Being Lady Harriet's Hero: Sweet and Clean Regency Romance (His Majesty's Hounds Book 4) by Arietta Richmond

Author:Arietta Richmond [Richmond, Arietta]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Dreamstone Publishing
Published: 2017-05-14T05:00:00+00:00

Lady Harriet was determined. This was the day when she would find what they sought, and bring this tedious process to an end. ‘But’, whispered the stubborn small voice in her mind ‘how will you then find cause to see Lord Geoffrey?’ She ignored it. That was a problem for another day. For now, Lord Geoffrey desired to find those papers, so searching for them was her first priority.

She stood in a small parlour on the upper floor, with windows which overlooked the herb and scent garden in the rear courtyard area of the house. This wing was one of the oldest parts of the house, and, along this side of the floor, the rooms all opened into each other, in the manner of centuries past, with the doors close to the windows in each case. The centre of the floor contained servants’ corridors, but also secret passages, accessed through the apparently blank walls which faced the windows in each room. At the far end of the floor, there was an area which was not clearly explained by the maps.

Lady Harriet held high hopes for what that area might contain. Once certain that no-one was near, she stepped to the rear of the room and, with careful coordination, shoved hard on a carved leaf at the edge of the mantle above the fireplace, whilst also pulling on a shelf of the adjoining bookcase. The shelves pivoted out to her pull, and she stepped into the dark passageway revealed, partially unshuttered her small lantern, and pulled the door closed behind her, taking careful note of the placement of the lever which would allow her to open it later.

She worked her way down the passage, looking through peepholes, poking into crevices, seeking any evidence of other doors, of cabinets skilfully laid into the walls, or of any other possible hiding places. For a long distance, there was nothing of interest beyond the peepholes. Eventually, she reached what appeared to be an end to the passage. Frowning, she retraced her steps to the last peephole. Looking through it confirmed her suspicions – the passage should continue, for the room she saw was the second to last room on the floor, not the last.

Returning to the blank wall, she ran her fingers over its surface, and traced its edges, as well as the walls to either side. Finally, when she was beginning to think that she might be wrong, that the passage might simply end, her gloved fingers caught on an uneven area of the side wall. A few moments poking and pushing at it experimentally, and the blank end of the passage shifted slightly, with a soft click. She pulled it open and slipped through, impatiently pulling at an errant tendril of hair as it caught on the door frame.

~~~~~

Jobs had come into the kitchen for a quick bite of food, taking advantage of the left-overs from the nobility’s luncheon. He turned away, as if about to return to the stables, catching Ashley’s eye as he did so.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.