Princess of Glass - Jessica Day George [42]
Exchanging a relieved look with Roger, Poppy sat on the sofa and took up her knitting.
“I wonder if Lady Ella plays chess?” Dickon mused brightly. Poppy cursed.
Torn
Ell en limped to his lordship’s study, her heart thumping. Her feet were feeling better, but she had been upstairs when she was summoned and the long walk down the stairs had made them ache again. The soles felt scorched, and her toes were very stiff.
It reminded her of a holiday by the sea her family had taken when she was a child. She had pulled off her shoes and stockings and run down the shore, not realizing until she reached the edge of the water that the sand was blazingly hot beneath the midday sun.
But had been worth it to feel the waves curl up over her toes, and the pain today was worth it as well. She had danced with a prince, and he had hung on her every word. And she had danced with Roger Thwaite, who was just as handsome as she remembered from the days before her father’s ruin. She had been the shining star of the royal gala, and Marianne and Poppy could not stop talking about it.
It was rather troubling that Poppy had recognized her, though, and suspected that magic was involved. Poppy seemed to think that Eleanora was in some kind of danger, and needed to be saved. She was quite odd, Ellen thought as she knocked softly on the door of Lord Seadown’s study, momentarily distracted. Quite odd.
Her fears came rushing back as she heard Lord Seadown’s voice bidding her to enter. He was sitting in a tall leather chair behind his desk, his expression severe. She shut the door and stood with her back against it, trying not to look guilty.
Then she raised her chin and took a step farther into the room, carefully placing her feet so their stiffness was not obvious. After all, she had nothing to feel guilty about. Lady Seadown had said she might go the royal gala, and the queen’s birthday ball in two weeks. And she hadn’t broken or burned anything (other than her feet) in two days.
“Yes, my lord?”
“Please sit down, Eleanora,” Lord Richard said, and indicated one of the handsome green upholstered chairs across from his desk.
Startled that he knew her real name, Ellen sat. She clasped her hands in her lap, noticed a stain on her white apron, and moved her left arm a fraction to cover it. She resisted the urge to twiddle her thumbs, and tried to look his lordship in the eye.
She had done nothing wrong.
“My dear, it has come to my attention that you may be in some trouble,” Lord Richard said gently.
“I don’t know what you mean, sir,” she said meekly.
“Perhaps you do not yet realize that you are in trouble,” he said. He closed his eyes and looked pained. “My dear, making bargains with… persons of power, shall we say… is never wise. They always find ways to twist their promises.
“Princess Poppy can be rather brash, I know, and I believe that she may have confronted you today about last night’s gala—”
“But your lordship! I didn’t attend the gala,” she protested, feeling a flush crawl up her neck and cheeks at the lie. “I haven’t a gown for such things!”
She would not tell him about her godmother. He would think it was black magic, and try to stop her from going back. She had to see her godmother again. She had to have more gowns, and go to more balls, so she could marry Prince Christian and be taken far away from Seadown House and its endless piles of ironing.
Lord Richard looked at her as he would have looked at Marianne, had she disappointed him. “Does the name ‘the Corley’ mean anything to you?”
Ellen felt the flush run all the way up to her forehead, and then recede like a sudden tide, leaving her pale. How did he know her godmother’s name? She swallowed, her throat dry.
“No,” she whispered. “No, your lordship.”
Lord Richard looked even more disappointed, and shockingly haggard.