He stares out into the hallway, ready to receive whichever policeman wants to pummel him with more questions. But the hallway is empty. At least so he thinks until Charlotte comes into view.
“Sorry, sir, she insisted,” she apologizes, wrapping her arm around her small charge and proffering her to him.
It’s little Rosalind. Archie glances down at his seven-year-old daughter. Beneath her heavy dark bangs, her bright-blue eyes, so like his own, stare up at him.
Incomprehensible to him now was his previously held sentiment that he did not want a child. When Agatha became pregnant, he had no suitable employment and did not want to share his wife’s affections with a baby. But when Rosalind came into the world and he saw himself in his daughter’s face and stolid temperament, he could not imagine a world without her.
He escorts his daughter into his study, leaving Charlotte in the hallway, and closes the door behind them. Rosalind settles into the armchair near the fireplace, her feet dangling above the oak floor and crimson-hued Turkish rug. She appears tiny and vulnerable, and a typical child of seven years of age would cry in this situation, but not his daughter. Instead, she faces the turmoil outside the study door with placid curiosity, and he loves her all the more for it.
Archie takes the armchair across from her, and for a moment, he relives his interview with the police officer. Shaking off the lingering despair from that exchange, he turns to his dark-haired daughter, her usually pale cheeks flushed with color, whether from the warmth of the fire or the trouble brewing in Styles, he can’t say for certain.
“You wanted to talk, Rosalind?” he asks.
“Yes, Papa,” she answers in an even voice.
“Do you have a question?”
“Yes.” Her brow furrows, and suddenly she looks much older than seven. “The house is full of police, and I’m wondering what’s happening.”
“Has Charlotte said anything to you about it?” he asks, trying to keep his tone as even as hers. Although he’d cautioned the secretary and governess to keep Rosalind in the dark, he knows the child is perceptive and has likely made her own assessment, perhaps even made insistent inquiries of Charlotte. Still, he doesn’t want to contradict outright any account Charlotte has offered.
“No, not a word. And, Papa, I’ve asked.”
If the situation weren’t so dire, he’d chuckle at the thought of his persistent daughter.
“Well, Rosalind, the police are here to help with your mother,” he answers with the most benign response he can fashion.
Her eyebrows raise quizzically as she processes this unusual, rather vague explanation. “To help with Mama?”
“Yes, my dear.”
“Is she ill?”
“No. Not that we know, anyway.”
Rosalind’s nose scrunches up as she contemplates another possibility. “Well then, is she in some sort of trouble? Is that why the police are here?”
“No, not at all. They are looking for your mother.”
“Why on earth would the police do that? Has she gone missing?” The smallest hint of worry surfaces in her tone, and Archie wants to make sure the escalation stops at this level.
How to phrase this without causing alarm? Archie settles on a harmless description that adheres somewhat to the facts. “It seems as though Mama decided not to go to Yorkshire this weekend, where she was expected. And while I’m certain she simply changed her plans at the last moment and forgot to tell us, the police want to make sure. They are very thorough fellows. Undoubtedly, she’s traipsed off somewhere to do her writing. As she has done frequently in the past.”
“Ah,” she says, the furrow in her brow softening. This was an explanation that made sense. Agatha had felt the compulsion to escape Styles to write before, leaving Rosalind in Charlotte’s excellent care and, to a lesser extent, his. “That’s all?”
“That’s all, Rosalind,” he answers with a nod.
“Good,” she pronounces, a satisfied set to her features. As she rises, smoothing the folds of the pressed navy pinafore in which Charlotte had thoughtfully dressed her, Archie feels an almost physical pang of emotion, reminding him that he will never, ever let his child go.
Chapter Nine
The Manuscript
December 31, 1912
Ashfield, Torquay, England
“Must this Lieutenant Christie accompany you and your friends tonight?” Mummy asked as I took my leave. “After all, New Year’s Eve is for close friends and family, not for new acquaintances. If”—she paused—“he is in fact only a new social acquaintance, as you’ve maintained.”
Was Mummy testing me? As I’d suspected from my conversation with Madge, Mummy wasn’t keen on this burgeoning connection, and our November discussion had opened the floodgates. At first, I chalked it up to the fact that “the young man” or “this Lieutenant Christie,” as she called him, was nearly as impoverished as myself. But then she began making barbs about his callow nature, his underdeveloped sensitivity, and his overly handsome face; I couldn’t understand the source of these remarks, aside from his obvious attractiveness, of course. I knew she wanted me to stay the course with the gentle, kind Reggie, whom she believed would made me very happy indeed, but did that desire really justify the negative remarks?
“Mummy, he’s already been invited. In fact, he’ll be meeting us at the ballroom. It’s far too late for any changes in plans,” I said as I slipped into my coat.
“He didn’t even have the courtesy of fetching you for the party,” she tsked, her voice quiet but audible enough for me to hear her disappointment. “It’s hardly gentlemanly behavior.”
“Mummy, the party is much closer to his barracks than to Ashfield. He wanted to come and get me, but I insisted that I meet him there,” I said, apologizing for him. No matter what happened in the future, I didn’t want her disliking Archie any more than she already did. And nothing had more significance to Mummy than a man acting like a gentleman and a woman acting her part as a lady in turn.
As we exchanged embraces and farewells, wishing each other an early happy new year, I thought about how different Madge and I were. Unlike my sister, who’d been very strategic in her marriage, I intended to marry for love, and I wasn’t certain that I loved Reggie. My clever older sister, with her claim to authorship fame and her strong, captivating manner, had an abundance of suitors when it came time for her to choose. She had selected the reserved James Watts, who was, unsurprisingly, wealthier than all her other beaus as well as the heir to Abney Hall. While I sensed she admired and rather liked Jimmy, who was a fine fellow and quite kind to me, I often wondered if she felt the deep grip of passionate love for him that I believed necessary for marriage. It was that sort of love I was determined to find. I had noticed that since I met Archie, I’d been putting Reggie’s letters away in a drawer, always intending to read them at a less busy time but never retrieving them, instead of racing to my bedroom to read them alone as I had before. This behavior didn’t seem a hallmark of love. By contrast, I found myself thinking about Archie almost constantly, and I had been daydreaming about ringing in the new year with him for weeks.