The Vanishing at Loxby Manor by Abigail Wilson (grave mercy .TXT) 📕

Piers crossed the room and took a moment to read the letter himself. He cast a look at me over the paper before folding it.“This does give one hope, but I cannot be easy until we’ve set eyes on Seline. This gentleman Uncle Charles is chasing toNorthampton could be anyone. It would be prudent for me to return to the villages a day’s ride north of here and see if anyonehas used the name Fitzgerald.”

Mrs. Cavanagh waved her hands in the air as if fighting a swarm of flies. “Heavens no, Piers. Are you daft?”

He formed a steeple with his fingers and rested his chin on top. “A matter of opinion, I suppose.”

Mrs. Cavanagh flicked open a fan. “You’ll simply get all those tongues wagging again, and then where will we be? Your suddenand, pardon me, notorious presence in the district is cause enough, but if you go riding from one end of Kent to the nextasking all sorts of questions about Seline, she’ll be ruined straightaway too.”

The weight of disgrace hung heavy around Piers’s neck as he lowered his head. “I would never wish to cause anyone in thisfamily any further harm, but I fear—”

“If only you had as much consideration when you chose to avoid that duel.”

Avery pushed to his feet. “That is enough, Mama. You needn’t drag up the past once again. I’ve grown bored of such a topic. Piers said he had a reason. He’s had reasons for everything he’s ever done, and I for one don’t intend to guilt him into sharing this particular one with me.”

Mrs. Cavanagh’s hand flew to her mouth to cover an audible gasp.

Avery measured his tone. “I shall be happy to spend a few discreet days on the road.” Then he turned to Piers. “Besides, itwould be better for you to stay at Loxby in case we receive word of Seline’s whereabouts. You’re a much better rider thanI, and speed may be a factor if we’re to track her down.”

Piers nodded, but it was half-hearted at best, his focus settling on the rug.

Mrs. Cavanagh seemed to recover from her shock rather quickly, waving Avery to come closer. “Send word as often as you can,my dear, even if there is nothing to report.”

The room felt colder somehow as I watched Avery saunter to the door, Piers curiously still at my side. Perhaps Charles Cavanaghwas right, and Seline was simply on the road with Miles Lacy. It would be a great relief to know she was safe.

No. I stiffened. A nice thought indeed—Seline and Miles deeply in love, possibly already married—but as quickly as the ideahad come, it turned to ice in my chest. My gaze fell to the folded piece of paper lying in the center of the small table.

Interesting that Seline had left a note, just like Miles Lacy, and— The image of my brooch lying in the dirt flashed intomy mind, followed by Seline’s haunting whispers. She meant to return to my room that night. I was certain of it. After all,she’d promised to return my brooch. Something or someone had prevented it. And if I was right and Seline’s letter was indeeda forgery, might the note Mr. Lacy had conveniently found days after his nephew’s disappearance be as well?

I pulled the cross on my necklace back and forth. Someone could be working quite hard to make us all believe she had simply run away. I pictured her riding through the night on her way home from Kinwich Abbey as a terrible thought struck—Seline Cavanagh might never come home.

Chapter 13

The first moment I could steal to myself I returned to Seline’s room, wondering all the while why I’d not thought to do soalready. If Seline really had come back to the house to leave a note the night she disappeared, she would have invariablytaken some of her things with her. Even if she didn’t elope with Miles Lacy and was planning to go elsewhere, she would haveneeded something.

Seline’s bedchamber lurked as unnaturally still as it had the fateful night of her disappearance, yet somehow in the midstof lonely shadows and the palpable thrum of silence, her essence remained. A half-burned candle on the bedside table, a bookleft open on the escritoire, a hairbrush at an angle on her dressing table.

The door felt suddenly heavy. I inched it shut behind me and made my way across the thick rug. Strange how I could hear thewhoosh of my slippered steps and the beat of my heart. Carefully, as if the fabric might come apart in my hands, I opened the heavychintz curtains at the back window, allowing the bright light of afternoon to flood in around me.

Seline’s jasmine scent seemed to hang in waves about the room, and I was forced to rub a chill from my arms. It was almost as if she stood beside me, watching me. Goodness. I took a deep breath. I only meant to look about her room, nothing more. I was hardly an intruder to her private world.

Uncertain exactly what I hoped to discover, I headed to her dressing table and looked over her toilet. I’d paid little attentionthe night I found her missing. Granted, I had known Seline quite well at one time. We would spend hours together in each other’srooms, talking, dressing for supper. Surely she hadn’t changed her habits all that much.

I cracked open the first drawer, shuffling through brushes and various containers of powder and rouge. The second drawer houseda rather fine collection of fans, and the third hairpins and papers. On the table’s surface lived the familiar bottles ofperfumes she’d always loved as well as a wooden jewelry box.

Her jewelry box. A twitch wriggled up my neck.

Gently, I lifted the lid and scoured over the few pieces inside. Nothing remarkable, which in a way was remarkable. Selinehad exceptional taste, and I remembered her begging her father for jewelry when we were younger. My fingers settled on a groove,the very place a necklace might have