Secrets of Sloane House(56)
“Yes, ma’am. I can see that. But I did not touch them!” She stood up. “I promise, when I last delivered her tray, she was awake. I poured her not one but two cups of coffee.”
“You will sit back down,” Mrs. Abrams barked.
Rosalind did as she was told, but she felt as if every muscle in her body had turned to stone. After a moment, the housekeeper turned to Rosalind and asked, “Are you certain about this?”
“I am more than certain. I am positive. I would never steal from Miss Veronica or from anyone in the house. I need this job too much to do anything like that. Plus, that is not who I am. I am not a thief.” Turning desperately to the housekeeper, Rosalind said plaintively, “Ma’am, you know how much I dislike delivering trays. I’m always afraid I’m going to drop one. Or not be able to open a door with my hands full. I wouldn’t have even delivered the tray except that Cook said that Miss Veronica had specifically asked for me to take it up.”
Mrs. Sloane looked taken aback. “I must admit that your story does sound very convincing.”
“It is the truth. I’m afraid Miss Sloane is mistaken.”
“Rosalind!” Mrs. Abrams hissed under her breath. “Remember your place.”
Mrs. Sloane looked from one of them to the other, then seemed to make a decision. “Please wait here. I am going to get Veronica and see if we can make some sense of this story.”
After she left, Rosalind pressed her hands to her eyes and tried to will them not to tear up. No good would come from crying. But she truly was scared. Beside her, the housekeeper seemed terribly agitated.
“I promise I didn’t take anything,” Rosalind pleaded. “I swear to you, if something is missing, it’s not my doing.”
“Why would Miss Veronica make up such a tale?”
Rosalind ached to tell everything she knew about Reid and Douglass and even Nanci. But that felt wrong. She didn’t want to betray anyone else’s confidences, especially since most of what she knew was based on rumor.
“I don’t know,” she said at last.
Mrs. Abrams pursed her lips, looked at Rosalind worriedly, but said nothing more.
A scant ten minutes later, Mrs. Sloane returned, followed by Veronica and Nanci. After a deep breath, she stood in front of Rosalind and folded her hands behind her back. “It seems there has been a slight misunderstanding.”
Unable to stay seated, Rosalind slowly stood up once again. To her dismay, her legs were shaking. Though she had feared she would be dismissed, she was discovering that the idea of being fired and the actuality of losing her job and place to live were two different things. She was beyond frightened.
Unable to meet Mrs. Sloane’s gaze, she held on to the armrest of the chair in hopes of steadying herself and stared at the floor. “Ma’am?”
“When I entered my daughter’s room just now, Nanci was there, arranging her hair. And it seems the other comb was in a dresser drawer.”
“In a drawer?” Rosalind cast an incredulous gaze on Veronica. Veronica was staring straight ahead. Mrs. Sloane now looked contrite.
“Well, um, it seems that Nanci recalled seeing it when she put away some of Veronica’s stockings. The comb was not lost at all. It must have fallen in the drawer accidentally. I fear this has all been a silly misunderstanding.”
A silly misunderstanding? Veronica had not only lied about her taking the comb, but she’d lied about what had happened in her room when Rosalind had given her the tray. Her mother had been ready to dismiss her without a recommendation. Mrs. Abrams had been content to accept the story and hadn’t been going to do anything at all.
However, it seemed that she was expected to deal with the consequences without a word or an apology and go on her way.
“Thank you, ma’am,” she said softly, feeling the irony in every pore.
Rosalind didn’t dare look Veronica’s way. She did glance at Nanci, though. But to her surprise, Nanci looked just as distant as the other women in the room did.
Mrs. Abrams stood as well and brushed her hands against each other as if the last half hour had sullied them. “I am glad this little confusion had a happy ending. Will that be all, ma’am?”
“It is. I am sorry for taking you two away from your duties.”
Feeling as if she was in the midst of a storm, Rosalind meekly followed Mrs. Abrams out of the room and down the hall. Only when they were on the servants’ stairwell did she say anything. “Mrs. Abrams, did you believe Veronica when she told her mother I’d taken that comb?”
“It didn’t matter what I believed.”
“But I hadn’t done anything wrong. Veronica was lying. And Mrs. Sloane didn’t even apologize.”