Freedom by Jenn LeBlanc Read Free Book Online Page A

you do not tell me what you were doing at that window, I will have to inform His Grace about exactly what I saw. I cannot take a chance on this. Go back to your silence afterward if you must, but trust me now or there’ll be hell to pay when he returns.”
     
    Francine looked into the woman’s eyes, noting the well-masked concern. She certainly didn’t want a bad word to get to him . She glanced toward the window. She was keenly aware that her existence here at the manor was conditional and if she disrupted him she might be sent away. It was that unknown that she couldn’t bear, even though she had become accustomed to it. She’d faced that before, when the police came to take her away after her parents died, and now as a grown woman she dreaded it even more.
     
    “I…” She cleared her throat gingerly. She could handle no more than a whisper, and even that strained and tightened the muscles of her throat to a thick, scraping ache.
     
    “Go on now, out with it,” Mrs. Weston prodded. Francine clutched her hands together.
     
    “I don’t want to be sent away,” she cried, and with that she wept. Mrs. Weston put one of her soft arms around Francine’s shoulders, pulling her down to the settee and cradling her against her ample chest.
     
    “There, there, miss, don’t fret. I will see that you stay. Why, only now I was looking to tell you that His Grace gave me leave to have some gowns made for you. Is that not a wonderful thing? If he was intending to send you away, would he be seeing to your comfort?” Mrs. Weston asked.
     
    Francine shook her head. “No, I don’t suppose so,” she said.
     
    “All right then, tell me, what has got to you? Why were you going out the window like that?” Mrs. Weston asked.
     
    Francine stared at her. Out the window? She wasn’t out the window; she was at the window. Wasn’t she? She never went out the window. Realization dawned and she sat up straight, looking at Mrs. Weston in horror. “Oh, no. No! I wasn’t going anywhere!”
     
    She groaned and clasped her throat. She struggled to speak, both of her hands massaging, trying to coax the words out as she sought to explain. “I was only feeling the breeze, I—I just, felt the breeze, I felt—” She shook her head. “I saw him on the horse and—” She clenched her eyes against the pain and tried to continue. “They were running toward the forest and it looked so—” Her breath caught in her throat; her voice was done.
     

     
    “All right, miss, calm yourself. There, there, calm yourself.” Mrs. Weston moved Francine to a chair by the fireplace and rang for a maid.
     
    “Meggie, put the kettle on and have tea sent up,” she said when the girl entered.
     
    When Meggie returned, Mrs. Weston poured some hot water into the teapot and the rest into a dish on the tray, soaking a soft cloth. She wrung it out and brought it over to Francine, wrapping it around her throat.
     
    “There’ll be no more words from you for a time, I’d say.” Mrs. Weston considered Francine with a stern face as she stood directly in front of her. “I just have one question. I expect the truth from you, and if I don’t get it, I will know it. Do you understand me, miss?” Francine nodded. “Did you intend to fall from the window, miss? Did you intend to die today?” she whispered.
     
    Francine shook her head until her hair tangled around her fingers as they held the cloth at her neck. Mrs. Weston shook her head, too. “Oh, there now, miss, you’re making yourself a fright. I believe you, just— I had to know. You see? I’m in charge of you, and I need to know if something is not as it should be. Do you understand?”
     
    Francine nodded. “Please,” she croaked, barely audible, her eyes stinging with tears.
     
    Mrs. Weston pushed her long unruly hair out of her face. She loosed the knot, since it was halfway to being undone anyway, and smoothed the mane down her back.
     
    “Settle there, miss. We’ll talk