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“Miss Bingley. I hope the roads are good.”
“Charles assures us that they are.”
“Then you have no need of another assurance from me.”
There was the faintest pause before Caroline inclined her head. They had neither reconciled nor pretended to. Elizabeth found that preferable to an embrace which would have embarrassed them both.
The carriage left with every bandbox accounted for. Charles stood upon the steps until it passed out of sight, then returned to Jane.
“She will write as soon as she discovers something we have forgotten,” he said.
“Then we shall hear very soon,” Jane replied.
That afternoon, the last fold opened without tearing. Mrs. Reynolds kept a supporting sheet beneath the old paper while Elizabeth eased it flat. A short length of linen cord lay within.
Neither touched it.
“Mara says she opened the turn,” Elizabeth said, reading the exposed lines. “She knew how to do it.”
The housekeeper bent closer. The November light fell upon writing which the folded paper had protected. They had followed references among the old sheets for three weeks, finding a name here, half a sentence there. Now, on the fourth of November, the account they had sought lay before them.
At the top stood the date: November 17, 1555. Beneath it Mara had written Alice Reed’s name and that of her husband, Matthew.
They knew both names. They knew how the lying-in ended. Elizabeth had hoped to discover an error in the work Mara described, something which might be corrected with enough practice. The first clear sentence deprived her of that comfort.
I opened the turn as my mistress taught me. It was not the turning
that failed.
Elizabeth read on, aloud, while Mrs. Reynolds followed the cramped writing beside her.
The cook sent for me to come to her daughter in the chamber
above the bakehouse. I had not entered the house since they took
my mistress away. I told the boy I could not come. Then he said
Alice had asked for me.
She had given me bread when I was hungry and never made me
beg for it. I went.
The midwife gave me a place at her shoulder. Alice took my hand
and said she had feared I would not come. I said I was there now.
Her mother brought out the thread. She thought I had learned
everything because I had stood beside my mistress. I told her I had
tried at home and could make nothing happen. She asked me to try
for Alice.
I made the turn. I said the words. The strand passed free, but cold
pressed into my fingers as though it were still drawn tight. The
