The Duke of Ravenshire was standing in the doorway to the main corridor. He was not dressed for bed; he still wore his dark evening coat, though his collar was loose. In his hand, he held a candle of his own, and in the other, a key. He had come in through the front door of the study with his own key.
For one terrible moment, neither of them moved. Clara knew exactly what this meant: a servant caught at midnight in a locked room, searching her master's private desk. She would be dismissed for this; she might even be arrested as a thief. And Polly would have nothing.
Clara stood up and slipped the little leather diary behind her back. "Your Grace," she said, her voice shaking. "I heard a noise. I thought a window had been left open. I came to close it."
The Duke looked at the window; the curtains were drawn tight. Then he looked at the desk with its sheet thrown off and all its drawers pulled open.
"I see," he said quietly.
He did not believe her; Clara could see that. She waited for him to call for Mrs. Dobbs, to ring for the footmen. Instead, he walked slowly into the room, set his candle down on the mantelpiece, and pulled the sheet off one of the armchairs. He sat down in it and looked up at his father's portrait.
"I come here at night sometimes," he said. "It's the only room in the house my mother refuses to enter. She says it holds too many memories." He paused. "I think that is exactly why I like it."
Clara did not know what to say, so she said nothing.
He looked at her then, his eyes going to the white lace cap on her head. Something passed across his face, gone before Clara could read it.
"That cap suits you," he said.
Clara's breath caught in her throat. Was he telling her something, or was it only an idle remark? She thought of the great hall, the scissors, the fire, his tall figure on the gallery turning away. And suddenly, she was angry: she was tired and frightened and angry, and she did not care anymore what happened to her.
"You were there," she said. "That night in the great hall, you saw what she did to me."
The Duke's face did not change. "Yes."
"You saw everything, and you walked away."
"Yes," he said again.
"Why?"
The question hung in the dusty air between them. For a long moment, the Duke said nothing at all. He looked down at his hands.
"Some things," he said at last, slowly, "are not what they seem. I ask you to remember that, Clara Bell, even if you can remember nothing else about me."
"That is not an answer, Your Grace."
"No," he agreed, "it is not." He almost smiled. "You are not afraid of me, are you?"
"I am afraid of a great many things," Clara said honestly. "But no, not of you."