The Fate of Mercy Alban by Wendy Webb

Author:Wendy Webb
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: HarperCollins

Later, we sat in the parlor, Matthew, Amity, and me, the manuscript out of its box and in my lap. With Amity curled up on one of the leather sofas, her arms wrapped around her knees, and Matthew seated in the leather wing chair next to mine, I leafed through the manuscript’s pages until I came to the third chapter.

“Ready to dive in?” I asked, looking up to see my daughter’s shining eyes.

I began to read.

Chapter Three

At breakfast the next morning, I mentioned that I had seen—or thought I had seen—a girl in white doing a midnight dance by the fire ring, but my hosts brushed it off, first with Flynn laughing about the imagination of a novelist doing strange things at Whitehall, and then Pru settling on the idea that I’d simply had a dream.

“If I were to dance by the lakeshore in the moonlight, I certainly wouldn’t do so alone.” She giggled, a musical sound that reminded me of a delicately rushing stream. “But I don’t blame you for conjuring up a dream about me, Mr. Connolly. You’re not the first man who has.”

Donny cleared his throat, his wife, Honor, smiling shyly over her coffee cup. Looking back on it now, I think I glimpsed something in their eyes then, a flash passing between them and vanishing as swiftly as it came. But hindsight plays funny tricks with memory. There may have been nothing at all.

“Oh, for goodness’ sake, Pru, you’re incorrigible. Can’t you go five minutes without flirting?” Flynn tossed a piece of breakfast sausage at his sister. It landed near her plate and she speared it with her fork, popping it into her mouth with a flourish.

“I flirt, therefore I am,” she purred, batting her eyelashes at me.

I didn’t meet her gaze, instead turning my attention to the scrambled eggs on my plate. I had no wish to be cast as Prudence’s love interest this summer and needed to nip this flirting business in the bud. Although Prudence was a beautiful and vivacious girl, I found myself longing for the quiet company of her friend.

“And where is Lily this morning?” I asked her. “Don’t tell me she’s still sleeping …?”

“Of course not, silly,” Prudence sniffed, as Mrs. McBride, who had been hovering all throughout breakfast, refilled the girl’s coffee cup with shaking hands. I smiled at the old woman, thinking of how the ravages of age were taking their toll.

“Lily lives down the lane, on the other side of the church,” Prudence went on. “She doesn’t stay here at Whitehall—not all the time, anyway.”

“She’ll be here soon enough,” Flynn offered, taking another helping of hashed brown potatoes. And then, looking across the table at his sister, he asked: “What do you girls have planned for the afternoon? Anything? I thought we’d play a round of croquet and then maybe go for a sail. Are you game?”

Now it was Prudence’s turn to shrug. “If nothing more interesting comes along,” she said, standing up from the table and dropping her napkin on her plate.

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