Conley took the snifter Grantham held out for him and tossed half of its contents back. “I won’t spite my stomach. But make it quick. I’ve no wish to remain here longer than I must.”
“It won’t be long.” Grantham went to the door and gave orders to a footman standing just inside the hallway. Then he returned to Elinor’s side, though he didn’t sit. She appeared to be dozing and he preferred not to wake her. Instead he turned to Conley. “I surmise you came to learn of your sister’s accident by word of mouth. Would you care to return tomorrow and see the scene for yourself? We had the carriage dragged to the carriage house, and I fear there’s not much salvageable about it. But it was your equipage. You might want to have a look.”
Conley nodded. He was studying the color and clarity of the remaining brandy in his cup, or so it seemed. Perhaps he simply didn’t want to acknowledge Grantham. “Aye, I’ll come. And my coachman? What became of him?”
“He was welcomed into my servants’ quarters,” Mrs. Rebmann answered. “You may see him as soon as you like.”
“Good. I’ll want to talk to him, as well.”
Grantham was just congratulating himself on making an awkward situation pass in an orderly fashion when Elinor sat up suddenly. “There is something else you ought to know—” she announced in a breathless voice. Then her eyes rolled upward and, with a small gasp of protest, she collapsed against the couch in a dead swoon.
Grantham sprang into action. He had her prone on the seat before anyone else had so much as put down their brandy. Only, as he was pushing her hair away from her face and gripping her small hands in his, he realized that even now, Mr. Conley had yet to make a move. “Your sister fainted!” Grantham chastised him. Not that he knew what he expected the other man to do, but calmly sipping brandy while Grantham panicked wasn’t it.
“So she did,” Conley mused, rolling his empty glass between his palms. He continued to look unperturbed. “Now what I want to know is…why?”
Chapter Eleven
ELINOR WOKE with a start. She pushed onto her elbows and looked around her, having the sense she was not in her room at home. Nor was she. Faint light barely brightened the bedchamber, but it was enough to see that the imposing four-poster bed gleamed with fresh polish and the draperies were cut from heavy velvet, rather than cotton. Not her bedchamber at home, then, or the cozy yet unremarkable quarters she’d been afforded at her aunt’s cottage, either. “Where am I?” she mused aloud, while her belly fluttered with the hope that she’d been laid in Grantham’s bed.
Now there was a wicked thought.
“We thought it best to remain at Chelford for the night,” Aunt Millie said, causing Elinor to jump.
Then Elinor remembered. She groaned and hid her face in her hands. Memories of the prior evening came flooding back, each more horrible than the previous. Gavin’s arrival. His resolve to investigate the carriage accident. Grantham’s proposal, a mistake he would surely right once he knew of her scheming.
Her heart caught in her throat. No! She raised her head and turned to see her aunt seated at her bedside with a book in hand. Aunt Millie had stripped down to her chemise and unpinned her coiffure, then reworked her ginger hair into a serviceable bun. She no longer looked like Mrs. Rebmann, the shocking actress, but like Mama.
Elinor burst into tears.
“Come now, child, we’ve no time for that. Lord Chelford and your brother are beside themselves with worry. Lord Chelford more so than Mr. Conley, perhaps, but you must cease this caterwauling and make yourself presentable nonetheless.”
Elinor drew up her knees and folded her arms over them. Then she buried her face against her forearms and sucked in several shuddering breaths. “D-d-do they k-know?”
Aunt Millie patted her shoulder awkwardly yet soothingly. “Don’t tell me your brother guessed correctly. Are you keeping a secret, child? You should have confided in me. I might have been able to help.”
It wasn’t too late. Elinor lifted her head and dabbed at her eyes. She’d been stripped to her chemise, too, and though the light waned, she guessed it was morning. Still too early, however, for Grantham to have taken Gavin out to the carriage house. “I ought to have done. As soon as I tumbled from the coach on Christmas Eve, I should have confessed. The wheel broke because I broke it, Aunt Millie. This was entirely my doing, and now Grantham and my brother will know what a silly girl I was.”
Her aunt pressed a soft kerchief into her hand, then set her book aside on a nearby table. She folded her hands in her lap. “Am I to understand you caused a carriage accident? Why on earth would you have done such a foolhardy thing?”