I did for the longest time.”
Now a tear did trickle down her face. Tiffany took one of the squares of cloth from the stack on her lap, and quickly mopped her face with it. “Please forgive me, My Lord. I was not entirely without affection for her. She was not kind, but she was, for all intents and purposes, my mother. I did the best I could for her until that last night.”
“You’ve sketched that out for me. Something Michaels said set her off?”
Tiffany nodded. “He only came in once or twice a year, at best. It was a quite long time at the last. I think he had some trouble. I’m not sure what it was. But his captain had the sweet sickness. You know what I mean?”
“I know. The people who crave sugar, yet it causes them to be ill. There are symptoms, but with care the sufferer can live for years.”
Tiffany paused and looked across the garden before she spoke again. “Michaels says that he died with the ship in port, and that it was impounded. I don’t think they were always on the right side of the law, but he was the ship’s cook, hardly a position that would make him privy to what the captain was planning.”
“Unlikely, to be sure,” Percival agreed. “But tell me about the day he came to the shop.”
“He always called me ‘Girlie.’ It made Father Benton laugh because it would make me angry, and I would insist that Michaels should apologize. But Mrs. Benton thought he was flirting, so she beat me for it.”
“She could do that?” Percival asked, surprised. “I though you said she was ill.”
