Dad Hears My Thoughts novel · Chapter 19 of 32

Chapter 19: Mama Cici

I didn't scream.

I think I wanted to, and nothing came out.

Tristram was beside me before I'd turned. He looked at the cradle, and then at the window.

He went to the sill and leaned out into the snow.

A ladder stood against the wall below. The gardener's ladder, from the shed by the orchard.

Footprints went from the foot of it across the garden to the wall. One man. Big boots.

On the iron latch of the window, a thread of brown wool had caught and pulled.

"Brown coat," I said.

"What?"

"The footman. Ralph's footman wore a brown coat at the foundling gate."

Tristram wasn't listening to me.

He had his hand flat on the window frame and his eyes shut.

"Quiet," he said. "Please. Quiet."

I held my breath.

His face went tight when he strained to hear her through the shop wall.

"She's there," he said. "She's far. It's like someone talking under a blanket."

"What is she saying?"

"Papa. Cold. Bumpy." He swallowed. "She says the tray man has her. The tray man smells like the bitter."

The footman who had carried the Duke's tea.

"A cart," I said. "Bumpy is a cart. Which way?"

"I don't know. She doesn't know left and right. She's ten months old."

The Duke was in the doorway in his dressing gown.

He had heard every word. He looked at the empty cradle, and something in his old face fell in.

"Go," he said. "I'll follow with every man in this house."

We went down the back stair and out through the garden gate at a run.

The streets below the hill were black and empty, with snow coming down slant.

At the first crossing, Tristram stopped and shut his eyes.

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