by Linda Ford
His jaw hardened. “Miss Norton is as much a lady as you, Vera.”
“That may be, but her position in society is nothing to be compared to ours. Really, Reid, Miss Norton is a paid companion. Her folks are as poor as church mice from what I understand.”
“That’s enough. Her good name has already been libeled by our aunt. I won’t have her further ill-treated by our family.”
“I’ll do anything to protect you, Reid.”
He exhaled in frustration. “Can’t you see the poor woman was already willing to give up her job for my sake? What more do you want of her?”
“I want to be certain she didn’t do anything to upset Aunt Millicent to precipitate her collapse.”
“Listen, Vera. For your information, I proposed marriage to Miss Norton the day I heard Aunt Millicent’s cruel insinuations read to everyone under this roof.” At his sister’s shocked expression he continued, his tone deliberately quiet. “She turned me down.”
Vera’s mouth dropped open.
“Yes, you heard me. So much for your accusation of self-interest. So, I’ll say this only once, Vera. Desist with your ridiculous threat to call in a magistrate to investigate Miss Norton’s behavior toward our aunt, or I’ll do everything in my power to force my suit with Miss Norton.”
Vera’s mouth snapped shut and she turned away as if in a daze. “Oh, Reid, I had no idea you’d go so far. I’m sorry.” She turned stricken eyes back to him. “Did you...care very much for her?”
He looked away from her. “It doesn’t matter what my feelings were. I wasn’t going to stand back and see her treated so unjustly.”
“I see. I misjudged Miss Norton then. She is an honorable woman.”
Reid left her then. He hadn’t seen Miss Norton since the day before. All he knew now was he wanted to see Maddie, to offer her his help in any way she might need. He realized his anger at her refusal had been his own wounded pride, but he still worried about her situation. If she refused to marry him, there must still be some way to get her to accept his help, perhaps with finding a new position.
He stopped a young footman. “Could you please tell Miss Norton I’d like to see her?”
“I’m sorry, sir. She’s gone.” At the look in Reid’s eyes, he added, “Didn’t you know, sir?”
“No. Gone where?”
“Don’t rightly know, sir. She left with all her bags—or bag, I should say. Would you like me to find out?”
“Yes, please do.” He paced the entry hall as he awaited a reply. After a few minutes, Mrs. Reeves, the housekeeper appeared.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Gallagher.”
He nodded. “When did Miss Norton leave precisely?”
She pursed her lips, thinking. “Why just after the reading of the will.” She looked down as if embarrassed.
He hesitated, hating to have to ask, but needing to know. “How was she?”
“She didn’t let on much about her feelings, if that’s what you mean, sir, but I could see she felt she could no longer lodge here.” She cleared her throat softly behind her hand. “I must say I understood her position.”
“Yes, quite. Can you please tell me where she has moved to?”
She pursed her lips. “I couldn’t tell you, sir.”
He suppressed his impatience. “What do you mean?”
“I mean I don’t know, sir.” She hesitated. “I’m not sure if she herself knew precisely where she was going to and she left no forwarding address.”
If the floor had shifted beneath him a few minutes ago, now he felt a fear growing in him as great as when he’d seen his wife begin to bleed. He tried one more avenue, knowing instinctively the futility of the inquiry. “Perhaps someone else in the house would know? Or perhaps she has been in touch with another servant since she left?”
“I can look into it, sir.”
“Yes, please do. I’ll wait in the library.”
“Very well, sir. Would you like me to bring you some tea?”
“No, thank you. Just fetch me the moment you know something.”
It wasn’t long before his suspicions were confirmed. Maddie had told no one where she was going. He then proceeded to ask if anyone knew her family’s address. No one knew.
His panic mounted as the day waned. He racked his brain, trying to remember if she’d ever told him anything that would help him find her now.
He finally notified Vera of what had happened. All she could add was that she believed Maddie’s parents hailed from Wiltshire. He ransacked his aunt’s desk, searching for any correspondence from Maddie, but all he found were receipts of the salary payments his aunt had made to her, a paltry sum paid quarterly. That presented a new worry. Had Maddie been paid her last earnings? If so, had she already sent everything to her parents and missionaries as she was accustomed to? Where would she go? How was she going to live? Finding nothing else useful, Reid finally enlisted the housekeeper’s help, as well as that of Aunt Millicent’s personal maid, to search his aunt’s bedroom and sitting room.
At last he found a letter from an acquaintance of his aunt’s, recommending Maddie for the position of companion. Attached to it was a letter from Maddie herself. A pang stabbed him when he recognized her neat script. At the heading was a London street address. He clutched the letter, half crumpling it in his fist, the first tide of relief washing over him. Could Maddie have gone back to this location?
He left the house and hailed a cab, praying the whole way. The address turned out to be a modest boardinghouse in a respectable middle-class neighborhood near Paddington.
But once he rang the bell and spoke to the landlady, he obtained no new information. The lady vaguely remembered Maddie, a quiet woman who had only stayed a few days with her. No, she had left no forwarding address.
Reid’s shoulders slumped. He turned away, viewing the setting sun over the buildings, thinking only of what Maddie was doing, alone in London, with little money, no references. Where would she go? What would she do? He dearly hoped she would seek refuge with her parents. But would she? She must. It would be the logical thing while she was seeking new employment. But how successful would she be, without his aunt’s reference?
* * *
Maddie blotted the short note and reread it one last time.
Dearest Mother and Father,
This is to let you know I am safe and well. I have left the residence of Lady Haversham following her demise. The poor lady had a stroke, which left her immobile. I can only thank the Lord that He granted me His grace to minister to her in her last days. She died in peace, having found mercy in her Savior.
I am presently seeking new employment. I have enclosed no return address. Please don’t be concerned over this fact. I do not wish to be contacted by anyone from my last place of employment. It is possible you would be requested to provide some information on my whereabouts by someone from Mrs. Haversham’s family.
Maddie bit the edge of her pen, wondering if she was being presumptuous that Mr. Gallagher would try to find her. In any case, she couldn’t run the risk. She continued reading.
I don’t want you to be in a position where you would be forced to conceal something that it is not in your nature to conceal. Please be assured I have done nothing wrong or of which I am ashamed. Only know I endured a painful experience at the end of my term with Lady Haversham and would prefer to put it behind me.
As soon as I find new work and a more permanent living situation, I will send you my address as well as some money. I trust it will be soon. Please don’t worry. The Lord is watching out for me and I am not in want of anything.
Your loving daughter, Maddie
With a sigh and final glance over the letter, she folded it up and placed it in an envelope. She would post it tomorrow when she went out again in search of employment.
She slumped over the scarred, uneven table a
t which she sat. Her search had been unfruitful in the week since she’d left Lady Haversham’s residence. All the reputable employment agencies she’d contacted frowned upon the fact that she could provide no references from her last place of employment. Because her last two positions had been found through informal arrangements of someone recommending her for the position, Maddie had no record with any of these agencies. She’d also scanned the newspapers every day for positions, but nothing suitable had appeared. She had no experience as a nursemaid or nanny, and knew that those, too, required impeccable references. She had tried applying for seamstress positions at a few places, but unsuccessfully.
She didn’t know how much longer her scant savings would last. She bit her lip, knowing she mustn’t dwell on the issue, reminding herself of the words in James:
The trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.
She sighed again and rose to prepare for bed, not looking too closely at her surroundings. They were ruder than anything she’d ever faced, even as a child in their humble dwelling in Jerusalem. She’d found the least expensive room she could find, but it came at the cost of dirt and squalor. Street noises continued far into the night and began again early in the morning. Thankfully, her third floor room was high enough that she didn’t fear sleeping with her tiny window open. Otherwise she’d suffocate in the heat and stale odor of the narrow room, which barely had space enough for a bed, a chair and table. Only a few nails on the back of the door were available to hang clothes, but she’d left most of her belongings in her portmanteau, the only clean place in the room. She wished she’d brought her own sheets. The stained and musty-smelling ones on the lumpy mattress were distasteful.
When she’d finished her few preparations, she climbed into bed. These moments were the only ones in the day she permitted her mind to dwell on things that had no future.
She knew she’d done the right thing in leaving Lady Haversham’s household when she had. Mr. Gallagher’s gallant proposal proved he was much too honorable a gentleman not to leap to her defense against the awful accusations in Mrs. Haversham’s will and his sister’s threat to bring legal action against Maddie.
Maddie had never been so touched in her life as when Mr. Gallagher had told her they must marry. No matter that the request hadn’t been attended by all the romantic avowals of love a woman longs to hear. Maddie knew how much more special this man’s proposal was in light of his still-strong feelings for his wife, as well as Maddie’s own inferior social situation to his. She’d never thought about his financial position before. He certainly seemed to be respectably off in his own right, but now, with his aunt’s inheritance, he must indeed be a wealthy man. As well as a knight, she reminded herself. What need had he to look Maddie’s way, except out of pity? But Maddie valued the pity that had prompted his proposal. How different Mr. Gallagher’s conduct from that of her former beau. He’d been a handsome, charming young gentleman. At least she’d thought him a gentleman, but now with the experience of time, she realized what a shallow, self-centered young man he was to have led her on and dropped her the way he had.
Mr. Gallagher had proven a true gentleman from the moment he’d met her. Maddie turned on her side, resting on her arm. Knowing him now the way she did, she had the strong suspicion he’d continue wearing down her resistance, insisting she marry him in some noble effort to save her from the magistrates. She smiled in the growing gloom of her room, touched by his gallantry.
She’d left because deep down she didn’t know how long she’d be able to resist him if he kept on trying to offer her his protection. What a shallow woman she’d prove to be if she married a man only to provide herself with material security.
No, she would never do that to him. She loved him too much to ruin his life...the way she had ruined her parents’.
She turned onto her back and looked up at the cracked, stained ceiling. This was the moment she permitted herself to dream. As she lay in the sweltering heat, she could ignore the shouts from down below in the street, she could forget the dingy sheets she lay between and whatever critters inhabited the mattress under her and dream about what it would have been like to be married to Reid Gallagher and live in far-off Egypt.... Only in the darkness did she permit herself to weave a hundred dreams of that life, where she would be busy with the Lord’s commission and Reid would be uncovering the secrets of the past....
Chapter Seventeen
Reid couldn’t concentrate on anything. In the fortnight since Maddie had left, he’d hired a private detective and spent just about every waking hour scouring the streets of London himself. But Maddie was nowhere to be found. In the city of over three million, it was as if she was one particle of sand in the vast desert.
The only progress the detective had made was in locating Maddie’s parents. Reid took the train out to the village they lived in in the west of England. They were a very nice elderly couple and treated Reid with warmth. They had only heard once from their daughter, they told him, but they had no idea of her whereabouts. Her letter had been postmarked London, but she might have moved elsewhere if she’d found a situation as she intended.
Reid had found a lot of common ground with them. Maddie’s father was a scholar on Biblical archaeology, and the two spoke about Reid’s work, as well as Mr. Norton’s time in Jerusalem.
“Your daughter proved an able assistant to me in cataloging an extensive collection of my late uncle’s,” he said, in order to explain his association with Maddie.
Mr. Norton smiled. “She has always had an interest in the Middle East. It’s a pity she was never able to return.”
“She told me it was due to her frequent ill health as a young girl that you were forced to return.”
“It is true she was frequently ill,” Mrs. Norton said, “but it wasn’t the only reason we decided to return to England.”
“That’s right,” Mr. Norton added. “You see, it was about that same time that this curacy fell open and I was asked to take it. The church here had fallen upon hard times and was on the verge of closing its doors. It’s a poor community.” He turned to his wife and patted her hand. “We spent some time in prayer about it, but the Lord confirmed it to both of us—” he tapped his chest “—in here, where it counts, that it was His will that we return from the mission field and make this community our mission field. We haven’t ever regretted the decision. The church is thriving and, not too long ago, the Lord sent me a young assistant who is showing much promise to take over when I start slowing down.” He smiled a gentle smile, which reminded Reid of Maddie.
Reid spent as much time with them as he dared to spare, learning of Maddie’s young life. He thanked her parents for their time, and Mr. Norton accompanied him back to the small train station. The two men shook hands when Reid’s train pulled in.
Mr. Norton released Reid’s hand. “I hope you find her.”
Reid nodded, unsmiling. “I do, too.”
He returned that night to his room at the Travellers Club. A fitting place for him, a traveler, except the name no longer appealed to him. He no longer wanted to be a mere nomad, passing through a city with no roots anywhere. He longed for a home and wife and children.
When he entered his quiet room, the street sounds muffled by its thick walls and drapes, everything in order, it only augmented the hole he felt in his heart. He took off his jacket and loosened his tie before going to sit on his bed.
He took up his wife’s portrait and stared at it a long time. Octavia’s face smiled lifelessly back at him. How long he’d acted as if she were still alive. Of course, his love for her had never died, but she would always be what she was now, a lifeless image in a portrait...not a living, breathing, warm woman. As he’d done with everything in his life, he was living in the past.
He sighed heavily. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry, but I can’t live witho
ut her. I need to find her. Please forgive me.” He bowed his head. “I never meant to cause you harm, to betray your memory with another woman. I’m so sorry, but I need her. Please forgive me...”
After a moment, he continued, “please forgive me, Lord.” The portrait fell to his lap. “Let me find Maddie, please. Show me where she is. Oh, God, protect her, wherever she is. I’m so sorry I hurt her.” What a blunder he’d made of his proposal. No wonder she’d gone away. He’d be lucky if she ever wanted to see him again.
He’d already endured untold agonies imagining the worst possible scenarios of her alone in London. He realized he’d rather chance the risk of losing her at his side than never see her again.
He continued praying for Maddie, as if her unerring faith had infused his own heart in his hour of need. What a fool he’d been! Why hadn’t he ever told her he loved her?
* * *
Early the next morning, a footman handed Reid a note just as he was leaving his room. It was from the private detective.
Good news. Come to my office as soon as you receive this.
Sam Abbot.
His hopes soared. Had the detective found her?
Barely fifteen minutes later, Reid walked into the man’s office.
Abbot stood at once from his desk, his checked jacket and trousers calling attention in the somber office. “Mr. Gallagher, we’ve hit the jackpot.” He held out a crumpled piece of paper to Reid.
Reid’s hand shook as he read it. It listed a street.
“She has a room there.”
Reid eyed him. “You’re certain?” They’d followed false leads before.
The man gave him a satisfied look. “As certain as my granny’s name is Jane. It took me a while, but I scoured every neighborhood, every boardinghouse. I knew if she hadn’t left London, I’d find her. All it takes is persistence. One by one, I tracked them down.”
“Thank you, Mr. Abbot. I’ll go there at once. If she’s there, I’ll come by your office and settle with you this afternoon, including the bonus I promised you if you located her within a month.”