An Unwilling Accomplice by Charles Todd

Author:Charles Todd
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9780062237217
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2014-07-09T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

MISS NEVILLE WAS just drawing up a chair to the Major’s bedside.

Whirling, she said angrily, “How many times must I tell you to knock?”

Breaking off, she stared at me.

“What are you doing in my house?” she demanded, her face flushing as her anger turned to fury. “Get out. Or I’ll have you taken up for trespass.”

I’d been told she was away. How had she arrived without our knowing it? Was it while Simon and I were with Maddie?

Of course it would be natural for her to come at once to the Major’s room to look in on him. Someone must have told her Maddie had been sent for, that he was even then cleaning the wound.

I said, “I’m so sorry, Miss Neville. My apron.” I pointed. But the apron wasn’t where I’d set it. She’d moved it and taken that chair for her vigil.

All at once I remembered that the letter from Sister Hammond must still be in the apron’s deep pocket. Had she noticed it there and taken it out to read? Had there been time?

As I caught it up, I pressed my hand against the pocket and felt the letter safely in place. But that still didn’t tell me whether she’d read it or not.

As I stepped out into the passage, it occurred to me that her sudden flare of temper might well have been the realization that she’d nearly been caught with the letter in her hand.

She was still glaring angrily at me as I swung the door shut.

I hurried down the stairs. No one else was in the Great Hall, and I was glad. I let myself quietly out the door. Simon had already cranked the motorcar and was waiting for me.

The drive back to the gates seemed to be twice as long as it had when we’d come down it little over an hour before.

“Miss Neville was in the sick room when I went back. She wasn’t especially happy to see me.”

As we pulled away from the gates, Simon spoke. “You touched his shoulders. What did you feel?”

“Nothing,” I said. “If there’s a wound on either shoulder, it’s healed well.”

“Then this man isn’t the missing Harry Cartwright?”

“Sadly, no. Or perhaps I should say, the odds are against it. I could wish he were, for his cousin’s sake. Of course I couldn’t see, I might have been pressing in the wrong places. But if the wound was as bad as Miss Cartwright described, I’d have felt something.”

“It’s been two years since the Somme.”

“Still.” I took a deep breath, glad to put Windward behind us.

“Was it Sergeant Wilkins? If it wasn’t Cartwright.”

“Yes, it could very well be. How long has it been since I’ve seen him? But England is full of fair men, Simon.”

“His hands, then.”

“I don’t know. Yes. Maybe. If he’s engaged to Miss Neville, why did he want me to take him back to hospital? Why had he written to Sister Hammond?”

“He was delirious, you can’t judge him there.”

“The words were so similar to those in the letter.

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