Yes, thought Clara bleakly, it is so bad. And yet, at some point, wasn’t it inevitable that the law would catch up with them? What would happen now? In the unlikely event that Ben found Sam alive and well, he would live with his brother, but if he didn’t? For the first time, Clara realized that in haring after the Sparrowhawk with no plan other than to keep Ben and Lotti safe, she had actually made things worse for them. Would anyone allow her to become Ben’s guardian, now that she had helped him run away? And would she herself be in trouble with the law? She wasn’t sure where it stood with respect to Ben, but she was fairly sure it would take a dim view of the fact that she hadn’t returned Lotti to her uncle.

She should have insisted on bringing Lotti home before the Netherburys returned from Scotland, taken her to St. Winifred’s, begged them to say nothing of the late arrival to her uncle … Hubert Netherbury would be furious. Clara had met him only once, when he interviewed her to tutor Lotti, but she had a fair idea of the sort of man he was. Suddenly, she felt very afraid for Lotti.

Oh, she should have done everything differently! And yet Clara also knew that nothing she said could have stopped Ben and Lotti, and that had she given them away, they would never have forgiven her.

Sister Monique was asking her a question.

“Do you trust this captain?”

Clara thought about the efficiency with which Henri had helped them at La Belle Ecluse, his bashfulness toward her at the end. Unconsciously, she stroked the telegram with her thumb. She knew that Henri would keep Albert Skinner away for as long as he could.

After that, who knew?

“I do trust him,” she said.

“Then save your worry for the children,” advised Sister Monique. “Or, better, pray for them.”

Her eyes fell on the puppies nestled with Elsie in their crate.

“The little toffee one is too thin,” she observed.

“I know,” said Clara. “I keep trying to help her feed, but Elsie is so unsettled since Ben went away, she doesn’t seem interested.”

“Bring her to the kitchen,” suggested Sister Monique. “I’ve some fresh goat’s milk, we’ll try her with that.”

As they walked up to the convent, a gardener came toward them pushing a wheelbarrow. He stopped and straightened to let them pass, and Clara felt a small shock. She had seen him several times from a distance and had assumed from the way he carried himself that he was an old man. Close up she saw that he was quite young, though his ragged clothes and thick beard and the livid scar that ran down his left cheek from his temple made it hard to guess his age.

“A poor lost soul,” sighed Sister Monique when they were out of earshot.