Page 96 of The Maid's Secret

Cradling my stinging cheek, I ran to my room, and I hid in my bed, quaking.

Mama came in a few minutes later. She sat on the edge of my mattress, and I wished it was Mrs.Mead perched there, not her. “You had it coming,” Mama pronounced. “Let me see?”

She drew the covers away, examining my swollen cheek.

“I’ve seen worse,” she said.

So had I, on her face.

“You’re not the first girl to disgrace herself, Flora, and you won’t be the last. Once he calms down, I’ll talk to him. No one has to know. There are ways out of this, you know.”

What she then proposed was a nightmare vision, a visit to a secret kind of doctor I vaguely knew existed.

“I can’t do that,” I said. “I won’t.”

“Then we’ll send you to a birth house. This is what’s done, Flora. If you weren’t so naïve, you’d know that. You’ll have the baby, and no one will be the wiser. You’ll go for ‘a stint in the countryside, a finishing school for girls,’ then you’ll return in ten months or so as though nothing ever happened.”

“But what about my baby?” I asked.

“What does it matter so long as it disappears? After the birth, youand the bastard child will both get a fresh start. Your father will keep quiet if he thinks he can use you to leverage getting close to a family of stature. We need that now more than ever.”

So many thoughts swirled in my head. Two roads diverged. John and Uncle Willy were banned from the manor, and I was certain John would want me to leave with them, but where would we go? John was willing to give up everything, to surrender his only chance at education and bettering himself, all for me and his unborn child. I could go with him, or I could do what my mother had proposed—disappear into a birth house, where I would have the baby, then return to Mama and Papa, and to this life, as though none of it had ever happened.

I considered the two possibilities, my mind racing. I decided on the spot. I came up with the plan.

“Take me to a birth house,” I told Mama. “Make it all disappear.”

“I’ll make arrangements. You’ll leave in a few days. You’ll come back a new woman, Flora, refreshed and reborn. Your father and I won’t say a word. We’ll find the right family for you to marry into.”

She brought me ice for my face, and when she left to find my father, I tiptoed down the corridor to the servants’ staircase. I scurried out the conservatory door, making my way to the cottage. Uncle Willy was packing in the bedroom. John was emptying the kitchen cupboards.

“Oh, Flora,” John said the second he saw my face.

“It’s just a bruise,” I said. “It’s not so bad.”

“Did he…Please tell me he didn’t…”

I knew what he was asking. “He hit only my face,” I said.

“Thank heavens,” he said as he drew me close. “He fired my father,” John said. “We have to leave right away. You’re coming with us. He’s a maniac and a tyrant. You’ll be safe with us, Flora.”

“Where will you go?” I asked.

“In town for the night. After that, we don’t know.”

“You’re coming, Flora, right?” John begged.

“Have you deferred your university enrollment?” I asked.

“Not yet, but I will. That doesn’t matter right now.”

“There’s no rush deferring,” I said. “And, John, I don’t think I should go with you just yet, not in my condition. I’ll slow you and Uncle Willy down. I can hardly keep anything down these days. I can’t just sleep anywhere the way you and he can. In my state, I need to be careful.”

“But I can’t leave you behind,” he said. “Look what he did to you.”

“Papa’s had his rage. The worst is over. I’ll find you soon.”

“When?” he asked, confused.