"As are you," Ellie replied, feeling tears welling in her eyes. "And you must call me Ellie. After all, we are family now."
"Tomorrow I shall show you 'round the house," the little girl stated. "I know all the secret passageways."
"That would be lovely. But you had better run along. We don't want Miss Dobbin to eat your pudding tonight."
"But you said—"
"I know, but the kitchens are in a sorry state this evening. It might prove difficult to find a replacement dessert."
"Oh, dear!" Judith exclaimed, paling at the thought. "Bye!"
Ellie watched her dash from the room, then turned to her tray of food and began to eat.
Despite her hunger, Ellie found that she only had the appetite to eat about a quarter of her food. Her empty stomach did little to calm her nerves, and she practically jumped clear to the ceiling when, later that night, she heard the outer door to Charles's bedroom open. She heard him rustling around, presumably getting ready to go to sleep, and cursed at herself for holding her breath every time his footsteps brought him near the connecting door.
This was madness. Utter madness. "You have one day," she muttered. "One day to feel sorry for yourself and then you must go out and make the best of it. So everyone thinks you set fire to the kitchen. That isn't the worst thing that could happen."
Ellie spent the next minute trying to think of something that was worse. It wasn't easy. Finally she waved her hand in the air and said, a touch louder than before, "You could have killed someone. That would have been very bad. Very very bad."
She nodded, trying to reassure herself that, in the grand scheme of life, the fire was actually a small incident. "Very bad," she said again. "Killing someone. Very bad."
A knock sounded at the connecting door. Ellie yanked her bedsheets up to her chin, even though she knew that the door was locked. "Yes?" she called out.
"Were you speaking to me?" Charles asked through the door.
"No."
"Then may I ask to whom you were speaking?"
Did he think she was carrying on with a footman? "I was talking to myself!" And then she muttered, "Save for Judith, I'm the best company I'm going to find in this mausoleum, anyway."
"What?"
"Nothing!"
"I couldn't hear you."
"You weren't meant to!" she fairly screamed.
Silence, and then she heard his footsteps carrying him away from the door. She relaxed slightly, snuggling more deeply into her bed. She had just about gotten comfortable when she heard an awful, terrible clicking sound, and she groaned, just knowing what she was going to see when she opened her eyes.
An open doorway. With Charles standing in it.
"Did I remember to mention," he drawled, leaning casually against the doorjamb, "how annoying I find connecting doors?"
"I can think of at least three replies," Ellie retorted, "but none of them are particularly ladylike."
He waved her barb away. "I assure you, I've long since stopped expecting you to behave in a ladylike manner."
Ellie's mouth fell open.
"You were talking." He shrugged. "I couldn't hear you."
It took a powerful force of will to unclench her teeth, but somehow she managed it. "I believe I said that you weren't meant to." Then she grinned in what she hoped was a sickly sort of manner. "I'm a bit batty that way."
"Funny you should say that, because I could swear you were carrying on in here about killing someone." Charles took a few steps toward her and crossed his arms. "The question is: just how batty are you?"
Ellie's eyes flew to his face in horror. He didn't really think she would kill someone, did he? If this wasn't proof that she hadn't known this man well enough to marry him, she didn't know what was. Then she saw telltale crinkles of humor form around his eyes, and she exhaled with relief. "If you must know," she finally said, "I was trying to console myself over the awful incident this morning—"
"The fiery incident, you mean?"
"Yes, that one," she said, not appreciating his facetious interruption. "As I was saying, I was trying to console myself by thinking of all the things that could have happened that would have been worse."
One corner of his mouth turned up in a wry smile. "And killing someone qualifies as worse?"
"Well, that depends on whom."
Charles let out a bark of laughter. "Ouch, my lady. You do know how to wound."
"Alas, but not lethally," Ellie replied, unable to suppress a grin. She was having far too much fun sparring with him.
There was a comfortable moment of silence, and then he said, "I do the same thing."
"I beg your pardon?"
"Try to make a bleak situation seem better by imagining all the scenarios that could be worse."
"Do you now?" Ellie felt absurdly pleased that they both dealt with adversity in the same fashion. It made her feel they were better suited, somehow.
"Mmm, yes. You should have heard what I thought up last month, when I was convinced that my entire fortune was going to go to my odious cousin Phillip."
"I thought your odious cousin was named Cecil."
"No, Cecil is the toad. Phillip is merely odious."
"Did you make a list?"
"I always make lists," he said flippantly.
"No," she said with a little laugh. "I meant did you make a list of what would be worse than losing your fortune?"
"As a matter of fact, I did," he said with a slow smile. "And, as a matter of fact, I have it in the next room. Would you like to hear it?"