The sound of carriage wheels grinding over the gravel drive sounded like a death rattle for the old world. Aunt Mildred did not leave quietly. She packed with the frantic, terrified energy of a soldier fleeing a collapsing front line. When Norah informed her that she would not be getting into the carriage, Mildred stopped dead in the hallway, her face a mask of aristocratic horror. You are throwing away your life.
Mildred hissed, her voice vibrating with genuine panic. He is amusing himself, Norah. He is a duke who plays in the dirt. He is unstable. When he tires of this rebellion, he will return to London, and you will be left here.
A ruined woman with no name. Norah stood by the banister. She didn't feel angry. She just felt tired. I already have no name, aunt.
I was a ghost in your house. Here, at least, I cast a shadow. Mildred slapped her. It was a sharp, stinging blow that echoed in the empty corridor. Norah didn't flinch.
She just touched her cheek, looked her aunt in the eye, and stepped aside to let the footmen carry the trunks past.
By sunset, Foxwood Hall was completely silent. The suffocating perfume of forty aristocrats had been aired out. The shrieking laughter was gone. The house felt massive, hollowed out, and finally able to breathe. Norah did not move into the lavish guest suites on the second floor.
She stayed in her cramped, drafty room on the third floor. She washed her face, brushed the dust from her faded pink gown, and walked downstairs when the grandfather clock chimed eight.
The grand dining room was a cavern. A table built to seat forty people stretched across the length of the room, gleaming under the candle light. One place was set at the head. One place was set at the foot. There was a distance of thirty feet between them.
Gabriel was already there. He had bathed. The layer of baked mud and sweat was gone, revealing skin that was tanned from the sun and marked with the pale silver lines of old scars. He wore a clean, dark blue coat, but it wasn't a tailored evening jacket. It was simple broadcloth.