Page 27 of To Swoon and to Spar
“I was,” she agreed readily.
“But not so alarmed that it put you off the idea of living here?”
“I like to think that I am made of sterner stuff than that.”
“Sterner stuff than my uncle, at least?” he asked.
“Yes.” She met his eyes defiantly.
“I agree,” he said simply, flashing a quick smile at her before turning back to his housekeeper. “What about you, Mrs. Ash?”
“My lord?”
“Were you not also alarmed? The noise you describe sounds terrifying indeed—one could hardly blame you for being spooked.”
“Well, I thought it might be the wind at first—”
“But you no longer think that?”
“No, my lord. It quickly became clear that the wind was not to blame, when we kept hearing it on otherwise quiet nights.”
“So what, then?” he pressed.
“Then there was the matter of the bloody christening gown.” She said this with a degree of ghoulish satisfaction that Penvale found somewhat disturbing.
“I beg your pardon?” he asked, nonplussed.
“Oh, yes,” Mrs. Ash said with relish. “The master was going to bed one night—late, naturally,” she added with contempt, as though this were some sort of moral failure, and Penvale was at once glad that he had adopted country hours since arriving at Trethwick Abbey. “And suddenly, he was yelling loud enough to wake everyone in the house, because…” She paused dramatically.
Penvale caught himselfjustas he was about to lean forward in his seat.
“He claimed that there was a christening gown in the bed,” Mrs. Ash finished.
Penvale blinked. “A christening gown.”
“They go on babies, when they are christened,” Mrs. Ash explained helpfully. “At a church,” she added, clearly doubtful that a godless man from town could possibly know anything of this ritual.
“Thank you, I am indeed familiar with the custom,” Penvale said.
“And there wasbloodon it,” Mrs. Ash added.
“Blood,” Penvale repeated. “How much blood, precisely?”
Mrs. Ash rubbed her hands together eagerly. “Enough.”
“Enough for… what?” Penvale was growing more perplexed by the moment.
“Enough to give the master quite a fright,” Mrs. Ash said with grim satisfaction.
Penvale turned to Jane, who was calmly eating a ginger biscuit despite the mildly stomach-turning nature of the conversation. “My uncle found abloody christening gown in his bed?”
“Allegedly,” Jane said coolly, taking another bite.
“What the devil do you mean, ‘allegedly’?” Penvale asked, growing more horrified the longer he contemplated the matter. “Either he did or he didn’t, I don’t see how there could be much ambiguity about it.”
“His valet disposed of it, so no one else saw the blood,” Mrs. Ash explained. “He left it for the maids to scrub the following day, but by the next morning…”
“The blood was gone,” Jane finished.
