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“Don’t cry, Rose,” George said, and walked over to put his arms around her shoulders. “I’ll figure things out. You know I always do.”
“But what if James makes us go with him today? We don’t even have any biscuits to take with us.”
A knock sounded at her door. Oh no, it was time to stuff them in a coach already. And she hadn’t even had a chance to say goodbye to General Jenny, who really was a very nice pony, and she would miss her terribly.
“Rose?”
It was Mrs. P’s voice. Rose gasped. “I’m not ready to leave yet, Georgie,” she whispered.
“Rose?” The door opened. “Oh, there you… What in the world is the matter, my dear?” Her fake mama glided into George’s room, then hurried forward and sank to her knees in front of Rose. “Please, tell me. Has someone frightened you? Been mean to you?”
So many things were wrong, and James had been very mean. “I—”
“She bit her tongue,” Georgie said, before she could ask if she could keep her dresses. He hugged Rose very hard, then let her go. “She doesn’t like it when she cries.”
Well, that wasn’t really true, because she was very good at crying when they were pretending things so people would give them money. But George knew that, which meant he was up to something. Which meant… what? She looked up at him, and he frowned at her from behind Mrs. P’s back, angling his chin toward their fake mama.
“Yeth, I bit my tongue,” she said. “It hurths.”
“Well. Let’s get you out of your riding habit and we’ll go downstairs for some lemonade. That’ll help, I imagine.” Standing, she offered her hand.
Rose took it. “Yeth, I think tho. Thank you, Mama.”
Something had happened. Mrs. P wasn’t mad at them. She didn’t seem any different at all, really. So, if the Pershings didn’t know about the findings she and Georgie had taken, who had snabbled them?
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Mrs. P hadn’t acted like she knew they’d been stealing things.
That meant two things, as far as George was concerned: first, they might not be sent away on the first coach headed to London after all; and second, that someone else had gotten into his and Rose’s chests after the Pershings had given their word that that wouldn’t happen.
For a second he wondered if it might have been James, impatient for his next haul of baubles. But he’d been correct when he’d said their chests were a better hiding place than any James had in the house. Plus, James knew their things were in there, and if he’d wanted something to sell he would have just come in and taken it. He wouldn’t have taken everything.
Who, then? Donald and Edward both talked to him and especially Rosie like they were babies, but they seemed to like working at Winnover Hall. Breaking promises didn’t seem like a good idea for a fart-catcher who liked catching farts.
If someone from outside had broken in, then he and Rosie wouldn’t be the only ones to be snabbled. He’d listen for that, to see if anything else was missing, even if he didn’t think a real housebreaker would have left behind near five quid in coins. That made him frown as they went downstairs for lemonade.
But if whoever had taken their things didn’t say anything to the Pershings, it also meant that Rosie and he had a chance to gather more supplies before the time did come for them to make a run for it. They just had to be smarter and more careful about protecting their finds. And explain to James why nothing would be going in his pockets today.
As he sat down, he caught sight of the black wood bird on a table in the corner. He knew Rose had nabbed it, because he’d seen it in her trunk the day before. And yet there it was. George turned his head. The fancy book with the colored drawings inside was back on its shelf, too, and just a few hours ago it had been wrapped in cloth inside his trunk waiting to go to James. What the devil?
Powell knocked at the door and walked in, Donald behind him carrying a tray with glasses and a pitcher of lemonade. While the footman poured and handed out the drinks, the butler looked at George. George looked back at him.
“Is there anything else I can get you?” Powell asked, turning from George to look at the table in the corner, the mantel, and then the bookcase with the painted book before he looked back at George again. Then he lifted one tufty eyebrow and turned away.
The butler had done it. Powell, the stuffy, patchy-pated, stiff-spined pantler, had snuck into his and Rosie’s bedchambers, opened their trunks when the Pershings had told everyone not to do that, and snabbled all of the goods they hadn’t already given to James. And he hadn’t even kept them or sold them. He’d just put them all back.
Even with James’s share handed over, he and his sister had managed to sneak a lot of things into their trunks. Because whether they were family or not, he recalled quite clearly when James had vanished without a thought for them the second the Bow Street Runner had appeared that day. He’d never trusted his brother’s word, even before the rats.
George took a slow breath, letting the realization that they weren’t about to be booted out of Winnover Hall fill him up. It felt like a warm breeze. They didn’t have to leave. Not yet, and not until they had time to finish their lessons and meet the duke. Unless James got mad and dragged them off, that was.
Powell had put them back to five quid, plus the things Rose had hidden in that hatbox. Their trunks weren’t safe any longer. He wouldn’t put it past Powell to search their entire bedchambers—the entire house, even—if something went missing again. And he and Rose needed to snabble more things. Or the same things again.
Therefore, they needed a better place to hide them, and James should probably find another one himself. Luckily, George had been figuring out his way around adults for his entire life. He glanced over at Mrs. P and Rose, currently chatting about lemonade and why sour things made their mouths pucker up. He was glad Rose had some time to be a little girl and not worry about anything but how fast she could spin without falling over.
Maybe it was good James had come. It reminded him that this place, being able to sleep soundly and eat as much as he wanted, was only temporary. At the end, either he and Rose would leave on their own, or James would make them go with him. The worst choice would be to go to some family who didn’t want them anyway. There was no fourth choice, and whatever he might think about on occasion, there would never be a fourth choice.
“Ah, James. There you are.”