Page 21 of The Meriwell Legacy
Mrs. Collard closed her hand over Mrs. Cleary’s, shifting her arm to be ready to support her in case she fainted. “Do you need to sit down, dear?”
With the change in positions, Constance found herself standing beside Mrs. Collard. Able to see only Mrs. Cleary’s profile, Constance saw her lower her eyes, until then apparently wide, then Rosa Cleary sucked in a breath, closed her eyes, and briefly shook her head. “No, no—it’s nothing. Just a turn.”
“A turn, dear?” Mrs. Cripps solicitously inquired. “Are you sure?”
Rosa drew in another long, bracing breath and opened her eyes. “Yes. I…sometimes get them. It’s of no moment, I assure you.”
“Oh!” said Miss Weldon. “That must be so trying.”
Along with the other more experienced ladies, Constance wasn’t convinced.
Rosa managed a smile, but it was patently strained. “Indeed, it is.” She dipped her head to Mrs. Collard and included the others with a glance as she said, “Thank you all. I’m quite recovered now.”
As if to demonstrate that, she drew back her hand, stiffened her spine, and waved down the corridor. “We should get on—all the men are before us.”
Constance looked ahead and glimpsed the last of the men turning briskly in to the front hall. They—at least the last stragglers—must have heard the ladies’ exclamations, but in typical male fashion, they hadn’t dallied. No doubt, they were terrified of being drawn into a discussion of some female malady.
Then again, they probably had looked—Constance vaguely thought they had—but the instant Rosa had declared it was nothing, they’d hurried to make themselves scarce.
Considering such behavior nothing more than to be expected of men—gentlemen or otherwise—Constance continued with the other ladies as they made for the drawing room. The tea trolley should have arrived by now.
They reached the front hall, but instead of continuing on, Rosa stepped toward the stairs. She still looked distinctly peaky. “If you would be so good as to make my excuses, I believe I’ll go straight to bed.”
“Of course, dear,” Mrs. Cripps said.
“We’ll tell Mrs. Fitzherbert if she asks, but truthfully, I doubt she’ll notice,” Mrs. Collard said.
“You’re still a trifle pale, my dear,” Mrs. Finlayson said. “We’ll hope it’s nothing a good night’s sleep won’t cure.”
Rosa assured them all that was so. With wishes for a good night’s rest following her, she went upstairs.
Constance noted that Rosa went up rather quickly; she dallied long enough to make sure Rosa didn’t trip or fall, then turning her mind to wondering how to engineer a moment—several moments—alone with Mrs. Cleary on the morrow, Constance followed the other ladies into the drawing room.
She’d been right. The tea trolley had already arrived. With an inward sigh, she lined up to accept her cup of overbrewed tea from Mrs. Fitzherbert’s gnarled hand.
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Chapter 4
Apiercing scream jerked Constance awake. Eyes wide, she sat up, clutching the covers; her heart thumped, then started to race.
“Oh no. What now?” She scrambled out of the bed, grabbed her night robe, shoved her arms into the sleeves and her feet into her slippers, spared a glance for Mrs. Macomber—still in a drugged sleep—and rushed out of the door. Hurriedly belting the robe, she ran toward where she’d thought the scream had come from—farther along the wing containing the rooms assigned to the ladies of the party.
Toward the end of the corridor, Constance saw a maid, her hands over her mouth, her eyes staring, backing out of a room. The maid’s gaze remained locked on what lay beyond the open door…
Constance’s lungs seized; a sense of looming horror gripped her.
Other doors opened. As Constance sped past, several guests looked out; some—the gentlemen who had spent the night in one or other of the ladies’ rooms—came out and strode after her.
Constance reached the maid, who had halted, frozen, just outside the room. The girl was breathing in ragged gasps.
Constance took the maid by the shoulders and steered her around so her back was to the corridor wall and she was no longer seeing whatever was inside.
Then Constance whirled and, with Guy Walker and Robert Fletcher on her heels, rushed into the room.
They pulled up just beyond the threshold, their feet coming to faltering halts at the sight that met their eyes.
On the bed, Rosa Cleary lay on her back, wide eyes staring upward. Her head was tipped back on the pillow, her mouth partly open as if she’d cried out, and her hands had clenched into claws, gripping the sheets to either side.
