Night of a Thousand Stars. Deanna Raybourn

my throat. “It’s really very good of you to stay on, all things considered.” I chose my words carefully. “After all, working for me won’t exactly count in your favour when you apply for a new position.”

      She said nothing as we walked on, and I decided to push just a little further. “I mean, you won’t want to go on working for me forever. I don’t even know what my plans will be.”

      “I am certain you will figure it out,” she said mildly.

      I suppressed a sigh. She was going to be difficult to dislodge, I decided. And the only solution was a more direct approach.

      “See here, Masterman—”

      She turned to look at me, her hazel eyes placid. There was a slightly greenish cast to them, like a mossy stone on a riverbed. “I am not leaving, miss.”

      I gaped at her. “How on earth did you know that’s what I was about to suggest?”

      She shrugged. “It’s only logical. Mrs. Hammond suggested it last night and you lit up like Bonfire Night.”

      I ducked my head. “That wasn’t very kind of me. I apologise, Masterman. And it isn’t that I don’t like you. You mustn’t think that.”

      “I don’t,” she replied with that same unflappable calm.

      “Oh, well, good. Because I do,” I assured her with a fatuous smile. “It’s just that—”

      “I make you uncomfortable,” she supplied.

      “That’s not at all what I meant to say,” I said, feeling my cheeks flush warmly.

      “But it is what you feel,” she said. There was no malice in her voice and her gaze was calm and level. I heaved a sigh.

      “Very well. Yes. You make me uncomfortable. I’m afraid you’ll always be a reminder of how badly I behaved.”

      “But I don’t think you did behave badly,” she told me.

      I stared at her a long moment. “That might be the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me.”

      “It happens to be true,” she said. She began to walk and I hurried after, suddenly eager to talk to her. There was something curiously topsy-turvy about the mistress chasing after the maid, and I grinned as I caught up to her.

      “You don’t think I ought to have married Gerald?”

      “Absolutely not. Miss March, what do you think a servant’s chief responsibility is?”

      I thought of the endless round of brushing clothes and whipping hems and pinning hair and shrugged.

      “It’s to be watchful—to see all and understand what we see. I watched you with Mr. Madderley, and I could tell from the first moment I saw you together you were entirely unsuited.”

      “You might have told me,” I said, kicking a pebble.

      “You did not ask,” she returned mildly.

      I grinned again. “All right, Masterman. I’ll give you that. And you can stay on if you like.”

      She gave me a brisk nod to indicate her acceptance. We walked on in silence for a little while, taking a turn around the pond. A few apathetic ducks bobbed on the glassy surface and a limp lily floated along. There was no one else on the village green, and even the smoke coming from the chimneys drifted in lazy circles.

      “Masterman, with your gift for watchfulness what do you make of our present circumstances?”

      She looked around the village, taking in the quiet shops and tranquil, sleepy air of the place.

      “I think, miss, we are in very great danger of being bored.”

      * * *

      She was not wrong. After that, our days settled into a pattern. Masterman and I went for long walks each morning, and after luncheon Father painted in his studio while I tried to make friends with George, although he remained stubbornly unmoved by my charms. I asked him to teach me to make his clever little soufflés or roast a duck or let me polish the silver, but each attempt was met with a firm rebuff. “That’s your side of the cottage,” he would state flatly, pushing me out of the kitchen and back into the hall. It was too bad really, because I was bored senseless and genuinely interested in acquiring a few new skills. It might come in handy to be able to roast a duck, I thought, but George was unwilling to oblige.

      So I occupied myself with brooding. I wrote no letters and received only one—a curt message from Mother stating that she had returned the wedding gifts but that I had been remiss in returning my engagement ring to Gerald. It was an enormous pigeon’s blood ruby, a relic from the days of the first King George and worn by every Madderley bride. The viscountess had been particularly resentful at giving it up, and I was abashed I hadn’t thought to give it back to Gerald when he left the cottage. I made a note to take it with me when I went up to London next; I couldn’t possibly trust such a valuable jewel to the post. But London held no charms for me in my present mood. I had given up reading the Town newspapers after the second day. They were vitriolic on the subject of my almost-marriage, and going up would mean facing people who had decided I was only slightly less awful than Messalina.

      So I buried myself in books, raiding Father’s library for anything that looked promising. There were a handful of Scarlet Pimpernel books and an assortment of detective stories, but beyond that nothing but weighty tomes on art history. I had almost resigned myself to reading one of them when I discovered a set of books high on a shelf, bound in scarlet morocco. They were privately printed, that much was obvious, and I gave a little gasp when I saw the author’s name: Lady Julia Brisbane. She was Father’s youngest sister, and the most notorious of our eccentric family. After a particularly awful first marriage, she had taken as her second husband a Scot who was half-Gypsy and rumoured to have the second sight. The fact that he was distantly related to the Duke of Aberdour hadn’t counted for much, I seemed to recall. There had been scandal and outrage that a peer’s daughter had married a man in trade. Nicholas Brisbane was a private inquiry agent, and Aunt Julia had joined him in his work. Ending up a duchess must have been particularly sweet for her, I decided. Father had talked about them my first morning at the cottage, and as near as I could guess, these books were her memoirs.

      I turned the first over in my hands. Silent in the Grave was incised in gilt letters and a slender piece of striped silk served as a bookmark. I opened to the first page and read the first line. “To say that I met Nicholas Brisbane over my husband’s dead body is not entirely accurate. Edward, it should be noted, was still twitching upon the floor.” I slipped down to sit on the carpet, the books tumbled in my lap, and began to read.

      I did not move until it was time for tea, and only then because Father joined me. He beckoned me to the table by the fire, giving a nod of his silvery-white head to the book in my hands.

      “I see you’ve discovered Julia’s memoirs.”

      I shook my head, clearing out the cobwebs. I had spent the whole day wandering the fog-bound streets of Victorian London with my aunt, striding over windy Yorkshire moors and climbing the foothills of the Himalayas. I took a plate from him and sipped at my tea.

      “I can’t believe I never knew she did all those things.”

      His smile was gentle. “It’s never been a secret.”

      “Yes, I always knew she went sleuthing with Uncle Brisbane but I had no idea the dangers they faced. And you—”

      I broke off, giving him a hard look.

      He burst out laughing. “There’s no need to look so accusing, child. Yes, I did my fair share of detective work, as well.”

      “I can’t believe Aunt Julia almost killed you once with her experiments with explosives.”

      “Once?” His eyes were wide. “Keep reading.”

      He urged sandwiches and cakes on me, and I ate heartily, suddenly ravenous after missing