Page 38 of The Colonel's Ungovernable Governess
“I did not think to leave either of you behind. Victoria, you must assist me in reasoning with Annabelle when we find her, and, Vincent, like it or not, you are head of the Babcock family. Therefore, Annabelle must have your permission to marry. She is not yet of age. Now, return to your quarters. Pack a change of clothes and so forth. Be prepared to leave once I arrange for a coach for us.”
“Yes, ma’am,” they chorused as they ran from the room.
Before she left them forever, Jocelyn would see their family reunited and all was well. Therefore, she followed her own orders, dressing quickly and simply. Then, she rushed to the small desk in the schoolroom, lit a candle, and took out paper and a pencil. She had no time to trim a pen and prepare the ink. She wrote of what she had learned of Annabelle’s elopement and her own plan to give chase. She included the identity of the young man who had lured Annabelle from her family in hopes the colonel would know something of the fellow’s family.
Grabbing her cloak, she went down the servant’s passage to exit through the kitchen. Scampering across the back lawn towards the barn, she called for Mr. Jessie before she actually entered the hay-strewn building.
“Mr. Jessie!”
“Yes, miss.”
“You are awake,” she stated in surprise.
“Lady Annabelle sent me to the village, miss, but it be fer no good. I was just preparin’ to come fetch you. The young mistress’s coach be gone.”
“So I have been made aware,” Jocelyn said. “I mean to give pursuit.” She realized Mr. Bartholomew must have come to the estate, for she doubted Annabelle held any knowledge of fastening a horse to a coach. “I need not explain how we must contain all this to as few people as possible.”
“Understand, miss. What ye be requirin’ from me?”
“I will require the small coach for me and the children,” she began.
“Yer takin’ the twins?” he asked in disapproving tones.
“Lady Annabelle confided in her sister. I shall possess a better chance of convincing her to abandon this caper if her brother and sister beg her.”
“I’ll drive the coach meself,” the man declared. “Be ready in a quarter hour.”
“I also require someone to carry a message to the colonel,” she told him.
“Got jist the right man,” he assured.
“Do we know when Lady Annabelle left?” she asked. “I must know how far ahead she might be.”
“Nearly two hours, I’m guessing, miss. I spent more than an hour tryin’ to do as she requested. Said Lady Victoria be ill and be requirin’ a tonic. Got the tonic in me bag.”
“Then, as we have agreed, have someone carry this message to the colonel. The children and I will wish to travel towards Scotland,” she ordered. However, as she turned to reenter the house, Jocelyn suspected she would not be required to travel so far. In her way of thinking, “Mr. Bartholomew” had only to travel far enough for Annabelle to begin to complain how she was exhausted and required her rest and a proper meal. She would be ruined when the two of them shared a room, even if intimacies were not shared. It was already problematic that the pair was traveling together and unchaperoned, but such could be explained as necessary, for there was an “emergency” regarding her mother, but as quickly as the pair let a room together and shared a bed, even fully clothed, Annabelle would be truly ruined. Odd as it would be to say the words aloud, Jocelyn did not think the young man wished to marry Annabelle. He had never presented himself and been denied. There was no reason for an elopement. “There is something rotten in the state of Denmark, that one may smile and smile and be a villain,” she quoted as she raced once again across the back lawn towards the manor house.
* * *
Edward had risen early, shaken awake by a very intimate dream of Miss Rose Lambert. It was not yet daylight, but the moon appeared bright in the night sky. “I will master this,” he told the view outside his chambers at Maitland Manor. “I most assuredly cannot bring Miss Romfield to this house as my wife while wishing to be sharing my bed with another.” He had just turned to ring for his batman when he spotted a lone rider racing towards the manor.
Immediately, he was on the move, dropping a shirt over his head and darting from his room, though still in his stocking feet. He was already descending the stairs as his father’s butler was opening the door to a frantic knock.
“Mayfield,” he said not permitting the butler even to ask of the urgency, “what is amiss at William’s Wood?”
“Don’t quite know, colonel,” the young man said. “Mr. Jessie roused me out a bit short of one in the night. Told me to bring ye this.” He handed Edward a folded over piece of paper.
Though he feared opening it, Edward broke the small spat of wax holding the sheets together. He moved to the side to take advantage of a candle in a sconce so he might scan it quickly to know the gist of the problem. “Mr. Arnold,” he told the butler, “have someone saddle my horse immediately. See that Mayfield here is fed and knows rest before he must return to my brother’s estate.”
“Yes, sir. Should I send up your man/”
“I do not have the time,” he said as he turned in the direction of his quarters. “Do send word, though, to Captain Carlson. Inform him there has been a family situation which requires my immediate attention.”
“I pray it is not Lord Lindale, sir,” Arnold said in apparent worry.
“No. Lindale is unchanged, but one of the children is not.”
Before he climbed into his saddle, a little over a quarter hour later, he handed off a note he had managed to write to his cousin. “Have someone carry this note to Mr. Darcy.”
