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Authors: Lauren Willig
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exit.
“How many staircases are there?” asked Gwen.
“There are three.” Mlle. de Fayette looked mildly surprised at the query. “The front stair and two back stairs.”
Gwen exchanged a look with Jane. “Where do the back stairs let out?”
Mlle. de Fayette was beginning to look distinctly nervous. “One by the garden and the other by the alley.”
In other words, two potential means of escape. Having seen the standards prevailing in the rest of the school, Gwen would be surprised if the doors were bolted. The main stair was in the middle and the back stairs at either end of the long hallway, presumably the stairs belonging to each of the original houses. It would be ridiculously easy for the girls to wait until the mistresses were distracted at one end to make their escape down the other.
Presuming, of course, they had left of their own volition.
“This is the room,” said Mlle. de Fayette, opening the door onto a square chamber the size of one of the small anterooms at the Hotel de Balcourt.
It wasn’t an unpleasant room. Two long windows looked out over the scraggle of the back garden, letting in the pale gray light of a rainy day. Water seeped mistily along the windowpanes. There was a narrow cot on each side of the room, neatly made with a plain blue blanket, standard issue from the look of it, although Agnes’s was embellished by two elaborately embroidered pillows. Fashion papers torn from magazines had been pinned to the whitewashed walls. Two desks gave testament to their owners’ personalities, the Reid girl’s cluttered with books and papers all jumbled together, Agnes’s neatly arranged.
Jane began unobtrusively sorting through the material on Agnes’s desk while Gwen, without waiting for leave, opened the wardrobe. Matching white muslin dresses hung from pegs, seemingly all the same. It made it very difficult to ascertain whether any were missing—although, presumably, if the girls had run away, they would have had the sense not to do so wearing the uniform of the school.
One thing, however, was missing. There was no sign of a portmanteau.
Her curiosity whetted, Gwen stood on tiptoe to inspect the top of the wardrobe. Nothing there either. She felt a burst of euphoria. If the girls had taken bags with them, it made it more likely that they had planned their own departure. Kidnappers seldom afforded one time to pack.
“What I don’t understand,” said Colonel Reid, looking to Mlle. de Fayette with an expression of appeal that Gwen was sure worked beautifully with most women, “is why my Lizzy would choose to run away. Was there any reason she might want to go?”
Mlle. de Fayette shook her head. “Miss Reid seemed of the most happy. She was to play a shepherdess in the spring theatricals. She took the interest most keen in her costume.”
“And the other girl?”
“Agnes,” Gwen snapped, although the pronouncement lost some force when delivered with her head stuck under the bed. She had found the missing portmanteaux.
Blast and botheration.
“Agnes,” repeated Colonel Reid, with an apologetic smile. “Was she happy?”
“Of all the students, Miss Wooliston was the most accomplished in her studies,” said Mlle. de Fayette. “The studies were a thing of great interest for her.”
Jane had drifted from Agnes’s desk to Lizzy’s, leafing with seeming nonchalance through the blizzard of debris that coated the surface, not just papers, but bits of ribbons, a broken bit of jewelry, the cheap sort of bracelet one purchased at country fairs, and even a half-eaten biscuit.
“Did the girls receive any letters?” she asked quietly. “Or packages?”
“Miss Wooliston had very little correspondence.” Mlle. de Fayette took a deep breath. “Miss Reid had many packages from her brother—in India, sometimes as many as two in a month. There was one just before she left.”
“That would be my Alex,” said the Colonel, and there was no mistaking the pride in his voice.
“How many staircases are there?” asked Gwen.
“There are three.” Mlle. de Fayette looked mildly surprised at the query. “The front stair and two back stairs.”
Gwen exchanged a look with Jane. “Where do the back stairs let out?”
Mlle. de Fayette was beginning to look distinctly nervous. “One by the garden and the other by the alley.”
In other words, two potential means of escape. Having seen the standards prevailing in the rest of the school, Gwen would be surprised if the doors were bolted. The main stair was in the middle and the back stairs at either end of the long hallway, presumably the stairs belonging to each of the original houses. It would be ridiculously easy for the girls to wait until the mistresses were distracted at one end to make their escape down the other.
Presuming, of course, they had left of their own volition.
“This is the room,” said Mlle. de Fayette, opening the door onto a square chamber the size of one of the small anterooms at the Hotel de Balcourt.
It wasn’t an unpleasant room. Two long windows looked out over the scraggle of the back garden, letting in the pale gray light of a rainy day. Water seeped mistily along the windowpanes. There was a narrow cot on each side of the room, neatly made with a plain blue blanket, standard issue from the look of it, although Agnes’s was embellished by two elaborately embroidered pillows. Fashion papers torn from magazines had been pinned to the whitewashed walls. Two desks gave testament to their owners’ personalities, the Reid girl’s cluttered with books and papers all jumbled together, Agnes’s neatly arranged.
Jane began unobtrusively sorting through the material on Agnes’s desk while Gwen, without waiting for leave, opened the wardrobe. Matching white muslin dresses hung from pegs, seemingly all the same. It made it very difficult to ascertain whether any were missing—although, presumably, if the girls had run away, they would have had the sense not to do so wearing the uniform of the school.
One thing, however, was missing. There was no sign of a portmanteau.
Her curiosity whetted, Gwen stood on tiptoe to inspect the top of the wardrobe. Nothing there either. She felt a burst of euphoria. If the girls had taken bags with them, it made it more likely that they had planned their own departure. Kidnappers seldom afforded one time to pack.
“What I don’t understand,” said Colonel Reid, looking to Mlle. de Fayette with an expression of appeal that Gwen was sure worked beautifully with most women, “is why my Lizzy would choose to run away. Was there any reason she might want to go?”
Mlle. de Fayette shook her head. “Miss Reid seemed of the most happy. She was to play a shepherdess in the spring theatricals. She took the interest most keen in her costume.”
“And the other girl?”
“Agnes,” Gwen snapped, although the pronouncement lost some force when delivered with her head stuck under the bed. She had found the missing portmanteaux.
Blast and botheration.
“Agnes,” repeated Colonel Reid, with an apologetic smile. “Was she happy?”
“Of all the students, Miss Wooliston was the most accomplished in her studies,” said Mlle. de Fayette. “The studies were a thing of great interest for her.”
Jane had drifted from Agnes’s desk to Lizzy’s, leafing with seeming nonchalance through the blizzard of debris that coated the surface, not just papers, but bits of ribbons, a broken bit of jewelry, the cheap sort of bracelet one purchased at country fairs, and even a half-eaten biscuit.
“Did the girls receive any letters?” she asked quietly. “Or packages?”
“Miss Wooliston had very little correspondence.” Mlle. de Fayette took a deep breath. “Miss Reid had many packages from her brother—in India, sometimes as many as two in a month. There was one just before she left.”
“That would be my Alex,” said the Colonel, and there was no mistaking the pride in his voice.
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