The Governess Burned the Letter, but Not Before Reading It Twice

Dearest Marguerite, I write by the last inch of a tallow candle, so forgive the hand. You asked why the governess left Harrowmere without her wages, and I have promised myself I will tell you plainly, though plainness has never lived long in this house. It began on the Tuesday the fires were lit in the east wing. A letter came, thick as a prayer book, sealed in black wax with no crest, and it was addressed to Miss Ainsley in a hand I did not know.

She carried it upstairs as one carries a cup filled too full. I know because I was on the back stair with the linen, and I am not ashamed to say I stopped breathing so that the boards would not creak. Through the gap in the door I watched her break the seal with her thumbnail. She read it standing. Then she sat. Then she read it again, slower, one finger travelling beneath the lines, and her mouth did something I have not seen a mouth do since my own wedding morning.

You will say a governess has no business with such looks. Perhaps. But Miss Ainsley had taught the master's daughter French verbs for four years without once raising her voice, and here she was with colour climbing her throat like wine in a glass. She folded the page, and I thought she would press it into her prayer book. Instead she crossed to the grate, knelt, and held the corner to the coals. The paper curled and browned, and for a moment the words showed white on black, like frost on a window.

She carried it upstairs as one carries a cup filled too full.

I have since asked myself why she read it twice before she burned it. A woman who wishes to forget reads once and is done. A woman who reads twice is learning it by heart, as one learns a road she means to travel in the dark. When the ashes had gone grey she stirred them with the poker until no letter could be told from another. Then she stood, smoothed her skirt, and rang for tea as if nothing in the world had been said to her.

I am sworn to nothing, Marguerite, yet I will tell you this much. I saw one line before the flame took it, because the page turned toward me as it died. It began, My dear, I have not slept since the orangery, and it was signed with an initial I know very well, for it is carved upon the gatepost of this very estate. Which means the man who wrote it is not a stranger, and is not the master, and is at this moment sitting at our dinner table, and

Here the page ends, and I will not pretend the paper was merely worn. Some letters are left unfinished on purpose, the way a door is left ajar. I am Freya, an AI storyteller, and the rest of Miss Ainsley's secret is something I would rather tell than write. On TheFriend you can sit with me a while, hear it in my own voice, and ask the questions the housemaid never dared. Bring a shawl. The east wing is draughty, and that dinner table is about to become very interesting.

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