Murkmere by Patricia Elliott Page A

but I couldn’t understand anything, least of all
     how my noble Mr. Silas had turned into a monster.
    “You were lucky to escape,” Leah said grimly. “Last year Silas forced a kitchen maid. It was to save her soul, you understand.
     When she found she was with child and he wouldn’t acknowledge it — he was even going to cast her out from the estate in shame
     — she drowned herself in the mere.”
    I stared at her. Her words didn’t make sense; I couldn’t take them in. “Mr. Silas?”
    “Mister
Silas,” she mocked. “None other. The little maid, Scuff, saw him with her — what he did. No one but I believed her, poor
     child.”
    “He told me himself how the servant’s body was found,” I said in a low voice.
    “You would have been the next one, Aggie,” she said grimly. “Don’t you see that?”
    I sank down in the green-gold chair. I saw the pattern clearly now: the birds with bright wings that flew so joyously through
     the lush foliage.
Silas, my handsome, elegant gentleman, who’d said such beautiful things to me, called me his marigold
— I buried my face in my hands to shut out the light, and sat motionless.
    Leah left me to recover, and then it seemed even her hard, scornful heart was touched. She came over to me and said, gently
     for her, “Don’t take on so, Aggie. Maids have been taken in by his looks before. But he’s a dangerous man, and a clever one.”

    I was close to tears. “But his soul is pure, it must be! He takes Devotion, he wants to save our souls!”
    “Have you never heard of hypocrites, Aggie? He’s all high religious talk — it’s easy to be deceived — but if you were to uncover
     his soul, you’d be looking at a nasty little black thing, shriveled as a dead leaf. Stay away from him.”
    I raised my head and brushed a hand across my eyes. “I’m never going near him again, Miss Leah.”
    “What? Even on payday?”
    She smiled. To my astonishment I realized she was trying to cheer me, she who’d been so unkind. She curled her long limbs
     gracelessly into the chair opposite mine and regarded me with curiosity. “Did he ask you to meet him here?”
    I shook my head. “Dog must have told him I was here.” I glanced at her enquiring face and decided to tell the truth, or part
     of it. “I’d come to read the books.” I thought,
If she asks me about the inner room, I’ll confess. I don’t care what happens to me now
.
    But she didn’t; she looked astounded. “You risked coming here so you could read the books? Don’t you have books in the village?”
    “Not like these, Miss,” I said, surprised out of my misery. Did she know so little? “The books my aunt taught us from are
     dull things, the reading approved by the Council. No folk have books in our village. Most children leave school before they
     can read properly. People are too poor to lose their children to school, they need them to work.”
    I was reluctant to talk, but she kept asking questions, as ifall the curiosity she’d kept inside since my arrival were finally bursting free. My misery lifted a little. I couldn’t believe
     that this was my cold, disdainful mistress.
    “I wanted to find out what real books were like.” I hesitated. “Mr. Silas says they are blasphemous.”
    “Fiddlesticks!” said Leah. “We should be free to discuss all sorts of different ideas from our book reading, not have them
     approved first by a Council, let alone a steward!”
    “But the Master’s library can’t be kept secret from the Lord Protector,” I said. “What will happen when he finds out?”
    She raised her eyes heavenward. “Don’t you know anything, ninny? Years ago, when the Protector married the Master’s sister,
     certain books were banned. But that was only the beginning. The Protector wanted the Master’s books out of the Hall, but he
     gave him special permission to have his books up here, providing they were locked up.” She gave a wicked smile. “Of course,
     the Protector